Doppelganger

4 Investigation [Mirage]

“Have you wondered at all why Jaguar picked us?” Mirage asked as they rode.

They were well into the plains of southern Currel by the time she made up her mind to air the question, but it had been on her mind since they left Corberth. She asked it now because they were nearly to the domain border of Starfall, and once they got there they’d have other concerns to keep them busy. Riding, however, had been dull and uneventful, and had left her time to wonder.

Eclipse gave her an arch look. “ ‘Us’ ? What’s this ‘us’ I hear? As I recall, the commission was given to me.”

“Right. And Jaguar no doubt expected you to pick Willow as your partner.”

He shuddered. “Warrior’s teeth. I haven’t seen that girl since we left Silverfire, thank the Warrior. No, you’re right; it never occurred to me to look for someone else, and he probably knew that.”

“So why us?”

Silence for a moment. Their horses ambled on in the late afternoon sunlight, surrounded by the greenery of ripening corn. Then Eclipse shrugged. “Why not us?”

“We’re young.”

“But not inexperienced. You’ve had a commission before, after all. And did it ever occur to you that you were the one he really wanted, and I was just a way to you?”

“Okay, two answers to that. First, as you said, the commission was given to you.”

“Jaguar knew where I was. You were harder to find. And they say a witch has to know where you are, to send things to you. Besides, how would you have reacted, if the commission just showed up in your lap that way, by magic?”

“Is that how it was delivered?”

He nodded. “Dropped out of thin air, with a note from Jaguar explaining the situation.”

If Eclipse was right about witches needing to know their target, that meant the witch in Corberth had known where they were staying. Mirage ground her teeth. He had a point about her probable reaction, though, if the commission had been sent straight to her. “All right. Second point, then. What’s so special about me?”

“You’re a damn good Hunter.”

Mirage shook her head. “I’m a good fighter. That’s all. When it comes to skulking and spying and all the other things we do, I’m no better than anyone else.”

“Well, you’re better than some.” He grinned at her. “Willow?” It had the desired effect; Mirage began laughing. “You’re not bad at the skulking and spying. And Jaguar’s got some kind of liking for you; always has, what with letting you into Silverfire late. Maybe he wants to see you get good opportunities.”

“Or maybe he expects danger on this job.”

That sobered both of them up. They rode silently for a moment before Eclipse shrugged again. “Bring it on. I haven’t had any excitement in a while, either.”

They found no excitement on the remainder of the ride. But both Hunters sat straighter in their saddles when they approached the border of Starfall; riding through the witches’ domain in a daze would not be a good idea.

After a night in Samalan, a town just on the Currel side of the border, they rode east, then left the road and crossed the border when there was no one in sight. Mirage half expected to feel something marking the boundary, but there was nothing; she was only certain they were in Starfall when they reached the foothills. Soon they were riding through a sparse forest of cypress and pine, and she felt uneasy; large areas of the domain were supposedly uninhabited, and she had seen no one, but what if someone was spying on them magically? Camping that night was worse. Even though they lit no fire and were as silent as possible, she felt as though their presence must be glaringly obvious. Surely their trespassing would bring punishment.

Now why would I feel that way? We’re here on Hunt, after all. It’s not trespassing when you have permission.

With that thought, she was able to see her emotions as if from the outside, and it became much clearer. More spells. Bloody witches. It makes sense, though; nice security measures, which make anybody skulking around suspect every shadow. I assume it doesn’t affect witches or Cousins.

She voiced her thoughts to Eclipse, and his face lightened. He, too, had been feeling the pressure. Understanding its source did not make it go away, but they were better able to ignore it after that, and managed some sleep at last.

The next day saw them winding through increasingly higher peaks, these covered in more obviously cultivated forests, with orchards of apple, pear, and pomegranate. They kept an eye out for Cousins tending the groves, and gave the highest peaks a wide berth; that was the heart of the domain, the one large settlement. The Primes who ruled the witches lived there, along with their daughters in training. Neither Hunter wanted to approach the seat of their power.

