by Sarra Cannon
None of that would change the fact that their relationship could go nowhere, that to cross the line as he had, to answer the call he felt thrumming within him morning and night, would inevitably bring them far more pain than it would pleasure.
Would it?
Someday, years from now, would he look back on his life and feel relief that he hadn’t allowed himself to know her touch, to lie with her in his arms? Or would it be his deepest regret?
“Elder Borean will be pleased. Manners are very important to him,” Burl was saying as Kila tuned back in to her. He panicked for a moment, thinking she had caught him out, but it was quite clear she hadn’t noticed his distraction. Her attention was fixed on the clock tower in the center of the enclave, and he had a feeling she was rehearsing in her head the things she intended to say to the Elders.
Yes, he knew how important observing social niceties was to the Houses. They preferred to kill via a million tiny cutting words rather than do something as distasteful as be honest and use a sword. Neat, quick, and clean wasn’t for them.
“What is this meeting about?” Kila asked as they were admitted to the enclave by the two menacing Battle Masters guarding the gates.
No doubt House Staerleigh paid top dollar for them, he thought, a casual flick of his eyes enough for him to pick up a myriad of tiny details. That the guards were hardened was obvious, considering their well-worn armor and implacable expressions. But Kila had tallied their scars, had observed the way they held themselves, had not failed to notice their subtle appraisal of him, and knew that they were highly trained and had plenty of experience.
They were also members of one of the mercenary companies. Though their weapons and armor were well-crafted, they were plain and made from sturdy but economical materials. House Staerleigh could have paid extra for fancier, more ornamental gear, which told Kila their intent was likelier to be to impress upon their visitors that their gates were secure than it was to show off their wealth. Even so, only the Battle Masters in the employ of the royal family had the financial backing to bear the best arms and armor Metal Shapers could craft. And only the royal family—what was left of it, at any rate—had the coin to pay for the most skilled of the Battle Masters.
Which was all to say that Kila had no desire to test either of the guards, not even were he in the company of another ten Enforcers he knew he could trust to back him.
“It’s a regular monthly meeting,” Burl said. “Enforcer liaisons to the Houses attend a meeting at the end of each month so the Houses can bring us up to speed on their most pressing concerns.”
“Have you any idea what those might be for House Staerleigh?”
“I imagine they don’t have many at present. Now that House business has begun to settle back into its usual patterns, I expect that the Elders will be relieved to be able to focus on their normal day-to-day affairs.”
She wanted him to read between the lines; every muscle in her body betrayed that fact. House Staerleigh was pleased that the Toran Stowley business had been resolved with as little fuss and inconvenience to them as possible, and both Burl and the Elders felt Kila had played his part in that particular charade. With any luck, they had decided that he had been properly chastened by his exile to the forest, and now assumed he was ready to abide by their rules.
Two more guards were stationed at the Council Hall. They waved Burl in without her having to break her stride, telling Kila that they were both quite familiar and quite comfortable with her presence in the Hall. He deduced that either the Elders had requested his presence as well or Burl had informed them of her intent to bring him along, and the guards had been told not to bother with stopping him.
A solicitous young man saw them into the Council’s private meeting chambers, where they found all five members waiting for them.
“Officer Burl, Officer an Movis, thank you for attending this meeting,” Elder Borean said, rising to greet them. The other four remained seated, which Kila was certain wasn’t entirely due to how old and frail three of them were. If Burl minded being treated like one of the servants, she showed no sign of it.
“Thank you for having us, Elder Borean,” Burl said, folding her hands and bowing at the waist. Kila followed suit.
“Branis, bring some refreshments for our guests,” Elder Borean said to the young man, who nodded and hurried off to do as he had been bid.
“Officer an Movis, I believe you’ve already met all the members of our Council of Elders,” Elder Borean said, turning his attention to Kila.
“I have had that honor indeed, Elder Borean.”
The polite address seemed to please the Elder. “Allow me to refresh your memory. This is Elder Vorfarth, Elder Maizton, Elder Florius, and Elder Stanich,” he said, going clockwise around the round table. The Elders all deigned to incline their heads at him, though Elder Stanich didn’t do much to conceal his open distrust of Kila.
“You are not native to Astoran,” Elder Stanich said, the words more an accusation than an observation.
“No, I am not, though I have long been a resident of your fair realm,” Kila replied.
Elder Stanich huffed as if the response were barely tolerable, and perhaps for him it was. Not everyone in Astoran loved the thought of foreigners dirtying their sacred ground.
The young man returned with a beautifully engraved silver tray bearing a tea service and a variety of small cakes and finger sandwiches. He set it down on the table and bowed his way out of the room. He hadn’t even shut the doors before Elder Stanich pounced on the tray, loading a plate with an impressive pile of assorted treats. He was so bird-like it seemed hardly credible that he could consume such a quantity of food.
“Shall we begin?” Elder Borean asked, gesturing to two empty chairs on either side of his seat. Burl took the one next to Elder Florius, which meant Kila had the pleasure of sitting next to Elder Stanich, who proceeded to act as if Kila didn’t exist.
