The emperors were dead.
And then, seventeen years later, Markino proved them wrong and emerged from hiding at the head of an army out of, of all places, Djan. Things had gotten interesting after that.
“Are you to the Cleansings yet?” I asked. On the march from Djan to Ildrecca, Markino had ordered his troops to deface every depiction of his former incarnations they came across. He claimed he was “cleansing” the temples and promoting a fresh start after the Regency; his other selves had had other opinions. They didn’t like being erased when they weren’t around. And so had begun the centuries-long, ongoing spat among the incarnations of the emperor. Lyconnis had hinted that he had found a new source on the topic, but he hadn’t been willing to elaborate on it.
Today was no different. Lyconnis smiled a crafty smile-or, at least, he tried to; it didn’t really fit his face. “I’m not telling,” he said.
“You wouldn’t be.” I considered pressing him-he loved to talk about his work, and it wouldn’t be hard to get him to relent-but sighed instead. “No, as much as I’d love to read it, I have to see your master on business.”
Lyconnis’s face clouded over. “Ah. I’ll leave you be, then.” He didn’t know the specifics of my relationship with Baldezar, but he was smart enough to realize it was something he would rather stay ignorant about.
I walked to the back of the shop and climbed the narrow circular stairs to the gallery. Baldezar was waiting for me at the top.
“Young Lyconnis does not seem to appreciate your trade as much as you do his.” The sentence rasped out of Baldezar’s mouth, his words dry and brittle as the parchments that surrounded us.
“I think it’s your business with me he disapproves of,” I said.
“Most likely.” The master scribe turned away and paced slowly toward his office. “But since the opinions of my lessers matter nothing to me…” He let the sentence drift to the floor, stepped past it.
I let my eyes brush the works that resided here. Books and scrolls filled the narrow spaces between the windows in the gallery, the shelves running floor to ceiling. Many were of little use to anyone except the scribes, but there were enough histories and collected tales here to keep me busy for ages. Baldezar consented to rent some out to me now and again, but only grudgingly, and always at a high price.
“No touching or taking,” he warned over his shoulder. There was no humor in the tone.
I bristled at the implication. “Mind your words, Jarkman.”
“It’s my trade-how can I not? You just mind your trade, burglar.”
“I haven’t cracked a den in years,” I said.
Baldezar sniffed but otherwise stayed silent.
We stepped into his office. The master scribe arranged himself like a potentate behind his reading table. I took the narrow seat across from him. The shutters to the room had been thrown back for light, but the glass windows themselves were closed against the dust and noise of the street. It made the space feel tight and bright and warm. I fought a yawn and sneezed instead.
For most people, such a basking would have made them appear healthy, or at least alive; but all it did for Baldezar was highlight the sharp crags of his face. I could make out a similar collection of jutting angles and projections beneath the ink-stained tunic, which hinted at the sparseness of his frame. He let his eyelids droop halfway closed as he regarded me.
“I hope you are not here for the work you commissioned,” he said. “I told you it would not be ready until next week. I’ve not even received the proper linen paper from the presser yet.”
I waved my hand. “No, no rush on that. Take your time.” I was having him do a bit of forgery for my sister, but it wouldn’t hurt to let her wait a bit. It might even teach her some patience, though I had my doubts. “I’ve come here for your opinion on something.”
The scribe nodded as if this made perfect and natural sense, which I’m sure it did to him. He was Baldezar, after all.
I reached into my ahrami pouch and drew out the piece of paper I had taken from Athel.
Baldezar’s eyebrows formed themselves into a brief pair of peaks, then settled down again. “May I?” He held out his reedlike fingers. I obliged, and he held the strip of paper up to the light.
“And what are you looking for here?” he asked after a long moment.
Even after giving him the paper, I hesitated. My instincts were to keep as many people out of my business as possible. I had to remind myself why I had come here in the first place.
“I’m hoping it’s a cipher you might recognize,” I said.
“As in a coded message?”
I nodded.
“Where did you get it?”
I regarded the Jarkman silently.
“I only ask,” he said, “because the provenance might help me to-”
“It doesn’t matter where I got it,” I said sharply, my fatigue getting the better of my patience. “What matters is what you can tell me about it.”
“I see.” Baldezar rubbed the paper between his fingers. “Do you know what it pertains to?”
“This is dusty stuff, Jarkman-don’t play the Boman.”
Baldezar lifted the side of his mouth in distaste. “I may understand your canting, Drothe, but it doesn’t mean I enjoy hearing it. Use the imperial tongue in my presence, or get out.”
I snapped forward in my chair, stopping myself just before I came out of it. Baldezar’s eyes went wide as he almost fell back in his own.
I took a long, slow breath.
“All right,” I grated. “In plain Imperial, I’m not happy about what that paper implies. In fact, I’m downright pissed. I’m having a bad day because of what’s on that paper, and I don’t expect I’ll be the only one. Now, we both know what that means, so my advice is to tell me what you see here. Otherwise, my using the cant won’t be the only thing you don’t enjoy.”
Baldezar opened his mouth, shut it, and cleared his throat. “A code, you say? Intriguing.” He laid the strip out on his desk, studying it. After a minute or so, his hands stopped shaking. Baldezar rotated the strip a few times, looking at the markings from all angles, and then turned it blank side up. He ran his fingers over the paper and hemmed to himself. Then he sat back.
“I don’t know.”
“What?”
Baldezar held up his hands placatingly. “It’s not any language I recognize, if it is a language at all. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to the markings. Nothing indicates a code or message of any sort.”
I stood up and leaned over the table. “There’re pystos and immus right there,” I said, pointing. “And what about the repeating marks. .. here… and here, and here again? And these two here and here. Those might be fragments of common cephta.”
“Not everyone uses imperial ideographs for writing, Drothe.”
No, just most of the people in the empire. “Okay, so maybe they’re those things the western Client Kingdoms use for writing…”
“Letters?”
“Right, letters.”
Baldezar let out a long sigh. “Perhaps. Or they might be a portion of an illumination exercise. Or unsanded errors. Or an attempt to use one of those useless new printing machines. But I see no traces of any cipher here, Drothe. What you have is a scrap from some scribe’s rubbish.” He flicked the paper. “Hardly worth threatening anyone over,” he added as he began to crumple the slip into a ball.
I held out my hand. “All the same…”
Baldezar stopped, looked at the paper, and then held it out in his palm. I took the slip and put it back into my ahrami pouch. When I looked up, he was studying me.
“You’re convinced the paper is that important?” said Baldezar.
Hell, no. It could have been a scrap, a pipe taper, even a bit of trash that had fallen to the bottom of Athel’s bag. But it was also the only thing I had gotten from Athel that hadn’t come to me under duress. Even with his last breath, Athel could have lied, and I needed something to confirm or deny his story. The paper was the best lead I had, no matter how pathetic that lead might be.