Eye of Truth

by Lindsay Buroker

  Which had driven Vastiun to join the army and get himself killed? Jev stared bleakly at his father, hoping for more of an explanation. Hoping they hadn’t truly had some fight that had prompted Vastiun to leave in a huff.

  But Father had nothing more to say on the subject.

  After waiting several long seconds, Jev asked, “Do you remember anything made from ivory among Vastiun’s belongings? I think at least one of his charms was, but I was distraught and frustrated by his death at the time, and I wasn’t paying that much attention to what I boxed up to mail off.”

  “You’ve always had a tendency to let your emotions get in the way of rational thoughts,” Father said, an observation he’d made many times over the years.

  “Yes,” Jev said, not wanting to revive the old argument by pointing out that there was nothing wrong with being emotional about the death of one’s only brother. “His belongings?”

  “I never looked through them. I remember the news of his death arriving, and…”

  Father frowned around the courtyard, his gaze growing distant in memory. It had been almost four years.

  A green and silver banner flying the family wolf emblem hung on one of the walls, a breeze slipping in to stir it.

  “I don’t believe I ever saw his belongings,” Father finally said, “though I do remember hearing that a package came while I was out working. I believe Butler Corvel would have received it. It’s probably in Vastiun’s room. Nobody has touched his belongings since he left. I’m not even sure if the maid dusts in there.”

  “I’ll check with Corvel.”

  “He no longer works here.”

  Jev blinked in surprise. “He retired?”

  Corvel had worked at the castle since before he had been born, so it was hard to imagine him gone. The quirky and eccentric man had always had time for young Jev, Vastiun, and his cousins, so they had all considered him a favorite among the staff.

  “Without giving notice, yes.” Father’s jaw firmed in disapproval.

  That struck Jev as odd. After spending so many years working for the family, why would Corvel take off without a word? He’d been a little distant with everyone after Jev’s mother disappeared, but he’d still seemed happy to serve here.

  “Shortly after your brother’s death, I believe,” Father added. “I haven’t seen or heard of him since then, so I don’t know where he ended up.”

  An uneasy sensation crawled up Jev’s spine, reminding him of the time he’d led a scouting party through the Death Morrow Swamp deep in elven territory. He’d known danger lurked all about them then. Did it also lurk now?

  “Check his room. What you seek is likely there. I’ll see you at dinner.” Father nodded once, then strode out of the courtyard.

  Jev realized he hadn’t mentioned the sanctuary he’d promised Cutter and Lornysh.

  Later. He had a room to search.

  6

  Jev gripped his chin as he gazed down at his brother’s desk. His brother’s empty desk.

  A curtain stirred, and he barely registered it until someone stepped away from one of the tall windows. Jev jumped, reaching for his sword.

  “It’s me,” Lornysh said.

  “You grew tired of waiting by the watchmen’s wagon?” Jev thought about pointing out that the castle had dozens, if not hundreds, of doors throughout, but he knew full well why his friend had avoided coming straight in.

  “I slipped away when they weren’t paying attention. They left to go meet with another wagon carrying more watchmen onto your land.”

  “Oh?”

  “I jogged down to a bluff overlooking the turnoff and saw people get out of each to discuss something. How to apprehend you, perhaps. The blue-robed women came up with the new wagon.”

  Jev scowled. He had expected Zenia to come after him, but he’d hoped he would have more time. He had spent the last half hour poking around his brother’s room, opening drawers and wardrobes and even looking between the mattress and bed frame and into the secret niche in the wall stones where Vastiun had kept his boyhood treasures. Logically, Jev had known Corvel wouldn’t have stored Vastiun’s belongings in any of those places, but he hadn’t known where else to search. He had expected the package he’d mailed to be left unopened on the bed or desk.

  “Where’s Cutter?” Jev didn’t want his other friend to be arrested simply because he’d been with Lornysh when he’d jumped the two Order women.

  “Last I saw, taking a nap in the back of the wagon we came up in.”

  “He’s concerned about the company, I see.”

