05 Dragon Blood: The Blade's Memory (11 page)

“Watch my back,” Kaika whispered and pressed her ear to the door at the end of the hall.

Cas did so, reaching for her rifle, but she paused before touching it and lowered her hand. Yes, even if someone charged up the stairs, they could not shoot the person. These were their own people. Sardelle would have to do her best to create an illusion to hide them, which she could do if only one or two staff members appeared. She kept her mind open, watching the stairs that led up to this level and also checking the rooms behind the doors. Some of them were occupied, and it wasn’t so late that everyone was sleeping.

“I don’t hear anyone,” Kaika whispered. “Sardelle, can you tell if she’s inside?”

Sardelle had already done a check of the room behind the door, but the suite had a number of interconnected rooms, and she examined them more closely. “There’s a fire in the hearth and lanterns burning, but nobody’s in there at the—” A presence stirred on the level below, a wood boy heading for the stairs with a basket of firewood. They had passed the diligent worker a couple of times already. “Someone’s coming up,” she whispered.

“How long? I need a couple minutes.”

As Kaika slipped two slender tools into the door lock, Sardelle searched for a way to delay the boy. He was only steps from the base of the stairs. She could employ an illusion, but if he was delivering wood to the queen’s suite, then he would walk right into them.

You haven’t given anyone a rash for a while
, Jaxi thought.

I prefer to save that for enemies, not innocent servants
.

When the youth was halfway up the stairs, Sardelle knocked one of the logs out of the basket he was carrying, bouncing it artfully back down to the bottom.

He’s not that innocent. He and a young female groundskeeper were doing frisky things in the woodshed in the courtyard recently. He’s feeling guilty because he was supposed to be on shift, and he’s hoping nobody will notice that he’s late bringing in the firewood.

Telepathically intruding, are you?

I scarcely have to. The guilty thoughts are oozing out of his head.

When the youth bent to pick up the log, balancing the basket on the steps, Sardelle knocked it over. The rest of his wood tumbled out. She felt bad about harassing him so, but perhaps he would believe the gods were teaching him a lesson for his indiscretion in the woodshed.

Comparing yourself to a god? Careful, that’s what got the mundanes up in arms about sorcerers three hundred years ago.

Yes, I’m certain they were upset that our people were flinging firewood out of baskets all over the continent.

“Got it.” Kaika pushed the door open and slipped inside.

Sardelle followed Cas into the room, leaving the youth to gather his wood in peace, but she kept him in her senses, still concerned that he might be heading for this suite.

“Look around,” Kaika said. “It’s been weeks since the king’s kidnapping, but I heard he was stolen right out of his room, so there might still be clues. And maybe the queen knows something. I’ll check her desk for correspondence. Sardelle, will you watch the door? Warn us if someone’s coming?”

“Of course.”

“Are we sure the queen is even in the castle?” Cas asked. “Didn’t you say nobody had seen her? That she hadn’t made any public appearances since the king’s disappearance, and that it’s only hearsay that she’s in charge?”

“If she wasn’t here at all, I think that’s a rumor that would have gotten out,” Kaika said, “but it’s been several days since Apex and I left to get you. I’m not current on the gossip.”

“I don’t think they would lay a fire in a room that was going to be empty that night.” Sardelle kept the hall—and the wood boy—in her mind, but walked around the sitting room while she did so, also looking for clues.

“Good point.” Kaika trotted into the bedroom.

With lush rugs, elegant upholstered chairs and sofas, and a tea service perched on a side table, the sitting room looked more like a staged area only for entertaining guests than a living space where clues might be found. Sardelle entered an office, conjuring a light to illuminate the walls of shelves and the two desks within. She went to the one with the large doily on it and the knitting basket on the corner, glancing at the bookcases as she passed. Most of the tomes were on military history, geography, politics, and economics, with a few lighter texts behind the queen’s desk, romances and mysteries and craft books.

I’m guessing she isn’t the mastermind behind the king’s disappearance,
Jaxi said.

You read romances. You don’t think you could plan a kidnapping?

