The spout shifted to her right. The moment she saw the scoured-white cobbles where it had been she said grimly, “Oh no you don’t.” Inhaling, she reached toward her creation with her mind. She instantly felt invisible ties that stretched between her and this water-and-garbage monster. Wrapping her mind around those ties, Tris gripped them hard, like reins, and tugged the waterspout until it returned to its original position.
“I’ll get Lark or Rosethorn.” Daja thrust her staff into Briar’s hands. “Here—in case someone else gets ideas.” She backed up, then ran around the waterspout, giving it a wide berth. Its upper half bent out of line, trying to follow her.
“Stop it!” cried Tris. This was starting to hurt; she could feel needles of pain in her head and neck. What would happen when she lost control?
Sandry drew close. Scooping up the dog, she wrapped her free, mucky hand around Tris’s. Briar gripped the redhead’s shoulder. Tris felt the stronger for their nearness. Taking a breath, she let it out and forbade the waterspout to go anywhere.
It shrank, then lengthened, fighting. Tris held firm. The spout whirled faster—then spat out the trash that it had collected in the alley. A slab of wood banged Tris on the forehead. She yowled and clapped a hand to the gash, feeling blood spill over her fingers. Briar and Sandry braced her.
“You gotta hold it!” Briar cried as the spout muttered to itself. “C’mon, merchant girl, this’s no time to worry about an ouch!”
Hissing, the spout tore at the cobbles, throwing rock splinters into the air. Tris’s hold on it broke as all three of them covered their eyes. With a roar of triumph, the waterspout turned on the market.
“Enough,” a familiar voice said. Daja, Lark, and Rosethorn had arrived to block the spout’s path. Lark held up a drop spindle, one that already carried blue yarn. Her fingers twitched; the spindle whirled left, against the proper twist. She let it slip down, her eyes fixed on the waterspout as the thread opened up. The water cyclone’s motion slowed, then reversed. It stretched, and stretched, and collapsed, dropping into a puddle that washed away from Lark. Halting the spindle, Lark wound her unspun wool around one hand.
With the fall of her creation, Tris felt the ground lurch. Her bones felt like water, trickling into her shoes. She sagged, and Briar caught her.
Rosethorn glared at them. “You were told to stay out of trouble.”
“It wasn’t so bad.” Briar put a hand over an eye that was rapidly going black. “Nobody was killed.”
“They were torturing this dog!” Sandry was still red with fury. “It’s just a puppy, and they were hurting it!”
“Come on.” Rosethorn grabbed Daja and Sandry and headed back into the market, towing them with her. Lark and Briar supported the wobbly Tris. “If we hurry,” Rosethorn explained, “we might get out of the city with no one the wiser.”
The cart, with the placid cob that drew it, stood beside the booth. “I can’t believe no one nicked it,” Briar said, awed.
“Never mind that. Start packing,” Rosethorn ordered.
Lark and Briar put Tris in the cart first, then their goods. That was a fast job—almost everything had been sold. The other children clambered into the cart after that. Daja, holding the dog as Sandry got settled, heard a roar, and looked around. A crowd was approaching. “Rosethorn—trouble.”
Both dedicates turned and saw what she meant. “So much for leaving before someone makes a fuss,” Lark murmured.
“You’ll answer for what you’ve done!” cried a wealthy-looking man.
A woman called, “You half-killed my boy!”
Sandry rose, twitching her skirt away as Briar tried to pull her back down. “Your boy hurt a helpless animal!” she cried, eyes blazing. “Shame to him!”
“Quiet,” Rosethorn said out of the corner of her mouth.
“The square’s torn up. Who’s to pay for that?” The speaker, a man in the knee-length tunic worn by Hatarans, halted before them. “And there’s penalty taxes for brawling in the marketplace.”
“There was no warning posted for a big magical working!” A woman drew close, a battered Green Tunic under her arm. “Plus there’s healer’s fees for my son. A fine thing, when children can’t play while their folks are at market!”
“He deserved a worse thrashing than he got!” Sandry snatched the puppy from Daja and held it up. “Here’s what he and his friends were playing at. I’d be ashamed to own up to such a son!”
Now both Daja and Briar were trying to make her sit.
Sandry yanked free. “Only a brute has fun by hurting animals! To—”
“Shut up, Sandry, please!” Everyone stared at the cart, startled by the agonized cry. Tris fought to sit up. Her voice as harsh as a raven’s, she croaked, “Isn’t it bad enough? Leave it!”
The pup whimpered, and thrust his nose into the crook of Sandry’s arm. With a sigh, the girl sat down. “But only for you,” she murmured to him. Digging a handkerchief from her pocket, she tried to clean his bleeding cuts.
“Maybe we need a truthsayer,” Rosethorn suggested. “Question the boys and our charges, to get the whole story.”
“I’m sure Master Niko would act as truthsayer.” Two men rode out of a lane between stalls, followed by soldiers in the brown leather jerkins, blue shirts, and breeches of the Provost’s Guard. “That is part of your skills, isn’t it, Niko?” Duke Vedris asked his companion. The duke was nearly as plainly dressed as his soldiers, in a plain, wine-red shirt, leather breeches, and a leather jerkin studded with metal rings. A heavy gold ring gleamed in one of his ears.