The City of Towers: The Dreaming Dark - Book I (38 page)

The tenth bell was ringing when they returned to the streets of High Walls. Rhazala had stayed below to investigate the tunnels.

“How are you going to pay her?” Lei asked.

“Let me handle that. What was your thought on the missing dragonmark?”

“I should examine Jode and see what he can tell me. I’ll need to make a divining rod. I should warn you, though, I can’t do many more infusions tonight.”

Daine nodded. “I know. We’ll need to be careful. But I’ll never be able to sleep until we’ve done all we can.”

Sorrow crossed Lei’s face. “I don’t know if I’ll be able to sleep in any case. It’s … I keep trying to forget about it, to think that he’ll be waiting for us at the Manticore.”

Daine put his hand on her shoulder. “Don’t give up hope. If anyone could find a way to swindle the Keeper of Souls, it would be Jode.”

She nodded, but she had no cheerful words.

Pierce was waiting in the common room when they arrived. “Ca—uh, General Daine, my lady Lei. I have seen no signs of Jode, and Mistress Dassi says that he did not return in our absence.” He paused. “What became of your armor and clothing, captain?”

Daine and Lei looked at one another. “Jode is dead, Pierce.”

“I don’t understand.”

“That’s what the goblin needed to show us. She found Jode’s body down in the sewers.”

Pierce was silent for a moment. “Was he attacked by our enemies from yesterday evening?”

“It seems likely. The sewer was fed from High Walls. But we don’t know how they found him or why they killed him. Yesterday they seemed to want him alive.”

“Perhaps he did not have what they were looking for.”

“Perhaps.” Lei said.

Pierce was silent again. His metal face gave no hint of his emotions. Finally he said “There is no war here. This death has no purpose.”

“That may be where you’re wrong,” Lei said. “One of you, help me back to our room.”

“Pierce, go with her. I have something else to attend to.”

“Yes, Captain.”

Once Lei and Pierce had left, Daine found the innkeeper, Dassi. “Where’s the nearest message station?”

“Halfstone Street in Black Arch, General.” She smiled sweetly. “Has there been any progress on establishing your credit?”

“Perhaps,” he said. “I’ll tell you when I get back.”

Black Arch housed the garrison of Tavick’s Landing. It was the most austere district Daine had been in yet. Located on the ground and close to the gates of Sharn, it was even more heavily fortified than Daggerwatch. It didn’t take long for Daine to find what he was looking for—the crest of House Sivis, hanging from a gilded board over a large black door.

Even late at night, the message station was a bustle of activity. Gnomes were scurrying about and the air was full of whispers. One entire wall was covered with bookshelves, filled with identical black leather tomes. The opposite side of the room was dominated by three marble busts on high pedestals. The busts had the features of elderly, sagacious gnomes, with faceted dragonshards in place of eyes. Two gnomes sat by each bust, each holding a quill and book. Occasionally the gnomes would talk to the statue, but most of the time they seemed to sit and listen, furiously scribbling notes in their books. There were a few more chairs by the door. A woman wearing the courier’s badge of House Orien was fast asleep in one chair, while a messenger in the livery of the Sharn Watch sat in another.

The message stations of House Sivis were the backbone of long-distance communication in Khorvaire. While they called it the Mark of Scribing, the dragonmark of House Sivis related to all forms of communication. By speaking to the stone figure, a gnome could send a message across the continent. It was far from instantaneous but still far faster than any human or beast. When the message reached the intended speaking stone, a gnome at the stone station would copy it down, either holding it for pickup or passing it to a courier for local delivery. Daine
had heard that House Sivis had developed its own language just for sending and recording messages. It wouldn’t surprise him. The gnomes were obsessed with the security of their system.

Daine approached the gnome spokesman. “Good evening, sir!” the gnome said cheerfully. “Are you sending or receiving?”

“Sending,” Daine said, “though there is a complication.” The gnome raised bushy eyebrows and waited for Daine to continue.

“I need to send the message at the recipient’s expense.”

“Well, sir, there are a few nations that have made such arrangements with the house, but unless you are an accredited member of the court in question, I’m afraid that I cannot—”

“The message is for Alina Lorridan Lyrris.”

“And what is it you wished to say?” The speaker produced a parchment and quill and smiled.

Back at the Manticore, Pierce set Jode’s body on one of the ragged pallets. He studied the terrible wound that had shattered his comrade’s head.

“Whoever did this must be punished,” he rumbled.

Lei was rummaging through her backpack, pulling out mystical charms and sheafs of parchment. “I never knew you to have a sense of vengeance, Pierce.”

“This is not a matter of vengeance, my lady. This is war, and war is my purpose.”

She nodded. “Then let it be mine, as well.”

She saw a minotaur falling at her touch, a warforged soldier collapsing into pieces, and for that moment, pure hatred chased away all sorrow. The moment passed, and she was left in the squalid room with her charms and her papers and the corpse of her friend. She sighed, determined to hold back her tears.

