Jonathan Moeller - The Ghosts 05 - Ghost in the Stone

by Jonathan Moeller

  Hard to believe…but not impossible.

  “Yes,” said Ranarius. He had a quiet, precise voice, and Caina felt his cold gaze turn to her. “The commoners can do all sorts of tricks once they’ve been properly trained.”

  “It is the invitation to a little gathering,” said Khosrau. “Deliver it to your mistress, and tell her that Lord Khosrau Asurius would be most pleased if she could sing for it.”

  Caina bowed. “My mistress would be most honored.” And pleased, as well. It would provide an opportunity to spy within the Palace of Splendors.

  “She had better be,” said Armizid. “It is unseemly for an opera singer to attend a gathering of nobles, but…”

  “Unseemly!” said Khosrau. “That is your favorite word, my boy. Unseemly. Well,” he waved his hand, “off you go, girl. It would please me greatly if your mistress performed at the feast.”

  Caina bowed and left the box. Khosrau’s attention returned to the opera, as did Corbould’s, but she felt Armizid and Ranarius staring at her as she left.

  She hurried back to the tents. Marcellus had taken the stage as Tertius Maraeus, his mighty voice booming his aria. In a few moments Theodosia would come on stage as Severa, and her song about the plight of the Cyricans would convince Tertius to make war upon Anshan. Caina slipped back into the shadows, listening to the song with half an ear as she scanned the crowd for any threats…

  “A blowgun.”

  She whirled, reaching for the dagger at her belt.

  A shadow detached itself from the back of a tent and stepped towards her.

  It was a man in a hooded cloak, eyes glinting beneath the cowl. Beneath his cloak she glimpsed a sheathed sword and chain mail. His right hand rested on the sword’s hilt, and Caina saw an odd, swirling black tattoo over his forearm.

  He was a Kindred assassin. She was sure of it.

  The assassin stared at her.

  “You’re not going to kill me,” Caina said at last.

  Behind them Theodosia’s soaring song joined Marcellus’s.

  “Oh?” said the man.

  “We’re standing in front of ten thousand people,” said Caina. “If I scream, quite a few armed men are going to notice. If you were going to kill me, you would have stabbed me in the back.”

  “Astute,” said the cloaked man. “I saw you watching the crowd, which seemed like an unusual thing for a servant girl to do.”

  “Perhaps I was bored,” said Caina. “I’ve heard the epic of Tertius Maraeus before.”

  “Perhaps,” said the cloaked man. He took a step closer, and Caina glimpsed his face, hard and lean. “I thought that at first. And then I remembered how the Emperor’s Ghosts have many friends among actors and singers and slaves.”

  “There’s no such thing as the Ghosts,” said Caina. “They’re a story, a legend.”

  A hard smile flashed over the cloaked man’s face. “And that is an answer in itself, no?”

  “The Ghosts are myths,” said Caina, “but the Kindred are not.”

  The man’s hard smile faded. “You think I am a Kindred assassin?”

  “I know you are a Kindred assassin,” said Caina. “I know how the Kindred walk. I know how they hold their weapons. I know how they disguise themselves. You’re Kindred. Who are you here to kill?”

  “You are almost correct,” said the cloaked man. “I was Kindred.”

  “That’s impossible,” said Caina. “No one leaves the Kindred. Alive, anyway.”

  But that was wrong, and she knew it. Riogan had left the Kindred. They had tried to kill him for it, but he had survived. At least until Maglarion had found him.

  “So,” said Caina. “Former Kindred. And you’re here to talk, not to kill me. What do you want to tell me?”

  “A blowgun,” said the cloaked man. “That’s how they’re going kill Corbould. A tiny dart, coated with a particularly exotic poison. The poison numbs the wound, and he will never feel it. Thirty-seven hours later, the poison will reach his heart and stop it. And then, I suppose, Lord Khosrau will have his war with the Emperor.”

  “Why are you telling me this?” said Caina. She would not put it past the Kindred to spread lies to mask one of their assassinations. “Are you such a great friend of Lord Corbould?”

