by Joe Jackson
They didn’t make love; Kari wasn’t really in the mood. Her body was changing due to the pregnancy, just as it had the first time, and she knew her urges would come and go during the long months. Grakin was a patient and loving mate, though, and he was content simply to hold Kari and stroke her hair while they fell asleep in each other’s arms. Kari had made it home safely, and before she fell asleep with her mate, she prayed silently to Sakkrass and Zalkar, thanking them for watching over her.
Chapter XX – Settlements
Kari strode across the campus toward the administrative building. If she was planning to take Se’sasha to the place where her mother had nearly punched a hole through the dimensional barriers, there was paperwork that needed to be filled out first. Kari needed to make sure she left written details about what she was going to undertake, what the possible consequences were, and what the Order should do in case of betrayal or any other mishap. If it turned out that something went wrong when Kari and her family and friends were in this mysterious valley, the Order had to know what to expect and what steps to undertake to safeguard the campus and the kingdom.
The campus was still abuzz with having a syrinthian priestess staying on the grounds. It was no mystery that not one other hunter on the campus trusted Se’sasha, not even Erik or Ty. Kari couldn’t fault any of them; the syrinthians had been enemies of the rir people and all of Citaria for thousands of years, since their first attempted invasion on Terrassia during the Third Demon War. To have one show up on the campus now and claim to be a friend or ally simply wouldn’t convince anyone. Se’sasha and her people had a lot of work to do to earn peoples’ trust. Kari was confident they were willing to work to earn that trust, and she hoped her faith in them wouldn’t prove foolish.
Kari scouted the campus grounds for only a short while before she found Se’sasha. The syrinthian priestess had her people with her, and they were doing some stretching exercises on one of the less-used parks among the buildings. Se’sasha was emaciated, and it was even more apparent now that she was dressed in what Kari guessed was more traditional garb for her people. Her upper body had a wrap that covered her chest but left her belly and arms exposed, and she wore a skirt not all that unlike the one Kari remembered Sakkrass wearing in her dream. With how badly Se’sasha had been starved at Sekassus’ hands, though, she was even thinner than her companions: her breasts were nearly non-existent, and her hip bones protruded out in a way that left little doubt she’d been near death.
The syrinthians all turned their attention to Kari at her approach and bowed respectfully. Kari briefly considered saluting them, but then she simply nodded her head. The snake-people looked happy to be outside and getting some exercise after being cramped in the prison for several weeks. Some of them still appeared distrustful of Kari – which she found ironic – but several now looked at Kari as someone deserving of respect. She wasn’t sure if it had anything to do with the training they’d received while posing as cadets, but it didn’t really matter.
Kari approached Se’sasha, and Liria came forward to translate without even being asked. “Where does Lord Allerius have you staying? Are you still holed up inside the prison?”
“No, Lord Allerius was kind enough to have one of the barracks converted for us to stay in,” Liria said. “It is under posted guards and the doors were kept locked from the outside during the night, but it is comfortable and secure. We’re very appreciative of the favorable treatment we’re receiving, given what our people were sent here to do. We give you our word: we will be no further trouble to you.”
Kari nodded and Liria translated their words to the priestess. “I’m going to go speak with Amastri again: I want to make sure there isn’t anyone looking for you already. Is there anything you want me to ask or tell her?”
Se’sasha seemed to think on that for a minute, but then she shrugged. “Tell her I said thank you,” she answered through Liria. “She and her master may have done it for their own benefit, but their aid saved my life, and I should show the proper gratitude.”
Kari smiled and bid the syrinthians farewell, and though their return pleasantries were hesitant, they did say goodbye. Kari made her way as quickly as she could to the administrative office. She wanted to find out if Erik’s work had turned up any more syrinthians among those hunters out on patrol. Once she took care of that, she made her way to the Silver Chalice to meet with Amastri. The thought of all the walking ahead of her made her wish she could simply lie down for a while. She was definitely pregnant.
