Текст книги "Cascet of Souls"

Автор книги: Lynn Flewelling

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 23 (всего у книги 31 страниц)

The man raised the sword and Seregil took to his heels, holding up his skirt with one hand again and clutching the shawl with the other. The man caught the end of the latter and nearly pulled him over backward. Seregil let go of it and ran for all he was worth, ducking around a pony cart and leaping over a collection of pots an old woman had displayed on a sodden blanket. Behind him, he could hear the bastard shouting something about having been robbed, as if expecting someone here to give enough of a damn to stop Seregil. He pelted on, dignity a bit dented. The man had been playing with him, and he had the sinking feeling that he’d been sussed.

Once he was sure he’d thrown off pursuit he slowed and

held his skirts in a more womanly manner as he circled back through the cold mud to where he thought the old man might be; he’d managed to lose both shoes in his escape.

The rain was coming down in earnest now, driving people from the street. Splashing through ankle-deep puddles, he finally gave up and went to meet Alec in the Sea Market. Alec was waiting for him at the fountain, and his grin promised better news than Seregil had to share.

“The boy talked to you?” he asked as they set off through the downpour for the inn.

“Better than that.” Alec showed him a yellow rock crystal. “This is what the old man traded him.”

“Well done! How did you get it away from the boy?”

“I bought it off him for a few pennies. What about the old man?”

“I lost him.”

“You lost an old man?”

Seregil gave him a sour look. “There was a distraction. Several, actually.”

“What?”

“A near rape, and a big masked fellow with a sword who offered to cut my hair for me-somewhere below the chin. I think he might have been in league with the old man. A bodyguard, perhaps.”

“Probably a good idea in there. Masked, you say?”

“Yes. Not that I’d expect to find many honest men in that part of the Ring, but I’d bet a sester that the tall bastard was a professional.”

“The old man didn’t look like he could afford much in the way of protection.”

“The professional could be part of this raven tribe, with a different role to play. Considering the areas of the city they’ve been working, they may all go out with partners who stay out of sight until needed. And somehow I got the wind up him. I don’t often get noticed, tracking.”

“Maybe he’s a nightrunner, too.”

Seregil let out what started as a derisive snort but turned into a sneeze.

“What happened to your shawl?” asked Alec.

“Spoil of war.”

Alec untied his own and draped it over Seregil’s shoulders. Seregil didn’t argue; the woolen shawl was soaked, but still held in some warmth. He was chilled to the bone and depressed now that the excitement was over. Walking wasn’t quite enough to keep him warm.

Alec patted the stone in his wallet. “At least we have this to show Valerius and Thero. Maybe they can get something from it.”

“Hopefully.” As they splashed along, Seregil found himself thinking more of the tall man than the old one; something niggled at the back of his mind, but he wasn’t quite sure yet what it meant.

Atre crouched in the shadows inside a derelict shanty, stripping off the fake whiskers, wig, and putty nose. Using a clean corner of his sodden cloak, he rubbed at his face to get off the last of the cosmetics. He was nearly done when Brader stepped inside and pulled the mask from the lower portion of his face.

“What was that all about?” Atre whispered.

“You had an admirer,” Brader replied, looking more dour than usual.

“That old beggar woman?”

“Not so old, and no beggar. I saw her take down a man twice her size in the blink of an eye and nearly cut his throat. I’m not completely certain it was even a woman.” He sat down on a box and kept watch while Atre stripped off his beggar’s clothing to the plain garb underneath and wadded the whole disguise into a sack.

“Oh, don’t glower so. You’ve always liked this part of our arrangement,” Atre wheedled.

After a moment Brader said, “I know you don’t want to hear this, but it’s happening again. You’re taking too many risks and someone is taking notice.”

“Your raggedy lady friend?”

“Listen to me for once, cousin!” Brader growled. “That was no beggar woman.”

“Well, that’s why I have you, isn’t it?” Atre said with a

grin. “The next time you catch someone suspicious, just kill them like you usually do. You haven’t bloodied your blade more than once or twice since we’ve been here.”

Brader let out an exasperated snort. “Because you were being careful, until that night you got yourself stabbed in that rat-hole tavern. It’s going to be just like before-”

“No, it isn’t,” Atre assured him with that dark, hungry smile. “It’s going to be much, much better.”

Back at the Stag and Otter, Seregil sent word to Valerius to meet them at Thero’s tower. Washed and changed into dry, nondescript clothing, they set off for the Oreska House through the relentless downpour.

