Chapter 101
Ardan awoke in the same gloom, in the same armchair, and with that same distinctive smell unpleasantly tickling his nose. Even Aloaeiol and Milar were in the same spots as before. The mutant was sitting at the table, and Captain Pnev was standing by the window, carefully pushing aside the heavy curtain. Ardi briefly wanted to deceive himself and believe that nothing had happened, but...
The mutant, who was naked from the waist up and biting down on her own belt, was injecting a syringe filled with thick, black sludge into the edge of her wound. It looked almost identical to the substance that had allowed the Tazidahian mutant—the one who had ransacked the scene of the Dandy’s father-in-law’s murder—to return to life several times, evading the Eternal Angels themselves by a hair’s breadth.
The captain pushed the plunger down, and the ridged edges of the large wound, which looked as though it had scarred over years ago, erupted. They hissed black smoke, burst with blood of the same color, then began to close. The captain growled and moaned, throwing her head back and very nearly biting through the thick leather of her belt. Her chest shook with each strangled breath.
Ardan hurried, as any respectable gentleman should, to turn away. Doing so cost him dearly.
His gaze once more slid across the papers and photographs spread out on the table. Ardan felt the nausea cutting at his throat as everything in his stomach twisted into a wide spiral. And trying to shift his gaze from the photographs to the jumble of formulas, calculations, ingredient lists, and several schematics of both seals and technical Ley-installations with complex instruments didn’t help him in the least.
Ardan didn’t think that he would ever be able to forget what he’d seen. It seemed as though the photographs had been seared into his very brain, right next to his Stars. His depleted Stars… And he was out of accumulators, too.
In that brief duel, where he had fueled a large fragment of the Name of Ice and Snow with his own Stars and those very same accumulators, he had accomplished so much... Of course, he couldn’t have managed a tenth of what had occurred near the incineration plant without the aid of the extraordinarily-cold winter. Even now, after two consecutive depletions, he could still feel the whisper of the Name and the heavy tread of the Queen who was touring her territory with her retinue.
When the snows melted, Ardi wasn’t certain that he would be able to summon even a remotely worthy shard of the Name of Ice and Snow, but right now...
Even all these thoughts didn’t save him from the images flickering in his consciousness. They refused to leave his mind. They burned and burned, their quiet conflagration causing him pain that was not at all physical, yet no less palpable for it.
“What is this, Ard?” Milar asked.
Captain Aloaeiol exhaled suddenly, released her chewed-up belt from her mouth, and, seizing the bottle of dwarven whiskey from the table, tipped it into her mouth. After two noisy gulps she wiped her lips and... collapsed face-first onto the table.
Ardan leaped to his feet and was about to do something when Milar stopped him:
“Don’t worry about it,” Captain Pnev waved his hand. “With mutants—Imperial ones, at least—that’s a normal process. They shoot themselves up with their stuff, drink, and then pass out. They do it to avoid the pain. While you were coming to, she went through that routine three times.”
Ardan looked at the unconscious Aloaeiol, who seemed to be breathing evenly, and nodded. He’d suspected that the Empire’s mutants were not of the same quality as those of Tazidahian. And, evidently, he had just seen proof of his conjecture. Rather vivid and half-naked proof.
Ardi turned away again. This time, avoiding the documents and photographs, he looked at Milar. He seemed exhausted and gaunt.
“So, Ard?” The captain repeated his question and took a drag.
He held his cigarette tucked away just behind the curtain so that the red glow of the ember wouldn’t show in the window. For a second, Ardan even began to worry about a fire. But Milar was evidently far from a novice at hiding a lit cigarette from prying eyes.
“These are research records,” Ardi reached out and, for a brief but very real moment, he deliberated over what exactly to take.
The bottle of amber liquid or the cloudy carafe of water? And his hesitation had nothing to do with the cleanliness of the carafe... In the end, the young man poured himself some plain water into a simple ceramic mug. Ergar had taught him that life’s hardships should never be used as an excuse to stray from his trails, but as a motivation to stick to them even more.
