Doppelganger (13 page)

Mirage would have cheerfully strangled him. She clasped her hands in her lap instead and vowed to have a little "chat" with him later.

The witch seemed confused by the question. "From a distance? It depends on what you mean by distance. You have to be able to see them with your own eyes. It can't be done from across the city, or from a different domain. Why?"

If you tell her, I'll break your elbows, Kerestel. This is
my
business, not yours
.

"It might be useful for capturing the assassin," he said smoothly.

"Oh. Well, it could be done, if I were close enough. Have you found the assassin, then?" A hint of eagerness crept into her melodious voice.

Eclipse shook his head. "Not yet. We're getting closer, though. As I wrote to you, we're fairly sure he was trained at Wolf star. That narrows the field considerably."

"And what about the employer?"

"That's what we wanted to ask you about," Mirage said. "Who succeeded Tari-nakana as Key of her Path?"

"Kekkai-nai. I mean, she's Kekkai-nakana now."

"What was she doing before she became Key?"

"She was the regional coordinator for the north—Askavya, Liak, and Miest."

Mirage remembered the name now; she had seen it on no small number of papers in Tarinakana's study. Closing her eyes, she thought back to those reports; had there been anything of note in them? Nothing came to mind. "Has Kekkai-nakana made any noticeable changes in the policies of her Path since she became Key?"

"Not that I can think of. But she hasn't been in office for very long, of course."

"What about Tari-nakana?" Eclipse asked. "What projects was she engaged in before she died?" The witch hesitated, and he lifted his hand in reminder of the blood-oath. They had every right in the world to know.

The witch nodded. "I'm sorry. In truth, though, Tari-nakana wasn't doing anything at all—nothing significant, that is. She was doing her job, obviously."

"Not 'obviously,'" Mirage said. "Was there something she
wasn't
doing? A duty she was neglecting, or a request she was ignoring? Can you think of anyone who would have wanted to remove her from office for ineffectiveness or incompetence?"

"She was quite competent," the witch said, her voice sharp.

Mirage made a conciliatory gesture. "The assassin's employer may have been unhappy with her failure to do something. Or perhaps he expects her successor to take a particular action that Tari-nakana wouldn't."

"Do you know of any projects Kekkai-nakana has been working on?" Eclipse asked. "Tasks assigned to her by Tari-nakana, or by her Prime? Did
she
have a pet project that might gain in importance now that she's a Key?"

Their contact shrugged, looking slightly hunted. "I don't know. Really. That's the kind of thing you'd really have to ask Kekkai-nakana."

"Then we need to meet with her," Mirage said.

The witch's control of her expression was greater than Mirage had thought; she quelled the flicker that ran across her face to the point where its nature could not be identified. Surprise? Unease? "Perhaps," the witch said slowly. "I'll have to write to her and ask. Heart Keys don't travel often, and Kekkai-nakana is particularly busy right now, as you can imagine."

They should have tried to set this up while they were still in Starfall. "Perhaps some magically arranged audience," Eclipse suggested. "Is there any way to do that? Talk to her at a distance, and not through one of those sheets?"

"Maybe," the witch said. "I'll have to ask. When I get an answer… I'll send the answer to your paper. You do still have that?"

"Of course," Eclipse said, and to his credit did not sound irritated by the question.

"Good," the witch said briskly. "I'll write to you, then, when I know about Kekkai-nakana. Until then, do keep looking into other clues. The Hunter bodyguard, for example."

They stood and saluted her, then left without another word.

"That wasn't the same woman," Mirage said as they rode out of Ravelle's eastern gate in the predawn light.

Eclipse glanced at her. "You think so?"

"She looked the same. And her voice was the same. But the way she spoke was entirely different."

"Much faster, and less formal. I agree." He fell silent for a moment as they prodded their horses into a trot to pass three empty wagons trundling along the road back to their farms. When they were alone once more, he picked up where he had left off. "Why, though?"

