Seventy Two: A Search

This is madness.

For once, he couldn't blame this one on Arlen. It had all been his idea, and as he had discussed the plans the previous night with his teacher, he hadn't liked the glimmer of satisfaction in Arlen's face as Jordan made suggestions and provided information. He wasn't remotely comfortable giving away the guest wing maps that Nova had sketched out for him, convinced it would be used in one of Arlen's nefarious plans later down the line, but what choice did he have? He had asked for the assassin's help and been accepted. No point getting squeamish now.

He walked along the guest corridor in the central wing of the castle. It wasn't far from Harkenn's study. It seemed ludicrous that the lord would take such a risk putting the Caelumese guests so close to his own rooms, but he also wouldn't have put it past the Angels to just move themselves, confident that the lord wouldn't have the wherewithal to notice. Jordan had just left a report to Lord Harkenn about his training progress, and the man had been barely recognisable.

Yddris waited at the end of the corridor. He didn't move until Jordan reached him, and even then it was only to heave a sigh. "How did the meeting go?"

Jordan hesitated. He was still trembling from the experience. "Horrible. Cael was poking at my mind the whole time, and Harkenn had a seizure halfway through and forgot who I was for five minutes."

The whole thing had fallen apart when Cael entered the room.

"Has Yddris given you an approximate time frame for graduating? Or is it too early to tell?" Harkenn had been asking him, partially concealing a tremor in his arm under the table. His paleness had turned sick and waxy. Even his orange glare had faded to glassy vagueness. Then the office door had opened without a preceding knock, Cael had entered, offering Jordan a smirk as he passed, and Harkenn had first turned unfocused and then slumped over on the desk and begun to seize. Jordan had only been grateful that the captain of the guard had followed the Angel inside and been able to assist.

"I don't understand why we can't just kick them out," he said, pulling himself back from that unpleasant memory. "It's obvious to everyone that something's gone wrong."

"Because if we show our hand too soon, boy, the Caelumese will leave and take any hope of curing Harkenn with them," Yddris muttered. "We can't afford to lose them before we know what they've done to him, or risk giving Lucifer an excuse to push harder while Harkenn is indisposed. Until the lord's signature is on a contract they like, or until he's dead, they won't leave. If they go empty handed and on the end of his boot, Lucifer will send someone else. He might even send an army, and without proof he'd be justified."

Jordan shuddered. "Still. I'm not looking forward to this at all."

"There are worse uses you could be putting these skills to," Yddris replied. "If you ask me, getting the practice Blackheart wants out of you from jobs that serve Harkenn is about as well as it could have worked out for you."

"If I remember right, that was my argument when I suggested it," Jordan said, a little smugly. His tutor just gestured rudely and led him on further down the corridor.

Jeorge Nerahardt was climbing a servants' staircase when they reached their meeting point, a scowl on his face. He didn't look any happier to find them already waiting at the top for him. "Those stairs are an absolute mare for a man on a crutch." He staggered to the landing, digging in his pocket. "Brillan would like me to pass on that he'll have your hide if a single one of these is missing when he gets them back."

He produced the castle's master key set and handed them over. All the keys save one had been tied together with string.

"Don't let any of them even touch that set, boy," Yddris added. "You won't see them swipe one if they have a mind to."

"I know, I know," Jordan growled. He was nervous enough without everyone else making it worse. "I have met them before, you know."

He stowed the set carefully in his pocket and tried to calm his pounding heart. Everything had been theory last night – it always felt different when actually doing it. Forefront in his mind was the mess that had been his last big job, despite his efforts to shove it aside. Last time, though, it had not brought the two halves of his life so perilously close to one another.

"Good luck," Jeorge muttered, with a doleful look at the stairs. "I think I'll need some too, getting back down those."

Jordan glanced at Yddris. At the end of the corridor, a narrow window showed the first rays of one of the moons rising. It was time to start.

Without another word to each other, they parted. Jordan followed Jeorge into the servants' staircase and pulled the hidden door to, then descended a few steps and squatted down to wait. There was a rune inscribed on the back of the door, humming faintly in his consciousness – at some point along this corridor, then, there was an outside exit. Its presence was strangely soothing in its familiarity.

