Ghost in the Seal (Ghost Exile #6)

by Jonathan Moeller

  They didn’t know it, but they just saved their own lives. Clever predators listened to their instincts.

  Fortunately, Rumarah was full of stupid predators who hadn’t gotten themselves killed yet.

  “You look lost,” said the Istarish man who planted himself in her path. He wore chain mail and leather, and he had eight friends, all of them armed. Some of them openly carried the chains and shackles of independent slavers.

  “Oh, sir,” said Kalgri, touching his arm, puttering a quaver into her voice. She donned a vapid, terrified expression. “I’m lost. My father sent me with a purse of gold for my brother, but I don’t know where he is.” The slavers exchanged looks, unable to hide their delight. “Can you take me to the street of the blacksmiths? He lives there.”

  “Of course we can, madam,” said the slaver. He looked about thirty, with a scarred, bearded face. “Come right this way. We can’t let a pretty thing like you wander the streets alone, can we? Come with us and we’ll take good care of you.”

  The other slavers laughed.

  “Thank you, sir,” said Kalgri with a tremulous smile. “My father always said I could rely upon the kindness of strangers.”

  “Let’s stop by our warehouse,” said the slaver, gesturing to an ugly, squat building of cheap brick, “and we’ll ask our captain the way to the street of the blacksmiths.”

  “Of course, sir,” said Kalgri. “I look forward to meeting him.”

  The slaver’s eyes flicked up and down over her. “I think we’ll all look forward to meeting you.”

  They escorted Kalgri into the warehouse.

  A few moments later she stood over the bearded slaver, her blade of fire and shadow resting at his throat, the stench of blood filling her nostrils as the Voice moaned in ecstasy at the life force it had just consumed. There had been a total of fifteen slavers in the warehouse. There had also been twenty slaves in metal cages. That had been annoying, since Kalgri didn’t want any witnesses to her true nature.

  Now only Kalgri and the bearded slaver were still alive.

  “Please,” whispered the slaver, his face wet with sweat, his eyes gleaming with terror. “Please…please don’t…”

  “Mmm,” said Kalgri, shivering a little as the stolen power surged through her. “What’s your name?”

  “Rhamil,” whispered the slaver, staring at her with horror.

  Kalgri dismissed the sword of force, the Voice’s power surging through her. Rhamil weighed at least twice what she did, but Kalgri reached down and heaved him to his feet. The slaver cringed and cried out.

  “There’s no need for that, my dear,” said Kalgri, reaching up to stroke his face. “You’re going to escort me as I walk about town. A pleasant little stroll.” She patted his cheek. “But if you try to run away from me, and if you say anything without my permission…why, do you remember what I did to your captain?”

  Rhamil’s eyes darted to the various pieces of his captain and then back to her face.

  Kalgri let shadow and purple flame pulse through her eyes, the Voice shrieking its glee. “Do you understand?”

  Rhamil bobbed his head in a jerky nod.

  “Say that you understand,” said Kalgri.

  “I understand,” Rhamil managed to whisper.

  “Splendid, just splendid,” said Kalgri. She threaded her arm through his and grinned. “Now come along and escort me.”

  Rhamil obeyed, and Kalgri went for a walk through the bazaars and taverns of Rumarah. This time, no one troubled her. Anyone who looked at Rhamil assumed that Kalgri was a prostitute. No one would attack a member of a slaving crew in the street. Unless, of course, Rhamil’s late and dismembered captain had enemies. Kalgri would prefer not to kill anyone in public, not yet, but…

  Well. No plan was perfect.

  But this plan worked. Kalgri and her new acquaintance made the rounds of the bazaars and the inns. She spent a good amount of time in an ugly, garish inn called the Corsair’s Rest, questioning the slaves and the drunks there as Rhamil stood next to her and sweated. Kalgri didn’t kill anyone. The purse of gold she had used to lure Rhamil’s dead friends proved helpful in loosening tongues and buying silence.

  A wise predator used every tool available.

  A plan came together in Kalgri’s mind, the Voice snarling with anticipation. Rumarah was perfect, absolutely perfect, for what Kalgri had in mind.

  Caina Amalas would know despair here.

  And then she would die.

