There was a knock at her cubicle door. Ismene slid it aside to find Eryx, carrying a couple of books.

  "I have something I want to ask you," Eryx said.

  "All right," Ismene replied, and beckoned her to come into the tiny room.

  Eryx slid the door closed behind them. "I want to sneak these back into Tyrene."

  Ismene looked at the books, and then Eryx.

  "Don't tell Harmonia. You can say no, and I'll forget about it," Eryx said.

  "That's not it," Ismene said. "It's... I don't know where to start. Why do you want me to do this?"

  "...You were right," Eryx said. "I didn't really believe it. They're just books; I understand that workers don't get representation in the Assembly, but I didn't think that I was doing anything really wrong. That Harmonia would have so much of a problem with me reading about law. Or the guild."

  "Did she get mad at you?" Ismene asked.

  "Mad enough. I'm going to have to watch myself from now on, I think," Eryx said. "But I don't have to like it."

  Ismene nodded. "Oh, good." The Library wouldn't care if Harmonia had a problem with Eryx, but she had to go back home with them, and Ismene didn't want to see Eryx face consequences later.

  "I just can't believe she's so blind. She told me to stick to my assignment! As if there's not piles of essays here about how Tyrene handles its workers. Or records by those workers. There's this whole library, and all she thinks is how it's not okay for a worker to read about the things we're already living with," Eryx said. "I thought... I thought that because I'd been allowed to come here, they thought I could be trusted not to work against their interests."

  "I don't think they ever really trust us," Ismene said. "That's why I'm so careful." She hadn't said it aloud before. Maybe there was something in Eryx's earlier condemnation. Maybe she had been complacent. "I mean, we're always going to be workers. I know I said I want a library, but...," she sighed. What Eryx said sounded frustratingly true. Their interests would always be against the interests of people like Mellon and Harmonia.

  "So. Harmonia thinks I'm reading outside of my place as a servant," Eryx said. "I'm asking you to do this, because I know you said you respect what I've done in the House. And it was my idea; the day off policies. Some of the token rules. The cafeteria quality. Mellon gets the credit, but it was me. I call myself a scholar, but I want to start doing something more."

  Ismene nodded.

  "If I can't get this stuff past Harmonia, I can get the idea out there other ways. These are old Assembly speeches. I bet there are copies of things like this in the House's private library, but I'm sure I'd never get to see them. They're from back before the responsibility laws, when workers earned real money. I want to show them to workers in the House. I mean, the speeches were fine then. Even the Assembly thought so. You know I've worked for your benefit before. I know you're nervous, but I think you can help make that happen."

  "I already do," Ismene said. There, she thought. I've said it. Eryx will know.

  "You what?" Eryx asked. Her entire pitch stopped abruptly.

  "Take books back. Harmonia doesn't know about them," Ismene said, her voice hushed despite the private room. "There's a few guild members in the House. They request things, take them for me, I don't know. There are underground presses somewhere." She smiled, despite the nerves she felt. "I don't know if I'll ever have my library. But I can do this," she said.

  Eryx opened her mouth, then closed it.

  "I'll get these," Ismene said, holding up her hand. Eryx gave her the books and Ismene jotted down their titles, then cleared them. Harmonia wouldn't ever know.

  "I'm sorry," Eryx said.

  "For what?" Ismene asked.

  "Misjudging you," Eryx admitted. "I saw all this," her gesture took in the room, "and I thought you were happy to let it stay here, where nobody could do anything with it."

  Ismene shrugged. "It isn't like I can talk about sneaking illegal books back. I didn't know if you'd tell Harmonia." She still didn't. It was hard to read people. What if Eryx decided to earn some favor, and turn her in? Should she have said anything at all? "If she finds out now, it's both our contracts," Ismene said.

  Fortunately, Eryx didn't seem to take it as a threat. "Together, then. So. Do you want to see what I'm working on?"

  Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  Ismene nodded. "I'd be honored."

  Eryx took a moment to shuffle her notes around. Ismene noticed a whole sheaf that had been already marked up, with notes in a graceful hand unlike the rest of the writing.

  "All right. Well. You're familiar with the responsibility laws." Eryx began. "The business families are like the classical Imperial nobility, in a way. It's not that their land and concessions are given to them by a central Emperor, but they are the ones that own the land and they are held responsible for the well-being of those in their employ.

  "It's not that we can't be business owners. We can buy licenses. We can cancel our contracts."

  Ismene shuddered. Eryx sighed.

  "And that's exactly the problem," Eryx replied, referring to her reaction. "You can't really cancel. It's not legal to be a vagrant. You risk getting impressed into the labor pool for the army. And a business license takes real currency, so it's not really likely you'll buy one yourself. If you weren't in a House from birth, or you haven't convinced a House to fund a license for you, you're a servant."

