“I’m very certain!” Kodyn growled. “I saw him again in the crowd on the Keeper’s Tier the day of Councilor Angrak’s assassination. I just couldn’t place where I’d seen him until now. You were there at the palace that night. You have to have seen him.”
“I did.” Ennolar nodded. “But even if I hadn’t been there, I would know of whom you speak. His name is Groebus, and he is one of Madani’s toadies.”
“Toad is right!” Kodyn snorted.
Ennolar narrowed his eyes. “Groebus is a minor priest of the Necroseti. He is renowned for his sharp intellect, on par with some of the brightest in our own temple, but his physical limitations preclude him from ever rising high in the Keeper’s Priesthood.”
“Which means he’s enough of a nobody that the Keeper’s Council wouldn’t hesitate to use him as a go-between with Hallar’s Warriors,” Kodyn said. “No one would think to look twice at a cripple, especially for something this big.”
Ennolar inclined his head. “And that fact makes him all the more devious an opponent. He can operate in plain sight, cloaked in the same anonymity of a servant or beggar. He appears as just one more of the Keeper’s Priests when in reality he is the Council’s link to Hallar’s Warriors.”
“So we go snatch him up!” Kodyn clenched his fist. “All we’ve got to do is find him and there’s no way he can outrun us.”
“Finding him might not be the problem.” Aisha spoke up now. “He is a Keeper’s Priest, after all. He’s most likely with his master in the Hall of the Beyond.”
Kodyn’s expression mirrored Aisha’s disappointment. The Hall of the Beyond, the temple of the Necroseti, was only marginally less secure than the Palace of Golden Eternity. They’d have to use the Serenii tunnels just to enter the temple, and it would take all the Mistress’ luck for them to locate Groebus within the enormous complex.
“Perhaps.” Ennolar’s expression grew pensive. “Though there is a chance that he will be in the Council’s offices in the palace. Minor priests of the Necroseti are often given clerical tasks that are best handled from within the palace, rather than the Hall of the Beyond. The Royal Records and the Library of Shalandra are both in the palace complex, and the upkeep of both fall on the Necroseti.”
Hope sprang to life within Aisha. They’d take even the smallest chance if it meant an end to the violence and chaos that gripped Shalandra.
“Let’s do it!” Kodyn’s jaw clenched. “Let’s snatch up the bastard and haul him back here. One dose of that potion should get him spilling his guts.” With a savage grin, he drew a dagger. “Or, steel always has a way of loosening tongues.”
The sight of Kodyn’s anger filled Aisha with concern. He had always been a passionate young man—that was one of the things that had drawn her to him—but that passion had distorted to anger over the last few days. He’d watched his friends hurt and threatened, nearly died multiple times, and been chased through the city. He carried a heavy burden of regret over Arch-Guardian Suroth’s death.
He had begun down a dangerous path, one that would lead him into darkness if he continued. If he couldn’t find his way out, Aisha needed to guide him. Anger, guilt, and hatred would get him killed.
“That will certainly prove easier said than done,” Ennolar signed. “If he is within the palace, he will be surrounded by his fellow Necroseti, a handful of Temple Guards, and the Indomitables patrolling the corridors. They will not simply let you stroll into their offices without question.”
Kodyn shrugged. “We’ll figure it out.” He sounded nonchalant, but a determined anger edged his words. Aisha knew him well enough to recognize his stubborn streak; if he couldn’t talk or sneak his way into the office, he’d turn to steel. That decision, born of fury and frustration, could have dire consequences.
“Yes, we will,” she said. “The two of us will go after him together. And Evren, if he’s up for it.”
Kodyn had made up his mind to go after this Groebus, and trying to talk him out of it would be as futile as bailing a sinking boat with a wooden fork. Aisha’s only chance of keeping him out of trouble would be to channel his tenacity into something that included a semblance of forethought and planning. Evren’s cautious nature could help to temper Kodyn’s anger-driven reckless streak.
“The only question is how we’re going to get there.” Kodyn’s brow furrowed. “There are a few too many people outside the temple for us to just stroll out the front door.”
