Sworn in Steel

Chapter Eighteen

After that, I threw myself at the street for the rest of that night and the following day. Where before I’d been lingering in the backs of low taverns and roosting kens, buying drinks to loosen other people’s tongues, now I took the more direct route. When steel wasn’t bared, it was shown, and my silver now carried the occasional smudge of red when it changed hands. I brandished my name like a blade, cowing those who knew better, and buying off or educating those who didn’t. These were Kin: Even here, under the thumb of the Zakur, I knew how to read them, how to talk to them-and how to scare the hell out of them when necessary.

Nothing happened in the Imperial Quarter without the Zakur’s say-so? I couldn’t find Degan without their protection? I was a Gray Prince, dammit: Fuck them.

Still, that didn’t mean I had to be stupid about it. Where I dropped my name, I did it in such a way that it wasn’t attached to me. I was an agent, a front man, a sounder sent ahead to prepare the ground or ask the questions. I was both interested and disinterested in el-Qaddice, solidifying my position in Ildrecca or expanding outward. I was presence and ghost, a fact and a rumor. Anything to muddy the waters for Fat Chair-yes, that was the cove in the sedan’s name-and make him wonder just what the hell was going on.

Anything, in short, to gain me some time.

As for Degan, he was proving as hard to pin down as ever. Even with him being a tall, fair-haired westerner in a land of dusky, dark-eyed Djanese, few people recalled having heard of him, let alone seen him. The best I was able to collect was a handful of stale memories about a man who might have been Degan wandering into the Imperial Quarter for a few days, and then wandering back out. That had been a month ago, and from what I could gather he’d spent most of his time strolling the bazaars and sampling street food. No word about a foreign blade selling his sword; no rumors of him signing on with a local noble or steel house. No trail of bodies or coins to follow.

All of which meant I was going to have to widen my search beyond the Imperial Quarter. Not a surprise, but part of me had been hoping Degan would stick close to what he knew. Working the Old City would require more time, money, and muscle than I had. It would require me to operate low to the ground, finding informers and sorting rumors as I went. That meant a lot of dirty Mumblers and questionable Ears, more than half of whom would either feed me a crooked line of patter or sell me to the Zakur if they could manage it. Plus, thanks to both Heron and Wolf, I was going to be doing all of this on a tight timeline.

No, this wasn’t going to be easy at all.

By the time I made it back to the Angel’s Shadow, it was well past noon on the day after I’d left. My feet were dragging and my head was pounding. I only had one ahrami seed left from the stash Heron had given me, and I was saving that for when I woke up, hopefully sometime tomorrow morning. Late tomorrow morning.

I found Tobin and his people in the courtyard, hard at work on the new play. Those not reading lines were fitting together the framing for the backdrops.

The moment he saw me, Tobin turned and started forward, displeasure writ large on his face. Fortunately for the troupe leader, Ezak caught the look in my eye and took his cousin by the elbow, steering him to another corner of the yard. Sounds of a brief but heated discussion drifted over as the rest of the troupe-even Muiress-gave me a wide berth. I made it to the inn’s door without incident and went inside.

Fowler was sitting in the window nearest the door, one leg propped up in the sunlight, watching the rehearsal. Her hair was loose and falling over her left shoulder, the light of the sun turning it to gold. I blinked, surprised to see it down. It took me a moment longer to realize she wasn’t in her street clothes-or, at least, not her normal street clothes. The well-worn travel shirt and coat had been replaced by finer stuff: a high-necked linen doublet of ivy green, its front only partially laced, with the shirt underneath likewise at ease across her collarbone. Her breeches were new, and tailored noticeably more for a woman than a man, which I found. . distracting. The lines hugged her legs closely, until, just above the knee, the pants stopped. Below were her usual hose and low shoes. Even those looked freshly brushed.

Fowler shifted slightly in the window and ran a critical eye over me. “I’m guessing you didn’t sleep.”

“That would have required me to stop moving.”

“Well, as long as you had a good reason. .”

I pointed at her clothes. “What’s this?”

“What’s what?”

“The outfit. Is it for the play?”