The anticipation was almost a torture, sitting in the dark unable to hear what was happening. There were far more people involved in this than he had anticipated, but it was their best chance of succeeding. Not that he had told Arlen quite how many people – as far as the assassin was concerned, between him and the Varthian girl, Dela, they hadn't told anyone else. He didn't want to imagine what he would think of Jordan withholding Callan's key from him – but that was a different plan for another time, and his only ally in that was an Angel slave.

When had his life become so fucking weird?

Static ran over his skin, the signal from Yddris that the wing would be deserted, and that the meeting between Cael and Kerrin had begun successfully. Blood started to pound in his ears. The calming exercises he had learned with Cara in the Guildtown were harder to reach during a high-strung situation like this, but he forced himself to stay present. He ducked out of the servants' stairwell and moved quickly down the hall to the furthest door on the left, pulling out the key set and unlocking the chamber door with the one hanging loose; then he rapidly replaced it in his inside pocket. There was no point in tempting them.

The room inside was just as neat as he had expected for a man like Cael. An astonishing array of grooming products sat on the vanity table, all gilt and glass, and the sheets on the bed were immaculate. A neatly-pressed outfit hung on the wardrobe door for the next day, lace and satin and glimmering embroidery. Have to look your best for slowly murdering a head of state, of course. He stirred himself from his distraction; timing here was crucial. He had no idea how long Kerrin could keep the delegation occupied when there was no guarantee that Harkenn would be in any fit state to help. Jordan wasn't even certain the lord knew what they were doing. It made a certain kind of sense, while they were unsure of the full extent of Cael's capabilities, not to let the poisoned man himself learn any details of the rescue attempt. So he locked the door behind him again, just to be certain. He didn't want to escape out the window with Akiva and Jesper, but he would if he was forced to.

He experienced another moment of paralysing doubt, so that he fumbled with the window catch and swore quietly. Cael's abilities made this mission incredibly dangerous, and mostly for him – even if Cael ever saw the Devils again, what could he do if he recognised their auras? Jordan, on the other hand, would definitely see him again. If he left some detectable astral traces on anything he touched, he dreaded to think what might happen.

Too late now. He pulled the window open and stepped back. After some light scuffing and a muttered curse, a dark figure appeared backlit by the moon and jumped down to the floor. Jordan winced as Akiva's boots left thick mud prints on the plush carpet.

"Hey, witch kid," Akiva said, grinning at him as Jesper wriggled in through the window after him. "Fancy seeing you here."

"Oh yeah," Jordan returned, completely without humour. "Ain't that a turn up."

Jesper smirked. "Someone's stressed. We've done this before, kid, the owner's just got wings this time. All the same otherwise."

"Aside from the mind-reading magic." Jordan scowled, but it wasn't worth pressing the point. The assassins would just find it funny and lean harder into their teasing. "Where do I look?"

"You start with the desk drawers, leave the rest to me and Jes," Akiva said, tone turning business-like. "You sense anyone coming...make some of your fancy fire or something. We'll haul you out with us if needed."

Jordan nodded. He'd use his 'fancy fire' as a last resort. When he was this tense, he wasn't absolutely certain that he'd be able to put it out again, and setting Cael's carpet on fire was not the definition of subtlety. He crossed back to the vanity, running his eye over the selection of bottles, pots and implements set out on the surface. Three glass jars lined the base of the mirror, all filled with clear liquid. Perfume bottles, he guessed – the Angel always reeked of something when he joined them in the study. He pulled three small glass sample vials from his pocket, courtesy of Arlen, and carefully tipped in a small amount from each bottle before stoppering them and putting them back. He didn't think it likely Cael would be hiding poison on his vanity table, but that idea might be the exact reason the Angel would hide it there. Next he went through the drawers, full of handkerchiefs, scarves and jewellery. One was locked and, after he'd picked it with some difficulty and a bit of help from Jesper, revealed itself to contain the draft copy of the contract the Caelumese were hoping Harkenn would sign. He slid it back into its tube and shut the drawer.

