“And another thing, daughter,” Charra said. “That man was our last solid lead on your father’s murder.”
“What? No. That’s not… I was told–”
“How are we supposed to ask a corpse what he had your father importing?”
“Layla,” I said. Charra shot me a venomous look but I steeled myself and ploughed ahead. “Did you have anything to do with getting rid of an alchemic-dealer called Keran? Or a gang called the Iron Wolves that claimed a part of the Warrens?” She’d also been behind that neatly done assassination in the gambling den, but I thought it better not to mention in front of Charra that she’d been in the Scabs. One scandal at a time.
Her mouth clamped shut, but I could read the answer in her body language well enough. Perhaps not personally, but she was involved somehow. The temptation to pull the information from her mind was powerful.
“Who commissioned you?” I asked.
As expected, she said nothing. She physically couldn’t. The group she apparently belonged to had a magus or some sort of artefact to enforce the silence of their members. I would be able to break through that sort of geas though, given time.
Layla sighed. “I can say that somebody claiming to be an altruist is behind all of this,” she said. “Somebody rich, powerful, and anonymous. They wished to see Setharis cleansed of undesirables and provided a list of criminals for removal.”
“But why the Harbourmaster?” I asked. “Why now?”
Layla glared at me, fingering a knife. She might feel besieged by her mother, but she didn’t really know me or owe me anything. Whatever Charra’s opinion, Layla saw me as a threat. My fault for getting so angry at Charra for sharing my secrets with her. “It took me some time to locate his latest bolthole. He helps the syndicate lords bring in alchemics and slaves from the continent. He profits from pain and flesh.”
“As it turns out, so do you, Layla,” Charra added. “You profit from pain and dead flesh. Just what do you think assassins are? Some merry band of avengers righting wrongs?” She spat at Layla’s feet.
“I think no such thing!” Layla snapped. “I am under no illusions as to what we are. I’m no hero. I pick and choose my own contracts, mother. It’s not the same. I am cutting out the rot.”
“Or so you think,” I said. “They’ve been damnably clever.”
Layla glared at me. “What do you mean?”
“Don’t you find it a huge coincidence that you just happen to be killing the very people who might be able to give us answers about your father’s murder? I’d wager good coin that somebody is getting twisted pleasure out of making his daughter dance to their twisted tune. And even better, they have you thinking it’s all your own doing.”
Layla lifted a hand to her mouth, looked like she might vomit. “No, I… I didn’t mean to. I didn’t know.”
Charra’s face softened. “And that’s why you don’t kill for somebody else, Layla. Always make it your own choice, if you must. And then you live with the consequences.”
Layla’s hands clenched, nails digging into her palms and drawing blood. Her eyes went cold, suppressing wild fury. Clearly you didn’t get to be an assassin of her prowess without iron discipline and self-control. I’d felt her mind, and she had barrels of the stuff to spare.
Charra reached for her daughter. “You will come home with me right this second.”
Layla shuddered, then spun and leapt across to the next rooftop, fleeing as fast as she could. Charra started after her but I seized her arm.
“Let her go,” I said. “She needs to figure this out on her own.” Charra tried to pull away, but I held on tight until her daughter was long gone.
She didn’t cry, didn’t show any emotion whatsoever. She felt numb, and didn’t look at me as she descended the ladder.
“Charra…” I didn’t have the faintest idea of what I could say, had no clue how to help.
“Leave it be, Walker. She’s big and ugly enough to make her own mistakes. She doesn’t hang onto her mam’s skirts anymore.” She paused in her descent. “Was she telling the truth or was that all an act? I don’t know her as well as I thought.”
“Layla wasn’t lying,” I said. “She’s not the heartless thing you fear she’s become. Not yet anyway.”
“How can you possibly know that?” she growled.
“I know.”
She said nothing as we made our way down to street level. Charra was in a daze, not noticing the people gathering on the street to stare into the building, or the suddenly hushed chatter from people spotting my bloodstained boots. I was acutely aware that the wrong people might recognize Charra and draw conclusions. This deep in syndicate territory I didn’t have a hope of protecting her if they mobbed us. I brushed a veil of hair across the unscarred side of my face to give me some disguise but resisted the urge to hunch down again – that would get me marked as having something to hide. Instead I stood tall and tried to look at ease. Just another scruffian out on the streets.
Her friendly wardens and sniffer spotted Charra and waved us through without fuss. She didn’t even acknowledge them. We passed through the hubbub of the market, tension rising with every step, and we were halfway up Fisherman’s Way when she stopped dead. A sick feeling rose up my gullet – she was going to discuss what I’d done to Layla, about what I did to people’s minds.
I finally found my voice, tried to divert the subject. “I don’t know what to say,” I said. “At least she can take care of herself. She was more than capable of killing me up there. She went easy on me.” I stopped in the street, a horrible suspicion occurred and somehow I was certain it was true, another flake of that locked-away secret ripped loose. “Charra, Layla is mageborn. After what happened to her father during the Forging, you never sent her for testing, did you?”
She shook her head. “After what they did to Lynas? I would never allow those butchers to lay a finger on my daughter. Lynas took care of it just before you left. He arranged forged papers proving she had already been through the testing.”
No, he hadn’t. Neither Lynas nor Charra had that sort of influence. Their safety was my payoff from the deal I’d made and I’d made him believe it. They had no need to feel any guilt over my exile; that truth I kept for myself.
The Arcanum could not risk magic running wild, or disloyal magi and mageborn working against Setharii interests. There were so many checks and protections in place to prevent such things that even the Archmagus and the High Houses were helpless to interfere. Only a god had the sort of clout necessary to fake that. Thinking about it made my head hurt, literally.
“Walker,” Charra said, sounding utterly drained. “Layla is still a stupid child in many ways, still naive. Promise me you will look out for her when – if…”
“Hey, hey – none of that,” I said. “We both will. I promise to look out for her if I survive that long.”
She gave me a wan smile. “We can hope.” She closed her eyes and loosed a deep sigh. When they opened again it was the old, harder Charra. Her dark eyes nailed me to the wall. I swallowed and prepared to weather the storm.
“Have you ever done that to me? Been in my mind?” she said. “Changed things?”
There it was, the beginnings of fear and paranoia. “Of course not,” I said. “I’d never do that to you.”
“All these years you led me to believe that you were just a swindler with a few clever magic tricks, maybe a little more. You pretended all that raw talent as a magus was wasted on you. You, just a copper-bit trickster? After what I’ve seen today? Hah! Do you take me for a fool?”
I hung my head, waiting for the righteous anger.