“Good.” Nona rubbed her aching ankles. “You’ve got to be even quicker this time. I’ll be coming in fast and I need to keep the speed. Hold your hands higher . . . here . . . I’ll jump.”

Nona backed off ten yards and stripped off both shoes then her range-coat, placing them in the lee of a boulder.

* * *

• • •

“YOU WANT ME to steal a tub of kelp juice?”

“Yes.” Nona followed Ruli towards the vinery.

“Nasty stinking half-rotted seaweed?” Ruli stopped and peered at Nona as if she might be unwell.

“Yes. You can do it. Everyone knows Sister Oak is sweet on you.”

“Sister Oak,” Ruli sniffed, “appreciates my ledger-keeping skills and the nose I have for wine.”

“Whatever.” Nona pushed Ruli back into walking. “You can get me a tub.”

“Of course I can.” Ruli grinned over her shoulder. “There’s scores of them at the vinery. Best fertilizer money can buy. Plus we don’t pay for it. It’s harvested on the beach at Gerran’s Crag. I bet the Holy Sisters have a ball at that convent. My pa says most of them stink of seaweed and the ones that don’t smell of fish.”

“Good. Hide it for me somewhere easy to get at and let me know.” Nona turned away, stifling a sneeze.

“Wait! You’re not coming?”

“Got things to do!”

“You only love me for my rotten seaweed juice.” Ruli pouted. “What do you want it for?” She brightened. “You’re going to tip it over Joeli, aren’t you? Do it! Do it! It’ll turn her hair green. You can’t wash it out!”

“Something like that!” And Nona ran off across the courtyard before stopping and calling back. “Oh, and I need a net. A big one, like the ones they use to keep the barrels in the carts.”

Nothing to say, Keot?

The devil remained silent, sulking across her ribs. The discovery that being submerged in truly icy water distressed him so much was a useful one that Nona vowed to investigate more thoroughly at a later date.

* * *

• • •

“CHALLENGE!”

Nona raised her hands. “You got me!”

Zole scowled. “It was not difficult.”

Across the novice cloister members of Mystic Class were converging on them, weaving through the other classes who stood chatting in their usual groups, huddled on benches or strolling beneath the galleries.

Nona unwound her headscarf. “Got to try!”

“You’re the only novice wearing a headscarf,” Zole said.

“And now you’re the only bald novice,” Alata said, drawing up to them.

“Also you’re the only novice with huge black eyes like an insect.” Joeli came up behind them from her patrol of the gallery.

“And with no shadow,” Crocey sneered. Though with the scudding cloud overhead there were few chances to check for the presence of a person’s shadow even if Nona hadn’t still been in the shade of the cloister walls when challenged.

Elani came across, her sneer echoing Crocey’s, her arm still splinted from Nona breaking her elbow in the dormitory attack. “It’s a pity you’ll never reach the tree. I would enjoy watching you try to hide in it.” She waved her good arm at the stark branches that stood like a thousand black fingers raised against the sky.

“Good!” Mally was one of the last to arrive. “We can go and eat at last!”

Normally the trial was held in Verity on seven-days and each candidate got to try her luck across a whole seven-day from dawn to dusk, with the sixth fail ending the matter. Since the novice cloisters were all but deserted on a seven-day Nona had managed to get Sister Apple to agree that she might try at any non-lesson time between breakfast and dinner, one attempt per day for the six days leading up to the seven-day. If she hadn’t succeeded by dinner on six-day then the trial was over and she had failed. This meant of course that none of those on guard duty could get lunch without weakening the defence.

“Couldn’t you just try before lunch?” Mesha trailed in behind Mally, rubbing her stomach. “Everyone knows you’re not going to make it. So be a saint and fail early!”

“On the bright side. Only three more days to go.” Joeli led the rush for the nearest exit. “Challenge you tomorrow, Nona!”

* * *

• • •

THAT NIGHT, IN the dark wake of the focus moon, Nona slid from her bed. She took her clothes and crept from the Mystic dormitory. On the stairs she hurried into her habit, tying her shoelaces blind. She stood, struggling into her range-coat. Dressed, she went down into the main corridor and stopped outside the Grey dormitory. She gave the lightest pull on a thread visible only within the clarity trance and using a quantal’s eyes. Ara opened the door moments later and handed over the lantern and rope they used on their caving trips. A moment later she fetched the hooded lantern kept for trips to the necessary and closed the door while Nona lit the first lantern from the second. Ara retrieved the hooded lantern and returned to her bed. Neither girl spoke during the whole exchange.

Nona left the building with the lantern trimmed so low that its glow barely reached past the smoky glass. She crossed the convent, keeping to the walls, avoiding the places where nuns were most likely to patrol.

In the bushes outside the sanatorium windows Nona recovered a heavy rope net and a wooden tub of kelp juice, five pints at least. She could smell the stuff as she picked the tub up. Burdened by her load, Nona made her way next to the novice cloisters, taking the path along the west side, a narrow alley between the laundry rooms and the low winery building.

“And where might you be off to, young lady?”

Nona froze. She turned her head slowly, seeing nothing in the darkness.

“Pssst.” The hiss made Nona look up. Kettle watched her from the winery roof, crouched low, darkness wound around her in sheets, untouched by the wind. “What are you up to?”

“No good,” Nona said.

“Be on your way then.” Kettle grinned and melted into the night, as if the dark had swallowed her then poured from the roof like oil.

Nona hurried into the novice cloister via the arch through the laundry rooms that filled the south wing. First she positioned the net then went to search through the laundry for the well. She found it after trekking through the washing and airing halls. It lay at the bottom of a short stair. The door to the well chamber had been locked but the device was simple and Nona soon found the necessary thread to pull in order that it be unlocked. It was a trick Hessa had showed her years before.

Nona secured her rope to the well-head, tied her lantern to her belt, and started to descend. A person of Darla’s size would probably not fit. Even Nona felt distinctly trapped as the sides rose around her, dark with slime and nitre, the lantern scraping on stone while she slid down the rope. The faint sounds of running water rose from far below.

Do you never sleep? Keot grumbled, stretching out along her arm, almost as if yawning. What hole have you found to crawl around in now?

Nona continued down the rope not bothering to reply. She became aware of the shaft opening up around her without needing to see it, something about the quality of the sound. She shinned another yard down the rope and looked out across the pool beneath her. The lantern’s glow reflected all around her, the light moving across rock walls capturing the ripples. Where the cavern opened out beyond the pool the forest of the centre oak’s roots swallowed all illumination.