“I understand that it’s not just a record of someone’s love of vivisecting orcish and elven children...” Milar snapped, his tone harsher than usual, then immediately softened. “Sorry... It’s been a rotten night.”
“A rotten night indeed,” Ard nodded.
“Damn it all, Magister... how old were they?”
Ardan didn’t need to look at the photographs again to recall what he had seen.
“Between three and seven... give or take. Some were older, and some...” Ardan grabbed the glass and took another sip of water to drown the vomit clawing at his throat. “Some were younger...”
Milar shook his head and fell silent. Ardan understood his partner. In the year and a half he’d spent in the Metropolis, he had seen all manner of things. And in his year of service in the Black House, he’d seen even more of them. But everything he’d seen had fallen, one way or another, within the bounds of harsh cruelty. Sometimes, it had been cruelty that had, for some reason, wandered in from the old stories of the previous era, but even then—if barely—it hadn’t defied all sense. But this...
“They used to only use kids who were about eleven, and in there...” Milar took a drag and exhaled a wisp of smoke. “...there are infants, Ard.”
“I saw,” was all Ardan said.
“Eternal Angels... I remember those stories about witches who’d boil babies in cauldrons and then eat them, but those are just stories, right? Just a way to scare children…”
Ardan nodded. The stories about witches and their love for devouring newborns were indeed exaggerations. They’d been created due to the Firstborn’s attempts to somehow control the population of the human race, which multiplied far more rapidly and productively than any Firstborn species. Children had been kidnapped. Turned into slaves. Sometimes, they’d simply been killed.
Was it cruel? Of course.
Had the Firstborn paid for it? Yes.
But Ardan doubted that they’d done what...
The young man cut himself off mid-thought. The fact that he didn’t know about something did not mean it couldn’t exist or hadn’t happened.
“Why only orcs and elves?” Milar attempted to steer the topic at least somewhat away from the photographs, but didn’t quite succeed. The discussion still had to touch on what they directly pertained to.
“They have the highest compatibility with humans and Fae,” Ardan answered. “Not counting the Matabar, of course.”
“So...” Milar paused long enough for Ardi to understand one thing: silence would not be an option here. Nor would postponing this conversation until they saw the Colonel.
“These research records contain notes on experiments related to bodily functions, the nervous system, brain structure, and reactions to stimuli,” Ardan explained. “Including stimuli of non-material origin.”
“Non-material?” The captain echoed. “You mean they...”
Ardan nodded again.
“The children were subjected to complex forms of maleficent magic with delayed effects.” Ardi, who was still fighting his nausea, drew one of the sheets toward him. “The full structures aren’t listed here, Milar. They used code names instead. But one can still surmise that these maleficent spells are designed to operate over extended periods of time.”
Captain Pnev took another drag, cast another glance at the deserted street, and returned to the table. He rather carefully shifted the sleeping Aloaeiol aside and picked up several of the research notes. Just like Ardan, the captain was clearly trying to avoid noticing the photographs.
“‘Subject number Orc-143, male, displayed instability during prolonged transformation of the lymphatic system. Has been reclassified as a secondary product of the primary experiment and will be used for testing the characteristics and properties of immune system formation.’” Milar scratched the bridge of his nose and didn’t even notice that he had burned himself with his cigarette. “‘Subject number Elf-216, female, displayed instability during the formation of the reproductive system and reproductive organs. Has been reclassified as a secondary product of the primary experiment and will be used for testing the characteristics and properties of the optic nerve and frontal lobe of the brain.’”
Ardan once again looked at the bottle of amber liquid that captain Aloaeiol was still holding in her hand. Milar, meanwhile, set aside the documents and looked at the next stack of papers. In total, the thick envelope contained forty photographs and eighty thin sheets of high-quality paper intended for recording Star Magic experiments.
“There are older children here as well,” Milar noted curtly.
“Yes.”
“They were forced... forced to...”
