Path of the Flame (The Dragon Thief Book 1)

by D. K. Holmberg

  He waited until it cleared completely. Ishantil trembled, and he glanced up to watch the rumbling, wondering if he might see some other sign, but there was nothing. Three days.

  That thought stayed with him.

  He tore his gaze away and found himself looking up at the peak of the temple—toward the Flame.

  Normally, the Flame’s pale orange light glowed softly, a reminder of Ishantil’s light.

  Now it glowed brightly, with hints of red and orange, and it seemed to tremble in time with Ishantil. It seemed to tremble as if the Flame truly was angry.

  Three days.

  It was time to go.

  Chapter Fourteen

  When Ty reached Bingham’s home, it was late—and dark. He hoped Bingham would be there, or at least would’ve left some sign for Ty, but why would he? If Bingham knew they had been captured, there would be no reason for him to have waited.

  Ty glanced along the streets, which remained relatively empty. The people who were out had started to get a look of resignation on their faces. Those who wanted to escape—and had the funds to do so—had already evacuated. Others had no means to leave. There were some who looked bloodied and bruised, and Ty suspected they had tried to escape the city on foot, maybe even going into the jungle, where it would’ve been difficult to do so—maybe even impossible if the Dragon Touched monitored it the way Bingham had suggested.

  Then there were others who seemed as if they had chosen to stay.

  The faithful.

  There were a surprising number of them—people who didn’t seem bothered by Ishantil’s trembling, who didn’t seem worried about the possibility of its impending explosion of lava that could spew down and destroy the entirety of the city. They looked at Ishantil with reverence. Ty had made a point of avoiding them altogether. The longer he stayed in the city, though, the more it looked as if he were one of them.

  He tested Bingham’s door. It was locked, and though he still had his lock pick set—Gayal and his captors hadn’t taken it from him, likely because it would’ve done him no good in his cell—he couldn’t get into Bingham’s home. The protections were too stout. He made his way along the street, turning down the alley, and slipped to the locked back door, which he also tried picking open.

  Ty straightened, stuffing the lock pick set back into his pocket and surveying the alley. He wasn’t going to be able to get to Bingham.

  What about Olivia?

  As much as it pained him, he did want to know what happened to her. She didn’t deserve captivity any more than the rest of them. And for that matter, he did want to know if she had managed to get out of the palace grounds before he and Eastley had gotten captured. He knew she wouldn’t have been able to talk her way out of her own capture—or flirt, or seduce, or use any other technique that Bingham had taught her to get out of it. She would’ve been held in prison no differently than Ty and Eastley.

  But Gayal and Roson James had not mentioned her.

  Which suggested she had gotten away.

  That should reassure him. And if he knew Olivia better, he could go to her and ask about the details, find out whether she was in any danger, but he didn’t even know where she lived.

  It was one more thing she’d kept from him.

  A business transaction.

  That was what she had called it.

  It hurt more now than it should have. Then again, when had he ever really been able to trust somebody in the city? The last time had been his parents before they had gone. Ever since then, he had been on his own. He had tried trusting his brother, but Albion had been so devoted to the priesthood that he hadn’t been able to offer Ty anything. Maggie had tried to earn his trust, but she wasn’t willing to disrupt her business on his behalf, regardless of how much she wanted to help him. Bingham had brought him in—his ties to Ty’s mother were enough to convince Bingham to pull Ty into his line of work—but it wasn’t as if Bingham cared about him. Eastley was something of a friend, but also a competitor. And Olivia had made him think that he might finally have somebody he could trust.

  Of course she would make him feel that way. She was skilled at what she did.

  He breathed out. Three days.

  He wasn’t even sure where to start. How could he find the egg in the city?

  He could run. He had given quite a bit of thought to that after Gayal had made the agreement with him, leaving him in the cell, as if to contemplate his decision, but in that time, he had not actually come to a decision. It should be a simple one. Save himself. But Eastley was captured because of him. They might not be the best of friends, but he was something of a friend. And Ty wasn’t about to leave somebody behind the way he had been left behind.

  Three days.

  That thought continued to stick with him.

  He made his way toward his home. It wasn’t much. It was small, mostly because he had wanted to hoard any extra wealth he had managed to accrue while in the city, but he had wanted something nice for himself. It was his way of allowing himself a certain luxury. He hadn’t been able to afford anything in the newer section of the city, so he’d bought a small home in one of the older sections, where the buildings were made out of old lava rock. It made them almost impenetrable, which benefited Ty to a certain extent.

  Gayal had come to his home.

  She had taken his coin. He didn’t know if she had secured all of it, but he knew she had taken some. He had made a point of staggering them throughout the baseboards of his home, trying to conceal them. If somebody found one pocket of coins, they hopefully wouldn’t find others.

  He wandered around until he reached his neighborhood. Surprisingly, he smelled the aroma of food from a bakery and nearby tavern, suggesting that people had not yet abandoned this part of the city. Maybe they were some of the faithful who believed the Flame would provide, much like Albion did.

