floating out around her like wings. There were about five rings on each hand and her earrings would’ve put chandeliers to shame, but she had an air of wild and innocent overdecoration, of having put on the prettiest things in her jewellery box and then forgotten to take them off. Her buttery hair was stuck to her forehead with sweat, and she kept tangling a curl of it in one finger and artlessly letting it go.
The second twin was as though the first had been taken to pieces and put back together without any genius. She wore a robe of the same cloth and colour, but on her it was a beautiful shroud on a mummy. The cavalier had lots of hair, an aquiline face, and a self-satisfied little jacket.
“I think,” the bright twin was saying, “that it’s a hell of a lot better than sticking us in a room and playing who’s the best necromancer? Or worse—loading us up with old scrolls and having us translate rituals for hours and hours on end.”
“Yes, it would have been unfortunate,” agreed her sister placidly, “considering it would have demonstrated within the first five minutes that you’re completely thick.”
A curl was wound about one finger. “Oh, shut it, Ianthe.”
“We should be celebrating, if we’re being honest with ourselves,” the pallid girl continued, warming to her subject, “since the already poorly hidden fact of you being a great big bimbo would have come to light so quickly that it would have broken the sound barrier.”
The curl was let go with a visual sproing. “Ianthe, don’t make me cross.”
“Please don’t be cross,” said her sister. “You know your brain can only deal with one emotion at a time.”
Their cavalier’s expression got ugly.
“You’re sore, Ianthe,” he said sharply. “You can’t show off with books ad infinitum, and so you’re invisible, isn’t that it?”
Both girls rounded on him at once. The pallid twin simply stared, eyes closed to pale-lashed slits, but the lovely twin took one of his ears between a thumb and forefinger and tweaked it unmercifully. He was not a short young man, but she had half a head on him, and a whole head if you counted her hair. Her sister watched from the side, impassive—though Gideon swore that she was smiling, very slightly.
“If you talk like that to her again, Babs,” said the golden twin, “I’ll destroy you. Beg her forgiveness.”
He was shocked and defensive. “C’mon, you know I didn’t—it was for you—I was meeting the insult for you—”
“She can insult me as she likes. You’re insubordinate. Say you’re sorry.”
“Princess, I live to serve—”
“Naberius!” she said, and pulled his ear forward so that he had to come with it, like an animal being led by a bit. Two bright red spots of outrage had formed in his cheeks. The lovely twin waggled his ear gently, so that his head shook with it. “Grovel, Babs. As soon as possible, please.”
“Leave it, Corona,” said the other girl, suddenly. “This isn’t the time to horse around. Drop him and let’s keep going.”
The bright twin—Corona—hesitated, but then dropped the ear of the unfortunate cavalier. He rubbed it fretfully. Gideon could only see the back of his head, but he kept looking at the girl who’d basically clouted him like a whipped dog, the arrogant line of his head and shoulders drooping. Suddenly, impetuously, Corona slung one arm around him and perambulated forward, giving his other ear a tweak—he jerked sullenly away—before wheeling him through the doors to the pit room. The pale twin held the door open for them both.
As they went through, exclaiming at the smell, the pale twin paused. She did not follow them. She looked straight into the darkness instead, the deep shadows around the stairwell. Gideon knew that she was completely hidden—hooded—invisible, but she felt herself pressing backward anyway: away from that pale, washed-out gaze, which was staring with discomfiting accuracy straight at her.
“This is not a clever path to start down,” she said softly. “I would not attract attention from the necromancer of the Third House.”
The pale twin stepped through and closed the door behind her. Gideon was left alone.
10
HARROWHARK DID NOT APPEAR for a midday meal. Gideon, still unused to the concept of midday meal or honestly midday, appeared a good hour earlier than anyone else would have. Either everyone had an appropriate circadian pattern of hunger or they were being too Housely and well bred not to follow one. Gideon sat in the hot, scrubbed room where she had