By midafternoon they were near the valley that held Tari-nakana’s private house, from which she had conducted much of her business. Among the many benefits of magic was the ability to work from a place other than an administrative center—which, along with other perks, was why every Lord in the land, and half their governors, took on witches as advisers.

After a short debate, they agreed to rest for a few hours, and continue on once night fell; even though they were entering with permission, they preferred to do so in relative secrecy. Mirage took the first watch, and spent it in a tree. It wouldn’t protect her much from magic, but it would do nicely against roving Cousins, if they had such things as patrols. She would, were she in their shoes.

But no one appeared, either during her watch or Eclipse’s, and after night fell they approached the house.

It was small, and much less sumptuous than Mirage had expected from the witch whose prominence in the Fire Ray had only been exceeded by that of her Prime. She had not indulged in the kind of extravagance some of her sisters did. There was, however, a lovely garden in front, filled with hyacinth and other blooming flowers, which Mirage saw as they scouted the surrounding area. It had not yet had time to become overgrown. The witches had hired them quickly in the aftermath of Tari-nakana’s death.

Eclipse was a short distance away, barely visible in the gloom. His uniform blended into the shadows; she wouldn’t have seen him if she didn’t know he was there. Glancing at him, Mirage signaled in Silverfire’s hand-code. See no tracks. Go forward?

He signaled agreement, and they slipped through the garden into the house.

In retrospect, Mirage realized they were lucky there had been no traps in the garden. She wasn’t sure what there could have been—snares or falling trees would have broken the presumed mode of subtlety—but if the assassin had gone for more direct methods, they might have found out the hard way. Start thinking, little girl. You’re not on a picnic ride in the sun anymore.

The house had the dead feel of a building that is deserted. Mirage was relieved, even though the hairs on the back of her neck kept expecting someone to jump out. But there was no one there, and the copper disks apparently kept them safe from Tari-nakana’s wards. She wondered briefly what the wards would have done. Then she wished she hadn’t. She could think of far too many gruesome possibilities. Front hall, sitting room, kitchen. The food, protected by spells, was still fresh; Mirage and Eclipse sniffed and tasted it cautiously, but could find no evidence of poison. Makes sense. If he used a quick poison, it would have been blatant, but a slow one probably would have been stopped in time. And then she would have been very suspicious. Laundry, maid’s room; Tari-nakana would have been unlikely to go there, but the Hunters checked both rooms nevertheless. Nothing.

Her personal quarters had to be upstairs, then, as Mirage had expected. They headed for the narrow staircase that arced gracefully up from the sitting room.

When she was almost to the second floor, Mirage stopped.

She could feel Eclipse freeze behind her. “Don’t worry,” she said, speaking for the first time since they had entered the house. “I think I’ve found something, is all.”

She lifted her right foot very cautiously from the step it had just come to rest on. Reaching down with one gloved finger, she touched the nails that held the board in place. They showed patches of brighter metal as if they’d been hammered recently. And the board, when she pressed gently on it, gave beneath her hand.

Four steps in sequence showed the same. Mirage looked to Eclipse for confirmation; he nodded, and she stamped on the lowest one. It splintered beneath her foot without much force.

Eclipse moved up beside her and examined one of the fragments. “Termite damage.”

“But not accidental.” Not with those nails recently hammered in. Mirage glanced at the line of the staircase, calculating. “We were going slowly. Someone at normal speed, especially if they weighed enough—” She put one hand on the banister, heard it creak.

Eclipse bent to examine the near end of that section. “Some nails missing. This gives way, and she falls to her death. Or so our assassin friend hoped. He’s running a risk, though—Tari-nakana would have looked a little accident-prone, after the horse and then this.”

“But lucky for us, he didn’t have a chance to come back and replace the nails and the original boards.” Mirage broke out the other three damaged steps. She and Eclipse had to edge their way past the gap along the wall, but it was safer than risking that they might forget where the trap was. And the rest of the staircase was safe.

They found the upstairs destroyed.

No trap had gone off there; the chaos they found had been caused by someone searching Tari-nakana’s belongings. Whoever it was had been thorough, if not particularly methodical. Papers were strewn everywhere. Mirage and Eclipse picked their way through the mess, not disturbing anything yet. No part of the bedroom, bath, or study had remained untouched; even floorboards and pieces of wall had been torn out.