Fowler stared at me for a moment, then turned back toward the courtyard.

“I borrowed it from the troupe,” she said. “Sent my drapes to be laundered. After this long on the road, they could use it.” She sniffed meaningfully and wiped at her nose. “Wouldn’t hurt you any, either.”

I scratched at my chest, suddenly self-conscious. “When I have time.”

“You could always ask Muiress.”

“I’d prefer they come back in one piece.”

“There is that.”

I watched her watch the players for a moment, then turned my gaze toward the troupe.

Ever since Fowler had come back to work for me, things had been. . different. Before, when I’d just been a Nose and she, the person who watched over my apartments, it had been easy: Easy to talk, easy to spend time with one another, easy to fall in bed together every now and again. But that had changed when she’d learned I’d spent the past seven years lying to her about who I had actually worked for-who, in some sense, I actually was. As a Long Nose, there had been no way for me to tell her that I worked for Kells and not Nicco, but that justification hadn’t lessened her sense of betrayal any. Nor would I have expected it to.

So I hadn’t been surprised when she’d walked away. Even when I’d been named a Gray Prince, she hadn’t returned. And then, a month later, she was suddenly back. One day, Broken Daniel was covering my blinders; the next, Fowler was back on the rooftops, her people watching my home. She never explained why she’d come back, and I’d never pushed, just as I’d never asked what had passed between her and Broken Daniel. Sometimes, it’s simply better not to ask.

But ever since, there had been. . not a distance, but a guardedness to her. I still trusted Fowler with my life-more so than anyone, now that Degan was gone-and while we still slipped into old habits now and then, it was clear a line had been drawn in her head when it came to me. Some aspects of that line were obvious, others, less so.

This, it seemed, was one of the less obvious times.

“Any luck finding us some Crows?” I said as I stood beside her and scanned the nearby roofs.

Fowler let out a small laugh. “Hardly.”

“Oh?” It wasn’t like Fowler to be unable to find people to stand watch over a ken, even in a place like el-Qaddice. If anyone could find willing, worthy eyes, it was her. I pulled up a chair. “Tell me.”

“The Kin around here don’t make sense.”

“How so?”

“I’m used to Kin being careful,” she said. “Being cagey. Used to their standing half a step back when you talk to them, especially if they don’t know you. I can understand that. But here?” She made a dismissive gesture toward the world beyond the window. “It’s more than that. They’re nervous. No one wants to hire on to stand watch without checking with someone else first. It’s like they’re all looking at their shadows, afraid that something’s going to jump out at them. Everyone’s so afraid of stepping wrong, no one’s willing to lift up their feet.”

“It’s the Zakur,” I said. “They’ve got a lock on the district-more so than you’d expect. More than the Kin have on the Raffa Na’Ir district back in Ildrecca, even.” I leaned back against my chair. My back cracked. It felt damn good. “I just wish I knew why their pull is so damn strong.”

“It’s the glimmer,” said Fowler.

“The what?”

“The glimmer. They control it.”

“How do you mean?”

“Remember how Heron went on about those carvings on the walls when we arrived?”

“You mean the Plague of the Paragons? When the empire sent the magical sickness?”

Fowler nodded impatiently. “Right, that. Well, it turns out not only did the despot decide to wall off the Imperial Quarter from the rest of the city; he also barred any kind of magic from the empire coming into el-Qaddice. And I’m not just talking portable glimmer here-I mean Mouths, too. Anyone who can speak a spell or mumble a charm. Getting caught with even a scrap of imperial spellcraft in this city gets you an immediate, irrevocable visit to the despot’s deepest dungeon.”

“Which means,” I said, spinning the consequences out in my head, “the Kin in this city don’t have access to glimmer.”

“Oh, we can get it, all right,” said Fowler, “as long at it’s Djanese in origin and we’re willing to pay the Zakur for the privilege.”

I collapsed back into my chair. That would do it, all right. It wasn’t that we, as Kin, were used to having easy access to magic-it was still rare and pricey in the Empire as well-but it was at least an option. The Kin were central to the illegal glimmer trade back home, which meant that we could get it when we needed it. But here, in a city where they made dust cyclones dance in the street and summoned rainbows out of the air? Working a dodge without glimmer here would be like trying to take part in an alley fight without a weapon-you could still come out of it in one piece, sure, but that steel in your hand sure made the odds better.