  “I haven’t noticed that dwarves are overly concerned about the doings of humans in general.”

  “Elves usually aren’t either.” Jev raised his eyebrows.

  “Your people’s incursions into elven lands have made them concerned.” Irritation flashed in his pale blue eyes.

  Jev wondered for the hundredth or thousandth time why Lornysh had joined the kingdom army, but he’d asked the question before and never received an answer. Others in Gryphon Company and especially in Wyvern Company had accused him of being a double spy, but Jev had never believed it. He remembered how close to death Lornysh had been when Jev had stopped what had been more torture than interrogation by his men. They’d captured the elf walking solo through the woods and not believed he did not have ill intent. Jev knew Lornysh would have integrated into the army much more smoothly if he had truly wished to be there from the start.

  Pushing away the memories, Jev took another lap around the room, peering up toward the ceiling, as if he might find the package dangling from the old candelabra.

  He spotted a familiar box wrapped in canvas perched atop a bookcase and snorted. “There you are.”

  He had to jump to reach it, and he wondered why Corvel had chosen such an out-of-the way spot. Had he worried the maid would come in and disturb Vastiun’s things?

  “This is the package I mailed back after my brother died,” Jev explained as he took it to the desk. The strings tying it were clumsily knotted, and he frowned, knowing that wasn’t the way he’d prepared it for mailing. He’d spent a summer sailing on one of his uncle’s merchant ships as a boy, and he’d learned how to tie various knots. This wasn’t his work. “It looks like Corvel or someone else opened it to see what was inside.”

  “There’s nothing magical in it. I can tell you that now.”

  Jev glanced at Lornysh as he untied the knots. “You’re sure?”

  “Positive. I can sense magic. You should remember that. You found the ability useful on more than one occasion.”

  “In finding people, yes, but I didn’t know you could sniff out magic in boxes like a hound finding jerky in his master’s pack.”

  One silver eyebrow twitched. “That isn’t the precise simile I would use to describe my talents.”

  The knots gave way and the canvas fell open, revealing the box. Jev hadn’t locked it, and it wasn’t locked now. His stomach knotted with the anticipation of pain, knowing he would look again upon his brother’s most treasured belongings, knowing he would dwell upon how Vastiun had been taken from the world far too soon.

  As he opened the lid, shouts drifted up to their third-story window. The window Lornysh had left open when he came through it. Like many windows in the castle, it overlooked the main courtyard.

  “Someone at your gate is challenging the watchmen’s wagons and the inquisitor riding on a horse beside them,” Lornysh said.

  His hearing had always been superior to Jev’s. Superior to that of any human.

  Jev hated that he had to rush and tried to detach himself emotionally as he sorted quickly through the box’s contents: gems, metal trinkets, and wooden carvings that had hung on leather bracers. There was also a necklace and scarf, along with the bone knife that Vastiun had inherited from their grandfather.

  “No ivory,” Jev murmured.

  “Is that good or bad?”

  “If it had been here, I could have handed it over to the inquisitor.”
>
  “If it never was, then it’s likely she was mistaken and neither you nor your brother ever had it in your possession.”

  Jev sighed. “That’s the problem. I remember there being an ivory charm. Or what I assumed was a charm.” He closed his eyes, bringing the carving up in his memory as clearly as he could. He held up his thumb and forefinger to give an approximation of the size. “It was about that big, the tusk made to look like a tree trunk with a hole in it. The single eye peeked out of the hole. The charm—artifact?—was yellowed and seemed old.”

  “I don’t recognize the description, but it sounds like something my people might have made.”

  “It must have been made by the Water Order if they consider it theirs. And stolen.”

  “Humans don’t make magical artifacts. You haven’t the ability to do so.”

  “True. Well, perhaps the Water Order purchased it at some point. You don’t have any idea what the artifact’s power would be, do you?” Jev reminded himself he didn’t know if the charm he remembered was indeed the artifact Zenia sought.

  “I would only be guessing.”

  Jev was tempted to ask for his guesses, but they were short on time.