Their cloaks were soaked through by the time they reached it. The night torches cast wavering lines of ruddy light across the huge puddles that had gathered all over the garden and in the carriage path.

Servants took their horses and cloaks, and they hurried upstairs to Thero’s rooms.

“We have something to show you!” Alec exclaimed as soon as the wizard let them in.

“Something more from Reltheus, I hope?” Thero asked, wiping his hands on his work apron. The room smelled like burnt roots and wine and there was something black and acrid bubbling in a flask on one of the long tables.

“Uh, no. We found something in the Ring that will help Myrhichia.”

Thero raised a questioning eyebrow as he took the stone from Alec.

Alec waited expectantly, hoping the wizard would divine something from it instantly. “A boy got this stone for a hog’s tooth. A little girl currently dying in the Sea Market temple got a sweet for a clay doll.”

“Interesting,” Thero muttered, tilting the stone this way and that to catch the light.

Rain lashed against the glass-paned dome overhead and lightning vied with the lamplight as he tried a few spells, then clutched it in his hand, muttering another under his

breath. After a moment, however, he shook his head. “Ordinary quartz, imbued with nothing. It’s useful in a few spells, but it has no killing power.”

A wave of disappointment rolled over Alec. He’d been certain this would be the key. “But there has to be something!”

“I’ve never seen quartz that color,” Seregil noted.

Thero shrugged. “It’s common in Skala’s northeast territory, near Isil.”

“But not found down here on the peninsula?”

“No, but you can get it easily enough. I’ve bought some from a stone dealer in Farrow Street.”

“And you can’t read anythingabout the old man from this one?” asked Alec.

“No, that’s one of the properties of the stone; it doesn’t take on the essence of those who handle it. That’s about all that makes it valuable, actually.” He held the crystal so it caught the light again. “It’s just the sort of thing a child would like, isn’t it? And sweetmeats.”

“I’d like to know where our strange friends got it from,” Seregil mused. “If they bought it here, then the dealer might be able to tell us something. But if they brought them here themselves, then they may not be from the city after all. Is your man in Farrow Street the only one who sells these?”

“I doubt it,” replied Thero. “I’ll make inquiries around the House to see if anyone gets their stones from somewhere else. As far as you know, is it always a trade?”

“We only know of a few cases for certain, but it was a trade those times,” Alec told him. “I think that must be significant. Otherwise the ravens could just as easily buy or steal what they want, right?”

Thero pondered that for a moment, clearly intrigued in spite of himself. The wizard loved a riddle as much as Seregil did. “Given the nature of the trades, it isn’t like for like,” he mused. “And apart from the quartz, none of the objects had any real value?”

“Is a hog’s tooth used for any magic?” asked Alec.

“None that I know of. And even if it were, you wouldn’t need to trade with a child to get what you could have for free from any butcher’s offal pile.”

“So?” asked Seregil.

“I’m not certain yet. If I had some other type of traded item, one that would hold an impression, I might be able to tell you more.”

A heavy knock sounded at the door and Thero went to let Valerius in.

“You’ve found something?” the drysian asked, tossing his wet cloak over a bench.

“Alec got this from a boy who traded for it with some beggars called the raven folk.” Thero handed him the yellow stone.

Valerius held it up to the light, sniffed it, then licked it. Shaking his head, he handed it back. “What am I supposed to make of this?”

“You don’t sense anything from it?”

“Nothing. It’s not poisoned, if that’s what you were thinking. And I suppose if it were cursed or bespelled, I’d be hearing about it from you, Thero.”

“I sense nothing on it, but this kind of stone doesn’t retain impressions.”

“You mean we went through all that for nothing?” Alec exclaimed in dismay.

“No, Alec,” said Seregil. “We just need to get something else, and now we know how.”

Thero rested a hand on Alec’s shoulder. “This is getting desperate. I know what this means to you, but the two of you have made inroads in both cabals that can’t be taken over by anyone else.”

“What about Micum Cavish?” asked Valerius. “Maybe he could look into this raven business for you. He’s very good with the lower classes.”

Seregil arched a wry eyebrow. “Do youwant to tell Kari Cavish that we intend to send her husband into the south Ring?”

“You don’t think he can handle himself there?”

“Of course he can. But not alone. Bilairy’s Balls, Valerius, Iwouldn’t go in there alone, and I doubt you would, either.”

