At the corner of the next street, a crowd had gathered–largely children just at apprentice‑age and younger, but there were some adults with them, too, and Eslingen paused, curious, to look over the bobbing heads into the manufactory yard. It was a glassblowers’, he realized at once, and the pit furnace was lit in the center of the open yard, waves of heat rolling off it toward the open gates. A young woman, her hair tucked under a leather cap, skirts and bodice protected by a thick leather apron that reached almost to her ankles, leather gauntlets to her elbows, spun a length of pipe in the flames, coaxing the blob of glass into an egg and then a sphere before she began to shape it with her breath. He had seen glassblowers at work before, but stared anyway, fascinated, as the sphere began to swell into a bubble, and the woman spun it deftly against a shaping block, turning it into a pale green bowl like the top of a wineglass. One had to be born under fire signs to work that easily among the flames; he himself had been born under air and water, and knew better than to try. He became aware then that another woman, an older woman, also in the leather apron but with her gauntlets tucked through the doubled ties at her waist, was watching him from the side of the yard. Her face was without expression, but the young man in the doorway of the shed was scowling openly. There were still plenty of people in Astreiant who thought of the League as the enemy, for all that that war had ended twenty‑five years earlier; Eslingen touched his hat, not quite respectfully, and moved on.

Knives’ Road was as busy as the other streets, and narrowed by the midden barrels that stood in ranks beside each butcher’s hall. Outside one hall, a barrel had overflowed, and gargoyles scratched and scrabbled in the spilled parings, quarreling over the scraps. Eslingen gave it a wide berth, as did most of the passersby, but as he drew abreast of the hall a boy barely at apprenticeship came slouching out with a broom to clean up the mess. The gargoyles exploded away, shrieking their displeasure, some scrambling up the corner stones of the hall, the rest lifting reluctantly on their batlike wings. Eslingen ducked as a fat gargoyle flew straight at him; it dodged at the last minute, swept up to a protruding beam and sat scolding as though it was his fault. The creatures were sacred to Bonfortune, the many‑faced, many‑named god of travelers and traders, but if they weren’t an amusing nuisance, Eslingen thought, someone would have found justification for getting rid of them centuries ago. Their chatter followed him as he turned onto the street Baeker had mentioned.

The Old Brown Dog stood at its end, completely blocking the street. It was a prosperous‑looking place, three, maybe four stories tall, if there were servants’ rooms under the eaves. The sign–a sleeping dog, brown with a grey muzzle–was newly painted, and the bush that marked the house as Leaguer tavern was a live and flourishing redberry in a blue and white pot. A gargoyle was rooting among the dropped fruit but took itself off with a shriek as he got closer. The benches to either side of the door were empty, but the main room seemed busy enough for mid afternoon, half a dozen tables filled and a waiter sweating as he hauled a barrel up through a trap from the cellar. Light poured in from an open door on the opposite side of the room– a door that gave onto a garden, he realized. The air smelled of beer and pungent greenery and the first savory whiffs of the night’s dinner.

The waiter got the barrel up onto its stand behind the bar, and let the trap door down again. He wiped his hands on the towel tied around his waist, and nodded to Eslingen. “Can I help you, sir?”

“I understood you rented rooms,” Eslingen answered.

The man gave him a quick, comprehensive glance, taking in the heavy soldier’s boots and the saddlebags slung over his shoulder, but never took his hands from the towel. “That’s up to the mistress,” he said. “And if we have a room. Adriana!”

A moment later, the top half of the door behind the bar opened– the kitchen door, Eslingen realized–and a young woman leaned out. She had taken the sleeves off her bodice while she cooked, and her shirtsleeves were pinned back to the shoulder, showing arms as brown as new bread; her tightly curled hair and broad nose were unmistakable signs of Silklands blood. “Yeah?”

“Is Aagte there?”

“Mother’s busy.”

“There’s man come about a room.”

“Oh?” The woman–she was probably about twenty, Eslingen thought, not precisely pretty but with a presence to her that wasn’t at all surprising in the tavernkeeper’s daughter and heir–tipped her head to one side, studying him with frank curiosity. “Who are you, then?”

Eslingen stepped up to the bar, gave her his best smile. “My name’s Philip Eslingen, last of Coindarel’s Dragons. Maggiele Reymers said the Brown Dog rented rooms.”

“We do.” The woman–Adriana, the waiter had called her– returned his smile with interest, showing perfect teeth. “I’ll fetch Mother.” Before he could answer, she popped back into the kitchen, closing the door behind her.

Eslingen set the saddlebags at his feet–the floor looked clean enough, and he was glad to be rid of their weight–and leaned against the bar. The waiter had vanished in response to a shout from the garden, but he was aware of the tavern’s regulars watching from their tables, and did his best to ignore their stares. Reymers had said that Devynck kept a Leaguer house; her regulars must be used to the occasional, or more than occasional, soldier passing through.

The kitchen door opened again–both halves, this time–and a stocky woman came out, pushing her grey hair back under the band of an embroidered cap. She wasn’t very tall, but she had the familiar sturdy build and rolling walk of the longtime horse trooper, and Eslingen touched his hat politely. “Sergeant Devynck?”

The rank was a guess, but he wasn’t surprised when she nodded and came forward to lean on the bar opposite him. “That’s right. And you’re–Eslingen, was it?”

“Philip Eslingen, ma’am, just paid off from Coindarel’s regiment. Maggiele Reymers told me you rented rooms.”

Devynck nodded again. She had a plain, comfortably homely face, and startlingly grey eyes caught in a web of fine lines. The daughter, Eslingen thought, had obviously gotten her looks from her father.

“That’s right. Three seillings a week, all found, or one if you just want the room. How long would you want it for?”

“That depends. Maybe as long as the fall hirings.”

“I see. No taste for the current season–what rank, anyway, Eslingen?”

“I had my commission this spring,” Eslingen answered. “Before that, I was senior sergeant.”

“Ah.” This time, Devynck sounded satisfied, and Eslingen allowed himself a soundless sigh of relief. She, at least, would understand the awkwardness of his position; it would be a reason she could sympathize with for sitting out a campaign. Hearing the change in her voice, he risked a question.

“Three seillings a week all found, you said. What’s that include?”

“Use of the room, it’s a bed, table, stove, and chair, and clean linen once a week. The boy empties your pot and rakes the grate, and the maid’ll do the cleaning, Demesdays and Reasdays in the morning. You haul your own water, there’s a pump out back.” Devynck’s eyes narrowed, as though she were considering something, but she said only, “I suppose you’ll want to see the room first.”

“Please,” Eslingen answered.

Devynck glanced over her shoulder, as though gauging whether she could afford to leave the kitchen, then came out from behind the bar. “Stairs are through the garden.”

Eslingen followed her out the back door. The garden was bigger than he’d realized, stretching almost twice the length of a normal city plot, and there were fruit trees along one wall, the hard green apples little bigger than a child’s fist. There were tables nearer the door and the ground around them was beaten bare; beyond that area, rows of woven fence kept the drinkers out of plots crowded with plants. Pig apples ripened on their sprawling vines, yellow against the dark green leaves, and he thought he recognized the delicate fronds of carrots in the nearest patch. The pump, as promised, was by the door, a spout shaped like Oriane’s Seabull roaring above a cast‑iron trough; the pump handle was iron, too, and looked nicely weighted. A well‑worn path led between the fences to an outhouse by the back wall.