Marcus had to admit the change of costume had been effective. It wasn’t a disguise, exactly, but she’d drawn up her hair and tucked it under a stiff-brimmed red cap, which gave her face a slimmer, boyish cast. Her jacket was bright red, too, with a high collar and polished bronze buttons in a double row down the front, and her trousers were dark gray with a red stripe on the outside seam. Black leather shoes with brass buckles completed the ensemble.

She looked, Marcus thought, like the better class of circus performer, or possibly the impresario of a brass band. He stared at her dubiously. “Do the Exchange Central couriers really dress like that?”

“It’s traditional,” Raesinia said. “This is one of their official uniforms.”

“Do I want to know how you came across it?”

“We . . . acquired them, for a job back before the revolution. They’re useful. The couriers can go everywhere without being noticed. Cora’s been storing them down at the church.”

“All right.” Marcus frowned. “I still don’t like this. You ought to stay here, where it’s safe.”

“Except I’m the one who knows where we’re going.”

“You could draw me a map . . .” It sounded weak, even to Marcus. “What if we get caught?”

“We won’t get caught.”

“And if we do?”

Raesinia shrugged. “You’re a colonel in the army, for God’s sake. What are they going to do? Just tell them you got lost.”

Marcus glanced down at the papers on his desk. “Being a colonel may not be all the protection it used to be.”

“Have you got a better idea? Every day we wait is another day Maurisk has to muddy the waters. If this doesn’t pan out, we don’t have many options.”

The truth was, of course, that Marcus didn’t have a better idea. But that doesn’t mean I have to like it.

*   *   *

RAESINIA

The realization that she was having fun hit Raesinia about the time they crossed over the Saint Uriah Street Bridge to Exchange Island, and it was nearly enough to stop her in her tracks.

It had been a long time since she genuinely enjoyed herself. Not since before the fall of the Vendre, for certain; before Ben and Faro had died, and Maurisk had turned against her. The nights of drinking and plotting in the back room of the Blue Mask felt like stories from another, rosier age, before the dark curtain of reality and responsibility had descended.

In some ways, this made sense. Since the revolution, the country had lurched from one crisis to another, each contributing its own unique flavor to the never-ending whirl of politics in the Deputies-General. Raesinia had watched with a feeling of helpless despair, simultaneously responsible for whatever happened and powerless to affect it. It would have led to many sleepless nights, if sleeping was something she’d still needed to do.