“They want me to become their full-time clerk, accountant, and treasurer,” she continued, oblivious to whatever expressions had flitted across his face in that brief moment. If any had. He’d probably looked like an idiot with his mouth hanging open.

Then what she’d said penetrated, and he realized that the situation was quite serious indeed. “Oh, hellfires,” he said. They want her to work for them and only them, and how is she supposed to do that and continue being Herald-Chronicler? Scratch that; spending that much time with them, how is she going to manage without getting caught?

“Norris has found a backer, and he’s getting a theater for the company. The gods of actors and idiots only know where he’s getting the money from, but it’s quite certain. And the fellow that handles all the business matters—you met him, remember?—wants me to do all of the money things for them. It’s a full-time job, I can pledge you that, between managing the take at the door, getting everyone and everything paid for, taxes, hiring things like cleaning women and laundresses.” She shook her head frantically. “Thank the gods I got wind of this before they actually asked me. I think they’re waiting—wisely, may I add—to be sure that the money for the theater is in hand before they say anything to an outsider.” Now her voice took on the tones of a wail of fear. “But what am I going to do?”

She wasn’t panicking, but she looked as if she was in knots. “Sit down, for one thing. You look as pale as a shirt.” She did as he ordered, while he sucked on his lower lip and thought, hard. “All right, you can’t take that job; I couldn’t take it and stay undiscovered with a trained actor like Norris watching me. Which means we have to come up with some reason why you can’t take it.”

The moment he said, “You can’t take the job,” he saw relief suffuse her features. And he was very glad that it was Myste in front of him now, and not Keren, who would have been offended at the very thought that she couldn’t keep up the deception. “I think we have these options to get Myste the Clerk out of range before the offer can actually be made. You can ‘take another position’—tell them tonight, even, that you’ve been offered a job, say, on some Great Lord’s staff but on his estate, so you have to leave. You can send them a letter saying that some wealthy elderly relative you didn’t even know of before today is sick, and wants you to move in and take care of her, and if you do, you’ll inherit everything. Or Myste can have a terrible accident and die.”