  He closed the box. “Someone sorted through this during the time between when I mailed it and now, and the ivory item I remember is gone. That’s… a lot of miles and a lot of years. It could have been taken out yesterday or four years ago, here or on Taziira, but Corvel’s disappearance is odd. I’d like to talk to him. Maybe others of the staff know more than my father about where he went and where he is now. I—”

  “Jevlain!” his father called in a booming voice that floated in through the window.

  “Damn.” Jev curled his fingers into a fist. He needed more time.

  “They’re all in the courtyard now. The women included.” Lornysh had moved from the desk to the window and looked down to the flagstones and the fountain. “The women appear healed.”

  “How many watchmen are there?”

  Should Jev contemplate running? If he was dragged off to a dungeon in the basement of the Water Order Temple, he wouldn’t be able to get to the bottom of this. He suspected the answers he needed were here, in this castle, among those who had lived here when this package arrived and perhaps also who had lived here just before Vastiun went off to war.

  “Eighteen between the two wagons,” Lornysh said. “I don’t see Cutter.”

  “Your sensitive ears can’t hear him snoring in the back of one of the wagons?” Jev wrapped up the box and returned it to its position atop the dusty bookcase.

  “If he were snoring, I would hear him. It’s possible he slipped out when the wagons were traveling up and down the hill.”

  “Or he might still be back there.” Jev had no trouble believing Lornysh could slip out of everything from a secured dungeon to chains and stocks in a public square, but Cutter wasn’t known for his stealth.

  “Possibly.” Lornysh sounded skeptical.

  His father bellowed his name again, and Jev stepped up to the window. He looked down into the courtyard and spotted Zenia right away. The inquisitor’s cool gaze locked on him, as if she’d known exactly what room he was in. Maybe she had.

  “I’m coming down,” Jev called, though he still wasn’t sure he should. He wished his father would have lied for him, said he wasn’t here or that he didn’t know where he was. But Jev wasn’t surprised the old man hadn’t. His father wore his honor closer than his undershirt and never did anything that might besmirch it.

  “You will go willingly with her?” Lornysh asked as Jev headed for the door.

  “Yes. Don’t attack her again, please. Just…” Jev paused and met Lornysh’s eyes, tempted to ask him to lurk around the castle and see if he could suss out information. Even if it wasn’t his family or his world, he’d been an army scout for years, and he was even better at gathering intelligence than Jev. But this wasn’t Lornysh’s problem, not his fight. He’d done enough. He deserved to rest under the branches of a spring-flowering tree or head off to seek that culture he’d mentioned.

  “What?”

  Jev shook his head and smiled. “Stay out of trouble. And out of my father’s sight for now. I’ll try to arrange a more inviting welcome for you and introduce you to my family when I return, but for now, you have my leave to enjoy the trees and rest where you will. If anyone spots you and questions you, say you’re there by my leave. I hope I’ll be back very soon.”

  “Very well.” Lornysh clasped his hands behind his back, as if he meant to stay in the room, but Jev knew that if someone were to come up in five minutes, he would be gone. “But do not fear to ask me for a favor if you want one. I owe you my life.”

  “A debt that you’ve repaid five times over by now.”

  “Hm, no more than four, I should think. You were crucial in assisting in the defeat of that tree golem.”

  “By screaming and running so it would focus on chasing me while you shot it full of arrows?” Jev asked.

  “You were cursing, not screaming. And I believe you also shot a few of your bullets into it.”

  “It’s good to know my actions appeared manly from the outside.”

  “Indeed.”

  “Anyway, you don’t owe me anything.” Jev lifted a hand as he opened the door, wanting his friend to know that he appreciated the offer even if he wouldn’t take him up on it. “Find a place to rest and relax before you head off on your next adventure. Oh, and if things haven’t changed in the last ten years, there’s a stash of elven wine in the cellar. You’re welcome to it.”

  Lornysh’s ears visibly perked up. “Oh? Ryleshno’ronar? Or Synsesthilia?”

