CHAPTER 16
Writing with a reed pen wasn’t my favorite.
I had found all sorts of paper in my office: the rougher sheets; the smoother ones; thin, brownish everyday paper; the pale formal paper; even the thick fancy paper, embossed with an ornate border and accented by a thin magenta thread.
I probably would’ve found a bullet journal if I looked long enough.
All of that was great. The reed pens were something else entirely.
Rellasian reed pens were carved out of hollow reeds, which were then tipped with a metal nib and filled with ink.
Lasa, the horrible shit smear that he was, had used them to produce a feathery, beautiful script.
How he’d managed that escaped me. I kept scratching the paper and leaving holes everywhere.
Outside the last of the sunset had burned down to twilight, the sky like purple velvet.
Fortunately, I had two oil lanterns—the larger floor lamp and the smaller one for my desk.
They weren’t as good as electric lamps, but they weren’t bad either, and their soft yellow glow turned my study into a cozy den.
My handwriting was never great and had gotten worse.
I typed at the speed of light and texted like a pro, but neither of those options were available here.
Besides, I was taught to write fast and clearly.
No frills, just legible letters. Writing in Rellasian was an exercise in pretty whorls.
I still couldn’t get over the fact that I knew how to do it.
I set the pen to paper, and Rellasian script came out.
I’d tried the Shears cypher for laughs and that worked, too.
If I ever got into the Shears’ HQ, all their secrets would be mine.
I had been at this for the better part of two hours. Now that we’d found the contraband iron, we had to decide what to do about it. I had a lot of things to write down.
A knock made me raise my head. Reynald stood in the doorway.
During the day, when he was doing things around the house, you forgot who he was and what he was capable of.
But right now, half wrapped in the gloom, he looked frightening.
His broad shoulders stretched his charcoal shirt.
He seemed to have congealed from twilight, complete with an impassive expression on his face.
Deadly swordsmen in my fantasy books loomed a lot, but I’d never seen anyone “loom” in real life.
Reynald could give a master class in looming.
If he wasn’t on our side, I’d be climbing out the window to get away.
“Come in,” I invited.
He stalked into the room and sat in the chair across the desk.
The golden glow of the lanterns played over the hard jaw and the defined contours of his cheekbones.
His gray-green eyes were cold and thoughtful, communicating just enough danger to catch your attention and hold it right there, on him.
You could put him on a cover just like that, with a sword by his chair, and I would buy it so fast, my phone would catch fire.
I also think you’re amazing . . .
Perspective. He wasn’t trying to impress me. He was just sitting in a chair.
“What are we going to do about the iron?” he asked.
Right. Back to business.
“It’s a valuable secret. We could sell it to the Shears,” I told him.
“The rebellion in the highlands is just south of Selva’s border.
If it flares up, Sauven will demand that Everard put it down and then find some fault with how he does.
The Sleepless Duke will lose soldiers, time, and money, and in the end, he’ll be accused of slaughtering helpless peasants or some other nonsense Sauven’s pack of counselors cooks up.
Don’t get me wrong, Everard is ruthless, but he doesn’t go out of his way to be cruel unless he is trying to make a point.
There is no point to be made in the hinterlands. ”
“We are ornery people,” Reynald said. “If we don’t rebel every decade or so, we get bored.”
Spoken like a highland man. Long ago that area was settled by geriben, who raided Rellas in their blade boats.
They were an independent and proud people, who kept the memories of their raiding glory alive, and they had no love for Rellasian bureaucracy.
It didn’t take much to set them off. If they weren’t rebelling, they were communicating their intention to rebel.
“Everard needs this rebellion like a hole in his head. Since the Shears are allied with him, they’ve been turning the kingdom inside out trying to figure out the iron supplier. They will pay top rate.”
He thought about it, his fingers tapping the right armrest. “What’s binding the Shears to Everard?”
“The Shears are led by Solentine Dagarra.”
“Ah.”
Nothing more needed to be said.
This portion of the continent was split between Rellas in the West and the Crimson Empire in the East. The two countries shared a long border, interrupted by the Corios Sea.
When they warred, their invasions happened either in the south, across a vast plain, or in the north, where three mountain ranges formed the Trihorn.
