Amaranthe plucked a brown leaf off a plant and dropped it so it would fall through the space between the statues. An orange ray shot from each lizard’s eyes, met in the middle, and incinerated the leaf. Tiny ashes wafted to the carpet.
“Magical protection,” she murmured. “Check.”
She crawled under the lizards and watched for more traps as she moved into the suite. The collection of spacious rooms took up hundreds of square feet. There was a private water closet, an elegant bath, a sitting room, and a book-filled office with two desks. Someone had started fires in each of the three hearths in preparation for the couple’s return-someone who might come in at any time to stir the logs.
Amaranthe veered toward the office, avoiding suspicious variations in the carpet and wall ornamentations on the way. She assumed the pink stationary identified Larocka’s desk and checked that one first. A drawer held correspondences, but none mentioned anything except legitimate business matters. She found no papers that demonstrated a tie to the Forge organization and certainly nothing as incriminating as a to-do list with “assassinate emperor” at the top.
The handwriting of those notes and letters did look familiar though. Amaranthe gripped the edge of the desk as her mind caught up to her instincts and she identified it. It was the handwriting from the Forge note she had seen in Hollowcrest’s office. Larocka had penned that message.
Amaranthe chewed on her lip and released her grip. While it was good to know she was on the right track, she hadn’t actually learned anything new. She grabbed one of Larocka’s discards from the waste bin and pocketed it; later, she might need to emulate that writing to send a note to Hollowcrest.
A couple steps took her to Arbitan’s workspace. The desk was immaculate. No loose papers littered the top, a wood caddy restrained pens, and, when she peered in a drawer, rows of alphabetized files peered back. She sifted through a couple folders, enough to learn Arbitan was a Turgonian entrepreneur who owned hundreds of acres of orchards around the capital, but she did not have time to poke into every file in every drawer. She feared she had already been gone too long.
Amaranthe glowered. As if the couple had anticipated a search, they had left nothing suspicious anywhere. She drummed her fingers on Arbitan’s desk. Criminals always made mistakes. There had to be something. She moved to the built-in bookcases. Maybe a secret compartment hid behind the tomes on business and economics. She prodded and pulled at various books. The titles of some were in languages she did not recognize. At least one of the two had an ecumenical education.
After poking at most of the books, she gave up. Reluctant to return with nothing, she went back to Arbitan’s desk and pulled open the drawers and read the file labels more closely. One near the back of the bottom drawer snagged her attention.
Newspaper Clippings.
She stuck her finger in the folder to mark the place and withdrew an article trimmed from the Gazette. Bear Slays Homeless Man in SoDoc.
It was the paper’s first story about the deadly mystery creature.
Amaranthe poked through the rest of the clippings. They all contained stories about the murders, all in sequential order by date. None were missing. There were even a few from a smaller newspaper that usually focused on business.
She returned the articles to their positions in the folder. Why was Arbitan keeping the clippings? For a moment, she wondered if he might be the wizard who warded the house-and created deadly magical creatures-but she snorted in dismissal. Surely becoming a powerful wizard was a full-time, lifelong pursuit, not something one did between pruning, harvesting, and selling apples. Running orchards wasn’t even the type of business that would take one out of the empire where one could stumble across foreign instructors. She closed the drawer. Maybe Arbitan was just interested in mysteries.
A clock on a shelf chimed. Amaranthe cursed. She had been gone over an hour.
Avoiding the known and suspected traps, she hustled out of the room. She forced herself not to leap down the flights of stairs in her rush to return to the anonymity of the fights. She crossed no servants this time and had almost made it to the foyer when footsteps sounded on the stairs leading from the basement.
Amaranthe darted into the water closet and pressed her ear to the door. Muffled voices started up in the foyer, both male and female, though she could not understand the words. She waited for the speakers to wander out of range, but they stopped moving. The voices continued.
Back against the door, Amaranthe stared around the small room, seeking inspiration. A single candle burned on top of the cistern on the opposite wall. A few feet below it, the wash-out squatted, its ceramic bowl embossed with flowers. The room was a perfectly functional place to pee and a perfectly useless place for plotting an escape.
At least she was in a less condemning place than she had been for the last hour. With no better alternative, Amaranthe pushed open the door and stepped out, abandoning her attempts at stealth.
“…don’t know,” came Maldynado’s voice, now distinguishable. “She said the blood was making her sick.”
Emperor’s warts, he was trying to explain her absence. She shut the water closet door loudly, to ensure it would be heard. Going along with his story, she dropped a hand onto her stomach and hunched over. She shuffled forward, sculpting her face into an expression of discomfort.
“A shame,” responded a cool masculine voice. “One expects a stronger stomach from an imperial woman. We are a nation born of warriors after all.”
Amaranthe recognized the voice at the same time as she entered the foyer. Arbitan and Larocka were facing Maldynado at the top of the basement stairs. The scarred security man also stood in the room, muscled arms folded across his chest. Though pale beneath the light of the chandelier, Maldynado portrayed little of the nervousness that had to lurk in his thoughts.
Amaranthe wiped the alarm off her face as the Forge folks turned toward her.
“Now, now,” Larocka said, “there’s no need to be snide, dear. Some women are more interested in numbers than war.” She smiled at Amaranthe, who could not tell if genuine warmth backed the gesture. Doubtful.
“I’m sorry to have been gone so long,” Amaranthe said in a raspy voice she hoped connoted illness.
“Apology accepted, my dear.” The pleasure Maldynado exuded at her approach seemed unfeigned.
That security man regarded her with narrowed-eyed suspicion again. Maybe that was his usual expression. Either way, it did not inspire one to linger. A wild part of Amaranthe wanted to stay and stir up a conversation with the couple, see what she could learn about them, but she had already drawn far more attention than was safe. Also, she suspected Arbitan might learn more about her than she did about him.
“We must be going, dear,” she said to Maldynado.
“I was saying just the same thing,” he said, “a half hour ago. Women-what they do in the water closet for so long is beyond me.” He tossed an aggrieved brotherhood-of-men look at Arbitan, who did not acknowledge it with anything more than a chilly stare.
Amaranthe stepped on Maldynado’s foot as she sidled out the door. He winced but managed a goodnight for the hosts as he backed out.
“Do come again,” Larocka said.
The door thudded shut. Outside, the lanterns burning along the walkway allowed Amaranthe to read the incredulous expression Maldynado fixed on her as they walked.
“Where were you for that long?” he asked.
“Exploring,” Amaranthe said. “You could have left without me.”
“Hah! You need a keeper to watch over you.” He paused, face twisting with displeasure. “I sound like my mother.”
“Careful, you may turn into a responsible fellow.”
“Never!” His ferocity startled her. He cleared his throat. “No responsibility for old Maldynado,” he added in a lighter tone.
They turned off the walkway and onto the wide street. Stars glittered in the clear night sky, and their breaths fogged the air. Infrequent streetlights burned, more like beacons to guide one from point to point than lamps illuminating the darkness. Hedges, thick and dense despite a lack of leaves, lined one side of the street.
“I can see working for you is going to be an adventure,” Maldynado said.
Movement stirred branches ahead of them.
“Looks like we’re in for one now,” Amaranthe said.
