Kushiel's Chosen - Jacqueline Carey [274]
And with that, I told them my plan. The girl Sarae's eyes widened and she ducked her head, fidgeting with the crossbow she held; whether or not she thought it blasphemous, I could not say. The Yeshuites murmured. Ti-Philippe swore admiringly. Kazan Atrabiades laughed so hard he had difficulty translating for his men. Some of the Illyrians grinned, when they heard it; some made superstitious gestures to avert evil.
Joscelin looked at me for a long time without comment. "Have you lost your mind?" he said at length. "No."
"What else would you have us do? If we make it inside, we won't have the option of stealth." I watched the thoughts flicker behind his eyes. "Joscelin, we're outnumbered. Ysandre is outnumbered. Even if we succeed in gaining access to the warehouse, to reaching the Temple—what if it's not enough to warn her? Melisande and Marco have too much to lose, and too many allies at hand. We need to turn some of them, or at least confuse them. I can't think of another way. Can you?"
He closed his eyes. "No."
"I have sworn a vow," I said softly, "and this is how I mean to keep it.”
He opened his eyes and looked at me. "And if it goes awry?"
I shrugged. "We run like hell, and pray they haven't surrounded the warehouse." I looked around at their watching faces. "Does anyone have a better plan?" No one did. "All right," I said. "Shall we go?"
In that, at least, no one was disagreed; we set out across the rough terrain, scrabbling our way through near-darkness to the water's edge, where our vessels lay concealed. Two skiffs in total, and our hard-won gondola. Dense ferns lay rotting in the water; to this day, the smell of decaying foliage brings that morning back to me in all its nerve-strung anxiety. A thin mist hovered above the river. I took my place beneath the awning of the gondola, as there was no room in the smaller skiffs. With soft splashing and a few muffled curses, we were launched.
It was a tense journey, especially once we were off the sedge-choked river and into the canals proper, wending our path through the waterways of La Serenissima. Once a bissone full of drunken rowdies returning home from the mean tenements of the courtesan's quarter passed nearby to us, voices raised in a ragged, off-key tune, the lantern in their prow casting wavering light over the dark waters. We hid ourselves in the shadows alongside the canal, all of us crouching low and scarce daring to breathe. Once they had gone, the oarsmen set our vessels to gliding silently out once more.
The street on which the warehouse was located was a quiet one; the residences were slightly more modest than those that lined the Great Canal, interspersed with some of the more elegant trade establishments, jewelers and drapers and the like. Beyond the two-storied roofs, I could see the pointed domes of the Temple of Asherat-of-the-Sea looming in the predawn sky to obscure the paling stars,
"There," Sarae whispered, her voice carrying faintly over the water. She pointed to a marble building, long and low, with a single entrance at street level. In the first skiff, Ti-Philippe was already making for it. We came noiselesslyalongside and disembarked. One oarsmen stayed in each of the smaller rowboats, and a pair of Illyrians in the gondola.
"Get as near to the harbor as you dare, and turn the boats loose," Joscelin murmured in Caerdicci. "Come back swiftly, but have a care for guards."
I repeated it in Illyrian, and Kazan nodded curt agreement. If we had any hope of going undetected, it would hardly do to have three strange vessels moored in the vicinity. The oarsmen pushed off and headed toward the harbor, quick and stealthy.
It left fifteen of us huddled on the dark street, a motley assortment bristling with arms, dreadfully suspicious and vulnerable to any passersby. I thought of the looming temple domes and