Ennolar shot Uryan a glance that held a wealth of meaning, though its significance was lost on Aisha. A silent exchange passed between them, punctuated by Uryan’s sharp shake of her head and Ennolar’s nod.
The bald Secret Keeper turned back to them. “We can offer you another way,” he said in the hand language. “But not lightly. You already know too many of our goddess’ secrets—more than any man or woman outside our temple’s walls ever should. Were the circumstances not so dire…”
His brow furrowed and his hands fell silent. For a long moment, he eyed them with a wariness bordering on suspicion. Finally, his face hardened and his fingers spoke once more. “But first, I will have the truth of the resonator stone from you.”
Kodyn looked taken aback. “What?”
The muscles of Ennolar’s jaw worked. “The stone that gave you access to the palace, after you fled the Heartspring with Desenne.”
Kodyn’s face tightened, lines forming around his mouth and eyes.
“Where did you come by it?” A hint of anger cracked Ennolar’s expression. “Did you steal it, too, from among Suroth’s things after his death?”
Aisha drew in a breath. There was no mistaking the fury in the way Ennolar’s fingers formed the word “steal”, as if they were pickpockets that had lifted it from an unwary mark. After all they’d done to aid the Secret Keepers, the accusation stung.
Kodyn bared his teeth in a snarl. “No.” For a heartbeat, Aisha worried he’d give voice to the angry words that formed on his lips. To her relief, he managed to control his temper. “Suroth entrusted the stone to me personally,” he said, his words tight and clipped. “Ask Briana. She was there when he gave it to me, the afternoon before…” He swallowed and a hint of his anger returned. “…before he was murdered in the Gatherer attack.”
Aisha knew him well enough to recognize the edge of guilt in his words, the shadow that flashed in his eyes. She’d tried in vain to help him understand that the blame for Suroth’s death didn’t rest with him. He carried the remorse anyway, as was his nature. And it only fanned the fires of his anger toward the ones truly responsible.
“For what purpose?” Wary suspicion showed plain on Ennolar’s face. “Such an item would not be given to just anyone, especially not some youths he just met.”
At the words “some youths”, Kodyn’s jaw muscles clenched and relaxed. He looked as if he’d just been slapped. “We had just rescued his daughter and returned her to him,” he snapped. “That’s more than can be said for you Secret Keepers.”
Aisha hid a wince. Careful, Kodyn, before you go too far. The Secret Keepers weren’t known for their forbearance, and Evren had already strained Ennolar’s magnanimity to its limits.
Ennolar scowled and Uryan’s sharp face pulled into a sharp grimace. “Guard your tongue,” her fingers said, the anger punctuated by the menace in her scowl. “And remember where you stand.”
Kodyn opened his mouth, and Aisha could see the retort forming on his lips. She quickly spoke before he could. “The Arch-Guardian instructed Kodyn to give it to the Black Widow.”
Kodyn turned a shocked expression on her. Though the light of betrayal in his eyes hurt, Aisha knew she’d done the right thing. Kodyn had kept the secret not because it was the right choice, but out of guilt for his part in Suroth’s death. When it came to dealing with the Secret Keepers, sometimes a simple truth proved a far more effective bargaining tool than the most convincing, elaborate lie.
“The Black Widow?” Ennolar cocked an eyebrow. “Unlikely.”
&nbs
p; Uryan’s thin lips pressed together in a line so tight her mouth nearly disappeared. “The Arch-Guardian might have had his faults—” Her eyes darted to the far wall, the direction in which lay Briana’s room. “—but he would never betray or endanger the Pharus.” She turned to Ennolar. “He’s lying.”
“No he’s not!” Aisha allowed herself a modicum of anger at their suspicion. “Suroth warned Kodyn that ‘in the wrong hands, this can be used for truly terrible things.’ He knew exactly what he was doing, and he made a conscious decision to give it to the Black Widow.”
She’d only known the man for a day, but in that time, she’d come to see that he weighed and measured each action, deliberated carefully before making a move. Though she didn’t understand Suroth’s rationale for sending the resonator stone to the Black Widow, she knew he’d done so for a reason he deemed to be right.