Not with a doily sitting on my desk. That would smother my ambition, aggression, and desire for revenge.

Oh? Would that work if I simply draped the doily over your scabbard?

Ha ha. No.

“I wish we could chat with the queen,” Kaika said through the open doorway connecting the bedroom to the office.

“So she could ask what we’re doing snooping in her room?”

“I wouldn’t let her ask the questions.”

“I think it’s called an interrogation then,” Sardelle said, “not a chat.”

Kaika drummed her fingers on the doorjamb, then walked in. “I was hoping to find something useful here.”

Sardelle slid open the top desk drawer. Kaika went to the king’s desk. Perhaps a better idea. If threats had been delivered before he had been kidnapped, maybe he would have a record of them. But wouldn’t people have already checked in here? Those leading the search for him?

After finding nothing besides yarn and other craft materials in the queen’s drawers, Sardelle turned toward the walls again. If there had been secret tunnels out of the castle once, perhaps there were also secret passages and rooms within it. She reached out, trying to get a sense of the rooms next to the suite. On the outside wall, the one made of stone, windows overlooked the courtyard, but she detected a gap of about four feet between the bedroom and the next room over, one not accessible via this suite. She assumed a door somewhere led to it, but as she probed about more carefully, she did not sense an exit from that room, at least not a visible one.

Sardelle walked into the bedroom to examine the connecting wall with her eyes, searching for a lever or a switch or a painting hanging suspiciously askew.

You might want to figure that out sooner, rather than later. These security fellows are determined, and they’re getting close to the hole.

You’ve hidden it?

Disguised it as well as I could, but our friend with the dragon blood is on the search party. He’s having itchy feelings about my illusion.

Even if they left right then, Sardelle feared they would not be able to escape the way they had come. The guards were sure to notice three women popping up among the rocks. Being caught in the castle would not be good, either, not when Kaika had been reported AWOL and Sardelle was wanted dead for witchcraft. Cas would have a hard time explaining that sword too. They would all be charged as traitors who had come to wreak mischief. Or they would be shot outright. Sardelle knew absolutely nothing about the queen, other than her knitting preferences.

She moved a painting and checked behind it for buttons or switches. This wall was made from vertical wooden boards, so if there was a secret door, the cracks would not be easily visible. Though she sensed that gap between the two rooms, she could not start burning holes in the walls of the king’s bedroom. There had to be a law against that.

Cas walked in. “What are you looking for?”

“I think there’s a secret passage to a room behind this one.” Sardelle prodded the andirons in the fireplace, even though that was on the opposite side of the room.

Cas walked along the wall Sardelle had indicated, studying the floor. She stopped halfway along it, bent down, then pulled her sword part of the way out of its scabbard. Sardelle almost pointed out that it wasn’t purported to be a divining rod but realized Cas probably just wanted a light. A second later, Cas sheathed it fully and stood up.

“This is the doorway.” She nudged the floorboards.

By the time Sardelle joined her, Cas had found a switch. A click sounded, and a panel swung open.

“What gave it away?” Sardelle asked, peering into the darkness.

“There are some faint scrapes on the floorboards where the door opens.”

“Ah. Good thinking.” Sardelle should have thought of that too. Ah, well. She was a healer, not a tracker or carpenter.

Is that the excuse that will make you feel better about an obvious oversight?

You didn’t see the scrapes, either.

No, I was watching our friends outside. They’ve stopped hunting momentarily and are watching a flier head toward the castle.

Cas entered the dark shaft while Sardelle was communicating with Jaxi. A draft brushed Sardelle’s cheeks as a second door was opened. The draft did not smell of must, dust, or disuse. A green glow arose, Cas pulling out the sword for a light again. If her father ever showed up to reclaim that blade from her, he might have to fight her for it.

“You’re right,” Cas said. “It’s another room. Chilly. Nobody laying fires in the hearth in here.”