"Ooh," Jesper said from somewhere behind him. Jordan turned; the assassin had rolled back the rug and pried up a floorboard. "This looks fun."

Jordan hurried over with a furtive glance at the door. In the cavity below the floor was a small trove of items; a selection of weapons and vials, a medal, a small notebook, and... "That coin. Can you pass it to me?"

Jesper handed up the thick bronze disc that had caught Jordan's eye, and as he peered at it, his suspicions were confirmed – the symbol stamped into it was one that he'd seen before, a dagger balanced between the points of a crescent moon. He had seen the symbol on an amulet that Ren had retrieved from the body of an Unspoken killer after the demon siege, and on a coin that had been discovered in the Kelian temple after a body went missing.

He put it back in the cavity, after toying with the idea of stealing it. Cael would probably know someone had been into his rooms, but they intended to leave it so that he couldn't prove anything was stolen or easily point any fingers.

"We'll have some of whatever the fuck this is." Akiva reached past him and grabbed a flask from the corner of the hole. "Haven't found anything anywhere else."

"I took some samples," Jordan muttered, "though I'm pretty certain they're all just perfume. My nose still hurts."

"Well, if they aren't helpful, Arlen can use them," Jesper said. "Nict knows he needs it."

Jordan snorted, then sputtered into a laugh. He couldn't help himself, imagining Arlen's face if he was presented with a bottle of perfume. The assassin seemed to find it a sore point – though never sore enough to do anything about it. "You know he'd stab you for that."

"He'd have to catch me first." Jesper winked at him, and then returned to flicking through the notebook. "I bet there's something really fucking useful in here, but he's written it in gibberish."

"Is it Caelumese?"

"No, I think it's a code."

"I can hear someone," Akiva said from over near the door, in the same tone as an observation about the weather. "Window it is for you, kid."

A moment later Jordan heard Cael's voice raised in anger. Akiva and Jesper were already moving towards the window, and Jordan managed to pull his suddenly sludgy, panicky thoughts together enough to follow them.

He had his leg over the sill when something hit him like a tonne of bricks. It wasn't a physical sensation; more like someone had whacked him with an invisible mallet and blown all his thoughts out like candles. He gasped, and had the wherewithal to grab the sill before he tipped out. Distantly, as if through water, he heard Jesper and Akiva calling to him from the ledge below. His head spun, and a horrible plucking sensation began at the edges of his mind as the doorknob rattled across the room.

Tears of pain blurring his vision, he scooted his other foot over and dropped to the ledge. One of the men caught him as he swayed; he couldn't have said which one.

He retreated towards Nictaven's current in his mind, allowing Akiva to shunt him along from behind back in the physical world. He found it, centred himself in the beat, and then pushed back at the plucking around the edges of his thoughts, sheer instinct driving him. If he had stopped to think about it the sheer absurdity of the concept would have stopped him in his tracks, but within seconds, his head had cleared and he gasped in relief. Not long after that came the nausea. He lost his grip on the current but reined his magic back in just before he dealt Akiva's guiding hand a nasty burn.

"I'm gonna puke," he mumbled.

"Oh, now he can talk," Jesper said up ahead. "What the fuck happened back there, kid, you snort something you found in his dresser?"

"Not high," Jordan snapped. Words were still proving strangely difficult to come by. "He just...slammed into me. Trying to get into my head." He groaned and bent over on the narrow ledge, steadying himself against the wall. It didn't help that the other side of the ledge was a sheer drop to the battlements. "I really need to puke."

"Not on a guard's head," Akiva said. He was far too cheerful for the predicament they were in. Jordan couldn't help but think he was enjoying himself. "That's just asking for it. Can you wait until we get to the ground?"

"No promises."

He focused on putting one foot in front of the other. He wondered if that had been an accurate representation of what Cael had been doing to Harkenn all this time, and then his thoughts inevitably turned towards what it must feel like when Cael actually managed to get in. It was violating enough when he failed. But that direction of thought only brought his nausea surging back stronger.

