Chapter 2 — The Pearl Diver

Iska Thorn had been offered many bad jobs on the lower piers, but never one by a queen.

The woman in the plain grey cloak did not look like a queen. She looked tired, and she paid in Archive scrip instead of coin, which meant she did not want the Lantern Guild to know.

"You know the streets under the bay," the queen said. "I need someone to swim to the cathedral and tell me what is ringing."

Iska thought of her brother's debt, and of the fog-wolves that hunted the shallows at dusk, and said yes before she could think better of it.