“The man who can’t choose sides,” she said bitterly.
He raised a pale brow.
“But he runs to you.”
“He appreciates my experience; you obviously do not. I apologize for my . . . intrusion. If you desire the writ, you will have my company—and my aid.”
He sheathed his sword.
She did not, could not know, what he granted her in the face of the threat of Kiriel’s sword unsheathed.
“He doesn’t trust me,” Kiriel said.
“No one does.”
“You aren’t as stupid as you look.”
“Except me.”
Kiriel’s laugh was brief and bitter. “You mean it. That’s what I don’t understand. You mean it all. You even think—you even think you understand what I am, and you still mean it.”
“I see it,” Jewel told her, “I see what Meralonne sees in you. What he sees when you draw sword. What he sees when you smile at someone else’s discomfort. Do you think I’m blind, Kiriel? I’m seer-born. I can’t help but see it.” And then, before she knew why, she added, “But I’m not the only one who both knew it and trusted you.”
And the moment she said it, she knew it was true.
She thought Kiriel would leave the room; her hand whitened against the hilt of her sword until it seemed all of a single color, and that, ivory. But she stayed her ground; the moment passed, by common consent, before she spoke of the matter at hand. “If we refuse to hunt them, they’ll kill.”
“Yes.”
“Then go to his Council of Magi, and tell them that. You won’t take them where they need to go, so unless we go on our own, the deaths are on their heads.”
“Why, Kiriel? Meralonne doesn’t trust you; it’s clear to me the lack of trust goes both ways. I trust you, and oddly enough, I trust him. You can work together in this. He’ll come to understand it—”
“They have to understand—he has to understand—that we’re not in their power. If we do as they say, on their orders, with no volition, if we bow to them, if we obey—”
“Kiriel.”
The young woman met the eyes of the older one; neither looked away, although Jewel wanted to. There was something, in the lines of Kiriel’s mouth, in the intensity, sudden and heated, of her words, that was feral, wild.
That was, Jewel thought, very like the kin themselves.
“If we play those games,” she said slowly, as much to gather her breath as to be understood, “helpless people die. Innocent people.”
“They’ll die anyway,” Kiriel replied, her words sharpened by certainty.
Jewel shrugged. Turned away. “I’m going to go hunting with or without you. I know the holdings—I owe you for the information, no matter what you decide—and if I don’t know the exact location they’ve chosen to hole up in, I know a demon when I see it. I’ll do what I can to protect you from censure; you’re one of mine, and I won’t desert you. But I can’t make you do anything. I won’t.
“You decide for yourself.”
“But the magi will win.”
“And if they do, then what? Meralonne already seems to know more about you than I do, and if he hasn’t used the knowledge by now, he’s keeping it to himself the same way he hoards every scrap of information that crosses his desk. What exactly happens if they, as you put it, win?”
“We’ll lose.”
“Yeah. We’ll lose.” Jewel Markess ATerafin walked across the length of a kitchen that was suddenly too small for two people.
“I’m going to talk to the mage. Join us if you want to. Stay here if you don’t.”
The second surprise—and annoyance—of the morning came one hour later, in the guise of a messenger, delivering the writ of execution. That writs of this nature were rarely granted was attested to by the seals that framed them, one in each corner of a rough-edged, rectangular page, joined by the finely drawn blades of swords: King Cormalyn, Queen Marieyan, King Reymalyn and Queen Siodonay the Fair.
Jewel expected the writ; indeed, she had been surprised to find that the Mysterium had responded before the Magisterium had.
What she did not expect, given the conversation of the previous eve, was Devon ATerafin. Unexpected use of her gift had taught her a few things in her time, and the one that came in most useful when her eyes lit upon the actual face of the messenger was this: To keep any surprise hidden. Devon did not stand as ATerafin in the sparsely populated—but still populated—hall that served as the entranceway to her home; there was something about his posture that was not quite right. It was an affect he was good at assuming; Devon ATerafin did not so much hide when he worked as blend in with people who were occupied with daily tedium.
She could not, however, mistake his face for anyone else’s once she’d seen it; nor was she intended to. Had she been, they would have sent someone else.
“ATerafin,” she said.
He stiffened. It was, in effect, an insult—and in intent. Among members of the same House, it was more than permissible to use given names—it was acknowledgement of family, of a mutual bond. His eyes narrowed, obscuring color; he bowed as stiffly as she spoke. “ATerafin,” he replied.
“How may I help you?”
“I’m afraid,” he said, knowing her better than Meralonne the mage ever had, “that it is I who am put in the uncomfortable position of being forced to aid you.”
Jewel had heard of the mountains in the far South that occasionally gave vent to heat and air—and she thought she knew how one felt at just this moment. “You might as well stand in line and join the crowd.”
“Crowd?”
“Let me guess. You’ve got the writ we need, and you come with it.”
He shrugged, little surprised at her surmise; it was, after all, what he would have expected.
Or at least that’s what she thought she read in the momentary shrug of his shoulders, in the unremarkable expression on his face.
Just at that moment, she loathed confident men.
