Trijn was working late herself, until second sunrise, according to her runner, and Rathe, bracing himself, presented himself at her door with more than an hour of her day to spare. She listened impassively, staring past him at the shuttered window. When he had finished, she sat silent for a few moments, then reached for her silver‑banded pipe. “They’ll never allow it,” she said.

“Allow which?” Rathe asked. “The reexamination of the death, the investigation–Leussi was important enough, they’d be fools to try to deny Holles.”

Trijn made a face, tamping the shards of tobacco into the bowl. “They might allow the reexamination, even the investigation, but as I understand it you’ve not endeared yourself to the grand bourgeoise, have you?”

“I told the advocat that, Chief, but he insists on having me there.”

“Do you really think they’ll give it to you?” Trijn’s eyebrows shot up, even as she gestured to the stove.

Rathe lit a twig from the bundle that hung ready, handed it to her. “That’s not the issue, Chief, though I won’t deny I’d like to have the chance to handle it. But the main thing right now is to get the death recognized as murder.”

Trijn gave him a humorless smile, and her black eyes were very dark indeed, little flames dancing in them as she pulled on her pipe. She spoke around its stem. “You know precious little of the magistracy, Rathe, if you think Holles will let it go at that.” Rathe opened his mouth to protest, but Trijn overrode him. “I know you liked the intendant, but Holles is going to want someone he can trust on this.” The pipe was lit, and she leaned back, releasing a cloud of smoke.

Rathe said, “Holles knows I’m not fee’able, I won’t find what’s not there, it’s not like he wants to own me.”

“No,” Trijn agreed, “and he’s one of the few who wouldn’t, I imagine. That’s exactly why he’ll want you, Nico. Almost anybody else is going to trip all over herself to find something, anything, but you won’t. You’ll go at your own pace, and probably by your own rules, until you find something like the truth.”

“And what’s wrong with that, Chief?”

“Rathe. An intendant is apparently murdered. An intendant who has lived happily with his leman for, what, seventeen years? So we can probably rule out a crime of passion. And that puts it squarely in the realm of the political. Someone there is likely to be who will not want the truth. Maybe not among the regents, maybe even not at the Tour, but somewhere. And that someone will make sure that an honest pointsman–worse, someone that all the broadsheets in Astreiant proclaim to be an honest pointsman–will not be assigned to this matter. And there’s damn little I can do about it. And even if by some miracle the regents were to agree, the surintendant won’t, because there’s no way you can win this one. Let me tell you that from the start.”

Rathe stared at her, disbelief turning to anger. “With all respect, Chief, I think you’re reaching.”

“Do you? Knowing the regents as we both do?”

She was right about that, if nothing else. Rathe knew the regents, and their temper, very well indeed. “But you can’t really think they’d be willing to let murder go, the murder of one of their own…”

Trijn smiled again through a cloud of smoke. “Have you read the astrologers’ sheets lately? The city’s primed for just such stupidity, and the regents have been primed for it for years.” She frowned at the window again. “If you make this plea, the regents are going to try to stall, just to spite you–and, I suspect, the metropolitan.”

“What’s she got to do with this?” Rathe demanded.

“She stood patronne to you over the children,” Trijn answered. “Don’t be dense, Rathe.”

“The important thing is the investigation,” Rathe said stubbornly. “Not who conducts it.”

“No.” Trijn released another cloud of smoke. “All right. I’m coming with you.”

“Chief?”

“I’m not going to let the regents eat my senior adjunct for breakfast simply because the metropolitan took his part against them once. The grande bourgeoise has a long memory.”

From the tone of her voice, Rathe wondered if she had some other motive as well, but put the thought aside. Her support could only help, he hoped, and pushed himself to his feet.

“With your permission, Chief, I thought I’d send to the alchemists first thing tomorrow, get the death signings.” He raised a hand. “Not as part of any investigation, of course, but there might be something there that would support our case.”

Trijn grinned. “Of course. Give Fanier my regards.”

Eslingen made his way back to Customs Point in good time, pushed his way through the garden gate just as the clock on the old Factors’ Hall was striking the quarter hour. He’d made better time than he’d expected, would have time to change before dinner if he chose, and he picked his way through the last drifts of leaves with some satisfaction. The garden was bare in the falling night, the tender plants already bundled against the coming cold, the last beds of vegetables piled with hay to keep the frosts at bay, and the light from the windows haloed the last spare sticks. Caiazzo was in his workroom, Eslingen saw without surprise–the merchant‑venturer tended to work late in any event, and with the winter‑sun rising later every day, after nine now, Caiazzo’s more discreet visitors tended to arrive in the hours of true dark between sunset and winter‑sunrise. No one had been expected, though–otherwise, he himself would not have been allowed the afternoon to himself–and Eslingen guessed the older man was just working on his books, allotting the capital for next year’s caravans. The loss of the de Mailhac gold mines had hurt, meant that Caiazzo had to be more careful than he had been, but recently the merchant‑venturer had expressed himself cautiously satisfied. Which would make me happier, Eslingen thought, if I were staying the winter.

The kitchen door was half open, one of the cooks leaning out to catch her breath; Eslingen lifted a hand in greeting, but kept on toward the side door, remembering a line from the last play he and Rathe had seen together. Magists by the front door, undertakers by the back, and the knife goes in at the side door. He thought it had been good, but they had had a box to themselves, and he hadn’t followed much of the story. Still, it captured his position well enough, somewhere between servant and colleague, and in any case, he liked the sound of it. He was smiling as he pushed open the heavy door, nodding to the runner who was sitting on the tabouret at the end of the short hall. To his surprise, the boy caught his sleeve as he passed. “Lieutenant. Master Caiazzo wants to see you right away.”

“Right away?” Eslingen repeated, a thrill of apprehension shooting through him. An unexpected visitor, maybe, one of Caiazzo’s less reputable agents from the Court of the Thirty‑two Knives, and him not here to offer backup… But Denizard was here, and she was effective protection in her own right, and Caiazzo would have no compunction about refusing to see someone, if he had the slightest suspicion of trouble.

“As soon as you came in,” the boy said, and Eslingen nodded.

“Show me up.”

Caiazzo’s workroom was warm and warmly lit, the polished stove in the corner showing bright tongues of flame to match the enormous candelabra. The candles were wax, too, all two dozen of them, and there were more candles in the sconces above the long counter. That surface was relatively clear, for once, the ledgers stacked, tallyboards turned face to the wall, papers tucked into folios, and Eslingen looked curiously at the stranger. There was no missing him, a big man, dark as Caiazzo, but older, his black hair streaked with silver under the candles’ light. The same brilliance reflected from a satin coat, bottle‑green striped with gold, and glinted from shoe buckles set with stones. The ivory lace at the thick wrists and neck seemed to glow as well. But there was no mistaking who was master here, Eslingen thought as he made his bow. Caiazzo might be plainly dressed, as plainly dressed as ever, but it was clear the big man deferred to him, and to the magist seated demurely in the corner.