The others weren’t so rude nor so dismissive. Elder Vorfarth nodded at him. She had seen him at the Stowley manor, though she wouldn’t be so indelicate as to bring that up. A mysterious smile wreathed Elder Florius’s face as she appraised him with lowered lids, and Elder Maizton made a blatant study of Kila.
Do they coordinate? he wondered. Decide ahead of time which of them will stare and which will pretend not to be scrutinizing me?
Once more his thoughts turned to Cianne, and the back of his neck prickled. He half expected to look up and find her clinging to the rafters, but she wouldn’t be that reckless. More likely she had flattened herself against the side of the building next to one of the windows, or was hiding in a closet in another room, ear pressed against a peephole she had previously drilled into the meeting chambers.
He almost smiled at such fanciful visions, but caught himself in time. While the amusement was certainly preferable to the fear, it was better he not think of her at all lest he somehow draw attention to himself, or, worse, give away something about her.
“Have you any particular concerns you wish to raise?” Burl asked the Elders in a tone so deferential that it set Kila’s teeth on edge.
“None at the moment,” Elder Maizton said with an air of deep satisfaction.
“Normal shipments will soon resume, and Captain Stowley will oversee the Leonovia run next week,” Elder Borean said.
“That’s excellent news,” Burl said.
“It is indeed,” Elder Vorfarth agreed. As one, the Council members all bobbed their heads in agreement, which Kila found uncanny to the point of being creepy.
“Have you had any further trouble with that petty theft ring down on the docks?” Burl asked.
“We have not, thanks to your assistance,” Elder Stanich said.
After a while, Kila didn’t trouble himself much with the particulars of the conversation. Whether the Council was typically more frank with Burl, he couldn’t say, but the meeting consisted of nothing more than common banalities. Kila did notice one thing of interest, though: the Counc
il didn’t bring up a single issue within its own House. Anything that affected them appeared to be instigated by outsiders, such as the petty theft ring Burl had mentioned.
Well, aren’t they perfect? Kila thought, suppressing a sardonic smile.
Really, the purpose of the meeting seemed to be what he’d suspected: it gave the Council members a chance to size him up. He wasn’t certain how to interpret it, which forced him to admit it would be a good thing if Cianne did manage to eavesdrop. The Council could want nothing more than to familiarize themselves with Kila’s appearance so that they would know him by sight and keep him from learning too much. Or they could want to assess his potential as another asset within Enforcement. Either way, Kila had no idea what was going on in their minds, no more than he did with Burl. The best he could do was work as hard as he could to ensure his actions appeared above reproach.
Kila asked Burl as many questions as he felt safe posing as one of the House carriages took them back to headquarters. He had to take care to appear interested but oblivious to anything that might make Burl suspicious, which was easier said than done. Burl, he knew, would pick apart everything he said.
By the end of the day he was exhausted. The mental strain of what he and Cianne were doing was taking a greater toll on him with each passing day. He had never been fond of intrigue, and his time in Cearova was making him even less fond. He hadn’t thought it possible, but he even found himself longing for a return to his forest exile. The obscurity had been so much more relaxing.
“Were you successful?” he asked Cianne when she appeared in his home office that night.
“I was,” she said, “though not as successful as I would have liked. Still, I can at least set your mind at ease on this count: the Elders don’t suspect you of anything.”
“Are you certain?” he asked, unwilling to surrender himself to relief just yet.
“Very,” she said with a definitive nod. “I’ve not had the chance to eavesdrop on the Council very often. Getting in and out of the Council Hall unnoticed is no mean feat, but I’ve listened to them often enough in other settings to know when what’s left unsaid is more important than what’s said.”
“So do you think Burl may be considering recruiting me?”
“If she is, she will not be able to do so without the Council condoning it. I think this meeting was intended to give them a chance to formulate their own assessments of you. My guess would be they plan to test you further down the line, see if they feel you’re worthy of their trust.”
“Lucky me,” he said, sighing and pressing the pad of his thumb to the inside corner of his eyebrow. “Have you anything new to share?”
“Unfortunately, no. I’ve been rather preoccupied with ensuring you haven’t registered with the Elders to concentrate much on anything else.”
It made sense. Were Burl or the Elders to become suspicious, the whole delicate web he and Cianne were spinning could unravel, potentially leading them back to her. Neither of them could afford that. Yet he also suspected her concern stemmed from something more personal, and however determined he was not to allow himself to slip with her again, he couldn’t deny that her concern warmed his heart. How long had it been since he had felt someone truly cared for him?
“We should discuss the equipment we’ll bring with us in two days,” Kila said.
“You should bring nothing more than you usually carry,” she said. “You’ll be confined to the ground, which makes the risk to you greater.”
“Yes, but if I’m pursued I can leave my equipment behind.”
