Page 14

“Unach!” the chatty female calls.

“Kesta!” Unach calls back in a mocking voice. Refocusing on me, she sighs. “You’ll have to ask for a tradesman package as well. You’ll get some pushback, I’m sure, but just say the council approved it, and the council will be very angry if they don’t accommodate you. If they don’t believe you, use my name.”

I wonder what sort of weight the nameUnach 935carries.

Knowing she’s eager to leave, I speak quickly. “And there’s an enclave here? Of humans?”

She looks at me as though the question is absurd. “How should I know? I don’t associate with humans.”

If she notes the insult in her words, she hardly cares to amend them.

Unach continues, “You’ll also need to go to the Rooms Office and request servants’ quarters. You might not get them; the city is only so big.” Looking at the ceiling above us, she clucks her tongue. “I don’t need you taking up space in my lodgings. Azmar takes up enough already.”

I nod.Rooms Office. Tradesman package. Unach 935, Azmar 937.

She lists several more items to collect and errands to run, and I panic inwardly, sure I won’t remember all of them, but I don’t want to ask her to repeat herself, and I have nothing on which to write. I offer another nod, and Unach leaves with Kesta and the others.

I’m nervous to wind through Cagmar by myself, especially after my encounter with Grodd ... but if more trolls are like Troff, it won’t be so bad. And I’m used to being novel. When one moves from township to township, she is always the “new girl.”

I start for the door. Pause. Turn back to Troff. “I ... I’m so sorry, but how do I get to the farm walls, again?”

He cocks a brow, winding rope around his forearm. “Go up the lift and turn left for the school block. Follow the stairs past Deccor housingand the Mid-divide. Quickest way is to follow that toward Storage and then up the lift again.”

I understand only a fraction of what he says. Before I pass through the doorway, he adds, “You have to default for the lifts.”

I hesitate. “Default?”

He nods. “Trollis first.”

Oh.“Thank you.”

Like Unach, he regards my gratitude strangely. Do trolls not thank one another? I ponder the question as I head away from the docks. I remember walking a straight line when I come to the first fork ... but I’d been so focused on not losing Unach a second time I get turned around quickly. Up a lift and ... left, wasn’t it?

I come to another fork. I can see a lift at the end of the tunnel to my left, though the passage is swarming with troll bodies. There’s a set of stairs straight ahead. Didn’t I take stairs with Unach? Either way, both would take me up ... and were I to wait for every troll to go ahead of me at that lift, I might never get to the market.

I take the stairs. One troll, then another, comes down from above. I press myself to the wall to let them pass. Neither takes interest in me, though the second does inspect my clothing. I wonder if the tradesman package Unach instructed me to collect includes Cagmar regalia. Will I have to pay for it, or is the name and birth year adequate? Is there some sort of tab?

I follow a corridor, staying close to the rough wall, trying not to meet the glances of passing trolls. This corridor opens into a decent-sized atrium. I search for signs to point me in the right direction, but there are none. Unach and I had descended far enough for my ears to pop on the way to the south dock, so surely I need to go up.

I continue walking, subtly looking around like I know where I’m going. I find a pathway that looks familiar and follow it, but it gets so narrow toward the end that I think I must be mistaken, so I turn around and take another left, succeeding in locating another set of stairs. I pass a great crisscrossing of metalwork that looks similar in build to theEmpyrean Bridge. That must be the Mid-divide. Troff had said something about following it ... Did he say which direction?

After debating the choice to keep climbing or follow the girders, I choose the latter. In the distance I see a flash of tan and think it must be a human, but it’s gone just as quickly. I search as I walk; surely another human would be understanding and tell me ... where to go ...

I stop walking when I realize I’ve entered a maze. Someone nearly runs into the back of me and mutters as they go around. I should keep moving ... but I’m floundering. Multiple lifts, stairs, corridors, doors ... they’re everywhere.

“Move!” growls a bald troll, bent with age. He hobbles around me, whacking my calf with his walking staff as he passes. Gritting my teeth, I follow him, then duck into the first passageway I reach, grateful the throng here is somewhat less dense. I press my back into the wall and take a deep breath.

Just ask someone.Someone who doesn’t look busy. They can’t all hate humans, if we’re allowed to live here. I did have to give up my greatest secret to stay here, which doesn’t bolster my courage.

What did Troff say? Follow the divider, and ... something about storage?

“Lark.”

A voice sounds over my head, and I jump, whirling around to face another troll. It takes me a heartbeat to recognize him, and relief floods my limbs. “Azmar.”

He regards me with what I can best describe as restrained curiosity. “What are you doing here?”

“I ...” I look around. “I don’t know where ‘here’ is, precisely. Could you tell me how to get to the market?”