Tippin's face took on a thoughtful look. "Not sure. But I wonder if I wouldn't do more good here on the Griffin than back with my regiment. The offer of honorable discharge still stands, and we've a good cause ahead of us, don't you think?"
"That we do."
"Then I think I'm staying."
Jacob smiled and raised his glass. "To the voyage ahead, then."
"To the voyage ahead."
22. Defend the Circle
ENSEL RHE FOUND AN ABANDONED apartment in the Slums in which to spend the night and most of the next day while he lay low and waited for Aaron to complete his analysis of the catalytic material. When the sun had just started to set over the city, he set out for the palace. He knew of the coronation ball, so the greater amount of carriage and foot traffic was not unexpected. Neither was the enhanced security, which he found both outside and in. He suspected he was partially responsible for some of it, due to the ruckus he had caused the day before. A pause to time the movement of the guards, a quick run and climb over the wall, and then a bit of skulking gained him the palace's eastern wing easily enough.
Aaron was not in his laboratory, nor was he with the elementalist's machine, which Ensel Rhe found unfamiliar and impressive in size, but not much else. He left with intentions of returning later. Knowing he needed to remain out of sight, he snuck his way into the palace gardens, which afforded him a wealth of dimly lit corridors, dark nooks, and a scant number of loiterers, none of whom noticed his passing. After some time spent trolling the darkest recesses, he was surprised when he sensed his daughter's presence nearby. He found her seated on a stone bench at the center of a rose bush encircled glade. She started to rise at his sudden appearance, but sank back when she recognized him. A single lantern illuminated the perturbed look on her face.
"What do you want?" she asked.
Ensel Rhe stepped all the way into the clearing. "I have come to talk."
"I do not wish to speak to you."
"Then I shall take my leave, and wait on you another time."
"I do not wish to speak to you at any other time, either. I do not wish to speak to you at all. Now, or ever."
Ensel Rhe stared at her, but said nothing.
She stared back. Finally, she said, "That is very annoying, you know. The way you just stare without saying anything. You never used to do that before."
"You just said—"
"I know what I just said." Jakinda crossed her arms and looked away, but she did not dismiss him this time.
Ensel Rhe strolled the glade, examining the roses as he made a full circle around the bench. The movement provided the opportunity for him to really see his daughter. She had shed her fighting clothes for something more appropriate to the occasion. A formal eslar gown, lighter blue than her blue-black skin, with high collar and a neckline which fell all the way to her navel, was customary attire for a young eslar woman of her age attending a high society event. The dress enhanced and accentuated her natural beauty, for she'd the look of her mother now more than ever. Also, like her mother, she wore her rust-red hair loose so it flowed down her back.
"You look...lovely," he told her.
Jakinda Rhe stood in a flash. "Is this why you're here? To wear down my resolve with compliments?"
He saw in his daughter many of the things he remembered about her, but also more. When he'd raised her, he had hoped to instill in her the value of independent thought, hoping the rest—confidence, conviction, and even perhaps a little bit of defiance—would come along naturally. He felt his and her mother's guidance had borne fruit. But he'd never expected to have her use such qualities against him.
There seemed no point to answering her question, so he asked, "You said your mother did not get along well after I left. How has she been more recently?"
Jakinda looked at him a while longer without saying anything before she walked away to settle into a corner of the glade. Her response sounded from the corner's darkness. "She is well...sometimes. Other times... Your leaving...and then Hannu..."
Before the silence grew heavy between them, Ensel Rhe said, "I know these past years have not been easy for her. Even before I left, she expressed much disappointment with the affairs of our city. Court intrigue and the pressures of the family businesses never sat well with her. Often, she spoke of 'getting away' and 'starting over.' Most times, I passed her words off as idle talk. But I've had years to consider them, and time enough to wonder at her sincerity. Perhaps if my thoughts had been more aligned with hers on this, we would have left Isia together, as a family, and your brother would still be alive."
Jakinda stepped back into the light just enough for her father to see her face. Her stark white eyes met his. "I am not doing this." She turned and headed for the path leading out. "Go back to wherever you ran off to. I do not wish to talk to you or see you again."
"If that is what you wish, then I will do so. But, first, I would ask you one last question."
His words failed to stop her. If she stepped outside the glade, he'd remain true to his word, and never bother her again. She didn't, though. One step away, she stopped. She didn't quite turn all the way around.
"Will you allow me to tell you why I left?"
"Only if it is the truth."
"You shall have nothing else. But first, promise you will hear me out. You will not like what I have to say, but you must hear all of it before you pronounce judgment."
She turned all the way now to face him. She crossed her arms. "Very well. I promise."
"Do you remember your grandfather?"
The question clearly surprised her, for she did not answer right away. "Only a little."
"Upon his death, I assumed control of our family's affairs. I was already familiar with many of our business partners and the various records my father kept, but I did not understand the sheer scope of our enterprise until faced with managing all of it. You may not remember—you were very young at the time—but I spent many nights away from the house poring over documents, receipts, and ledgers trying to make sense of it all."
