Kay, herself a mix of Farrowe and Gaoel blood, had drawn unwelcome attention during these tense days. Wetbloods, the favored slur for Gaoel of mixed heritage, were not popular right now. She’d been in Celest for nearly ten years and she was committed to dying before she left the aura of the fire-eye behind. But the flood of refugees had forced a Gaoel-Farrowe divide which endangered her peace. Hers and all others of mixed blood. Kay’s skin was the more golden tone of the Gaoel and her hair was black, which allowed her to pass as Gaoel at a glance, but a closer look revealed sharp features more in line with the Farrowe. Smaller eyes, a hawkish nose. She kept her hair neatly trimmed at shoulder length, just long enough to swing free in the Gaoel fashion for women but easy to pull back when she needed to move quickly. She wore a dark blue cloak pulled around her to hide her lithe frame and the weapons she carried.
Her plan had been to arrive for the meeting early to scope the crowd and have an escape route ready. During the opening, the height at which one was stationed was reflective of status. Gaoel were obsessed with station and its most prominent marker was altitude. The plaza Kay walked through was filled with commoners, children running around with eager shouts. The rich and noble would be atop the various buildings and higher plazas surrounding the main. Over at the palace, the Dynasty would have carefully chosen the elevation of each guest based on their contributions of the last year and anticipated ability to carry that level of effort forward. Kay looked past the crowd to the stairs where she was summoned tonight. Two men guarded the entry of the long stairs, ending in the Goet Overlook where Ban Terrel was waiting. She had yet to learn much about where she was headed. The crowd had slowed her. If the meet went bad, she had no escape plan.
The two men gave her a move-on gesture as she approached, clearly expecting her. She climbed the stairs slowly, trying not to look up at the fire-eye above her. She would take it in later. It would wait. She needed her senses at the top. Another two guards waiting there. They wore a common dark grey color on slightly different cuts of coat, not uniforms but pretty close. Kay didn’t know enough about Ban Terrel. She was unsure whether his people would be best treated as a gang, a family, or a company. Given their disciplined stances, there was definitely a martial component. She had to assume any of his men would kill her at a look from him. She knew Ban Terrel was both respected and feared. She had no idea where his money was born or where it slept. No idea where he stood with the Dynasty or where he came down on the refugees. Just enough to know she wasn’t saying no to this invitation and would find it hard to say no to whatever job was offered her.
The Goet Overlook was crowded with additional grey coats. It had none of the festive atmosphere from below. The one who could only be Ban Terrel stood at the far end of the space, resting both hands on the crumbled remnants of the rampart which surrounded the Overlook. A beautiful choice, maybe the best Kay had seen, for a viewing of the fire-eye. All eyes were on Ban Terrel as he quietly looked at the skies, some personal communication between him and the celestial event. Kay paused, uncertain whether to come any closer. She could feel the men, respectfully distanced from Ban Terrel, turn their attention to her. Weighing her. Then Ban Terrel turned. He was elderly, dressed in a simple robe of dark grey, a thin beard below a shaved head. He gave her a light smile and gestured for her to take the place beside him. As she neared she saw he had two lanterns ready for launch. He’d prepared and waited for her. An unexpected gesture of respect that did nothing to placate her wariness.
Ban Terrel took her hand in a paternal manner and drew her to one of the lanterns. He took his place in front of his own. Both had lit candles. When he loosened their ties, only Ban Terrel’s gentle grip preventing them from floating away. The sky in front of them was littered with rising lights as the lanterns from the plaza below ascended. Kay could see hues of purple and orange dancing on the outside rims of the thin paper lanterns, the fire-eye reaching out. She would have to look at it. He would notice if she didn’t. The flame dancing atop the candle in front of her didn’t call to her the way it normally would. Not tonight. Not with its great mother, father, god in the sky above. The candle was nothing. The fire-eye was everything.
As she released her lantern, following Ban Terrel’s lead, she lifted her eyes. There it was just above her. The light hit her eyes and burrowed deeper, filling her head with its song. She felt her body melt, become one with the perfect fire in the sky. Her dream, her savior. No one else understood the gift they’d been given. The fire she’d chased her whole life painted above, unafraid and beautiful. Her mouth fell slack, eyes filled with tears. This is why she tried to be alone the night the fire-eye opened.
She was dimly aware that Ban Terrel was waiting for her to pull her attention away from the fire-eye. She closed her eyes reluctantly, still seeing the fiery pattern on the insides of her lids for a moment, and turned to face him. If he saw the tears streaming, he ignored them.
