There was only a single master in evidence this early in the day, and she greeted them with a certain puzzlement. Rathe explained what they wanted, and even though he’d expected it, felt his heart sink as she shook her head.
“No, we haven’t taken in any new lottery-prentices. We do redraw if someone drops out, but that hasn’t happened in years—” She broke off as the two men turned away, Rathe calling his thanks over his shoulder.
“Back to Point of Hopes,” he said, and b’Estorr touched his arm.
“The river’s faster from here,” he said. “University privilege.”
They found a boatman more quickly than Rathe would have thought possible, but even so, he fidgeted unhappily until the boat drew up at the Rivermarket landing. Monteia was pacing the length of the main room as they burst through the door, but she stopped at once, seeing Rathe’s face.
“Inside,” she ordered, and jerked her head toward the workroom. Rathe started to follow, but b’Estorr caught his sleeve, handed him the orrery. Rathe took it, careful not to disturb the settings, and preceded the chief point into little room.
“Bad?” she asked, and shut the door behind them.
Rathe nodded. “They’ve taken her. They offered her a place in the embroiderers, the one thing she wanted badly enough to take chances for, and they’ve got her. And, Astree’s Web, it’s my fault. She would never have done this if I hadn’t asked her—”He broke off then, knowing how pointless this was, but Monteia shook her head anyway.
“You don’t know that, Nico. It’s the time of year to have your stars read, and Asheri always was—is—a saving creature. Tell me what happened.”
Rathe took a deep breath, and set the orrery on the worktable. Quickly, he ran through what Mijan had told him, finished with b’Estorr’s analysis. “She’s important to the process, he says, so they shouldn’t hurt her. But, gods, we have to find her.”
Monteia nodded, her expression remote. “I’ll send to Fairs again, tell him what’s happened today—I already told him to arrest any astrologers he found, and why, but I haven’t heard anything yet. This should make him move a little faster, though.” She shook her head. “It’s times like these I wish Astreiant still had walls. I’ll send people to ask at the gates and the inns along the main highway, see if anyone saw her or someone taking a child with them, but I can’t say I’ve a lot of hope for it.”
They hadn’t found any of the other children this way, there was little likelihood Asheri would be any different. Rathe swallowed his anger, said, “There has to be something else we can do.”
Monteia looked at him. “If you think of something, Nico, let me know.”
“I’m sorry.” Rathe shook his head. “She’s a good kid—and it’s my doing, Chief. This one’s my responsibility.”
Eslingen took the river way from Customs Point to Point of Hopes, the early sun warm on his back through the heavy fabric of his second-best coat. The weight of it, and the stains on the dark green linen, annoyed him unreasonably; if he was going to go to Rathe with this particularly questionable story, he would have preferred to look his best. Inside the station’s wide main room, the duty point looked up at him, blankly at first, and then with recognition.
“Is Rathe around?” Eslingen said, before the woman could say something unfortunate, and she grinned.
“He’s withthe chief point now—Eslingen, isn’t it? You can wait if you want, but it’s a busy morning.”
“Already?” Eslingen murmured, but turned away from the table before she had to answer. A fair-haired man in a dark red coat, shirt open at the throat, was sitting on the bench that stretched along one short wall, reading through a sheaf of broadsheets. Not the sort of person I’d’ve expected to see here, Eslingen thought, not a merchant but not a knife, either, and only then saw the anvil and star of the Starsmith pinned to the fair man’s cuff. A poet or an astrologer, the soldier decided, or maybe a magist out of his robes, and he smiled. “Hope you don’t mind,” he said, and settled himself on the bench beside the fair-haired man, keeping a scrupulous distance between them.
The man looked up, his face unsmiling but not unwelcoming, and nodded. “Looking for Nico?”
Eslingen nodded. “A friend of his, are you?”
“I do some work for him from time to time.”
Eslingen looked again at the badge on the man’s cuff. “An astrologer?”
The man shook his head. “A necromancer, actually,” he said, and offered his hand. “Istre b’Estorr. I’m at the university.”
