David Weber - How firm a foundation

“Was Nimue Alban as much of a smartass as you are?” Cayleb inquired pleasantly.

“Probably not. She was a lot more junior than I am, of course.”

“Oh, of course,” Cayleb agreed with a nod, and rubbed his chin for a moment, thinking.

“How did you put all of that together?” he asked after a moment. “I’m not complaining, you understand, but…?”

He let his voice trail off and sensed Merlin’s distant shrug.

“It’s not really all that surprising. I’ve had Owl conducting continual reconnaissance of all three continents. I don’t want him wasting processor power trying to actually monitor that much area on any real-time basis, but he’s got a sub-routine set up to store the imagery in Romulus ’ computer core as it comes in. That way it’s available for us to backtrack just about anything we want to if it turns out there’s a reason we should. Things like individual horsemen don’t even show up in the raw imagery, but once he starts enhancing and manipulating it, he can turn up a surprising amount of detail and do a lot about backtracking targets once they’ve been pointed out to him.

“He’s beginning to show more initiative within his assigned parameters, too. Bynzhamyn and I instructed him to cover inns and hostels in Delferahk with parasites and listen for key words that might identify the assassins, and he decided on his own to place parasites in the Temple hostels on the main roads into Delferahk from Sodar and the Desnairian Empire, as well. Then he started moving farther back up the line without mentioning it to us. One of the ostlers in a hostel he’d wired for sound waited until this particular group had left and then described them as ‘Langhorne-damned Charisians, probably heretics the lot of them,’ to one of his coworkers. That popped through Owl’s filters and he started going through the data-including what he had of the group this fellow was describing talking to each other from his other parasites-until he could locate and positively ID them. Once he had them, he simply ran back through the recorded imagery, backtracking them until the first time he picked them up. Which, as I say, was in Malikai. He was able to track the ship back to Malansath, but it looks like they must have gone aboard during one of the blizzards that rolled through there last month.”

“It sounds to me like we got lucky,” Cayleb said.

“We got lucky because Owl’s getting better. Still, you’re right. On the other hand, we’ve got a lot denser fence along the Delferahkan border, and Owl’s keeping a real-time watch over Talkyra itself. If we hadn’t picked them up now, we’d have picked them up then. I think.”

“You hope, you mean,” Cayleb snorted. He thought again for several more seconds. “So what does this imply for your plans?” he asked after a moment.

“My biggest concern is the fact that they’re moving sooner than we thought they would-or faster, anyway,” Merlin pointed out. “By my calculations, they’ll reach Talkyra sometime around the fifteenth, a good two days earlier than we’d allowed for. For that matter, Yairley’s squadron isn’t even supposed to hit Sarm Keep until the thirteenth. I realize he’s a little ahead of schedule, but whether or not the wind will let him stay that way is another question. And then there’s the minor fact that nobody in Talkyra’s heard back from us yet.” Cayleb sensed another of those distant shrugs. “I think I’m going to have to go ahead and move down to the Sunthorns to be a little closer to the scene, just in case. And it’s probably time I went and had that conversation with Earl Coris, too. In a manner of speaking, of course.” .

Royal Palace, City of Talkyra, Kingdom of Delferahk

Phylyp Ahzgood was a light sleeper.

He always had been, and his tendency to sleep less soundly than most had only grown stronger over his years as a spymaster. Hektor Daykyn had teased him about it, once upon a time, pointing out that it was probably the result of an increasingly guilty conscience. The Earl of Coris had responded that it had far less to do with guilty consciences than with a growing familiarity with-and appreciation for-the versatility of assassins.

Whatever the reason, he tended to wake up quickly and completely… and without moving.

Now he lay very still and let one hand steal slowly, slowly under his pillow. Its fingers settled around the dagger hilt, and his nostrils flared as he drew a deep, silent breath and prepared to fling himself out of the bed and away from the direction from which he thought the slight sound had come.

“I do hope you’re not planning to do anything hasty with that dagger, My Lord,” a voice said politely out of the darkness. “This is a new tunic. I’d hate to have to have it patched so soon.”

Coris froze, eyes narrowing. There was something about that voice. He couldn’t quite put a finger on it, but he knew he’d heard it before somewhere…

“If you don’t mind, My Lord, I’m going to strike a light,” the voice continued as pleasantly as if it held conversations in someone else’s bedchamber in the middle of the night on a regular basis.

“Go ahead,” the earl invited, trying to match the voice’s conversational tone.

“Thank you, My Lord,” the voice replied.

There was a scratching sound, and then sudden, painful light smote Coris’ eyes as something flared and guttered blindingly. He smelled a stink of brimstone, and despite himself, flipped out of bed and landed in a half crouch on its other side, dagger ready.

The intruder paid him no attention. He simply lifted the glass chimney from a lamp, lit the wick, and then blew out the flaming sliver of wood he’d used to do the lighting.

“What in Langhorne’s name was that?” Coris demanded, his voice considerably more shaken than he would have liked.

“The Charisians call it a ‘Shan-wei’s candle,’” the other man said in an amused tone. “Personally, I think they could’ve come up with a more tactful name, given Vicar Zhaspahr’s current attitude towards the Empire and the Church of Charis.” He shrugged. “On the other hand, given how… enthusiastically it takes fire-and the stink-it is an appropriate name, don’t you think? Besides, I don’t think they’re especially concerned by the thought of hurting the Grand Inquisitor’s tender feelings these days.”

“Zhevons,” Coris said, eyes going wide as his orderly memory put a face-and a name-together with the oddly familiar voice. “Ahbraim Zhevons.”

“At your service,” Zhevons acknowledged with a bow. It was clearly the same man and the same voice, but the accent and dialect had changed completely. Unlike the smuggler Coris had met earlier, this man could have stepped straight off a street-an expensive street-in Zion itself.

“What are you doing here? And how the hell did you get into my bedroom?” the earl demanded, his dagger still raised between them.

“As to how I got in, let’s just say King Zhames’ guards aren’t the most alert lot in the world. In fact, they’re pretty pathetic,” Zhevons said in a judicious tone. “Sergeant Raimair’s lads are much better than that, but there aren’t very many of them. And, frankly, I’m a lot better at creeping around in the shadows than anyone else they’re likely to meet.”

“You are, are you?” Coris straightened from his crouch, lowering the dagger. “Given the fact that you’re here, I’m inclined to take your word for that. On the other hand,” his eyes narrowed, “that doesn’t explain why you’re here.”

“You sent a message to Earl Gray Harbor last month,” Zhevons said, his voice suddenly flat and serious, without the edge of humor which had marked it. “I’m the response.”

The tip of an icicle ran down Coris’ spine. It was an instant, instinctive reaction, born of his awareness of just how precarious his position truly was. But he pushed the instant hollowness of his stomach aside quickly. If Zhevons were an agent of the Inquisition, there’d be no point in any sort of elaborate charade designed to entrap him. And he was the man who’d delivered the messenger wyverns in the first place.