“And before you go pointing fingers,” Kodyn said, his voice tight, and jabbed a finger at Ennolar, “remember that you are the one who gave up the map of the Serenii tunnels because the Black Widow asked you to.”
Ennolar’s face hardened. “On the Arch-Guardian’s orders, and against my better judgement.”
Kodyn and Aisha’s eyes widened.
“I spoke with Suroth an hour after you came to me with the Black Widow’s request,” Ennolar’s fingers said. “He instructed me to give it to you, said the time would come when you needed it. He was more right than he knew.” Sorrow softened his features and stooped his shoulders. “While I might not have agreed with his recruiting you to his battle with the Keeper’s Council, I understood it. But to give something with such power to the Black Widow…” He shook his head. “I simply cannot see it.”
“Neither can I.” Kodyn’s tone held a resigned edge. “And yet, that was his last instruction to me, so I followed it.”
Aisha wanted to reach out and comfort him, remind him once more that Suroth’s death wasn’t his fault. Yet now wasn’t the time. She determined to broach the subject with him again, soon.
Uryan’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. “But if, as you say, you followed his instructions, how is it that you still have the stone?”
Kodyn related the events of their last meeting with the Black Widow, ending with the assassination of the woman that had been the mouthpiece and façade for the real spymistress. “I haven’t had a chance to set another meeting with the Black Widow to deliver it.” He drew it out and stared down at it. “But now, I’m not sure I should give it to her. At least, not yet.” He closed his fist around the stone. “Not until we’re done with the Keeper’s Council.”
Ennolar and Uryan exchanged guarded glances.
“This stone got us into the palace,” Kodyn insisted, “and it can do so again. We can get in, snatch this Groebus, and get him out of there before anyone knows. By the time the Keeper’s Council finds out what happened to him, he’ll be back here, spilling his guts. I’m certain Suroth would have understood the necessity of our circumstances.”
Ennolar and Uryan looked at each other, and once again the silent communication flashed between them. After a moment, they both nodded.
“So be it,” Ennolar’s fingers said. “For now, the state of our city is dire enough that we must make certain…allowances.” He turned his palms upward, a gesture of grudging admittance. “Your assistance in the matter of the Heartspring has earned you a bit of latitude. But I warn you, the Mistress’ secrets always come at a price. Remember that, for we will speak of what you have seen and learned once the situation is resolved.”
Aisha cocked an eyebrow. Not quite a veiled threat, but bloody close. They had said something similar to Briana when she claimed sanctuary in the Temple of Whispers. The Secret Keepers wanted her to follow in her parents’ footsteps and swear service to the Mistress, though they had left the “or else” unspoken.
Kodyn, however, appeared unfazed. “Seems fair enough.” He actually grinned, that cocky smile of his he always adopted when using flippancy to mask his true feelings.
Ennolar’s mention of the Heartspring brought back memories of Thimara. For a moment, Aisha half-expected to feel the surge of heat within her veins, as always when she was near Uryan. Yet it never came. Thimara had passed from the world of the living to the land of the dead, to Pharadesi and peace forever more. She had fulfilled her mission of pointing them to the antidote for the poison killing the people of Shalandra. Her final action had been to sacrifice herself to save Kodyn’s life.
Yet she wasn’t completely gone. Though her spirit had passed on, the time she’d spent within Aisha had left an imprint. A trace of her emotions—her passion for knowledge, her fierce desire to uncover the truth of the Azure Rot, and, most of all, her love for the stern-faced Uryan—remained and would only dissipate in time.
If Thimara were still within Aisha, she would want to know the outcome of her research.
Aisha turned to Uryan. “How is the antidote to the Azure Rot coming?”
The Guardian nodded. “Well. Already our alchemists have deconstructed the alchemical structure of the poison we gathered from the Gatherers at the Heartspring and are even now creating a remedy that should cure the Azure Rot completely.” The stern angles of her face softened. “I don’t know how you managed to read Thimara’s scrawls, but in doing so, you saved many lives.”
Aisha ducked her head, warmth rising to her cheeks.