“I was told you find children.” Kay nodded but he was already looking back out over the city. “Thank you for answering my summons. I hope the timing wasn’t too inconvenient. I have always enjoyed the opening. A wonderful time for reflection on the past as well as the beginning of something new.” He paused for a long time. “I also love Celest. I love seeing the joy and spirit of the opening reflected out there.” A sweeping gesture to the plaza below. “What do you see when you look out there?”
Kay shrugged. “I see a much needed release. A step away from everyone’s concerns.”
“And what are everyone’s concerns?”
Kay’s eyes shifted to the west. Thousands of lights floated in the skies above Celest. Beyond the city walls there were few lights. The fire-eye went uncelebrated amongst the refugees. The Farrowe fought a battle with starvation and chaos. The people she had once called her own, from a land that had once been her miserable home. The ones who had driven her away to Celest now badly wanted to follow her through its gates.
Ban Terrel was watching her closely. “I understand you have Farrowe blood. Does it cause you pain to see them suffer?”
A long pause. “Yes,” Kay said. “There were some who treated me kindly, long ago, though I have no idea how many of the ones I remember survived the war.”
“Why did you become a finder of children?”
It was a question Kay fielded often. The ones who hired her, the desperate parents and grandparents, the scared friends, the fretting relations, all were full of mistrust. To invite one into a story involving the missing was to expose your weakness. It told a stranger of your willingness to do anything for their return. You could be conned, made to pay ransom. A competing offer could be leveled to your enemies, assuming they hadn’t already wrapped their hands around your offspring. Assuming your child still lived.
She gave him the safe answer. “I have a knack for it.”
“Hard to argue with your success. I have made some quiet inquiries around the city. As a fetch, you are peerless. But you leave me guessing at your motivation.”
She looked at him long, feeling the pressure he radiated. His men around him. The fire-eye ignored in the sky. She was being evaluated, but if there was anyone here not being upfront about motivation, it was Ban Terrel. She kept quiet.
Finally, he turned back to the view, bringing strong, weathered hands up to rest on the rocky ledge before them. There was a more relaxed lean to his stance. “Her name is Leah Jordene. She is of mixed blood, a Farrowe mother named Maggie Jordene. A Gaeol father. She is twelve.”
“When did you see her last?”
He didn’t like being inserted into the narrative and distanced himself with his response. “Last report on her was eighteen months ago, before the Winden siege began. She was tall for her age with reddish hair.”
“What can you tell me about the mother?”
“If she is alive, she is likely somewhere out there. She is in her middle forties.” He looked to the darkness in the west. “The mother was not unskilled in food preparation and had worked enou
gh in Farrowe to achieve modest recognition. She would have been placed near the kitchens.”
Which meant she had a better chance of being alive. Food had guards. If one wanted to find the centers of power with refugee camps, one looked to the kitchens and the water distributors.
“If I can find them, do you want me to approach them? Do they know you’re looking? Will they know your name?”
“See to their immediate security and then give me their location. Keep my name out of all stages of your investigation. I have powerful enemies.”
“I charge…” Kay began but he waved her off.
“Sort the details out with Yamar,” Ban Terrel said, turning away from her while gesturing to the closest man. Kay glanced at him. Yamar wore the uniform like the others. He was a head taller than the others. He had hands with long fingers folded in front of him, gaze lowered.
Kay turned back to Ban Terrel. “What about the father’s name?”
“Good luck in your search.” The only answer she got. And then the meeting was over.
…
Yamar took her arm and led her to the stairs. He was calm and collected. He started by taking the stairs two at a time with his long legs, then slowed when he saw she was moving slower. Her cloak was pulled tight around her as she tried to process the investigation she’d just, apparently, signed up for. After giving her a few moments, Yamar launched into the details. He’d researched her daily rate and was fine with it. They could cover expenses. They already knew where her office was and would be by to check in two days from now. She wasn’t to contact Ban Terrel, only go through Yamar. Ban Terrel wasn’t joking about the enemies thing. She should keep her eyes open for unwanted attention. If she needed muscle for inside or outside the walls, they could set it up.
Kay was feeling okay about the job by the time they reached the bottom of the stairs. Her hire made sense. She was getting paid for her Farrowe connections, her ability to track down someone outside the walls without drawing too much attention. Fair enough, sounded easy despite Ban Terrel’s evasion about the father. She was wondering whether Yamar would be forthcoming about Ban Terrel’s familial indiscretions. Then Yamar handed her off to another of Ban Terrel’s men at the bottom of the stairs, a soldier named Reagan, and things went south.
