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and applauded our host, and then I took my
seat with the other guests. At my table were other minor merchants,
those who had licenses for booths in the Cyrican Bazaar or shops in
the surrounding streets. I knew all of them and was on good terms
with most of them – merchants enjoyed coffee, after all. The sounds
of drums and flutes rang out as musicians played in the corners of
the courtyard. A double line of women came from the mansion doors,
clad in scanty costumes that revealed rather more than they
concealed. They began to dance, moving their limbs in time to the
music, spinning and gyrating. I thought that in poor taste, but
most of the guests were men.
    And then I spotted Caina among the dancers.
    She wore a skirt of red silk knotted over her left
thigh, leaving her left leg bare. An intricate net of red silken
strips encircled her neck and chest and did a marginal job of
concealing her breasts, leaving her back and shoulders and stomach
bare. She wore ornate jewelry upon her wrists and ears and ankles,
and a black wig over her close-cropped hair. Her face had been
painted with elaborate makeup, her eyes lined, her lips reddened,
her eyelids painted a shade of blue that matched her eyes. She
moved in an intricate dance in time to the drum, the skirt flaring
around her as she spun to expose her legs. I saw the definition of
the muscles in her arms and legs, the strength in her
movements.
    I had expected her to disguise herself as a merchant
or a guard, not a dancing girl. I could not imagine how she could
wear such a revealing costume in front of so many staring eyes. And
the eyes did stare. Most of the men near her watched with open
admiration. I had worn a costume like that when I helped her regain
my sons, and the embarrassment had almost been crippling.
    Yet it was an admirable disguise, was it not? Who
among the emirs and the Alchemists and the merchants would expect a
dancing girl to be a spy? Or the most wanted master thief in the
city, for that matter?
    I laughed a little at that.
    “Mistress Damla?” said one of the other merchants, an
old man who sold brassware in the Bazaar.
    “Nothing,” I said. I started to reach for a cup of
wine and realized that I needed to keep my wits sharp. “I am
contemplating the peculiar nature of life, that is all.”
    The merchant grunted, gave me an odd look, and
started conversing with someone else.
    Dozens of slaves issued from the kitchen doors,
carrying trays of food. They laid platters upon the tables, and the
guests began to eat with vigor as the music played and the dancers
whirled, the bonfires throwing their long, flickering shadows
across the courtyard. I ate only a little, just enough to avoid the
appearance of rudeness, and drank nothing at all. From time to time
I exchanged polite remarks with the guests near me, but my whole
attention was upon Korim, Dinaka, and Kamal. Korim tore into his
food with an appalling lack of manners. Had Bahad or Bayram eaten
like that in public, I would have slapped them. Dinaka’s disdain
for her husband was plain. Perhaps she had simply tired of his
table manners, though that was a poor reason to kill a man.
    Korim finished the first course, the second, and then
the third, downing five goblets of wine in the process. Dinaka
remained seated the entire time, ignoring her husband as he stuffed
himself. Kamal hovered in the shadows behind them. The dancers
whirled and spun before the bonfires, forming elaborate patterns of
flickering shadows across the banquet. I met Caina’s eyes for a
moment, and there was a flash of acknowledgment there, and she gave
me a faint nod.
    I had to keep watching. Kamal and Dinaka would make
their attempt tonight. But when? Maybe Korim took a cup of wine
before bed, and Dinaka would slip the poison into it then. Or…
    Suddenly Kamal moved. He detached himself from the
shadows of the door behind Korim and Dinaka and made his way across
the courtyard. Another troop of slaves emerged from the