Of course, that was pretty much all of the ones she had to deal with day to day. Gods, she was in a foul mood. She was also in no mood to argue with Devon; certainly in no mood to lose another argument, and sadly, certain that she would lose it.
But at least she had the comfort of knowing that Devon’s orders were from the Kings, and not a handful of smarter-than-god-in-their-own-opinion mages. Cold comfort was better than none.
“You might as well go into the kitchen,” she told him curtly.
“Oh?”
“You can keep the mage and Kiriel from killing each other.”
“Kiriel?”
She had the satisfaction of seeing a momentary astonishment ripple his brow. And the guilt that followed the indulgence of such a petty thought. “Kiriel. Devon, until the House is settled—one way or the other—we’re not going to be on speaking terms. We’ll be on civil terms, and certainly, we’ll be allies in the bigger fight.
“Don’t expect more, and don’t ask for it.” She wanted to close her eyes a moment; turned her back on him instead. “And as long as I don’t lose any of mine in the war,” she said, each word dragged out of her throat by the pull of lips into near silence, “we’ll be friends again. As much friends as you’re allowed to be in the role you’ve chosen.”
“Friendship,” Devon said, closer to her back than she would have thought, given that she’d heard almost no movement, “is an indulgence that you’ll have less time for than I, Jewel.”
“I—”
“And I suppose it is worse to have less time and a better understanding of what the word means.”
She was surprised at the bitterness of his tone; not surprised enough to relent, but surprised enough to face him. He’d gone.
Damn, she thought, for no particular reason. Damn, damn, damn.
>
Teller’s eyes were closed as Finch spoke, and he didn’t trouble himself to open them. His hands held no slate, his fingers no quill, and thighs angled toward the ceiling were as close to the kitchen table as he was going to come for some time, if Alowan had much to say about it.
“What can she do?” he asked Finch.
Finch shrugged uneasily. “Don’t know. But Jay took her in for a reason.”
He nodded. “Don’t worry too much about me,” he said, and meant it. “They’ve done what they intended. Made their threat. I’m not useful now, and they wouldn’t kill me in the healerie anyway.” He took a deep breath, wrapped his words in it, and spoke again. “She knows what she’s doing, Finch. You’ve seen Meralonne fight the kin before.”
“Yeah. But that time we had all of the Chosen and the House Guards as backup.”
But Teller knew enough of Jay to know that in this battle, she thought Kiriel di’Ashaf was a worthy replacement for almost a hundred men. He knew she was on their side; Jay had said so, and Jay’s word couldn’t be doubted.
But he was troubled for other reasons, because he also knew what Kiriel was: god-born. No girl, no single girl, even if she was that, should have so much power.
It was time to think about killers.
Angel came, with Jester, into the kitchen, swinging the doors smack into the wall. She hated it. Avandar’s frown bit the back of her neck because she knew he hated it more. It was disrespectful, and Mandaros knew the only person who was allowed to treat her with disrespect in his eyes was Avandar himself.
But the doors’ wide swing was a type of alert; they didn’t have bells here, or horns, and they rarely raised their voices in shouts or screams—if you didn’t count Jewel’s nightmares, and she didn’t.
“Jay,” Angel said, without preamble.
“Sit?”
He shook his head. Stopped for just a moment to look at the white-haired mage, the grim and silent Astari, and the youngest member of Jewel’s den. Jewel nodded, perceptibly and irritably, and he shrugged.
“You’re not going to like it much.”
“What?”
“We didn’t find much in the thirty-second, or the twenty-sixth. We didn’t even bother with the Common; stopped just long enough to pick up some rumors, gossip. Food,” he added quickly.
“And?”
“This is the bad thing. The list of holdings you gave us—no disappearances, no strange deaths, nothing.”
“None that’ve been leaked anyway.”
“They’d be leaked—you can’t hide the really bad deaths, Jay.”
She shrugged. “Why’s that bad?”
“Because there have been bodies. Disappearances and then discoveries. In the fifteenth,” he told her grimly.
“What the Hells is in the—isn’t the fifteenth one of the foreign quarters?”
“It’s where a chunk of them hole up, yeah.”
“Well, that would make sense, I guess.” She turned and whispered two words to Avandar; he left the room and returned, wordless, with a rolled map.
“The fifteenth,” Devon ATerafin said, as Jewel unrolled the map, “is particularly significant this year.”
“Why?”
“Spoken like a Terafin,” he answered. “You might remember that this is the time of the year for the Kings’ Challenge?” At her glower, he continued. “There’s a large contingent of Annagarian contestants for the Challenge this year. They train under the auspices of the only man from the South who has ever won the title.”
Angel whistled. “He won it twice,” he said quietly.
“How do you know that?”
“I pay attention, Jay.”
“Great. So what you’re saying is that one of the contestants is a demon?” She snorted. “It’s not impossible, Devon. With what’s happened the last two months, no demon would survive half an eye-blink if he tried to enter Avantari. There’s no way they’d try it.”
Kiriel, silent until then, stepped forward. “They haven’t. Or if they have, he lives elsewhere.”
