And behind them, emitting frustrated sighs like a depressed bellows and making no effort at stealth whatsoever, Kaleb followed.
'I'm telling you,' he said, giving Jassion a violent start just as the baron had been reaching for the knob on the room's far door, 'he's not here.'
Jassion glared, and even Mellorin couldn't help but cast the sorcerer an exasperated look. 'Will you be quiet?' the baron hissed.
'I rather doubt it. I haven't so far.'
'Kaleb…,' Mellorin began, then visibly flinched, wilting at the sorcerer's glare.
They'd been passing through Vorringar when they heard the rumors: muttered tales that Rebaine had targeted the Weavers' Guild of Kevrireun for his latest rampage. Not merely the local Guildmistress, but most of her lieutenants, had been slaughtered in a quartet of vicious attacks-three by axe, one when his entire bedchamber was engulfed in roaring flames. And several times, those rumors claimed, passersby had spotted a towering figure in black-and-bone, lurking nearby immediately after the carnage.
It was-Jassion had been utterly convinced-the break they were waiting for. 'People wouldn't just make up stories like this,' he'd insisted. 'One murder, perhaps, but four?' Even Kaleb's failure to detect Rebaine's presence using Mellorin as a focus for his spell hadn't convinced him otherwise.
'Isn't it possible,' the baron had asked, 'that he's found a way to block your 'blood divination' even once you've gotten close?'
'With his mastery of magic? I seriously doubt it.'
'But it can be done?'
'Anything can be-'
'Then we go.'
So they'd gone, traveling several days to the small and slowly dying city of Kevrireun. Missing stones marred the uneven streets; the buildings peeled and sagged like rotting fruit. Carelessly throwing both money and rank around him, Jassion either bribed or cowed witnesses, guards, even government officials into providing every detail of the murders.
Yes, m'lord, Rebaine had been spotted at two of the scenes.
No, sir, he'd never attacked his victims in large groups.
Yes, the victims were all members of the Weavers' Guild.
Most of the remaining Guildsmen were now barricaded in their homes, protected by Kevrireun's ragtag militia. Embran Laphert, now the highest-ranking survivor, had closed down the Guildhouse and told everyone to go home-or into hiding-until further notice.
Despite Kaleb's continual protestations, Jassion had determined that investigating the Guildhouse itself was their next step. 'Perhaps,' he'd argued, 'we can find some hint as to why Rebaine chose these poor fools as his latest targets.' Mellorin, though not so quick to dismiss Kaleb's arguments, was sufficiently swept up in her uncle's enthusiasm. Once she'd agreed to go, the sorcerer had grudgingly followed.
Now they stood within the foyer of the Weavers' Guild Hall, one of the few such institutions left in Kevrireun. Jassion once more reached for the door, hurling it open and dashing into the hallway beyond. Kaleb irritably circled the room, examining the various tapestries-Mount Derattus doesn't actually look like that, he noted while passing one particular landscape.
He knew damn well that these murders weren't part of the pattern, no matter what the witnesses claimed to have seen. But how to convince the simpleton and the brat without explaining how he knew, that had so far eluded him. Nor was the summons that had been ringing in the confines of his own skull for the past ten minutes, deafening as any church bell, making it any easier to think.
He expected this sort of nonsense from Jassion, but that Mellorin had gone along with it, had refused to heed his words… His fists trembled in frustrated fury, and the nearest tapestry actually began to smolder around the edges. Seething, his thoughts darker than the armor for which they searched, Kaleb moved to catch up with the others.
Their exploration took them through workrooms replete with looms and spinning wheels of every conceivable design, including some that hadn't seen regular use for centuries. Up thickly carpeted stairs they trod, through heavily locked chambers containing a fortune in textiles and rare yarns and intricately woven garb, and finally into a hallway of opulent offices.
It was here that Jassion insisted they split up, each searching an office for anything even remotely useful. The sorcerer welcomed the opportunity for solitude, however brief, partly to avoid speaking with the baron whose obstinacy was driving him inexorably mad…
And partly because it finally offered the chance to silence that damn summons, even if it meant turning his attentions toward a different idiot.
Kaleb slipped into one of the chambers, garishly decorated with an array of mismatched stitchings, and slumped into the thickly upholstered chair behind the desk. 'What?' he rasped under his breath.
'Gods damn it all, Kaleb! I've been trying to make contact!'
'I'm very well aware-Master Nenavar,' he added quickly, as he felt the first stirrings of pain rack his body.
'I am not accustomed to being ignored.'
'We can work on that.' Then, before the old coot could grow even more irritated, 'I was with the others. Couldn't get away. Jassion's a bit dense, but I think even he might notice if I started to talking to myself.'
Nenavar remained silent. Kaleb leaned back in the chair and propped his feet up on the desk.
'I assume you had some reason for contacting me other than just wanting to yell at me?'
'We've found him.'
Kaleb's feet hit the floor with a resounding thud; he was out of the chair before the echo faded. 'What? Where?'
'He triggered the ward that I ordered placed on Ellowaine. Apparently he finally figured out that she was our initial source of intelligence on him.'
'He's in Emdimir, then?'
'No. Nearby, though.' Kaleb heard the accustomed exasperation in the old voice, but for once it wasn't directed his way. 'It took the Cephiran sorceress who'd been scrying on Ellowaine over an hour to reach me. Godsdamn incompetents. I told Rhykus to let me cast the spell, but no, it had to be one of his people. Military paranoia at its finest.
'Anyway, the Cephirans are dogging his heels, and even if he enchants the horses again, there's a limit to how far he can push them. We should be able to maintain at least a general idea of his location. Be ready to move swiftly to intercept; I'll get back to you when we're certain which way he's heading.'
Kaleb nodded, though he knew Nenavar couldn't see him. 'And what would you like me to tell Baron Tantrum and She-Rebaine?'
But there was no answer. Nenavar's presence was gone from his head.
No worries. He'd find something.
'I've found something.'
Kaleb's voice in the hallway was enough to conjure Jassion and Mellorin from their own offices. They appeared in twin swirls of parchment, and Kaleb could only shake his head at the detritus they were leaving behind. 'It's a good thing we weren't trying to be subtle or anything,' he told them. 'It looks like you've been shearing parchment sheep in there.'
Mellorin offered a grin that was at least slightly embarrassed, but Jassion-as usual-cared little for Kaleb's concerns. 'You've found why Rebaine was interested in these people?'
'I've found an answer,' the sorcerer said, so smugly that even his words seemed to turn up their noses in disdain. He held out a creased sheaf of parchments he'd found (with the aid of a few judicious spells) in the office files. 'It appears,' Kaleb told them, 'that the late Guildmistress had commissioned a private investigation of her own. You might like to know what she found.' The baron and the warlord's daughter leaned in, scanning the cramped writing, and when they spoke once more, they spoke as one.
'Son of a bitch!' HALF AN HOUR LATER, THEY STOOD gathered in the living room of a modest house on Kevrireun's south end. What had once been a low table was now so much kindling, books and scrolls were scattered about the chamber, and one Embran Laphert-a bald, broad-shouldered fellow who currently led the
