Cerryl refilled her goblet and added some wine to his mug. Then he ate another chunk of cheese. “Do you recall Reylerk?”
“The big old trader?”
“He was involved with Eliasar’s death. I started to get close to asking questions, and he took poison. He died right in the hall.”
“That’s bad.”
Cerryl stood and looked out the open window, blotting the sweat from his forehead. The study felt close. “I hadn’t even threatened him. He knew I was truth-reading him.”
“And he poisoned himself? Why?”
“Why do you think?”
The dark-haired mage moistened her lips. “You want me to guess. Well, I would wager that he knew something and he knew you could find it out and he didn’t want to let you know it.”
“A trader self-willed enough to kill himself? An attack against us?” He eased back to the massive desk.
“I would say someone he feared more than you, perhaps someone who threatened his family,” suggested Lyasa. “As mages, we don’t always understand how strong family can be.”
“Some of us don’t have family, but I can look at Leyladin and see where that might be the case.” He took a sip of wine and used his belt knife to cut several small slabs off the block of yellow cheese. “Have some.”
The black-haired mage took a chunk of cheese and began to eat.
“I have to wonder,” Cerryl mused, “why someone would care enough to threaten Reylerk. Or what he would care enough about to kill himself to keep me from finding out.”
“That shows we have a big problem.”
“We already knew that.” Cerryl turned and looked out at the harbor once more. After a few moments, he turned back. “I’m not very good at intrigue.” But you’re getting better, unfortunately. “Some of this is obvious. The traders know we can tell when they lie. One of the most powerful traders takes his own life rather than let me question him. No one is doing any trading or even buying things in the city.”
“Recluce?” Lyasa finished her water.
Cerryl reached forward and refilled the goblet from the pitcher, then shook his head. “They’ve been used, just as we have. Jeslek and I played right into Rystyr’s hands. I can’t prove the viscount is the one, but it feels right.”
Lyasa shrugged helplessly. “You may be right, but I don’t see it.”
“First, take the crossbow bolts. Someone tried to kill me with a crossbow when I was in Jellico. Eliasar was killed with three at once. Now…Sverlik was supposedly killed by Lyam. Remember, he was prefect of Gallos before Syrma? It took over a dozen archers-archers, not crossbowmen.”
“What are you pointing toward?”
“Bear with me.” Cerryl turned and took a swallow of the clean but warm water in the goblet. “Axalt-Axalt controlled the direct land trade between Spidlar and Certis. Axalt is no more. Then, there is Gallos, now split in twain by those Little Easthorns raised by Jeslek, with much of the High Grasslands burned to ashes. And Hydlen, rent by struggles over who would be duke ever since the untimely death of Berofar and then his son. Of course, Ferobar might have been a strong duke, too, except I was sent to kill him and I succeeded. Spidlar-Spidlaria is the best port on the northern coast, and it had strong free traders. Diev is gone…”
Lyasa’s mouth opened. “Everything that has happened…it all helps Certis and its traders.”
“The glass would show it that way…” Cerryl paused. “Shyren…when I found the golds in his bedchamber, he said that I was just ‘his’ tool. I thought he was referring to Jeslek. I don’t think so now.”
“Rystyr?”
Cerryl nodded. “Then there’s Jiolt. Layel said something about his cousin being the largest factor in Jellico.”
“Anya’s sister is consorted to Jiolt’s son.”
“It’s all like a spiderweb. You can barely see it except if you look at it in a certain way.” Cerryl shrugged. “That may not be the proper way, either.” And sometimes you can’t even see things. You can only sense them, like the way in which Anya used her ties with Jiolt to set Kesrik after you when you were an apprentice…and there was no way to prove it and never will be.
“Best you send Kalesin to Kleth, then.”
“Kalesin?”
“Once…he and Anya…”
“Has she bedded every mage in the Guild?”
Lyasa laughed. “She’s tried every one, except the women, and she’d try that if she thought it might benefit her.”
“What about Syandar?”
“He’s not bad-like Myredin, I’d guess.”
“Then we don’t want Kalesin with him. We’ll have to be Kalesin’s keepers.”
Lyasa brushed short black hair off her left ear. “Put that way, I would agree he should stay, like it though I do not.”
“What do you think? About the whole situation here?”
“We’re losing as badly as at the beginning. We aren’t getting any golds from Spidlar. The lancers are on edge, and they feel it’s but eight-days before we lose another mage.”
“It will take years for Spidlar to recover, and Certis will benefit?”
“Gallos, too, if not so much.”
“And the Guild is already weaker.”
Lyasa nodded.
“We aren’t going to do it this way any longer.”
“What have you in mind?”
“I don’t know. Yet.” Cerryl could feel the chill in his eyes, the anger colder than chaos was hot. “But I will stop it. Without letting Anya and Sterol learn what I know.”
Lyasa shivered.
CL
WITH THE DIM light of late twilight fading, Cerryl looked at the image of a blonde healer in the glass for a long moment, savoring the smile offered by Leyladin, wishing, once again, that they were together before letting her visage fade.
The stacks of lists and papers remained on the study desk-a set of papers larger than those left by Eliasar. Cerryl had read them, all, and, for the most part, they were just that-lists. He picked up the shorter list, the one for the evening, the one that held Lyasa’s suspected nighttime traders.
He’d already ridden by the shops earlier in the day, beside Hiser at the head of a routine patrol, marking them in his mind, trying to assess which might be the most likely. He’d not told Hiser the purpose of the ride, nor Lyasa the reason for the list. The less anyone knew about what he planned, the safer he would be. Spidlaria was far more dangerous than Kalesin could know. Or than he cares.
With a deep breath, Cerryl stood, then stepped past the massive desk and out of the study into the hallway. “Good evening, Natrey.”
“Evening, ser,” answered the lancer guard, remaining alert, his eyes on the entry hall and the front door.
“How have you found Spidlaria?”
“It be an unfriendly place, ser. Folk’d spit at you, dared they to.”
“They’ve never been that friendly, I fear.” Cerryl nodded. They’ll be less friendly before they become more so.
“Yes, ser.”
“I’m going upstairs.” Cerryl turned and walked toward the staircase until he was out of the guard’s direct line of sight and only a dozen cubits from the barred side door.
Where to? The chandlery? The reluctant arms mage turned toward the side door out of the dwelling. He eased the light-blurring shield around him-the illusion protection that caused people’s eyes to slide past him, as if he were a wall or something so commonplace that he were not even to be noticed. Then he slid the bar enough so that he could open the door and step outside.
Using the blur shield would keep Kalesin, were the other mage even around, from sensing Cerryl’s presence.
Cerryl paused in the rear courtyard, drinking in the coolness of early evening for a moment. With sunset, the breeze had quieted, but it still blew off the cooler waters of the empty harbor.
He walked quietly to the rear gateway and stepped through the archway and down along the walled passage to the street below the house. He halted in the deeper shadows of the arch that opened onto the street, one of the four that led to the harbor square.