trance to the building.
She gestured to the men. “Thieves will be a concern once
news about the messengers spreads.”
I paused in the threshold, soaking in the warmth and
hum of the kiln. Pazia gave me a quick tour of her gleaming
shop. Everything appeared to be in order. All the right tools
hung within reach, the mixing room was stocked with the
proper ingredients and the annealing ovens contained cooling
projects.
But no diamonds. Black or otherwise.
She tsked at me when I asked. “You can’t just leave them
lying around!” Pazia led me to a windowless office in the
back. A safe had been built into the wall. She spun the dial
with practiced ease, opening the thick door.
Magic poured from the safe. Pulling out a drawer, she set
it on her desk. Then she hefted a couple of super messengers,
stacking the blocks next to the drawer. I hesitated.
“Go on, Opal. I trust you.”
Being trustworthy hadn’t been my concern. It was the lumps
of black that caused my reluctance. No vial of blood in sight. I guess I should be happy the super messengers were legitimate
except I couldn’t produce the emotion.
When I reached for one of the diamonds, Pazia said, “Be
careful, they’re charged. You’ll be okay as long as you don’t
try to use the magic.”
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I paused. “Who charged them?”
“One of my father’s people.”
Pushing through a thick layer of magic, I picked up a small
black stone and held it up to the sunlight. It looked familiar, but as a gemstone, it failed to impress me. “Why doesn’t it
glitter?”
“No sense polishing and faceting them if they’re going into
the glass.”
I replaced the stone and grabbed one of the messengers. The
power felt muted. “Can you send messages?” I asked her.
“Yes.” An inner excitement danced from her eyes.
“You can do more with them.” It wasn’t a question, but a
heartrending realization.
“Can’t you?” she asked. “I so hoped they would help you,
too.”
“No.” As usual, I felt the power, but couldn’t use it. “What
else can you do?”
“It’s…odd. It’s like I have magic again, but instead of draw-
ing from the power source through my…” She tapped her
chest. “Through me, I draw on the cube. And when the
power is gone, I take it back to my father and he has them
charged again. My abilities from before remained the same. I
can still light fires, move objects and read minds, but I have
to be touching the glass.”
Another thought struck me. Even if I recovered my blood,
no one would want my little glass animals when Pazia’s super
messengers could do so much more. Except for the cost. “Has
your father decided on a price?”
“No. But he plans to be…egalitarian about them. He’s going
to give one to each Master Magician for free, and then anyone
can purchase one. He’ll work out payment plans. If you think
about it, you could buy one and then charge a fee for others to use. Once the messenger is paid for, you could make money.
I’m sure businesses will capitalize on that.”
The possibilities were endless. The richest man in Sitia
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would be even richer. What would he do with all that gold?
I’d purchased a number of things with mine, but besides the
wedding, none of them touched the emptiness inside me.
Devlen’s Story Weaver mumbo jumbo about it being filled
had been wrong.
Pazia returned the messengers and drawer of diamonds to
the safe.
Trying to see all angles, I thought if I did regain my powers,
my animals would be much cheaper and they would compete
with Vasko’s, especially if he had only a few super messengers.
Would he steal my blood to keep that from happening?
I pointed to the safe. “Is that all the diamonds?”
“No. The vein is pretty thick.”
I considered. I’ve never seen a black diamond before. So
why did they feel familiar? “Can I see the vein?”
“I’ll have to ask my uncle.”
We left the factory and searched for her uncle. He worked
in a building that Pazia called the command center. She ex-
plained it was an old family joke that stuck.
Hans Cloud Mist stood up as soon as we entered his large
office. His resemblance to his brother Vasko was uncanny, and
I wondered if they were twins. Hans insisted he was not only
the younger brother but also the smarter and better-looking
one, as well.
Pazia rolled her eyes. “Just humor him. He thinks he’s
funny.”
Hans pretended to be hurt, but his pout lasted less than a
second. “Did Pazia show you her factory?” he asked me. “She’s
quite proud of it.”
She blushed and quickly changed the subject, asking about
a tour.
“You’ll have to get permission from Galen.” He glanced
out the window. “He should be overseeing checks now.”
She
frowned.
“Another uncle?” I asked.
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“No. My father’s right-hand man and I don’t need his
permission.”
“Are you going to be her tour guide?” Hans asked.
Pazia shivered. “No.”
“And I don’t know where the vein is, so it’s Galen or
nothing.”
She grumbled, but didn’t argue. I followed her from Hans’s
office.