The Silver Chalice had only sparse clientele early in the afternoon. Its common room was bright but quiet, and smelled of whatever stew they had served for lunch. A couple of rir men were seated at the bar having a muffled conversation, and a human couple occupied one of the tables near the front windows. The windows were open, letting in the ever-warming late spring air and sunshine, and the couple’s conversation was lost on the breeze. Kari turned her attention to the opposite far corner, where Amastri was predictably seated.
The part-elven woman was drinking a cup of tea that whispered its steamy heat into the air between her and the man seated before her. Amastri’s eyes flicked to Kari once and then again, but she never paused in her discussion with the human traveler. The man looked like an adventurer at best or a vagrant at worst, but his back was to Kari and he never bothered to stop and look at her. Between his dusty overcoat and wide-brimmed hat, Kari couldn’t see much detail other than long brown hair. She didn’t want to intrude on or interrupt their discussion, so she made her way to the bar instead, leaving a fair distance between herself and the two rir men.
It occurred to her after a minute that she and her Order weren’t the only ones who came to Amastri looking for information or aid from her master. The thought of commoners making the mistake of striking deals with a demon king made Kari very uncomfortable. Her thoughts shifted sideways only slightly, and she considered that Erik’s summary confirmed that there were no more syrinthians among the Order. That relieved Kari on more than one level: not only did she not have to worry about the snake-folk infiltrators committing evil under the Order’s banner, but the investigators were now free to look into other things for Kari – things like Amastri and the elusive agent of Sekassus still at large.
She asked the barkeep for a glass of water while she waited for Amastri to conclude her business, and Kari turned to watch the part-elven woman while she sipped the drink. Kari wasn’t sure if anyone was even keeping an eye on Amastri since the death of Jason Bosimar; did the woman have free rein to do whatever she wished? Not while I’m in charge, Kari thought. As soon as she got back to the campus, she planned to set several investigators to keeping tabs not only on Amastri, but everyone that went to see the woman to discuss business. Kari wondered if the Duke knew about the not-quite-demoness living in his city, and whether he’d loan the Order some of his investigators and detectives to assist in keeping tabs on Amastri. It was unlikely the Order’s investigators alone could catch the woman doing anything she wasn’t supposed to, but she might not know the Duke’s men quite as well.
The dusty traveler rose from his seat at last and left without so much as a respectful nod or goodbye to Amastri, and Kari found that interesting. Amastri seemed to bring out the best and most polite side of everyone she spoke to, and Kari had little doubt that the part-elven woman would be flustered by the man’s rudeness. When the woman’s green, cat-like eyes turned back Kari’s way, the demonhunter nodded her head and kept eye contact. She wasn’t sure why she sought Amastri’s permission to go and speak with her, but the woman seemed to run her table at the Silver Chalice as if it was a private office. Strangely, Kari felt some odd sense of wanting to respect that, though she wasn’t exactly sure the thought was her own. It aroused her suspicions about the woman even more than they already were.
Amastri gestured amicably for Kari to come join her as if they were old friends. Kari moved over to the table, and Amastri waved casually toward the seat Kari had taken before
her trip to Mehr’Durillia. “Lady Vanador, please, have a seat,” she said. “It may do wonders for my mood to speak with someone who has some grasp of etiquette and decorum.” Kari sat down, and Amastri beckoned the barkeep over to warm up her tea. “Would you like some? Never have I had mint tea like they serve here.”
“No, thanks,” Kari said casually when the barkeep reached the table. He filled Amastri’s cup again and moved off with a polite bow of his head. Once he’d left, Kari got to the matter at hand. “I’ll be leaving to go retrieve your master’s payment soon, just like we bargained. I have to say, I’m pleasantly surprised by how thorough your master’s information was, but make no mistake – I am very angry that a young girl was sacrificed, and I wasn’t told beforehand.”
