“Tell me about the person he was with,” Bastan said.
“I don’t know,” the Shuver replied.
“She worked for the palace,” Alec said. “There is some sort of turmoil there.”
Bastan frowned at him. “Turmoil?”
Alec nodded. How could he phrase it in a way that would let Bastan know what was going on? Maybe he didn’t have to. Maybe he only needed to help get out of here, and then he could explain to Bastan what was taking place.
“I don’t understand it. It’s complicated and beyond my ability to comprehend.” If he played stupid, maybe Bastan would realize that there was something to it and that he needed to be cautious.
“I shared with you, and now you need to share with me,” the Shuver said.
“You did. You brought one of my people back to me. For that, you have my gratitude.”
“Gratitude? I want something a little more substantial than gratitude.”
“Fine. There is an attack taking place within the city. I would warn you to be ready.”
“What kind of attack?” the Shuver asked.
“The kind that unsettles power.”
The Shuver’s eyes widened. “The palace? The woman we confined claimed she was with the palace.”
“You confined her?”
The Shuver waved his hand. “What choice did I have? She, like the others, came here and attacked.”
Bastan started to smile. “Interesting. Perhaps we will be better prepared than I realized.”
“What do you mean?” Alec asked.
Bastan glanced over. “Marin is gone. They’ve taken her.”
Alec hurriedly tried to think through the complications. If Marin was gone, then the help Sam had hoped to have with making the crossing over the swamp and then beyond to reach Tray would be gone. And then there was the strangeness to Master Helen’s attack on him, as well as the attack on the prince.
“Bastan, I think we need to return to my father’s shop.”
“Why?”
“Because I need a few supplies. And, if I’m right, we may need to stop this attack.”
“Stop it? I want nothing to do with it until it plays out.”
“I think we need to be involved.”
Bastan watched him, saying nothing for a long moment, but the Shuver laughed. “Why would we care whether there was an attack? Let the royals destroy themselves.”
Bastan was watching Alec, who almost squirmed beneath the weight of his gaze. There was something about the way that Bastan looked at him that made him uncomfortable.
“I don’t know everything that’s taking place,” Alec said. “But it’s all connected.”
“What does it matter?” Bastan asked. “Even if they destabilize, it’s not like we don’t have any ability to ensure stability of our sections.”
“I don’t know that it’s all about stability. I think this is about something else. I think this is about what’s happening where Tray has gone.”
Could the princess have been angling for more power? If she intended to remove the prince, then it was possible. If she did remove Jalen from power, Alec wouldn’t be surprised to see Lyasanna push an attack on the Thelns.
Any attack that she caused would lead to greater instability within the city. It would lead to violence. It would lead to even more danger for those who lived here.
Bastan had to see that.
“Help me get to my father’s shop, and then I might be able to help Sam. We can rescue Marin.”
“I’m not convinced I want to help rescue Marin,” Bastan said.
“Even if she can help Sam?”
“With everything that Marin has done, I don’t know that I can trust her, not anymore.”
“You keep saying that name. Is this Marin, the Marin?”
“It’s the same,” Bastan said.
“Kyza,” the Shuver said. “If Marin is involved, I have to help.”
Bastan frowned. “You have to help with Marin?”
“Marin helped ensure I had my position. Without her, none of this would be possible.”
Bastan frowned. “She’s been playing me.”
“What do you mean?” Alec asked.
Bastan shook his head. “It doesn’t matter, not anymore. All that matters is that perhaps Marin has been more deeply involved than I’ve ever realized.”
He nodded to the Shuver, and they headed out of the cells, back through the tavern, and out onto the street. As they went, Bastan glanced over. “What really happened?”
Alec told him about the prince and everything that had taken place, and described the Kaver attack, including how he had escaped.
“All of this because you went after one of the trees in the swamp?” Bastan asked.
“It might be the key to making easar paper.”
“I thought you said the key was the eels?”
“The eels might be part of it, but I don’t think they’re all of it. And if the prince is right with what he saw, the eels swam around the trees.” He touched the section of swamp wood in his pocket, hoping that it was what they believed.
“What if the prince is the one who intends to attack?” Bastan asked.
“What do you mean?”
Bastan shrugged. “I think you have focused on only one possibility. What if there’s another? What if the prince intends to use the easar paper to attack the Thelns?”
Alec hadn’t considered it. What did he really know of Jalen? It was possible he’d been played, but from the little he knew of the man, he didn’t think it likely. “I don’t know.”
“And you still think you should make this paper?”
“Bastan, if we can understand it, if we can begin to use the power of the easar paper, that is incredibly valuable. Even if we’re the only ones who know the secret.”
Bastan grunted and started to smile.
They quickly crossed through the city, heading toward Arrend. When they reached it, they stopped at his father’s shop, and the door was locked. Bastan pushed him aside and picked the lock, forcing his way in.
“We should hurry,” Bastan said.
“Why?”