“Well,” Mirage said at last, “someone certainly didn’t care if we found this.”

“Must have happened recently, too,” Eclipse said. “Our contact would have mentioned it, otherwise.”

Mirage crouched to scan the scattered papers, then picked up a single sheet. Under it lay a small pile of ash. “Whoever it was already burned at least one thing.”

Eclipse glanced out the window at the rapidly lightening sky. “It’s almost dawn. I say we pull back to the woods. We can watch the house in turn and get some rest, then come back when it’s dark again and search this mess.”

Assuming there’s anything left to find. Mirage sighed, but her interest was piqued. Who was responsible for this destruction? The assassin? Or someone else?

“Agreed,” she said at last. “We’ll come back at dusk.”

Mirage took the first watch again, but this time she explored a bit. She never went far enough to miss anything that might happen at the house, but she did climb up to the valley’s lip, to where it ended abruptly in a crumbling cliff. From there she could see down into a lower, wider valley, more sparsely forested, with fields between patches of trees. Just before noon she saw figures out there, too far to be distinguished. She guessed them to be Cousins, farming the land.

Watching them drive a wagon across the valley, Mirage found herself grinning. People thought her one of those creatures? A tame pet of the witches? Not for all the money in the world. There was a reason she had chosen not to train at Cloudhawk or Stoneshadow. Mirage would no more want to be bound to a single employer than she would want to live her whole life in the same place.

The Cousins’ situation seemed even creepier. In her few encounters with them over the years, they’d hardly spoken. Maybe their reticence only applied in front of strangers, but still—where did they come from? There were a dozen popular answers to that, but no proof. Did the witches really build them out of twigs and hair? Or were they the revived bodies of dead witches? She’d never seen a male Cousin, any more than she’d seen a male witch; either they never had sons, or they kept them all hidden here, in their home domain. Maybe as one of her three boons, when she finished this commission, she could ask their employer. Despite trying to stay mostly away from witches, she was sometimes curious about them.

Not long after that she returned and woke Eclipse, then lay down to rest. Her sleep was even lighter than usual; her nerves were tight enough that it was all she could manage. She didn’t mind. This edge of excitement was what she had been lacking.

In the late afternoon Eclipse nudged her awake and offered her a meal of bread, raisins, and cold sausage. They ate in silence, then waited for the sun to set.

“I’m leaning toward Wolfstar,” Eclipse said as they waited.

Mirage nodded. “I am, too. The pattern seems like them, with things ‘accidentally’ failing—the banister, the step, the girth strap. A Stoneshadow would have used poison, I think.”

“You’re probably right. Which means we can tentatively take the domain rulers off the suspect list. They all have bonded assassins; they would have used them.”

“True enough. And a pity, too.” Eclipse raised an eyebrow, and she elaborated. “We know who employs Stone-shadows. So find the assassin, and you find the employer, and vice versa. It might have made things easier.”

“Yes. And there’s an unpleasantly large number of people left to suspect—pretty much any person or group of people who could afford to hire a Wolfstar.”

“On the other hand, it does make some things simpler.”

“Like what?”

“Repercussions. We can worry less about having to call Hunt on a Lord or Lady.”

Eclipse looked puzzled. “You did that before, didn’t you, with Kobach?”

“That was different. He was a usurper, and by the time I was hired all his allies had abandoned him. So that was less tricky. But we have no idea what the politics are here—why Tari-nakana was assassinated in the first place. I’m just as glad the employer is someone less influential than a Lord.”

“I don’t know about influential—there are some merchant consortia that have more clout than their supposed ‘rulers.’”

Mirage rose and dusted off her hands. “We’ll worry about that if we come to it. If we don’t start searching that mess, it’ll be a moot point. We won’t know who’s behind it anyway. Let’s go.”

Searching Tari-nakana’s private rooms was a frustrating task. Mirage was not certain what she was looking for, or even if there was anything to find; she knew all too well that whoever had ransacked the place had probably taken or destroyed everything important. Assuming they had found anything. Assuming there had been anything to find.

