“I don’t know,” Alias said. “Victor, I have to go after the golem.”
“Why?” he demanded. “Why risk your life for my father’s body?”
“Without it, Durgar can’t speak with his dead spirit. We might never learn the truth,” she replied.
“I’ve seen enough. I don’t think I want to learn any more,” the merchant lord declared. “There’s no guarantee my father will answer in death any questions he would not answer in life.”
Gently Alias took Victor’s hand from her gown and gave it a sympathetic squeeze. “We still have to try,” she said. Then she raced off after the iron monster.
By the time Alias caught up with the fleeing golem, it stood at the edge of the harbor, teetering on the thick wooden pylons that protected the shore. The watch soldiers had the monster cornered. Alias shouted for them to get a rope on it, but she was too late. Ponderously the creature rocked back, then forward, pitching headlong into the water with a tremendous splash.
The ripples spread outward until they hit the pier and bounced back. The moon was nearly full, but Alias could detect no bubbles or turbulence in the dark water below. She returned to the ramshackle warehouse. Victor was ordering one of the watchmen to fetch a priest for Durgar. The old man lay on the floor of the warehouse, his breathing strained and shallow, his complexion turning gray.
“It’s just cracked ribs,” Durgar assured Alias. “After years of combat wounds, I can tell,” he added with a grim smile.
Alias reported on the fate of the iron golem and Luer Dhostar’s body.
“Damnation,” Durgar growled with annoyance. “It could walk across the bottom of the bay and be halfway to the Pirate Isles before it corrodes. We’ll never get Luer’s body back now.”
The watchman Victor had sent out returned with a stern-faced young man in white robes, a follower of Ilmater, god of suffering. The others maintained a respectful silence as he knelt beside the elderly priest and began intoning a curative chant, his hands hovering over Durgar’s chest. When the young man had finished, Durgar took a deep breath, then another, and his complexion began to grow rosier.
“I just can’t believe it,” Durgar said as Victor helped him to sit up. “I’ve known Luer for years. I can’t believe he was—he was … Victor, I’m so sorry,” he concluded, patting the merchant lord’s hand.
“It’s all right,” Victor said softly. “He hid it well. I couldn’t believe it either, at first.”
“But your father lived for this city and for his business!” the old priest insisted. He picked up the Faceless’s coin mask and sighed. “Luer’s greatest pleasure was going over his books,” he said, still unable to grasp his friend’s treachery. “We used to work together in the Tower for company’s sake, me with my arrest records, he with his account books. Not two nights ago—no, three—he spent the whole evening tracking down an error in bookkeeping that proved one of his ship captains was skimming off his shipments. He used to say it was easier to catch a thief with an accounting ledger and an abacus than it was with a sword. It was nearly dawn before he found what he was looking for, but when he did, he was elated. Of course, it didn’t last. Ssentar Urdo came in to holler about Haztor’s arrest. Still, for those few moments, he was so happy. You can’t imagine a man’s a scheming criminal when he’s that happy doing his work.”
Durgar got wearily to his feet. “I’d best be getting back to the Tower to see what assistance I can give the survivors.” His shoulders were bowed—the weight not of his responsibilities, Alias knew, but of his grief. Magical spells could cure broken ribs, but not spirits. Victor walked the priest to the door, speaking to him in a hushed whisper. The noble returned to the swordswoman’s side as all the watchmen followed behind their leader.
“I should return to the Tower, too,” Alias said to Victor. “I have to find Dragonbait. I haven’t seen him since we left the ball.”
“I did, just after you left to chase the golem. He was behind the stair, healing an injured member of the watch.”
“Then he was all right?”
“Looked all right to me, though I’m no expert on how saurials are supposed to look,” Victor said. “I guess there’s really nothing more I can do until morning. All the nobles who were still able ran off to bolt their castle doors. Durgar’s seeing to the injured.”
The young man looked back down at the chair where his father’s corpse had been. “I don’t know if I want to be alone right now. Would you come back to Castle Dhostar with me?”
Alias hesitated. It was hardly an invitation Victor could have made were his father still alive, she knew. It was bound to cause talk. Victor could use her support, though, especially after all he’d been through. There was really nothing else she could do tonight, either, and she was beginning to feel weary. She nodded her consent.
They walked back to the market green, where Victor found his carriage, attended by his driver. He dismissed the driver and took up the reins himself.
The drive from the city was quiet and uneventful. They leaned on each other, but neither spoke much. No one greeted them at the door, and Victor explained that, save for Kimbel and his carriage driver, the servants had all been given the evening off in honor of the ball.
Victor ushered Alias down the hallways and into the library, where Kimbel was tending a blazing fire in the hearth. After all the violence and the chill of the night air, the room seemed blissfully warm and peaceful, in spite of the malignant servant. Kimbel bowed and left the room without a word. Alias noticed that there was another bottle of Evermead on the table, with two glasses.
“Were you expecting me to return with you?” Alias asked.
Victor shook his head. “The other glass would be for my father. I just realized, Kimbel probably doesn’t know yet that Father is—is dead.” He sighed. “I suppose I can wait until morning to tell him, if he hasn’t picked it up in the servant hall by then.”
The nobleman poured them each a glass of Evermead as Alias wondered if the Dhostars ever drank less expensive wines. “You look lovely,” he said as he handed her a glass.
Alias laughed. “My hair’s a rat’s nest, I’ve torn my gown, and I’m covered with iron golem rust.”
“You look lovely to me. He sat down at the desk, but Alias stood warming herself before the fire.
“I spoke with Durgar before he left us,” Victor said. “He agreed to call a meeting for tomorrow morning of all the surviving heads of the noble merchant families. It doesn’t look good, I’m afraid. From what I could see of the casualties, most of the noble merchant houses are going to end up in the hands of third children or second cousins. Do you think it’s possible what you said, that the Night Masters killed my father for opposing the use of the golems on the nobles?”
“It makes a certain amount of sense. But then, so do a lot of other scenarios,” Alias said as she laid another log on the fire. “Your father might have wanted to use the golems on the nobles to consolidate his grip as croamarkh. The Night Masters might have realized he was using them, and fearing he would betray them, destroyed him. What I can’t figure out is why the Night Masters went to so much trouble to be sure we found your father’s body but then made sure the golem took it away from us. I’m surprised they left his coin mask, too. A piece of magic that powerful—why didn’t they take it from him after they killed him?”
Victor reached calmly into one of the desk drawers and pulled out an ornate ring, set with a huge black opal. Pushing a tiny nub forced the opal to slide aside, revealing a needle tipped with poison. Alias, staring thoughtfully into the fire, did not notice the merchant lord’s actions.
“It was as if they wanted us to discover that your father was the Faceless. Did they think I would stop hunting for them if they slew their leader? Unless—”