“Because your friend has it in her head that she needs to make a move soon.”
“What kind of move?” Even as he asked, he thought he knew. Sam would be the kind to go after Marin, thinking she could rescue her. And it was possible she could, though it would be dangerous. Anything she might do would potentially put her in significant danger.
“Considering that Kavers attacked my hideout, I think Sam is determined to go after them.” Bastan looked over at Alec. “Any loyalty she once had to them is gone. I doubt that was their intention, but…”
Alec hurried into the shop. The other ingredients to mix the easar paper were all common, and he found them easily on his father’s shelves, then headed to the back of the shop where the hearth was and the big pot. Once again, Alec filled the pot with water and began to add the same ingredients he’d mixed before, quickly bring it to a boil. He withdrew the piece of swamp wood and held it in hands, twisting it. How would he add this? It would need to be cut up, turned into something that would be added to the mixture, but how?
He began to cut off sections of the root, and as he did, he added them to the boiling water. He was surprised when the water seemed to dissolve the root entirely.
“What is it?” Bastan asked.
“It’s the water. I think the other ingredients are the reason this works. I didn’t know what the purpose of some of these would be, but when mixed together, they seem to dissolve the section of root.”
“Then keep going,” Bastan said.
Alec made quick work of the rest of the root. He had no idea how much to use, so he added all of it to the boiling water and continued to stir. The smell was not nearly as pungent as it had been with other woods, and it wasn’t awful in the same way it had been when he had been at the university attempting the same thing. This was almost sweet.
“What now?” Bastan
asked.
“Now I have to strain it and stretch it,” Alec said.
He went to find the proper supplies, then returned and strained the water from mixture, setting it aside. The effort of mixing the thick pulp was tiring, and Alec started to sway on his feet.
Bastan grabbed him. “Eel meat?”
Alec nodded. “I had some when I was at the palace with the prince. It helped, but I think it’s starting to wear off.”
“The prince brought you eel meat?”
“I told him it would help.”
Bastan shook his head. “I’m still not sure that this is the right plan. But… I will trust you in this. Finish what you’re doing, and I will return with something that can help.”
“Return with Sam,” Alec said.
Bastan snorted. “Fine, I will return with Sam, as well.”
When Bastan left, Alec turned his attention back to the paper mixture. He still didn’t know whether it would work, and whether the recipe was accurate, but if it was, it was possible he would be the first one in the city to have made easar paper. That idea should excite him, but instead, it made him nervous. Having an abundant supply of easar paper was powerful, and he could only imagine the lengths others would go to in order to get it.
Maybe Bastan was right. Maybe the prince didn’t have a benevolent intent. Maybe he wanted something else.
Either way, Alec was determined to have the supply of paper. He trusted himself and Sam to use it appropriately. He might not trust others, but he and Sam…
And once they had enough paper, then they could go find Tray. They could go to the Theln lands without fear of not having adequate augmentations for Sam. And he wouldn’t have to fear his illness consuming him.
30
The Real Deceit
The door to the prince’s cell was difficult open. Sam grabbed the bars, trying to pull on them, but she just wasn’t strong enough to rip the bars off. Had she an augmentation, maybe it would’ve been different, but without one—at least more than what she could supply to herself—she needed the keys.
“Can you pick the lock?” Elaine asked her.
“It’s not quite the same as breaking into someone’s home,” Sam said. “A lock like this…” She pulled out her lock-pick set and began to work on the cell door, but it wasn’t the same. Trying to break in here was much more difficult than simply trying to break into a house, or any of the locked buildings that Bastan had sent her into over the years.
“Let me have a try,” Marin said.
Elaine glanced at Marin. Sam could see the levels of distrust in her eyes, distrust that had built over years.
“Gods,” Sam said, handing the lock pick over to Marin. “It’s not as if you don’t know what you get when you have Marin here.” Marin glanced at Sam, took the lock pick, and began to work on the cell door.
“We need to hurry,” Elaine said.
“There is only so much I can do to expedite this. If we had the keys…”
Sam raced back down the hall, thankful for the augmentation that still held, but wishing she had something more, enough that she could have some strength. She pulled the door open and saw the guard standing there. She grabbed him, yanking him into the room. It startled him enough that he couldn’t react, not before she managed to smack him unconscious with her staff.
Sam searched him and found a ring of keys. She brought them back to Elaine, who pushed Marin out of the way and began to work at the lock, going key after key, trying them in the lock, and failing to find the right one to open it.
Marin glared at Elaine and pushed her aside, once again working at the lock.
“I need to find Alec,” Sam said.
“The Scribe?”
This came from within the cell. The prince.
Sam grabbed the bars and leaned close. “Do you know him? You know what happened to him?”
The prince shook his head. “He was with me on the barge in the swamp when we were attacked. You must be his Kaver.” When Sam nodded, he smiled. “I have seen you around here before. What are you doing with her?” he glanced at Elaine.
“Trying to break you out,” Sam said.