“Yes,” Ardi repeated.
He wanted to curse whoever had dared call such an approach “constructive.” And yet, it made a brutal sort of sense. Why seek new material for experiments when you can produce the required subjects directly in the laboratory? And part of the research, which spanned several pages of the “secondary product of the primary experiment,” was devoted to exactly that—improving the reproductive system of the Firstborn.
Formulas... Numbers... Chemical compounds...
More than one researcher had worked on this. It had likely been an entire group of them, one similar to the groups the Puppeteers maintained all across the Empire.
“What are they after, Magister?” Milar asked in a dry tone, his tongue very nearly creaking.
Ardan turned toward the curtained window.
“Anything and everything, Milar,” the young man shrugged. “In any case, we need a consultation. My knowledge is sufficient only to read the research, not to understand it. We need a chimerologist. And a professional in the field of Maleficence and the branches of Star Magic forbidden by the Al’Zafir Pact.”
“Ard. The Empire respects the Pact.”
Ardan didn’t even turn toward his partner. He was no longer the same young man who, a year ago, had agreed to don the black in exchange for an apprenticeship under Grand Magister Aversky and access to the archival records of “Operation Mountain Predator.”
The Empire respected the Pact? Sure. And so did all the other nations. On the surface.
But if you dipped a little deeper, if you climbed a little further beneath Lady Justice’s skirts, then...
“All right, let’s assume I can convince the Colonel that this idea has merit. We still won’t get a consultation before the Congress ends,” Milar said after a time. “And believe me, you won’t enjoy that trip. And neither will I... I can’t stand assignments.”
Ardan vividly remembered the cell they’d locked him up in after the incident at the central branch of the Imperial Bank. During the lectures he’d attended—Professor Convel’s in particular—the conditions needed for isolating an organism from the planetary Paarlax Field had sometimes been mentioned. In other words, they’d discussed how to isolate them from the Ley.
What did this mean?
They’d have to visit a prison for Star Mages, naturally.
“But why did Linda Day need these papers?” Milar flicked the burnt tobacco into the ashtray. “She was working with Driba. And they-”
“Their research was different,” Ardan shook his head. “Driba and his students were exploring the possibility of combining Firstborn and humans with the Fae, including the Homeless. Here, though... This is more earthbound research. More of a meta-study, really. It focused on maleficent magic and biological investigations into the structures of Firstborn organisms. It’s the-”
“Same thing Lea Mortimer and the chimerologist in the Nightfolk Quarter were doing,” Milar finished for Ardan. “The Tazidahian papers dovetail with their research.”
The young man silently ground his teeth. The Puppeteers were clearly trying to create something. Something that went beyond his encounters with Fae capable of far greater freedom than what those books, scrolls, and Atta’nha herself had told him they could have. Why was Ardan so certain of this?
First of all, because his instincts were telling him that was the case, and secondly… because there were too many discrepancies. If the Puppeteers were only concerned with possession and the symbiosis of creatures of flesh and creatures of spirit, then why bother with all the rest? What was the point of the experiments with werewolves, vampires, and the creation of humanoid chimeras? And one also had to consider the presence of Alla Tantov, the mutant who had stolen the Key, on the airship.
“That still doesn’t explain Linda Day’s motives.”
“It’s simple, Milar,” Ardan shrugged with something like sadness. “I saw her memories. Her motives were painfully simple. Greed. Greed and stupidity.”
The Memories of Linda Day
Ardan swept his hand out and time stopped. It froze like a fly caught in a web, stripped of the ability to so much as twitch its wings in a desperate attempt to escape the trap. Figures cloaked in dark garments stopped in poses that were sometimes absurd, and their clothing, snapping in the wind, turned to stone in folds that were simultaneously elegant and yet also repulsive.
Raindrops, sharp and thin, stretched out into needles glittering in the sparse light of the Ley-lanterns. And the drops of water coming from the puddles, these ones round and thick, hung like clusters of rotten berries above the murky pavement.