“Micum wouldn’t have to,” said Alec. “We could take turns during the day, helping Micum.”

“What about Malthus and his friends?” asked Thero. “And the reprisals?”

Seregil sighed. “The two sides may do the job for us.”

“Have they tried assassinating you lately?”

“Nothing so far. Perhaps word got back to them somehow that we aren’t so easy to kill. Or it was only Laneus sending them. With two failed attempts, I suspect that if the others come after us again, it won’t be by way of an assassin. Given what we’ve seen of the methods on both sides, it’s more likely to be some form of blackmail.”

Valerius snorted at that. “What could they do to you that way? It’s not like either of you has a pristine character.”

“I expect it would be something along the lines of another incriminating letter, like the one found with Laneus’s body.”

“At least Korathan knows the circumstances of that one,” said Thero.

Seregil frowned. “If too many more of those sorts of things come to light, he might just start to doubt all of us. Now, as for Micum, will you send one of your little messengers out to Watermead? Just tell him we have a job we need help with.”

Thero summoned a tiny spark of blue light into being and said softly, “Micum, we need you in Rhiminee. Watcher business.” With that, he flicked his finger and the little light flew across the room and disappeared through the wall by the door.

“What will you do now?” Thero asked.

“We’re close, I think. All we need to do is get our hands on something that will hold an impression for you to read and we’ll have them.”

Just then a frantic knocking came at the door, and what sounded like a scuffle.

“Let me in, Thero!” a woman’s ragged voice cried out over the softer sound of a man’s trying to reassure her. The lock rattled and the door banged wide, framing Thero’s servant Wethis supporting a rain-soaked woman. She wore no cloak over her mud-spattered gown, and her black hair was plastered to her face and shoulders. It wasn’t until she cried out

and rushed to throw herself sobbing into Seregil’s arms that Alec realized it was Eirual. Seregil caught her and they swayed together a moment before sinking to the floor in each other’s arms.

“Oh, no. No!” Alec gasped. Eirual was too hysterical to speak, but there was no doubt in anyone’s mind what had happened.

“The lady arrived on horseback, insisting that she see you and Lord Valerius at once, my lord,” Wethis explained.

“Fetch blankets and hot wine,” Thero told him. “Then find a nightdress and make up one of the guest beds.”

Thero cast a fire in the workroom fireplace. They wrapped Eirual in blankets and Seregil held her in his arms before it. He coaxed a little of the wine into her, as well, and Valerius pressed his hand to her brow and murmured a healing. The hysterical weeping slowly subsided into sobs and then to tearful sighs.

“Myrhichia is dead,” she managed at last. “She just closed her eyes and…”

Seregil stroked her wet hair. “I’m so sorry, my love. So very sorry.”

She looked up at the wizard and drysian. “Why couldn’t you help her?”

Thero knelt and took her cold hand between his. “We tried, Eirual, but we haven’t found the cause yet. I’m sorry.”

“My poor, darling girl.” Tears overflowed those sad violet eyes again and she sank against Seregil in a swoon.

With Alec’s help he got her downstairs to Thero’s guest chamber and into bed in the dry nightgown. He rested a hand on her forehead. “She’s feverish.”

“That’s not unusual after such a shock,” Valerius explained when they’d carried the news upstairs. “I’ll see to it personally that she’s properly cared for.”

“She can remain here, or I’ll have her taken home in a carriage, if she’d rather,” Thero told them.

“Maybe we should stay tonight, too,” Alec suggested.

“We might as well. Do you still have those spare clothes I left here, Thero?”

“Yes, of course. They’re in the chest in the apprentice chamber.”

Seregil and Alec stayed with Eirual, but though they slept entwined in each other’s arms again, there was still a cold space where Myrhichia should have been.

CHAPTER 33. In the Ravens' Wake

THE following morning Alec helped Seregil escort Eirual home in a hired carriage. Leaning silently on Seregil’s shoulder, holding both their hands, she seemed to have no more tears left, but her cheeks were pale, her eyes dull with grief.

Alec couldn’t think of any words of comfort to offer; his own sorrow was too raw, and he suspected Seregil felt the same, though he was concentrating on soothing Eirual.

The house was closed in mourning. Word had been given out that Myrhichia had died of fever.

Seregil gave Eirual his arm and helped her up to her bed. As he pulled the coverlet over her, she caught his hand. “Who would want to kill poor Myrhichia? She never harmed a soul!”