  When Ishantil trembled again, Ty snorted at the thought. The Flame was not going to provide anything other than a brutal, flaming death. As he approached his home, he watched the street, trying to determine whether there would be anybody following him. He hadn’t seen anything as he made his way through the city, so he didn’t think he had been followed, but he wouldn’t have been terribly surprised if he had been.

  His home was tucked in against neighboring buildings, and he had gotten to know some of his neighbors well enough that he worried about them. He thought of Henry and Mary, an older couple who lived next door and had been kindly to him, even sharing a meal with him from time to time, thinking he needed a helping hand. He hadn’t the heart to tell them he had more than enough money to afford his home and any food he might want, along with the luxury of the wine he often brought back to his home. He had shared that meal. There were others along the street like Henry and Mary, people who had lived in the city for their entire lives, and all of them were genuine, warm people.

  His own door was faded brown, long overdue for repainting. Most of his neighbors made a point of keeping up their houses, and Ty knew he should do a better job of it, but he thought there was a benefit in keeping his home looking a little more rundown than the others. The door was closed, and he supposed he should thank Gayal for not leaving it open.

  He stepped inside.

  It was dark. He picked his way toward the table near the door, finding his lantern and getting it glowing softly. His normally neat home was in disarray. Tables were upended, chairs were lying on their sides, and the cupboards had been opened, their contents dropped to the ground. Pots lay in a pile. Pottery had shattered.

  He sighed. It would take him a long time to clean all of this up.

  He started laughing. He knew it was a sign of madness, but here he was, with Ishantil about to explode, and he was thinking about cleaning up so he could stay?

  Gayal—and likely the king’s men she’d brought with her—had no qualms about destroying everything in his home. Then again, this was his home. Maybe picking it up would help him think. Find the egg. Get Eastley. Learn what Gayal
might be able to tell him about his parents. Then get out of the city.

  He set to work picking up his home. He started with the tables and chairs, then moved to the cupboards, stacking items back in there. Several of his wine bottles had shattered on the ground, leaving stains that looked like blood, though if that was all that stained the floorboards, then so be it. He swept up as much as he could, then started laughing again.

  What am I doing?

  That thought persisted. He kept trying to get back into a routine, but why?

  He went to the back room, which he had feared doing—maybe it was more avoidance, rather than anything else, that had kept him from coming back here. Having seen what Gayal had taken, he knew what he would find, at least in part. He feared how much she would’ve uncovered.

  One of the floorboards had been pried up, and he could see that it rested at a strange angle. That must’ve been the one that Gayal had found. That would’ve been mostly silvers.

  He moved to one of the corners. Sliding his hand carefully along the edge, he propped up the floorboard. Reaching inside, he found a stack of coins. Ty breathed out in relief. They hadn’t found all of it. He made his way around the home, checking each of the floorboards under which he had stacked money, and in each section, he found the coins he’d hidden.

  As far as he could tell, Gayal had only taken a dozen or so silvers. That wasn’t enough to make a huge difference. He probably should have converted those to gold a long time ago, anyway, but had not.

  Ty took a moment to place the coins back in their hiding spots and smooth out the floorboards, then he headed out to the main part of the house. He should gather his coins, but not yet. He would take them when he finally departed the city. They would be part of his collection to restart.

  Three days.

  The thought made it difficult for him to focus on anything else. It was all he could do to keep it from overwhelming him.

  He looked around his home. He wouldn’t have much longer here. He pulled open the door, looking up at Ishantil and watching the glowing light in the darkness. He allowed himself a few moments of desperation, a few moments of worry, thinking he might not find the egg after all, but he would give it all he could.

  As much as he hated to admit it, the smart move would be to simply leave. And he could. He trusted himself in the jungle, and suspected he would be able to slip past any Dragon Touched who might try to keep him from escaping.

  The challenge was whether he could live with himself if he were to do so.

  Ty didn’t think he could.

  Eastley depended on him. He pushed away the fear, the thoughts of panic, and made a decision: it was time to get to work.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Ty leaned against the outside of Bingham’s shop. It was early morning and he was still tired, so he found himself drifting in and out while he lingered, determined to find Bingham. It was possible that Bingham had already left the city, but Ty suspected he had not. He had peeked into the windows, noticing the obsidian sculptures—both fake and real—were still there, on display. Ty would have expected Bingham to bring those with him if he had gone anywhere, as he prized them almost as much as Ty’s mother had.

  He had been there for the better part of an hour and had told himself he would wait until dawn before going anywhere else. Anything later than that meant he might not find Bingham, and it might be too late for any answer he wanted. He would have to begin working on his own. Ty had contacts in the city, or he had them, but with everything that had been going on—all of the explosions and eruptions—he no longer knew if his contacts would be reliable. It made it difficult for him to know who he could go to for help. Not only that, but having been captured and imprisoned for as long as he was, he no longer knew who remained.