Ardan stood beside Linda Day, who, like everyone else, was hiding from the wind and rain beneath a dark coat. In the reflection of one puddle, Ardan caught her face. It was almost indistinguishable from the one he had encountered at the Larand Monastery. She still had the same intelligent, calm gaze, and her face still had an oval, nearly doll-like shape. Those disproportionate features didn’t make it outright repulsive, but it was definitely the kind of visage one’s gaze didn’t particularly want to linger on.
Ardan stepped back and looked around. Everything outside of Day’s line of sight was veiled in a gray haze, filled with vague outlines and indistinct shapes. This was more her imagination than a proper recollection. Memory, as Atta’nha had taught him, was sometimes not the most reliable narrator.
Objects, passersby and buildings also grew less distinct the farther away they were. She was most likely beginning to suffer from the eye condition that was so common among the Star Magic community. Many even joked that before a Star Mage earned the medallion of a Senior Magister, they would have to don glasses.
But even such scant information was enough for Ardi to understand a simple thing—Linda Day was in the Metropolis. And in a very specific part of it, too: the Firstborn Quarter. It was easy to recognize thanks to the jumble of mismatched buildings, which looked as though they’d been piled atop one another by a lazy child playing with river sand and constructing from it... an entire city, essentially.
He took in the many walkways, the near-total absence of light, and the narrow streets connected by staircases, descents, little bridges, and sometimes, they’d simply tunneled into buildings to connect them.
Linda Day was standing near one such building. Unfortunately, she was leaning on her sheathed staff and shielding her face with the edge of her hood that was sheltering her from the slanting downpour. Because of this, Ardan couldn’t see the sign on the building. He could only see the door—it was simple, cobbled together from planks and reinforced with metal sheets affixed there with ordinary nails.
Ardan swept his hand forward and time hurried to obey. He moved it again, stopping the memory, then drew his hand back, returning Day to the puddle she was about to step into with her boot.
Alas, the sign remained outside of Day’s field of vision, and in the gray haze of her recollection, he could only discern certain outlines. It was either a cow or a Shaggier from the Alcade steppes—Ardan couldn’t tell for sure.
Recognizing the futility of his efforts, Ardi allowed the ephemeral time of memory to continue on its way.
She pushed the door open and entered the establishment. Ardan still couldn’t quite understand how humans lived with their rather meager sense of smell. All Day remembered was the scent of alcohol, cheap, pungent tobacco, and the dampness that was being opposed, unsuccessfully, by several stoves and a fireplace. There were no overtones or undertones.
Ardan stopped time once more with another sweep of his hand. He walked between rows of simple, round tables that had been hewn and assembled from dismantled pallets. The patrons were part of that gray haze of memory, with only a few that had left a mark in Day’s consciousness having actual faces.
He saw someone’s enormous arm that had brown skin and a tattoo in the shape of a laughing skull. He spotted the massive tusks of an orc, noting that one of them was slightly curved toward his nose. It seemed like a careless movement might let the owner pick his own nose with it. There was a tricorn hat, a long, thick pipe someone was filling with tobacco, and... an elven woman. Day’s gaze had lingered on her.
She’d evidently been surprised to see such a person in a den like this. Beyond her long, pointed ears and eyes the color of living flame, where the iris had replaced the whites, Day hadn’t committed much to memory—the rest was covered by the haze. But for some reason, Ardan felt like he’d seen this elf somewhere before...
…In the far corner, standing on a round stage beside a Ley-microphone, an elven woman was singing. She had dark blue, curly hair, and was wearing a dress that revealed rather than concealed the satiny skin of a lithe, alluring body. Her almond-shaped eyes of blazing flame paled in comparison to her voice, which rivaled even the mythical singing of the siren who was waving her tail on the sign...
Of course! He’d seen her in the “Sea Breeze” bar, where Ardan and Arkar had crossed paths with Indgar and the Star-born werewolf! Perhaps she could tell them which bar this was. But that would have to wait.