  “You know,” said Kalgri as she walked through an alley, Rhamil still on her arm, “it’s all her fault, really.”

  “I’m…I’m sorry?” said Rhamil, his eyes wide.

  “If she hadn’t dodged that arrow,” said Kalgri. “If she hadn’t found that valikon. She could have died quickly and without pain. Everything that’s going to happen is her own fault. Though I will enjoy it nonetheless.”

  “I don’t understand,” said Rhamil.

  “Oh?” said Kalgri, reaching through the Voice’s senses. No one was nearby. “I suppose not. I simply like to talk while I am killing.”

  The Voice’s power surged through her, and before the slaver reacted, Kalgri broke his arm, yanked the dagger from his belt, and killed him. As his body lay in the dust, she helped herself to the coin purse at his belt. Anyone who found the corpse would assume that he had been robbed.

  Kalgri laced the front of her dress tight and donned a headscarf, humming to herself.

  She didn’t want to be interrupted just now. She needed to start a fire.

  ###

  Cassander stood at the rail of the galley, frowning at the plume of black smoke rising from Rumarah. It looked like a substantial fire. Around him the Adamant Guards moved to the rail. The crew of the galley kept away from both Cassander and his Guards. They had been well-behaved during the voyage, though the large amount of money Cassander had paid them had something to do with it.

  That, and his own reputation.

  “A fire, my lord,” said the chief of his remaining Silent Hunters in a gravelly voice. The wiry man had been a capable assassin before taking the sigils of a Silent Hunter, which explained why he had survived while many of his fellows had not. “Do you wish us to investigate?”

  “No, not yet,” said Cassander. “I suspect I know who caused the fire.” He saw a flash of blue among the close-packed warehouses of the docks. “Wait here.”

  He strode to the gangplank and descended to the pier, his black coat rustling around him. The spells upon the greatcoat made it stronger than plate armor, yet as light and as comfortable as a silk robe. That was just as well, since Rumarah was not the sort of place one wanted to go without armor.

  Not that Rumarah contained any real threats to Cassander.

  The pier creaked beneath him. The piers of Istarinmul had been well-constructed of finished stone. The piers of Rumarah were slapped together from lumber that looked as if it been taken from wrecked ships. Perhaps the corsairs even sold their seized ships as lumber in Rumarah.

  Cassander stopped halfway along the pier and waited.

  A moment later Kalgri came onto the pier, still in her tight blue dress. She had a contented, almost dreamy, look upon her face, and hummed to herself as she walked.

  “Given the lack of panic I hear,” said Cassander, “I assume you kept things quiet?”

  “Mmm,” murmured Kalgri, that unfocused look still upon her face.

  Cassander sighed. “How many people did you kill?”

  “I don’t remember,” said Kalgri. “About thirty or forty. Oh, don’t worry. No one will suspect we’re here. It will look like some slaves tried to escape and kill their captors, only they all died when someone knocked over a lantern, alas, alas.”

  “Very well,” said Cassander. There was no point in trying to control her. “Did you learn anything useful? Did our foes come here?”

  “Oh, yes,” said Kalgri. “Caina was here.”

  “Good,” said Cassander. “Where is she now?”

&
nbsp; “I imagine,” said Kalgri, “about thirty or forty miles directly east of here.”

  “What?” said Cassander.

  “She and her allies left yesterday aboard a corsair ship called the Sandstorm,” said Kalgri. “They caused a bit of a stir at the Corsair’s Rest, one of the larger taverns and brothels. Rather sloppy, really.” She laughed to herself. “But she doesn’t know that I’m following her. She only thinks that you’re chasing her. So of course she’s gotten careless.”

  Cassander resisted the urge to hit her. “Then where is she going?”

  “We need to talk, you and I,” said Kalgri.

  “You need to tell me where Caina is going,” said Cassander.

  “Actually, you should wait here for her to return,” said Kalgri. “In fact, that’s what you’re going to do.”

  “And just why,” said Cassander, “am I going to do that?”

  The steel plates of his gauntlet rasped as his hand curled into a fist.

  Kalgri’s blue eyes flicked down to the gauntlet and then back to him, though her lazy smile never wavered. “Because I’m going to tell you Caina’s destination.”