  “I do not give a damn for Lord Corbould,” said the cloaked man, “nor for his precious Empire. Nor do I have a damn for the Ghosts. Suffice to say I have my own business here, and I do not want you stumbling over me in your zeal to save Corbould Maraeus.”

  Caina opened her mouth to answer…and fell silent.

  She saw a slave moving through the aisles of the Amphitheatre. A dozen slaves hurried through the Amphitheatre, running errands for their masters. Yet this slave was heading straight for Lord Corbould and the other nobles.

  And Caina recognized him.

  When last she had seen him, he had been wearing a yellow robe and creeping up behind her in Barius’s pawnshop.

  She turned back to the cloaked man, only to see that she had vanished.

  Caina cursed, looking around for him, but he had disappeared without a trace. She looked back at the seats, and saw that the Kindred assassin had moved closer to Lord Corbould. Had the cloaked man been right about the blowgun? Corbould was wearing armor, but his neck was exposed.

  She hurried across the aisles, moving as fast as she dared. The assassin drew closer, and Caina saw something clutched in his left hand, something that looked like a thick brown straw.

  His nose was broken, she saw with some satisfaction.

  Marcellus and Theodosia continued their intricate duet, the notes rising and falling, every eye in the Amphitheatre fixed on them. The assassin stopped three aisles from Lord Corbould’s box and dropped to one knee, as if to fix the laces on his sandal.

  But the blowgun came up, and Caina was out of time.

  She reached into her sleeve, snatched out a throwing knife, and flung it at the assassin. She could not put all her strength into the throw, not in front of so many people. But the blade sank an inch into the assassin’s shoulder. The knife knocked him off-balance, the poisoned dart falling to the ground.

  The assassin glared at her, his bruised lips tight with rage. He wouldn’t recognize her from Barius’s pawnshop, but he would realize that his cover was blown. She watched the calculation flash over his face. He couldn’t attack her, not in front of ten thousand spectators. Caina would only need to scream, and all ten thousand spectators would see a slave attacking a freeborn woman.

  That would not end well for the assassin.

  Nor could Caina kill him. If she slew him in front of the audience, it would ruin her disguise. Anyone with a brain would realize there were Ghosts among the Grand Imperial Opera, and Caina’s effectiveness would be curtailed.

  The Kindred assassin yanked her knife from his shoulder, turned, and began walking away.

  Caina followed, moving as fast as she dared. The assassin veered for one of the exits from the Amphitheatre, and Caina followed. Her mind settled on a plan. She would get close enough to overpower him. Then she could take him captive and question him. With luck, she could find out what the Kindred had planned for Lord Corbould…and, perhaps, what had happened to Barius.

  Then Theodosia and Marcellus finished their duet.

  Lord Khosrau rose to his feet, applauding. The other nobles took one look at him and hauled themselves to their feet, also applauding, and the merchants in the upper rows followed suit. Soon the entire Amphitheatre stood, applauding and cheering.

  And Caina lost sight of the assassin. She was too short to see over the rows of applauding nobles.

  She whispered a curse and broke into a run. A few of the nobles would see her, but they would only assume she was on an urgent errand for Theodosia. She caught a glimpse of the assassin sprinting for the Amphitheatre’s exit, and she ran in that direction. A half-dozen streets led from the Amphitheatre’s gates. If the assassin reached them, Caina would never find him again.

  She saw the a
ssassin vanish through the gates.

  Caina ran into the small plaza outside the Amphitheatre, the Palace of Splendors and the Stone rising behind her. She heard Theodosia’s aria roll over the sides of the white hill, echoing through the city. The plaza was deserted, its opulent houses dark. Their owners filled the Amphitheatre, and no doubt their slaves had taken the opportunity to get drunk.

  There was no trace of the assassin.

  Caina struck her fist against the side of her leg in frustration. Twice now that assassin had eluded her. Suddenly she felt like a fool. The show with the blowgun might have been a distraction to allow the cloaked man to kill Corbould without interference. She had to get back to the Amphitheatre.

  Caina turned and froze.

  A statue of white stone stood next to the Amphitheatre’s gates.

  She stared at it in horrified fascination.