“Out? She’s the one who put me in here.”
Sam glanced over to Elaine. Her mother just shook her head. “I wasn’t the one who placed him here. I didn’t know he was a prisoner.”
“You would have to have known. They wouldn’t have acted without your permission,” the prince said.
Elaine started to argue when Marin looked up at her. “Enough! I’m trying to figure out how I can open this cell, and with the two of you bickering, I’m not going to be able to do it effectively.”
The prince looked down at Marin, and there was a strange expression in his eyes. “I had heard you were dead. That’s what they told me.”
“That’s what I wanted them to believe,” Marin said.
“Why?”
Marin paused before finally looking up. “Because of your sister.”
“What did my sister do that made you want to be dead to me?”
“Later.”
“Later,” the prince said, shaking his head. “With you, it was always later. And now? If you fail to rescue me, will it be later once more? Will you tell me again that you don’t have time to share what happened to you all those years ago and what you’ve been doing?”
The lock clicked, and Marin stood, handing the lock pick set over to Sam. She took it and slipped it into her pocket and helped Marin as she pulled the door to the cell open, letting the prince out.
“Like I said, later.”
“Are there any others?” Sam asked Jalen.
“There was another from the university, but…”
Could that mean Beckah? Alec would want to know what happened to her, even if it wasn’t the outcome he wanted to know about. For his sake, she needed to learn what happened.
They reached the end of the hallway, and Elaine glanced down at the fallen guard. “He’s a good man,” she whispered.
“There are going to be a lot of good men you’re going to have to deal with,” the prince said. “Most of them were pulled into something that they might not have wanted to be pulled into.”
“Your sister has it in her mind that they are going to attack the Thelns. What is your position on that?” Sam asked.
“That is my sister’s plan, not mine,” the prince said. “She’s angry about their attempt on her and has managed to convince my father that now is a good time for us to turn our attention back northward, and back to the Thelns.” He knelt next to the fallen guard and pulled a sword out of the man’s sheath, and then stood, swinging it briefly, as if getting a feel for the weapon. “I’ve been trying to figure out a way to counter her desire. She has convinced the university the attack is necessary for us to have an adequate supply of easar paper, and I have been trying to prove that if we had a supply of our own, we wouldn’t need to attack.”
“That’s why you know Alec,” Sam said.
“When rumor came that there was someone at the university who had discovered something about the easar paper, I thought I could find out what he might know.”
“He was poisoned by Master Helen,” Sam said. “He wouldn’t have been able to help you that much, not in that state.”
“He was still weak when he was brought to me, but he asked me for a restorative that I helped provide.”
Sam frowned a moment before nodding. She glanced at the prince, realizing he had made a point of not saying it out loud, not in front of Elaine and Marin. Was that coincidental, or was that a sign that he didn’t trust one— or either—of the women?
But then, who did Sam trust? Did she trust the prince? She’d already seen the way that Lyasanna could lie and had learned the extent to which she would go to cover up something that she wanted to hide, attempting to deceive not only her Kaver, but everyone. Marin had been unwilling to murder a child to cover up her mistake.
“We need to go to the king,” Elaine said. “He needs
to know about this.”
They were taking too long, and Sam was uncomfortable with that. “I don’t think that going to the king is going to matter.”
“Samara, you haven’t been in the palace long enough to understand the dynamics. Lyasanna might have convinced the king, which has given her an element of authority, but if he understood what she was doing, and if he knew—”
Sam shook her head. “Think about what you saw, Elaine. Lyasanna was augmented, and she used Helen to help her with those augmentations. The only way that happens is if the king has either allowed himself to be used, or—”
“Or they have forced him,” Elaine said softly.
“Kyza!” The prince grabbed the door and glanced out before racing down the hall.
Sam followed, staying close behind him. “I want to know what happened to Alec.”
“You were captured, and it’s likely the Kavers that attacked us on the swamp managed to get your friend after they got me. He would have been in one of these cells though, so perhaps he managed to escape. He isn’t without his own talents, and he might be one of the brightest Scribes I’ve ever met.”
“Did you figure out the secret to making easar paper?”
The prince frowned. “I don’t know. It’s possible we did, but we didn’t have time to test it, not before they managed to capture me. I had intended to do a trial, but there just wasn’t the time.”
They hurried through the hallways, and Sam could tell they were making their way out of the palace. She stopped, and the prince glanced back at her. “I need to find Alec.”
“You don’t know that he’s here,” he said. “I already told you—”
“I know what you told me, but if he is here, I can’t leave him.”
“And I can’t leave the king,” Elaine said. She looked over at the prince. “And you shouldn’t, either.”
“He wasn’t willing to listen before. What makes you think he will listen now?”
“How do you know he wasn’t forced, coerced?” Sam asked.
“I have a hard time believing that would be possible,” the prince said.
“Oh, trust me. Many things are possible. Even having your memories erased.”
Amnesia_The Book of Maladies Page 25