Lei spread her tools around the pallet. She took a wooden rod and whispered to it, weaving a minor spell of divination. When this task was completed, she found a flat shard of black crystal and etched the symbol of a skull into its surface. She set the stone disk aside.

“What are you doing, my lady?” Pierce asked.

Lei picked up the rod. “First, I’m going to examine him more closely and search for any sort of mystical energies. Then we’ll see what he can tell us.”

She ran her fingers across the rod, activating the enchantment she’d placed within. Slowly, carefully, she passed the rod along the body.

“There is residual magical energy here—ever so faint, but definitely there.” She studied the shattered skull more closely, then gagged, dropping the wand.

“My lady?” Pierce said, moving to take her shoulders.

“I’m … I’m all right,” she said, returning to her feet. “It’s …” She knelt again. Steeling herself, she examined the wound more closely.

“What is it?”

“This injury … it’s not what it appears.” Lei picked up a small glowing crystal, illuminating the jagged edge of the wound. “Look. This was caused by one or two powerful blows with a large, blunt implement.”

“Yes?” Pierce said.

“But beneath, it looks as if his brain was removed before this injury occurred. There’s no trace of brain matter against the inside of the skull.”

“Why would someone do such a thing?”

“I don’t know, but it means he was dead before the crushing blow, that someone was trying to cover up that first injury. I can only assume that the killers were trying to hide the subtle wound with this savage blow.” She shivered and picked up the disk of black crystal. “Let’s see if Jode can tell us.”

“How could he do that?”

Lei positioned the disk on what remained of Jode’s forehead. “The enchantment I’ve woven within this stone will let us speak with Jode, if only for a few minutes. It’s … not really him, just the traces of his spirit left behind. But he should be able to tell us what happened—at least, as much as he knew before …”

Lei was trying to hold things together, to focus on this as an academic challenge, but this was her friend, and she knew this was the last time she would ever speak to him. Pierce put his
hand on her shoulder, and for a moment she clung to his arm, squeezing the cold metal as hard as she could. Then she took a deep breath and let go, moving back to the corpse.

She touched the stone disk and unlocked the energies with a whisper and a thought. “Jode,” she said quietly. “Tell us who did this to you.”

The silence was absolute.

“Jode,” she repeated. “Tell us what was done to you.” Nothing.

“Jode!” she screamed, though she knew he could not hear.
“Jode!”

A moment later Pierce was holding her, gently shaking her. “Be calm, my lady. Your enchantment has failed, that is all. Be calm.”

Lei shook her head, touching the stone. She could feel the mystical energies still running through it. “No. No, that’s not it. He’s gone, Pierce. There’s nothing there at all. It’s all gone.”

She grabbed hold of Pierce and clung to him, and her tears began to flow.

“They didn’t just take his mark,” she whispered. “They destroyed him completely.”

I
t was almost the eleventh bell by the time Daine returned to the Manticore. Pierce had draped the ruined cloak over Jode’s body. Lei was studying sheets of parchment, her eyes still red with tears.

Daine sat down on the empty pallet and removed the shreds of his chainmail shirt. “What have you found?”

“His mark
was
removed,” Lei said. “Moreover, I think it was removed with these.” She pushed a sheet of parchment across the floor. It was the description of the deep dragonshards Alina wished to have returned. “The other day I told you that such a shard might be able to bind the energies of a dragonmark, to create some sort of defense against a mark. I think someone managed to take that one step further. They drew out his mark, his spirit, everything that defined his mystical identity.” Briefly, she recounted the results of her autopsy.

Daine drew his dagger while she was talking and slowly carved grooves in the floor. When she mentioned the missing brain he slammed the dagger down, the adamantine blade passing through wood as if it were paper. He ground his teeth and pulled the dagger from the floor. He’d seen so many die over the past two years, and right now there was no time for sorrow or fury. He took a deep breath and set down the dagger. He drew his acid-scarred sword and laid it next to his armor.

“I need restoration. We may have a battle soon, and I don’t want this shattering the moment it strikes steel.”

Lei nodded and picked up the sword. As she ran her fingers along the blade, the metal began to flow and reform. Within moments it had been restored to its original condition. Then she turned to the armor.

“I’m going to have to stretch the metal to make do,” she said. “It won’t be as strong as it was before.”

“Whatever you need to do,” Daine said.

There was a knock on the door.

It was still too early for Rhazala to show up. Daine snatched his restored sword and rolled over to the door. Remaining in a low crouch, he indicated that Pierce should open the door. As soon as there was enough space, his hand was through the opening, the point of his blade poised at the belly of their visitor.

A human woman stood on the other side of the door. She was dressed in black leather and wool and carried a large satchel. The courier’s crest of House Orien was emblazoned above her heart. She didn’t flinch or blink. Apparently she was used to suspicious clients.