Ardan raised his hand.
Linda Day passed by several tables and sat down at what appeared to be a very specific one. It was in the far corner, where there was only a single patron. He was quietly sipping something very tart that had a sharp smell from a wooden mug. His back was leaning against the corner, and he was able to see both the front entrance and an inconspicuous door that most likely led somewhere other than a storage room.
And when Day sat down opposite him, she found herself with her back to all the aforementioned potential sources of danger. Ultimately, Day was a Star Mage—perhaps a thoroughly unscrupulous one, perverted by her thirst for knowledge and the opening of new horizons, but still just a scholar. She was no military mage, and certainly not someone accustomed to danger.
Ardan easily determined this thanks to how readily Day set her staff aside, leaning it against the edge of the table. In such a situation, a military mage would’ve never let go the one thing that could determine whether they would get to see the next dawn.
“You are late, Mrs. Eshkovets,” a... dead voice stated. It sounded as though one dry log was being rubbed against another, or like a raven was croaking above the freshest in a row of graves.
Two unblinking, red eyes had seared themselves into Day’s memory.
A vampire.
But clearly not the one captain Pnev’s unit, alongside Major Mshisty’s, had put to rest in the suburbs. Despite his dead voice and the fact that his face was hidden in the shadows, Ardan still sensed certain differences.
“The Cloaks interrogated me not too long ago, Mr. Amonas,” Day answered and gave a grateful nod to a scrawny hand that emerged from the gray haze and placed a perfectly ordinary cup of tea before her. “I must be careful.”
“Your new documents are in perfect order, Mrs. Anora Eshkovets,” the lifeless voice whistled.
“For which I am most grateful,” Day nodded. “For the documents, and for...”
With her thumb, she lifted the heavy metal chain hanging from her neck. There was a gleaming silver amulet on it that bore several runes in the Fae language. Ardi couldn’t make out which ones they were since the gray haze was covering them. They were constantly shifting their forms, never managing to settle.
“And how is life as a free woman treating you, Mrs. Eshkovets?” The vampire asked pointedly.
Day sipped her tea. It was sour, with a spicy aftertaste. Humans didn’t drink such things. Ardan was once again assured that they were in the Firstborn Quarter.
“Better than when I foolishly agreed to the offer of a mysterious man,” Day answered, clearly insinuating something. “Only back then, we didn’t meet in a moldy bar, but in a restaurant on New Era Avenue.”
“Forgive me, Mrs. Eshkovets, for not having the means to take you to such a refined establishment.”
“It’s fine.” Perhaps she’d missed the cold sarcasm, or perhaps she simply hadn’t understood it. “In any case, Mr. Amonas, I’m sure you understand where I’m going with this.”
“I understand,” the vampire confirmed simply.
“In my opinion, you are no different from the one who put a noose around my neck fifteen years ago.”
“You agreed to put it on yourself, madam,” the vampire reminded her, and sipped some of his strange brew. “It was your own ambitions that led you to it.”
“Semantics,” Day waved a hand, clearly feeling entirely safe.
It was astonishing to see how quickly the sense of danger dulled in people who didn’t live side by side with the sort of tragedy that was eternally waiting for them around the corner. With each passing day, Ardan became more convinced that Katerina had been absolutely right about what she’d said in that ill-fated dining car.
“As you say, Mrs. Eshkovets,” the vampire didn’t bother to argue with her. “But I have to remind you that we did provide you with documents. With the opportunity to be free of the noose... in which you were caught.”
The vampire’s gaze slid to her amulet. It wasn’t hard to guess what kind of freedom was being discussed. Everyone connected to the Puppeteers carried a delayed-action seal in their heads that, if they attempted to compromise the organization, literally turned their brains into mush.
And, by all appearances, the amulet given to Day by this unknown vampire had somehow neutralized the seal’s effects.
