She shuddered. Unbidden, her imagination filled the blank spaces between the previous day’s not-a-dark-workshop and the Immersion Chamber.
Keeper Lijjen had bugged and sent her into the Refugee Territories, then contradicted his own orders under duress and demanded the Missionaries return to Sumad Reach. What could force Lijjen, of all people, to relent? She was gaining certainty that something linked the Immersion Chamber massacre to her miserable trudge about the Sumadan Wastes. But what?
Had Lijjen learned that the four renegades weren’t infected, or about the Immersion Chamber? He wouldn’t shy from slipping beyond the rules. Indeed, she and Holder Moorcam hadn’t shied from the prospect of killing the four renegades—the Immersion Chamber’s only surviving witnesses. They’d believed the renegades were infected. But what would they have decided had they known the renegades were uninfected?
She didn’t like to dwell on that. She didn’t have an answer that Moorcam would like.
The guard at MarverWall’s gate raised an eyebrow at her approach. She must have looked unusual to him, her clothes in better condition than most refugees and of a different cut.
“My name is Terese Saarg,” she said. “I believe there’s a message for me?”
The guard’s eyebrow rose further, likely at her Armen accent. “You’ll be wanting the guest rooms, lass. Other side of the farm from here.”
‘Lass’? He looked the same age as her!
He shook his head when she offered a pendant filled with vibrations as entry fee. “Taken care of, lass.”
She carried her boots with her, for it seemed folk living at this Wall preferred clean feet treading their thinly-carpeted corridors. There were five guest rooms at the back, four of which were unoccupied, their doors standing open. She knocked on the fifth, closed door.
“Enter,” called a male Cenephan voice.
A bearded, heavyset man in his late fifties or early sixties sat cross-legged on a thin mattress. Alone in the room, it looked like he was simply sitting still.
“Head Saarg of Sumad Reach and Armer Stone,” she said.
The man smiled at her name. “I’m Patzer,” he said, rising and extending a hand.
She shook his thickly callused palms. “I wasn’t told everything, Mr…”
“Just Patzer,” he said, not releasing her hand. “Delighted to meet you, Head. Your Keeper Lijjen spoke highly of you.” He released her.
An attempt at politeness, or evidence Patzer hadn’t spoken to Lijjen recently? Then it dawned on her: a Cenephan would only speak with a Seeker for one reason.
She almost groaned aloud. “You’re a bounty hunter.” No, she didn’t need his confirmation. The thick body, strong grip and wild glint in his eye.
Gods, Lijjen wanted her commanded by a bounty hunter? She’d never heard of such an outrage!
Royal and Seeker technology, however sophisticated, lacked instinct and local knowledge. So, Seekers sometimes employed bounty hunters to root out suspected infected.
Another humiliation, another convention upended.
What kept her rage from boiling over was the realization someone above Keeper Lijjen had decreed she would work with Patzer. It wouldn’t have been Sumad Reach’s commander, the Holder Mathra. She knew enough of her host chapterhouse’s inner workings to know Mathra and Lijjen had a good working relationship. It was likely Mathra who had approved Lijjen’s treatment of her.
A small voice in the back of her head suggested Patzer might be more than just a bounty hunter.
“Right, lass,” said Patzer. “Bounties. You have infected that need finding.”
After three months, she was back to hunting the renegades, with no warning. Was there some emergency? She wouldn’t ask though; she’d let him lead.
He bent to pick up a bag at the door, already fully packed. Had he been sitting there, waiting for her all this time? For how many days?
Patzer gestured back the way she’d come, toward MarverWall’s entry, and they strode down the corridor. The obvious question would have been ‘What is our mission?’ or ‘Where are we going?’
“How long have you worked with Sumad Reach?”
His smile didn’t reach his eyes. “A few years, now. We’ve solved many problems together. Yes, Patzer, many problems.”
That last sentence he’d spoken had sounded different from those before. More calm and authoritative.
“So, you’ve had infected problems?” Patzer asked.
Did he know the renegades weren’t infected? She wanted to tell him they were both better-off renting those guest rooms here at MarverWall for four weeks, then returning to Sumad Reach, faking exhaustion. But Patzer’s employers, whoever they were, wanted answers to questions greater than the renegades’ location.
“They thrashed us, then went to ground,” she said. “And they’re too smart to poke their heads out.”
“It’s my turn, then,” he said. “I’ll find them for you. Yes, Patzer, you shall.”
They passed through the MarverWall gate, nodding to the guard and pushing into the middling heat. Perhaps one hundred feet from MarverWall, Patzer came to the point.
“So, Head Saarg,” he said, keeping a brisk pace, “tell me of your friends.”
“Infected renegades,” she said, “come to Sumad after surviving a dark golem massacre. They were common city guards, but unusually good at it.” Not a waking hour passed without a silent lament that she’d ever heard their names. “Domnic Dantet, Repaan Lethrien, Zalaran Morgenheth, Cestin Rortiin.”
Patzer slowly repeated their names, as though tasting them with his tongue.
“And what leverage can you supply me with, Saarg? Who were they closest to back home?”
What a stupid question. Did the man intend on threatening innocents on the other side of the world?
“We monitored and interviewed their surviving relatives before we came,” she said, gauging the odd man. “There’s no one. Their nuclear families are broken or dead. And each of them had a hand in that. And none of them were close to their extended families. No surviving girlfriends – or boyfriends, for that matter. Normally we’d monitor the families’ mail, but it didn’t take long to realize that was pointless. They’re ghosts, Patzer.”
His face formed a frown before the shadow of a
