Brian McClellan - Murder at the Kinnen Hotel

At one of the tables, neither the best nor the worst of them, sat Lord Walis Kemptin. His head was back against the leather of the booth, the remnants of a meal being cleaned away by a waiter. The acrid smell of mala hung in the air above him.

The doorman cleared his throat. “My Lord Walis,” he said, “Attaché White to see you.”

Walis’ eyelids opened a fraction. Mala smoke curled out through his nose. “White?” he asked as the doorman excused himself. “I thought that was the woman. Your partner.”

“It is,” Adamat said. “It was necessary to borrow one of her cards to have access to this club. May I sit?”

Walis pulled himself up and seemed to try and shake the mala haze. “I don’t see why not. I can always call to have you removed at a moment’s notice.”

“I wouldn’t recommend that,” Adamat said, setting White’s card face up on the table.

“You already admitted the card does not belong to you.”

“But I’m using it with permission, my lord. Or did you think me daft enough to steal one from her pocket?” A waiter passed by with a tray containing cigars and tobacco and mala pipes. Adamat took a tobacco pipe, found it already packed, and took a light from the waiter before letting him move on.

Sweat rolled down Adamat’s sides and under his arms. It took every bit of his will to keep from trembling. He was an imposter here and he knew it. But he had to play the part to end this entire debacle tonight.

“You obviously know what this is,” Adamat said, tapping the card with one finger. “Your cousin the commissioner would have told you of White’s interest in the powder mage you hired.”

“I can’t imagine what you … “ Walis started.

“Please,” Adamat said, cutting him off gently with a raised hand. “Don’t patronize me, my lord. I wouldn’t be here if we didn’t already have a confession from another of your cousins you may remember.” Adamat produced a paper from his pocket and smoothed it on the table before pushing it over to Walis. “A somewhat distant cousin, I fear, but a relative nonetheless. She confessed to myself and Attaché White that you personally hired her to kill the Viscount Brezé.”

Adamat held up his hand to forestall Walis’s inevitable protest and continued. “This very moment, Attaché White and the newly promoted Commissioner Hewi are arresting your cousin Aleksandre under the charges of treason, theft from the crown, conspiracy against the royal cabal, and half a dozen other bits and pieces that they’ve decided to pin him with. I think it’s unnecessary, but I’m told the cabal likes to be very thorough.”

“If any of this was true,” Walis said, “The new commissioner and Attaché White would be here right now. Not some damned constable.”

“I think,” Adamat said with a confidence he didn’t feel, “You underestimate the gravity of removing the commissioner of the Adran Police. However, I understand your doubt. I’m not here to arrest you. A politician and businessman such as yourself may have guessed right now that we have various … options.”

Walis lifted a finger and a moment later a waiter appeared at his side. “Novi vodka.”

“For you, sir?” the waiter asked Adamat.

Adamat shook his head. Once the waiter had gone, he continued. “There are two paths available to us. The first is that we, the police, pull on this string, beginning with Genetrie Kemptin, and unravel it over the course of the next several years. The Kemptin family will be prosecuted to the full extent of Adran law-with the weight of the Adran Cabal behind it. All of your secrets will be laid bare. Everything put out for the public and your enemies to see.”

“We’ll have the powder mage within days,” he went on. “The cabal has dispatched a number of their Privileged to find him.” A lie, but Walis didn’t need to know that. “And once they have him, they will ring a confession from him. And trust me, they are far more displeased with your use of a powder mage assassin than with your murder of the Viscount Brezé or a businessman’s mistress.”

“What is my second option?” Walis licked his fingertips and brushed a bit of hair from his forehead. His hand trembled.

“That you sign this piece of paper,” Adamat produced a paper from his shirt pocket and slid it up next to the confession. “And in return you will receive a pardon from the king for whatever … wrongdoings … you have been involved with through this whole affair. Aleksandre and a few other members of your family will be sacrificed but you, my lord, will remain safe.”

Walis ran his eyes over the paper which Adamat had given him. He paused, picked it up, and read it again. “Do you know what this says?”

“I was not privy,” Adamat said. He didn’t know, and he didn’t want to know. Demands, most likely. A tithe to the Adran cabal. Concession of property to the crown. And, Adamat did know, a promise to point the finger at Aleksandre for this whole affair, including Melany’s murder.

Walis read the paper a third time, then a fourth, very slowly. Adamat’s shirt soaked completely now. He could feel the perspiration beading on his forehead and hoped Walis was too high on mala to notice.

There would be no investigation if Walis said no, of course. Aleksandre was already under arrest, and the conspiracy would still be pinned on him, but the cabal had no interest in investigating one of the noble families. Adamat needed Walis to sign that paper, or he would get away with this whole affair without even a slap on the wrist.

“Personally,” Adamat said as nonchalantly as possible, “I would rather you take the first option, my lord. You and your family tried to destroy my life. I would relish the opportunity to do the same to yours.”

Walis’ eyes tightened. He leaned forward, examining Adamat over the paper in his hand, and then leaned back again. What was he thinking? Would he call Adamat’s bluff?

Walis stared at the paper in his hand for nearly five minutes. Adamat felt the seconds ticking by, willing him to make a decision.

Finally, excruciatingly, Walis reached for his pocket. He produced a pen and smoothed the paper out on the table with one hand and scrawled his signature on the bottom. He slid the paper over to Adamat. “My pardon?” he asked.

“First,” Adamat said, “we need the location of your powder mage.”

The fight, the newspaper said, was quick and brutal.

Four members of the Adran Royal Cabal and an entire company of their personal guards had descended on a block of tenements in the docklands of Adopest to arrest the powder mage. He managed to kill three guardsmen and wound a Privileged before he himself was killed in the melee. An entire block burned down from the sorcery unleashed, and two dozen civilians were dead.

There was no mention at all of Adamat’s involvement in finding the powder mage, and the newspaper article announcing the disgrace of Commissioner Aleksandre and his involvement in the murder of the mistress of a local businessman was on an entirely different page.

Adamat lowered his paper and picked up his coffee, blowing gently to dispel some of the heat. “Do these horrid clashes of violence and conspiracy always claim innocent lives?” he asked.

“Not always,” White said. She sat across from him, having refused coffee, and watched the other people in the cafe as they broke their morning fast. “Usually,” she admitted a moment later. “I’ve seen better results. And far worse.”

“The newspaper,” Adamat said, “Doesn’t even mention his name. Do you know what it was?”

White shook her head. “Walis didn’t even know. Just called him the powder mage.” Her eyes, Adamat noticed, seemed to smile again, brighter than they had before. The rest of her face remained as unmoved as marble.