The Child Prince (The Artifactor) (48 page)

Bellomi returned the smile with a wolfish baring of the teeth. “Name it.”

“I’d lay odds that I can get closer to yon target than you without actually hitting the man.”

Without saying a word, Bellomi reached for the quiver at his side and extended an arrow toward the man, generously offering him first shot. Axelrad outright grinned as he accepted the arrow. In a smooth notion, he knocked it, pulled back, and raised up just enough to aim.

Axelrad paused two seconds before letting fly. The arrow flew through the air, whistling, going straight and true. It thunked into the wall a scant inch away from the Councilman’s neck, quivering slightly as it embedded itself into the wood.

For a moment, the man froze, as if he couldn’t believe what had just happened. Then his bodyguard slammed into him, throwing him roughly to the ground and under cover. The nobleman screeched, his voice warbling higher and higher in his panic as he started gibbering out orders. Chaos ensued as everyone seemed to spring into action at once, running around in different directions.

“You got quite close,” Bellomi praised, impressed the man had pulled that off in such weak lighting.

Axelrad smiled, dipping his head to accept the compliment, but the expression on his face silently said,
You can’t beat that.

Several guards were running about below, looking for the assassin. The bodyguard hauled his employer up off the ground and shoved him into a corner in the wall, which did a better job of shielding him from view. It was a good decision—or it would have been if Bellomi had been sitting on a roof instead of the decorative half-balcony that jutted out from the side of the house. Actually, this new location gave him a better line of sight on the target and helped eliminate the possibility of him accidentally shooting someone else.

Drawing another arrow from his quiver, he put a knee underneath him and levered himself up just enough to be able to fully draw the bow. Knocking the arrow, he took in a deep breath, held it, and sighted the target. There. That clump of hair dangling near his cheek should do nicely.

Breath in again, hold, release. The arrow released with a twang, string vibrating in its wake. Bellomi ducked back down again as the arrow flew forward, hitting exactly where he intended. The shaft brushed the Councilman’s hair before embedding itself solidly between the cracks of two bricks.

Screaming like a wounded banshee, the man sank instantly to his knees, arms up over his head, curling up in a defensive position. The bodyguard threw himself between the Councilman and the outside world, blocking Bellomi’s view of the man almost completely.

“Excellent shot,” Axelrad praised. “Have you been practicing behind my back?”

“But of course.” Bellomi beamed at him.

The captain chuckled softly. “Well, we can’t stay here longer. What say you? Shall we continue the competition at Massart’s house?”

“I think that a splendid idea.” 

No one stirred until well after noon, not with the events of the night before. Sevana made a very late breakfast (lunch?) and left it sitting out on the table, available for whenever people dragged themselves from their beds. As she had absolutely no intention of dealing with the massive amounts of reports and things to go through, she headed straight for her workroom and instead dealt with the pile of work orders that Kip had piled up on the table. Dealing with that took a good portion of the day, so it wasn’t until midnight or so that she finally got through with the business-related work.

She entertained an idle thought or two of perhaps retiring to bed, but she didn’t do more than get her feet off the table before Sarsen gave a quick knock on her door and stepped inside. “Ah, good. You’re still up.” Without invitation, he came all the way in, plopping himself on the bench next to her with easy familiarity.

Sevana hadn’t seen a soul today before he walked in, and so had just enough curiosity to ask, “Is everyone else still sorting through all of that?”

“What else do you expect?” he responded, half-amused. “Although they did cheat at one point. Hana had me come in and use a key-word spell to sort through the truly relevant ones. She’s got them in nice, tidy little piles now.”

“The girl’s becoming a magpie, I swear.”

“But she’s an organized one,” Sarsen agreed, eyes crinkling. “I stuck my head in there just now, and I don’t think it’s going well. There’s some very unhappy faces in that room.”

Sevana rubbed at both eyes with thumb and forefinger, resisting the urge to sigh. “I don’t think anyone’s expecting good news. They’re just holding their breath to see how bad it really is.”

“Hmmm,” Sarsen agreed noncommittally.

Another knock came at the door, and as usual, Aren didn’t wait for a response before just stepping inside. Sevana watched wearily as he came in and also sat without invitation. The man just couldn’t develop the habit of
asking
for permission, could he? It had taken a direct threat from her before he even learned to knock!

“Sevana, Sarsen,” he greeted, sitting down in the sole remaining chair. “There’s something I need to ask you.”

Something important, judging from that expression and tone. Curiosity piqued, Sevana silently waved for him to continue.

Aren leaned forward in his chair slightly, elbows braced on knees, posture and expression radiating intensity. “I come to you with this not because I want a magical solution but because I need your minds. Artifactors are known the world over as the most intelligent, talented, and resourceful people. You cannot hold the positions that you do without possessing a very sharp intellect. I need that now.”

Sevana gave Sarsen a glance, and the look on his face confirmed that he knew just what the king had come to them for, as she did. “You want us to find and entrap the person who attacked you and Bel.”

“Yes,” Aren said simply, voice rough and husky.

Sevana took in a deep breath to buy herself a second to think. Aren had hit the nail on the head—this problem didn’t have a magical solution. She had already tried to track down the person who cast the spell only to have that idea backlash in her face. When that didn’t work, she had nothing left to try. The trail for this crime lay ten years cold after all. This would indeed be a mental challenge, although they might be able to use a few magic tricks to gain the information they needed.

A good challenge had never scared Sevana. She enjoyed them, actually. Sometimes the job of Artifactor became tedious because people constantly requested the same spells and potions over and
over
and she grew tired of the repetition. Part of the reason she’d picked up Bel was simply for the challenge. So she smiled at Aren with wicked anticipation.

