All three of them looked at Marra, who looked away, at the narrow street, the buildings close overhead. They had made it through the gate unnoticed. No one cared. No one had pointed at her and shouted, “Princess!” or “Runaway!” And now they were inside, standing in a small alley off the main street, and there was the next thing to do.
Bonedog came and sat on her foot. She closed her fingers around his collar and thought, My dog trusts me, and then, My dog is witless and also dead, but things loosened a little in her chest nevertheless.
“We’ll have to find somewhere to stay,” she said. “I don’t have much money left. But I can’t … I don’t think I should just…” She waved her hand vaguely toward the top of the hill and the shining white palace. Yes, that would go well. I just waltz in unannounced and then the prince turns up dead. I don’t see any way that would end with the Northern Kingdom declaring war on my homeland and grinding us all into dust.
“I suppose we’ll have to figure out how to get up to the palace without being noticed,” she said, looking down at Bonedog, whose illusionary tongue was lolling out. “And then … er … well. I don’t think we’re going to do this tonight, are we?”
She looked back at her trio of—followers? Weapons? Friends? She had been so narrowly focused for so long that she had not thought very much about what to do once she arrived at the city, except that she should stay out of Prince Vorling’s sight.
“Definitely not,” said the dust-wife.
“Where should we stay?” asked Fenris.
“Um…” Marra shook her head. “I’ve never been here. Down here, I mean. I was always up there.”
Fortunately he took this in stride. “Then we will have to learn if there is a curfew and what parts of the city to avoid. I do know that any inn near the front gate is likely going to prey terribly on travelers, so we would be wise to seek accommodations elsewhere.”
“Er…” Agnes cleared her throat. It was a very small noise, nearly lost in the sound of movement past the mouth of the alley, but everyone turned to look at her nonetheless. It had been a hopeful sound.
“Oh dear,” she said, twining her fingers together. “I had a thought. It’s not much, but you know how you talked about the moth? The moth that found what you need? I was thinking … Well, it seems unlikely. But I might be able to do something like that.”
The dust-wife leaned forward, eyes intent. “What do you need?”
“A baby,” said Agnes.
“I’m not kidnapping children,” said Fenris. “I realize we’re working for a higher cause here, but I have to draw the line.”
“Oh, goodness no!” Agnes waved her hands, agitated, like a bird trapped against a wall. “No, no! Not a human child! No, of course not! Just a baby something. Anything. And we can bring it back to its mother afterward.”
The dust-wife rubbed her forehead. On her staff, the hen cackled.
“What about a chick?” asked Marra, gazing up at the hen. “Would that work?”
“Oh yes,” said Agnes. “That would be perfect!”
Buying a live chick in a strange city was surprisingly easy, although Marra imagined it would have been very difficult indeed if it were just her. I’d have to get my nerve up to talk to a stranger and ask them if anyone sold chickens and where, and if they didn’t know, I’d have to ask the next person …
Fenris, apparently untroubled by such complicated matters, simply walked out of the alley and addressed the first local he saw, a man selling pickles out of a large barrel on a cart. “You, sir! Do you know where I might find a place selling live fowls?”
“You sure you don’t want a pickle instead? Much less trouble than fowl.”
“Sadly, I do not. Not even such fine pickles.” Fenris put a hand over his heart, somehow managing to indicate a profound sense of loss at his inability to eat the pickle in question. “But I’ve need of live fowl at once.”
Marra didn’t know how he did it, but two minutes later, Fenris was in possession of directions to the market and the location of the least crooked poultry seller in the place. Five minutes after that, they were standing in front of a stall full of assorted chickens. Full-grown hens sat in cages, clucking to each other, and there was an entire box filled with small, fluffy chicks.
The dust-wife’s hen drew herself up very tall and glared down at her imprisoned sisters with something very like scorn.
“We need to buy a chick,” said the dust-wife.
The chicken seller was a large man with even larger eyebrows. He gazed up at the hen on her perch and raised one eyebrow very slowly. “The crate,” he said.
Agnes leaned over the edge of the crate and cooed at the chicks. “Oh, they’re always so adorable at this age…”
“Focus,” said the dust-wife.
“Oh yes, of course. I suppose we’ll have to keep it, won’t we? He won’t just let us borrow a chicken…”
The chicken seller did not look like a man who routinely let customers borrow chickens.
Marra shoved her hands in her pockets and tried to look like someone who was possibly a nun and definitely not the queen’s runaway sister. After a minute or two, though, it became obvious that she didn’t need to bother. The chicken seller gazed at Agnes, who was picking up each chick and whispering to it, then slowly turned to Fenris. He didn’t say anything, but his eyebrows were eloquent.
“She’s very particular about her chickens,” said Fenris. “Very particular.”
“It’s not taking,” Agnes whispered to the dust-wife, just loud enough for Marra to make out the words. “It won’t take. Oh, it was a silly idea. I don’t know why I thought it would ever work…”
“Keep trying,” ordered the dust-wife.
The chicken seller looked back at Agnes, then to Fenris again. His eyebrows inched higher up his skull.
Fenris remained absolutely deadpan, as if it were perfectly normal for women to whisper to chicks before buying them. Marra didn’t dare look at Agnes, because if she did, she was going to burst into hysterical laughter.
“Fine,” said Agnes in the tone of someone reaching her limits. Marra’s ears popped. “There!”
“That took,” observed the dust-wife dispassionately.
“Not well at all and I have to keep … I’m pushing it … It doesn’t want to stick; it’s like jelly sliding down a bowl!”
“Keep pushing,” said the dust-wife. “Keep blessing it over and over if you have to.”
“Oh dear…”
Marra darted a glance at the chick in question. It was a dark, fuzzy little lump with a bright yellow bill and, for a chicken, a remarkably phlegmatic expression.
The chicken seller’s eyebrows did a complex dance across his forehead. He named a price that was frankly ridiculous for a day-old chick.
“Don’t be absurd,” said Marra, stung out of her silence. “It’s a chicken, not a phoenix.”
The chicken seller’s eyes drifted back over to Agnes, followed by his eyebrows.
“The sooner we pay,” rumbled Fenris, “the sooner we will go away.”
The price mysteriously plummeted.
Agnes fumbled with her belt pouch and handed over a coin, cupping the chick against her bosom with one hand. “Who’s a good chicken?” she said, looking down.
They left the chicken seller and his dancing eyebrows behind and made it into a nearby courtyard without Marra losing her composure completely.
“What did you do?” asked the dust-wife. “There’s magic on it, but I can’t read it.”
“I told it that it would find us somewhere safe,” said Agnes. “Like the moth that found what you need. I don’t know if it’ll work. Maybe it could only take us someplace that it would feel safe or that was safe for chickens. But it’s there—I just have to keep pushing…”
“That’s a curse,” said the dust-wife. “That’s why it finally took.”
“No!” Agnes looked upset, cradling the chicken. “It’s not! It’s … Okay, it’s not exactly a blessing, but it’s not really a curse. Nothing bad will happen.”
“Well, let’s see if it works,” said the dust-wife. “Go on.”
“Okay,” said Agnes. “Go on, little chick! Find us a safe place!” She set the chick down on the ground and made flapping motions.
The chick looked around, then cheeped and began to run down the alley with Agnes and the dust-wife in hot pursuit.
“See, this would take much longer with a baby,” said Fenris.