City of Keys, page 18
“Ehlah,” he said. Hello.
Jamila’s head whipped around. She rose quickly to her feet. “Ehlah, Cardinal. You speak our tongue?”
“That’s all I know,” he said apologetically. “I hoped to ask you some questions.”
She rolled up the rug. “I am at your service.”
His first impression had been right. She was young, no more than mid-twenties. She had large brown eyes and a delicate face, olive-hued. She wore seven small silver hoops in her right ear and a black robe sewn with beads at the bottom.
“Why are you here?” he asked bluntly.
“Merely as an advisor.” Her Osterlish was perfect, with only the faintest accent. An educated woman. “I represent certain parties in the Masdar League who have an interest in the outcome of this conflict.”
“So you expect us to win?”
A faint smile. “It seems likely.”
“Did the Golden Imperator send you?”
“I’m not at liberty to disclose my patron.”
“Of course.” He smiled back. “What matters are you advising us on?”
She shrugged. “Your Reverend Father is interested in the political situation in my homeland.”
“Which is?”
“There will be a change of government soon. The seven-year term of the Imperator, may the Alsakhan bless her, is expiring. A new Golden Imperator will take her place. Naturally, Balaur would prefer to see power transferred to a faction with favorable views toward the mages.”
“Naturally. But what does your patron get out of it?”
She regarded him with amusement. “If it’s details you’re after, Cardinal, I think it best you ask your Reverend Father directly.”
Malach inclined his head. “I was merely curious.”
She made a flowery gesture. “It has pleased me to make your acquaintance, but I fear I am wanted elsewhere. El am salaam, Cardinal.”
“El am salaam,” he echoed, watching her walk away.
She must be wearing silken slippers for her feet made not a sound.
When he returned to the archives, he discovered two things.
First, Sydonie and Tristhus had made good on their promise to bring “real food.” A feast awaited. Fresh, soft bread and creamy yellow butter, apples and pears, a hearty vegetable stew and even a plate of small honey tarts with raspberries, most of which had been devoured already.
The other thing was that Syd had given Rachel a haircut.
“Do you like it?” Syd asked, jumping up and down with the scissors in her hand. “She looks just like Bishop Caralexa!”
Malach snatched the scissors away. She’d shorn the sides of Rachel’s head, leaving a strip from front to back, and dressed her in a green cloak, raggedly cut off at the bottom.
“Doesn’t she look pretty?” Syd demanded, anxious now. “It didn’t hurt! She likes it, don’t you, Rachel?”
Rachel grinned and nodded—at Syd, not him.
Malach drew a deep breath. “Yes, it suits her very well. But ask next time.”
He sat in one of the chairs and devoured a plate of stew, ignoring Falke’s grim stare. If anything, the disapproval made him more determined to let Rachel spend time with her cousins. Yes, they seemed to regard her as a life-sized doll they could dress up at whim, but that’s what older kids did to younger kids. As long as Rachel didn’t mind, what did it matter?
After the meal, he let them go play on the main floor. Screams and shouts drifted up from above, but they were the happy kind. It occurred to him that Syd and Trist were starved for company too. He just prayed he could manage them.
“You see?” Falke said in a low voice as Malach sopped up the last of the stew. “Balaur hoards all this for himself while the rest of us starve!”
“I’m not starving,” Malach mumbled through a mouthful of bread.
“Because those creatures stole food from the kitchen—”
“They’re not creatures,” he said warningly. “They’re children. And cousins of mine. I suggest you guard your tongue lest you lose it.”
Falke huffed. “How much longer must we remain here?”
“Until I say so.”
A crash resounded from below. It sounded like a bookcase toppling over. Malach froze with the bread halfway to his mouth. Then he heard Rachel’s distinctive giggle, a neighing snort that reminded him so much of her mother it hurt. He finished the bread.
Falke scowled. “You cannot seriously mean to allow them—”
“What did I just say?”
Falke fell silent.