A thought occurred.

“You can’t tell me someone hasn’t tried to sneak some Mouths in here over the years?” I said. “Especially Kin.”

“Of course they have,” said Fowler. “And from what I hear, the despot’s magi have even eased up on the punishment for it. They used to keep the offender alive for a week while they let magical fires cosume their body; now they only draw it our for three days.”

Shit. No wonder Fat Chair had sought me out so soon after my arrival. He wasn’t worried about me smuggling in a single piece of glimmer in; he was worried I was going to try and set up permanent shop. That I was going to step in and start supplying the Imperial Quarter with mages or magic-or both-and try to take over the district. Or more.

And all because I was a Gray Prince. Because everyone knew that a Gray Prince wouldn’t come to a place like el-Qaddice in person unless he a good reason. Unless he had plans.

Dammit.

“How did I not hear about this?” I said, pushing myself away from the table so I could stand. And pace. “I just spent the last day and a half working the damn street. How did I miss it?”

Fowler stayed put in the window. “What were you looking for?” she said.

“Degan, of course.”

“Well, there you go, then: You had no reason to ask.”

“And you did?”

“I saw what they do on the streets for fun while we were walking to the inn from the padishah’s. I figured if I wanted to have any chance of sewing this ken up, I’d need to get my hands on at least a couple glimmer-mongers, if not a proper Mouth. Only I couldn’t find any.” Fowler tapped the knife at her side. “It wasn’t until I started digging that people began to tell me the hows and whys of it.”

I nodded. Kin or no, that wasn’t the kind of thing you wanted to share with some brand-new cove on the street. Weaknesses are embarrassing, no matter whose fault they are.

“If that’s the case with the glimmer,” I said, “then we may have a bigger problem than I first thought.”

“How so?”

I took a step closer, then thought better of it and moved to put the chair between me and her.

I told her about Fat Chair.

“And you told him to go to hell?” she practically shouted once I was done.

“I thought he was a local boss flexing his muscle, trying to brush me back on some smuggling,” I said. “How was I supposed to know he had a lock on all the glimmer in the Imperial Quarter?”

“Fuck,” said Fowler. She looked out the window, then back at me, then back out the window again. “Fuck, fuck, fuck! Do you know how hard it just got for me to secure this place? How hard it’s going to be to recruit any kind of Crows now? Once word gets out that this bastard is after you, no one’s going to want to take our coin. I’m going to have to skip over any likely Kin or Zakur I may have had my eye on and go straight to the street urchins and the outcasts.” She kicked the chair at me. “Fucking brilliant.”

I sidestepped the chair. “We still may have one angle,” I said.

“Oh, and what’s that?” said Fowler. She jerked her chin toward the troupe. “You going to sonnet the Zakur to death?”

I tapped my doublet, where Jelem’s packet had been carefully restitched between layers of lining. “There’s still the yazani from the cellar.”

Fowler sat up. “You mean Raaz?” She began to pat at her own doublet. “Shit. He was here looking for you earlier. I almost forgot. Said he needed to talk to you.”

“I’ll bet he did.” Between the shadow magics and the yazani, he and his master had to be worried about whatever it was Jelem had hidden in those papers. My guess was that it was worth more than the price of getting us into the Old City-and if it wasn’t, I was going to make it so. “Where did he say I could find him?”

“He didn’t.”

“Well, then, how am I-?”

“Ah, here it is.” Fowler pulled a thin strip of dark fabric from beneath her waistband. The cloth was roughly the length of her little finger and half as wide. She held it up between us. “He said to burn this when you were ready to talk to him.”

I reached out and took it gingerly between finger and thumb. It felt tacky and stiff, as if it had been dipped in resin or tar and left to dry. “Burn it?”

Fowler nodded.

“And then what?” I said.

Fowler shrugged.

I sighed. Sleep would have to wait. “Go get me a candle, will you?”