“Sounds fun. Sarsen?”

He sported the same feral smile, teeth flashing white in his dark skin. “I’m in.”

Aren’s eyes closed in a gesture of relief. “Thank you.”

“Let’s start with the basics of what happened,” Sarsen suggested, already pulling out a miniature shell from his breast pocket. He set it on the table and tapped it three times on the apex with his forefinger.

“What is that?” Aren asked, pointing a finger at it.

“Ah, it’s an Endless Shell,” Sarsen explained easily. “They naturally record the sounds of the ocean, so we’ve learned to adapt them to record any sound that we wish it to. It’s part of how we gather spell elements, usually. But I like to use it for moments like this, where it’s too much of a hassle to take notes.” 

From the expression on Aren’s face, he really wanted to have one as well, but since it took a magical person to operate it, he’d have to keep wanting. Sevana moved them along before he could get the idea permanently lodged into his head. “Alright, I know Bel’s story. He told it to me the first day he came here. But what is yours?”

“I honestly can’t tell you when I was cursed,” Aren admitted sourly. “The spell worked on me so gradually I didn’t notice until it was too late. I had passing thoughts of talking to someone about what was happening to me, but I could never follow up on the thought long enough to move more than a step before that thrice-cursed spell re-focused my attention. But I started to tinker more and more in my workshop about a month or so before Bellomi was cursed.”

Interesting. Bellomi had said it was longer than that. This might be a simple matter of ten year old memories and a different perception, but Sevana made a mental note of it regardless.

“His curse of course diverted my attention for a time, but after I set Pierpoint to solve the problem, I felt a compelling need to be in my laboratory.” Aren briefly buried his face in both hands. “If my wife had still been alive at that point, she’d have had my head for neglecting our son.”

No doubt. If she hadn’t been cursed as well.

Aren’s forehead furrowed as he concentrated. “Those early days I remember clearly, but it becomes progressively murky after that. I don’t remember much after I ordered Pierpoint to focus on Bellomi’s curse. I remember he was worried about me, for some reason, but he couldn’t ignore an outright command from me.”

He should have
, Sevana couldn’t help but think.

“But I don’t remember ever following up with him about it, or him reporting to me his progress. A few members of the council came to see me in the laboratory, and I remember responding to their inquiries into several matters, but I don’t think I left that room after that.” He shifted, agitatedly, growing progressively more upset as he spoke. “I stayed in there, sometimes resting in a chair, or eating a tray that was brought up to me, but never leaving. And then my thoughts and energies were poured into whatever ideas I’d thought up or sketched out and just didn’t have time to build. The next thing I recall that was different than that routine was Bellomi coming to take me away from that place.”

That didn’t give them much in the way of information, much like Bel’s story. Sevana gave a little growl of vexation. “And where was Axelrad during all of this?”

“Oh, he retired a good year before Bel was cursed.” Drawn out of his moroseness, Aren looked back up. “He didn’t want to, but the man should have retired a good five years before, so I rather forced him. Now I wish I hadn’t. He would never have let things go as they did.”

No, he wouldn’t have. But the attacker might well have been waiting for the extremely loyal captain of the guard to retire before attacking. So Axelrad remaining in his position would have done nothing more than delay the inevitable.

“You said several Councilmen came to see you in those early days,” Sarsen said slowly, wheels turning in his mind. “Which ones?”

“Hmmm. Now, let me think.” Aren’s eyes strayed to the ceiling as he tried to recall. “Bauwens, Clasessens, Goethals, Massart…I remember seeing Delhaye once. Oh, Lernaire came once as well, although I don’t think he said anything to me, just hovered near the door.”

“So, six men out of a council of thirteen.”

“Clasessens and Goethals came several times and voiced concern over my reclusiveness,” Aren added thoughtfully. “They were always the most loyal to me. I don’t think they had anything to do with it. Bauwens and Massart were famous for sitting on the fence and siding with whoever they thought would give them the most advantage. I don’t think they were behind the attack, but I’m sure they took advantage of it. I’ve never been able to tell what side Lernaire was on, or if he’s on a side at all.”

“And the rest of the Council?” Sarsen asked.

“You can lump them all into the category of ‘greedy, ambitious men with no scruples,’” Aren responded sourly. “I wouldn’t put anything past them.”

While Sevana had to agree that the culprit was probably a Councilman, she had been taught by Master to never assume anything or look at a problem with too narrow a focus. “Outside of the Council, who are your enemies?”

“If I started listing them, we’d be here most of the night,” Aren grimaced as if he had just bitten into something rotten. “In short, anyone that’s connected to the Council with the same greedy ambitions, anyone that doesn’t agree with my policies, and anyone that I’ve denied promotions to in the past twenty years.”

Sarsen hummed in a deep, thoughtful way, as he was wont to do when contemplating something. “I don’t think we should focus on
who
, Sev. Too troublesome, too wide of a field. We should focus on
how
. How many people could afford to hire a magician of such high caliber that even you couldn’t trace him? How many people could manage to sneak him in through palace security not once, but twice, in order to curse two different highly guarded people? That is where we should start.”

He made several very good points. “Then let’s start with the magician and work our way outward.” Seeing that Aren still sat there like a lump on a log, she shooed him out with a wave of the hand. “You’ve got other things to research. Leave this problem to us to puzzle out.”

For some reason, this amused him, as if being shooed away had never happened to him before. Well, actually, it probably hadn’t. But he stood and made his way out of the room, no doubt heading for the second research room to help Hana.

At least, if the man had any sense, that’s where he
should
be headed.