Solentine’s father, Margrave Izarn Demarr, held the southern edge of the Trihorn, while the Sleepless Duke shielded the northern side.
The Demarrs and the Everards had to cooperate.
They were both vassals of Rellas, but Izarn was much more vulnerable to Sauven’s whims and paranoia.
More, he had to maintain a large standing army that was beyond his means.
The Throne sent him an annual grant, and without that money the defense of the border would collapse.
Izarn couldn’t afford to piss Sauven off.
To keep everyone safe, a secret agreement was reached between the Everards and the Demarrs.
“Publicly, the Demarrs are cool toward Selva and hold themselves as if the Sleepless Duke is the necessary evil they must endure to guard the border,” I said.
“Privately, Solentine aids Everard in his ambitions using the Shears, at least for now. In return, if the Demarrs need help, Everard will come to their aid.”
“Good to know,” Reynald said.
While we’re on the subject . . . I handed him a small envelope.
“What is it?”
“Leverage against Solentine. If something happens to me, and you suspect the Shears are involved, you can use this to pressure him.”
Reynald studied the envelope. “Can I look at it?”
I nodded.
He opened the envelope, freed the single piece of paper inside, and read it. His eyebrows crept up.
Yeah. Solentine regretted a few things he had done in his life, but he was only ashamed of one. That one.
Reynald slid the paper back into the envelope.
“Solentine is very dangerous,” I said. “You’re the superior swordsman, but he has magic, and he won’t meet you head-on. He’s more likely to shoot you in the back and call it a day.”
“He wouldn’t be the first to try.” Reynald shrugged, then frowned. “You said Solentine supports Everard for now. Does he switch his allegiance?”
“Yes.”
“To Hreban?”
“No. Not at all. The Demarrs go at it alone.” And it would become their undoing.
“What causes the rift?”
Now that I’d met Solentine, I could picture it in my head, him standing in the middle of a terrible battle, splattered with blood and screaming. It would be a wordless, horrible howl, the sound of grief and rage so awful that it had to be vented or it would’ve torn him apart.
“Solentine is loyal to his family, while Everard is loyal only to Selva. The Sleepless Duke makes a choice that Solentine can’t live with.”
Reynald nodded, his expression thoughtful. “Makes sense. Only a fool expects loyalty from a man who salts fields and burns villages to the ground.”
Loyalty among the Great Families was a touchy subject. Some, like Bors, inspired it. Others, like Hreban, ruled through intimidation and money.
“There is also this.” I passed another folded piece of paper to him.
Reynald looked at it. “What language is this?”
“It’s the Shears’ cypher.”
“What does it say?”
“‘Don’t get into the carriage. Krasta has magic, and he’s fast with a knife.’”
“Is that a warning for Solentine?”
I nodded. “He’s getting desperate to find the source of iron. He took a shortcut and crossed a kir from the of Tangle.”
Kir meant a gang boss, and as criminals went, Krasta was one of the more vicious. Curiously, kir also meant “sergeant” and there was probably some deep meaning in that.
“What happens if he gets into the carriage?”
“He’ll win, but it will cost him the use of his left arm for about a month.”
“Everything I’ve heard about the Bastard of Dagarra says he can take care of himself,” Reynald said.
“Yes, but I don’t want to take a chance on Solentine being stabbed in the throat instead of his shoulder. I was thinking of asking Will to sneak the message into the Three Moons.”
“You feel something for Solentine,” he said.
“I know what drives him. He is a horrible bastard, but if you earn his loyalty, he will fight for you till his dying breath. I don’t want that breath to happen any time soon. He is useful.”
And that sounded a lot better than I spent too much time watching him struggle and now I’m emotionally invested despite my common sense.
“I’ll take care of it,” Reynald offered.
“Thank you. As you can see, Solentine is at his wits’ end. We can sell the secret of iron to the Shears. It would earn us some coin and let us keep the element of surprise. Hreban would continue his present course for a while, unaware that he was being targeted.”
“I sense a but coming.”
“We could also leak the existence of the iron to the Throne. We would lose the surprise, but we’d rattle Hreban’s cage. He’s been too comfortable for too long. Planning to kidnap Galiene’s daughter, killing a man and paying the city guards to watch the body . . . He thinks he is untouchable.”
It rankled me.
“I think I know why that is,” Reynald said. “Silveren.”