“Hey, Flora!” yelled Fowler. “Go get us a candle, will you?”

The girl straightening the common room dipped her head and hurried off.

I glared at Fowler and rubbed my ear. She smiled beatifically back.

“Mistress,” said Flora as she hurried back into the room, her hand cupped around a burning taper. She set it on the table, bobbed another half bow, and left.

“What the hell did you do to her?” I asked as the girl scuttled away, glancing over her shoulder at the Oak Mistress.

“Nothing. Just told her older brother that if he pushes her around again, I’d snap off his cock and feed it to him with a side of hummus.” Fowler winked. “Think she has a crush on me now.”

I sighed and took a seat at the table. The taper’s flame flickered and wavered, giving off a oily, dirty smoke. I held up Raaz’s scrap, hesitated, then cautiously touched fabric to flame.

If I’d been expecting an explosion or a clap of thunder, I would have been sorely disappointed. All that happened was a hiss and a sputter as the fabric reluctantly caught fire. I held it for a moment, then set it on the table. The flame crept slowly up the length of the scrap.

I was about to ask Fowler what we were supposed to do next when I noticed the smoke from the cloth wasn’t behaving the way it should. Rather than wafting upward and spreading into a wider ribbon before dissipating, the pale line instead rippled and turned back on itself, bending to and fro, in arcs and lines, before finally resuming its journey ceilingward. It wasn’t until the fabric was half-gone that I was able to discern the face hanging before me in the air like an empty carnival mask, its features sketched in smoke.

The face it depicted was, not surprisingly, Raaz’s.

“Ah, you got my message,” said the mask. Or, rather, wrote, since each word came out its mouth as a gray bit of imperial cephta, drifting on the air between us before van-ishing. “We need to speak. Can you come now?”

I waited until the last symbol drifted away and then said, “Um, yes?” There was less than a quarter of the fabric left on the table.

“Excellent. Come to the old temple to the Family in the Blessed Sky District in the third ring. Repeat it.”

“Temple to the Family in Blessed Sky, third ring.”

“What the hell is going on?” whispered Fowler, leaning forward until her face almost passed though Razz’s. “Who are you talking-?”

“Hsst!” I said, waving her away. The breeze from my hand caused Raaz’s face to shiver and distort briefly. He didn’t seem to mind.

“Good. I’ll be waiting,” he smoke-said. Then his face broke apart and drifted away.

I looked down at the table. The piece of fabric was nothing more than a charred line on its surface.

“What happened?” said Fowler, still leaning forward. “Was it Raaz? What did he say?”

“What did you see?”

Fowler sat back and blinked. “You sitting there muttering to a stream of smoke. I couldn’t even hear what you were saying, you were talking so low. Why, what did you see?”

I brushed the line of char away and stood. “Pretty much the same. Come on.”

Fowler scowled at my answer but didn’t argue. “Where are we going?” she said as she rose.

“To see how the other half prays, it seems.”

We found the temple easy enough. Raaz, though, was another matter.

It was an impressive place, and not what I had been expecting. Back in Ildrecca, the Empire went for vast and intimidating: vaulted ceilings, vast arches, mosaics and paintings four and five times the height of a man, all designed to make the petitioner feel both pious and penitent. What with the emperor being the direct intermediary between his subjects and the Angels, religion ran part and parcel with the state. Loyalty was one of the main businesses of the churches in the empire.

By contrast, the business of the temples in Djan, or at least this one, seemed to be. . well, everything.

The place itself was a large rectangle, open to the heavens, bordered on all sides by more pillared arcades. Out in the middle, under the brilliant blue sky, a series of winding gravel paths wandered across a patchwork of trimmed lawns and small open areas. Men and women moved about on these paths, walking and talking, arguing and laughing, reading and contemplating. Almost as an afterthought, I saw people kneeling on prayer rugs as well, facing different directions as they bowed and prayed to one of the many images depicted on the back walls of the arcade.