"I remember," Jakinda said. Her arms remained crossed, but she'd at least a look of mild interest in her face now.
"The task was made more difficult because some things did not add up. Large payments had been made to companies whose products did not warrant such consideration. I recall one case where the company in question manufactured nothing more than utilitarian parts for windows and doors. Yet your grandfather had made large, regular investments into their business. Even more puzzling, their production changed very little. Their business was neither growing nor expanding. Your grandfather made larger and larger investments into a company which gave him nothing more in return."
"So now you question grandfather's integrity?"
"No. Even now, I do not think he had any idea what was going on."
"So what was this door company using the money for?"
"Nothing. The window and door company was a front. Not a shell company, for their business was legitimate, but the funds were passed on to various other enterprises throughout Isia in the form of routine payments for seemingly legitimate labor and service costs. My suspicions arose not because of the payments themselves, but because of their frequency and the amounts. They were not so large as to attract casual attention, but with my interest already piqued, I questioned the owner of the business concerning the outlays. He claimed they were paid to retain trusted vendors. It seemed a legitimate answer, and I might have let the entire matter drop, if not for the name which came up too many times as the owner of some of these other businesses. That name was Balrabbek."
"Uncle Bal owns a lot of businesses," Jakinda said. "That's why Ingrid and I are here, to secure trading rights through Brighton and on to the Barrens and to the cities to the north. It took a long time, but we've arranged a safe route through the Merrow Woods to the Fiefdoms."
Trading routes from Panthora to the Four Fiefdoms were few and far between. The krill of the Merrow Woods did not suffer tre
spassers, the Ugulls to the north and the Alzions to the south were slow and treacherous, and the Blasted Zone, where the Immortals of old had conducted their final battle, was a land of wild magic and entirely impassable. But by skirting the southern edge of the Merrow Woods, where the krill were more tolerant of outsiders, and following Shantywall into the Dormont, one could reach the Fiefdoms. Brighton was a gateway for these visitors, with the Whitecrest leading to the Barrens Ocean and the Aundaria Highway leading north and beyond. Securing trading rights, while a legitimate reason for coming here, was not Ingrid's real purpose.
"Ingrid Kane is here for something else."
"What then? You think she's bringing something into the city? Ingrid has had me checking and double-checking inventory lists since we arrived. That's practically what I did all day today. We've had three caravans arrive in the past week, with the latest just this morning. I personally have examined every bag and crate on every wagon. The contents are nothing more nefarious than willow barley, Peldin wheat, and Alderden hardwoods." She took a few steps closer to her father. "Ingrid has been like an aunt to me and a sister to Mother. What plan does she have I wouldn't know about? Why do you even suspect her of planning something here in Brighton, anyway?"
"Because at some point the payments to those various front businesses in Isia also started coming here."
"But...why?"
"I meant to find out. But I was...delayed. By the time I came here, years had passed and the trail had gone cold. But I get ahead of myself. In Isia, after I had questioned that first business owner, I started making inquiries with some others. Little did I realize the progress of my investigative work was being relayed back to Balrabbek. We saw each other often around that time, either for business or at family gatherings. Not once did he ask what I was doing. Now, I wonder if he wasn't feeding me false information, either to throw me off or simply to keep me occupied. Thinking back, I think he wanted me to know, for even I came to realize there was nothing for me to do about it. While I continued with my discreet inquiries, Balrabbek busied himself making new and powerful allies. Back then, he'd already bought most of the city's aristocracy, either through business relations or blackmail. When Balrabbek finally revealed himself to me, I knew I was finished. I've no idea why he did not simply kill me. Instead, he cast me from the city with a warning that if I ever returned, he'd kill Hannu, you, and your mother."
Jakinda, with her arms still crossed, shook her head at him. "You...lie. Uncle Bal would never hurt us."
Ensel Rhe plunged onward. She needed to hear all of it.
"Ingrid Kane has been his partner from the start. Whatever the real reason for her presence here, she is here as his emissary, doing his work. I know you do not believe me, though I have sworn to tell you the truth and so that is what I have done. But if you will not believe the words I have said so far, then there is little point in saying anything more concerning Balrabbek's reason for all of this."
"Tell me anyway," Jakinda said.
"I will. But, first, tell me what you learned about Ill Sigith and Jux Jeorn."
It was a game they used to play. He provided a name, which she then researched. She reported back when she'd learned everything she could about the person. Historical figures, politicians, dignitaries, sometimes even the names of their business partners. Some had been too much for a girl not even in her teens, but she'd an inquisitive mind, and so always came back with something.
"They were eslar necromancers who lived a long time ago. The library here did not have much information about them. What I found was under 'Mythology.' I doubt they were real people."
"They were real."
"How do you know?"
"Because I found a book written by them. What else did you learn?"
"That they came from Navarre, City of the Dead. Once, they walked eslar lands, raising the dead wherever they went. Many of the living flocked to them, too, until they'd an army they marched to Isia's gates."
"And? What happened to them?"
"They were defeated. The dead were made dead again, and the living who followed them... They were killed. The books and such used by the necromancers were destroyed."