Kay could immediately sense trouble within Reagan. After Yamar left, there was scant eye contact before he grabbed her arm to lead her across the plaza, still buzzing with families and vendors. His eyes were busy roaming the crowd. He was under instruction to escort her home but he was the one setting the direction. If she was lucky, he was just a fool, one who couldn’t handle even taking minor direction from a woman. But she didn’t like those eyes. Was he working a different angle? It was a little early in this game to allow herself to be taken. Did she deal with this before getting dragged into a dark alley? The only thing that stopped her was, if he was working for someone else, she wanted to know who. This was the problem with not setting up an escape plan.
She decided to push back just as Reagan got her to the edge of the crowd. She pulled her arm back and turned to face him. “I’m the other way,” she said.
“Honey,” he said, “you’re whichever way I say you are.” He was big for a Gaoel, black hair hung over one eye. Battered face with old scars. Why had they handed her to him? Intimidation? Or had he taken a mask off, one that worked well enough to fool Ban Terrel? He reached out to grab her again, but his eyes were up, looking back to the crowd. He missed.
Kay slid her hands inside her cloak. She gripped her baton in one. The other carefully pinched out some powdered demonlord pepper from one of the jars on her belt. Her fingers would burn for hours whether she used it or not, but that never bothered her.
“We should talk…” she began but he cut her off.
“Oh, you’ll talk. You’ll have plenty to say.” Still looking up and down the alley, maybe whoever he was expecting meeting him here.
Kay decided not to wait around. She flung the demonlord in his face, followed it up by hitting him hard in the back of the knee with her baton. When he crumpled before her, she lined up and cracked him in the neck. Out cold, not even much chance to feel the sting of the pepper in his eyes. Oh, well. Unlikely anyone would think to wash it off. It would wait for him to awaken. She, on the other hand, needed to move.
She blended back into the fringes of the crowd, then ducked into a different alley. If there were watchers in the crowd, she didn’t see them. She saw no one following her as she went half the way back to her office, then, when she changed her mind, all the way back across the city to the western gates. Kay had remembered an underground fight between Farrowe and Gaoel barefist champions was scheduled for midnight just outside the city. It would be in her best interest to learn what she could about Ban Terrel and a soldier named Reagan before news of her hire leaked. And to start setting herself up for a trip to the refugee camps tomorrow in a hunt for Leah Jordene, potential illegitimate daughter of a Gaoel man of consequence.
Her fingers burned and the fire-eye shone above. She should be home, she had set this week aside as a holiday, but the night seemed to call to her. As she neared the gates she could see stray lanterns, giving up on their futile quest to reach their glorious mother in the sky, surrender to the eastern winds and run up against the city walls where their small flames died.
Table of Contents
Prologue. Red Locust
The Day of Arrival
Chapter 1. Never Enough Gold
Chapter 2. A Harvest of Bodies
Chapter 3. The Man with the Snakeskin Hat
Chapter 4. The Problem with Shareholders
Chapter 5. A Known Face
Chapter 6. The Castalanian
The Day of Preparation
Chapter 7. Find Your Way to Us
Chapter 8. A Single Cart
Chapter 9. Barbayir Beckons
Chapter 10. Behind the Marked Door
Chapter 11. Far More Than One
Chapter 12. Spies of Dragon and Chalk
Chapter 13. Hideon’s Return
Chapter 14. Blood on the Pages
The Day of Council
Chapter 15. Under the Blanket
Chapter 16. The Hearing
Chapter 17. Whim and Whisper
Chapter 18. Severing the Fifth Arm
Chapter 19. The Curious Man
Chapter 20. The Bay
Chapter 21. The Prisoner’s Escape
Chapter 22. Through the Bars
Chapter 23. The First Cell
The Day of Alliance
Chapter 24. Regrouping at the Apartments
Chapter 25. The Price of Information
Chapter 26. Dragons in the Streets
Chapter 27. Not the Right Knock
Chapter 28. Into the Ceiling
Chapter 29. Face the Five
Chapter 30. The Wrong Side of History
Chapter 31. Too Close to the Line
The Day of Battle
Chapter 32. Back to the Stairs
Chapter 33. The Price of a Son
Chapter 34. They Fade in Death
Chapter 35. What Started It All
Chapter 36. The Only Secret We Shared
Chapter 37. Shields of Glass
Chapter 38. The Torchless Path
Chapter 39. There Will Always Be Others
Epilogue. Stories of Bodies
Rise of the Falsemarked (Spies of Dragon and Chalk Book 2) Page 28