by Kat Parrish
“Of course he does. When a street urchin comes in with a bag of swag, he’d be a fool to think the boy was selling the family jewels, wouldn’t he?”
Mirielle wasn’t quite sure what “swag” was, but she was not going to ask him to translate and risk being ridiculed again. Annoyed, she opened the door herself and walked in.
In contrast with its façade, the jeweler’s shop was bright and inviting inside, filled with cabinets of the same white lorch wood that was used in Idrissa’s Temple.
The jeweler was said to have been a pirate in his youth, and it was also said that he’d filled his shop with plunder taken in raids.
Looking at the small bald man, Mirielle found it hard to credit such rumors but she could feel Loic’s tension as they entered the shop and took her cue from him to be cautious.
“The jeweler glanced at Mirielle but his attention was focused on her companion. “Loic,” he said in an accent she did not recognize. He did not sound pleased.
“Greik,” Loic replied, just as flatly, then the two men just stared at each other as Mirielle looked at the baubles in the case in front of her.
Her eyes were caught by a large black stone that seemed to have fire dancing at its center.
“It’s called a kea,” Greik said, “a fire gem from beyond the hungry wastes. It once belonged to a princess who bartered it for a kiss.
“It’s said to bestow a certain kind of … vigor…to any man who wears it. But it is bad luck for a woman to hold it.”
“I am not superstitious,” Mirielle she said and reached for the stone. Loic scooped it up before she could touch it.
“But I am,” he said, “All thieves are. So why tempt fate?” He made as if to hand the gem back to the jeweler, then palmed it.
Greik scowled. What are you doing here? I paid the Lady’s protection money this Third Day past. She’s not due any more for another four days.”
“I’m not here on behalf of my mother,” Loic said, “although you sound like you have a guilty conscience. Something to hide perhaps?”
Loic tossed the fire gem in his hand as if flipping a coin. The jeweler reached for it but Loic kept it just out of his each.
“I’ll have the gem back,” Greik said nervously. “I’ve already promised it to a buyer.”
“Really?” Loic said. “I’ll bet you will make a handsome profit on that.” He pulled out the tail of his shirt and began vigorously polishing the gem.
“Don’t,” the jeweler said.
“Why not?” Loic asked, the picture of innocence.
“You’ll destroy the patina,” the jeweler said glumly.
“Will you look at that,” Loic said, showing Mirielle the specks of glittering color on the fabric of his shirt. “It looks like I have rubbed the patina off.”
“Oh for the love of tears,” the jeweler said. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“No one likes a cheat Greik,” Loic said, handing him back the now-drab rock. “Trying to pass an ordinary rock off as a kwaa is a dangerous ploy. It’s not like anyone won’t ever try to polish it.”
Greik took the worthless stone and put it in a drawer in a glass-fronted cabinet.
“You’re worse than your mother,” he said.
“I’m glad you think so,” Loic responded pleasantly. “It will save time.”
Greik looked wary. “What do you want?”
“I’m looking for something very specific.”
“That’s specific,” Greik said and then a crafty gleam entered his eyes. “You’re looking for the Tears? I don’t have them.”
Beside Loic, Mirielle let out a long breath.
“Does everyone in the city know the Tears have been stolen?”
The jeweler gave her the smile someone might give a not-terribly-bright child.
“Of course they do. That’s the kind of news that grows wrings.” His grin turned nasty. “And it serves that old bitch of a Holy Mother right.”
His venom surprised Mirielle. It sounded personal.
“What grudge do you have against the Holy Mother?” she asked, genuinely curious.
“It doesn’t concern you girl,” he said.
“What concerns us is the whereabouts of the gems,” Loic said.
“And as I have said, I do not have them,” Greik responded. The only person who might buy them is some religious zealot who wanted to possess an artifact of the goddess, and if that’s the case, you’ll never see them again, at least not until the thief dies.” He chuckled.
“If I were you, I’d buy a set of keepsakes in the marketplace and take them to the Holy Mother. See if she will give you a reward.
“But the Daughters need the Tears to make their medicines,” Mirielle said, appalled.
The jeweler shrugged. “People have been selling potions for years. A little colored water, a little scent, a little flavoring…who’ll be any the wiser?”
“That would be terrible,” she said.
Greik shrugged again. “The sky is blue. It is what it is.”
Loic looked at Mirielle. “Do you hear their song in here?”
“No,” she said.
“We’re finished here,” Loic said to Greik, who looked relieved. Loic took Mirielle’s elbow to guide her out of the shop.
At the door he turned around to address the jeweler again.
“A word of advice, Greik. Don’t let my mother catch you selling counterfeit gems. She might start wondering about the provenance of that ruby ring you sold her last winter.”
Greik took in the warning and swallowed hard.
“You won’t tell her?” he asked, a plea not a question.
“The Lady doesn’t need me to tell her anything,” Loic said, “she has her eyes and ears everywhere.”
Outside in the street, Mirielle took a deep breath. The encounter with the jeweler had unsettled her.
“What will your mother do to him?” Mirielle asked.