“I don’t know. But they’ll pay, I swear to you.”

Her dark eyes met his. “The Cat. Will you speak to him? I’ll give anything!”

He kissed her brow. “I will. And he won’t take a penny of yours for avenging her, I promise you.”

She gave a tremulous sigh. “I wish I could thank him myself.”

He gave her a fond smile as he stroked the hair back from her cheek. “You know it doesn’t work that way.”

“Not even after all this time?”

“No. He won’t change.”

Hyli and a few other girls came in to sit with her. Alec and Seregil took their leave and went to Myrhichia’s room.

The velvet drapes were drawn and candles had been lit. Coils of sweet smoke rose from an incense burner hanging from the ceiling to cover the smell of death.

Myrhichia had been laid out on her own bed. The women of the house had bathed her and dressed her in a white silk gown. Her hands were folded on her breast; the gold sesters on her eyes glittered like tears in the flickering light. Devoid of cosmetics, her pinched, waxen features lacked any semblance of life, and when Alec touched her hand he found it stiff and cold. The young woman who’d so sweetly ushered him into the soft give and take of real lovemaking was gone. A sob caught in his throat at the memory.

Seregil put his arm around Alec’s shoulders and pulled him close. “We did all we could, tali.”

Alec shook his head angrily. “Not enough! If we’d caught that old man-”

“I’m sorry. I swear to you, we’ll find out what happened and avenge her. But we have a duty to keep Elani and Klia safe. We can’t do anything more for Myrhichia now.”

He held Alec and let him cry for a while, then handed him his handkerchief. “Come on, tali. Work’s the best thing for us now.”

Alec wiped his face and nodded. Taking his dead friend’s hand for the last time, he whispered, “By Illior, Myrhichia, I swear I will kill the one who killed you!”

Seregil was grim as they headed back to the Oreska for their horses.

“How often has the Cat helped Eirual?” Alec asked.

“Oh, three or four times, over the years. Small jobs, except for one. I hunted down a man who murdered one of the girls. Strangled her in her own bed. It was early in Eirual’s career and she didn’t have the influence she does now, so the bluecoats didn’t waste much time trying to find him.”

“Sort of like how no one seems to care about the poor with the sleeping death.”

“Yes, very much like that. Then again, I don’t suppose the very poor care much about the doings of the rich, either. The

gulf is too wide. Not many have been on both sides of it, as we have.”

They visited Thero’s Farrow Street stone dealer, but the man hadn’t had dealings with any strange folk.

“Have you had many people buying this particular kind of stone before?” asked Alec, showing him the one he’d bought from the boy in the Ring.

“Wizards, mostly, and dishonest jewelers.” The merchant examined the stone closely. “This isn’t one of mine. In fact it’s better than anything I have here. You could cut this one and pass it off as citrine or beryl. Maybe even a yellow sapphire.”

“Do you know anyone else who sells them?” asked Seregil.

“Only Mistress Elein, in Bank Street.”

They made that their next stop, but it was a dead end, as well. The woman was as certain as the other dealer had been that she’d have remembered anyone that fit the raven folk’s description selling a stone that pure.

“So they could have brought them from wherever it is they came from.”

“Or bought them from some street vendor in any one of the markets,” Seregil replied with a sigh.

They returned to Stag in time for the evening meal and found Micum waiting for them in the kitchen. He’d come dressed for nightrunning, in homespun clothing and mud-flecked boots, with a small pack at his feet. Rain droplets still beaded his long moustache and his mane of red-and-silver hair.

They carried their supper upstairs to eat in private and Seregil laid out the circumstances surrounding the sleeping death and the loss of Myrhichia.

“Astellus carry her softly,” Micum said sadly. “If these raven folk are the same people who were attacking the Lower City poor, then Korathan’s quarantine must have driven them up here.”

“So it would seem. Yet the first Kepi saw of them was up here.” Seregil absently tapped his pewter spoon on the edge

of his untouched soup bowl. “We’ll have to set someone to watch at the Yellow Eel Street temple. If that little traitor who led us into that ambush really did make a trade, she might just show up there.”

“I’d like to have had a word with that old man, too. I’d really like to know how he gave me the slip like that.”

“So, what’s the job, exactly?” Micum asked as they settled over wine.

Seregil smiled at the familiar glint in his old friend’s eyes. Micum grew more keen still as Seregil and Alec explained the complicated tangle of problems with the ravens and the noble cabals.

