Imperial Spy (21 page)

‘Where have you been, Phagen? You’ve been gone ages.’

Phagen was surprised to find Kalheen in their room. He had not seen much of his roommate recently.

‘I was trying to arrange a visit to see the Ambassador,’ Phagen replied, his voice not much louder than a whisper.

‘Really? Did you get to see her? I feel terribly bad about handing her over to the guards the way I did. Maybe I should have given her a chance to bluff her way out. It was a tricky
situation. I didn’t want to get locked up as well.’

Phagen did not answer. He pursed his lips and shook his head.

‘No joy? I tried myself a few days ago, but the Royal Guards are a stubborn lot,’ Kalheen continued, not noticing the undertones of Phagen’s gesture. ‘They’re
determined not to let anyone near her until the trial. I spoke to Sidis and Reynik earlier as well. They’ve not found out anything helpful about the murders. All the evidence still points at
the Ambassador. Do you think she did do it?’

‘I don’t,’ he replied. ‘But I’ve not found anything either. Time is running out. If we don’t find the true killer soon, it’ll be too late.’

‘Don’t be long. Let’s not invite trouble.’

‘I won’t. Thanks, Faslen,’ Reynik replied in a grateful whisper.

The door to the cell opened. Ambassador Femke looked pale and slightly worried, though she brightened the instant she saw who was entering.

‘Reynik! How did you convince them to let you down here? I didn’t expect to see anyone until they called me for trial.’

‘I’ve made a few friends amongst the Palace Guards. They’re a good bunch once you get to know them,’ Reynik replied with a grin. ‘Listen, I only have a minute. I
just wanted to know you were all right and to see if there’s anything we can do to help. We – me, Sidis, Kalheen and Phagen that is – don’t believe you committed those
murders, but we haven’t been able to find any clues as to who did.’

‘It was a man named Shalidar,’ Femke said quickly. ‘He’s a Shandese assassin. He has a house here in the upper quarter of Mantor. Apparently he’s known here as a
wealthy Shandese merchant and probably runs a perfectly legitimate business.’

‘Shalidar. Right. I’ll keep an eye out for him.’

‘Kalheen knows who he is, but listen: Reynik, do the others know you’re here?’ Femke asked urgently.

‘No. I’ve only just managed to persuade Faslen to bring me down.’

‘Don’t tell them you’ve seen me. I may be paranoid, but I think the less people involved, the better. If you can snoop around a bit, I’d appreciate it, but be careful.
Shalidar is extremely dangerous. He’d kill you as soon as blink. I know he did it. He told me himself, but I have no proof. I get the feeling that evidence will not be easy to come
by.’

‘Don’t worry, Ambassador. I’ll be careful. I’ll do my best and . . .’ Reynik dropped his voice as low as he could, ‘I’ll see if there’s any way I
can get you out of here. Be ready when the time comes.’

‘Please don’t do anything silly, Reynik. This trip has been a disaster for international relations as it is. I don’t want to make it worse.’

‘Trust me, my Lady,’ Reynik whispered with a grin that made him look positively boyish. ‘I’d better go now. Chin up.’

‘Excuse me, sir.’

‘Yes, Hanri, what is it?’ Shalidar asked, irritated by the disturbance.

‘One of the watchers has reported a young man hanging around outside. They say this is the second day he’s been seen watching the house. Would you like the men to bring him
in?’

Shalidar thought about it for a moment. ‘No,’ he said with a dismissive wave of his hand. ‘Have them “dissuade” him from loitering, would you? Tell them not to kill
him. Just get them to rough him up. He’ll soon get the message.’

‘Very well, sir. I’ll see to it right away.’

Femke drummed her fingers on the edge of the wooden cot bed. Has it been fourteen days now, or fifteen? she wondered dully. Five days had passed since Reynik’s visit, but
had there been nine, or ten days in prison before that? It was irrelevant really. In all that time she had come no closer to finding a way out.