“Our offer remains the same, Mrs. Eshkovets,” the vampire continued. “You will hand over all the research—the copies you made at the monastery—and in winter, you will receive documents at the specified location and time. You will make a copy, then send the original to the same address as the copy of the Larand research. And in-”
“In that future copy, I am to make alterations that will turn the research into meaningless, useless garbage,” Day interrupted, evidently convinced that she was the one running the show. “And in exchange, you will remove the seal placed on me by those... monsters, provide papers from any country on the northern or eastern continents, and pay me twenty thousand exes.”
Despite being inside someone else’s memory, Ardan almost choked on that number. Twenty thousand exes... To possess such a sum, you’d need to be one of the wealthiest inhabitants not only of the Empire, but the entire world (in practice, this was nearly one and the same). Or else...
Or else it was far simpler than that. And Day was once again, as she had long ago, preparing to place her own neck into a tightening noose. The question was actually quite straightforward—why would anyone leave her alive once she fulfilled her purpose?
“But what guarantees my survival?” Day suddenly asked. She might not have been a military mage, but she was still an intelligent person.
“The fact that you are going to die anyway,” the vampire answered calmly. “And I’m not talking about your mortal fragility. I mean that the Black House will find your trail sooner or later. And sooner or later, the seal in your brain will turn you into a vegetable. You are playing a zero-sum game, Mrs. Eshkovets. Either you risk trusting us and have a faint chance of becoming wealthy, free, and sailing beyond the Shallow Seas… or you die. Your options are limited. So, stop wasting time, mortal lady. Decide. Either pay for the sins you committed at the Larand Monastery in the near future, or live in freedom and comfort until the final judgment of the Eternal Angels. But one way or another—do not forget that you are doomed.”
“Mortal lady”—what a strange phrase, even for a vampire...
The Present Day
“Wonderful,” Milar exhaled a wisp of smoke. “So, in this pile of filth the Colonel calls a game, there is a third side.”
“A side that needed the Tazidahian research to be falsified so that the Puppeteers would receive an altered version and not suspect the existence of a mole in their own organization,” Ardan added.
“But not a mole from the Black House. Rather, it’s the mole of some unknown third party, and our only thread leading to their meeting is an elven singer from the ‘Sea Breeze’ jazz bar, which you and Arkar nearly demolished.”
Ardan spread his arms out.
For a time, he and Milar sat in silence, then they both looked up at each other at the same time.
“You understand what this means, Magister?”
“I’m afraid I do, Milar,” Ardan sighed and massaged the bridge of his nose. “Do you think they’ll give us a raise?”
“Dream on,” Captain Pnev snorted.
Indeed... Dreaming was all they had left. Because the existence of a third side, together with all the confusion and disarray of recent events, pointed to one very simple, yet deeply frightening conclusion:
They had been wrong.
All of them.
Milar, Ardan, the Colonel, the Black House, even His Imperial Majesty. All of them had been wrong. About what, exactly? It was hard to pinpoint, but one thing was clear:
Whatever the conspirators were plotting, their goal was much bigger than just the Empire of the New Monarchy...
*
Ardan was very nearly pecking at the grains being scattered about by the invisible spirits of the Dream World because of how badly he wanted to sleep. The last several days had not been easy. Especially for Milar.
Captain Pnev had been forced to bear the brunt of the Colonel’s displeasure single-handedly. The damage, given that a waste incineration plant wasn’t especially costly to build, and they had mostly just damaged the conveyor belt, the storage facility, and the walls of the utility buildings, hadn’t been all that costly, but... Milar and Ardan had still engaged in something that the Second Chancery didn’t exactly dislike, but they definitely didn’t encourage it, either. Particularly not in the middle of the planet’s premier political event.
What was the issue?
They’d conducted an unsanctioned operation.
As a result, the previous morning, Ardan had received—a taciturn individual had stopped by the Prime Minister’s residence to drop it off—a sealed envelope that Captain Ponskih had delivered to him. It had been very thin and entirely unremarkable. Only three documents had been inside.