For a wild moment, Eslingen wondered how Rathe could have found out about the bodies already, and have had the foresight to call in a necromancer for something that wasn’t even in his jurisdiction. He had never liked the idea of necromancers, no soldier did—no matter what the scholars said, he thought, some of those deaths had to be untimely. b’Estorr tipped his head to one side, and Eslingen shook himself, took the hand that was held out to him. “My name’s Eslingen, Philip Eslingen. Late of Coindarel’s Dragons.”
“Oh. And currently Hanselin Caiazzo’s knife,” b’Estorr said.
Eslingen looked at him warily, wondering how in all hells he could have known that, wondering, too, what ghosts he might be carrying that the other could feel. b’Estorr smiled faintly, as though he’d guessed the thought.
“Nico mentioned you once, said he owed you a good turn. I’m glad to meet you. It’s made a lot of people much easier to know that Caiazzo has a capable knife to back him again.”
“So I heard,” Eslingen said. “Are you working for Rathe now?”
b’Estorr nodded, the smile vanishing. “I’m afraid so—”
He broke off as the door to the workroom opened, and Rathe burst out again. “Monteia’s sending to Fairs, we’ll see if Claes can’t find one of these damn astrologers, make him tell us what’s going on—” He broke off, seeing Eslingen. “Philip. Sorry, what are you doing here?”
Eslingen looked back at him. “I need to talk to you—Caiazzo sent me—but if this is a bad time—what’s happened?”
Rathe took an unsteady breath. “Asheri, one of our runners. She’s disappeared—been stolen, like the others. And we know a large chunk of how, and why, but still not who, or where they’re being taken.”
“Gods,” Eslingen said.
“So unless it’s really important,” Rathe went on, “you’ll have to wait.”
Eslingen hesitated. “It is important,” he said at last, “but I think I can wait, at least until you’ve gotten this settled.”
Rathe gave him a fleeting smile of thanks, looked at b’Estorr. “Is there any way we can narrow down the location of the mine? Something in the kids’ stars, anything?”
Eslingen froze, his eyes widening. A mine and the missing children in the same breath, and a crazy magist in Mailhac… He took a deep breath. “What’s this about a mine?” Rathe turned on him, eyes angry, and Eslingen held up a hand. “What I was sent to say, it may be more important that I thought. What mine, Rathe?”
“The children who’ve been taken, they all have the right stars to work the process that turns gold into aurichalcum,” the pointsman answered, impatiently. “It’s the only thing we’ve found that binds them together, but now we have to figure out where that gold mine could be.”
Eslingen swore. “Look, Rathe, last night Caiazzo met a man—” He broke off, shaking his head, tried to reorder his thoughts. “There’s an estate in the Ajanes, Mailhac, it’s called, the woman who ostensibly owns the title actually owes Caiazzo a lot of money, and she pays it out of the take of a gold mine that’s part of the estate.”
“Which explains where Caiazzo’s cash comes from. Rathe said, but his eyes were wary. ”And I hear he’s had trouble with money this season.”
Eslingen nodded. “The gold hasn’t come in the way it should. And from what the messenger said, it won’t be. There’s a magist living on the estate, apparently he promised to increase the take, but that was just to get her confidence. According
to Mal—the messenger, it’s him, the magist, who’s running everything, and keeping all the gold on the estate. The rumor was, he may be making use of it himself.”
“Gods,” the necromancer murmured, and Rathe waved him to silence.
Eslingen went on, “Caiazzo’s man was attacked on his way here— that’s what I was really sent here for, to tell you who’d left a pair of bodies in the Little Chain Market, and to claim self-defense, which it was. I was also supposed to tell you about the Ajanine situation, make it clear that, whatever de Mailhac thinks she’s doing, Caiazzo has nothing to do with it.” He shook his head. “But this… this is worse than any of us imagined. I don’t want Caiazzo hanged for a high treason he’s not committing. He’s been going mad from the want of gold, it could be a disaster if he doesn’t get it, but he doesn’t want queen’s gold, he wants spending gold.”
“Caiazzo has a magist in his household, doesn’t he?” Rathe said. “She must have suspected something when she heard the news.”
“She did,” Eslingen answered, “she mentioned aurichalcum, but she thought it was political. Something to do with the starchange and maybe with the clocks—which, as I said, is why I’m here.”
