Dead Letter (28 page)

“
That which is least perceived is most powerful,” said
Lanuille.

“
True enough,” replied Minni. “You mages know that better than
most. I’ve never had a chance to speak with guilders of the Order.
You’re not half as aloof as people say.”

“
What else do they say?”

“
They say all the secrets of the universe are in the Great
Library and the Archmagus never lets anyone in.”

“
I spend most of my time in there,” said Kettna. “If I were
Archmagus, I’d open it to the people of Calimska, like Calim first
intended.”

“
Mother knows best,” assured Minni. “Any shiner I’ve met would
tear up the pages and sell the information by the
letter.”

Kettna
dropped a shot of rum and winced. “How did you know the Archmagus
is my mother?”

“
Like I said, wildfire gossip. Don’t worry, it’s only good
things they are trumpeting. You have to pay for the
dirt.”

“
I doubt it’s worth the shine,” said Kettna, hiding her fear
that someone knew her true weakness.

“
You’re right. I paid a silver for it, too! Scandal, they
said. My sordid history with men is more scandalous than
yours.”

“
A silver!” Kettna laughed, unravelling her nerves. “My love
life’s not worth a copper clipping.”

“
Say, you’ve both spent half you life with your noses in old
books. Ever come across anything about the Dragon Choir?” asked the
Minni.

“
I’ve never encountered that topic, but others might have.
Lanuille, have you?”

Lanuille
shook her head and poured another drink. “Why do you
ask?”

“
My mother is enchanted with Muden mysticism. I’m less
enchanted and more confused. Everything they say is a
riddle.”

“
How strange, my mother collects anything she can on Muden
culture. They don’t write anything down. Knowledge is kept in their
spoken language alone.”

“
The Muden would say our meeting is fate,” suggested
Minni.

“
Fate is for lazy fools,” said Lanuille.

“
Muden prophesied the Jandan exodus and invasion,” said
Kettna. “That was documented by one of our Order before they made
landfall.”

Lanuille
laughed. “At best, Muden are overgrown frogs using primitive tribal
guesswork. At worst, they are weak-willed manipulators who
hypnotise idiots to fight the Jandans whilst they hide away in the
swamp.”

“
Are you calling my mother an idiot?” asked the rogue. “If
mine is daft then your Archmagus is daft too. You both know that
isn’t the case.”

Kettna
knew it was time to cool the conversation down before Lanuille
started a fire that wouldn’t go out.“Maybe the Muden can interpret
the weave better than sorcerers, or at least in a different way.
They are an ancient race, here long before human civilisation
migrated from the West and still we know barely anything about
them.”

“
You can read into frogger ramblings as much as you like, but
there is no grand plan,” said Lanuille. “We forge our own
future.”

“
I want to believe the truth is a path in between,” offered
Kettna, “where some things are bound to happen, some things are
likely to happen and others are entirely of our own making. If
everything in my life was fated by the gods, why bother lifting a
finger in any direction? It’s decided. I doubt the gods give a damn
about most of what we do, but there are some things, some
monumental moments like hinges in eternity that pivot our future
this way or that. Maybe Muden can sense those hinges. Maybe they
are hidden threads in the weave.”

“
I like your way of thinking,” said Minni.

Lanuille
sat back, sipping her rum, unmoved by the Reik’s charm. “Who are
you, really?”

“
I’m just an outrider for merchants traveling over the Great
Dividing Range, mainly between Calimska and Rum Hill, though I’ll
take you anywhere, if the price is right. Do mages ever go
adventuring and need a good tracker?”

Lanuille
ignored the careful deflection. “If you’re an outrider, shouldn’t
you be selling your skills outside the gates at the Trading
Post?”

Minni
laughed off the veiled accusations. “I was. I had an agreement with
our favourite Jandan traders. I waited and waited on the promise of
pay that never shone. I’d keep on waiting, but I’d get caught
flouting the carry laws once dragon season begins.”

“
Foreigners can fend for themselves,” offered
Lanuille.

“
I have no trouble with that,” replied Minni.

The Reik
outrider was charismatic and kind, sharing her knowledge of horse
training and wild foraging, the difference between kobold and
goblin scats, even describing the various techniques to beat a
swordsman in a fight. Lanuille rarely said a word, but Kettna found
herself drawn into sharing her knowledge of potions to heal and
compounds to induce comatose slumber that resembled death. The
inspector described magical beasts and Calim’s collection of local
insects, which was kept in the Great library.

Time
passed by and the Jandans didn’t arrive.

“
I’ve had enough of this idle talk,” complained Lanuille. “I
believe the Jandans have been tipped off, Inspector. Know anything
about that, Reik?”

“
Careful what you say mage,” replied Minni.

“
I’ll say what I want. To me, it is obvious that your
conversation was a ploy to allow the Jandans time to escape our
questioning.”

“
Is this true?” asked Kettna, realising that it didn’t matter
what came out of Minni’s mouth; she had no idea if it would be
truth or lies. Yet, still she needed to know.

“
I’ve done no such thing,” Minni replied. “I’ve nothing to
gain. Wait a little longer with me. They will be back in
time.”

“
Don’t be fooled, Kettna. We are better to spend our time
asleep than to pursue this distraction.”

Kettna
agreed with her partner. The rogue had played her for the naive
island girl she was, but would do so no longer. “Foul my
investigation another time and I will have you locked up. Is that
clear?”

“
Inspector, you have me all wro—“

“
Shut it!” fumed Lanuille. “Every time your mouth opens, lies
drip out. You Muden addled Reik’s are all the same.”

“
Hear me well,” said Minni in defiance of Lanuille’s anger.
“Watch your back out there. The night is not your
friend.”

