Chapter 41 #2
With his fingers digging into his eyeballs, Orry swore. “You were right, oh handsome one. There is no smarter or,” Orry swallowed, “virile man alive, and I should’ve known better than to contradict someone of your superior intellect.”
“Better.”
“Now what?”
“Let’s head to the apothecary. Ren should be there by now.”
“Fine. But we should—”
“What have we here, boys?”
Croak froze. Low chuckles and the sound of metal clanging came from behind them. Turning slowly, both Croak and Orry looked wide-eyed at the trio of guards leering at them. One had his sword out, idly tapping the blade against the side of his leg as he grinned maliciously at them.
“Sorry, Your… Watchfulness,” Croak said with a smile. “We are weary travelers who seem to have gotten lost. We’ll just go and find our big group of very large and dangerous friends and leave you to your… City Watching.”
Croak tugged on Orry’s sleeve and made to leave when one of the guards shoved him in the shoulder. Stumbling back, Croak sighed and closed his eyes for a beat.
“Not until you tell me what you’re doing here. This is the clerics’ residences.”
“Oh!” Croak said, slapping his forehead as he looked at Orry in feigned shock.
“You told me this was the brothel with the contortionist from Boha!” Turning to the three guards, Croak put a hand to his heart and graced them with a sheepish smile.
“Sorry, boys—guards!—apologies. My friend obviously doesn’t know the difference between a whorehouse and a cleric’s asshole. Excuse us.”
“I wish I could,” said the one with his sword out.
His apologetic smile was about as genuine as the shroud they’d given Duke Aurora all those months ago.
“But you see, we’ve been looking for Ormano Peredor,” he brought up his sword to point at Orry.
Like an idiot, Orry raised his hands and squeaked.
“So if he’s Ormano Peredor, the cleric, then you must be… ”
Before Croak could protest, his hands were grabbed by a guard who’d surreptitiously snuck up behind him. He’d been so worried about what Orry would do, he hadn’t seen the guard at all until it was too late.
“I don’t know who this ‘Ormano Peredor’ is,” Croak called out as the guard bound his hands. Another did the same to Orry who looked at him in terror. “If you knew us at all, you’d laugh at the idea that I’d ever be friends with a cleric.”
Orry’s expression became mulish, and Croak closed his eyes as he bit off a curse.
“Is that right?” The leader of this little group of assholes tapped his lip as if in thought. “Then why is this fat fuck wearing the robes of a cleric?”
“Hey!” Croak shouted, bursting forward, his face heating and his heart pounding murderously. “Only I get to call him fat, you fucking waste of sperm!”
“Croak!”
Croak shut his eyes again as the guards broke out in surprised laughter.
“Croak? As in Croak Luca?” The ringleader cackled like a loon. “Oh, this is a good day, boys.”
As they pushed Croak and Orry out of the alley, their laughter rang in Croak’s ears, making his blood boil.
Orry nudged him and smiled wanly at him. “Sorry, Croak.”
Croak shook his head. “Not yet, Orry. But I have a feeling we’re going to be.”
Terena walked out of the Boar’s Head Inn with Gabriol, Cassandra, and Migela, heading for the apothecary.
When Croak was four, he’d fallen into a patch of rattleberries and almost died.
Her mother had a basic knowledge of medicinal herbs but nothing that would save her son.
Lorence, their father, had taken Croak to an apothecary named Neokles, on the advice of Empress Adanna.
She used the apothecary’s services, despite his being a disgraced cleric.
After saving Croak’s life, he’d become a regular fixture at family meals, teaching her mother more about herbs, to the point she became his assistant.
“I’m worried about Croak and Orry,” Terena grumbled as they walked. “They should’ve been back here by now.”
“Must have stopped at a brothel on the way,” Gabriol snorted.
“If they’re not at the inn by the time we return from the apothecary, we’ll go looking.”
They’d been in Metilai close to a week now, and they were finally to meet up with Vassori.
The tiny shop was wedged between a cobbler and an abandoned tea room. It was in a less populated part of the city, which suited them perfectly.
As soon as they walked inside, Terena closed her eyes and breathed in the scents of the cozy shop.
Thyme, elerian, lavender, summer wart and rosemary were the ones she could pick out as they walked to the small counter.
It was filled with canisters of different herbs and balms, little vials of red, blue, green, dark purple, and clear liquids, some stoppered with corks and others with melted wax over the cork.
Terena knew from experience the waxed vials held poisons.