Amastri nodded her head ever so slightly, but her expression remained neutral. “This was expected, but consider that it is better that you be angry in victory than in defeat,” she said. A slight smile curled her upper lip and she added, “I must admit, I find your placing value on the life of a mallasti to be quite interesting, as does Her Majesty.”
Kari tried to keep any emotion from her face or her voice, but she tilted her head to the side and tried to read what Amastri was thinking. “Well, with Uldriana having told me that the mallasti aren’t demons, it’s even more aggravating than it would have been,” she said, willing to tip her hand a bit to the part-elven woman. She wanted to let King Koursturaux know what she thought and felt, but not in a way that would suggest Kari was looking to go make friends with any of the peoples of Mehr’Durillia. She imagined that might have been the very point: that Koursturaux wanted to get the Order to overbalance and do something that attracted the attention of all the kings. Kari was already wary of that, and was planning to take things very slowly.
“So already your eyes are being opened,” Amastri said, but the inflection in her voice made it difficult to tell if she was pleased or mocking Kari. “Perhaps in time, you will begin to understand that the price you paid for what you have received was quite small.”
Kari shook her head. “Not likely,” she said. “What does your master want with this sword, anyway? It’s not like I can go back on our deal, and there’s nothing I can do to stop her, so what does she want with Taesenus’ sword, really?”
Amastri shrugged her slender shoulders while she took a careful sip of her hot tea. “I honestly have no idea, Lady Vanador,” she said. “You know I am a negotiator for Her Majesty, but aside from knowing what she wants and what she offers, I know little of what her ultimate intentions are. And, of course, even if I did, that is not something I would share, particularly with…her enemies.”
She let that disconcerting, beautiful smile spread fully across her face, and Kari found it to be a trifle insulting. Kari kept her feelings to herself, though, and shrugged off the woman’s words. “So was your master pleased with the results of our work?” she asked. “I’m curious to know if there’s been any reaction…like whether King Sekassus has sent anyone to try to hunt down and kill Se’sasha. His people harried us all the way out of Sorelizar.”
Kari left out the parts about Turillia, the succubus, or the fact that they’d crossed into Si’Dorra and been followed; she was curious to see if Amastri would mention any of it first. The part-elven woman tilted her own head to the side. “Nothing that I have been made aware of; I would wager that if someone were being sent to kill Se’sasha, I would be alerted to it due to the danger it poses to me. I understand you are keeping Se’sasha and her people on your Order’s campus; that is not exactly a good tactical place for King Sekassus to make a move against his former high priestess, now is it? No, for the time being, I would wager that Se’sasha is safe, and if that is to change, I will surely know before anything happens.”
“And you’d tell me?” Kari prodded.
“I did not say that, Lady Vanador,” Amastri countered. “If you wish Her Majesty to put resources toward keeping Se’sasha safe, then that will require a separate bargain. Her Majesty has given you what you wanted, and now you are to give her what she wanted. There are no other benefits to this bargain for either of you.”
Kari nodded; that didn’t surprise her at all. “So your master is satisfied?”
“With the outcome of your work? Yes,” Amastri answered. She started to say more but stopped herself and sucked in her upper lip for a second. She shrugged and took a sip of her tea, and after settling the cup carefully in its saucer, Amastri raised her eyes to meet Kari’s evenly. “King Sekassus believes he can keep the syrinthian people under control by brute force, but the escape of their high priestess is going to cause ripples through their society for some time. The more stress and strife that piles upon King Sekassus on account of what you have done, the happier Her Majesty will be with your work.”
Kari nodded, satisfied with that, but before she could say anything else, Amastri added, “Keep something in mind when you think to come deal with me, Lady Vanador: I strike deals for Her Majesty, but King Koursturaux is ancient even by our peoples’ standards. She has dreams and goals that are older than your world, and given my relative youth among our peoples, I have not been, and am unlikely to be made privy to those dreams and goals. And if I, being a member of Her Majesty’s court, am not kept abreast of such things, then the likelihood that you will ever have even the slightest inkling of what Her Majesty desires is next to nil.”