Sardelle joined her inside what looked to be an old nursery with a handsomely crafted but dusty crib along an inner wall. A couple of child-sized dressers also occupied the space along with a desk built for an adult. It rested against the outside wall, one with a shuttered window in it. This room couldn’t be
that
secret, but there were not any other doors in it, not visible ones.

Cas went straight to the desk. It and its chair were the only pieces of furniture in the room without dust on them. A soft click came from behind them, Kaika scooting into the room with a lantern.

“Wood boy is in the suite,” she whispered.

Sardelle grimaced. She had let the search for the secret room distract her.

“He didn’t see me,” Kaika added, nodding to Sardelle. “What’s this?”

“The pamphlet creation station, apparently,” Cas said, stepping back from a drawer. It was filled with small hand-stapled booklets, all with the same cover of forest-green with a silver triangular symbol on the front and leaves at each of the points. “Another craft project?”

Sardelle had never seen the symbol before, but when she leaned in closer and could read the title, her heart lurched.
The Order of the Heartwood Sisterhood, Charter and Mandates.

Jaxi!

Oh, it’s my favorite of the secret, all-women orders listed in that book we were researching. The one dedicated to protecting innocent young men from the advances of lusty female dragons.

It must have evolved into more than that.

Take a pamphlet. Maybe they’re recruiting.

Sardelle did remove one and slip it into her bag. When she and Jaxi had been researching possible organizations that might have been responsible for following Sardelle around the city and trying to blow her up, this name had been one of three possibilities. Granted, it had seemed the least likely, but that had been before they found this stash.

“Looking for some bedtime reading?” Kaika asked.

“I believe this may be the organization that’s been trying to kill me,” Sardelle said.

“To
kill
you?”

“Before we left, some women in dark cloaks were following me around, and then someone blew up the archives building while I was in the basement.”

“Oh, I heard about that. One of my colleagues was asked to go investigate. Huh. I knew you were on the wanted posters around the city, but I didn’t look that closely at them. Witches, uhm, the idea of magic makes my eye twitch. My trigger finger too.”

Sardelle shrugged. She hadn’t been looking for sympathy.

“Guess it wasn’t that smart for Zirkander to send you here where you might get captured then,” Kaika said.

“I believe he sent me so we
wouldn’t
get captured. Also, I’m pleased to be asked to help. It’s what I was trained to do.”

“Help?” Kaika eyebrows rose.

“Yes. I’m a healer and a student of history, as well as a sorceress.”

“Hm.” Kaika picked up one of the pamphlets. “As a history student, do you know anything about this organization? Is it new or something old?”

“It was founded at least a thousand years ago, but its mission may have evolved. I’m going to have to find a library and do some research.”

“What was their original mission?”

Jaxi made a snickering sound in Sardelle’s head.

“According to one book, to keep young village men from being lured away by female dragons for mating.”

Kaika blinked slowly a few times. “Was that a big problem once?”

“Not from what I’ve read, but I wasn’t there. I’m not quite
that
old.”

Kaika frowned down at the pamphlet. “It’s a stretch, since we haven’t stumbled across any clues yet, but I had the thought that they might have something to do with the king’s kidnapping. But I don’t know of any female dragons that have been lusting after him.”

“As I said, I would like to research the organization more to see what they’ve been poking their fingers into lately, but that does sound unlikely. I would be more inclined to believe that it was the Cofah who wanted him out of the city. With all that secret weapons research they’re doing, they must be preparing for a big attack on someone.”

“And we’re their recalcitrant former imperial subjects that rebelled.” Kaika rolled the pamphlet and rested the end against her chin, scowling at the desk, or perhaps into space. With her voice uncommonly soft, she said, “I’m worried that we’re going to learn he wasn’t kidnapped at all, but shot and his body stashed somewhere it would never be found.”

Even though Kaika did not seem to be the kind of person who required—or ever wanted—comforting, Sardelle risked putting a hand on her shoulder. She did not push it away.

“Is the wood delivery boy still out there?” Cas had rifled through the other drawer and the dressers and apparently not found anything interesting. “How are we going to get out of here?”

Not through your hole.