"Depends on which one that face really belongs to. If the first witch looks like that, and the second was using an illusion, it may just be that our real contact was occupied elsewhere. Since she couldn't meet us on our way to Insebrar, she delegated someone else to take care of it."

Eclipse pondered that for a moment. "That makes sense, I guess."

"Unless neither one of them really has that face. That could be blamed on simple, standard-issue witch paranoia. If we can't identify our contact, that's one less bit of information we have."

"Did you get the feeling this second witch wasn't a member of the Fire Ray?" Eclipse said suddenly.

Now it was Mirage's turn to ponder. She hadn't considered that at all, but now that she did… "I think you might be right. She knew precious little about what was going on with Tari-nakana and Kekkai-nakana. Not that I expect leaders of any stripe to tell their subordinates everything they do, but she seemed particularly clueless. Which could be her natural state of mind. Or not." A thought struck Mirage then, and she pulled one glove off, cuing Mist with her knees to stop in the road.

Eclipse circled Sparker back to her side. "What is it?"

She extended her right wrist to him. "What color would you call that scar?"

"Sort of a faded brown—but there's a bint of green in it, too. Which is how it'll be recognizable as a blood-oath scar. It doesn't look natural."

"Now, I might be wrong about this, but I seem to remember a conversation back when we were trainees, where Talon mentioned that you can tell the Ray of the witch who cast the blood-oath spell by the color of the scar it leaves."

Eclipse looked at the scar again, then at her. "Greenish brown. Earth?"

"That would be my guess. It's certainly not a fiery color."

"So if our second witch wasn't Fire Ray, neither was our first."

Mirage pulled her gauntlet back on and kneed Mist forward; they couldn't afford to waste all day sitting on their horses in the middle of the road. "We thought she might be Void Ray, remember. And maybe we weren't wrong. But if she
was
Earth, and this second witch was something other than Fire—why are so many witches of other Rays involved in this investigation?"

"Tari-nakana was an important woman. Her assassination might mean trouble for all of them."

"Maybe. But it seems too pat."

More silence as they rode. Mirage kept quiet, for she could feel Eclipse was working through something in his mind. Morning had come in full by the time he had his thoughts together. She looked up sharply when he spoke again.

"Do you remember anything odd about those papers and letters in Tarinakana's study?"

"I assume you mean the ones besides the itinerary." Mirage considered it, then shook her head. "Nothing jumps to mind. It looked like routine paperwork and correspondence."

"Who was she receiving letters from?"

"Witches, mostly. Also Lords and Ladies of domains, of course, and some of their more important ministers and governors. But the bulk of it was from witches."

"Which makes sense, given that she was a Key, and of the Heart Path to boot. She was responsible for coordinating the activities of her Ray, and sending out orders that came down from her Prime. But what I want to know is, why were so many of those letters from witches—un-ranked ones, no less—
outside
her Ray?"

Mirage closed her eyes and summoned to mind as many of the endless sheets of paper as she could recall. She supposed Eclipse was right, but still—"Most of those letters were unimportant. Personal in nature. Like the one about the cat."

"They
looked
unimportant."

"You think they were in code?"

"I don't know. Maybe. We may have to ask our contact—or whoever it is we're dealing with now—to send us the papers from Starfall. I think I'm going to want another look at them."

The thought of having to cart the contents of Tarinakana's study with them across the land made Mirage cringe. "Let's at least wait until we've spoken to Avalanche. If there's something hidden in those letters, he may know about it."

Miryo schooled her face to calm, her eyes in soft focus on the far wall. Once she might have paced, might have bit at her fingernails or her hair. The ritual had changed her, though; the calm of Air was in her, and she knew it now. She needed all its help to stay tranquil.

I have been marked. But in what ways? Goddess, Lady, I don't understand
—
have I passed, or not
?

What is to become of me?

Miryo had not seen many people since the ritual; for a while it had just been Nenikune. Then, when the healer was satisfied with Miryo's physical health, Satomi's secretary Ruriko had come to summon Miryo.