  It hadn’t been there this morning.

  She drew closer, heart pounding behind her ribs. The statue showed a man in a slave’s ragged tunic, arms thrown up as if to ward off a blow, face distorted with fear and horror.

  Caina recognized it.

  It was the Kindred assassin she had pursued through the Amphitheatre.

  Like the statue of Barius, it was incredibly detailed. Caina saw every wrinkle in the assassin’s face, every fold and crease of his tunic. The statue’s nose was even broken. Caina held out a hesitant hand and brushed the statue’s arm.

  She felt cool, smooth stone…and the tingle of sorcery.

  Caina jerked her hand back as if it had been burned.

  She had pursued the assassin out of the Amphitheatre…and someone had turned him to stone.

  Caina turned in a circle, her eyes sweeping the darkened plaza. She saw no one else, not a single living soul. No trace, no hint, of who might have done this.

  Or why.

  And if whatever power or creature had turned the assassin to stone was still lurking out here, standing alone in the plaza was not the brightest decision Caina could make.

  She hurried back into the Amphitheatre.

  Theodosia stood on the stage, singing her aria, her voice holding the nobles rapt. Even Armizid seemed impressed. Corbould Maraeus remained unharmed. Caina breathed a sigh of relief and hurried back into the tents.

  There was no trace of the cloaked man who had warned her about the assassin. Had he, perhaps, turned the assassin to stone?

  A sudden recollection tugged at her memory.

  She had seen the cloaked man’s scabbard and sword belt before.

  He had been watching her in the alley behind Barius’s pawnshop.

  Chapter 5 – Visions

  “I think that went well,” said Theodosia, pacing back and forth through the sitting room, “don’t you? You should have seen the look on Khosrau’s face! I thought the old fellow was about to jump out of his seat!”

  Caina nodded. It was well past midnight, and from past experience, she knew that Theodosia became exhilarated, almost manic, after a performance. In another twenty minutes she would sink into a pit of despondency, declare her singing a failure, and then go to bed. Eight or nine hours later she would awaken as her usual cheerful self.

  “I’m just glad,” said Caina, “that Lord Corbould lived long enough to appreciate your performance.”

  “You did well,” said Theodosia. “Gods, if Corbould was murdered during my aria, that would have been dreadful! Simply dreadful!” She considered for a moment. “And bad for the Empire, too, I suppose.”

  Caina shook her head. “We still don’t know who hired the Kindred. Or how Barius and that assassin were turned to stone.”

  “But Corbould is still alive,” said Theodosia, pacing once more through the lavish sitting room.

  The opera company was staying at the Inn of the Defender, an inn catering to wealthy merchants. As the leading lady, Theodosia occupied one of the inn’s finer suites. It had a sitting room and a separate bedroom with an enormous, pillow-piled bed. Caina even had a cot in the sitting room. Slaves waited outside the door, ready to serve their slightest whim.

  Caina’s mouth twisted in disgust at that thought.

  “Corbould is still alive,” Theodosia said, and Caina snapped out of her reverie, “and we have a meeting tomorrow.”

  “Oh?” said Caina.

  “The local circlemaster has graciously agreed to assist us,” said Theodosia, scowling. “He’s a former slave, a Szaldic freedman named Marzhod. Hard, ruthless, and uncouth, but he’s…effective. We’ll need his help if we’re to find out who hired the Kindred.”

  “And who turned Barius and that assassin to stone,” said Caina.

  Theodosia nodded. “We’ll disguise ourselves and visit him tomorrow. He keeps his headquarters at a sink of a tavern in Seatown.” She sniffed. “Though the man has absolutely no appreciation for opera…”

  Caina nodded and let Theodosia talk. Eventually, the older woman’s mood turned towards despondency, and Caina steered her to bed.

  ###

  A few minutes later Caina stepped onto the sitting room’s balcony.

  It overlooked the Plaza of the Defender, a small square lined with shops selling luxuries. To the north, Caina saw the palaces of Cyrica’s nobility, each more ostentatious than the last, though no match for the Palace of Splendor. Beyond she saw the slums and warehouses of Seatown, and the lights from the countless ships maneuvering in Cyrioch’s harbor, even at night.

