The Mask of Mirrors by M. Carrick; (lightest ebook reader txt) 📗

“Gammer Lindworm? Or that inscriptor of his. But Indestor must want it for some other purpose.” Something magical, if that pattern spoke true. “What would happen if you drew a numinat with ash?”

Vargo fell silent, contemplating her question. She watched the minute twitches of his jaw and lips. He talks to himself sometimes, Sedge had said.

“Nothing, I think,” he finally replied. “The powder form is inert unless ingested. I could try… but I’d rather not.”

“Don’t.” It came out more vehemently than she intended.

Vargo scooped Peabody up and tucked him under his collar. “Don’t worry, Renata. I’m not the sort to take unnecessary risks.”

That fleeting touch of familiarity, Vargo using her unadorned name, stayed with Ren as she left his townhouse and went to share what she’d learned with Tanaquis. She couldn’t tell whether it was deliberate, or so accidental he hadn’t even noticed the slip.

It’s Vargo. I don’t think he blinks accidentally.

But that didn’t stop her from thinking about it all the way to Whitesail.

Tanaquis’s frown was enough to drive such thoughts from her mind. “You said nothing about seeing the Depths in your nightmare.”

“I know, and I can’t apologize enough.” Renata twisted her fingers around each other. “That portion… I was searching for my true father. But I didn’t feel I could say that, even in a private report. I should have, I know—but all I can do now is share what I held back. I assure you, that is everything.” Another lie, but if she needed to tell Tanaquis anything else—like what she’d felt in the Charterhouse with the statues—she could always claim she’d learned it from the pattern cards.

The astrologer had her write down her account, which Renata dutifully did, making sure to work Ondrakja into it. Then she gritted her teeth, squared her shoulders, and went to the Aerie.

She didn’t expect Captain Serrado to be standing quite so close when he opened the door to his office. Nor did he, in only shirtsleeves and a waistcoat, seem to be expecting visitors. “Alta Renata,” he said, surprised. “Can I help you?”

“I need to report something,” she said. “Concerning your investigation with the sleepless children.”

His head jerked back, surprise deepening. “And you came here? You could have summoned me to your house.”

The thought hadn’t even crossed her mind, and she cursed inwardly.

Serrado backed up a half step. “Please, come in. I apologize for the cramped conditions.”

She soon realized why he’d been pressed so close. If it weren’t for the window, she would have suspected his “office” was a repurposed broom closet. A stack of ledgers behind the door prevented it from opening all the way, and more occupied the seat of the one visitor’s chair. When Serrado made an abortive move toward them, she said, “Don’t trouble yourself; I can stand. I went looking for that old woman—the one we spoke of before.”

He stilled. “You went wandering around the Lower Bank?”

At this rate Alta Renata was going to get a reputation for being mad, but… “No, I went wandering around the place you call the Depths.”

A pile of papers cascaded to the floor.

Save for that one twitch, he stood utterly still as she gave her account for a third time. When she was done, he planted his fists on his desk and struggled against what she suspected was language inappropriate for an alta to hear. He should have heard Vargo earlier. “You said Vargo’s man knows the way?”

“Yes, although his wrist is broken.” Not that it would stop Sedge.

“I’ll assemble my people.” Yanking his patrol coat off a hook, Serrado shrugged it on. “If he’s well enough—and Vargo allows it—he can show us the way. If not…” He eyed her surcoat, fern green in honor of the spring and embroidered with a motif of silver reeds and herons. “Perhaps you could draw me a map.”

“We left chalk marks on the walls, and if all else fails, just go directly toward your sense of dread,” she said darkly. “But, Captain… if the old woman truly can slip into what you call Ažerais’s Dream, how can you possibly catch her?”

That stopped him short. Deflated, he leaned against his desk and rubbed his eyes. He looked like he’d barely slept more than she had after the Night of Hells.

“That’s an annoyingly logical point. The elders might know a way. Or Szorsa Mevieny.” He shook his head, sighing. “With the floods coming, the main thing is to ensure she can’t use that place to trap any more victims, rather than wait and hope we can catch her.”

He shifted, and Renata realized he couldn’t leave with her blocking the way. As she started to open the door, though, he caught its edge and eased it shut again. “Alta,” he said, his voice too soft to be heard in the corridor. “You should know… back when I was first investigating Gammer Lindworm—Ondrakja—I found that someone had torn her arrest record out of the ledger. Like they wanted to hide that she’d ever been here. Not many people have access to our archives. It could have been one of my fellow officers…”

“But you don’t think it was,” she murmured.

His eyes were bleak. “I reported what you told me about the old woman you saw, and her claim that she’d poisoned everyone. Eret Indestor accepted the theory a little too readily for a man who shouldn’t have had any idea who she was.”

Her heart thumped so loudly, Serrado could probably hear it. She’d told neither Serrado nor Tanaquis what Ondrakja said in the nightmare about making Indestor pay. That was the kind of accusation that could end with her in a hangman’s noose if she didn’t have evidence to back it up. But now she had a hawk—someone under Caerulet’s authority—all but accusing his superior.

A Vraszenian hawk. Who couldn’t possibly have failed to notice Indestor’s hatred for his people.

She almost let slip a wildly inappropriate giggle. For a brief instant, an impossible image danced through her mind: Derossi Vargo, master of the Spiders, and Grey Serrado,