They split up the task; Mirage searched the bedroom and the bath, while Eclipse took the study. When they finished, they would switch and search again, each hoping to find something the other had missed the first time around.

It promised to be a long and tedious night.

Mirage checked the clothes first, examining them by the light of her shuttered thieves’ lantern, piling each garment into the corner as she finished with it. They had not been treated with anything as far as she could tell; perhaps the staircase had been the assassin’s last planned trick.

She headed for the bath next, looking again for assassin’s traps. She found nothing beyond a palatial setup powered by spells that provided heated, running water. Moral superiority and envy warred with one another in Mirage’s heart; envy won out. It would be nice to always have a hot bath. She frequently had to make do wife streams, snowmelt as often as not.

Well, this job should pay enough that you can winter somewhere comfortable. Assuming it’s finished by then. And assuming you actually succeed, and don’t get killed by the blood-oath.

There were few belongings left to search; some jewelry, and a couple of things that looked like sentimental keepsakes. No sign of traps. Now it was time to look for clues, things that might tell her why Tari-nakana had been killed.

The most obvious thing to search for first was a secret compartment, which might hold important papers. The previous visitor had already done that, though, if by rather less delicate methods than Mirage herself would have used. She picked through the detritus, trying to see if any of it had concealed such a compartment, but everything seemed to have been normal before it was ripped apart. And none of the holes in the walls and floor held any remains of hidden contents.

Eclipse was still working in the study, so she turned her attention to the intact parts of the room. None of the walls held compartments she could find, and the same with the floor. The furniture, which the previous searcher had not thought to destroy, was similarly clean. Of course, if she hid anything with a spell, I don’t stand a chance in the Void of finding it.

Standing with her hands on her hips, Mirage surveyed the room and tried to decide if she was missing anything.

“I think you should come look at this,” Eclipse called from the adjoining room.

Grabbing her lantern, Mirage picked her way through the papers to Eclipse’s side. He was holding a scrap of paper, quite small, with something written on it in an illegible scrawl. Eclipse tapped the signature scribbled at the bottom, but try as she might, Mirage could make nothing of it.

“You never could read his writing,” Eclipse said with a grin. “It’s Avalanche.”

Avalanche. Six years their senior at Silverfire; he and Eclipse had been friends despite the gap in their ages. Mirage had never known him well, though, since he graduated not too long after she arrived. She peered at the note and supposed she could see his name in the scribble. “What does it say?”

Eclipse snorted. “Not much. ‘Nakana: Back tomorrow.’”

Mirage blinked, and looked at Eclipse in mystified surprise. “He was working for Tari-nakana?”

“Looks like it.”

Witches hardly ever hire Hunters.

Not that you could tell by their behavior lately. Next Ice’ll show up with a commission of her own. Mirage took the scrap of paper and turned it over in her hands, but there was nothing beyond those three words and Avalanche’s signature. “What could she have wanted him for?”

“Your guess is as good as mine.”

“Protection?”

“Could be.” Eclipse cracked his knuckles; there was a gleam in his eye. “We could always ask him.”

“Do you know where he is?”

“Not at the moment, but one of our agents might know.”

Mirage looked around at the chaos of the study. “Should we keep going through this stuff?”

“I’m pretty much done in here. Want to switch?”

“Not particularly, but I guess we should.” Mirage stretched and eyed the papers balefully. “Warrior’s teeth—did this woman never throw any papers away?”

“Give her a break. She was a high-ranking witch. This place is no worse than Jaguar’s office would look if you threw everything he owns on the floor.”

Left alone in the room, Mirage scowled at the papers. If only she had some idea of what to look for, searching blind like this was annoying. And the scattered, tiny piles of ash were testament that some important things had already been destroyed. Then she swore. “Kerestel—we’re going to have to check downstairs again, too. If she had anything hidden, she might not have kept it up here.”

“True enough,” he said from the bedroom. “Looks like the last visitor didn’t think of that.”

“Who do you think he was?” she asked as she picked up a stack of papers and flipped through them.

