“We have to disguise ourselves,” she said. “I can keep my hood up. Smoothie … if you get some kind of clothes on, no one will look twice unless they’re up close. Is there anything in the boat?”
“An old sail under here,” said Ardent after a quick nose around. He pulled it out and dragged it back to Anya. It was just a rough piece of faded and patched canvas, but it served as a makeshift cloak for Smoothie. When it was drawn over her head, she looked like some poor beggar.
“What about me?” asked Shrub.
“You’ll just have to stay low in the boat,” said Anya. She couldn’t think of any way to disguise a huge, bright orange newt. “Ardent, you should lie low too. And if you do have to move, act as if you’re nervous and scared of being kicked. Not like a royal dog.”
Anya had been right to be careful. As they drew closer to the city, they encountered other boats, mostly crossing the river rather than going up or down. The farmland on either side began to be replaced by ramshackle warehouses, small businesses, and dwellings of all sizes, from tiny huts made of reeds to once-grand four-story houses. Nearly all the buildings had their own jetties or wharves, the shoreline bristling with them at all angles.
The other boats nearly all carried red, blue, or green lanterns at stern or prow, and the buildings without exception had long strings of differently colored lanterns stretched under their eaves and across to nearby trees or poles obviously erected to hold them up.
“Is this normal?” Anya asked Shrub. “All the lanterns?”
“More than usual,” said Shrub after a quick glance over the side. “Probably a festival. They have a lot of festivals in the city.”
“Have we got a lantern anywhere?” asked Anya. “We don’t want to look different from the other boats.”
Shrub and Ardent fossicked around the bottom of the boat. Eventually, Ardent dragged a tin box over to Anya. She opened it and found several collapsed paper lanterns, a number of candle stubs, and three friction lights, or matches, as some people called them.
Anya stretched out a blue lantern, fixed the candle in place, and lit it with the second friction light. The first one had only fizzed when she dragged it along the gunwale, and smelled of sulfur. The third match she put behind her ear, in case it came in handy later on.
The blue lantern wasn’t very bright, which suited their requirements. There was a little platform for it on the bow, shielded on three sides, with a peg to keep it in place. Anya fixed it there, and went back to her oars, though she didn’t need to use them while the current sped the boat along.
Soon enough Anya had to start rowing to steer the boat, Smoothie softly calling out course corrections as she watched the two otters guiding them in. It was hard work to pull out of the current, but got a bit easier as they approached the shore.
Anya kept glancing over her shoulder; though she was confident in Smoothie’s directions, she wanted to see for herself as well. The line of buildings was now continual—there were no gaps at all that she could see—and there were more and more buildings behind the ones on the riverfront, outlined against the sky, or in evidence from the lanterns in their windows or roofs. Far more buildings than Anya had ever seen.
She also smelled the city now. It was like nothing she had smelled before, a mixture of smoke and odors that not only hung in the air but actively crawled up her nose and coated her tongue, occasionally intensifying to a point where the smell actually hurt before a slight brush of air dissipated the worst of the stench.
“You get used to the smell,” remarked Shrub from his spot near Anya’s feet. He’d seen her wrinkling her nose and making faces. “It’s a lot worse once you get in a bit.”
“Is it?” asked Ardent happily. He was crouched down as well, but his nose was up and sniffing wildly. “Fascinating! So many different combinations!”
“We’re approaching the entrance to the canal,” said Smoothie. “Diver is coming back for some reason … Slow down.”
Anya eased her oars out of the water and rested her forearms on her legs, while Smoothie bent over the side and whispered in otter to her cousin.
“There’s a guard on the lock gate where the river joins the canal,” reported Smoothie. “The lock is open. Apparently it’s always open, but there’s not normally a guard.”
“Bribe ’em,” said Shrub from the bottom of the boat. “Hold a coin up, and as you get close, throw it to the guard.”
“Oh,” said Smoothie. “We didn’t think of that. Swiftie’s already gone to—”
Up ahead they heard a faint cry and then a loud splash.
Anya twisted around to look. It took her a few seconds to make sense of what she was looking at. A shape moving in the water resolved itself as the two otters towing an unconscious guard to the muddy shore near the canal entrance. They dragged him or her up above the tidemark of flotsam and then returned to the water, yipping victoriously.
“We can go on now,” said Smoothie. Her teeth shone, moonlight reflecting from a happy smile.
Anya bent to her oars and the boat moved forward, into the canal.
It was darker almost immediately, the canal shadowed by the buildings on both sides. The lanterns, though plentiful, did not compare with the light of the silver moon. Every now and then, though, there was a line of lanterns stretched high across the canal, rather than just strung over doorways or windows. Anya hunched down as they passed under these, and tugged at her hood to keep it well forward.
There were also people. Every building had a landing with a door behind it, and some of these doors were open, as were the windows above. Though it had to be close to midnight now, there were still city dwellers looking out, or drinking on their landings, or fishing (usually while also drinking).