The Jaldean’s comfortable tone, the throaty murmurs of the crowd, died away as Parno led them slowly out of the square.

“Sometimes,” Mar murmured to Dhulyn, “they seem to make sense.”

“Yes,” Dhulyn’s tone was carefully neutral. “Yes, they do.” In public they were all tolerance and forgiveness, Alkoryn Pantherclaw had said, and Dhulyn saw what he meant. That’s what makes them so dangerous, she thought. Much of what was said seemed so logical, people tended not to question the rest. Dorian had always said to be careful of logic. While one was using logic on you, another was stealing your purse. Or slitting your throat. She met the eye of a man behind her, also trying to leave the square, who murmured something under his breath and shook his head, holding Dhulyn’s eye. She kept her face impassive, but did not turn away.

The streets became wider still, and better paved, with fewer people on them and no one, now, in the dark green of the Marked. Walls of undressed stone lined with the doorways of shops and workplaces gradually turned into unbroken whitewashed stucco. At one point bells started ringing the midmorning watch.

“Do you recognize that tune, my heart?” Dhulyn called out.

“I’ve heard it, certainly,” Parno said. “But I don’t place it.

Dhulyn began to sing.

“Weeping lass, weeping lass,

Where have you been?

Weeping lass, weeping lass,

Walk right in.”

Mar joined in, her rounded notes a counterpoint to Dhulyn’s throaty purr,

“Step to corner, step to fire…”

Dhulyn laughed. “You haven’t sung that one before, Dove. I’d forgotten that. We used to sing a verse like that when I was a very young child, though not those words. At least, I don’t think so. Try that again, Mar, and perhaps my childhood words will come back to me.”

Halfway through a second verse, their voices faltered as a burly man running to fat went past on a roan horse being led by a servant. He turned his head to watch them as he passed. The servant and the horse didn’t look. Dhulyn laughed and began to whistle the tune.

When they were still a street away from Tenebro House, Dhulyn called to Parno and drew her companions to one side.

“Well, little Dove,” Dhulyn said, the corner of her mouth lifting. “This is your last chance. Do we go on?”

The girl looked from one to the other. Parno raised his eyebrows but said nothing. Dhulyn hadn’t consulted him, knowing he would be with her on this. Better the girl should freely choose.

Mar nodded absently, her eyes focused somewhere between the two Mercenaries. She parted her lips, thought better of what she was about to say, and shut her mouth again. “What about your pay?” she asked finally.

“We’d want to be paid, rightly enough,” Dhulyn told her. “But in this case we’re not particular by whom. Plenty of work to be found in this city now that we’re here. For you and us.” Dhulyn smiled, no need for the Dove to know what Alkoryn had told them. “We could wait to be paid if you decide so. Or simply,” she said, her voice more gentle, “we can wait if you need time to be certain.”

Mar nodded again. She looked up, meeting Dhulyn’s eyes directly. “Suppose I go to my House, I might still change my mind,” Mar said.

“And you would have been paid, but not by me.” She grinned in response to Dhulyn’s wolf’s smile. “In the meantime, they sent for me, and I have come. There is no way for me to be more certain.”

Mar turned her head away. If it were possible, Dhulyn would have said that the girl’s pallor had increased. She looked almost green in the morning light. Dhulyn caught Parno’s eye, but he only shrugged, and set off toward Mar’s House.

Tenebro House was a walled enclave, high up in the streets near the Carnelian Dome, almost but not quite a part of the Tarkin’s grounds. The huge doors of the gateway, large enough to admit carriages, were heavy wood reinforced with iron bars. But there was a pass door in the right-hand leaf, with a pull chain beside it. Mar took a deep breath and pulled the chain, jumping back at the sudden loud rattle. The two Mercenaries stood, hands resting on hilts, looking over Mar’s shoulders as she waited. After a long interval, the pass door opened, revealing an unarmed man with another stone wall perhaps a half span behind him.

Not any movement of face or body revealed Dhulyn’s alert interest. She had read that many of the older Noble Houses were doubled-gated, and the plans had shown her that Tenebro House was one, but she had never seen such a thing with her own eyes. There would be two walls, she knew, with a gate in each, offset so that forcing one gate could not force the other. Rather, attackers could be trapped between the inner and the outer wall, easy prey for anyone standing on the inner battlements.

Dhulyn looked with even more interest at the man who stood so calmly within the pass door. This would be the Steward of Walls, a House’s equivalent of the Captain of the Guard, a responsibility so weighty that once it had been accepted, he could never leave the House’s walls again. It was part of his undertaking to inspect any who entered the House for the first time. It was he who decided whether to open the pass door or gate. And at times he staked his life on his judgment, since the inner gate was opened only when he allowed it. Intruders might kill him, but killing him would not open the inner gate.

This Steward was a tall, lean man all arms and legs, dressed like a minor nobleman in soft woolen leggings tucked into short boots, linen shirt with wide sleeves and a blue silk tunic. A teal-and-black crest was sewn into the left shoulder of his tunic, the colors of House Tenebro. His dark hair showed some gray, and the skin had begun to turn to paper around his eyes. But those eyes were still a sharp crystal blue. He stood calm, his wide mouth faintly smiling, a man still hard. Had he been a Brother, he would have many years of good service still to give. The man took time to appraise Parno and Dhulyn, their Mercenary badges, their swords ready to draw, their proximity to their plainly dressed charge. His gaze lingered on Dhulyn. She could feel herself starting to smile. He did not seem surprised by what he saw, but then, he did not seem like a man who could be easily surprised.

“In what way can I assist you?” he said, inclining his head to Mar.

“I am Mar-eMar, a daughter of this House.”

Nothing changed on the man’s face. He would have seen that her clothes, while well made, were nothing more than serviceable by the standards of a Noble House, that those clothes had seen plenty of recent service, and that she and her guards had collected a portion of dust walking in the streets. His face showed nothing of this. “You’ll forgive me, Lady,” was all he said. “I do not know you.”

Mar drew up her shoulders. “I am the daughter of the Lady TamuTam, who was the daughter of the Lady Wat-aWat, who was the daughter of the Lord Dow-oDow. I am summoned by the Tenebroso Lady Kor-iRok, who is my House.” Mar reached into the front of her tunic and pulled out the letter that Dhulyn had seen and read in Navra. Mar held out the parchment so that the seal could be seen.

The man had started to nod long before Mar had finished her account. “You are expected and welcome, Mar-eMar Tenebro. I am Karlyn-Tan, your Steward of Walls. Pray, enter.” He bowed his head more deeply and stepped aside to let them into the space between the doors. The pass door closed behind them, and bars were thrown before the inner gates-a good five paces to the left-opened to reveal the interior courtyard.

As soon as the inner gates had closed behind them, what little street noise existed here so close to the Carnelian Dome faded completely. The courtyard was much larger than had seemed possible from the street, holding a fountain-dry at this time of year-as well as several small trees. To the left and right, doors and windows indicated quarters built into the walls for the guards and outer servants who did not live in the House. Across the yard and up three broad flagstone steps were the double doors of the House itself, elaborate carvings and metal inlays presenting the emblems of the Tenebro. No hinges were showing. That confirmed the detail shown on Alkoryn’s plans. A banner hung from a standard, indicating that the Tenebroso, the head of the House, was in residence.