  "And we only earn House tokens," Ismene said.

  "As long as most of us are servants on contract, we're trapped," Eryx said. "It's legal, but... well, I wanted it to change.

  "I wasn't willing to go full guildsman. I saw what happened to my predecessor. He got tossed out out of hand." Eryx frowned. "He joined up with the guild offices back in Dryas—you know, the ones on temple grounds. And that's wonderful, but I wanted to try to get Mellon to implement something. You can say that I'm not doing enough, or that it's useless to try working in the House, but that's what I'm trying to do.

  "I had a long correspondence with the Prytane about the leisure day policy. It wasn't that long ago that the right to have work was the big issue; what with all the factories, we don't need workers like we used to. Thirty years ago it looked like half of Tyrene was going to be on the streets, with none of the old guild or creche systems having any support, and no one taking in apprentices to train them anymore. The villages were a lot better off, but that was because they held to their organizational systems longer. People actually blocked off streets in Dryas to demand work back then.

  "But it makes sense to have days off now. We're not machines, and Mellon wanted a way to keep us happier. The rest, you remember. We tried it out, staggered the day off among the workers, and everyone loved it. well, everyone who didn't think we were lazy."

  Ismene nodded. She remembered the complaints; a guaranteed day off meant a guaranteed day without tokens, and the workers who really wanted to put in effort were a bit miffed. She'd liked it, though. She thought that most of the people who complained were servants who already had days off as part of their position. Having a day to relax meant that she had something to look forward to in the schedule. It gave her something to pace her time with better. Overall, she felt like it had improved the job for everyone.

  "And that's what I've been doing. The food was a health initiative. But what I'd really like..." Eryx pulled out one page. "We should get real currency."

  It was a lovely thought, Ismene thought. "But why would a House do that? They'd be giving away their profits."

  "Aren't we making their profits for them?" Eryx asked.

  "Yes, but..."

  "Yes, and it's crazy, I know. I'm not going to ask Mellon to give us gold, he'd throw me out too. But... I want to do something," Eryx said. "And this is exactly the territory Harmonia wanted me off of, so don't tell her."

  "You have my word," Ismene said. "On the Castle."

  Eryx grinned at her, and accepted the terms. "If we earned at least a little of our pay in currency, instead of tokens, we'd establish a whole other facet to the economy. Workers could patronize offices that didn't have arrangements with their House. I don't know how much difference that would make in the short term; it wouldn't be much of our pay. We wouldn't be disrupting dorm agreements anytime soon. But we might do other things. Go eat somewhere else. Get a robe that isn't House issue. Save up for things."

  "Save up for licenses," Ismene said, without thinking. She looked over at Eryx to see her reaction.

  "It's not impossible," Eryx said. "And in the long term, that might be true. It won't make a difference in a lot of ways. We probably wouldn't be able to hire servants of our own. I don't think it would be legal for us to buy products sold for license-holders, even if we had the cash. The same goes for travel permits." She shrugged. "The Assembly would have to rewrite the laws for a lot of things. They fundamentally give House runners the authority, because the workers are their responsibility. It used to work, I guess, but I think we can handle being free agents."

  It was a little scary, in some ways, but Ismene thought she was right. Having a place to live, having a reliable job, all of that was because of the House system. Losing that security—and Ismene absolutely believed that some houses would immediately wipe their hands of a lot of responsibilities, given the chance—seemed dangerous. But Eryx had a vision of a Tyrene where the law did take that into account.

  "You want Mellon to do more, but it would be better if the Assembly did this," Ismene said.

  "Oh, I wish Harmonia could hear that," Eryx crowed. Ismene tensed. "No, no, I don't mean— I mean she was so indignant, and here you are, immediately understanding why this is a political matter," Eryx said. "It has to be, in the end. It should be."

  "I wonder if they'd ever do it," Ismene said.

  "I don't know. But I can start in this House, like I always have. I'm going to start a guild cell when I get back," Eryx said.

  "Join it. We already have one," Ismene said.

  Eryx blinked. "I'm in regular correspondence with the city guild offices, but in the House...?"

  That surprised Ismene. She expected Eryx to be the sort of person who would already know about social goings-on in the House. But then again, Eryx had been a scholar, not a working servant. She hadn't realized that might be the sort of difference that caused a gap... or mistrust. "I only know because, well, of the books I get for them," she said. "I stay out of the meetings because that way, Harmonia thinks I'm well-behaved." She grimaced. "She knows there are guild believers, in a vague way, just no particulars. But I know who to refer you to. I'll introduce you," she promised.

  Eryx nodded. "I'd like that."

  There was a moment where neither of them had more to say. Ismene surveyed her work space. "You said Harmonia found you working with things?"

  "Yes," Eryx replied.

  "Let me show you how to erase a book. They just display it, so it's not like you're destroying the actual text..."