  Cassander gestured. “Please. You have the entirety of my attention.”

  “The Staff and Seal of Iramis are hidden on Pyramid Isle,” said Kalgri.

  Cassander blinked. “What?” For a moment the name meant nothing to him. Then long-forgotten knowledge stirred in the depths of his memory. “Pyramid Isle…that was where the ancient Maatish buried some heretical Great Necromancer or another. The Iramisians fought against him and the loremasters bound him further. He’s…” His eyes widened. “The Staff and Seal of Iramis are hidden in the Tomb of Kharnaces?”

  “They are,” said Kalgri. “For a century and a half. Waiting for someone to come and claim them. Someone strong enough to take them.”

  “It will be me,” said Cassander, but he felt doubt even as he spoke. He knew his own strengths. He knew he was a powerful sorcerer. Yet he would not have wanted to challenge a Great Necromancer of Maat, and if Kharnaces still existed in undead form in his Tomb…

  “It shouldn’t be,” said Kalgri.

  Cassander scowled. “Why not?”

  “Kharnaces was a heretic,” said Kalgri. She stepped closer, her blue eyes wide and glittering with madness. “Do you know the nature of his heresy?”

  “He denied Anubankh and the other gods of ancient Maat, I imagine,” said Cassander.

  “He worshipped,” whispered Kalgri, “the nagataaru.”

  Silence hung between them for a moment.

  “I see,” said Cassander.

  “Where do you think Callatas learned of the nagataaru?” said Kalgri. She was so close that he felt her hot breath as she spoke and saw the flickers of shadow and purple flame in the depths of her blue eyes, like fire dancing beneath a crust of ice. “A long, long time ago Callatas fled Iramis. He went to Pyramid Isle, and there he learned all he wanted to of the nagataaru, and much, much more. In time he escaped…but Kharnaces is still waiting there.”

  “Why are the Staff and Seal in his Tomb?” said Cassander.

  “Because in all the earth and all the netherworld and all the worlds that ever were or ever will be,” said Kalgri, “there is only one place Callatas is too frightened to go. The Tomb of Kharnaces.”

  “I see,” said Cassander.

  “You can go there, if you wish,” said Kalgri. “I will not stop you. But I will not go with you, for you will never return.”

  “But Caina will?” said Cassander. “Why?”

  “Because she has the help of an Iramisian loremaster and an Iramisian valikon,” said Kalgri. “True, she might not return. Ill fortune can overtake anyone. But I believe Caina shall return. And if you lie low and remain quiet, if you set a watch over the harbor and strike from the shadows…then she will walk into your waiting arms with the relics.”

  “And you will kill her, then,” said Cassander.

  “Of course,” said Kalgri. “You can take the credit with Callatas. I don’t care who claims the reward for her head, so long as I am the one to kill her.”

  “And the Staff and the Seal?” said Cassander. “What about them? Will you claim them and take them to Callatas?”

  Kalgri laughed, longer and louder than Cassander had ever heard her laugh. “If you can claim the relics, they are yours. I cannot use them, and I have no interest in them.”

  “The Seal can bind spirits,” said Cassander. “Perhaps it could bind the nagataaru within you.”

  “Ah,” breathed Kalgri. “That would be fun.”

  “Fun?” said Cassander, then he remembered what she had said about corpses at one’s feet. “The Seal can’t control you. You would play along, lull the bearer of the Seal into a false sense of confidence…”

  “You begin to understand the nature of victory,” said Kalgri. “It matters not what happens along the path. What matters is the end of the path.” She shrugged. “If you want the Staff and Seal, take them. They are yours…if you can keep them when Callatas comes to kill you for the relics.”

  “And if Caina fails?” said Cassander. “If she dies upon Pyramid Isle?”

  Kalgri shrugged again. “Then she dies, and I am rid of her. No one will ever claim the Staff and the Seal. But you…you have a plan for Callatas, don’t you? A plan that will kill a lot of people.” Her eyes glittered with that unsettling madness again. “A lot of people.”

  Cassander snorted. “Then you win no matter what you do, is that it? You like killing people…and regardless of what I decide to do, you’ll kill a lot of people.”

  She smiled. “I’m so glad we understand each other at last.”

