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these four walls but her persona outside the tavern could be as plain as a little sparrow.
No one would connect Nightingale with whatever she called herself in here.
And if she did that well, she might not find herself in the "half-royal" category, but
she was fairly certain that the five coins she would earn each shift would be silver, not
copper.
"I believe I can live with these terms," she said, without bothering to try and strike a
better bargain. Not that there would be much point to trying the price a Deliambren set
was not subject to bargaining. One accepted, or one did without.
"Excellent!" The man positively beamed. "I saw that you had harps; we don't have
any harp players right now. I can put you up in the Oak Grove, that's on the third floor,
far enough away from the dancing that you shouldn't have any trouble with noise. What
shift?"
"Supper to midnight," she replied immediately, and he beamed again.
"Perfect! Let's go check the front desk and find out what room you've got ah " He
looked a little embarrassed. "I didn't catch your name "
"That's because I didn't give it to you," she replied, softening the words with a faint
smile, as she ran a list of possible alternative names in her mind. She would save
"Nightingale" for now just in case this Deliambren was already part of her friend's little
plot. "My name is Lyrebird."
He nodded with approval. "The lyre's a harp right? Got a nice sound to it I'm Kyran,
by the way, Kyran Horat."
She held out her hand, and he shook it, in the way of Gypsies sealing a bargain.
"Welcome to Freehold, Lyrebird," he said heartily. "I think you'll be happy here. You can
lighten up now; the bargaining is over."
She chuckled, then looked away from him and out over the expanse of the building
and all it contained. There would be enough people here every night that she or rather,
Lyrebird as flamboyant as that persona would be, would simply be one more
flamboyant entertainer among many. She would earn enough to not only get her covert
quest done, but quite possibly turn a profit. This place was built by a Deliambren, so she
could probably expect some luxuries in her quarters that Kyran hadn't even seen fit to
mention which was a far sight better than anything she'd find in an ordinary inn. All
things considered, this had turned out to be luck of the sort that had eased her journey all
the way here.
"I think you're right, Kyran," she replied as she suppressed the shiver that thought
brought her. "Shall we find out about that room?"
Luck this good has to break sometime, she thought as she followed him. I only pray
that when it does, it does not turn as bad as it has been good!
And if this was the result of that fate, geas, or whatever else had brought her
here well, that turn of good luck to bad, very bad, was all too likely.
CHAPTER THREE
Nightingale found nothing to complain about in the room that Kyran assigned to her,
except the lack of windows and on the whole, although it did make her feel a bit closed
in, that might have been as much of a benefit as a lack. Certainly there was not going to be
much of a view around here, and if the wind happened to come from the wrong
direction well, what traveled on the wind from the direction of the slaughterhouses was
nothing she wanted to have to endure.
She surveyed what was likely to be her refuge for the next several weeks, if not
months, and on the whole was pleased. There was one light overhead in the main room, a
second in the bathroom, both controlled by plates on the wall that one touched her
escort had shown her how to use them, and she had not revealed that she already knew
what they were. This was Deliambren light, of course, not an oil lamp or candle; it
replicated natural sunlight at about an hour after sunrise; warm, clear, but not too bright.
The overall effect with the four walls bare of decoration was of a white box, but that was
not altogether bad Deliambren taste in artwork was not always something she admired,
and only the Lady knew who or what had this room before she got it. The one thing this
room did boast that was quite out of the ordinary was its own tiny bathroom.
It's out of the ordinary, unless you happen to be acquainted with Deliambrens, that
is. By their standards, this is all patched together, old and rather tired, the bare
minimum for civilization. She considered the closer examination she'd been able to make
as she walked up the open staircases and along the balcony to her room. All visible
equipment was very shopworn by Deliambren standards their equivalent of secondhand
goods. It was all too heavy and too bulky to steal, which made it safe to use here,
surrounded by humans who just might try to carry it off otherwise. And those dangling
wires and furlongs of conduit those weren't just afterthoughts, things they hadn't quite
tucked out of sight. This equipment was probably reliable, but, to Nightingale's eyes at
least, was very clearly cobbled together from several other mismatched pieces of heavy
equipment, and likely there was no place else for those wires to go.
The bathroom, stuck off one corner of the main room, was in keeping with the general
feeling of "making do." A tiny box, tiled on all surfaces with some shiny white substance
that might be ceramic, it had a small sink, one of the Deliambren-designed privies, and an
oblong object in one corner that she was certain must puzzle the life out of ordinary folk.
She had been inside the Fortress-City any number of times; the Deliambrens used these
things in places of bathtubs. At a touch, water cascaded from the nozzle in the wall, and
although one could not soak in this contrivance, it was the best thing in all the world for [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]