3. An Orphan In Demand

The Knights of the Penitent Order of the Pale Circle didn't come for Val for two more days. The intervening day was a good one, too - the herbalist needed some things done, which meant Val got to be in proximity to Penny for about six hours, during which she learned a bit about herbalism and even more about the gossip around the city. She also learned how, exactly, Penny got all of her information.

She was far more forthright and personable than Val, striking up conversations with just about every customer. In her cheery voice, with her pearly smile, she'd ask probing, follow-up questions to whatever they'd been talking about the week before. Almost invariably, the customers and associates would answer, even when they ought not to have.

"You know how my wife's been cold on me of late… probably shouldn't be saying this to a couple of kids. But that balm that Beatriz gave us really worked wonders. Her soreness all taken care of and her readier than since we wasn't much older than you…"

"I'm so glad it worked!" Penny replied, and she managed not to roll her eyes and look mildly disgusted until the moment the man left the store. "Too much information!" she sighed.

Val giggled. "Yeah!"

Though she wasn't sure she understood the nature of the problem. Something to do with sex, probably, which she was still very iffy about. It was her job to order the storefront inventory, which tended to get a bit messy over time since customers liked to rifle through the bins. Meanwhile, Penny minded the shop, occasionally wandering over to the big mortar and pestle to grind a medicinal mixture of leaves and herbs into a fine powder during lulls in the shop's business.

"I don't think Beatriz is looking for another assistant," Penny said.

"I know," Val said. It would be wonderful to get to work with Penny on a regular basis, but one day here and there was nice. She didn't have to go angling for an apprenticeship every day.

At the end of the day, Penny gave Val her two chits and then offered her a cup of herbal tea gratis, which meant free. Val had never had herbal tea before, so of course she accepted. Penny set the pot to boiling, closed the store front, and then set the sachets steeping in the hot water, blowing over her cup. Val blew over her cup, too, which made Penny giggle, and then she copied Penny's very proper poise as she sat, even though Val was just wearing dungarees and her striped shirt and Penny had a proper shopkeeper's dress, complete with embroidered apron.

"I got a shilling and two tuppence yesterday," Val said.

"Oh? That must have been some job! Who was it for?"

Val nodded. "For the man across. Mr. Vinzenno. He kidnapped a bishop… well, he bondsman'ed a bishop who'd done some bad things and took him over to Aurilicht. Me and Pudge… Pudge and I provided a distraction, and after he got beat something awful the missus felt sorry for us and threw in something extra." She sipped at her tea, finding it barely cool enough for tiny sips. "Don't tell anybody, though."

Penny pinched her lips together and mumbled out: "Liph phealed," which made Val giggle. Without getting up, Penny retrieved a tin from the nearby shelf and slid it across to Val. "This is for Astrid Lavoie. It's for her knee."

"I didn't know she had a bad knee."

Penny nodded. "Don't tell anybody, though."

"Liph phealed!" Val said, and they both giggled.

+++++

The next morning, Val sat in for morning classes because she had to do so if she wanted to take her morning meal at the orphanage. That was part of the deal - a chit got you lessons and the meal, as if anybody would actually pay to sit in a classroom and learn boring lessons.

Val had learned everything there was to learn at the orphanage ages ago. Heck, she'd known half of it from her time at the orphanage under the Sisters of Resonant Grace, though everything they taught there had some kind of religious nonsense attached to it.

Mostly, Val sat in the corner and read - there were always books around, and sometimes the teachers brought in new ones that she hadn't read before. Sometimes, the instructors would tell her that the stories she was reading were more meant for boys, but Val didn't care. If the other girls wanted to read about princesses having tea parties with chipmunks, they were welcome to it. She wanted to read about pirates, heroes, and tempest-controlling wizards. If that lot ever had tea parties with talking animals, the books must have skipped it over.

"Valerie, do you know what an elevation is?" Miss Astrid asked her.

Astrid was Mrs. Lavoie's adult daughter, perhaps twenty years old. She taught at the orphanage a few days a week, and would some day take over its operations if her mother had her way. She had the same tall, broad frame as her mother, but had the cheeriest smile that Val had ever seen. In their reading lessons, Astrid spent equal times covering proper religion, like the dusty old stories the Pale Order liked, and actually interesting religion, like the old gods that you weren't supposed to worship anymore. But, since they were just telling stories, Astrid insisted that it was okay and nobody at the orphanage bothered to contradict her.

"Is it something to do with religion?" Val asked.

