“You have two minutes,” said the voice from the other end of the room, “starting… now.”
Daud turned as Sierra walked in. She was dressed in the red jacket of a guard captain. The distinctive white helmet of the Grand Guard was tucked under one arm, her long black hair braided into cornrows that vanished against her equally dark skin in the gloomy interior of the Royal Conservatory. In one hand she held a pocket fob, her thumb hovering over the watch’s crown.
“I knew the Guard was corrupt,” he said, “but I didn’t expect it to charge by the hour.”
“One minute, fifty-five seconds.”
Daud rubbed his chin, surprised for a moment to find the skin clean-shaven. “I’m looking for a group—a gang. Don’t know who they are but they might be identifiable by a tattoo.”
Sierra pulled a pencil from her jacket. She turned to the nearby shelf and tore out the blank front page of a book, scrawled something on it, and handed it over.
“Like this?”
Daud cast his eye over the page. Sierra had drawn asymbol on it—a hollow triangle and a cross. It was the same symbol he had seen tattooed onto the intruder’s chest back at Norcross’s castle.
“That’s it.”
Sierra nodded. “The Eyeless.”
“Never heard of them.”
Sierra pursed her lips. “They’re relatively quiet. Local to some parts of the Empire. Got stronger in Karnaca about a year ago. The Grand Guard got word from a couple of informants in the Butcher Brothers and the Howlers. Seems the Eyeless had appeared in their territory, but when challenged, they cleared out, set up somewhere in one of the outer districts. Didn’t bother them again. One minute fifteen seconds.”
Daud frowned. “And the other gangs just accepted that?”
“Accepted isn’t the right word. Tolerated, maybe. At least for now.”
“Interesting,” said Daud, and then he paused, considering.
“One minute.”
“Base of operations?”
“Unclear.”
“I need more than that.”
“The Howlers think the Eyeless have some kind of fortified facility, hidden in plain sight, but we haven’t been able to confirm that. The Grand Guard has been a little… preoccupied, lately.” Her eyes returned to the fob. “Forty seconds.”
“Leader?”
“Don’t know. Thirty-five seconds.”
“Numbers?”
“Small. We’ve counted a few dozen individuals, but it’s hard to tell. Could be a lot more. They’re bigger than theSly Eyes. Smaller than the Howlers. We haven’t crossed swords with them yet, so official reports are hazy at best.”
“Okay.”
“Ten seconds.” Sierra sighed and thumbed the crown on the fob watch. “Piece of advice. I’m not going to ask what you’re planning to do, but you’re on your own with this one. The Grand Guard has enough on its plate at the moment. You get yourself in trouble, you get yourself out of it. If you’re planning on taking out the Eyeless, you do that on your own. I can’t help you, and once I walk out of this building, you don’t see me again. Understand?”
Daud nodded. Sierra held his gaze for a moment, then left.
Daud leaned back against the bookcase and listened to her heavy-booted footsteps as they faded away. So, they were called the Eyeless. He still didn’t know what they wanted with the Knife, but that didn’t matter. The Twin-bladed Knife was here, in Karnaca.
He was one small step closer.
Daud waited in the shadows, counting time in his head to allow Sierra to exit the building, then he pushed off the bookcase and prepared to make his own departure.
That was when he heard the sound of a book falling. Daud stopped and looked over his shoulder, but the case against which he had been leaning had not been disturbed by his movement. As he examined the tomes, he heard more sounds—shuffling, like someone going through papers, then another thud as a second book was pulled off a shelf and tossed to the floor.
The sounds continued as Daud moved over to the atrium and peered down into the depths of the Royal Conservatory library. The noise echoed up from somewhere far below, and it was too loud for rats. Daud doubted it was the Grand Guard either—they may have had the place underlockdown, but Daud had seen no evidence that they were actually working inside the building.
No, someone else was here. And Daud wanted to find out who.
* * *
Daud made his way down to the lower floors of the Royal Conservatory, gliding silently across the polished floorboards as he followed the sounds of the mystery intruders. Away from the library atrium it was darker, the windows smaller, the moonlight dimmer.
The rooms on this level were less ornate, more functional, than the rest of the building, and consisted mostly of offices, storerooms, and workshops. Daud crept forward, the sounds growing in volume as he got closer. If he had been able to hear them up in the library, echoing through the cavernous space of the building, then the intruders must have been listening in to his conversation with Sierra. And if they were the Eyeless, they would report back to their leader. That they’d been at Norcross’s castle was a coincidence. That they were here, at the Royal Conservatory, was too much. They must have been following him.
Perfect. Now was the chance to grab one and extract the information he needed.
Daud turned a corner, his fists clenched, ready to confront the intruders. There was another thump as a heavy book hit the floor.
The room beyond was a large office, acres of carpet leading up to a huge desk in front of a wide bookcase. Stairs curved up around either side of the bookcase, leading up to another railed mezzanine. The desk was covered with papers, as was the floor around it, along with a good many books that had been pulled off the case.
Two women were searching for something. Their hair was shaved to the scalp, their skin pale, almost translucent, covered with a tracery of black veins. As one half-turned to deposit another book on the desk, Daud could see there were
