After a moment, she asked, ‘What do you want?’
Erik shook his head. ‘I don’t know either, but I . . . I didn’t like the way things felt when you . . .’
‘Said “Oh”?’ she finished for him.
Said that way, it sounded so silly Erik had to laugh. ‘Yes, I guess that’s what I mean.’
‘Come with me,’ she said. She gestured to one of the other girls that she was leaving, and led Erik through the kitchen, past the cook and his helpers, through a rear door into the courtyard behind the inn.
For a moment Erik experienced an odd sensation of familiarity; he had grown up in such a yard, with the stable and forge, well and hayloft, behind an inn. There was a wooden bench around the well, used by those too short to pull up the bucket easily, and Kitty went and sat on it, motioning for Erik to sit next to her.
Erik said, ‘It’s quiet back here.’
Kitty shrugged. ‘I never noticed. I’m usually too busy.’
Erik sat and Kitty leaned over and kissed him. He held still an instant, then he returned her kiss. After a long moment, she sat back, looking at him. Finally she said, ‘I’ve never done that before.’
‘Kissed a man?’ Erik said, his voice showing his surprise.
‘I’m a thief, not a whore,’ she said. ‘I’ve been raped and had men stick their tongues in my mouth, but I’ve never kissed anyone before.’
Erik’s mouth hung open, and then he shut it. ‘What about Bobby?’ he asked finally.
She shrugged. ‘What about him?’
‘Well, I thought . . .’ He hesitated. ‘Well, we just assumed you and he . . .’
She looked down. ‘I would have, if he’d asked. He was good to me. Better than I deserved, I think. I mean, he treated me roughly that night you caught me, and he threatened to hang me and the like, but mostly he made me laugh. And he kept others from hurting me.’ She pointed to the back of the inn. ‘I’ve got to watch for Mockers, or anyone else nosing around, but what I am now is just a barmaid. That’s not bad, ‘cause I won’t whore.’
She looked down. ‘I would have lain down for Bobby, ‘cause he was good to me, but he didn’t love me and I didn’t love him. Not that way.’ She looked at Erik. ‘I don’t think there was anyone he loved, maybe ‘cept for Captain Calis.’
‘Bobby was devoted to him.’
‘I thought for a while he might be one of those men who love other men.’ She made a motion with her hand, as if flipping something over. ‘Not that I care - I’m no follower of Sung the Pure, but you do wonder. Then I heard he was a regular down at the White Wing, so I figure he’s just got it in his head to get his itch scratched by someone who’s . . .’ She searched for a concept.
‘Not special to him?’ Erik supplied.
‘Ya,’ she agreed. ‘That’s it. Like if he did it with me or someone else who wasn’t a whore, it might make things . . . you know, different.’
Erik nodded that he understood.
She sighed. ‘Bobby joked and made me laugh. At first I was scared of him, because he said he would kill me if I betrayed the Prince or the Duke, and I saw in his eyes he meant it. But after a while, when folks here treated me right, well, I stopped being afraid.
‘I’ve got no place to go, so like it or not, this is my home.’ She was silent awhile, looking at the inn. ‘It’s not a bad life. I know something big’s coming. You can’t work here and not figure out a few things. Soldiers who aren’t bragging on what they’re doing, they’re keeping secrets. So something big’s coming. I don’t know what, and I think I don’t want to know.’ She paused, and stared up at the pale moon.
Suddenly, she turned her head to face Erik. ‘But with Bobby gone, you’re the man who’s been nicest to me. The men sometimes say things to the other girls, about me, but I don’t mind. It’s just, well, you’ve never been anything but nice to me.’
Erik shrugged and said, ‘I know what it’s like to have some tough luck, I guess.’
‘You can’t know what life is like on the street.’
He said nothing, just watching her in the flickering torchlight. She went on, ‘Girl Children aren’t thought much of, except for whores. There’s good money for little girls in some places.’ She hugged herself. ‘My mum was a whore, that’s the truth. No one knows who my father was. My mum threw me out when I was six. I think maybe she was keeping me from the crib. Her whoremaster kept looking at me funny.
‘I got found by this man, named Daniels, and he took me to this place in the sewers. They gave me food and told me they’d take care of me, but I had to do what they said. There were other children there, too. They didn’t seem too bad off. They were dirty, mostly, but they were fed.
‘I begged, and I learned the best dodges. I could cry like I was lost and if some mark stopped to see what the problem was, someone else cut his purse. I started being the holder after a while.’