There was more praying going on in the shade in front of the murals. Each had been painted with a likeness of one of the members of the divine family and then decorated with various symbols and precious metals associated with each god-gold and rubies for Ahreesh, jade and lavender for A’wella, black silk and ashes for The Banished One, and so on-but there were other things going on there as well. Scholars sat conducting lessons with their students while water hawkers and rug menders called out their services, and beggars silently held out bowls, hoping for a share of the alms all Djanese were expected to donate every month. Off to one side, a young man was making an elaborate show of kneeling before a young woman and reciting poetry. I could hear her laughter from here.

“It’s more like a bazaar than a temple,” said Fowler. She laughed. “I like it!”

“Bazaar or temple,” I said, “we need to find Raaz.” I looked around, then hopped up onto the plinth for one of the columns and tried to see over the crowd. “You take that side of the temple,” I said to Fowler, “while I-”

I was interrupted by the sound of a single, clear, deep note ringing out over the space.

The poetry stopped, the girl became solemn, and everyone made their way to a clear patch of ground. Those without rugs or mats chose the grass, while most of the others opted for the clearings covered with raked sand. A few of the more dedicated knelt on the gravel. I noticed that those within the arcades fell silent as well, although not all of them knelt in prayer.

As before, everyone faced in a different direction, directing their prayers at the image of the god they had come to petition. A few people seemed to pray in no particular direction at all, or looked to be facing the space between two representations. Indecisive, I wondered, or hedging their bets?

The bell sounded again, and a single priest came out from an archway on the far side of the temple. He was clad in deep red-orange robes, and carried a twisted, gnarled staff in his hands. After a brief gesture to each of the four cardinal directions, he faced back the way he’d come and began a low, sonorous chant.

The prayers lasted maybe ten minutes, and I used that time to look over the heads and backs of the various supplicants. When the bell sounded for a third time, everyone rose. Those with rugs or mats rolled them up. The water sellers and the rug menders began calling out again. Some people moved to leave, others stayed, and still others came in. The girl, I noticed, walked out before the poet could prostrate himself before her again.

The temple had turned back into something like a common green.

“Any luck?” said Fowler.

I pointed. “Over there, under the arcade.”

I led us out into the temple yard and along the gravel paths, angling over toward a small group of men and women who sat in the shade halfway along the wall.

As we approached, I saw a brief shimmer appear and dance along the fingertips of one of the men in the circle. A moment later, a similar shimmer, but longer in duration and with more color, appeared on another set of fingers. Then a third. When a fourth figure-a handsome, raven-haired woman-raised her hands, only to have the magical luminescence slither up the arm and along the shoulders of the man next to her, the circle erupted in polite laughter, followed by the gentle tapping of palms on the floor of the arcade.

Raaz smiled along with the rest of them and made a show of brushing off his shoulder.

“Well done, Zural,” he said. “Now, tell me-ah!” He nodded as he saw me and held up one hand. We stopped maybe four paces away.

“I’m afraid the rest will have to wait for another time,” said Raaz to his students. “But remember the purpose behind this exercise: If you can recognize another’s magic-can understand how he shapes the fragments of power-and form it to your own use, you are one step closer to turning it against him even as he gathers it, yes?”

Murmured agreement from the circle. The students-both young and old-rose and wandered away, leaving Raaz alone, perched on a threadbare cushion on an even more threadbare rug.

“Please,” said Raaz, indicating the floor before him. Fowler and I sat. “My apologies for dragging you here, but my master isn’t well and someone has to carry on the lessons.”

“You teach your classes here?” said Fowler.

Raaz tilted his head. “Why not?”

“Well, I’d think. .” She gestured at the milling square of the temple. “Privacy, for one. Secrecy for another. And, well, privacy for a third.”

Raaz steepled his fingers and rested his elbows on the knees. “I can see your point,” he said. “And were I a member of, say, Tal Nareesh, I might agree with you. Were I Nareesh, I would happily stay back in my hall and conduct lessons in the privacy of a classroom or closed garden. But I’m of Tal al-Faj, and that means our school is no longer our own. It is, in fact, the property of Tal Nareesh-a gift from the despot for exposing the foul conspiracy of its former owners.”