“Why can’t you take me?” I asked.
“I can’t stand being in the mines. I’m claustrophobic.” She
stopped. “Are you?”
“Afraid of small spaces?”
She nodded. “And the dark?”
“No
lanterns?”
“Plenty of light, but sometimes an errant wind blows them
out. We pump air down into the shafts to keep it fresh.”
I thought of my various adventures, being hidden in a box
under a pile of sand, swimming through a tunnel in a cave
and spending a couple weeks chained in a dark cell. “I’m not
claustrophobic.”
“Good.”
“Do you know the location of the vein?” I asked her.
“No. I think only Father and Galen do. They tend to get
all paranoid when they make a new find. Both of them know
every shaft below. I don’t even think there are any maps.” She
shook her head and continued.
Pazia led me to the lowest level of the command center.
Rumors about the main entrance to the mines hadn’t been
too far off. Instead of being in the basement of his house,
the doorway for the miners was deep under the command
center.
I waited with Pazia as the day shift’s personnel streamed
in from the large cavern. Under the keen gaze of another
group, the workers stripped off their jumpers, stood under
spouts of water and were searched before they donned clean
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&
nbsp; clothes. The process reminded me of Wirral. Except they
seemed more worried about what might be smuggled out of
the mines than in. Mirrors lined the wall opposite the search
area and I suspected they were two-way ones and observers
lurked behind them.
When the last worker left, Pazia told me to wait while she
slipped behind the mirrors. It didn’t take her long before she
returned.
“Come on,” she said, almost running from the underground
entrance. She finally slowed when we exited the building.
“I hope you’re not in trouble,” I said.
“Not at all. Galen just gives me the creeps. He practically
lives in the mines. In fact, I haven’t seen him in seasons,
which is fine by me. But when I do see him, he acts like he’s
in charge.” She smoothed her skirt. “He gets away with that
attitude because my father trusts him.”
“What does he do?”
“Whatever my father wants.” She took a breath. “I know I
shouldn’t be so down on him. He’s dedicated to our family, and
he was the one who found the black diamond vein. And Galen
promised to find someone to give you a tour tomorrow.”
I accepted her offer to stay in their guesthouse, but con-
vinced her to join me at the Tourmaline Inn for supper. Pazia
made the proper appreciative noises over the large pink tour-
maline the inn’s owner, Carleen, wore around her neck.
Carleen remembered me, but since I had paid in full before
Janco and I had made our sudden departure, she welcomed me
back. She led us to a nice table and served us each a heaping
portion of beef pie. Pazia and I chatted about our days at the
Keep.
“How is your brother doing?” I asked.
She crinkled her forehead. “Which one?”
“Walker. Do you have another brother at the Keep?”
“No. My older brother also attended, but he graduated the
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season before I started. I guess Walker’s doing okay. He hasn’t written to say otherwise. Have you met him?”
I smiled, thinking about his attack. “Brief ly.”
“Don’t mind him. He’s a hothead like all the male members
of my family. They get all high and mighty about honor and
family and duty.”
“Your uncle Hans seemed nice,” I said.
“They’re all nice as long as you play their game. Once you
cross them, look out. They think it’s a personal assault.”
“Does your older brother work here, as well?”
“Sort of. My father calls him his secret weapon. He sends
him off on missions and to strong-arm the people who owe
my father money.”
Interesting. He would have enough money to purchase my
blood. As for motive, he could want revenge. “What type of
missions?”
“I don’t know and I don’t care. I never wanted to be in-
volved in the family business, but…” Pazia drained her wine,
then changed the subject. “So what’s new in the Keep’s glass
shop?”
I filled her in on the new kiln and water system. As we
talked, Nic and Eve entered the inn’s common room and
f lagged down Carleen. They rented a room and followed
the innkeeper up the stairs. Eve had signaled me her room
number, and after a few minutes I excused myself to meet up
with them.
Nic bounced on the edge of the bed. “I think you have
more pillows,” he said to Eve.
“She also has the best mattress in the house,” I said.
“It’s discrimination. All this pink is unfriendly to men.”
“At least she didn’t tell you to take a bath,” I offered, but
he wrinkled his nose.
I tried to stif le a laugh. “She’s concerned about your
health.”
“She’s concerned about her clean sheets,” Eve said.
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He crossed his arms and continued to look sour. “Should
I be listening for anything in particular at the bathhouse?”