“Not sure. The assassin, maybe; he might have wanted to take away any evidence pointing at his employer. And whoever it was knew to avoid the doctored steps.”

“It doesn’t seem like his style, though. He’s been subtle up until now, so why rip this place apart? Especially since he’s a Hunter. Even assassin specialists are taught to be more delicate than this.”

Eclipse appeared in the doorway. “Who else, then? The employer himself?”

“Maybe.” Mirage moved on to the next stack of papers. They looked like economic reports on the earnings of various Fire witches. “I’m tempted to bag half this stuff and take it with us back to Silverfire. Jaguar would like to know more about the witches.”

“Uh-uh,” Eclipse said, pointing a stern finger at her. “We’re on hire. You don’t spy on your employer.”

“Thornbloods do.”

“And Thornbloods are soulless mercenaries. What’s your point?”

“Fine, fine, I’ll leave the papers here. Go search. If I have to work, you do, too.”

He vanished back into the bedroom, leaving Mirage with the papers. She made it through more than half of them before taking a break. Plenty of interesting things I never knew about the Fire Ray, but nothing that seems relevant. Tari-nakana wasn’t doing anything special that I can see.

She went to the doorway. Eclipse gave her a mock-glare. “If I have to work, you do, too.”

Mirage lifted one lip in a delicate snarl and he grinned. “Okay. What is it?” he asked.

“Why would someone kill Tari-nakana?” she asked.

Eclipse sat back on his heels. “You mean genetically?” He began to tick the reasons off on his fingers. “Revenge for some personal or professional action. Prevention of some personal or professional action she was about to take. Political maneuvering—maybe someone wanted to see a new Fire Heart Key.”

“We need to find out who replaced her.”

“Definitely. And if the new Key has made any significant changes in the Ray’s policy. You done with the papers in there?”

“Not quite. I was going to check the room for compartments, then finish them off.”

“Okay. Then we’ll look downstairs.”

Mirage returned to the study and surveyed the walls and floor. There wasn’t a lot left intact; the searcher had been more thorough—or desperate—in here. She checked nevertheless, and examined the desk as well, but found nothing. With a heavy sigh, she faced the remaining papers and set to work.

A paper covered in scribbled calculations; a personal letter from a Water witch informing her that the cat was doing well in its new home; a list of towns and domains that she scanned quickly. Breiano, Insebrar; Ravelle, Verdosa; Chiero, Teria; Olpri, Haira; a row of question marks; Ansing, Seach; Leswile, Abern. More question marks.

The names were familiar; she’d traveled too much to not recognize them. But why did they ring such a loud bell?

Breiano. Leswile.

Mirage leapt to her feet and went into the bedroom.

Eclipse glanced up, then rose hastily when he saw her eyes. “What is it?”

Wordlessly she thrust the sheet at him.

He scanned it and shrugged. “An itinerary?”

“My itinerary,” she snarled.

“What?”

“Breiano to Leswile. That was the courier run I did, and those are most of the major towns I stopped in along the way. The question marks between Haira and Seach are probably where I cut through the tail of the mountains; they must have lost track of me.” She held up two more sheets, both covered in names. “This is more of the same. She’s been tracking me for years.”

He crossed to her and took the papers. “Why?”

Mirage threw up her hands. “I’m supposed to know?”

Eclipse gave her a careful look. “You’re really upset, aren’t you?”

“Wouldn’t you be? I spend half my time trying to convince people that I have nothing to do with the witches, and now I find out they’ve been tracking my every move!”

“Well, not your every move. It looks like you lost them a few times.” Mirage snarled at him, and he put up his hands defensively. “Okay, okay. Poor choice of joke.”

Mirage spun away and kicked a wall in fury. The board cracked under her foot.

Eclipse’s hand clamped down on her shoulder. “Calm down, Sen.”

She took a deep breath, held it, then let it out slowly. “Sorry. I’ll finish in the study. Then we can go downstairs.”

“Avalanche may know something about this,” Eclipse said, holding up the papers.

“He had better,” Mirage said, her voice still tight. She could practically feel the eyes on her, and it made her skin crawl. “Because if he doesn’t, I’m going to hunt down someone who does.”