“Oh,” said Fowler, sounding abashed. “I didn’t-”

“How could you?” cut in Raaz smoothly. “And besides, the despot has been generous. Tal al-Faj still has a school to call its own. It is just smaller. And poorer. And prone to leaning to one side. So we come here.” He gestured at the temple. “Where better to teach the secrets of power and control than under the eyes of the Family?” He leaned for-ward. “And how better to avoid suspicion than by sitting out in the open, for all to see? If my master wants privacy, dear Fowler, he will save it for the things that truly matter-not simple lessons in manipulative magics.”

“Speaking of manipulative magicians,” I said, “What do you want?”

Raaz grudgingly turned his attention to me. “You have to ask?”

I smiled a thin smile and looked over my shoulder, making sure no one was near. Enough of the worshippers and loiterers had cleared out by now that we weren’t in any danger of being overheard. Still, I gave Fowler a look. She got up and stepped away, placing herself between us and the rest of the arcade.

I turned back, reached into my doublet, and set Jelem’s packet on the polished floor tiles.

Raaz looked from the packet to me and back again. I noted that he still had a wavering gray scar around his neck, still had a glove on his left hand where the neyajin had cut his shadow, and still spoke with a bit of a rasp.

His right hand moved toward the folded sheaf of papers. “I’m glad to see that-”

“Not so fast,” I said, leaning forward and putting my finger on the packet’s nearest corner. “The price has gone up.”

Raaz frowned but didn’t withdraw his hand. “Up? Why?”

“I’m nobody’s mule,” I said. “Especially not Jelem’s.”

“And yet here you are, papers and all.”

“I just wanted to let you know I was serious.”

“If I recall, the arrangement was for us to aid you in exchange for delivering the missives. Now here you sit in the city, and yet my hand remains empty. Not only that, but you ask more to fill it.” Raaz shook his head. “I was under the impression that Gray Princes honored their word.”

“I keep my word just fine,” I said. “When I’m not being conned or played or used.”

“That’s what this is, then? Your princely pride was wounded, and so you make threats and demands to assuage it? Based on what Jelem wrote, I’d hoped for more from you, but I see you’re simply another red-knuckled Imperial, just like the rest of your so-called Kin.”

My hand swept down and jerked Arrebah’s smoke-edged dagger from my boot. Raaz’s eyes went wide at the sight, and a faint rattling sound escaped from his throat. I could have almost sworn that I saw the fingers inside his gloves deflate a bit.

“This ‘red-knuckled Imperial’ fought a fucking assassin in the dark for you people,” I said, holding the blade low while making sure he could see the shadow-stuff trailing off it. “I saved not only your life, but your master’s as well. Fowler took a click to the head, and I got cut up and poisoned in the process. So, yes, your master may have spent his money and influence on my behalf, but I spilled my blood on his. If anyone’s owed anything, it’s me.”

Raaz sat, staring at the knife as if it were a serpent ready to strike. “You’re not the only one who suffered in that chamber,” he said slowly. “And we weren’t the only ones in danger. Your life was under threat from the neyajin as well.”

“True,” I said. “But she didn’t leave because of you, now, did she?”

His stared at me a long moment, his gloved hand clenching until the leather glove creaked with the strain. “Have I told you what happened to my master?” he said. “Why he can’t be here to speak with you? It’s because he’s dying. Whatever that hesheh did, it’s eating away at him. There’s a line of darkness. .” Raaz traced a mark across his fist, below the knuckles and above the wrist. “A piece of shadow where his fingers used to be. He says he can still feel the digits, that they are there on the other side of the line, and that something is nibbling at them. Devouring him. Slowly.”

“Devouring him?” Of a sudden, I didn’t feel quite so comfortable holding that knife.

“The original cut was at the base of the fingers. The line is moving up his arm. We don’t know if the pain will drive him mad before whatever it is kills him, or if we will kill him first out of pity.”

“Can’t you just cut off the hand? I know it’s not the best solution, but given the other options. .”

Raaz shook his head. “The other magi say the shadow is in his blood, that it’s eating him from the inside, only at a slower rate. They’re trying to exorcise it, but. .” He opened his gloved hand so he could see the fingers, rubbed at the line on his neck. “It seems I was fortunate by comparison.”

