Poison Tree

Cori had known that, too, Sarik thought as Jeht pulled his brother close and leaned his chin on the four-year-old’s head, hiding his fear from Quean but unable to hide it from the rest of the world.

CHAPTER 21

MAYBE IT WAS childish, but the moment Christian had answered Sahara’s private phone, Alysia had lost all desire to speak to him. She would wait until they were standing face to face, so she could see his expression and try to understand anything going through his crazy brain.

From the moment they had met, they had clicked. Despite completely di erent backgrounds and goals, they had always worked well together. Together they had decided to do what no one else had done: join all three guilds and say “screw you” to the rules. It was all about the challenge—it was always about the challenge.

It had been for Alysia, anyway, until the day she had joined SingleEarth, and for the rst time, the challenge had been paired with something else: expectations. Responsibility, not just for one moment and one contract, but for people, day after day, who knew her name and smiled at her in the hallway and relied on her to do her job. Her rst two-weeks’ paycheck was worth less than she would have charged for two hours’ work in Bruja, but something about that stupid check, and the way it said her last name on the top—her real last name, the one she’d gotten from her father, which not even Christian knew—

convinced her to stay not just two weeks, but two years.

Fish gotta swim, birds gotta y, but what about someone who is a little bit of both?

Where did she want to go now? Back to the Crimson safe house, which was apparently the only place she could stay unless she wanted to crash like a fth wheel with Christian and

Sahara and the kids? Back to SingleEarth, so she could explain why they had been shot at and where Sarik had gone?

A temporary solution was suggested to her as her phone chirped, alerting her to a text message: The contract against you was just dropped at Frost.

That was vaguely unsettling, as the only person who should have had that cell number was Ravyn, but Ravyn wouldn’t have known anything about what contracts were or were not up in Frost. Alysia would have suspected that the information came from Christian if she hadn’t had recent evidence that he had been sleeping at Onyx just before the message arrived.

Trap? she wondered.

Possibly, but she had to risk it.

Besides, Frost called to her. It had been hers before she had met Christian.

Each of the Bruja halls had its own style. Onyx had its converted theater, Crimson had its farm, and the Bruja guild hall, which was mostly only used for events like the competition for guild leadership, was a redbrick house with white shutters. The Frost guild hall was in the middle of a quaint suburban neighborhood; it consisted of four middle-class homes connected by underground tunnels. Frost had been known to call the local police on guild members who were stupid enough to look out of place as they approached.

The key to the front door was still hidden in a planter, but the elaborate computer setup that had occupied the “o ce” on the rst oor had been replaced by a home theater that would surely have been the envy of the neighborhood even if the screen hadn’t been an interactive whiteboard—a touch-sensitive computer screen, like a giant tablet. When Alysia touched the screen, it flickered to life and showed all of Frost’s current job listings.

Nice upgrade, she thought as she quickly con rmed that the contract against her was gone. Nearby, she spotted a digital pen. On the o chance that the operator was currently logged on, she wrote on the screen, Did current leader instal the new tech? If Christian had done this, she would have to reassess his competency as Frost’s leader.

She waited, wondering if the board operator would reply.

The individual responsible for controlling the board was an utter enigma. No one knew who he or she was. The system itself probably wasn’t actual y hacker-proof—nothing really was—but no one ever discouraged members from blatantly trying to mess with it, and yet to Alysia’s knowledge no one had ever broken in. She was one of many who had tried with no success.

Alysia had almost decided the operator wasn’t attending the board when a picture spun into place: a kitten, tangled in computer wires, with a caption saying WHICH ONE

CONTROLS THE INTERTUBES? Beneath it, words began to appear as they were swiftly typed elsewhere. fearless leader bolted the door for three hrs so he could figure how to use the new system.

Alysia snickered. That was sad. Predictable, but sad. you looking for a job? the operator asked.

Yeah. Something nOOb-level.

She needed to start small, because she was out of shape and out of practice, and it would take her a while to catch up enough electronically that she could take on one of the more exciting jobs in that realm. Two years was a very long time in the computer world; she had kept up with reading and research while at SingleEarth, but that wasn’t the same as knowing all the ins and outs and back doors of modern technology. She would also have to make new contacts for obtaining documents, since she didn’t have access to SingleEarth’s specialists, who for altruistic reasons made identi cation papers, passports, and the like for needy individuals. this one looks relevant to your interests.

A new listing rose to the top.

Retrieval: Heirloom painting and frame with ritual and sentimental value. Reward o ered higher than assessed value of materials. 5,000, method of payment negotiable.

“Ritual value” implied that the work was in some way imbued with magic. Including information about the assessment value was the client’s way of ensuring that the mercenary who picked the painting up didn’t try to sell it for parts, which for magic items could include anything from enchanted charcoal bits to diamonds and platinum. The reward was ridiculously low for a ritual item, which meant Alysia would de nitely have a third party assess it before she turned it in, but its value could be more on the sentimental side. A low reward like that normally suggested an easy job, too, which she hoped would be within her current abilities.

Intrigued, she kept reading.

Last seen in possession of Maya. Previous owner Kral kuloka Kral. Painting lost in a bet six years ago.

That could explain why the board’s operator had thought Alysia would be interested.

Accepting the job might be suicidal, though, unless the painting was somewhere Maya wasn’t guarding.

Alysia reached to tap the Client button but found little in the way of useful information.

Client: Anonymous, paid escrow. That meant he or she probably wasn’t well known by the guild but had already put five thousand cash into an account as a deposit.

Mostly for curiosity’s sake, she tapped the button for more information, including a description of the piece:

10 ? 10 inches, abstract painting, with detail in silver and gold thread. Frame is dark wood with silver details and black and red stones. Difficult for most individuals to look at directly.

Well, that was interesting.

Has guild leader seen this? she wrote, using the digital pen. It was doubtful that Christian had bothered to read such a low-level post, but if he had, he might have noticed the same thing Alysia had: this painting wasn’t with Maya. In fact, Alysia had seen it, recently, in

Kral’s little torture chamber. has not returned to frost hal since posting, the