“That sounds vaguely like a threat,” Kari said, though her voice didn’t make it sound as though she really thought so.
“Not a threat, Lady Vanador, simply an observation,” the part-elven woman said. “You must understand that if you plan to deal with Her Majesty, then you must be prepared to lose. Her Majesty has been long at this game and craft, and she knows all possible outcomes. You have but a few decades of experience on which to draw, and your experience and wisdom, while quite considerable for one of your years, simply cannot compare to those of Her Majesty.”
Kari considered those words; she knew she was at a disadvantage and that Koursturaux was likely to get what she wanted in the end, so it was hard for her to fathom why releasing Se’sasha had satisfied the demon king’s goals. Kari simply didn’t understand how a syrinthian priestess spilling the many secrets of the kings and the peoples of Mehr’Durillia served anyone’s purposes. There was always the possibility that King Koursturaux sought to draw members of the Order to Mehr’Durillia to be trapped or, perhaps, in turn taken hostage to spill the secrets of the Temple and Citaria in general. If there was even the possibility that was Koursturaux’ – or anyone else’s – goal, then Kari had to safeguard the lives of her hunters against such trickery.
“So should I be surprised if some member of an assassin’s guild or some other ‘demon’ from your world shows up with Taesenus’ sword, shortly after I give it to you, and tries to kill someone I love?” Kari asked evenly. Amastri seemed shocked by the question and didn’t even bother to try to mask it. “You have to admit, there’d be a certain…poetry to having me give her a sword, and then using it to kill me or one of my friends.”
Amastri looked away while making a dismissive gesture. “Lady Vanador, though I am not at liberty to discuss Her Majesty’s past or personality with you, I can and will tell you one thing,” she said when she turned her gaze back to meet Kari’s. “If King Koursturaux wanted you or your friends dead, she would not be subtle about it. Though it may pain you to hear me say as much, Her Majesty is pleased with your work and sees you as a resource; she has no reason to kill you as of this moment.”
“What about King Sekassus?” Kari prodded. “I’ve now killed one of his sons and, from what you say, embarrassed him in front of his syrinthians.”
That disconcerting smile spread across Amastri’s face once again. “Do you not have a dozen syrinthians on your Order’s campus?” she asked. “King Sekassus is never going to stop trying to kill you and dismantle your Order. Fortunately for you, this blow you have struck against him…while the killing of his son may have give
n the syrinthian people some momentary satisfaction or even hope, having rescued their high priestess from his clutches is going to have much more far-reaching results. You may find, in the future, that any of the syrinthians sent to infiltrate your Order, or otherwise bring harm to you, may defect to Se’sasha’s service instead.”
Kari’s brows rose; she hadn’t really thought about that, but it made sense. “So that’s what your master was after? Further humiliation over time now that the syrinthians’ loyalties might be split?”
Amastri held her hands out wide. “That was simply my deduction on the matter,” she said innocently. “As I have said before, what Her Majesty is truly after in this situation – as with all others – only she knows.”
Kari nodded and gave up on trying to wrest any information about Koursturaux from the demon king’s courtier. She looked around briefly and folded her arms before her on the table. “So I’ve already been told that the beshathans aren’t demons,” Kari said at last, and there was a subtle shift to the set of Amastri’s eyes. Kari wasn’t sure what to make of that; perhaps it was because Uldriana had been lying, and Amastri was pleased to know that the Order was being duped. She tried to push the thoughts aside until she had a clearer picture. “I was wondering what you might be able to tell me about that: where they came from, how they ended up enslaved to the kings, anything like that.”
The part-elven woman picked up her teacup and smiled at Kari over the rim while she took a sip. “Ah, but that is why you rescued Se’sasha from King Sekassus, is it not? Let her be the one to tell you such things. Her Majesty would be…displeased, to say the least, were I to go wagging my tongue to her enemies.”