I swallowed. It didn’t seem wise just now to point out that over half the glimmer in that tunnel had originated with Raaz and his shadow magic, nor that my own wound had been healing well, rather than growing. Neither would help just now.

“And you think this other tal, the Nareesh, are behind the attack in the cellar?” I said.

“It makes the most sense,” he said. “They’ve already benefitted from our fall. Now if they were to dig the grave and fill it with our bones? One less thing to worry about.”

I grunted. If anyone could find and hire an invisible, shadow-killing assassin, I expect it would be a bunch of Mouths. “You realize someone in your organization is likely talking?” I said.

He dipped his chin. “That, or the Tal Nareesh have managed to set a spirit to observing us, despite our precautions. Either way, we’re looking into the problem, trust me. Now, if you’d please, remove that thing from my presence.”

I drew the neyajin’s blade back. I noticed that as I moved to put it away, Raaz shifted slightly to one side. It took me a moment to realize that he’d done it to make sure his shadow was nowhere near the blade’s.

I slid the blade home more gingerly than I’d taken it out and resettled myself on the ground.

“So, with all that said, what is it you want?” said Raaz.

“For starters? Some answers.”

“About?”

I tapped my finger on the papers. “Why do you want the package?”

For perhaps the first time since I’d met him, Raaz looked truly puzzled. “Because it’s ours.”

“No. That tells me why you want what Jelem sent; I want to know why you want what’s in here. I want to know why you want Imperial magic.”

Raaz didn’t even bother to deny it. “Is this a jest? You know what your Paragons can do-who wouldn’t want those secrets?”

“Not me, for one. And not a lot of other Mouths I know, either.” I pointed at the papers. “Do you know what this is? It’s death, long and slow-just to have it, just to know about it. It’s the one secret the empire never gives out, the one thing no one besides the emperor and his magicians have ever been able to do. Imperial Paragons have turned men’s bones to iron and heated that iron until it burned through their flesh, just for asking questions about it. But to have these? To have notes about how it’s done, how it was discovered?” I frowned. I had no doubts about what was in that package-not after having had Jelem go through the ancient Paragon’s journal for me four months ago; not after letting him keep some of the notes in payment for his work. And definitely not after Raaz having had all but confirmed they were smuggling Imperial glimmer just now. “No,” I said. “I know plenty of people who’d want nothing to do with that package, either to hold it or to study what was inside. Too damn dangerous.”

“Then why didn’t you destroy it when you figured out what it is?” said Raaz.

It was a good question, and one I’d been trying to answer myself. The easiest solution would be the fire. . and yet I hadn’t been able to bring myself to do it.

“Three reasons,” I said. “First, because I gave my word that I’d deliver it. I don’t like breaking promises, not even when I’ve been tricked into them. But I will if I have to.”

“And what would make you do that?”

“The second reason.” I tapped the paper. “This isn’t Jelem’s first shipment-can’t be. Jelem’s had months to send portions of this down, and I can’t believe he’d wait until I suddenly had to come down here to start. That means that, even if I destroyed this, I wouldn’t be accomplishing anything. The damage has already been done-sooner or later, the empire is going to find out that one of their best-kept secrets is making the rounds and they’ll come looking, even if it means coming to Djan. And that means they’ll trace it back to me.”

“Let them. This is el-Qaddice. Their magi will not be able to enter.”

“Do you really think walls and laws are going to stop them when it comes to this? This is the foundation of the fucking Dorminikan Empire-they’ll tear el-Qaddice apart down to the bedrock if they get wind of what you’ve been smuggling down here.”

“And your third concern?”

“I’m an Imperial,” I said. “I may not have much use for the emperor, but that doesn’t mean I want the empire falling to Djan. And the idea of giving you the key to one of the secrets that have been keeping you from our door for centuries?” I shook my head. “Collapsing empires are bad for business.”

Raaz rapped his fingers on the stone tiles. “Good arguments. And I can understand your concern. But what if I was able to reassure you that what you say won’t come to pass? Would that be enough?”

