Michelle Sagara - Cast In Honour

“She’s not furniture,” Teela pointed out, as she waited for some sort of response from the resident of the house.

“No. She’s too bony and too loud.”

Teela knocked a third time. Nothing. Kaylin knew there wouldn’t be a fourth attempt.

True to form, Teela raised her voice to let the occupants of the house—if they were present—know that Hawks were standing on their doorstep and were about to enter. This still elicited no response.

It wasn’t completely unheard-of for a house to be empty at this time of day, but it was rare. The streets often felt as if they were full of small children and their elderly minders, but many actually stayed home if they had yards or a small space outdoors—something Kaylin had never had in her childhood.

Teela tried the doorknob. The door was locked. Placing a hand on the door itself, the Barrani Hawk closed her eyes. “Bolted,” she murmured.

“We can kick it in,” Tain offered.

Teela, however, shook her head, her expression shifting. To Kaylin’s wing-masked eyes, the door looked entirely normal. “Kitling, the door?”

Kaylin reached up and pushed the dragon wing aside. “No magic that I can see.”

“None?”

She pushed her way past Tain and looked again, bringing her eyes inches away from Teela’s resting palm. She frowned. “...Maybe.”

“Best guess?”

“Someone may have bolted the door from the outside. It wouldn’t be difficult for most mages.”

“Not diligent students, at any rate.” Teela opened the bolt. Magically. She pushed the door inward and entered.

* * *

The house appeared to be empty, which wasn’t Kaylin’s immediate concern. As she once again lifted the dragon’s wing, she looked down at the floor. The crack they’d followed to this particular door couldn’t be seen; the wooden floor was worn in some areas, but solid. The sense of magic was absent.

Teela walked into the house, announcing her presence loudly without actually shouting, a trick Kaylin had not quite mastered. The Barrani Hawk’s voice almost echoed. The house appeared to be empty. For one long beat, Kaylin felt that the house had always been empty.

The building had two stories. They searched the first floor. Aside from the accumulated mess any house gathered and displayed when visitors weren’t expected, there was nothing that caught the eye. Teela headed upstairs, Tain in tow. Severn, Kaylin and Bellusdeo headed toward the back door to investigate the yard.

The back door, like the front, was bolted; the windows that faced the yard were glassed and barred. The bars appeared to be new. Kaylin studied the bolt, first with small and squawky’s translucent wing, and then without; it appeared to be exactly what it was.

“The bolt looks new,” Severn said.

Kaylin nodded. She opened the door and looked down the few steps into a fenced yard. The fence, like the bars on the window, appeared to be newly constructed—and in this area of town, fences were rare. The yards were generally like one great common.

The steps just beneath the door bore cracks similar to the road and the front steps of the house. They also—in winged view—looked as if they’d been broken instantly by too great a weight. The line led out into the yard. Kaylin followed it; it seemed to bisect one of the paths between cultivated vegetables, heading toward the distant quarries that provided the city with stone, among other things.

No, she thought, as she slowed an already crawling pace. “Severn, does this look like normal yard to you?”

“Yes. Except for the fence.”

“I think there’s a...hatch. Up ahead.”

“I can’t see it.”

“Right. There’s obviously a basement here; let’s assume the invisible hatch and the basement are connected.”

“I think it’s time we paid a visit to the house where the murders took place.”

“Basement first.”

* * *

Teela and Tain had found nothing of importance upstairs. There were two obvious bedrooms and one sitting room; the sitting room was so pristine it was clear it wasn’t used for much. The bedrooms had small, shallow closets that were filled with clothing and linen, and dirty laundry had accumulated in the usual places—at least in Kaylin’s experience.

The basement, however, was different.

The moment Kaylin opened the door, her arms began to tingle. Teela, moving slowly and scanning carefully, sucked in air; when Kaylin glanced back at her, the Barrani’s eyes were a much darker shade of blue.

“Teela?”

“Be careful here.” She glanced once at the Dragon.

The Dragon nodded, and the tingling across Kaylin’s marked skin grew sharper, though it was not yet painful. “What do you see?”

“Magic” was Teela’s curt reply. She didn’t bother to draw a weapon; Kaylin drew a silent dagger. Severn had not let go of his blade.

“I’ll go winged,” Kaylin said, as the small dragon huffed.

“I’m not sure wingless wouldn’t be more useful at this point,” Teela said. She gestured and light appeared to her right, in about the position a lantern would hold if she’d been using one. The light bounced off the walls as they began their descent. Teela had once again taken point, and once again, Kaylin let her have it, choosing to take the rear instead.

There was no trail of shadow on the stairs by which they made their descent. The narrow, steeply inclined steps were whole, if more obviously worn than the stone that girded the front and back of the house. The width forced Bellusdeo and the Hawks to move in single file.

Kaylin nearly leaped out of her skin when she heard clanging bells. It was only when Teela cursed—in Leontine—that she remembered the portable mirror. “Are you going to answer that?”

“No,” Teela replied. “It’s Marcus.”

Kaylin hesitated.

Teela, accustomed to Kaylin’s hesitations, said, “Marcus doesn’t normally have the ability to communicate with us in the course of a regular investigation. The lack of snarling has not notably harmed us, and he remains in a mood that can only charitably be called foul.”

“But—”

“If I answer, he will ask for an update. If I give him an update that reflects reality, he will almost certainly order you—and Corporal Handred—from the building. Possibly from the district.”

“He sent us.”

“Yes. But you have the most valuable citizen in the Empire as your shadow today. Examining corpses for possible magical taint is unlikely to harm her. Examining a deserted building for possible Shadows, not so much.”

Kaylin wanted to slap herself, hard. She did not, however, continue to argue with Teela. Instead, she looked guiltily at Bellusdeo, who she could just see over Severn’s shoulder. Bellusdeo had chosen not to hear the exchange, and given that she was in the literal middle of it, that took deliberate effort.

“That citizen,” Teela continued, when interruption or argument failed to stop her, “has seen more Shadow war than we have. Her presence might be of value in this investigation.”

Kaylin was acutely aware of just how little that would matter to the Emperor, but held her peace, since she was also acutely aware of how much it would mean to Bellusdeo. Bellusdeo was the most important single individual in the Empire—in the opinion of the Emperor. As she was the only surviving female Dragon, a life of decadent luxury was hers for the taking. She didn’t need to work or take responsibility for anything that occurred within Elantra; she never needed to lift a finger again in her life, never mind actually risk it on anything.

And it was killing her.

“You win.” Kaylin continued down the stairs, but felt compelled to add, “But it’s me he’s going to be mad at.”