The waiting was the worst. Jordan had been hoping that he wouldn't have to escape with the Devils as it was, but the route was even more torturous when he felt in imminent danger of vomiting. Arlen had been through all the escape routes with him, and then through them twice more, and the one they'd chosen involved far too many sheer abseils for his liking. They crouched on the ledge around a turret for a full several minutes, waiting for the guard patrol to pass. Then all he had with which to descend was a grappling hook secured on a crenelation and all the prayers he could think of.

But he did at least learn from his last big job; he left his gloves on as he slipped down the rope, with his eyes squeezed shut until he felt his boots touch solid ground. As he descended, he thought he felt the ghost of Cael's influence, then dismissed it as aftershocks. His ears were still ringing. It was probably just terror at the idea of the hook falling out before he was on the ground.

After another hair-raising descent and a close call with a patrol, Jordan was finally able to relieve himself into the castle guttering. He had swallowed bile more times than he could count, and his throat burned with it. It wasn't as bad as almost getting incinerated – a sensation of which he had far too much experience – but he still scowled as he wiped his mouth. Worst of all, this break-in was the first of three, if this one turned up nothing useful. He prayed that something they had collected would shed some light or provide an answer; anything that meant he could get out of breaking into the Orthanian temple's private rooms. That, however was something he wasn't going to think about before he had to.

"You weren't kidding," Jesper said, grimacing as Jordan bent over and retched again. "The Angel tried to get into your head?"

"From the other side of the door," Jordan grumbled. He didn't trust himself to stand up straight yet, and spoke to his vomit-puddle. "My aura will have been way more obvious than either of yours. He probably knows who it was." Having involved himself in this break-in suddenly seemed like a stupid risk to take. "Hopefully he didn't notice you, or that could get back to Marick."

He stood up, slowly and tentatively. The two men exchanged a glance. Then Akiva shrugged. "We can explain it away. Leave us to worry about that. Marick can't get upset without revealing he's working with them."

Jordan hadn't thought of that, but couldn't shake the feeling that it wouldn't deflect retribution forever. "When is Arlen planning to see this poisoner bloke?"

"Soon as we've got something to show him," Akiva shrugged again, "so...your next visit, probably. Speaking of Arlen, he wants us to tell you – Marick lost the vote. On breaking Ethred out."

Jordan blinked. "Really?"

He couldn't stop the flood of relief that followed. He had seen the wisdom of voting for Marick's plan, but that didn't mean he'd liked doing it. It had taken all his effort not to think about how he would feel if the plan passed and he had helped it. He'd never be able to look Harkenn in the eye again.

"Mm. I'm thinking there's a wall somewhere that got thoroughly shredded by a knife last night," Jesper said.

"What did Arlen say about it?"

"Just told us." Akiva cocked his head, smirking. "Didn't say anything else. Usually means he's cooking up something fun."

Jordan didn't trust Akiva's definition of fun.

"Give us what you got and we'll take it back with us," Jesper finally said. In the pause, they had heard the guards stirring to action; the break-in had been reported, but the reaction seemed too slow not to be intentional. Jordan silently thanked Yddris. He pulled the vials he had collected out of his pocket and placed them in Jesper's waiting hands. "Arlen wants you on fifthday. Usk is coming for you. Now get back and hang around somewhere unsuspicious."

Jordan nodded tightly, and watched the two assassins retreat into the night. He glanced up the castle wall he had scaled down and balked at the height he had come from; no wonder the ground wouldn't quite stay still under him.

He let out a long breath and rubbed his temples. The assault on his aura had rattled him more than he wanted Akiva or Jesper to know; he felt violated in a way he'd never experienced before. That any man, Angel or otherwise, could launch an attack on thought itself chilled him. That Cael could easily have identified him in that attack made his knees tremble.

He took one step in the vague direction of home, then sank to one knee, placed his bare hand on the ground to find Nictaven, and retreated into his centre. He stayed there for a long time.

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Regards,

Elinor (S E Harrison)