“Ah! Come to rob me blind, have you? Go on, then, take what you want. Too old to bother.”
Terena grinned at the feeble voice as Neokles walked out of the doorway to his sparse bedroom in the back. He walked with a very pronounced hunch, the knotty cane he held thudding with every other step. When he saw who had entered, he managed a wicked smile.
“Well, well. So this is what I have to do to get you to come out and see old Neokles, eh? Agree to let the Captain of the Imperial Guard have a secret meeting in my shop?”
Terena shot a wink at Gabriol who stood with his thumbs tucked into his belt as he smiled at the old man.
Kissing him on his balding head, Terena went on Neokles’s other side and tucked her hand into the crook of his elbow.
“I would’ve come sooner, old man, if I’d known how much you’ve missed me.”
“Of course, I missed you. Haven’t seen you in at least a year.”
“I’ve been… busy.”
“Aye, busy.” He turned to her when they reached the counter and he’d sat on the little stool behind it with a groan. “I suspect you’ve had to be careful, considering the emperor tried to kill you once already.”
“More than once,” Gabriol said.
“Right,” Neokles sighed.
“So.” Terena crossed her arms. “You said Xoran wanted to hold a meeting here. I think we’re the ones he’s meeting with, if it is for today. We came to meet with his sister, actually.”
“Didn’t mention a sister. Said he’d be here at ten bells.”
“So we have an hour to kill,” Migela signed as she leaned against the bookshelves to the left of the door.
“I’ll go look for the boys,” Gabriol said as he walked to the door. “I’ll either come back this way or meet you at the inn.”
“Thanks, Gabe,” Terena called out as he closed the door behind him.
“You have a book by Circe, the priestess,” Cassandra commented, looking down at the tome in her hands. Flipping it over, she squinted to read the text. It looked to be bound in red leather with faded black lettering on the front.
“That is not just any book,” Neokles said. His face became animated as he smiled at Cassandra. “You are holding Circe’s grimoire.”
“You’re joking,” Cassandra said sharply as she swung her head around to regard the herbalist.
“Not when it comes to witches,” the old man said with a wink.
“Do you know what this means?” Cassandra asked Terena. She shrugged as she watched the seer turn the book over and hug it to her chest.
“It’s a book of her spells, incantations, creating amulets—”
“And how to find amulets.” She stepped closer to Terena, turning the book in her hand as she motioned with it. “This book will help us find the Amulet of Ka?ra.”
“The Amulet of Ka?ra,” Neokles said in a voice filled with horror. “No, you must not! No!”
He made to stand, groaning the entire way up. Terena went to his side to help him, but he waved her away as he glowered at Cassandra.
“Give me that!”
Cassandra pulled the book away, holding it up high behind her. “We need this to find the amulet! The emperor is looking for it, too, and I think you’ll agree, Terena finding it is the lesser of two evils.”
“The gods hid it for a reason!” Neokles hissed as he reached up to try to take it from her. Instead, Terena reached around him and plucked the book from Cassandra’s hand.
“And yet the key to finding it sits in your dusty old shop?”
Flipping through it, Terena glanced up at him. “Why do you have this? I would’ve thought you, a good citizen of the empire, would’ve handed this over to the clerics or the City Watch to have it burned.”
“I would never! That book was a gift from—”
Terena glanced up at Neokles when he stopped speaking. Curiously, Cassandra chuckled as the old man stared down at the wood floor with a bemused expression.
“What is it?”
“What?” The old man looked up at her, befuddled.
“You were saying something.” Terena held the book up. “You said this was a gift from…?”
“Aye. That was a gift from—”
Again, Neokles stopped abruptly. Terena frowned and glanced at Cassandra. The seer stared at the old man with a knowing smile.
“Are you going to tell me the secret, too?”
Startled, Cassandra swung her gaze to Terena. “What?”
Terena narrowed her eyes, using the book to point at Cassandra and Neokles, who seemed very interested in his nails.
“You two are hiding something. What’s going on?”
Cassandra shook her head and Neokles held his hands up as if he was not to blame.
“She told me I shouldn’t say.”
“Who?”
Neokles opened his mouth to answer when the door burst open. Gabriol took two steps inside, his eyes wide and his braided locks disheveled.
Terena straightened as he caught her eye. Before he could speak, Xoran and Vassori came in behind him.
“We’ve got trouble,” Gabriol said, his expression cold.
“Your brother has been arrested,” Xoran nodded. “He and the cleric were just brought before the emperor.”