Meanwhile, the déjà vu continued. She did her best to shake it off and focus. After all, she wasn’t just here to be part of Alucard’s tableau. There was the issue of finding a mark, of performing her own little magic trick. The tavern was full of magicians, and Delilah Bard was going to make one of them disappear.
Someone boomed a greeting to Alucard, and the entourage came to a halt as the two clasped wrists. Tav went to round up drinks, while Stross surveyed the room with keen appraisal. She guessed he’d been brought along for the same reason she had, to size up the competition.
Vasry, meanwhile, eyed the room as if it were a feast.
“That’s the reigning champion, Kisimyr,” he whispered to Lila in Arnesian as the woman with the roped hair strode toward Alucard, boots ringing out on the worn wood floor. The man who’d greeted Alucard retreated a few steps as she approached.
“Emery,” she said with a feline grin and a heady accent. “You really don’t know how to stay out of trouble.” She wasn’t from London. She was speaking Royal, but her words all ran together—not in the serpentine way of the Faroan tongue, more like she’d hacked off all the edges and taken out the space between. She had a low, resonant voice, and when she spoke, it sounded like rumbling thunder.
“Not when trouble is more fun,” said Alucard with a bow. Kisimyr’s grin widened as the two fell to quiet conversation—there was something sharp about that grin, and paired with the rest of her face, the slanted brow and straight-on gaze, it read like a taunt. A challenge. The woman exuded confidence. Not arrogance, exactly—that was usually unfounded, and everything about Kisimyr said she’d just love an excuse to show you what she could do.
Lila liked that, found herself mimicking the features, wondering what kind of whole they’d add up to on her own face.
She didn’t know if she wanted to fight the woman or be her friend, but she certainly wouldn’t be replacing her. Lila’s attention shifted, trailing across a pair of brawny figures, and a very pretty girl in blue with cascades of dark hair, not to mention a fair number of curves. No good matches there. She continued to scan the room as Alucard’s entourage made its way toward a corner booth.
Kisimyr had retreated into the folds of her own group, and she was talking to a young, dark-skinned man beside her. He was fine-boned and wiry, with bare arms and gold earrings running the length of both ears to match the ones in Kisimyr’s.
“Losen,” said Alucard softly. “Her protégé.”
“Will they have to compete against each other?”
He shrugged. “Depends on the draw.”
A man with a stack of paper appeared at Kisimyr’s elbow.
“Works for the Scryer, that one,” said Stross. “Best avoid him, unless you want to find yourself on the boards.”
Just then, the tavern doors flung open, and a young man blew in—quite literally—on a gust of wind. It swirled around him and through the tavern, shuddering candle flames and rocking lanterns. Alucard twisted in his seat, then rolled his eyes with a smile. “Jinnar!” he said, and Lila couldn’t tell by the way he said it if that was a name or a curse.
Even next to the broad Veskans and the jewel-marked Faroans she’d met in Sasenroche, the newcomer was one of the most striking men Lila had ever seen. Wisp-thin, like a late shadow, his skin had the rich tan of an Arnesian and his black hair shot up in a vertical shock. Below black brows, his eyes were silver, shining like a cat’s in the low tavern light and scored only by the beads of black at their center. A fringe of thick black lashes framed both silver pools, and he had a jackal’s grin, not sharp but wide. It only got wider when he saw Alucard.
“Emery!” he called, tugging the cloak from his shoulders and crossing the room, the two gestures wound together in a seamless motion. Beneath the cloak, his clothes weren’t just close fitting; they were molded to his body, ornamented by silver cuffs that circled his throat and ran the lengths of his forearms.
Alucard stood. “They let you out in public?”
The young man threw his arm around the captain’s shoulder. “Only for the Essen Tasch. You know that old Tieren has a soft spot for me.”
He spoke so fast Lila could barely follow, but her attention prickled at the mention of London’s head priest.
“Jin, meet my crew. At least, the ones I like best.”
The man’s eyes danced over the table, flitting across Lila for only a moment—it felt like a cool breeze—before returning to Alucard. Up close, his metallic gaze was even more unsettling.
“What are we calling you these days?”
“Captain will do.”
“How very official. Though I suppose it’s not as bad as a vestra title.” He dipped into an elaborate gesture that vaguely resembled a bow, if a bow were paired with a rude hand gesture. “His Eminence Alucard, second son of the Royal House of Emery.”
“You’re embarrassing yourself.”
“No, I’m embarrassing you,” said Jin, straightening. “There’s a difference.”
Alucard offered him a seat, but Jin declined, perching instead on the shoulder of Alucard’s own chair, light as a feather. “What have I missed?”
“Nothing, yet.”
Jin looked around. “Going to be a strange one.”
“Oh?”
“Air of mystery around it all this year.”
“Is that an element joke?”
“Hah,” said Jin, “I didn’t even think about that.”
“I thought you kept a list of wind jokes,” teased Alucard. “I certainly do, just for you. I’ve broken them down into chills, gales, steam….”
“Just like your sails,” jabbed Jin, hopping down from the chair. “So full of air. But I’m serious,” he said, leaning in. “I haven’t even seen half the competition. Hidden away for effect perhaps. And the pomp surrounding everything! I was at Faro three years back, and you know how much they like their gold, but it was a pauper’s haunt compared to this affair. I’m telling you, the air of spectacle’s run away with it. Blame the prince. Always had a flare for drama.”
“Says the man floating three inches off the ground.”
Lila looked down, and started slightly when she saw that Jinnar was, in fact, hovering. Not constantly, but every time he moved, he took a fraction too long to settle, as if gravity didn’t have the same hold on him as it did on everyone else. Or maybe, as if something else were lifting him up.
“Yes, well,” Jin said with a shrug, “I suppose I’ll fit in splendidly. As will you,” he added, flicking the silver feather on Alucard’s hat. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I should make the rounds and the welcomes. I’ll be back.”
And with that, he was gone. Lila turned to Alucard, bemused. “Is he always like that?”
“Jinnar? He’s always been a bit … enthusiastic. But don’t let his childish humor fool you. He is the best wind mage I’ve ever met.”
“He was levitating,” said Lila. She’d seen plenty of magicians doing magic. But Jinnar was magic.
“Jinnar belongs to a particular school of magic, one that believes not only in using an element, but in becoming one with it.” Alucard scratched his head. “It’s like when children are learning to play renna and they have to carry the ball with them everywhere, to get comfortable with it. Well, Jin never set the ball down.”
Lila watched the wind mage flit around the room, greeting Kisimyr and Losen, as well as the girl in blue. And then he stopped to perch on the edge of a couch, and began talking to a man she hadn’t noticed yet. Or rather, she had noticed him, but she’d taken him for the cast-off member of someone else’s entourage, dressed as he was in a simple black coat with an iridescent pin shaped like an S at his throat. He’d made his way through the gathering earlier, hugging the edges of the room and clutching a glass of white ale. The actions held more discomfort than stealth, and he’d eventually retreated to a couch to sip his drink in peace.