"Not all of them, it would seem."
"You don't actually think Uncle Bal and Ingrid are necromancers, do you?"
She needed to hear all of it.
"In the course of my investigation, I discovered that much of the financial outlay was being funneled into one particular project. The person overseeing this project was Ingrid Kane, who by then I knew as a close associate of Balrabbek's. Ingrid made frequent visits to a construction site outside Isia in the nearby mountains. On one such trip, I followed her. They were building a machine. A very large one. Through subterfuge, I gained access to their facility. Inside, I found the plans of what they were building, rosters of the workers, the front businesses which had hired them...everything. I left with a copy of the plans, intending to show it to the authorities. I made it as far as the city walls when I was accosted by Balrabbek's men. They took me to see him. Ingrid was there as well. They knew I'd been to the construction site and what I'd seen. Rather than kill me, they exiled me from Panthora with the warning I have already mentioned. I never determined the nature of the machine they were building, but I did learn years afterwards that construction had stopped, everything had been dismantled and traces wiped away, and the funds which once had been used there instead started coming here. I may not have learned the purpose of the first machine, but I've a good idea now why all of their resources were transferred here. There is another machine, one built hundreds of years ago, whose purpose must be the same or similar to the one Balrabbek was having built."
"What machine?"
Ensel Rhe remembered she knew nothing about it. He told her everything he knew.
"Yesterday, a connection was made between something Ingrid had in her possession and the machine itself. It seems clear the machine is the reason she is here."
"But..." Jakinda Rhe shook her head, confused or overwhelmed or both. She'd too many questions, with no idea which to ask first.
Ensel Rhe took the opportunity to present one of his own. "Do you still think I lie?"
She looked at him, the confusion in her face gone. Still, it took her some moments to come to an answer. "No, I don't. I don't think anyone would make up such a story just to tell a lie."
"Then you believe me."
"I don't know what to believe." She paced. "You're saying you discovered Uncle Bal and Ingrid building a machine in secret, the purpose of which you don't know, but that there's another machine here, in Brighton, right now, which may do whatever the first was supposed to do. And necromancy has something to do with it. Who else knows about the machine here in Brighton? Isn't anyone trying to figure out what it does?"
"Someone has. But Ingrid's interest in the machine remains elusive."
"If you're so sure Ingrid has something to do with it, why not just ask her?"
"Ingrid and Balrabbek have been at this for a good long while. I don't think she would tell me their plans, even if I asked nicely."
She still paced. "Then maybe I will."
"You can try."
"I was going to earlier, but I wasn't certain what to even ask. Now, though, I will." She stopped, and looked her father in the eye. "But, first, I want to know something else. I want to know why you never came back. Did you ever even try to send a letter? Just to let us know you were still alive?"
"I never sent a letter. It would have been too risky. But I did come back. Three years ago."
"Three years ago?" She made the connection quickly. "That was the same time Hannu..."
"Yes. I made it as far as Peldin Ive before Balrabbek sent word to me of Hannu's murder. After that, I saw no point in continuing. If I had, Balrabbek would have killed you next."
"But... Uncle Bal found Hannu's murderers. They were tried and executed."
"These supposed murderers were eslar?"
Jakinda nodded.
<
br /> "Eslar do not scalp their victims. Only sitheri kill in such a way. Hannu's scalp was missing, was it not?"
Jakinda swallowed. Again, she nodded.
"Sitheri keep them as trophies. I spent the past three years hunting down the one who took Hannu's. Just over a week ago, I found it. Your brother's murder has been avenged. Those Balrabbek had executed may have committed other crimes, but they were innocent inasmuch as Hannu's murder was concerned."
Jakinda's gaze fell from his as thoughts swirled through her mind.
"Did Ingrid mention anything to you about a theft from your room at the inn?"
Jakinda shook her head. "She said nothing to me."
"She knows I am here now. She would have gone back to your room to check on the thing I stole from her."
"You stole something from her?"
"The connection I mentioned between Ingrid Kane and the machine is something I found in your suite."
"You were in our room at the inn? Wait, you keep saying... Were you in my room? You were, weren't you?"
His lack of a response proved answer enough.
"Did you find my journal?" she asked, not pleased. "Did you read it?"
"I did find it, but I did not read it. I would not so disregard your privacy."
"But you would enter my room and search through my belongings?"
"Only because I searched for anything Ingrid might have hidden there. I realized your room the more likely place to hide something when I found nothing in hers."
"At least you looked through her room first." She sighed. "So what do you plan to do next?"
"I return to the machine to await Ingrid. She will go to it, sooner or later."
"Then we'll both go there and wait for her."
Ensel Rhe shook his head. "If Ingrid sees you with me, she will doubt your loyalty. Your life will be at risk."
"I can take care of myself. I've been doing it for—"
Ensel Rhe held up his hand, asking for her silence. He didn't think that alone would have worked, but the way he glanced toward the glade's exit told her it was not specifically to silence her protests.
The Nullification Engine (The Alchemancer: Book Two) Page 33