Femke had long since decided that whoever had designed this cell had done a good job. The door was solid, with a double bolt and a sturdy lock. It had two small, sliding metal plates fitted. One
was at head height, square, with a similar width to Femke’s spread hand. The other was a small distance from the floor and was slot-like. This was where the guards would push through plates
of food at obscure times of day and night. As far as Femke could tell, there was little rhyme or reason to the timings of her meals, but she knew a little about the psychology behind the treatment
of prisoners. It was likely an attempt by the guards to disorientate her by playing with her concept of passing time. She ignored it.

The vent in the roof which, judging from the small amount of natural light that filtered through during the daytime, led up to clear air about thirty feet above the cell. It was too narrow to
climb through and was blocked by securely fixed iron bars. The toilet drain hole was also narrow and barred. The vent, toilet hole and door comprised the only entry and exit points from the cell.
Femke explored every potential avenue for exploiting them, but found nothing positive.

The small cot bed had been Femke’s first thought for possible escape materials. Listening hard at the door to discern when the guard outside was taking a nap, Femke had waited until she
felt safe to make some noise without raising suspicion, then she had tipped the bed on its side and traced every join of the wood. The maker of the bed had been extremely clever and had not used a
single metal nail or screw in its construction. The entire bed had been put together using fitted joints with glue, so there were no stray bits of metal of any kind for her to work with.

The plates of food the guards pushed through the slot were no better. Femke had been delighted when she had seen the outlines of cutlery in the dim light of the cell. But the joy was short-lived
for the knife and fork proved to be wooden. Nowhere within the confines of the small chamber was there anything that could be used to pry, pick or poke at the door locks effectively. Without some
sort of outside aid, Femke had nothing that would enable her to make a break for freedom.

Once the young spy had established she could not escape, she bent her mind towards working out exactly how Shalidar had anticipated her moves so cleverly, and how to prove it had been he who had
killed Anton and Dreban.

Thinking back to sequences of events and the timescales involved, Femke constructed scenarios in her mind. The spy set aside her own beliefs and used her objective expertise to study the facts
as the King would see them.

Shalidar appeared to have castiron alibis for the time of both murders. From what Kalheen had said before Femke was caught, the assassin was hosting a dinner party at his house at the time of
the first murder and had somehow managed to be in the Palace over the approximate time the second murder took place. If Femke took Kalheen’s word as a reliable source, then it indicated that
Shalidar could not have murdered either man. If Kalheen was not reliable, then lots of possibilities opened up.

What had Kalheen been doing out in the corridor in the middle of the night? Had he really been looking to help Femke, or was he in league with Shalidar? Kalheen had set her running from the
Palace in the first place with his message that Anton had been killed. Had Kalheen been genuinely concerned for her, or was he simply looking to make her appear guilty of the crime? The more Femke
thought about the servant’s role in this affair, the more of an enigma he became. Was he really observant enough to identify her when she was in disguise, or had he been following her for
some time beforehand?

Then there was Shalidar. So much of the information available about the assassin and his role here did not add up. It could be the case that having had his plans foiled in Shandar, the assassin
had decided to come to Thrandor to pursue a legitimate trade as a Merchant here in Mantor. This, Femke decided, was most unlikely. Shalidar was at the height of his powers as an assassin. Why would
the man give up something he was a master of, simply because one of his plans had been thwarted? Femke could think of no reason. Then again, if Shalidar had killed Anton and Dreban, then who had
paid him for the hits? The Assassins’ Creed did not allow them to kill for personal revenge or pleasure. Allowable kills (other than for money) were those that prevented their anonymity being
breached.

It was possible, as Count Dreban had indicated, that the jealousy of one of the other Noblemen had offered a motive for hiring an assassin to kill Baron Anton. It was also possible that Count
Dreban had riled someone enough to warrant hiring an assassin. What was difficult to resolve were the chances of those killings being ordered for reasons unrelated to the framing of Femke. The
probability of no link was very remote, particularly given the young spy had been in the perfect place to pick up the blame on both occasions. This meant either Shalidar was breaching the
Assassins’ Creed, or he had arranged to be paid to kill both Noblemen. He
might
have justified the kills on the grounds of maintaining his anonymity, but he had already told Femke the
kills had been paid hits.