Ennolar frowned. “But perhaps you should know, that second wave of attackers were not Gatherers like the first group. Those men bore the same tattoos as the ones in young Briana’s room,” Ennolar said.
“Hallar’s Warriors,” Kodyn growled. “Militants trying to restore Shalandra to the days of Hallar.”
Ennolar’s face soured. “Mistress forbid that we ever return to such barbaric times!”
Lady Callista had told them about the brutal, bloody justice system of Hallar’s day: everyone with a grievance could take up arms and battle in the Crucible, with the crowds determining if the loser deserved to survive the confrontation. A ruthless, barbaric practice long since eradicated. Why anyone would want to bring that back was beyond her. But the ways of fanatics and zealots proved difficult for a sane person to understand.
“But it’s more than that.” Ennolar frowned, his expression a mixture of pensive and concerned. “They did not bear the same poison the Gatherers intended to pour into the Heartspring.”
Aisha’s brow furrowed. Two poisons? That made no sense. “What do you mean?”
“Instead of barrels, they carried glass bottles with an airtight seal.” Uryan actually seemed hesitant, uncertain. “When they saw they could not reach the Heartspring or flee the battle, they chose to shatter the bottles rather than letting us claim the poison.”
Kodyn cocked his head. “Why would they do that?”
“Because this poison degrades when it comes in contact with the air.” Ennolar drew a glass vial from within his robes and held it up to the light. A viscous liquid glowed lambent purple within. “This is, without a doubt, alchemy of the blackest sort, but because the poison has degraded, we cannot determine its true nature. All we have been able to determine is that it is a…”
Aisha didn’t recognize the word his hands formed. At her confused look, Ennolar spelled it out.
“Psychotropic?” The word seemed somehow familiar, yet she couldn’t place its meaning.
“A chemical that affects your mental state,” Ennolar explained. “It may cause hallucinations or could lead to severe and irreversible damage to the brain of those who take it. But without a viable sample, we cannot be certain.”
The explanation brought back the memory of where she’d heard the word before. Briana had used it to explain the effects of Whispering Lily.
Horror surged within her. Imbuka, the Ghandian Spirit Whisperer she’d met in the Foreign Quarter, had warned her of the effects of the potent plant. Whatever the men who carried it had planned, it couldn’t be good.
Chapter Eight
“Nechda?
”
The familiar word shattered something in the dam Issa had erected within her heart. The horror she’d felt at seeing the two bodies on the floor, the anger over the violence and bloodshed, and the fear for her grandparents’ safety all drained away at the voice she’d known all her life.
“S-Saba?” Her voice sounded so small, like the little girl he’d carried on his shoulders through the olive groves outside the city. Yet just seeing him standing there before her was enough to bring a flood of tears to her eyes. She wanted to throw herself into his arms and weep in relief and joy at finding him alive.
Alive! It seemed impossible. He had escaped the carnage unharmed. His presence meant her grandmother was safe as well—Saba would have died before letting any harm come to Savta.
Yet as her eyes drank in the sight of him, a part of Issa recoiled. He was the man she’d known for as long as she could remember—strong, tall, confident, quietly earnest—yet he seemed somehow…different. A stranger, no longer the simple Earaqi laborer, clad in the sweat, dust, and dirt of a day toiling in the fields. He stood clad head to toe in the spiked, segmented plate mail of a Keeper’s Blade. In his right hand, he held a huge flammard with its glistening flame-shaped blade of black Shalandran steel. He gripped the sword with the comfort of familiarity, as if it belonged there. Blood flecked his face and darkened his crimson Earaqi headband. He had been in battle…her calm, peaceful grandfather, in battle!
How? Her mind refused to grasp the truth evident before her eyes. He was a Keeper’s Blade? The fact simply didn’t register.
She tried to speak, to ask questions, but nothing came out. For a heartbeat, she stood in stunned silence, her mouth agape, words refusing to form in her mind.
“Get over the wall, quickly, nechda!” Nytano held out a mailed hand toward her, urgency written in his eyes. “You’ll be safe in—”
“Get them!” A roar drowned out her grandfather’s words. “Kill the Dhukari!”
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