“So it’s Alec and me for the Ring, then?”

“I’ll go in with you sometimes, too, but it will always be with one of us. And only during the day,” said Seregil. “Micum, I’d like you to stay out of sight here when you’re not on the job. Alec and I will have to be seen at Wheel Street and around town.”

Micum took out his pipe and tobacco pouch and set about preparing for a smoke. “That suits me fine.”

The rainy weather continued for the next few days. Seregil and Alec were summoned once to the Palace to attend Elani, and spent the following night burgling Kyrin for fresh evidence. There was more gold in Kyrin’s secret room, but no new coded messages. Perhaps Klia had rooted that out, at least for now.

They set Kepi to watch at the Sea Market temple, in case the boy who’d traded with the old man or anyone else with the sleeping death turned up.

With the threat of quarantine hanging over their heads, Alec and Micum made their forays into the Ring slum. Alec wore his peasant-woman garb and Micum looked suitably disreputable in a dirty soldier’s coat and an eye patch. He went armed and they were mostly left alone. Though they found more people, mostly children, who claimed to have traded with a raven person, almost none of the descriptions matched. One had dealt with the old woman with the strange belt adornments, but no one had seen the old man. There was

talk of a young woman in a ragged cloak, and the lame young man on a crutch, but none of the people they questioned were able to give much more of a description than that. No one remembered a tall swordsman hanging about.

Kepi soon turned up at Wheel Street again with news of a boy who fit the description of the one Alec had gotten the yellow crystal from. He’d been brought into the Yellow Eel Street temple, along with many others.

“The merchants in the square are up in arms about it,” Kepi told them while having his customary meal in the kitchen under the fond eye of the cook. “They’re hollerin’ for quarantine louder every day ’cause folk are staying away from the merchants nearest there.”

“Then we’d better hurry,” said Seregil.

Alec and Seregil rode to the temple and found it ringed with angry people shouting at the priests and trembling acolytes.

“You know we can’t turn away the sick,” the head priest cried. “Maker’s Mercy, good people, let them at least die in peace.”

They shouldered their way through the crowd and into the temple. Once inside, Alec shook his head, looking at all the sightless sleepers lined up against the walls. The boy he’d gotten the stone from lay on a pallet near the door.

Alec hunted out the drysian in charge. “Could I borrow two of your acolytes, please, Brother? I need to send some messages.”

The two boys were quickly sent off, one with a message for Valerius, the other for Thero.

While they waited he and Seregil made use of their time examining the stricken people, looking for marks of any sort, or anything else out of the ordinary.

“Here’s something,” said Alec, kneeling by one of the little girls. “Look, someone’s cut a lock of her hair in the back. I saw that on another of the little ones over there, too.” He turned to the drysian woman. “Have you noticed that with any of the others who’ve come through here?”

“No. But we deal in illness, not hair.”

“Alec, look!” Seregil pointed to a child on the far side of the room.

It was the little golden-haired washerwoman’s daughter and her mother. The child still lived.

“That’s a few days longer than we expected,” Alec pointed out hopefully.

“We can’t take anything for granted,” Seregil warned.

The wizard and drysian arrived within the hour. The crowd had swelled but parted respectfully for Valerius.

Thero’s robe was rumpled and he looked rather hollow-eyed. He took in the room at a glance. “Your messenger told us a bit about what’s going on, but this? Look at all the little ones!”

“I’ve been talking with the priests,” said Seregil. “At least half of them were seen making trades with the ravens. I think this may be magic, rather than a simple illness. Or magic that causes the illness, at least.”

Thero nodded. “I’ll see what I can discover.”

The wizard moved among the sick, touching them, brushing their minds-or trying to. There seemed to be no mind to touch. The bodies were mere empty, breathing husks. All the same, there was the faintest hint of something else, something that made him vaguely uncomfortable, like a bad smell. He took his time at it, and when he finished he washed his hands.

“Did you find anything?” asked Valerius.

“I’m not sure. It’s not like anything has been laid on them, but rather something taken away, leaving just the faintest echo in its wake.”

“I sensed something similar,” Valerius told him.

“Taken.” Alec touched a little girl’s hand. “Like their khi?”

“Their soul, you mean?” Valerius shook his head. “They’d be dead if that were the case.”

