Doppelganger (9 page)

"True enough," he said from the bedroom. "Looks like the last visitor didn't think of that."

"Who do you think he was?" she asked as she picked up a stack of papers and flipped through them.

"Not sure. The assassin, maybe; he might have wanted to take away any evidence pointing at his employer. And whoever it was knew to avoid the doctored steps."

"It doesn't seem like his style, though. He's been subtle up until now, so why rip this place apart? Especially since he's a Hunter. Even assassin specialists are taught to be more delicate than this."

Eclipse appeared in the doorway. "Who else, then? The employer himself?"

"Maybe." Mirage moved on to the next stack of papers. They looked like economic reports on the earnings of various Fire witches. "I'm tempted to bag half this stuff and take it with us back to Silverfire. Jaguar would like to know more about the witches."

"Uh-uh," Eclipse said, pointing a stern finger at her. "We're on hire. You don't spy on your employer."

"Thornbloods do."

"And Thornbloods are soulless mercenaries. What's your point?"

"Fine, fine, I'll leave the papers here. Go search. If I have to work, you do, too."

He vanished back into the bedroom, leaving Mirage with the papers. She made it through more than half of them before taking a break.
Plenty of interesting things I never knew about the Fire Ray, but nothing that seems relevant. Tari-nakana wasn't doing anything special that I can see
.

She went to the doorway. Eclipse gave her a mock-glare. "If I have to work, you do, too."

Mirage lifted one lip in a delicate snarl and he grinned. "Okay. What is it?" he asked.

"Why would someone kill Tari-nakana?" she asked.

Eclipse sat back on his heels. "You mean genetically?" He began to tick the reasons off on his fingers. "Revenge for some personal or professional action. Prevention of some personal or professional action she was about to take. Political maneuvering—maybe someone wanted to see a new Fire Heart Key."

"We need to find out who replaced her."

"Definitely. And if the new Key has made any significant changes in the Ray's policy. You done with the papers in there?"

"Not quite. I was going to check the room for compartments, then finish them off."

"Okay. Then we'll look downstairs."

Mirage returned to the study and surveyed the walls and floor. There wasn't a lot left intact; the searcher had been more thorough—or desperate—in here. She checked nevertheless, and examined the desk as well, but found nothing. With a heavy sigh, she faced the remaining papers and set to work.

A paper covered in scribbled calculations; a personal letter from a Water witch informing her that the cat was doing well in its new home; a list of towns and domains that she scanned quickly. Breiano, Insebrar; Ravelle, Verdosa; Chiero, Teria; Olpri, Haira; a row of question marks; Ansing, Seach; Leswile, Abern. More question marks.

The names were familiar; she'd traveled too much to not recognize them. But why did they ring such a loud bell?

Breiano. Leswile.

Mirage leapt to her feet and went into the bedroom.

Eclipse glanced up, then rose hastily when he saw her eyes. "What is it?"

Wordlessly she thrust the sheet at him.

He scanned it and shrugged. "An itinerary?"

"My itinerary," she snarled.

"What?"

"Breiano to Leswile. That was the courier run I did, and those are most of the major towns I stopped in along the way. The question marks between Haira and Seach are probably where I cut through the tail of the mountains; they must have lost track of me." She held up two more sheets, both covered in names. "This is more of the same. She's been tracking me for
years
."

He crossed to her and took the papers. "Why?"

Mirage threw up her hands. "I'm supposed to know?"

Eclipse gave her a careful look. "You're really upset, aren't you?"

"Wouldn't
you
be? I spend half my time trying to convince people that I have nothing to do with the witches, and now I find out they've been tracking my every move!"

"Well, not your
every
move. It looks like you lost them a few times." Mirage snarled at him, and he put up his hands defensively. "Okay, okay. Poor choice of joke."

Mirage spun away and kicked a wall in fury. The board cracked under her foot.

Eclipse's hand clamped down on her shoulder. "Calm
down
, Sen."

She took a deep breath, held it, then let it out slowly. "Sorry. I'll finish in the study. Then we can go downstairs."

"Avalanche may know something about this," Eclipse said, holding up the papers.

"He had better," Mirage said, her voice still tight. She could practically feel the eyes on her, and it made her skin crawl. "Because if he doesn't, I'm going to hunt down someone who does."

Miryo was on the roof again when Eikyo found ha, this time on a slope that had her facing Star Hall directly.

"You're brooding," her friend said in accusation, when she rounded a gable and found Miryo there. "
And
yon made yourself hard to find."

Miryo just shrugged.

"Don't think you can get rid of me that easily." Eikyo came up and sat on the tiles next to her. "What's wrong?"

"Just thinking."

"While staring at Star Hall."

"I'm worried about the test, okay?"

Eikyo peered at her. "No, not okay. There's more to it than that. Has something happened?"

The sun-warmed tiles were soothing against Miryo's hands. She picked at a leaf that had become caught between two of them. "Maybe. I don't know." She caught sight of Eikyo's face, and sighed. "All right. I talked to Ashin-kasora a while ago, because I was thinking about maybe joining the Air Hand."

Eikyo's expression became sympathetic. "Did she ton you down?"

Miryo laughed without much humor. "She may not have to."

"What?"

"She…" Miryo searched for words to describe the Key's behavior. There really was no gentle way to say it. "She thinks I'm going to fail the test."

Eikyo stared at her in complete shock. "You can't be serious."

"And the funny thing is," Miryo said, not finding it funny at all, "just a few days before that, Narika-kai was telling me she thought I would be fine."

"Well, there you go," Eikyo said. "Who says Ashin's right? And for the love of the Mother, why would she even
tell
you that?"

"She didn't say it outright. Just acted like it."

Eikyo brightened. "See? You were probably just imagining it."

"I wasn't." Miryo shook her head, eyes on Star Hall again. "I don't know. Maybe it wasn't quite that. But… she was on edge about
something
having to do with my test. And she did a miserable job of hiding it."

Her friend ran her fingers down the cracks between the roof tiles, one by one. "Maybe she did it on purpose," she said slowly.

Now it was Miryo's turn to stare. "What?"

"Well," Eikyo said, "most of the time I've seen you fail at something, it's because you didn't think it was going to be a problem. So you weren't prepared. But if you expect a challenge—well, that's the quickest way to make you succeed. You put your head down and run at it, and Goddess help anything that gets in your way."

Miryo rolled her eyes. "You think she did it just to make me work harder?"

"Maybe."

It was better than the alternative.
And Eikyo's right about me, I guess. I left Ashin's office and went straight back to my room to look over my notes again
.

She was only up here brooding because that morning she'd received her script for the ritual that framed the test. It told her some, but not much. From the terse lines of her responses, she guessed that the test somehow involved trials of character, before it opened her to power.

Do I really think I'm going to fail that? Do I think my character isn't strong enough? Given some of the witches I've known here at Starfall?

But that wasn't really the question.

Am I going to back down from this—from what I've worked for all my life—just because I might fail?

Even if she could, she wouldn't.

Miryo smiled at Eikyo, and meant it. "I'll find out, I
guess. In the
meantime, it's back to studying for me. I'm damned if I'll fail the questioning, and miss the chance to prove Ashin wrong."

"Why is amethyst unstable in certain Fire spells, and which are those it can be used in?"

Miryo's heart clawed its way into her throat. Amethyst-Fire—Misetsu and Menukyo help her, she didn't know! Given time, maybe, but they would tolerate no delay!

And, for the thousandth time that day, even as Miryo's mind froze in terrified paralysis, her mouth gave the answer. The Fire Hand Key who had asked the question showed no reaction whatsoever, but Miryo knew it was correct. Again. Luckily.