The first, which, admittedly, had somewhat warmed Ardan’s heart, had been an official document bearing the seals of the Imperial Secretariat and the General Staff.
“Nomination for State Decoration.
By this decree, We, Pavel IV, Lord of Gales, Emperor of the New Monarchy, for exceptional service to the country, do award etid Ard Egobar the Order of Valor, Second Class. Honor, dignity, brotherhood. For the glory of the Empire!”
Below had been the signatures of all the parties involved in the commendation, as well as their personal seals, including one in the shape of a double-headed phoenix. However, this time, they hadn’t even let him look at the medal. Last time, the Colonel had at least brought his and Milar’s awards in little boxes before taking them back.
That was simply the procedure. The certificates came first, and the decorations themselves—unlike the medals—were then presented at special ceremonies held once every several months at the Palace of the Kings of the Past.
But at least they’d issued the certificate. That was pleasant, too. Ardi had even spent some time trying to recall what the word “etid” meant before realizing that it was his title. They were conferred upon all mages to equalize their standing with the aristocracy—a purely bureaucratic formality.
The second document had warmed his heart even more than the first:
“Order number: CLASSIFIED.
Operative number: CLASSIFIED, for actions conducted within the framework of the operation involving CLASSIFIED, is hereby nominated for a bonus in the amount of one annual salary and an extraordinary, Crown-funded leave of absence.
Order takes effect from: CLASSIFIED.”
The Colonel hadn’t merely kept all his promises, but upon receiving that wretched, revolting packet with its no-less-revolting research from Milar, he had even gone beyond them. And now, after nearly nine months, Ardi understood Captain Pnev as well as he ever had.
What was he supposed to do with decorations? He didn’t even have a proper uniform to pin them on. And active Black House personnel were forbidden from wearing their awards in any case. But the bonus—now there was something. And it was equal to a full year’s salary, no less! A very welcome addition to his finances!
Of course, the apothecary in the Firstborn Quarter was continuing to expand its clientele, and the first royalties from the Ice Bullet seal he’d sold to the Spell Market were due to arrive soon, so Ardan’s bank account was gradually fattening. But the one thing that could never be said of any Star Mage actively engaged in research was that they had enough money.
Perhaps only one percent of one percent of the Empire’s best and brightest minds could say otherwise, but not the overwhelming majority, which Ardan was a part of. Had he not possessed restraint, as well as his inheritance from Edward, Ardan could’ve emptied his entire bank account in a single visit to the Spell Market and still not acquired a quarter of the equipment, instruments, books, accumulators, grimoires, and specialized document for recording seals that he really wanted.
But then there was the third document. Or rather, it wasn’t even a document, but a letter—one that had made Ardi sigh sadly and shake his head.
“Corporal, as part of your investigation, you are hereby tasked with adding copies of the recently-obtained material that was taken from the adversary to the intelligence already in your possession. Collect them from the Archive upon completion of your current assignment.
The Colonel.
P.S. Until you complete your current assignment, you are forbidden from any further excursions. Concentrate on Loon. In the event this order is violated, you will be subjected to the harshest of sanctions in the form of a rightward shift in your advancement through the table of ranks.”
Ardan closed his eyes and tucked the letter, or rather, the note, back into his pocket. The prospect of adding that abomination that Linda Day was supposed to have received to the pile of already-existing encrypted records and the mystery of Driba’s staff didn’t exactly fill him with joy. But he had no choice in the matter.
He had no choice about the documents or his current position.
“You look as though you haven’t slept more than twelve hours in the past several days,” Captain Aloaeiol said in the Fae tongue.
Ardan didn’t bother to explain for the tenth time that his body—specifically his brain—was compensating like this for the extreme strain it had endured several days ago.
“Why aren’t we looking for the elven woman?” Was all Ardan asked instead.