No matter how Femke jiggled the pieces of the jigsaw around, they did not fit. One thing was certain: Shalidar was not working alone here in Mantor. With hindsight, that should have been obvious
from the beginning. Femke kicked herself for not realising sooner. That Shalidar had a house here showed he was no stranger to Mantor, and would therefore have associates and possibly a whole
network of contacts around the city. This would explain how he had managed to continue tracking her after he had disappeared following their encounter in the lower city.

Shalidar had deceived Femke with a similar trick before in Shandrim, yet Femke had not considered the possibility of him doing it here. It was a simple enough ploy but, with the stress of the
situation, Femke had failed to take precautions against it. The assassin must have organised someone to follow him discreetly, she realised, maintaining enough distance to see whether anyone else
was trying to do so. He could even have had a tail on the tail if he was being particularly careful. The basic principle was simple: the assassin would set off on a random course to a predetermined
rendezvous point where, if his shadow had seen nothing, he would get a signal that all was clear. If Shalidar did not get the signal, then he would lead whoever was following him on a wild goose
chase or into a trap.

Femke had decided not to follow Shalidar the night of Count Dreban’s murder. However, given she had thought to have gained the initiative, she had neglected to check if she was being
followed. Whoever Shalidar’s arranged tail was had simply locked on to her and followed her right to the tavern where she had taken lodging for the night. Once her tail had decided she was
staying the night, he would have reported her location to Shalidar, who would then have arranged to have the place watched for her to emerge.

Femke was particularly irritated to realise she must have been followed the following day as well. Shalidar knew everything, she decided grimly. He knew exactly what clothes she had bought,
when, and from where. If he had, as she now suspected, arranged a small team of people to follow her every move, then he knew she had visited his street, asked questions about his house, and more
importantly that she had entered the Palace in disguise late in the evening. In short, she had neglected one of the basic rules of spying: never focus on something without considering that others
could be watching you.

‘Oh, Shand!’ Femke cursed suddenly. ‘Reynik! I didn’t warn him!’ She swore again.

It was too late now to help the young soldier. He would know nothing of Shalidar’s network of operatives. All Femke could do was to pray that he stayed out of trouble.

Reynik was frustrated. He had surreptitiously observed Shalidar’s house for a couple of days and seen nothing suspicious. It had not taken long to find out where the man
lived, as many people appeared to know of him. However, catching sight of the supposed merchant was proving more problematic.

It had crossed Reynik’s mind that Shalidar might be his uncle’s killer. If that was the case, then Reynik had a particular interest in proving him guilty of the murders here at the
Palace. Unless he could spot him, however, there seemed little likelihood of finding out.

Reynik sighed and moved away from the house again. He did not want his observation of the property to become obvious, so he restricted his viewings to short periods. He would just have to be
patient, hope for a bit of luck and keep trying.

The young soldier had not gone far when he noticed he was being followed. A quick glance behind showed four men striding down the road after him. They did not look friendly. Reynik’s
heartbeat accelerated as he realised they were coming after him.

‘Calm down,’ he told himself silently. ‘You don’t know that for certain.’

Reynik took the next right turn into a little side street to see if they would follow. They did. More than that – they accelerated, running towards him. Should he run away? If he ran and
they caught him, he would stand less chance in a fight than if he stood his ground here. Distance running had never been one of his strengths. He did not want to try to fight four of them. It was
hardly good odds, but it was not yet certain they were looking for a fight. Reluctantly, Reynik decided to let them approach to see what they wanted.

When they saw Reynik turn to face them, the four men slowed slightly. The lead man’s face twisted slightly into an ugly smile. His look did not bode well, Reynik decided. Not one of the
men was blessed with good looks. They were all burly with tough-looking faces. As they approached, they spread out and encircled him.

‘Good evening, gentlemen, what can I do for you?’ Reynik asked politely, focusing his attention on the man who had grinned. He appeared to be the leader.