Loic shrugged. “It will depend on how much she needs him. But my guess is she would make an example of him. The Lady does not like to be cheated. And she doesn’t like anyone handling scams and schemes that don’t profit her directly. The last person who tried to cheat my mother choked to death on a mouthful of uncut diamonds. She fed them to him personally.”
Mirielle took that in. Then was struck by another question. “I wonder why he doesn’t like the Holy Mother. She hasn’t been outside the temple in 40 years.”
Loic snorted.
“What?” she asked.
“I told you I’d listened to their conversations. You’re not the only one who can go about the city in disguise,” he said. “Her favorite masquerade is that of a Dairish beggar.”
Mirielle stopped in the street to stare at him.
“I don’t believe you,” she said.
“I’m a thief not a liar,” he said. “And I have seen her myself when she visits my mother.”
He laughed at her shocked expression.
“Do you really think anyone could rule this city without my mother’s help? The Governor-General pays court to her regularly, seeking favors and information and advice.”
“Then your mother is the most important person in the city,” Mirielle said.
“She likes to think so,” Loic agreed.
“Do you think she has the stones and we’re just running around the city for her amusement?”
He gave that question some consideration. “I do not think she has the Tears but I expect she’s taking some satisfaction from our trouble. My mother has a strange sense of humor.” He fell silent for a moment and then added. “The Tears are symbols, but they’re only potent in context, and only if they are held by the Daughters of Light. Anyone else trying to use them for power or influence would be seen as just a thief, and someone who stole from a goddess. That would take away any power they might have bestowed. My mother doesn’t need the Tears to run things; she is already the puppet master.”
“You didn’t really think Greik had the stones.”
<
br /> “No. But I knew that if we went to his shop, word would get around. If people know the Lady’s son is asking questions, they’ll be eager to give her some answers. And meanwhile, there’s another direction we can look.
He looked off toward the Citadel, the gray -rock compound that housed the Governor-General and his militia
She followed his gaze.
“You don’t mean to go in there,” she said, horrified. “His guards will imprison you if they don’t kill you.
He turned, his eyes twinkling with mischief.
“But first they have to catch me,” he said.
Unconvinced, she followed him to the parade ground in the back of the compound, mingling with the travelers who always seemed to be milling about, gawking at the great stone edifice.
“What do you know about the Governor-General,” Loic asked her.
“I thought you knew everything about everyone,” she said, glancing at him sideways with a smile to let him know she was teasing him.
Why am I acting this way? she scolded herself. As if I’ve never talked to a man before.
“Humor me,” he said. “I’d like your perspective on the matter. What kind of man do you think he is?”
Mirielle took her time answering. She’d never really considered the matter before.
“He doesn’t like the Holy Mother,” she said, “and I don’t think it’s because he resents sharing power with her. He enjoys the perquisites that the Governor-General is entitled to but he is not hungry for more power. In fact, I think he’s rather lazy.”
She realized as she spoke, that her words were true. Over the past year or so, she’d noted that the Governor-General had ceded more and more authority to the Holy Mother, allowing her to take over areas of the government that should by rights have been under secular control.
“He is a fastidious person. He doesn’t like disorder,” she said, thinking out loud.
“I think he is concerned that the Holy Mother, left to her own devices, would purge all the non-believers from Idrissa.”
“Purge them peacefully?” Loic asked.
“By whatever means necessary,” Mirielle said. “And that could get---”
“Messy,” Loid said. “Do you think the Governor-General could have stolen the Tears?” he asked.
“I thought you thought the Holy Mother took them?”
Loic shrugged. “I suspect everyone.”
“The Governor’s in and out of the temple all the time but I’ve never seen him in the chapel except for holy day celebrations and then he wasn’t alone.”
“But think Miri, how could he use the Tears?”
Mirielle was momentarily distracted by the way he shortened her name, as if they were intimates. I like it, she decided.
“If he stole the Tears and kept them to himself, it might be to simply deprive the Holy Mother of her symbolic power,” she said.
“Or maybe he has another goal in mind,” Loic coaxed her. “What other use could he make of them?”
Mirielle knew these speculations weren’t a game, but it felt as if her mind had grown wings in the last few hours. There had been so little to challenge her in the temple. Her life had been so ordered and so ordained that there were never any surprises.
“What if he planned to use them as a propaganda tool to unyoke himself from the burden of sharing power himself? He could claim divine intervention—say that the Goddess had lost faith in her Daughters and given him he Tears as a sign of Her favor.”
Loic beamed at her. “That is a magnificently devious thought,” he said. “I’m proud of you.”
Strangely, Mirielle felt pleased by this compliment. Then she shook her head. “The temple was desecrated,” she said. “What the thief did was vile. Blasphemous. Wicked.”
She thought about it. “The Governor is a vain and foolish man in many ways,” she said, “a man who is unsuited to the job and wishes he were still a law-keeper on the border. But I do not see him behind that ugliness.”
“You may be right about that,” Loic said. “But we need to be certain.”
“How—” she started to say but before she could get the question out, Loic bent and kissed her.