“In one of these holdings?” Jewel said, indicating the map’s penciled positions.
She nodded grimly.
“Your call,” Jewel said to Devon.
“We’ve a watch on the Southern contestants already,” he replied.
“And?”
“No.”
“No what?”
“No, they don’t leave the fifteenth holding—and when they do, they travel in groups of no less than six.” He fell silent a moment, and then added, “A group of six men is hard to miss.”
“Maybe,” Angel said, “They’re the killers. From what I’ve heard—”
Jewel lifted her hand; he subsided at once. “Where?”
“In the Common.”
“That means—”
“Yeah,” Jester said, speaking for the first time. “Everyone in the city knows it. Or thinks it, at any rate.”
“Doesn’t make any sense,” Angel added. “If I were going to kidnap and kill, I’d make damned sure the bodies were dumped in another holding.”
“Maybe someone did,” Meralonne said softly. His eyes met Devon’s across the bent heads of Jewel’s den.
“Everyone in The Ten Houses has heard tell of the demon that killed the priests in the Great Hall,” Finch offered helpfully. “It was trying to kill the rightful king of Annagar.”
“The Tyr’agar,” Kiriel said softly.
“Whatever. The point is that the demons are already known to be working for, or with, the Dominion.”
Devon and Meralonne frowned, and Jewel was struck by their similarity of expression; something at once focused, intent, and cold.
“What?” she demanded, speaking to Meralonne.
“I think that whoever it is who is killing in so obvious a fashion either knows the city well—or has been commanded by someone who does. We cannot have the Southerners killed in this city by an angry mob—”
“Seems like it would solve a lot of problems,” Angel said, shrugging.
No surprise that Meralonne continued as if uninterrupted. “—and it may be that our efforts to protect Valedan—and our own—will be severely tried in the next several days; we’ll be forced to split our forces to defend the very people sent to be a threat to him.” He reached for his pipe, avoiding the sudden narrowing of Jewel’s eyes. Stuffed it with leaf, too—but didn’t quite go so far as to light it. “To put us in the position of protecting his probable would-be killers takes a . . . certain frame of mind. I would say that the girl is right: the demon will not be found among the Annagarians.”
“They can take care of themselves,” Angel said.
“They can be left to take care of themselves,” Devon agreed, rather affably. “But if they die, they become another symbol; they are here under a peaceful flag. Valedan’s cause will be hurt by their deaths, if we ever make it as far as the Southern borders—because they’ll be Southern deaths at Northern hands during a trial of prowess; a statement that the only way Valedan can win the trials the Kings set is by killing the only ‘true’ challengers.
“You’re right, Magi,” he said. “Someone understands the city well. And if it’s a demon . . .”
Kiriel di’Ashaf looked up across the table, at Jewel, as if she were a tossed ship and the den leader a momentary anchor. Her face, Jewel thought, was perfectly white, her eyes obsidian; the shadows surrounding her grew until Jewel could not breathe for fear of what they presaged.
And Kiriel said, “He is.”
They left two hours later.
Devon armed them, although both Meralonne and Kiriel fastidiously refused the weapons he offered. There was about the group a silence of purpose; it descended and it would not be lifted, Jewel thought, no matter what words were spoken w
ithin its hush.
She was torn between leaving Finch and taking her, and in the end, she chose to leave her, praying to Kalliaris for a smile, just a smile. Haerrad was here, after all, and in some ways worse than a demon. He was on the inside.
Angel and Jester came; Arann stayed, but Carver joined them before they’d left the gated grounds. They walked three abreast, ahead of her, as they’d often done, and she felt more at home, watching their backs, than she had in months. Years, possibly.
Kiriel walked beside her to the right, Avandar to the left; Devon ATerafin and Meralonne APhaniel behind. They walked with a light step, an easy confidence, that suggested they might be going to the Common, and no more. But Meralonne at least was known in the high city, and what passersby there were stepped well out of the way of any group that he accompanied.
So it began.
It should have taken time. There should have been investigations, conversations, bribery (because, alas, there were always magisterial guards who could be wheedled into parting with information that didn’t threaten the guards themselves) and threats. There should have been a retreat then, a planning session, something official, intellectual, something that showed they had control.
But it happened quickly; quickly enough that Jewel felt as if all steps taken, from the moment of her nightmare to the crossing of the bridge between Averalaan Aramarelas and Averalaan proper, had traveled a single, fine edge. It cut her now.
Kiriel's head rose, her eyes widened. She lifted a hand, staring into a clear day’s sky as if the clarity itself were a disguise, something that her god-born eyes could pierce, with work. She worked.
Jewel began to ask her a question, and Kiriel di’Ashaf lifted a hand in command; it was all Jay could do not to take a step backward. She did not stifle the small cry that escaped her lips as the darkness suddenly imposed itself upon her vision.
Nothing escaped the Astari’s notice; Devon was no exception. She felt, rather than saw, his presence at her elbow. She knew it couldn’t be Avandar; there was something about Avandar that was unmistakable, some unseen, but much felt familiarity that the years had built between them in place of affection and respect.
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