“You think Hreban and the Redeemers are already allied?”
He nodded.
“Why? When Hreban approaches Silveren after coming to power, Silveren seems to be conflicted about it. He hesitates.”
“Because Hreban is not a strategist, but Silveren is. I fought with Silveren once, years ago. The man is sly, subtle, and guarded. He doesn’t seek personal recognition, he avoids it.
I watched him formulate the plan of assault and then nudge the commanders in the room toward it until they saw it, and when they claimed it, he congratulated them on their superb strategy.
He observes, he waits, and he strikes only when he is sure.
I doubt he’s changed in the last few years.
I cannot see him throwing his lot in with Hreban on a whim. ”
In the books, after Hreban claimed his top-dog spot, he made a grand show of traveling to the Redeemer Tower and asking Silveren in front of the entire order to be his sword for justice and protection of the kingdom.
But that could’ve been staged. In fact, it probably was.
Hreban wouldn’t have risked public humiliation of being turned down.
He had to know in advance that Silveren would agree to aid him.
An existing alliance with Silveren would explain why Hreban was feeling bold. He had an entire knight order at his disposal. If things went badly, Silveren’s people had many ways of solving inconvenient problems.
Reynald leaned back, his expression thoughtful.
“I understand Hreban. Gaining the support of a knight order would go a long way to helping him climb up. The Defenders and the Conquerors each have a Great Family behind them. Allying with them is more complicated, while the Redeemers have no backing. I know what he gets out of it. But what’s in it for Silveren? ”
“The Redeemers rise in status above other holy orders.”
Reynald grimaced. “Status they would lose immediately if either Arvel or Bors decide they care. Too much risk for too little gain. No, it’s bigger than that.”
“So Silveren is using Hreban? To what end?”
“I was hoping you could tell me.”
Estol Silveren wasn’t a POV character. He didn’t have a lot of page time either.
He was the son of a baron from the southwest. His family was well-off.
He came from a long line of knights, and like his father, he had distinguished himself on the battlefield.
In war, he was clever and demonstrated flashes of brilliance.
When he was twenty-three, he was sent overseas on one of Rellas’s foreign campaigns.
The detachment of the army under his command had taken a small town and burned it to the ground.
It was unclear how the fire had started, but many people died, and Silveren was deeply affected by it.
He resigned and joined the Order of Redeemers, seeking forgiveness and absolution.
His rise through their ranks was meteoric.
Within five years, the aging Preceptor passed him the reins.
Silveren was thirty-one now, and so far, he’d stayed completely neutral, surfing the sea of political intrigue without getting his hair wet.
“I don’t know,” I told him. “Hreban holds him in high regard, which for him means refraining from openly sneering in Silveren’s direction.
When chaos starts, publicly the Redeemers act mostly as one would expect.
Once Hreban’s private troops are done rampaging, they put out the fires, keep the peace, and obey Sauven’s commands. ”
“And privately?”
“They do things that would turn your hair white. Especially Silveren. You’re right, he must have some kind of plan, but what is it?”
“I don’t know, and that troubles me.”
It troubled me as well.
There was something I was missing here, which wasn’t surprising.
Latour was infamous for inserting seemingly random scenes into the narrative.
They would sit there without any obvious reason for their existence, until three hundred pages later some shocking revelation would make them crucial and relevant.
One of them could’ve related to Silveren and without the final book, I would never make the connection, no matter how many times I’d reread.
The lack of the third book was so fucking frustrating.
“What do you want to do?” Reynald asked.
“I want to rattle Hreban’s cage.”
“You want to leak word of the iron.” His eyes lit up.
“Yes.”
“So do I.”
“Rattled people make mistakes. I want to see what he does.”
“Then we’re in accord. I want to stab Hreban and see if Silveren moves to counter.”
We shared a look across the table.
“It is far riskier than selling it to the Shears,” I said.
“I’m willing to take the risk,” he said. “Let me handle this as well.”
“What will you do?”
“I have a friend who works for the Justice Chamber.”
I waited but he didn’t volunteer anything else. Whoever this friend was, the books didn’t mention them.
“It’s my turn to demonstrate trust then.”
His grin had a slightly evil edge to it. “Don’t worry, Maggie. Your trust is not misplaced.”