“She’s mine now. She may not be speaking to me yet, but I’ll win her over. In time, I will. You know it. So for your own sake, it’s better you stop fighting the inevitable.” He leaned forward. “You are nothing but a warm body keeping my daughter alive. You have no will of your own. No purpose other than to draw your next breath. And soon enough, your empire will be in ashes.”
Falke’s eyes narrowed. “What did Balaur tell you?”
Malach smiled. “Mox nox, Severin.”
Soon, nightfall.
Chapter Seventeen
Sydonie and Tristhus proved to be invaluable allies. They not only told him the names of every mage at Bal Agnar, but they knew where everyone slept, who they conspired with and who they hated.
Malach found Valdrian and confirmed most of it. His cousin readily agreed to be part of the advance party to Nantwich, as did Caralexa and Jessiel. They seemed as eager as Malach to be gone.
He wondered if it was true what Falke claimed, that the ley was tainted here. He had no way of knowing for certain—the children seemed immune—but Jess told him stories from the camp that made him ill.
He wondered how much longer the mages would keep control.
One by one, he sought out those whom he respected for their level heads and independence from the scheming of the old guard. By the end of the second day, Malach had a list of two dozen men and women he meant to bring with him when they rode out.
He was walking back to the archives at dusk, feeling pleased with himself, when Syd came sprinting up.
“They took him away, Malach! Your servant!”
His heart stopped. “What about Rachel?”
“She’s with Trist.” Syd paused to catch her breath. “They’re okay.”
He was relieved, but this was still bad. Very bad.
“Who did it?”
“Two of the nasty old cardinals.” She adjusted the bow across her back. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere!”
If Falke had been brought to Balaur, they were both done for.
“Shit,” he muttered. “Shit!”
“I know where they went,” she said, tugging his hand. “I’ll show you.”
A sudden wave of paranoia swept over him. “Are you lying to me, Syd?”
“No! I like you. I don’t like them.” She pulled harder. “Come on! Before they kill him!”
Malach followed her at a run to an abandoned ruin near the outer wall of the Arx. It was half buried in thick vegetation. As they neared, she pressed a finger to her lips. He heard voices inside. Malach crept up to the crumbling edge of a wall and peered inside.
A wiry old woman in a red robe paced up and down. Cardinal Mandrake. One of Beleth’s cronies and a prize-winning bitch. Falke lay on the ground. His hands were bound behind his back with rusty wire. Two more figures stood in the shadows.
“We must bring him to the Reverend Father,” one rasped.
Malach recognized the voice. Bishop Aarin. The scar on his sagging face was from Tristhus. Aarin had made the mistake of trying to fondle the boy. By the time Malach had heard about the incident, the fucker was long gone from Bal Kirith or he would have killed him himself.
“Not until I’ve had some fun. I watched him murder my husband!”
Mandrake had to be Falke’s age. Early seventies. But her step was lithe as she strode up and delivered a kick to his ribs.
The third laughed, a nasal bray that named him as Mandrake’s youngest son, Valoel. A shifty-eyed shit who was, unfortunately, also huge.
We have to kill them all, Malach mouthed at Sydonie.
She nodded and silently drew an arrow from her quiver.
“Why are you here masquerading as a servant?” Mandrake demanded, delivering another vicious kick. “How did you get inside?”
Falke stared at her through a swollen eye.
“We’ll cut the truth out.” Valoel came forward. A blade gleamed in his hand. “I could compel you, but my mother wants entertainment.”
“Go ahead,” Falke said, spitting at his feet. “You’ll get nothing.”
Malach almost admired his courage. He must know how bad this would get, but he hid his fear.
“Your father deserved to die,” he said. “My only regret is that the rest of you escaped justice.”
Valoel crouched down, pressing the tip of the knife to Falke’s eyelid. “I’ll try to save a piece of you for Balaur, but I can’t make any promises—”
The mage made a gurgling noise as Syd’s arrow pierced his throat. The force knocked him back. The blade slid from his hand. Malach leapt though the gap in the wall. Mandrake spun around, teeth bared. She lunged at him, her hands curling into claws. The kaldurite went cold in his belly.
