Spy's Honor

There was a spy at large in the Imperial Palace, probably a Sardossian shroud mage. Now Lucien understood the bizarre incident in Florian’s office. Augustan had tripped an enemy ward, yet his interrogation had come up clean. Important papers had gone missing that day. The event should have been followed up on, but then Rhianne had gone missing and all available resources had been allocated toward her recovery. An invisible spy must have entered the room at the same time as Augustan, triggering the ward so that the blame fell on the legatus. Then the spy had grabbed the papers. Clever bastard.

Lucien rose from his chair and shouldered his crutch. He limped into the sitting room. “Hiberus,” he called to his door guard. “Send me a warder right away. And get me on Florian’s schedule. I need to speak to him.”

* * *

The spy ship was late. Three nights in a row, Janto had made the long trek out to the seaside cliff and signaled the ship, only to stare into the darkness and wait for a return signal that never came. He had, unknowingly, sent the ship on its relay mission just as the Kjallan fleet had been returning from Mosar. His ship might have sailed into that fleet and been destroyed. There was no way he could know its fate for certain at this point. But with the intelligence he possessed about the planned attack on Sardos, he could stand around and wait no longer. Somehow he had to get out of Kjall.

In the harbor, the Meritorious, bound for Mosar, rode at double anchor. One of its boats was at the dock, half loaded with casks labeled BEEF. Janto liked the look of that boat. He could more easily hide himself amidst cargo than among men, since cargo didn’t notice when you bumped it.

Lots of guards, he commented to Sashi, who rode atop his shoulder.

Sashi’s hackles rose. Kill them?

No. Too many. Janto felt the ferret’s disappointment through the link and smiled.

Increased security at the docks was one of the side effects of Rhianne’s disappearance. Some of the guards weren’t in uniform and milled about in the crowd. With their erect, soldierlike posture, they were laughably easy to spot. The others were in uniform, and they stood before every boat tied to the docks, including the one Janto meant to sneak onto.

He needed a diversion to get past them. Something simple.

Shrouded, he trod along the wooden planking, dodging individual sailors and looking for a suitable group of three or more men. He would shove one of them while no one was looking, and masculine pride ought to take care of the rest. He spotted a likely-looking quartet on a spur just across from the Meritorious’s boat.

Just as he stepped forward to reach them, fireworks crackled in his ear, and he froze in terror. Fingers of orange and green lightning twined their way up from the ground, all around him. Gods! He’d tripped an invisibility ward.

He broke into a run. Men shouted and ran toward the ward, converging on his position. They couldn’t see him, but they knew where he’d been a moment ago. He wanted to turn and make his path unpredictable, but the dock was straight with only a few spurs angling off it, none of which led anywhere but into the water.

He shivered in horror. He was pounding toward a dead end! He could go into the water, but he could not swim invisibly. His best chance was to turn around and go back the way he’d come—toward the guards.

He turned and ran back, ducking his shoulder as he dodged between the first pair of guards. His boots slipped on wooden planks he hadn’t recalled being wet. Up ahead, a guard flung a bucket of seawater across the docks.

His stomach tightened with dread.

Something cold and wet struck him. He looked in the direction it had come from and saw an empty bucket in a guard’s hands.

“There he is!” someone cried.

He extended his shroud, taking into it the water droplets that covered his body. But the ones that streamed off him could not be hidden. Another bucket of water hit him.

Someone collided with him from the side. He flew through the air and landed on the hard planks, wincing at a sharp pain in his knee. Sashi screamed as he was thrown clear. Janto tried to get up, but a heavy weight fell atop him, and another.

Run, Sashi, he commanded.

The ferret wriggled through a gap in the wooden planks and splashed into the water.

“We’ve got him! We’ve got him!” his captors were yelling.

Janto struggled, but the guards held him fast. His hold on the Rift and his shroud slackened, and he grasped at it mentally. Sashi?

If I go any farther I’ll break the link, the ferret reported.

Through the link he sensed fear and exhaustion. Are you still in the ocean?

Yes.

Break the link, he ordered. Get to dry land.

Getting Sashi free was the best he could do—Janto was finished. He tucked his chin, scooping his necklace of glass beads into his mouth. He bit hard on one of the beads, cracking it open. Bitter liquid seeped onto his tongue. He gagged at the taste but forced himself to swallow.

He felt Sashi leave his range. He lost the link and the shroud and popped into visibility. The guards holding him down shouted in surprise.

“Hey!” A guard tore the beads off his neck and examined the one he’d bitten. “I think he took poison.”

Another guard stood up and yelled. “We need a Healer here, right away!”

Janto’s throat tightened. His vision narrowed around the edges and faded. Then he let go.

25

Janto woke disoriented. He swallowed with difficulty, finding his tongue thick and his throat swollen. He opened his eyes and for a moment wasn’t sure he had opened them, since he saw only darkness, but as he shifted on his hard pallet, he located a broad rectangle of faint light halfway up the wall. Bars slashed across the rectangle. Prison bars? He tried to rise, but he was too weak. Also, something impeded his movement. Something heavy on his wrist.

A manacle.

Memories of the dock flashed through his head. His desperate run, the buckets of water they’d thrown at him, the poison he’d taken. How was it he still lived?

They’d called for a Healer.

He reached for the link to his familiar and, in a rush of relief, found it open and available. Sashi?

You’re awake! the ferret crowed.

Where are you? How long have I been out?

Days, said Sashi. I’m in the hypocaust.

Janto could sense his ferret’s position relative to him, now that more of his mind was awakening. You’re not below me. You’re beside me. Not in the same room, though. There was some distance.

You’re in the prison, below ground, said Sashi. The hypocaust doesn’t go beneath the prison but runs alongside it. I’m as close to you as I can get.

I see. He was in the palace prison. This was extraordinarily bad news. They would have saved his life only in order to interrogate and torture him before staking him. He’d swallowed the poison to avoid such a fate.

They’re going to kill me, he told Sashi. You should get to a safe place—to the woods. His death would not kill Sashi, but it would extinguish the fragment of his soul embedded within his familiar. Sashi would become an ordinary ferret.

You are mine and I am yours, su-kali, said Sashi. I am with you until