had to work the ropes here today. Among slaves, they were well treated, even paid, their work for the star-keepers considered important, technically difficult, and even holy, but they spent their days in two-man teams in the narrow spindles, one spotting and one working the ropes with deft hands, often working from the first shimmer of dawn until the dark of night without reprieve except for switching with their spotter. When the Prism or a superviolet traveled and needed use of the stars, they could do so directly, magically. But every mundane purpose required the services of the monkeys.
Idly, Liv considered reaching into a superviolet control line embedded in the street and taking control of a star, just to wreak some havoc on the rich people’s party. That was the beauty of being a superviolet. No one could tell you were drafting who couldn’t also see superviolet.
Still, it wasn’t like she would be the first student to do such a thing. Punishments for such pranks were swift and severe.
Liv’s stomach was doing backflips, though. Despite the hubbub of the morning crowd and shouts of merchants and the singing of minstrels and the crackling of the brightwater fireworks, nothing could distract her from her upcoming meeting.
The Crossroads was a kopi house, restaurant, tavern, the highest-priced inn on the Jaspers, and downstairs, allegedly, a similarly priced brothel. It was centrally located in the Embassies District for all the ambassadors, spies, merchants trying to deal with various governments, and drafters having just crossed the Lily’s Stem, because the Crossroads was housed in a former embassy building. As a matter of fact, it was in the old Tyrean embassy. Liv wondered if her handler had done that on purpose, or if she’d just chosen it because she knew it was far too expensive for Liv to afford.
Liv hiked up the grand staircase to the second floor where the kopi house was. A beautiful greeter met her with a dazzling bright smile. The Crossroads had the best staff in the city: every last man, woman, and table slave attractive, immaculately dressed, and unfailingly professional. Liv had always suspected that the slaves here earned more than she did. Not that that would be hard. Actually, it was Liv’s first time inside.
“How may we serve you today?” the greeter asked. “We have some lovely tables by the south window.” She politely didn’t stare at Liv’s rough clothing.
“A private table, if possible. I’ll be meeting a… friend from the Ruthgari embassy, Aglaia Crassos.”
“Of course, I’ll be sure to send her over.” The staff here knew everyone who was anyone, by name. “Will you be needing muting for your table?”
Muting? Oh. Liv tightened her eyes to see into the superviolet. Of course. She’d forgotten; she’d heard about this too. A third of the tables here were surrounded by superviolet bubbles. The bubbles had holes, of course, or the patrons inside would suffocate, so the sound couldn’t be completely cut off, but it would certainly help make sure it was a hundred times harder to eavesdrop. Some of the bubbles even had small spinning superviolet fans to blow fresh air into them. Which, Liv realized, was eminently practical. Those patrons who had opted to have the bubble but not the fan looked uncomfortably warm.
Liv was going to go way out on a limb and guess that the fan was available for a small additional cost.
Now that she was looking, she realized the greeter was herself a superviolet drafter, her pupils bearing the halo barely a third of the way through her irises. No wonder Liv hadn’t noticed right away. When a superviolet drafter got much further along, the color in their eyes began to bleed over into the visible range, lending a slight violet tinge that was difficult to see in brown eyes and made blue eyes astonishingly beautiful—not that Liv was ever going to get that, with her bland browns.
“Actually…” Liv said. She turned her cloak so the woman could see the back. It was common for superviolets to weave some extra pattern into their clothing so that other superviolets could identify them.
The greeter’s pupils tightened to pinpricks in a heartbeat as she glanced at Liv’s cloak. “Very finely done. Superviolets are welcome to draft their own muting, just let us know you’re going to be using muting when you visit so our servers don’t make any mistakes.”
The woman took Liv to a table by the windows on the south side where she could get sunlight through open windows.