“More or less. I haven’t decided what I’ll do with the information yet. Like I was saying, I’m thinking of selling the paper, what’s left of it. I’m tired of Stumps.”
Since he didn’t seem upset by his father’s death, Amaranthe wondered if his malaise was a result of some other interpersonal relationship. “You might take a vacation. Go off somewhere with a pretty girl.”
Deret grunted. “I would ask if you were offering your own company, but I understand you returned to the city with your dark shadow still attached.”
“Yes, I was thinking more of Suan. Are you and she still on... good terms?”
Deret grimaced and took another drink. “I haven’t seen her much since the funeral. At the time, I thought... well, let’s just say that I think she was only looking for someone to stand between her and your friends in that factory last winter. She knew she was a prisoner and that she needed someone to protect her. She decided I could be that someone. For a time.”
“Ah. And the girl you spoke of when we were blowing our way out of this basement?” Amaranthe pointed toward the floor.
“You mean the girlfriend I made up so you wouldn’t think I was a castrated bull without any prospects?”
“Er, possibly?”
Deret set the bottle on the desk, propped his elbow next to it, and leaned his head into his hand. “It hasn’t been a good winter for me.”
Indeed, he appeared as weary as Colonel Starcrest. “Perhaps you can come to the dinner party Maldynado is planning. It’s designed to get... a couple of young people together, but I imagine he could talk some extra women into coming along. You might have fun.”
“There’s a man-eating plant devouring the city, and Maldynado is planning a dinner party?”
“Yes,” Amaranthe said. “Does this surprise you?”
“Not really.”
“You’ll think about coming?”
“Assuming we’re all alive at the end of the week, maybe.” Deret clinked a fingernail against the side of the brandy bottle. “Amaranthe, you haven’t met my mother, but she’s a strong, proud warrior-caste lady and doesn’t know my father was... friendly with so many other women. She’s been harping on my brothers and me—mostly me, because I live in the city—to avenge my father’s death. I don’t know that I’d go that far, but I would like to know what happened, so I can tell her that much at least. Do you know, if it wasn’t Starcrest, who did kill him?”
Amaranthe realized she might once again be in a position to trade information with him. She had intended to ask about the priests, simply as a friend, but perhaps a trade would be more effective. If he didn’t know what she needed to know, specifically who was in charge over there, he might feel obligated to find out, and it sounded like he was in a better position to do so than she...
“I’ll tell you what I know on that front if you agree to help me find out who the lead priest is in that organization.”
With his head still in his palm, Deret gazed thoughtfully at her. “Do you truly know what happened there?”
“Largely by unforeseen circumstance, I was downstairs in Sauda Starcrest’s house when it all happened. Sicarius chased the assassin back to her lair.”
“Her lair? Interesting.”
“Yes.” Amaranthe smiled and held out her palm, inviting him to take a turn at sharing information.
“I should have known you didn’t come here because you missed my company.”
“I did wish to offer my condolences on your father’s death, though... it’s true I might not have made it by quite so soon if I hadn’t been hoping you knew more than the military intelligence office in regard to this organization. You journalists seem particularly fine at ferreting out information.”
“I’ll accept that as a compliment, because I haven’t been getting many from women lately, but I think the intel fellows have things covered fairly well. They’ve got an informant working at the Gazette, so I don’t know much they don’t.”
“They do?” Amaranthe asked. “How did you find out?”
“I wouldn’t have except that he felt guilty about my father’s death and told me he had been keeping the soldiers apprised of my father’s goings on. Apparently his dalliance with that Forge woman left people suspicious of him. I read between the lines that I’m not entirely free of suspicion, either.” He pushed a hand through his hair. “I need to get out of this city.”
“If you sold the newspaper, you could hand these burdens to someone else, it’s true. But you’re not that much older than I am, still young enough to appreciate a challenge and want to do something important with your life, I should think. Running a solid, reliable newspaper that refuses to be influenced by outside parties... that would be a noble calling.”
“Hm. Isn’t settling down and starting a family a noble calling too? I’ve been thinking about that of late, which is odd, since I have no one to settle down with, but... if I did, I would hate to be spending sixteen hours a day at work. This isn’t an easy job, even for the owner. Especially for the owner.”
“You need to hire a good manager and delegate some of the work to underlings. Such as that fine fellow who’s getting paid by Colonel Starcrest as well as by your coffers. A man getting paid twice really should be doing twice the work, don’t you think?”
Deret smirked at this idea, though he shook his head in the end. “I’m not the type to delegate everything and ask someone to work harder than I do.”
“You wouldn’t delegate everything, just enough so that you could have time to do that which you love. Such as pursuing a fine woman at Maldynado’s dinner party.”
“Dear ancestors, I can only imagine who he would set me up with.” Deret chuckled and took a drink—a smaller sip this time—from the bottle. He shook his head wryly—or maybe ruefully—at the label, then paused, his brow crinkled. “Did you say Colonel Starcrest? Not President Starcrest?”
