The Emperor's Edge (a high fantasy mystery in an era of steam)

by Lindsay Buroker

  * * * * *

  Sespian looked up from a report when the door opened and Jeddah walked into the suite. Trog sauntered into the servant’s path, but Jeddah managed to maintain his poise—and hold onto the tray with Sespian’s tea—without tripping when the cat rubbed against his shin. His lips flattened, but he was too professional to scowl at the creature leaving hairs on his uniform.

  “Thank you, Jeddah,” Sespian said when the man set the tray down. Steam rolled off the freshly poured cup of tea. “Is Hollowcrest in his suite?”

  Sespian kept hoping for a chance to snoop in Hollowcrest’s office, but the honor guard that trailed him everywhere made it impossible to ensure his movements would not be reported. As a boy, he had crawled through the old hypocaust ducts in the walls and under the floors, and he was thinking of taking up the hobby again.

  “Yes, Sire,” Jeddah said. “I believe he has a guest.”

  Sespian glanced at the grandfather clock ticking against one wall. “It’s late for entertaining.”

  “Yes, Sire.”

  “Do you know who it is?”

  “I don’t know the gentleman’s name.”

  “Has he been here before?” Sespian asked.

  “I have served him a few times, Sire.”

  “Thank you.”

  After Jeddah left, Sespian stared thoughtfully at the door. Maybe he should take more of an interest in what went on in Hollowcrest’s private meetings.

  He pushed himself to his feet, only to double over with a hiss. Stabs of pain ricocheted through his head. The problem was getting worse every day.

  Sespian sucked in a few deep breaths. The stabs subsided into a more manageable ache.

  His guards came to attention when he exited the suite.

  “Just going across the hall,” he said.

  Three steps took him to Hollowcrest’s door. He lifted a hand to knock but paused midair. He always knocked before entering. Emperor or not, he felt it the polite thing to do. Yet he could do as he wished, right? Maybe he should surprise Hollowcrest.

  His hand lowered to the knob. He twisted it and stalked inside.

  Hollowcrest and a brown-clad man Sespian had never seen before stood in front of a desk. Surprise blossomed across Hollowcrest’s face, but he quickly recovered. The other man looked...guilty. What were they discussing in here so late at night?

  “What can I do for you, Sire?” Hollowcrest asked.

  Got to be faster, Sespian. You should have spoken first. “Who’s this?”

  “This is Malford, the assistant to the Chief of Finance in the Urkart Satrapy,” Hollowcrest said. “He’s here on business.”

  Mud and some sort of damp green gunk adorned the stranger’s boots. A worn leather jacket hung nearly to his knees with something that might have been a pistol bulging at his side. Neither the scarred cheek nor shaven head suggested finance expert. In addition, a hint of the sewers clung to the man.

  “One wonders what route he took to arrive here,” Sespian said.

  “What can I do for you, Sire?” Hollowcrest repeated.

  Sespian could challenge him then and there, demand to know who the man really was. But if Hollowcrest continued to lie, what could Sespian do?

  “My birthday celebration is coming up,” he said, “a huge holiday for everyone, and there’ll be the gala here at the Barracks, of course. I’d like to invite all the foreign diplomats in the city. It’s time to build real relations instead of simply humoring them.”

  “Of course, Sire, I’ll take care of it personally.”

  Uh huh, sure you will.

  “Anything else, Sire?”

  “No. Nothing at all.”

  As soon as Sespian returned to his suite, he shoved aside an antique armoire. He grabbed a nail file from a drawer and unfastened a grate at the base of the wall.

  He squirmed into the dark and narrow duct. It barely provided enough room to wriggle through on his belly. He had grown in the ten years since he used it last—the age he had decided it was unseemly for the future emperor to crawl through the ducts, spying on people. Perhaps he never should have stopped.

  Dust blanketed the inside, and cobwebs wrapped around his face. Drafts of warm air stirred his hair. When he reached a T-section, he folded himself in half to turn right. Before he reached the blob of light that represented the grate to Hollowcrest’s room, he heard voices.

  “From your promises, I was expecting a drooling simpleton.” It was not Hollowcrest’s voice—it had to be the supposed finance assistant.

  “For a man of average intellect, that would be the result,” Hollowcrest said. “The boy’s naïve but bright. I have everything under control though. The poison has dulled his faculties and is on its way to rendering him bedridden.”

  In the stillness of the duct, Sespian’s quickened breaths stirred the cobwebs. His head throbbed dully. Not a tumor. Poison. It was hard to feel relief, since the latter was just as bad as the former. Although poison he might be able to do something about.

  “I don’t think he believed your finance chief cover.”

  “If you’d avoid mucking around in the sewers, your true occupation wouldn’t be so obvious,” Hollowcrest muttered.

  “My work takes me to fabulous and varied places.” The man laughed and something sinister in it chilled Sespian further.

  Hollowcrest sighed. “Sicarius never smelled of his work.”

  Sespian’s stomach lurched at the assassin’s name, old fear rearing to the front of his mind.

  “Sicarius, Sicarius, Sicarius,” the other man snarled. “The way you always talk about him, you’d think you were lovers.”

  “He was efficient. Very efficient. A man in my position values that.”

  “I hear he’s in the city. Maybe you two should kiss and make up. Unless you’re afraid you’re his next mark. Or perhaps the boy is.” That sinister laugh again. “Many would benefit from the emperor’s death and the succession confusion it would bring. I’m sure there’s a lot of money in that job.” He sounded wistful.

  “Let’s focus on why you’re here,” Hollowcrest said. “What have you found out about Forge?”

  “I can’t get into the lead lady’s place. I ran up against a bunch of magical protection, and I was almost discovered by some scarred-up security guard.”

  The men moved to another room in the suite where Sespian could not hear them. That was fine. He had heard enough. He backed through the duct until he reached his room. When he tried to screw the grate back in place, his hands shook too much for the job.

  Hollowcrest was poisoning him.

  Sespian stalked the room, mind whirring. How was the old curmudgeon doing it? Putting it in his food? Was the kitchen staff a part of it? Was Jeddah?

  His peregrinations halted in front of the tray with the cup of tea on it. He sank to the floor before the steeping liquid. Not his food. His tea. The one thing that most reminded him of his mother. Sespian clenched his jaw. That bastard had ruined it.

  He picked up the cup, crossed to the water closet, and poured it down the wash-out. A part of him wanted to stalk across the hall and hurl the empty cup at Hollowcrest—a big part of him. But that would do no good. It would only tip Hollowcrest to what Sespian now knew.

  Sespian stared into the empty cup. What was he going to do?