“Good idea. I think there’s a bathhouse over by the miners’
village,” I said. “They’re basically barracks for the under-
ground workers. Listen for any comments about black coal or
black diamonds from the miners.”
“Do they know what’s going on?” Eve asked.
“They’re not supposed to, but…”
“It’s hard to keep something that big a secret,” Nic finished
for me. “I wouldn’t be surprised if one of them smuggled a
few stones out.”
“It would be difficult.” I explained about the search.
“But not impossible,” he said.
I recalled what I had been able to carry into Wirral with
me. “You’re right. Nothing’s impossible.”
“We should make that our motto.” Nic surged to his feet.
“This is probably a waste of time,” I said. “So far, every-
thing appears to be legitimate.”
“Nothing wrong with good news,” Eve said. “It would be
refreshing.”
I felt a small twinge of guilt as I crept from the guesthouse.
My actions were not exactly proper guest behavior. Oh well.
A half-moon hung high in the sky, illuminating the buildings.
Even at this late hour, armed guards patrolled the walkways
and a dozen guarded the main house.
Avoiding Vasko’s residence—I needed more training to slip
past so many watchers—I sneaked into a couple of the utili-
tarian structures. Conveyor belts from underground brought
up crushed rock, dumping it into piles. Workers shoveled the
rock into screens and sifted the material. Others watched.
Interesting how all the sorting was done inside. Even the
wagons filled with rejected material were taken to another
building. I found a couple of open mine shafts, but they were
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too small to be anything but air vents and they had protective
walls around them.
From my nighttime explorations, I couldn’t find another
way into or out of the mines. Before stopping, I circled the
command center. Guards had been stationed next to the two
entrances, but no one bothered to watch the sides of the build-
ing. With no windows on the first two f loors, there wasn’t a
reason to be concerned. Unless the thief ’s teacher happened
to be Valek, who delighted in climbing up sheer walls. And
most people didn’t bother to lock shutters on windows above
the fourth f loor.
I kicked off my boots, tied the laces together and looped
them around my neck. Using fingers, toes and a mortar crum-
bler invented by Valek, I scaled the side of the building. By-
passing the third and fourth f loors, I found an open window
on the top level and entered a dark office.
I poked around the offices on the fifth f loor, read a few
papers by moonlight and worked my way down. All the offices
looked the same, and I found nothing out of the ordinary. Even
Vasko’s spacious work area held nothing incriminating.
After searching a few more rooms, I decided to exit the
building through Vas
ko’s office on the third f loor. Unlocking
the shutters, I pushed them wide. The light from the moon
pierced the darkness and shone on the desk. Metal glinted
from under the wooden top. I pulled the chair back and ran
a hand along the wood. Encountering a small lock, I crawled
under and used my picks. A small panel clicked open.
Inside the hidden drawer were stacks of files. I brought them
out into the moonlight and skimmed the papers. About three
files down, I hit the jackpot.
My name had been written on the file folder’s tab, and
inside was an accounting of expenses. The list included prices
for forged documents, bribes, the purchase of drugs and weap-
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ons. Damned expensive, but worth every piece of gold, was scrawled under the total. And farther down it in big letters, Success!
Junior pulled it off again.
Finally a connection ! Junior had to be Vasko’s son and Pazia’s older brother. And from the list of prison officials Junior had bribed, he had to be Finn. He was the right
age and had attended the Keep. I did another quick search of
Vasko’s office, but uncovered nothing to implicate him. They
hadn’t used my blood for the super messengers. So where was
it? Locked away?
“Find anything interesting?” a male voice asked from the
doorway.
I stif led a yelp and grabbed my switchblade. The snick of
the blade cut through the quiet office.
“Easy, Opal. It’s me.”
“What are you doing here?”
“Same thing you are, looking for clues.”
“I meant why here in Ognap?”
“Oh, that.” Janco entered the office. He wore a skintight
black coverall and had darkened his face.
“We linked Finn to Vasko Cloud Mist and I’m playing
miner, hoping he’ll show up. But no luck so far.”
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“And the message to me that you found Finn is en route to
the Citadel?”
“I didn’t find him,” he said. “He’s Vasko’s oldest son and
he has dropped out of the gossip network. None of our…in-
formers have been able to tell us where he’s been for the last
half year.”
I showed Janco the file of expenses. “Why would Vasko
send his son undercover? It doesn’t make sense.”
“From what I’ve been hearing, Vasko doesn’t trust many
people outside his immediate family. And he kept his children
out of the spotlight. Perhaps for that reason.”
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