“How it is passed is a mystery so far,” Valerius explained. “But it doesn’t seem to be through physical contact. I mean to look into this personally.”
“Very good. See that you keep me apprised of your progress. Of all the damnable luck!”
“With all this heat, I’m surprised we haven’t seen more sickness,” said Valerius. “Hopefully this one will run its course quickly.”
“I’ll issue the edict of quarantine immediately.” With that Korathan returned to his breakfast and the papers he’d been studying.
Parting ways with Valerius at the front gate, Seregil and Alec headed for Wheel Street.
“There, that’s handled,” Seregil remarked as they rode down Silvermoon. “Are you satisfied?”
Alec shrugged. “Quarantine isn’t going to help the people who are already sick.”
“It’s in Valerius’s hands, now, tali. There’s nothing more we can do. Come on, let’s see Thero, then it’s home for a nap for me.”
CHAPTER 28. Ruby Lane
SEREGIL had his answer about the attempted assassination the following afternoon when Runcer appeared at the library door. “My lord, there’s an urchin asking for you.”
“The usual urchin?” Seregil asked, setting his book aside.
“No, my lord. A new one.”
The boy in question had been left waiting on the front doorstep. He wasn’t much older than Kepi, and had the same capable, starved look about him. He hopped to his feet as soon as Seregil stepped out.
“Message for you, m’lord,” he said, making a sort of bow.
“Yes?”
“Just one word, m’lord. ‘Laneus.’ ”
Seregil felt a cold sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach, although he’d expected something like this. He gave the child a silver penny and went back inside.
Alec came in from the kitchen and found Seregil staring at the murals, absently rubbing at the thin scab on his throat.
“What’s wrong?”
“Laneus didn’t waste any time. He set the assassins on us. I doubt they’ll stop at just one attempt.”
“Time to pay him a visit, don’t you think?” asked Alec.
“Perhaps he and his lady would enjoy an evening out? I’ll send invitations to him and Malthus, and Eirual and Myrhichia, too. The women will be a good distraction. I’ll fall ill at the last moment and send you to play host. Take them to the Red Hart. If anything goes wrong, you can excuse yourself and ride like hell to warn me.”
“Why can’t I do the housebreaking? You’re better at entertaining the nobles.”
“You’ll be fine.” Seregil leaned forward and kissed him on the tip of his nose. “Besides, it’s my turn.”
“We’re taking turns now? If that’s the case, then you’re wrong. You burgled Malthus, and Reltheus,” Alec countered, undeterred by the kiss. His expression darkened ominously. “This is the second time you’ve tried to keep me from going out alone. Is this about that night I broke into Kyrin’s house without you?”
“No, tali, I just-” Seregil broke off with a sigh. He’d sworn long ago not to lie to his talimenios. “Well, maybe a bit.”
“I’m going,” Alec said in a tone that he seldom used with Seregil, or anyone else, for that matter. “Either you trust me, or you don’t.”
“It’s not a matter of trust.”
“Yes, it is.” Alec took him firmly by the shoulders and looked him square in the eye. “You’re going with Laneus. Because you
A muscle twitched in Seregil’s jaw as he clenched his teeth against all the arguments he wanted to make. It was true; he hated the thought of Alec doing the job alone, in a large and unfamiliar villa. But Alec was also right about their individual skills. His young partner had taken to nightrunning and swordplay far more naturally than he had to the delicate thrust and parry of social subterfuge.
Caught in the strong current of that earnest blue gaze, Seregil gave in. “All right. You do the housebreaking.”
Alec grinned. “And
Dressing for the evening, Seregil was careful to leave the lacings of his shirt loose, so that the garrote mark showed. It would be interesting to see how Laneus reacted to the sight of it.
The sharp thud of an arrow striking a wooden target drifted in through the open bedroom window. Seregil shrugged into one of his more elaborate coats and wandered over to watch
Alec send another shaft to the center of the painted bull’s-eye. The setting sun cast a mellow light over the garden and picked out glints of pure gold in his lover’s hair as he smoothly nocked an arrow and raised the bow again, speeding a third arrow to split one of the first two. It was a neat trick, if hard on arrows, and one that never ceased to impress people. Alec made it look as easy as picking a single ward lock.
As he lingered there at the window, however, another image came to him: Yhakobin’s villa in Plenimar, and the day he’d stood at a barred window, seeing Alec alive in another garden, walking with Ilar.
He stood a moment longer, admiring the strong lines of Alec’s slim body, and the lean, corded muscles in the younger man’s bare forearms as he pulled the bowstring to his ear again. Seregil had long since come to appreciate that archery was far more to Alec than a mere skill; it was a kind of meditation, a way he sometimes focused that fearless mind of his.
Alec let fly, then looked up and smiled at him, as if he’d known he was there all along. Seregil smiled back and went to find his boots.
Alec saw Seregil off that evening, then stole off to the Stag and Otter to pass the evening until it was time to go. Settling by an open window in the sitting room with a book Thero had lent him on dragon lore, Alec tried to read, but soon found himself scanning the same page over again. He set it aside and gazed out over the neighboring rooftops as the shadows lengthened across the city. Seregil had always been concerned for him, he knew, and in the early days of his apprenticeship that concern had been warranted. He wasn’t sure when it had begun to irk him, but it did now.
When it was full dark he went to one of the clothes chests in the bedroom and put on a plain dark coat and trousers, then tucked a square of black silk and his tool roll inside his
shirt. The cool weight of the tools against his bare skin was familiar and comforting, as was the dagger at his belt. After a moment’s thought, he buckled on his sword belt and threw on a light cloak to cover it, in case of assassins or footpads, though the latter were less likely in that quarter.
He blew out the lamp and went back to the sitting room and one of the chests there. Inside, he found the muslin bag he was looking for and selected an owl feather. He held it a moment, sending up a silent prayer to Illior Lightbearer, patron of thieves-and nightrunners, presumably-then singed the tip of it over the remaining candle and tucked it behind his ear for luck. Gathering the rest of the night’s equipment, he blew out the candle and set off.
Laneus’s handsome three-story villa in Ruby Lane had plenty of tempting balconies and lots of trees. Alec skulked down an alleyway to the tradesmen’s lane that ran behind it. The wall here was higher than most. Seregil had joked that the higher a noble’s rank and the greater their fortune, the more they walled themselves in.
He checked the lane, then took the rope and muffled grapple from under his cloak. Checking the cloth wrappings that would mute the sound of the metal on stone, he swung it up and grinned when it caught on the first try. Tugging it to make certain it was securely seated, he climbed up to the top and peered over. Metal spikes that had once protected the house had been sacrificed to the war here, too.
The garden was large and laid out in a formal pattern, with traditional crushed-shell paths that showed pale in the starlight between the beds of flowers and herbs. Balanced there, Alec appraised his route in. On this side of the