“She would have needed to know the children’s nativities to make the connection,” b’Estorr said, and Rathe nodded.
“Yeah, I can see that. But, gods, now we know—” He broke off as the door to the workroom opened again, and Monteia stepped out, waving a sheet of paper to dry the ink.
“Know what?” she asked, and Rathe bared teeth in a feral grin.
“Where the children are.”
“Where?”
“An estate called Mailhac, in the Ajanes.” Quickly, Rathe outlined Eslingen’s information. “It fits, Chief, and too well to be a coincidence. This has got to be where they are.”
Monteia nodded thoughtfully. “A noble. That would explain how she could afford all these hired hands, or how this magist could, with a noble name to back him.” She looked at Eslingen. “I suppose I believe you when you say Caiazzo’s not involved.”
“If he were,” the soldier answered, “I wouldn’t be here.”
“True enough,” Monteia said.
“We have to send someone after them,” Rathe said, “and I want it to be me. Gods, if we move fast enough, Asheri’s only been gone since last evening, we might be able to overtake them.”
Monteia shook her head. “I can’t send you, Nico, and it’s not because I don’t agree with you. We don’t have the authority outside Astreiant, you know that. That’s the queen’s business.”
“If we can convince her, or her ministers or whoever, intendants probably, to act in time,” Rathe said, bitterly.
“Which is why I want you—and Master b’Estorr and Master Eslingen, if he’s willing—to go to the surintendant,” Monteia went on as though he hadn’t spoken, though Eslingen suspected from the set of her lip that she was barely holding her own temper in check. “Tell him what we’ve found, and see what he can do.”
Rathe nodded, tightly. “Sorry, Chief.”
Eslingen sighed. “Caiazzo is simply going to love this.”
“Caiazzo,” Rathe said, “will appreciate not being hauled up on treason charges. Come on.”
They took a low-flyer, and Rathe paid without demur. As they climbed out of the carriage outside the Tour, Eslingen glanced uncertainly up at the thick stone walls. It looked more like a fortress—more like the gatehouse it had once been, the strongest point in the city walls—than a court of justice, and he couldn’t help wondering just how much of the old ways still prevailed within those walls, in spite of all the boasting. Caiazzo would not be pleased, he was sure of that, and wished for an instant that there had been time to contact the trader, ask what he wanted done. But Rathe was right, time was short, especially if there was to be any chance of overtaking this last victim. He took a deep breath, and followed the others into the dimly lit building.
Rathe spoke quietly to the first green-robed clerk he saw, and within minutes, they were ushered into the surintendant’s room. Eslingen glanced around once, quickly, impressed in spite of himself by the delicately painted paneling, fruited vines climbing pale willow trellises, and the obviously expensive furniture. Then the man behind the desk cleared his throat, and Eslingen blinked, startled. The surintendant wore plain black, unrelieved by any lace, just the pale linen at collar and cuffs, and his thinning hair was cut unfashionably short. He raised one sandy eyebrow in chill query, and Eslingen found himself wondering whether the furniture or the clothes represented the man’s real taste.
“We know what’s happening to the children, sir,” Rathe said, and Eslingen saw the older man blink.
“Then you had better sit down, hadn’t you? Magist b’Estorr I know, primarily by reputation, but this gentleman?”
Eslingen met the cold stare calmly. “Philip Eslingen, lieutenant, late of Coindarel’s Dragons, currently of the household of Hanselin Caiazzo.”
“Indeed?” Fourie looked at Rathe, the hint of a smile on his thin lips.
“Not what you think, sir,” Rathe answered, and no longer felt the triumph he had expected. It was a hollow victory, with Asheri lost. “When we determined that the one thing all the lads had in common was that they knew their stars to better than the quarter hour, I asked Istre to look at all of them together, to see if he could find something in common there—why these children, with these stars.”
b’Estorr said, “What I found was that there was only one magistical process for which these nativities, and children, would be suitable. And that is the making of aurichalcum.”
“Even Caiazzo isn’t that stupid, or ambitious that way,” Fourie said. His eyes narrowed. “Those damned hedge-astrologers, and you were right, Rathe, and I was wrong.” He looked at Eslingen then. “Or was I?”