They
left the inn after dark and treked up the hill to the Cog and
Wheel. The streets were a menace of shadows. For every lamp that
illuminated part of the street, a deep trench of pitch extended
between. Kettna found her eyes constantly readjusting to the
changes in light, never quite sure what moved at the edge of her
vision. Cats scampered about chasing rats, mice and other cats. In
dimly lit side streets night folk congregated in inebriated
fellowship. Kettna grew paranoid the further they walked, watching
the movements in the corner of her eye and thinking every shift was
going to be the Reik, come to end her investigation and her life.
If Minni had been paid to stall the investigation, what wouldn’t a
rogue do to complete such a contract? Shadow was the home of the
rogue, not Kettna’s. The sorceress was at a
disadvantage.

“
I think she is following us,” said Kettna, stopping to peer
into the shadows down the street behind them. “Did you see that
move?”

“
No. You’re just skittish. It’s probably a cat,” suggested
Lanuille.

“
It was bigger than a cat.”

“
A dog then,” Lanuille smirked. “Don’t worry, no one is going
to take on four mages. Let’s keep walking.”

Further
up the street, a couple of drunks sang a ribald ditty, leaning on
each other and staggering down the cobbles. A rat scuttled into an
alley in silhouette. A child whined an exhausted bedtime tantrum.
Candlelight flickered behind windows and gave the street a thousand
dull disinterested eyes. No one would run from their doors to help
if a fight broke out and none would come if they heard a murderous
scream. Curtains would be drawn and doors would be
barred.

Shadows
continued to shift behind the mages. Something followed
them.

“
There is something back there,” assured Kettna. “I can feel
eyes on us.”

“
Don’t worry about the shadows,” replied Lanuille. “Look what
is waiting for us in plain site.”

At the
entrance to an alley only a street away from the Cog and Wheel, a
man stared at them from under the street lantern. As they
approached he yelled at them with a thick Jandan accent, brimming
with devout spite. “You thought you could ambush a holy servant? I
was told you were coming to arrest me.”

“
Who told you that, Wasnid?” asked Kettna.

“
The Lord, my saviour.”

Lanuille
laughed. “He hasn’t saved you from anything yet.”

The
Jandan trader took out a black star pendant and held it before him
as a ward against evil. “Stay your ground, sorceress! Not another
step.”

Lanuille
took an extra step and a bolt flew from the shadows of the alley
and hit the cobbles beside her foot. A crossbow was heard reloading
with a winder. “You shouldn’t have done that,” said the
adept.

Four men
emerged from the shadows, pointing crossbows at the contingent of
mages. “My devout men are ready to do the bidding of the Lord. Do
not even think of befouling the street with your indecent magics,
for they will pierce your demon hearts with blessed
bolts.”

“
There is no need for violence,” said Kettna, hoping Lanuille
would heed the message not to exasperate the situation. “We only
desire an audience with you to ask some simple
questions.”

“
Why does the Guildmaster send four of his sinful Order to ask
questions? The truth is clear. You are a hit squad sent to ensorcel
me into a confession. I had no part in the robbery. I was duped
into the con by a devilish mixer of poisons and a woman who curses
glass with ensorcelled lusts. I was fooled. I trusted them and they
swindled me.”

“
I don’t think they are responsible—“ assured
Kettna.

“
Yet you think I am?”

“
I have to make a judgement on that based on the evidence,”
replied Kettna.

“
Lies! Your minions already tried to arrest me. A bribe bought
me time to execute the Lord’s justice.”

“
I had no part in that,” explained Kettna. “I am not to be
bought. I only judge the truth, not how much shine you
have.”

“
I shall not be judged by a sinner, a woman no less. My life
is in the Lord’s hands and I am here on his holy mission. He speaks
to me now and I know there is only one way to deliver him justice
for the shame you put upon my sacred expedition. I came in peace to
trade and you stalk me with evil doers, accusing me of the
corruption that I am the victim of.”

“
Stand your men down!” ordered the Inspector. “I can promise
you clemency.”

“
The Lord is my redeemer and he demands your
sacrifice.”

A shadow
struck each crossbowman in quick succession and blood burst from
lacerated arteries, colouring the night red. One after the other
they fell like gurgling pins, clutching at their necks. From the
shadows stalked the rogue they had met in The Outpost Inn. She wore
a mask, and brandished two dripping stilettos, but Kettna knew it
was Minni by the way she held herself with catlike
confidence.

“
Thank you!” said Kettna.

“
I said you could have him first, but it looked like things
took a nasty turn. That was not going to end well for
you.”

Lanuille
brought flames to her hands and again stepped toward Wasnid, who
was now petrified with fear. “Your bone sucking false god has no
power on my streets. I’ll melt that black star in your
face.”

“
Hold up!” hollered Minni, walking between Lanuille and the
Jandan. “I agree with your plan. It’s pure poetry, but you had your
chance and missed it. He’s mine now.”

Lanuille
flexed her power and the rising flames reflected in Minni’s dark
eyes. The rogue would not be intimidated. In one step, one blink of
an eye, those stilettos could bite the life from Lanuille. No flame
would stop that, but neither woman would back down.

Kettna
intervened. “Sorcery can have no place in this scene. If the Order
is known to be assassinating Jandans in the street, it would start
a war.”

“
How is it fine in reverse?” asked Lanuille. “Listen to
yourself, you almost had a bolt in your gullet and you make
political excuses. No dog threatens me and lives.”

“
Who said I wanted him alive?” asked Minni, removing her mask.
The rogue’s ringlets of flame kissed disregard danced into the
firelight.

“
You? But I thought—“ began the terror-stricken
Wasnid.

“
Oh, it’s so nice to be remembered after so long,” said Minni
with genuine appreciation. “I was in the area and heard tell that
you were too. You’re a hard one to find these days.”