“Only if the soul is the same thing as life,” said Thero. “Philosophers have been debating that for centuries.” He tapped his chin, thinking. “There is one last thing I’d like to

try, though. Help me move this older boy over to that clear place by the wall.”

Seregil and Alec carried the boy to the spot he’d indicated and then stood back with Valerius as Thero took out his chalk and began drawing an elaborate pattern of symbols around the stricken one. When he was done there was a solid circle around the boy, with room enough for Thero to sit inside with him on the floor.

He rested his hands on his knees, closed his eyes, and sat in concentration for over an hour before giving up. At last he stood up, scuffed the chalk circle, and walked over to where Alec and the others were waiting.

“Anything?” asked Seregil.

“Just a headache.”

“Didn’t you sense anymagic?” Valerius asked impatiently.

“No, nothing that I recognize as such.”

“Could it be some form of necromancy?” Alec suggested.

Thero gave him an affronted look. “I’m well versed in the various arts, Alec, as you very well know. That sort of magic always leaves traces and marks. If there is any magic to this, it’s too clean for necromancy. Nysander’s friend Teleus would have been the man to talk to about this, but he was killed when the Plenimarans attacked the Oreska House. He was the best versed in killing magic of any of us.”

“What about his successor, Miya?” asked Valerius.

“I think her studies have taken her in another direction, but she has all of her master’s books. I’ll speak with her.”

As they stepped outside they were met by a group of Scavengers being overseen by a score of the City Watch.

“What are you doing?” the temple drysian exclaimed in alarm as two Scavengers shouldered past him.

“Vicegerent’s orders,” the bluecoat captain informed him, handing him a scroll with the prince’s seal of office dangling from it. “As of now, this part of the Ring is being sealed off. All the sick ones you have there must go back inside.”

Looking past him, Alec saw a wagon loaded with boards and rocks, no doubt to build the barrier.

“But you can’t just toss them in there!” the temple drysian cried. “What will become of them?”

“They’ll be under your care, won’t they?” said Valerius.

The man looked at him with horror. “You expect us to go in there?”

“The Maker’s servants go where the need is greatest. They are your charges and you will attend to them. You, Captain!” He turned to the man in charge of the bluecoats. “Give my priests time to gather all they need and see that the sick are moved gently to some sheltered place. I won’t have you doing murder in the prince’s name and if you do, he’ll hear about it from me, understand?”

“Of course, Brother Valerius!” the captain assured him, cowed as most were by the sheer force of the imposing drysian’s will and presence.

Leaving Valerius to oversee the transfer, Alec drew Thero aside. “So what do you think?”

“I think that if this is magic, then a quarantine isn’t going to solve the problem,” the wizard replied. He paused, frowning. “I wonder if we have this backward?”

“How so?” asked Alec.

“What if it isn’t what these raven folk take away? What if it’s what they leave behind that acts as some sort of telesm? If so, then you may have put yourself in danger, buying that stone the other day. The boy who bought it has already been struck down.”

“May have?” Alec asked, suddenly uneasy. He’d had bad experiences in the past with strange magics.

“It’s just a theory. Do you have it?”

Alec took it from his purse and handed it to the wizard.

“If that’s the case, though, then now you’re in danger, aren’t you?” asked Seregil.

“I can seal it up so that it can’t be used by anyone from a distance.”

“The little girl we found in the temple had only been given a sweetmeat,” Alec pointed out. “And she ate it, so there was nothing left to work magic through.”

“What you eat becomes a part of you, doesn’t it?”

“Just how certain are you that sealing the stone away will work?” asked Alec.

Thero shrugged. “Reasonably certain.” Then, lowering his voice, “Can you find your way into the quarantined areas and look for more of these raven folk of yours tonight? I really need some item from them.”

“We’re hosting Archduchess Alaya, Princess Elani, and her mother at the Golden Crane, to see the new tragedy. Reltheus and his wife are coming, as well. By the time we get out of that, the ravens will probably have gone to nest. But tomorrow we’ll look into it.”

“Ah, I see. Then would you mind if I accompanied you to the theater?” Thero asked, surprising them both.

“You wantto go?” asked Seregil.

“I’d like to have a closer look at Reltheus, and also reestablish my acquaintance with the princess royal. I can discreetly ascertain whether magic is being worked on her by any conspirators, as well. This would be the most innocuous way to do it, given that I’m known to be your friend.” He paused and raised an eyebrow at them. “And perhaps you’ll stop hounding me about it, too.”