  “The one I can pronounce,” Jev said, though he had no idea. He remembered quite a few varietals down there.

  “Synsesthilia, then.”

  “Yes, my mother acquired it. I think it’s a few decades old.”

  Lornysh sniffed. “That wine isn’t even drinkable until it’s aged two hundred years.”

  “Stick it in your backpack for later then.” Jev smiled, well aware of elven longevity. Sometimes, he wondered if his people’s tendency to loathe the elves had more to do with the greater gifts the founders had given them rather than their haughty disdain for humanity. “Just avoid my grandmother if you see her. She would pelt you with stale baked goods. She and my father are both… I’m actually not sure what the full story is, but they’ve always made it clear they don’t like your kind.”

  “Few humans do.”

  “Judging by the number of half elves I’ve seen in my life, I know that’s not true.”

  Lornysh curled a lip in distaste. Apparently, he didn’t have his eye on any human women.

  Jev left before his father could bellow his name again. As he headed for the stairs and down them, he passed a couple of servants he remembered, and they gave him friendly pats on the back. Mildrey the cook gave him a hug that left him covered in flour. What did it say about his family that the hired help greeted him with far more warmth than his own father?

  When he reached the first level, the door to the courtyard coming into sight, his cousin Wyleria strode out of a side passage. She lifted a hand to stop him.

  “Jev, before you go, I need to tell you something.”

  He glanced toward the courtyard, wondering how long the watchmen would wait before coming in to forcefully retrieve him. Though worried, he nodded for Wyleria to speak.

  “I heard you and your father talking about Vastiun.”

  “Yes?” Jev leaned forward and rested a hand on her forearm. Could she be the very source of information he needed?

  “I know I shouldn’t have eavesdropped, but… I was there first.” She sniffed.

  Jev nodded, not concerned at all about eavesdropping. “What about Vastiun?”

  “We weren’t living here when he left, so I don’t know if he had a blowup with your father, but Mother and I suspected… Well, he’d been running around with an elf woman. Dating her if his words were to be believ
ed.”

  “Elf? Or half elf?” He remembered Vastiun alluding to a woman. Pointed ears hadn’t been mentioned.

  Wyleria hesitated. “I don’t know. I saw her in the distance once. She was so graceful and beautiful, I would have believed her a full-blood. But I don’t know what a full-blooded elf would have seen in him.”

  Jev thought of his offhand comment to Lornysh about the existence of half elves. Pairings between the races certainly happened, but they had happened a lot more often in the past, before King Abdor turned all of Korvann against the Taziir. Jev hadn’t even seen full-blooded elves around when he’d been growing up, nor had he heard of any interracial romances. It was hard to imagine an elf wandering into the kingdom to date Vastiun while a war between their peoples was going on.

  “What happened?” he asked.

  “I don’t know, but many people saw them together over a space of a couple of weeks. There was some speculation that her relatives might have come looking for Vastiun, to physically convince him to leave her alone, but I don’t think anyone ever saw them. We were just trying to figure out why he left so abruptly. We had dinner with him and the rest of the family here one night, and the next day, he joined the army and caught a ship sailing to Taziir without saying goodbye to anyone.”

  “Hm, I don’t suppose you ever saw Vastiun with a carved ivory charm?”

  “Sorry, no. I just thought you should know that it was likely his love life that got him into trouble and had him scurrying for another continent, not anything your father said. We—my sisters and I—speculated that he got her pregnant and that her brothers wanted to kill him.”

  “I…” Jev rubbed his head, having no idea what to say. What if he had some half-elf nephew out there that he didn’t know about?

  “Jevlain,” his father’s booming voice came down the corridor.

  “Thanks, Wyleria.” Jev released her arm and nodded, then strode out to meet Zenia, though inquisitors weren’t at the top of his mind now. He was perplexed about everything going on and had no idea how to start solving a mystery that was more than four years old.

  “And here I thought I’d just get some cool beer and get drunk on a beach somewhere,” he mumbled as he walked out into the courtyard.