"This is excellent, Raven. You've proven invaluable to me. And of course you are correct, I am Dardas. In fact, I'm more Dardas than I was just half a watch ago. An internal shift has occurred. I believe that my host doesn't have the stomach for battle, in the end. He has... withdrawn. I am in command of this body. Do you understand?"
"I do, General," she said, firmly.
"That I can truly believe," he said. "But for the moment, you'll have to excuse me. I must call my senior staff back. If the Battle of Torran Flats can't be won one way, it can be won another."
Raven wandered a little distance off. She glanced back now and then at Dardas, watching him issuing new orders, his movements assured and natural now. Apparently his distress of earlier had been due to some sort of struggle or adjustment between himself and his host. Raven hadn't known such a thing could happen between people sharing a bodily vessel. She had certainly felt no such contention between herself and Vadya. She remarked on this silently to her own host.
I think we are unusually compatible, Vadya said.
Raven agreed. She was pleased with herself right now. She had contributed something worthwhile. She had pointed out a possibility for disaster that Dardas himself had overlooked. It might not be too farfetched to say she had just saved the day.
Tell me something, Raven.
Yes? Despite the oncoming night's chill and the frenzy of activity around her, Raven felt a warm calm glow of satisfaction.
Do you love Matokin? Vadya asked. As the father you believe him to be—do you love him?
Raven blinked. She had never put it into such language. I think I must, she finally said. If he is my father, I must love him.
Vadya was silent a moment, then asked, Do you love Dardas?
As...? Raven asked, prompting her.
As Dardas, Vadya said simply.
Raven considered. She looked at him now, a short distance away. He was bold, confident, powerful, full of ancient shrewdness and a curiously fresh zest for life.
How could I not love him? she said, finally.
Very well, Vadya said. Then, for your sake, I hope that it never becomes necessary to kill either man. Or both.
RADSTAC (5)
It was nearly a whole leaf she'd chewed, but the occasion was special, the need poignant. Not the addict's craving; not so much, at least. More, the needs of the moment. Sharpened senses, an acute alertness. Clarity. These things she needed.
Radstac walked side by side with Aquint, their pace steady and parallel. The pain in her teeth had peaked and passed, and the clear solid sense of things was emerging. She understood, in a profound way, the inner meanings of the patterns of traffic in the streets leading up to the Registry. She saw and comprehended the code of the sky in the lowering grey of the clouds overhead.
Sidelong, her peripheral vision stimulated and intense, she saw that Aquint despised her. It wasn't that she had betrayed him; his fealty to the Felk was quite flimsy. It was that she, by cooperating with the Broken Circle, had set in motion the events that had resulted in Cat being shot by Deo's crossbow. That was something worthy of a grudge, in his mind.
She silently acknowledged the rightfulness of his enmity.
Cat, however, wasn't dead. Or at least probably wasn't. The Broken Circle's leader, the one called the Minstrel, had sent someone back to that lot to retrieve Cat's body, per Aquint's request. But the boy wasn't there. There were bloodstains on the scene and a confusion of footprints among the mud but nothing to explicitly tell the tale of what had happened. Had Cat merely been wounded, then staggered away? Had someone come upon his corpse and hauled it off?
Deo, as she well knew, was a most excellent shot with a crossbow; but even he was unsure if the bolt had hit the boy fatally. It had happened so fast, and Deo didn't have a combatant's instincts. Radstac's feeling was that the lad was still alive and licking his wounds. And very likely seeking out his partner this very moment. Certainly there was a bond between the two males; the staunch camaraderie of thieves was her guess.
It meant she had an eye out for Cat, as well as all the other potential dangers she was alert to. She had no complaints. She simply accepted the parameters of the mission.
This was, after all, what Deo wanted, and she was still in his employ. He wanted to play at being a rebel, just as before he had tried his hand at being an assassin. The latter hadn't worked out, though Radstac conceded that Deo had made a very fine effort at it.
As to this new role of anti-Felk rebel in this occupied city... today would likely tell if he was going to succeed. In truth, if this operation was accomplished, it would have consequences of almost unimaginable scope.
They came at the Registry through the marketplace. The scene seemed brisk, but Radstac noted that very little actual transacting was taking place. The new higher taxes were evidently impacting the economy. Governor Jesile had thought he'd found a way to stabilize things after the counterfeiting debacle, which she had first read about in the report Aquint had given her and Deo when they were recruited. Instead, the Felk governor was probably worsening conditions overall—and certainly giving the people of Callah something more to grumble about.
Aquint, under the Minstrel's directions, had sent an official messenger to the Registry last night, bearing a communication meant for the garrison's Far Speak wizard. The message had since been relayed to Felk and acknowledged. Radstac was satisfied that Aquint hadn't planted some code in the communiquй that would lay a trap for herself and the others of the Broken Circle.
It wasn't too difficult to judge a person's character, particularly if mansid-inspired clarity was involved. Aquint had a thief's heart, and his interests were almost entirely selfish. But he had no love for the Felk, especially those that had subjugated this city of his birth. He specifically didn't like this war because it interfered with the comforts of his life.
"I'd like to have my sword back before things happen," Radstac said as they approached one of the Registry's entrances.
Aquint gave her a glance. It was flat, indifferent, yet she knew it was full of loathing. "That won't be a problem."
They entered the large stone building. Radstac was no longer affecting her limp. It felt good to be moving about normally. Her balance was right, her reflexes at the ready. She was primed, just as though this were a battlefield and she was preparing to face an enemy.
She had never had an opinion regarding who she favored to win a particular war. It was a pointless frill for a mercenary. But perhaps she did have a conviction about this Felk war. After all, if the Felk did manage to conquer every other state of the Isthmus, then that unified Isthmus would no longer supply her with the reliable conflicts that allowed her to earn her livelihood. Certainly the Southsoil didn't produce enough wars to keep her employed. The Southern Continent, though a shadow of its former pre-Upheavals glory, was still too civilized to engage routinely in internal hostilities.
Also, she couldn't get her mansid leaves anywhere but here.
Sentries immediately passed her and Aquint through, and they moved along chilly corridors. Radstac wondered if they would encounter that same fussy officer with the pinched lips who'd made things difficult for her and Deo when they first arrived in Callah.
Aquint led her into a room where a uniformed clerk appeared. His eyes moved rapidly between them, while his face remained bland.