"Sort of," Astrid said. "The religion of the old gods. It was said that, if you were particularly favored by a god or goddess, that, instead of dying, they would summon you up on a great winged horse and you would join the gods and heroes in Sturmhalle without ever dying."

Val nodded, thinking it over for a moment. "If that really happened, then nobody would have stopped worshiping the old gods. Nobody's seen a god in forever."

Astrid appeared to give it serious consideration. "You're probably right," she said eventually.

She ate her morning meal with Pudge, whose missing teeth were almost fully grown back, visibly whiter and cleaner than his other teeth. When rich folks had tooth problems, that's how they dealt with them. They got the offending teeth pulled right out of their head and then gulped down a healing potion to regrow them. Val imagined it hurt - but, then again, so did toothaches.

Afterward, she and Pudge discussed what to do for the day, since he was back to his chipper self after taking a day to heal up and take things easy. They were about to head out to the Green Procession, where Val had heard from Penny that the cloth-seller needed a pair of helpers to measure and cut lengths of fabric, which sounded like an easy job.

"Sounds a bit boring," Pudge said. "If she don't need two, then I'm running by the printworks, since I know they'll take me. They don't take girls there, though."

"Thought as much," Val grumbled. She wasn't clear on why some jobs only recruited boys and some only took girls - she bet she could run a press every bit as well as Pudge. Probably better. And Beatriz the herbalist never once took a boy for a job. Most merchants, though, would take whoever they could get.

They rounded the corner, only to spot a few Knights of the Penitent Order of the Pale Circle chatting with Mrs. Lavoie. Where Pudge ducked back around the corner to make himself scarce, Val crept closer, trying to keep herself in the shadows. They were standing out in the sunlight on the front stoop and wouldn't be able to see anything but a big black entryway in the dim confines of the orphanage. She crept as close as she dared, crouching behind the coat rack that some of the instructors hung their jackets on. There, hidden behind Miss Astrid's patchouli-scented autumn jacket, Val overheard a snippet of conversation.

"Like I said, probably ten or eleven years old. A slim girl, probably half-native with a medium complexion and straight, ruddy hair. Oh, and violet eyes," one of the brother-knights said.

"I haven't got any girls like that," Mrs. Lavoie said eventually.

"You're sure? The reward for her return is five crowns."

"I'm sure I would remember it if I had a half-Sudren girl with violet eyes. I would love five crowns to fund my humble establishment, but you can't squeeze blood from a stone, gentlemen," she said eventually. "But I wish you well on your search."

"Ma'am."

It was all of five seconds between the end of their conversation and when Mrs. Lavoie lifted her daughter's jacket aside to face Val. Her eyebrows shifted upward - she wasn't angry, but she wanted answers.

At first, Val assumed that the brother-knights were after her and Pudge for their role in the bishop's abduction. But they hadn't mentioned Pudge, not once, and they had a pretty specific description of her. No… it was her in particular that they were after. But why? What had she done to provoke their ire?

"Me and Pudge…"

"Pudge and I…" Mrs. Lavoie said. Obviously, Val knew that, but she sometimes went informal when she was nervous.

Val cleared her throat, straightened her posture, and tried again. "Pudge and I engaged in a job yesterday, where we were accosted by three ruffians who wanted to take our employer's property off our hands. Pudge was injured, so I took him to the mendicant brothers for treatment. I reckon… I imagine that's where the brothers got their eyes on me."

Mrs. Lavoie continued to regard her, perhaps trying to root out the lie. But there was none - the three brother-knights who'd attacked them weren't anything more than glorified ruffians and the fake censer was Ette's property. That was the truth and Val hoped her unwavering eye contact conveyed that.

"Very well… and the Brothers of the Faithful Order… they just gave Pudge a potion for free?"

"No, I had to give them about nine drams of blood. That's not so much." Val used her hands to indicate how large the phlebolic was - about half the size of her fist, which wasn't so big.

"So perhaps it's your blood they're after," Mrs. Lavoie said. The thought hadn't even occurred to Val.

"My blood?"

"Your blood, girl. Certain rare types are more valuable than others." Mrs. Lavoie put her hands on Val's shoulders and turned her bodily to face her straight-on. That meant she was pretty serious about what was coming next, not that Mrs. Lavoie was often unserious. "They may mean you harm, so I'd stay well away from them. And I'm not certain that this is the safest place for you to be right now. Do you think you can lay low for a few days?"

Val had lived on the street for almost a year after she ran away from the Sisters of Resonant Grace. She knew how to lay low.

"I can come back after that?"

"If it's safe," Mrs. Lavoie said. "Now… go have Astrid see you out the back exit."