“Yes, you didn’t know he was running the intelligence department now?” Amaranthe was surprised how much Deret didn’t know about what was going on with the president. She should have read some of the papers before coming by, assuming he would have useful information. Though, to be fair, she was living inside the hotel and sitting in on meetings with the Starcrests, a privilege nobody at the newspaper would have.
“No. I thought it was still Colonel Alpinecrest, though it makes sense that a new ruler—new president—would bring in new staff. Besides, I heard Alpinecrest was getting his pockets padded by Forge at one point.” Deret rubbed his chin. “Colonel Starcrest. Huh. He’s definitely kept quiet about that. I wonder how many of his informants even know who they’re dealing with.”
“Are you familiar with him? I had never heard of him before my return to the city.”
“I don’t know him well, but I covered the story of the border infiltrations ten, no that was almost fifteen years ago. It was before I went off to the military academy; I used to help my father at the paper after school.” Deret grimaced, yet managed to look nostalgic at the same moment. Remembering better times for the family?
“Border infiltrations?”
“Yes, the major in charge of patrolling the southern border between us and Kendor was shot by a sniper. Captain Daksaron Starcrest ended up in charge because he was the ranking officer until Command sent out someone new, but they were dealing with more than the expected few smugglers and technology thieves that week. Kendorian shamans had concocted a virus that they were trying out down there, figuring there would be few witnesses. Well, they managed to kill a few of our patrollers, but they also had an accident and infected everyone in one of their own towns near the border. Damon Mokk. Do you remember hearing about that?”
Amaranthe shook her head. Deret was a few years older than she, so she would have only been a kid at the time. Following the newspapers hadn’t been a big concern for her then. Of course, she had been too busy vacationing to keep up with them lately too...
“It was one of those ugly no-win military situations yo
u hope you never get stuck in.” Deret massaged his leg, perhaps remembering his own no-win military situation. “Dak Starcrest chose to go in and try to help the people of Damon Mokk. What exactly happened, I don’t know. The minutes of the military trial were never shared publicly, and you would need a high security clearance to get a look at those records. What we at the Gazette were able to piece together was that he helped save the town, but he lost a number of his men in the process, men who wouldn’t have been at risk if he hadn’t chosen to cross the border and leave his post. Hundreds of lives were saved, but...” Deret shrugged. “If it had been a Turgonian town, it would have been a different story, but Emperor Raumesys wasn’t the type to order soldiers across borders on humanitarian missions.”
“No, he probably would have cheered, knowing the Kendorians had killed their own people in their attempt to harm us.”
“Just so,” Deret said. “Dak was demoted to lieutenant, and he switched from infantry to intelligence. I don’t know whether that was his own choice, or if someone wanted to make him disappear. Either way, the average person didn’t hear about him again. I crossed paths with him once shortly before I was discharged and again here in Stumps a couple of years ago. The first time, he was coming back from a mission in Nuria. The second, Kendor. He’s been a field agent, I believe, spying and performing whatever missions the throne needed accomplished covertly. I got the impression he was good at his job and had refused promotions that would have meant desk duty. Sitting in an office in the bowels of that hotel must be driving him crazy. I doubt he would have accepted that assignment from anyone else but his famous uncle.”
A spy. If Amaranthe had passed Colonel Starcrest on the street, she would not have guessed that, maybe because he looked more like an infantry thug with that missing eye. Still, that might make him an ideal person to gather information. Those who didn’t know his last name might underestimate him, based on appearance alone.
“I had wondered...” Amaranthe stopped herself before mentioning the snitch; that wasn’t information that should be shared openly. “I guess I was wondering how loyal he was to his uncle. He seems... bitter and resentful.”
“Oh, he probably is. He’s been in Rias Starcrest’s shadow his whole life, even when Rias was out of the empire—and supposedly dead—for twenty years. That incident at Damon Mokk was one of a handful of commands that didn’t go that well for him. He was—is—smart, but you got the impression he was trying too hard to be the hero his uncle had been, and he didn’t quite have the same tactical savvy to pull off the impossible the way Rias so often did.”
The front door banged open before Amaranthe could ask further questions.
Figures in green robes streamed inside, pistols in their hands. Amaranthe leaped from her seat to crouch behind the desk. Deret jumped to his feet, knocking over his swordstick, and cursing as he almost lost his balance. He caught himself on the desk. Amaranthe pulled him down beside her so they would have some cover, albeit not nearly as much as they needed against... eight, no, ten people spreading out in the entryway. Their hoods were all up, their faces hidden by shadows. They were all armed.
Amaranthe had pulled her sword out as she ducked behind the desk, but it would do precious little against men with pistols twenty feet away.
“Deret Mancrest,” one of the figures said, his deep voice resonating as if it were echoing from the walls of a cave. “You will come with us.”
“I’d rather not,” Deret said. “I already attended the meeting tonight. The little sardine snacks weren’t appealing enough to make me want to return again on the same day.”
“Can we get out the back?” Amaranthe whispered, thinking of the door behind the presses as well as the unofficial basement exit they had made the last time she visited.
A clang came from the shadows in the back, and a cool draft whispered into the room. A moment later, six more robed figures strode into the light from behind.
“I think not,” Deret murmured.
The desk offered no cover from these men, and they raised pistols as soon as they spotted Deret and Amaranthe.
