As Tesara had said, the room had nothing of their father’s comfortable study about it. There were just walls of bookcases, all locked. No doubt Trune held the keys on him, but no matter. She took a tiny screwdriver out of her pocket and set to work. It didn’t take long to undo the hinges and set the door aside. Holding up the lamp, she perused the files. There were thousands, she suspected, all Guild records. She rifled through to make sure. They were just records, though. There was nothing special that she could see. Fees, taxes, dues, enrollment, cargo. All honest and above board.
If I had secret files, where would I put them?
She looked at the desk. It was a magnificent piece, dark mahogany, burnished to a gleaming shine. There were no drawers, though. Yvienne continued to scan the room, stamping on the carpet to detect a hollow space, going back to the cabinets to see if there was anything she had missed.
Running out of time, girl. Damnation, she thought, and leaned against the desk, fighting off despair. Her boot heel clunked against the side. Yvienne stopped, cocked her head, and clunked again. There it was – the faintest of rattles.
It was clever, a thin panel that slid out from the inner side of the desk, ingeniously released with a push of a spring-loaded catch. The narrow drawer held several files that were old, shabby, and stained. She ran her fingers through the files, and cursed under her breath. Among Trune’s other villainies, the man did not alphabetize. She rifled through the tabs again. This time the notations were tantalizingly familiar – El. Mert. 73, for instance. Or Sola. 55. Fort. a, 97, Fort. b, 97. MC, 97.
Ships. These were ships, and the dates they were lost at sea. Elizavetta Mertado, lost in ’73. The Soliano, in ’55. The Mederos ships, the Fortune, Fortitude, and the Main Chance, lost in ’97. Six years ago.
A small discreet chime from the mantel clock caught her attention. She had been at her work for only ten minutes. She had perhaps five minutes more before Trune and his guests would wonder where the next course was. She laid out the papers on the desk and set the lantern beside them to read them.
There it all was: the records of the Mederos shipping fleet, including their last fated journey. But instead of a date of the sinking taken from the single survivor, there was a careful listing of sales invoices for the cargo, with meticulously recorded dates from weeks and even months after the date of the wreck. Every last crate of hardware and bolt of cotton, every bit of tea and coffee and sugar and lumber, all of it divvied up into careful shares into Guild hands, all receivers carefully noted and identified. The cargo had been diverted, a willing sailor bribed or coerced into telling a tall tale of a violent storm and a tragic shipwreck.
“The bastards,” she said out loud. She stuffed the pages into her bag. They had acted with complete impunity, too. Even if any merchants suspected, they could do nothing, for it would only ensure that their ships would be next. And not only that – it might be that they could be assured of a share in the next “sinking.” The Elizavetta Mertado was lost ten years before Yvienne was born, but she knew the ship. Like all the ships, her name and the name of her House were inscribed on the Cathedral’s wall. Elizavetta Mertado. House Lupiere.
Perhaps that explained the punishment doled out to House Mederos. Had her parents refused to be complicit? A little voice inside her head wondered if that was because they hadn’t been given a chance.
It doesn’t matter, she thought grimly, as she tied the strings of her now bulging satchel. It was up to her to avenge her family and bring down Trune and his cronies. One good thing, she thought. Tesara can stop worrying that she had done something to sink the fleet.
She rifled through the rest of the files in the drawer. So much evidence, she thought. It was a crying shame to leave it all to be destroyed by the Guild. But she had the crux of the matter at hand, and it would have to suffice.
A noise caught her attention. Voices, rising with anger and alarm. Discovery was at hand, and her sister was helpless in a nest of very bad men.
Because if she had not sunk the fleet, it meant she didn’t have powers after all.
Chapter Sixty-Four
Yvienne, where are you?
The charge continued to build in Tesara’s fingers. Compounded by her fear and anger, she felt it rising in her and almost had to keep blinking against a light that kept going on and off inside her head.
Let it out. She did, making a surreptitious little gesture while she stood by the sideboard, stacking plates ostensibly to be sent down with the dumbwaiter, whenever it came back to the dining room. On command, a gust of wind tinkled through the crystal drops like a rain of glass. The candlelight in the chandelier above the dining table flickered, and several candles blew out.
“What the devil!” Lupiere exclaimed.
She heard heavy running footsteps, and the thuggish coachman burst into the dining room. He looked over at Trune. “We’ve got trouble.”
Trune grew very still, then, with excruciating