“It’d be a start.”

“Very well, then.” Raaz sat up straighter and held his left arm above the floor, pulling the sleeve back to reveal his iron magician’s manacle. Its edges were rolled and etched to suggest billowing clouds-or maybe, more appropriately, shadows. With one deft motion, he reached out with his free hand, twisted a hidden hasp, and spoke a single syllable. The supposedly permanent and unremovable symbol of a yazani’s duty to the despot opened and fell to the floor with a soft clink.

I blinked, trying to understand what I was seeing.

“In this,” said Raaz, “I do not work for the despot. It is a personal matter-a tal and a tribal matter. Jelem was exiled for. . let’s say ‘politics,’ although that’s not quite right. It’s not for me to talk about. But the point is, there are those who think it was ill done, and wish to correct the matter. The Imperial magic you bear can help with that correction.

“The secrets Jelem possesses are nowhere near powerful enough to bring down your empire, or to draw their attention: You know this, since you were the one who portioned it out to him. But.” He raised a finger. “It’s powerful enough for his friends to seek vengeance in his name, and perhaps even secure his return to Djan. Believe me when I say, I have no wish to see what you carry fall into the hands of another tal, or even the despot-I merely want the chance to turn the bones of my enemies to iron and watch them burn.”

In point of fact, I didn’t know this-not for certain. When I’d made my original deal with Jelem, there hadn’t been another Mouth on hand to consult when it came to the notes and the glimmer. All I’d had to go on was what I was able to parse out on my own, both from the papers and Jelem’s reactions to my terms, and a healthy helping of bravado. To hear Raaz say what I’d passed along wasn’t going to bring down the empire, or even a corner of it, was frankly a relief. But that didn’t mean I had be excited about passing those secrets on to a group of yazani whose only character reference came from the man who’d tricked me into smuggling the magic into Djan in the first place.

Not the best testimonial, but Angels knew I’d heard worse over the years. Hell, I was worse. And it wasn’t as if I was going to get any better offers. Besides, I didn’t want to keep the package on me indefinitely-that could only lead to bigger risks and worse outcomes.

Still, nothing said I had to just hand it over.

“All right,” I said, “I can work with that. But like I told you when I first sat down, I’m going to need something more. The price has still gone up.”

Raaz ran his gloved hand over his chin. The fingers seemed fuller again. “What did you have in mind?”

“I’m not sure yet,” I said as I finally slid the papers over to him. “But I figure I’ll come up with something.”

“I’m certain you will,” said Raaz as he snatched up the packet. He began to turn it over in his hands, and then froze. “The seal on this has been broken.”

“Has it?” I said. I leaned forward. “Huh. So it has.”

His fingers flipped the folds back. He began to leaf through the letters. I’d looked at them earlier and hadn’t been able to find a damn thing besides tedious accounts of Jelem’s daily routine in Ildrecca. My guess was either some kind of code or, more likely, a hidden magical script.

I stood up and brushed at my pants while Raaz shuffled the papers, turned them over, and shuffled them some more. He glared up at me.

“Only half of the pages are here,” he said.

“You got all that from that quick read through? I’m impressed.”

“I know because Jelem wrote to tell me what to expect. This isn’t it-or, not all of it.” He waved the papers at me. “Where are the rest?”

“Safe,” I said, as I resisted the urge to run my hand along my doublet’s seam. “And they’ll stay that way until I get the rest of my payment.”

“That wasn’t our deal.”

“Our deal said nothing about how many pages you get, or when. And I’m not stupid. I know that if I still have what you want, you’ll be quick to answer when I call. But if you already had all of Jelem’s papers?” I shook my head. “No, when I need people, I tend to need them in a hurry. This way works best for me.”

“And what about what works best for us?” said Raaz, standing up. “What if something happens to you before we get the rest?”

“That doesn’t sound like my problem,” I said as I turned away. “It sounds like yours. I suggest you think about ways to keep it from happening, yes?”

I gathered up Fowler with a look and headed for the exit, pausing long enough to direct a nod toward the vestibule of the Banished god as I went. Somehow, it seemed appropriate.