I nodded. They would have been rather hard to miss, after all.
‘Aye,’ I said. ‘And I know the magicians and their supporters are fighting back. Their Guard of the Magi have had more than one scuffle with the City Guard, and some of the riots are turning into pitched battles between supporters of the two houses.’
Sasura shrugged. ‘Such is the nature of mobs,’ he said. ‘It is sad, but the human animal is essentially tribal. Those who support the magicians and the university find themselves at odds with the common folk who support the house of law. It is to be expected.’
‘Someone bombed my inn yesterday morning,’ I said.
He startled at that, and I could tell that was something he hadn’t known. Of course the accusations against the house of magicians were almost certainly horseshit, I knew that, and that wasn’t why I was there at all. We had started those rumours ourselves, for Our Lady’s sake, for all that that didn’t mean they hadn’t bombed my inn in retaliation. That wasn’t what I was interested in.
‘By the Many-Headed God!’ he swore. ‘Was anyone hurt?’
‘No, thank Our Lady,’ I replied, ‘but I think it was only a warning, this time. Do you think the magicians would have done that?’
‘There have been lynchings,’ he repeated idly, sipping his brandy as he spoke, ‘but I doubt they would resort to random acts of public terrorism in retribution. They have no reason to target you in particular, a simple businessman from Ellinburg, now have they?’
His eyebrow raised slightly when he said it, and I felt a lead weight begin to form in my stomach. Sasura was a very shrewd man, as I have written, which was a big part of why I liked him so much. Ailsa was adamant her parents had no idea what she did, and therefore by extension no idea what I did, but I was truly beginning to doubt that. I swallowed my brandy and looked at my father-by-law with a new respect, and I began to wonder if once again we were working our way around the edges of something here.
‘It would seem unlikely on the surface of it, I agree,’ I said.
‘It would,’ he replied, and reached for the brandy.
He refilled my glass, emptying the bottle, then stood and turned away to get a fresh one from the cupboard. That way his back was almost completely turned to me when he spoke.
‘Tomas,’ he said quietly. ‘If I say two words to you now, all I need you to do is to say whether you know what I mean or not. If not, we will never speak of this again, is that agreed?’
‘Aye, Sasura,’ I said, frowning at his back. ‘That’s clear enough. Say your words.’
‘Mother Ruin,’ he almost whispered.
I choked on my brandy, and I suppose that told him all he needed to know.
‘Yes,’ I said, once I had my breath.
He took his time opening the new brandy bottle and filling his glass. At length he turned to face me, and he gave me a grave look.
‘So Ailsa gave you the Queen’s Warrant, then,’ he said. ‘I had suspected it, but I couldn’t know for sure. I still remember when Sabine gave me mine.’
I looked back at him, and felt my hands trying to shake. Of all the ways I had seen this afternoon going, this had never been one of them. My sasura had been a Queen’s Man? He couldn’t have been. He wasn’t now, that was for certain, or Ailsa and me would both have known of it.
‘I don’t understand,’ I said, after a long pause that probably made me look something of a fool.
‘Sabine,’ he said. ‘You’ve met her, yes?’
‘Aye,’ I said carefully, completely unsure how to proceed with this unexpected conversation.
‘What I tell you now, I have to ask you on your honour and our family ties that this stays utterly between you and me. My daughter can never know of this, or may the Many-Headed God forbid, my wife.’
‘I understand,’ I said. ‘On my honour, Sasura. On our family, I swear it.’
He looked at me for a long moment, then he nodded slowly and sat down again.
‘Sabine seduced me,’ he said. ‘Oh, long ago. Not so long after I moved my business from Alaria to Dannsburg, in fact. Before Ailsa was born. I was a very successful young smuggler whose ships ran the poppy winds, and the Queen’s Men wanted the poppy trade. Of course they did, and Sabine was Provost Marshal in those days. To my shame I was a married man, but . . . oh, Tomas, oh, you should have seen her in those days. I was weak. She seduced me, and then she recruited me. I carried the warrant and I fucked Sabine for ten years, and my wife never knew of any of it. Then she met Dieter Vogel, and she recruited him. They were in love within weeks, and she left me for him. Vogel didn’t want me around after that, for all that I accepted her decision, and he talked her around to his way of thinking. I think I am possibly the only Queen’s Man in history to have been allowed to retire honourably, under an oath of silence and a pending death warrant should I ever break it. But since you too carry the Queen’s Warrant, well . . . There it is. That is my secret, and my eternal shame. I hope that you can forgive me.’
I wasn’t sure that I could, in that moment.
‘Ailsa truly doesn’t know?’
‘Truly,’ he said. ‘It would break her heart to know that I was ever unfaithful to her honoured mother, and even more so to learn how she in her turn earned her current position.’
I stared at him.
‘You put her forward for the job? For this? You introduced her to the Queen’s Men, fucking seriously?’
I was angry with him now. I didn’t want to