“Because, Corporal, as I’ve already explained, if the third party really is so interested in the documents, then right now, we are the best bait for them,” Aloaeiol answered, hissing slightly—perhaps because of her mask, perhaps not. “The Colonel is doing everything correctly. Right now, we mustn’t make any unnecessary moves. The field has plunged into the fog of war. None of the sides know what the others possess or know for sure. Whoever moves first will be the one to make the mistake. So, stand at attention and pretend to be a fearsome, savage non-human. Let the Selkadians get nervous.”
After Milar had seen the Colonel and the mutant had visited the Black House, Captain Aloaeiol had become involved in their investigation. How closely? Who knows. How long would she be part of it? Again, Ardi had no idea.
All Ardan knew for certain were two things. First: Aloaeiol now knew considerably more about the Puppeteers than before. And second: they had already been standing outside for half an hour, knee-deep in snow, awaiting the visit of the Selkado ambassador. It was entirely unofficial and outside the framework of the Congress, and therefore, presumably, very important.
Two days had already passed since the conclusion of the economic forum, which meant that only one day remained until the ambassadors’ round table. After that, in three more days, the treaty-signing ceremony and the formal dinner with His Imperial Majesty would be held.
Why was Ardan counting the days?
Because the Congress had proven to be a far more exhausting affair than he could’ve ever imagined.
“But we-”
“Enough,” Captain Ponskih said without raising his tone but with more than enough severity, his face also hidden behind his mask. “Do not shame the country.”
Ardan might have objected that there was no one before whom he could shame the country just yet, but he held his tongue. He had already fallen into disfavor with the Prime Minister; the last thing he needed was to do the same with one of his closest confidants. And Captain Aloaeiol had already turned away and gone still. She would still sometimes press a hand to her chest to steady herself or stoop slightly, but one could never have guessed that the captain had suffered a serious wound not long ago. It had been serious for a mutant and unquestionably fatal for a human and most Firstborn.
At last, from around the corner, coming from the direction of the avenue that led to the Guild Embankment, an automobile appeared. A foreign one, at that. It looked somewhat rougher than Imperial models, with angular lines, thin wheels, and the metal wasn’t of the finest quality. But it was still capable of functioning even in this relentless cold and, most importantly, it had been delivered by sea from another continent.
Not every embassy, except for those from Selkado and the Confederation of Free Cities, possessed its own transport. The very act of shipping such cargo across the Shallow Seas was being perceived as an exclusively political gesture.
The Empire did not import motor vehicles. On the contrary, it was the world’s chief exporter of such products. This was a fact that Boris had already talked Ardi’s ear off about. The man truly adored anything that moved on wheels. And the faster it moved, the better.
Behind the first angular, black automobile came a second, and then a third. The procession drove unhurriedly along the snowy tracks and pulled up to the residence, positioning itself so that the central vehicle stopped right at the entrance.
But the first thing that caught everyone’s eye was not the ambassador, whose door was being held open for her. No. Ardan was certain that everyone, himself included, was looking at a single figure. It was a man no taller than Milar, with shoulders narrow enough that, from behind, he might easily have been mistaken for a ballerina, and who was carrying on his back—in an ingenious, mechanical scabbard bristling with gears and levers—something that could’ve almost been a railway rail.
It was a sword so gigantic that even Arkar would’ve probably struggled to wield it. And yet, the slight man with the pleasant features and thick, fair hair seemed not to notice its weight at all. Dressed as lightly as Ardan, he helped a stately woman in a warm fur coat and fur hat step out of the car—the ambassador of Selkado.
But no one was looking at her.
“A Knight-Warrior,” Aloaeiol whispered in Galessian.
For the first time, a foreign mage possessing a Black Star was standing before Ardan. A Knight-Warrior, the pinnacle of the Selkadian Swordmages.
And something told the young man that a Knight-Warrior appearing at the very heart of the Empire, on the very doorstep of the Prime Minister, who also happened to be the current Emperor’s mentor, served almost the same purpose as the angular automobiles.
He was a living political gesture.
And why, for just an instant, did it seem to Ardan like everything happening on this snowy street was even more dangerous than those recently-obtained documents?