  Cassander said nothing. There was something that she was not telling him, he was sure of it. She knew too much about his plans, and he knew far too little about hers. But, then, what plans did someone like the Red Huntress actually have? She liked to kill people, and had no long-term plans beyond that.

  And the plan she had suggested to him was sound. Let Caina Amalas and her allies do the hard work of breaking into the Tomb of Kharnaces and retrieving the Staff and Seal of Iramis. Let them walk into his waiting arms in Rumarah. Cassander would then kill Caina, or let Kalgri do it for him, and Cassander could take the credit. If Callatas kept his bargain and opened the Starfall Straits, well and good.

  And if Callatas broke his word…well, Cassander would have the Staff and the Seal to bolster his position.

  They would make his plan to open the Starfall Straits by force all the easier.

  “Very well,” said Cassander. “What did you have in mind?”

  Chapter 14: Pyramid Isle

  The knock at the cabin’s door awoke Caina.

  She sat up at once, reaching for the dagger under her pillow. The cabin was small and narrow, with little room to fight. Yet that meant a dagger was a better weapon in an enclosed space, and…

  “It’s Kylon,” said a familiar voice through the door. “We’ve arrived.”

  Caina rubbed her forehead, clearing the last of the fog from her mind. Gods, but she felt tired.

  “I’ll be right up,” said Caina.

  They had reached Pyramid Isle. Perhaps today would be the day that she died.

  It was time to go to work, and she needed to prepare.

  Caina pulled on her boots, her daggers going into their hidden sheaths. The ghostsilver dagger went into its scabbard on her belt, along with a short sword, and more throwing knives went up her sleeves, the pyrikon upon her left wrist clinking when she slid the blades past it. She tucked smoke bombs into various pockets, a coil of rope and a collapsible grapnel going on her belt. She made sure her father’s signet ring hung from its cord around her neck, and she took her shadow-cloak, rolled it up, and hid it beneath her leather armor.

  Undoubtedly she would soon need it.

  Caina did not bother with the ragged brown cloak of her caravan guard disguise. Pyramid Isle was uninhabited, and it was too damned hot for the thing.

&
nbsp; She pulled open the flimsy door. Kylon waited in the narrow hallway, wearing leather armor, trousers, and heavy boots, the valikon slung over his shoulder. He had a number of daggers sheathed at his belt.

  His expression was grim.

  “What’s wrong?” said Caina.

  “Can you feel the aura?” said Kylon.

  “I just woke up,” said Caina. “I…”

  Now that he mentioned it, she did feel the presence of a faint sorcerous aura. Her first thought was that Murat had a sorcerer among his crew. Then she realized the aura was necromantic in nature, which meant the corsairs had a necromancer among them.

  No. It was too faint for that. Too broad. It felt like…

  “A bloodcrystal?” said Caina, blinking. The aura reminded of the terrible power that had radiated from the Ascendant Bloodcrystal in Caer Magia and the Subjugant Bloodcrystal she had destroyed in the Inferno. “Gods, how did I miss that?”

  “It just started a few moments ago,” said Kylon. “Likely Kharnaces was interred with a greater bloodcrystal.”

  “Or more than one,” said Caina. “We’re almost to Pyramid Isle?”

  “It just came into sight,” said Kylon. “We’d better get up on deck. Murat’s crew isn’t happy. I think the only thing keeping them from heading back to Rumarah right now is the promise of Nasser’s payment.”

  “Well,” said Caina, “if they see you fight, that might change their minds. Hopefully it won’t come to that.”

  They climbed to the galley’s deck. The air was hot and humid, and Caina felt sweat appear on her forehead just from the minor effort of climbing the ladder. It was an hour or so past dawn, but the surrounding seas were gloomy, the sun concealed beneath heavy clouds. Fingers of mist flowed over the sea, and in the distance Caina saw a thick band of fog.

  From the heart of the fog rose a pyramid of bone.

  At least, it looked like a pyramid made of bone. After a moment, Caina saw that it was a rough hill of pale white stone with a flat top, perhaps a thousand feet tall. As she looked further, she caught sight of a brilliant green jungle around the base of the hill, and glimpses of a sandy shore encircling the island.