“You will come with us,” the speaker repeated.
Amaranthe didn’t see many possible escape routes and none that wouldn’t involve dodging fire. She admitted a certain curiosity as to where these people wanted to take Deret anyway. If she went along, she might find the leader she sought that very night.
Deret sighed and stood up, spreading his hands. “It seems I have no choice. Though I would appreciate it if you left this woman behind—”
Amaranthe elbowed him in the side as she stood up, also spreading her hands. “I’ll not have you carted off by these strange men, never to be seen again,” Amaranthe said. “Where you go, I go.”
Deret glowered at her but didn’t argue.
“Very sweet,” the speaker said, the deepness of his voice doing nothing to muffle his sarcasm.
His voice sounded familiar, and Amaranthe thought it might belong to the priest who had called down the lightning. If so, would he recognize her? She hadn’t done anything to stand out at that gathering. Like everyone else, she had been too busy gaping at the lightning strike and the charred plant.
The robed men at the back of the room shuffled forward until they were close enough to prod Deret and Amaranthe in the backs with their pistols. The proximity of those weapons made Amaranthe’s shoulder blades twitch—and her instincts call out for her to do something—but she forced herself to do nothing more than walk in the direction the men indicated. She expected them to lead her and Deret out the front door, but they must have deemed that too public a route, even with the city largely abandoned. She and Deret were poked and prodded toward the back door, where Amaranthe had a chance to see that the floor had indeed been repaired. The big press she had hidden behind was gone—either disassembled and moved to the ridge location or maybe it had been smashed beyond repair when it had fallen into the basement. Poor Deret had inherited a mess. Even if he had helped create that mess, it had been her crazy idea that had prompted him into that destructive route. She told herself that his father had given them little choice, though she could definitely understand why he might want to take a break from the family business.
Outside on the loading dock, Amaranthe grew a little nervous when two of the men hopped down and opened a storm drain cover. This was a more secretive route than she had imagined. Stars gleamed between the clouds, and she eyed the rooflines, hoping to catch a dark figure crouched up there, spying on them. But she had left Sicarius hunting his own assassin. Whatever trouble she had gotten herself into tonight, she would have to get out of on her own.
Chapter 20
Tea didn’t revive and energize one as effectively as coffee, and Tikaya couldn’t believe the latter wasn’t a popular drink in Turgonia. She wondered if it would be in her prerogative as a president’s wife to request that shiploads of it be regularly imported to the capital to rejuvenate her—and Rias’s staff, of course. As soon as she caught herself wondering that, she grumbled at herself to focus, and returned to the five thousandth report she had gone over. It was probably more like the five hundredth, but it felt like the five thousandth.
Outside of Dak’s office, the sounds of chairs scuffing, papers shuffling, and throats being cleared had dwindled. She wasn’t sure what time it was but knew that most of the staff had stayed late, so it had to be later yet. She rubbed the back of her neck and stood for a moment, giving her rump a rest from the hard wooden chair. She added a few calf and side stretches to loosen muscles tight from disuse. Though she shifted about, she didn’t take her eyes from the reports. At least the one she was perusing now was legible. Mostly. Only one in four military intelligence officers seemed capable of passing a simple penmanship test. Tikaya couldn’t bring herself to delegate reading them to anyone else, not being certain who she could trust, but there was so much chaff in the reports that she worried she was wasting her time. Almost worse were the interesting snippets among the chaff, fo
r they could distract her, leading her down roads that eventually became dead ends.
Since it had grown so quiet in the outer office, when a knock came at the door, it startled her into tripping over the chair and falling to the floor. That was what she got for doing calf stretches while reading. When Dak walked in, he found her scrambling to her feet. Tikaya groped for the chair and straightened it.
“Good evening,” she said. “I, ah, wasn’t expecting company.”
“Oh?” Dak eyed the section of floor she had vacated, the “what sort of floor exercises do you do when you are expecting company?” going unspoken.
Tikaya flushed, feeling like an idiot. She wished she could show him some piece of brilliance she had discovered, something that would justify any odd research habits.
“Here are a handful of names.” Dak tossed a paper on the desk. “I’ve learned some of the information the snitch has been credited with relaying to others, and these are the only people who would have had access to everything.”
“Oh?” Tikaya picked up the sheet. If she could simply skim the reports for mentions of those names, she would save a lot of time. Though... it was the information about the priests that she specifically sought here. She couldn’t abandon that search. She read the short list. “Your name is on here.”
“Yeah.” Dak picked up a pen and wrote on a notepad on the corner of the desk. “Watch for this name too. Your friends found him dead upstairs. I think he might have been blackmailed, but I can’t be positive he wasn’t involved in something duplicitous of his own accord.”
“Avigart?” Tikaya had seen something with that name on it recently. What had it been?
“Yes.” Dak tilted his head. “Have you found anything interesting?”
He sounded genuinely curious. Maybe even hopeful.
“So far... I feel like I’ve been wasting my time. And yours. I haven’t found anything.” She straightened her own notepad and picked up her pencil; she wouldn’t get anywhere if she allowed herself to be distracted.
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