Fie scowled, already sweltering under the heat of her black over-robe. But since he’d kept his topknot, Jasimir had to stay covered, so Tavin had to stay covered, and so she had to stay covered lest she draw notice. Still, she envied the airy wraps and shaved heads of the Cheparok women around them. They were dressed for the muggy heat.

“I don’t know what the sign says, cousin,” she said. “And I don’t care. That mark there? That means Crows aren’t allowed. We need to take the stairs. And the stairs are this way.”

Tavin blinked at her. “You can’t read?”

Something in her shrank at his surprise. “I … I know Crow signs,” she mumbled. “Swain does the reading for us.”

“And the Crow signs say we won’t be allowed on the water-lifts,” Hangdog chipped in. Perhaps two and a half days of Fie’s silence had taught him to keep a cooler head, for no resentment smoldered in his voice, only stiff resignation.

“Well, those signs look old. Let’s make sure.” The prince set off down the muddy road.

Fie gritted her teeth and followed. She couldn’t blame him, not truly. The idea of slogging up stair after limestone stair, all the way up to Second Market, made her want to vomit. The water-lifts used the force of the reservoir’s water channels to move cargo and citizens between Cheparok’s tiers with considerable less effort.

The lift attendant looked up from a cotton-heaped cart only long enough to snap, “No.”

For a moment Fie wanted to stand there anyway and relish the faint relief of mist and water splashing down from Fourth Market. Then she remembered that same water had traveled from the Fan, into the city reservoir, and down four tiers of canals and bathing steps, carrying whatever those tiers’ citizens felt like throwing in it. Likely it was as clean as the grime on her arms.

“Come on,” she said, wincing, and headed back toward the stairs. This time Jasimir kept his mouth shut.

Hangdog split off once they’d climbed the three-score steps to Fourth Market. “Luck, cousin,” he muttered to Fie, and gave her a half grin. She briefly debated pushing him back down those three-score steps, but it seemed like an awful lot of work in this dreadful sun.

Instead she looked for a Crow mark for the stairs. One was carved into a signpost nearby, pointing to the opposite end of Fourth Market.

“Do they even know how hot it is?” gasped Tavin, staring at the crowds packing the market. Fie could scarce hear him over the lowing of disgruntled cattle, shouts of vendors, wailing children, and high-pitched warbling from some unholy horn busker.

Holy texts said the Covenant disposed of irredeemable souls in one of twelve hells. Fie wasn’t sure what she’d done to deserve this one.