“And then they’ll know for certain that you were spying. Should someone question you, your best bet will be to feign ignorance. They won’t want to fuss with capturing you if they don’t have to. A struggle would create too much of a ruckus.”
The worry on her face made him worry too, and he tried not to think about what might happen to him if he were caught.
What neither of them said was that they both doubted anyone who might catch them would believe claims of ignorance, no matter how feasible they sounded. In the interest of averting a ruckus, whoever was on the lookout during the meeting might just leave him dead, Enforcement officer or no.
“What about you?” Kila asked.
“I can flee over the rooftops and through the alleys if I’m spotted. I know this city like the back of my hand, have spent years navigating every route through it I can think of.”
“I still don’t like this,” he said.
“Neither do I, but nothing has changed, has it?”
“No, but I felt it had to be said.” He grimaced.
“We won’t take any unnecessary risks,” she said. “Whatever this is, it isn’t worth our lives. Leave immediately if you suspect you’ve been made. Work your way through the city until you’re certain you’ve lost any possible tail, then return here. I’ll do the same.”
“Let’s spar,” he said, too restless to talk about it any longer.
“Yes, let’s,” she said, her relief evident.
Chapter 29
Cianne was so tense the day of the eavesdropping mission she felt like her bones might snap from sheer pressure. She hadn’t seen Lach since their last, unsettling encounter, and as much of a relief as it was not to have to continue to put on a show for him, she also worried about not seeing him. What did her father, Moiria, and the Elders make of it? Had she exposed herself, destroyed the one thing that had provided her with cover? If they felt she no longer had any power over Lach, they’d have no further use for her, not even her father. Especially not her father. She would be an impediment to him, an obstacle standing in the way of whatever it was he hoped to achieve.
She wanted to be well rested for that evening, but her worries kept circling around and around in her mind until she gave in and spent some time in her rafters, pushing herself to move faster, to work harder. She moved until she could move no more, and then she collapsed in one of the alcoves formed by a joist and a strut, folding herself into the tiny space. The sun’s position told her it would soon be time for dinner, and she let her eyes go unfocused, the fragments of color thrown off by her glass baubles softening and going blurry around the edges. When she swept her eyes around the rafters like that, taking in the refracted light, she felt almost as if she were sitting in a rainbow, high up in the clouds, far from the city, far from House Staerleigh, far from anything that could hurt her.
Would her illusion of safety and security ever become a reality?
She lingered as long as she dared and then leapt lightly down to her bed frame and set about getting herself cleaned up and dressed. Her gear sack had long since been packed and repacked, checked and double checked, and was hidden under her floorboards with the clothing she’d selected for that night. Once she and her father finished dinner she wouldn’t have much time. She would have to get back to her quarters, change, and climb out through one of the upper story windows in a matter of minutes. Otherwise she risked losing sight of her father, who she knew would leave promptly after dinner ended, as he had every time he had attended one of these secretive meetings.
“Cianne, you’re looking well tonight,” Daerwyn said as she joined him at the table.
“Thank you, Father,” she replied. No matter how much icy water she had splashed over her face, she hadn’t been able to rid it of the flush brought about by her exertions. She worried that he suspected something, but he gave her no more than a cursory nod of approval before focusing his attention on his meal.
They ate for a while without speaking, Cianne casting about for safe topics, but she no longer had any idea what was safe. Every subject seemed to hold twice the meaning she believed it to hold, and she felt as though she had to tiptoe around everything while with her father. She lived in dread of that one misstep, that one slip that would reveal her hand. Though she had been about the practice of deceiving him for many years, she had begun to wonder if she was up to the task of continuing.
“How are the preparations for
Lach’s journey coming along?” she asked at last.
“Very well. I had initial concerns because he didn’t show much interest in the preparations, which, as you know, is quite unusual for him. But he’s come around of late, is almost acting like his old self again, so whatever you said to him helped.”
Was he testing her? She sent an appraising look at him from beneath lowered lids, feigning modesty at the compliment. Nothing seemed amiss. Even so, she felt a tingle of apprehension at the base of her spine.
“I’m glad I was able to help him, though I don’t think I can take all the credit. The decision to send him on this journey did him a real service, but then you, Moiria, and the Elders have always looked out for his best interests.”
“Always will, as we would for any member of our House. We must none of us neglect our duty to our House,” her father said, a note of something in his voice that Cianne didn’t like.
“I have done my best these past few weeks to do mine as well,” she said, speaking in a low voice, head hung as if in embarrassment for her past transgressions.
“You have made great strides this week, my daughter. I’m very pleased. Is it possible you believe you have discerned your role in our House?”
“Yes, I believe I have,” she said, raising her eyes to meet his, letting him see her determination.
“You cannot imagine how glad I am to hear it,” he said, wiping his mouth with a linen napkin. He rose, tugging his embroidered silk waistcoat into place. His manservant emerged from the shadows lurking around the edges of the room and helped him into his frock coat. “I hate to rush off on you like this, but I’ve an engagement with Rayshford tonight. It may run late. Have you any plans?”