Eslingen took a long breath, choosing his words carefully. “Master Caiazzo has—interests—in an estate in the Ile’nord, in the Ajanes, more properly. And there’s a gold mine on that estate.”
“Which has been funding his sudden prosperity, I daresay,” Fourie muttered. “Go on.”
“The owner of the estate has taken in a magist,” Eslingen said, “who seems to be keeping the gold for his own purposes, and is willing to kill to keep them secret.” He gave an edited version of the previous night’s events, stressing that Caiazzo had been waiting for an overdue payment. “Master Caiazzo thought it was just de Mailhac pushing to see how much she could get away with, she did that last year, too, or at worst that she’d overspent herself and didn’t have the money to send, never something like this. As soon as he realized it involved politics, he sent me to the points.”
“And that was the last piece we needed,” Rathe said. “The children are at Mailhac, in the Ajanes.”
Fourie leaned back in his chair, pressing his long fingers together at the tips. “It’s never the easiest solution with you, is it, Rathe? An estate in the Ajanes, which means it falls under the rule of four quarters.” He shook his head. “It’ll take time to organize an expedition, a few days at least—”
“We don’t have that much time,” Rathe said. “Putting aside the kids, we don’t know what he’s mining the aurichalcum for, we could be standing on the edge of a disaster—”
b’Estorr cut in, his own voice uncharacteristically urgent. “The clocks—aurichalcum moves clocks, or it can, it has powers most of us don’t even dream of, not in our nightmares. There’s no time to be lost.”
“There’s no time left,” Rathe said.
Fourie lifted a hand, and Rathe subsided reluctantly. “I have no authority outside Astreiant. No pointsman, adjunct point, or surintendant himself has that authority outside the city. Much as I’d like to, much as I desperately want to, I can’t send you or anyone into the Ajanes. I don’t have the power.”
It was an impasse, Eslingen thought, and a bad one. He looked at Rathe, seeing the frustration barely held in check, saw the same anger, better hidden, in the magist’s
eyes. He said, slowly, certain he would regret it later, “Denizard—Caiazzo’s household magist—she said Hanse would have to send someone north to deal with all of this. Admittedly, that was before we knew what was going on—” And Caiazzo still doesn’t, he realized abruptly, would be furious when he was told. “—but I can’t see that it’ll change things. Someone will still have to deal with de Mailhac, and I don’t see why that someone can’t also deal with the magist and the children.”
“He has the resources,” Fourie said, with distaste. “And I’m sure a little good will from the judiciary wouldn’t come amiss. Especially given the questionable nature of his involvement in this entire affair.”
“The main thing is the children,” Eslingen answered, and prayed he wasn’t committing himself too deeply for Caiazzo to back him up. “Caiazzo has been made part of this without his knowledge and against his will. I know he’ll want to put it right.”
Fourie stared at him for a long moment, then reached for a sheet of paper. He dipped his pen in the silver inkwell and began to write, saying, “I’m not fond of relying on people like Caiazzo—or anyone outside the judiciary or the nobility, Lieutenant, not your master in particular. This should be a matter of the law. But, as you say, the children have to be our main concern.” He looked at Rathe, his pen never pausing. “Rathe, I want you to go with him. Mind you, this is not an order, I cannot order you to do anything outside the city, but you’re the best man I have.”
“Of course I’ll go,” Rathe said, and Fourie nodded.
“b’Estorr I can’t give any orders at all, but I imagine his talents would come in very useful.”
b’Estorr looked at Eslingen. “If you’ll have me, yes, I’ll come.” His mouth tightened. “I’d like to see the end of this.”
“You’d be welcome,” Eslingen answered, and meant it.
“I wish I could send a troop of the royal guard with you,” Fourie went on, and lifted the sheet of paper, waving it to dry the ink, then reached for his seal and a stick of wax. “Unfortunately, there isn’t time to arrange it. What I can do, have done, is send you with a letter authorizing you to call on the royal auxiliaries in the area.” He glanced at another sheet of paper, looked at Eslingen with another of his thin smiles. “They’re commanded by your old colonel, Lieutenant. It makes one wonder what Coindarel has done this time.” He looked back at Rathe, held out the sheet of paper. “Use it if you need to, Nico. I hope you don’t.”
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