Mirror Sight

“Amberhill,” she murmured.

She could not see its face for it looked out across the ocean, but she assumed it was Amberhill, carved of stone and seated in a throne chair. It reminded her that in this time, there was only one history, and it belonged to the empire.

Something else in the harbor caught her eye, as well: a small island, really too small to be an island. It was more of a rocky ledge with dead trees on it. She could not remember it being there. She’d grown up in Corsa, so she should have known all the islands and ledges in the harbor. Then she recalled how the land around Sacor City had changed, with a river created and redirected to flow past what was now Mill City. Then she pictured the ruins of Sacor City itself. Amberhill’s great weapon had unleashed unimaginable forces that had not only brought an entire city down, but had also caused changes in the landscape. Why not in the seascape?

She could no longer look at her home harbor so changed, so she looked ahead into the city. Rising above even the tall buildings of Gossham were the sky-touching spires that could only belong to the emperor’s palace. Before she could see more than the spires, however, Luke turned down a narrow side lane.

The lodging he found for them that evening was not the typical traveler’s inn to which she’d become accustomed. It was a rambling old house that looked like it might have survived from her own time or earlier, with newer wings added on. It was nice to know that not everything in Corsa had been demolished. It was fronted on one side by a canal, with a smaller entrance from the lane. The sign on the place named it Laughing Gull House.

The horses and wagon were led off to the attached carriage house and stable. When Luke finished conferring with the innkeeper, he led Karigan and Cade to an entrance on one of the wings where he’d reserved them a suite of rooms. There was a large master bedroom, a sitting room with fireplace, a bathing room, and a very small servants room. Whether they wanted intimacy that night or not, that’s what they were going to get regardless. The rooms were not luxurious but had an austere tidiness that she appreciated, the low timbered ceiling, leaded windows, and a slanting floor with wide, painted boards. It reminded her of home. In a place where even the land had been dramatically altered, it was no small thing.

“Nice place,” Cade said. “Different, anyway.”

“There are many inns in Gossham,” Luke said. He stood by the fireplace surveying the sitting room and nodding with approval. “This was recommended to me by the keeper of the last inn we stayed at. He said it would be the proper place for a gentleman like Stanton Mayforte to stay when on business in Gossham. Not too lowly and not extravagant.”

“And what business does Stanton Mayforte have at this moment?” Cade asked.

Karigan was wondering the same thing, since it was not too late in the afternoon.

“I think,” Luke said, “it is time for Stanton Mayforte to send his letter to Webster Silk at the palace. So I shall be off to find a courier, and perhaps to hear what news of the city there is.”

“Be careful,” Cade said. He looked as if he wanted to say more but did not.

Luke nodded and, walking cane swinging at his side, he headed for the door. Before stepping out, he told them, “Probably best if you two stay inside. I do not doubt you’ll find some way to occupy yourselves before my return.” With that, he was gone, Karigan choking on laughter.

“Well,” Cade said, “the empire may not like two lads being together, but coming from Mr. Mayforte it almost sounded like an order. Speaking of which, let me see your hand.”

Karigan sat on a window seat looking out over the canal while Cade re-dressed the wound Luke’s whip had left on the back of her hand. It was an angry red, swollen and bruised, but the salve Cade had acquired the previous day seemed to be helping. She watched boat traffic on the canal as he bandaged it back up.

“That should do it,” he said, patting her knee, then taking to a rocking chair nearby.

“Cade,” she said, watching through the window as a man rowed by with a spotted dog at the prow of his boat, “what was it you were going to tell Luke?”

“Hmm?”

“Just before he left. You seemed to have more you wanted to say.”

“Oh, well, I’m just worried, after what he said about spies yesterday, and then the odd change-about by the Inspectors at the city gates today. But Luke knows how to be careful.”

“Yes, the Inspectors’ behavior troubled me, too.”

They stared at one another for a moment, then Cade shrugged. “It could be the Inspectors are truly suspicious of anyone out of Mill City, or . . .”

“Or?”

Cade’s expression darkened. “Or, we’ve been found out.”

That had been Karigan’s line of thought too, but she hadn’t wanted to admit it.

“What do we do?”

The floorboards groaned as Cade slowly rocked back and forth. He rubbed his chin as though deep in thought. “I don’t know,” he said. “They haven’t come and arrested us—not yet, anyway. I suppose we just keep going forward.”

Karigan did not like it, going blindly forward, but hadn’t that been her whole experience in this world, thus far? She did not know its ways or even its geography. The professor and Cade had been her guides, but now the professor was gone, and Cade was as much in a different world as she.

She stood, stretched, and started pacing across the uneven floor. Cade sank into his own thoughts, his eyes half closed, his chair rocking back and forth in a slow, rhythmic pace. Having no plan was no plan at all, but what could she do? She could head out, get a feel for Gossham, or at least get a look at the palace’s exterior. She could watch and listen, same as Luke. He’d told them to stay put, and she could see the wisdom in that. If she got caught, it was all over. And her chances of getting caught? Well, if there were spies keeping watch on their little group, chances were pretty good. They’d wonder why Stanton Mayforte’s sick servant was up and about prowling the streets.