  So he waited.

  If Bingham was still in the city, he would return. Ty believed that.

  He had no idea about Olivia.

  Maybe it would be better for her to have gone. Ty had little reason to doubt that she would have any difficulty getting out of the city. She could have easily flirted her way into one of those caravans.

  He remembered when he had first seen her. Bingham had introduced them a few years after Ty had started working with him. She was a new recruit. Ty was to help her as much as possible. He was younger then, barely more than a boy, and had been immediately taken by how attractive she was—her quick smile, the way the sunlight sparkled in her eyes, and her easy laugh.

  He had always liked her laugh.

  There was one night when he had been waiting for Bingham in the shop and Olivia had come in, surprising him. She looked so innocent and demure, which Ty learned was all part of her act. When she saw him, she frowned.

  Olivia tucked her red hair back, pressing it beneath her shirt. “I was supposed to meet him tonight. He told me we were going to… I suppose it doesn’t matter.”

  “What were you going to do?”

  “He told me not to share with anyone.”

  Ty smiled to himself, thinking that very typical of Bingham. He motioned to the inside of the shop. “You can come in and take a seat.”

  “If Bingham isn’t here, I’m not so sure I should.”

  “Why not?”

  Olivia twisted the fabric of her dress, looking down at the ground with her pale blue eyes. She really was pretty. “He wants me to be careful, especially with those who come to the shop.”

  “Even with me?” He wasn’t sure if Bingham had shared anything about him with Olivia, but he had been working with Bingham longer than most.

  She watched Ty for a moment. “Well…”

  He wouldn’t have any reason to pit Olivia against Ty, other than the fact that he might have wanted to make sure Olivia listened to him rather than to Ty. It would be one way to maintain his authority. It could also be a training technique. Only, when Ty had been learning from him, there had been no similar techniques. He had learned to trust others who worked with Bingham, and had no reason not to.

  “What does he have you working on these days?” Ty asked.

  “Ty—”

  “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, but I can tell you what it was like for me when I was first started working with Bingham, if that would help you.” Ty had been a bit younger than Olivia when he had started. “He worked with me on all aspects of what he needed from me—picking locks, sneaking, and even reading people,” he said. “I learned to watch for certain signs that somebody might be looking to double-cross me.”

  “You think I am?”

  Ty shook his head. “I don’t think anything about you.”

  “You don’t,” Olivia said. She had a hard time concealing her disappointment.

  Ty smiled at her. “You’re going to have to do a better job at hiding your emotions, especially if you are going to continue working with Bingham. You’re like an open book. Your emotions flash across your face. When you take jobs, you need to be able to conceal them, or even better, make people believe you have a different emotion than you actually have. Coming across as neutral works most of the time, but sometimes you want people to believe you are feeling one way when you are feeling another.”

  “I thought the job involved breaking in and taking things.”

  “Most of the time, it does, but there are other aspects of the job,” Ty said. “When I first connected with Bingham, I had to travel through the city with him.”

  “He’s had me do the same,” Olivia said.

  Ty looked at her. Olivia was probably in her mid-teens and quite pretty with her red hair, round blue eyes, and full lips. Ty had seen how men reacted to her and knew Olivia would have an easier time than Ty at finding certain things. That was one of Bingham’s lessons. Use what the gods provided.

  “When he has you wandering with him, he wants you to watch the people around you. See how they react. See if you can influence their reactions.”

  “He told me to watch, but he didn’t tell me about the rest.”

 
“He doesn’t want to tell you what to do. He wants you to come up with it on your own.”

  “It would be easier if he just told me what he wanted from me.”

  Ty smiled. “I thought the same thing.”

  “What else did he have you do?” she asked.

  “He let me sit in with him while he was bargaining. Sometimes in the shop, sometimes elsewhere for other things he was out purchasing, but always with the intention of trying to learn.”

  She leaned forward. Some of the nerves seemed to have faded, though not completely. “What did you learn?”

  “I learned Bingham rarely lost the upper hand.” Ty shook his head. Even in his own interactions with Bingham, Ty rarely got the best of him. There were only a few times when Bingham had overpaid, and most of the time, Ty had thought he did it as a favor to him, buying sculptures that were probably not worth nearly as much as he believed them to be, and occasionally purchasing one of the dragon remnants that had no warmth left in it, which suggested the power within it was spent. “Keep watching him, and eventually you’ll see that even Bingham has particular traits you can use.”

  “What are they?”

  Ty smiled. “If I told you, then I couldn’t use them.”

  “I’m not sure this is the right line of work for me anyway,” Olivia said.

  “It’s not for everybody,” Ty said.

  “How did you get caught up in it?”

  Ty took a deep breath. “I was young. My parents disappeared. We lived outside the city—”

  “Closer to the capital?”

  Ty regarded her for a moment before answering. “In the jungle,” he said.

  Olivia’s eyes widened. “I didn’t know anybody still lived in the jungle.”