Aarin dove behind a pile of rubble. Another arrow whizzed over his head. Syd calmly nocked another.
“Take the blade and kill the girl,” Mandrake hissed at Malach, her nails sinking into his flesh. “Now!”
He sank down and picked up Valoel’s knife with wide, blank eyes.
“Cut her ears off first. Then cut out her heart and kill yourself—”
Malach flipped the blade up and caught the hilt. “How about this? I kill you first.” He glanced at the cowering bishop. “And then I kill him?”
Her mouth worked but no sound came out. Malach buried the knife right where her heart would be, if she had one. Astonishment flashed across her face. Then the cardinal collapsed.
“Please!” Aarin pleaded, licking his lips, as Syd walked toward him. “I never meant to . . . . All a misunderstanding!”
“I don’t like you.” She frowned. “My brother doesn’t like you either.”
He whimpered as she aimed the bow at his groin.
“Finish it, Syd,” Malach said. “We don’t have time for this.”
“Yes, Cardinal.” The arrow took Aarin right at the juncture of the Broken Chain Mark around his neck. He gasped, shuddered, and lay still.
Malach turned to Falke. “Can you walk?”
He nodded. Syd took out a knife and cut the wires around his wrists. He rose with a grimace.
“How were you found out?”
“I’m not sure. I was on the ration line. I took my share and started back. They must have followed.”
“Did anyone else recognize you?”
“How should I know?” Falke managed a haughty glare through his slitted, blackened eye. “I warned you this would happen.”
Malach regarded the dead mages. “We have to hide the bodies.”
Syd retrieved the arrows, yanking them unceremoniously from her victims, and shouldered her bow. She glanced at Falke. “Who is he, Cardinal?”
He pulled her aside, trying to remember if any of them had spoken Falke’s name. He didn’t think they had. “That’s my secret.”
“I can keep a secret.”
“I doubt that.”
Her lips pinched. “Tell me.”
Malach said nothing.
“Ooooh. I bet I know.” Syd fished in a pocket and held up Falke’s heavy gold ring. “He’s a pontifex!”
She’d lifted it from Malach’s own pocket. When, he had no idea.
“Give me that, you little thief!”
She danced away. “Only if you tell me everything!”
He knew when he was defeated. “Listen, Syd. Rachel’s my daughter. Falke stole her. I took her back. But I have to keep him safe.”
“Because of the Raven Mark?”
Why, Malach wondered wryly, did he ever imagine he could fool this child?
“Yes. No one can know about him.”
She poked her tongue through the missing front tooth. The one next to it looked loose. She gave it an experimental wiggle. “I wish we could kill him.”
“Me too.” Falke was watching them both. “But it’s not happening, so put it from your blood-soaked little mind.”
“I won’t tell.”
“Good girl.” He looked at her dirty cloak. The holes in her shoes. He thought of her quick intelligence and sunny smile that hadn’t yet soured. “Do you want to come to Nantwich with me? Stay in a palace with a real bed and nice things?”
“Is Rachel going?”
“Of course.”
“Can Trist go, too?”
“Obviously.”
“Can I drive a car when we get there?” She mimed jerking a steering wheel. “A super fast one!”
He shuddered inwardly. “Sure, why not?”
She threw her arms around his waist.
Falke cleared his throat. “Did you say Nantwich?”
Malach almost laughed. The poor bastard sounded so hopeful.
Back at the archives, he found Tristhus and Rachel trying to set fire to a pile of paper in the room next door. Happily, it was too damp to catch. The stern lecture that followed would probably last as long as an ice cube in the Masdari desert, but Rachel was down for a nap now. He’d told her “Severin” walked into a door. She looked at him like she knew better. She probably assumed he’d done it.
So much for detente.
Malach sent Tristhus to make sure no one else saw Falke hauled away. He broke out the first aid kit and pulled his robe off. Valdrian had loaned him a pair of pants. They’d felt strange at first, but he wasn’t sorry to be rid of the Rahai.