What? Mirielle thought, and then her thoughts were drowned in a rush of confused delight. She’d never been kissed before and it was lovely to feel his lips on hers.
She didn’t know quite what to do when she felt his tongue probing between her lips and she pulled back slightly.
“No,” he said. “Play along. We need to distract the guard.”
This is a distraction? Mirielle thought, disappointed, and she cursed herself for misunderstanding his intentions. But as he bent his head to hers once again, she surrendered to the feeling his touch aroused in her, telling herself that it was in the interest of making their passion look real to anyone who might be watching.
“Here now,” cried a voice that had not yet broken. “Take your slut and move along.”
Loic lifted his head to stare at the young cadet who’d just challenged him. “Mind what you say,” he said in a low growl.
The cadet, who could not have been much older than Florin, swallowed hard but mustered his courage. “You cannot be here,” he said. “This is a private area.”
“Excellent,” Loic said. “We were looking for privacy.”
The young cadet looked so nonplussed Mirielle felt sorry for him.
“Sir,” the cadet said, “I must insist.”
Loic backed away from Mirielle and put his hand on the hilt of his sword.
“Must you?” he said.
“What’s going on here?”
Mirielle turned to see another cadet, this one older and a lot more capable looking. The young cadet looked immensely relieved.
“They were just leaving, Stal,” he said.
“Then move along,” Stal said.
“When we’re ready,” Loic said, and as if the cadets weren’t there, he reached for Mirielle again.
He’s a lunatic, she thought. Or a fool. But part of her was thrilled by the interplay and part of her was curious to see what would happen next.
“Right then,” the cadet called Stal said and moved toward Loic. Loic stepped back and with actions almost too quick for the eye to follow, he disarmed the cadet and knocked him out with a weighted sap he carried on his belt. He then turned to the younger cadet, who was watching round-eyed.
“Turn around,” Loic said.
“Please don’t kill me,” he pleaded.
“He’s not going to kill you,” Mirielle said, hoping the thief would not make her a liar.
“I’m not going to kill you,” Loic confirmed, “but I am going to knock you out. It’ll be easier if you turn around.”
Looking dubious, the boy turned his back. Mirielle could see he was trembling. Loic shook his head in exasperation and then swung the sap at the back of the cadet’s head. He fell like a stone.
“Help me drag them into the glade,” Loic said and Mirielle took the younger boy by the legs and dragged him into a corner of the grounds with thickly planted lorch trees while Loic handled Stal.
One he was satisfied they were hidden from view, Loic stripped the cadets of their uniforms and left them bound and gagged with bonds improvised from their torn under-shirts.
“What if they get cold?” Mirielle asked.
Loic gave her a look, but then sighed and covered the boys with their coats.
“Satisfied?”
“Yes,” she said.
He shook his head but he was smiling and his amusement irritated Mirielle.
“I don’t see what’s funny about this,” she said with some heat.
“You,” he said. “You’re so bossy and it’s all to cover up how soft-hearted you are.”
Mirielle was about to protest that she was not soft-hearted when he held up his hand. “Someone’s coming.”
Just then the great bell in the Citadel tower began tolling.
Loic began stripping off his clothes. “What ar
e you doing?” Mirielle asked.
“Putting on Stal’s uniform,” he said. “You need to change too, unless you think you can get into the Citadel wearing that dress.”
This is the second time today he’s asked me to take off my clothes, Mirielle thought, and to her surprise, she did not find the thought unwelcome.
By the time the bell had stopped tolling, a mob of cadets had formed in front of the Citadel’s great brass doors. Mirielle stuffed her hair inside the cadet’s cap and followed Loic to the back of the line.
“Everyone’s hungry and thinking of their dinner,” he said to her. “No one will notice us.”
Moments later, the doors opened and the cadets streamed in. Loic was right, Mirielle marveled. No one even gave them a second glance.
When Loic stepped to one side, pretending that someone was out of place on his uniform, Mirielle stepped up beside them and when the last cadet passed them, they quietly slipped into a side corridor.
Mirielle’s heart was hammering in her chest but she kept her head down.
“This place is vast,” she whispered. “Where do we start?”
There’s only one place we need to search,” he said, “In the Governor-General’s quarters.
“It’ll be guarded,” she said.
“Most likely,” he agreed. “Just follow my lead.”
“You have a plan?”
“Yes.”
“What is it?”
Loic stopped in the middle of the hall. “The Governor likes to entertain cadets in his quarters. He’s easily bored. He will be delighted to find a beautiful cadet waiting in his bed.”
‘You want me to sleep with him while you search his rooms?”
“Is that a problem?” he asked, genuinely baffled by her reaction.
You stupid man.
“Yes,” she said. “Of course it’s a problem.”
He studied her for a moment then comprehension dawned.
“Oh, how stupid of me,” he said. “You’re a virgin aren’t you?”
Mirielle’s mouth fell open in astonishment and to her horror, she could feel a blush darkening her cheeks.
“I’m a Daughter of Light,” she said, outraged.
“The Governor will be very happy to find out you’re a virgin,” he said casually.
Mirielle stood there, shaking her head.