  The Defender stood in the center of the square.

  The statue was eighteen feet tall, clad in armor of antique design, the hilt of a greatsword in its armored hands. A towering helm hid the statue’s features, and it gazed to the north, as if watching for invaders from the sea. A single massive crack ran down the center of the Defender, from its stone helm to its boots. The crack had only appeared a few years ago, Theodosia said, and people interpreted it as an ill omen. The Defender had stood here for millennia, older than Cyrioch, perhaps even as old as the Stone itself. The statue was made from the same indestructible rock as the Stone.

  As the statues of Barius and the assassin, now that Caina thought about it.

  She stared at the Defender for a long time, thinking.

  But no answers came to her, and Caina went to bed.

  ###

  Nightmares lashed at her.

  Caina often had nightmares. Bad dreams, Halfdan had told her, were scars of the mind. Just as wounds left scars upon the flesh, so too did the mind bear nightmares after an injury. Of late, whenever Caina closed her eyes, she dreamed of Marsis, of Andromache’s lightning falling from the sky, of Nicolai sobbing as he called for his mother. It didn’t matter that she had saved Nicolai. The dread had sunk into her bones like salt into poisoned earth.

  And sometimes her memories melded together to produce a new nightmare.

  Like tonight.

  In her dream Caina was naked but for the chains binding her wrists and neck. A pair of Istarish slavers dragged her onto a wooden stage. A crowd of magi, stark in their black robes, gazed up at her, their eyes cold and merciless.

  “One slave for sale,” said the auctioneer, and Caina saw that it was Maglarion. The bloodcrystal in his left eye socket blazed with ghostly green light, panting his dark coat with eerie light. She tried to cringe away as he approached, but the Istarish slavers yanked her chains, forcing her stand upright. “A bit scarred, to be sure.” His hand brushed over the scars his necromantic experiments had carved below her navel, the experiments that had left her unable to bear a child. “But still ripe for any sort of sorcerous experiment.” He grinned. “I know firsthand that she can scream for hours! You should have seen how she wailed when I killed her father!”

  “One thousand denarii!” shouted a bald master magus. It was Kalastus, the pyromancer who had almost destroyed Rasadda.

  “A hundred thousand!” said a withered corpse in the crumbling remnants of fine clothes. Caina recognized Lord Naelon Icaraeus – or at least, what was left of him after she and Ark had defeat
ed him.

  “Half a million!” said another man, the top of his head a smashed ruin. Ephaeron, the master magus who had tried to kill her in Rasadda.

  Caina struggled, splinters digging into her bare feet, but the chains held her fast.

  “Fine bids, all!” said Maglarion. “But surely someone can pay more!”

  “One million!” said a hissing, bubbling voice.

  Caina turned her head and started to scream.

  A misshapen, twisted corpse shambled onto the stage, its arms and legs distorted by huge, cancerous growths, veins running black beneath its skin. Alastair Corus had been Caina’s only lover, and Maglarion’s necromantic sorcery had killed him.

  And now he shuffled towards her, reaching for her with twisted fingers.

  “Sold!” said Maglarion.

  Alastair’s corpse reached for her, and the slavers shoved her at him. Caina slammed against him, her bare skin touching his deformed flesh, and she shrieked in horror. Alastair’s arms closed around her, and she screamed again.

  Then a strange keening noise filled her ears, and the world dissolved into gray mist.

  ###

  Caina found herself lying on the ground.

  Gray mist swirled around her, cold and clammy, and bleak nothingness stretched in all directions. This was a dream, she knew, just as the nightmare of the slave block had been.

  She stood up, and saw the dead sorceress.

  The woman was beautiful, radiant. She looked like a maiden of eighteen years, with long black hair and red lips. But that was only an illusion. She was the Moroaica, a sorceress of legend and terror, and her black eyes were ancient and cold with dark knowledge.

  “No,” said Caina. “You’re dead. I saw you die. Sicarion thought some of your power is trapped inside of me. But you’re dead. You’re dead!”

  The woman who had called herself Jadriga did not respond.