“Would you have a look, Syd?” he asked, straddling the back of the chair and leaning forward.
She rolled her sleeves up. “Want me to do surgery?”
“No, thank you. Just put some of that on.” He pointed to a half-empty tube of ointment.
“Were you near a shell blast?” she asked, squeezing an enormous glob into one palm and messily smearing it over his back.
He winced. “Is that what it looks like?”
“Yeah.”
“No, but I got hit by lots of little rocks.”
“How?”
“Meteors.”
He braced himself for another barrage of questions he didn’t care to answer, but all she said was, “Oh, right.”
As if that was an everyday occurrence.
The summons from Balaur came the next morning. Malach went to the palace unsure if he was about to be killed or formally anointed Nuncio.
Tristhus hadn’t heard any whispers about Falke, but that meant nothing. If Balaur knew, he’d probably just lure him there, snuff him like a candle, and dump the body where it would never be found.
He entered the stifling room already sweating. The Masdari woman was not present, though he caught a whiff of her sandalwood perfume. Balaur was sitting up in bed. He looked marginally improved.
“Malach! I have news to please us both. A Markhawk arrived. All is in place. You will ride out tomorrow. I hope to join you in a few days, once I complete my course of treatment.”
He decided not to ask what that entailed. “I would like to choose the mages I bring with me. It pains me to say it, Reverend Father, but there are some here I do not trust.”
Balaur made a wry face. “They are likely the ones who say the same about you, Malach. Ah, do not frown so! I have been told that you are too young to be given such responsibility. They also wonder how you managed to escape when others shed their last drop of blood in defense of Bal Kirith.”
“We were overrun!”
He waved a hand. “I know. Petty jealousy, no doubt. Ambition runs in our blood, does it not? But I am certain you will prove them all wrong.” A slight frown. “It is curious, though. Cardinal Mandrake—one of those critics whom we speak of—has not been seen since yesterday. We seem to be missing Bishop Aarin, as well. And Mandrake’s son. Have you seen them?”
“No, Reverend Father.” Malach smiled. “But I say good riddance.”
Balaur regarded him for a long moment. Then he laughed. “Ah, it reminds me of the old days. If one dabbles in intrigues and conspiracy, one must take care not to be ensnared oneself, yes? Well, we shall pray for their safe return. In the meantime, you may commence preparations for the journey. When you arrive, the first priority is to secure the cartomancer. I have already made my own advance arrangements so you should have no trouble with that.”
“She’s at the Arx?”
Blue eyes twinkled. “She is indeed. Kasia is most valuable to me, Malach. She must not come to harm.”
“I will ensure it.”
“Very good.” He tilted his head. “Jamila tells me you approached her.”
“Only to be certain of her intentions. She is very close to you, Reverend Father.”
“Your concern is admirable. Well, I can assure you that Jamila is working toward our success. I would tell you more, but the negotiations are at a delicate juncture. I can’t risk jeopardizing them. Not even for my new Nuncio! But all will be clear in time.”
We both have our secrets, Malach thought. As long as you never discover mine, they can crown you the new Golden Imperator for all I care.
“This starfall,” Balaur said. “Did you witness it?”
“Yes, Reverend Father. I was staying up in Arbot Hills. I had a clear view of the city.”
“Did it target the Arx?”
“Truthfully, I’m not sure. It was chaos. I fled.”
“Just as you fled Bal Kirith?” he asked softly.
Malach stiffened. “Should I have stayed in Novostopol as the city blew apart around me, Reverend Father?”
“No, no. Though I wish I knew how this came about.” Balaur gave a windy sigh. “I imagine the cartomancer will be able to tell us. She is quite extraordinary.”
Playing cards! Had it been a witch, he’d be worried. But Kasia Novak was obviously a charlatan. If she was nihilim, he was a Praefator.
Malach nodded solemnly. “I look forward to meeting her.”
