“—dying for a smoke,” one said. “Three weeks and I’m losing my mind. I think I’ve gained ten pounds.”
Kal vaguely remembered her roommate Elena saying something about a cleaning lady getting fired for smuggling cigarettes into the school.
“My sister sent me money for my birthday,” another girl said. “I’d pay double for a bottle of that cherry liqueur from Falin’s.”
They saw her looking and Kal hastily shoveled food in her mouth. But that night as she got undressed for bed, she mentioned what she’d overheard to her roommates.
“Everyone wants something,” Elena said with a shrug. “But the gates are locked, the walls are high, and the wards trigger if anyone tries to leave.”
“Wards?” Kal asked.
“You know, lithomancy,” Gabi said. “A few years ago, girls were sneaking out to the clubs every weekend. They messed it up for everyone when they got caught. Now there’s wards along the walls. They glow blue, but you only notice it after dark.”
Kal felt a spark of excitement. “What if I could get things? Like from outside?”
Gabi and Elena swapped a dubious glance. “If Lara Lenormand finds out, you’ll get expelled,” Elena said.
“She won’t. But I’d need to charge a commission for the risk.”
“You won’t get past the wards,” Gabi said flatly, opening one of her engineering textbooks and settling in to study.
“We’ll see about that,” Kal said. “So, do you want anything? Or know someone who does?”
“Ciggies,” Elena said immediately, as Gabi added, “Romashka chocolates. I’d give my left tit for a box.”
By lights-out, Kal had a list and a wad of bills. As soon as the dormitory fell silent, she took her peacoat from the wardrobe and shrugged it on over her school uniform. It held her most precious possession—the stash of kaldurite stones in the lining.
“This is either genius or the dumbest thing you’ve ever done,” Durian remarked as she eased open the window. He was sitting on the sill, arms folded and ankles crossed. “And that’s a low bar.”
Kal nearly retorted that he was the one who had egged her on, but Gabi and Elena were still awake. She gave them a wave and climbed out the window.
She shimmied down using cornices, lintels, and decorative brickwork for hand- and footholds. Kal had wormed in and out of vertical mine shafts since she was a kid, and it was even easier than she’d hoped. She jogged through the shadows to a deserted corner of the grounds and stood there for a moment, taking stock.
The wards were set along the wall at fifteen-cubit intervals. As Gabi had said, they glowed with ethereal blue light. Each was a circle with the Rook of Kievad Rus inside, about the size of her palm.
Kal drew a shallow breath. Time to find out if her kaldurite worked against all kinds of lithomancy.
“No risk, no reward,” she muttered.
Durian’s favorite dumbass motto.
Before she had a chance to chicken out, Kal threw herself at the ivy-covered wall, scaling it like a monkey and dropping down to the quiet street on the other side. She stood there for a moment, breathing hard, her fingers tingling.
The wards didn’t change color or react in any way. Kal listened for shouts or running footsteps. All she heard was the chirp of night insects beyond the wall and the distant sound of a car horn.
A crooked grin split her face.
The first run went so smoothly Kal almost felt disappointed. The trendy, upscale neighborhood surrounding the school had late-night shops that carried every luxury her new clients desired. She returned with cigarettes, chocolate, some gossip rags, and four bottles of booze. Kal was treated like a conquering hero.
By the third week, word spread. Girls she’d never seen before approached her between classes, slipping her lists and money. She expanded her inventory to include books deemed too racy for the school library and spirits of every variety.
Beyond the wall, her makeup and pink hair gave an extra layer of disguise should anyone look too closely.
With each successful transaction, her escape fund grew. In the quiet moments before sleep, she would count her earnings and calculate how much more she needed to buy passage on a ship.
“Where should we go first?” Durian would ask, his voice fading as she drifted toward sleep.
“Anywhere,” she’d answer. “Anywhere but here.”
