"Siggy," Ehren said, smiling. "Is Ibrus in?"
The big man's voice was slurred by his mangled face, but its tone was surprisingly warm and mellow. "It's late, Appius. He's told you about his hours before."
"I'm prepared to make it worth his time."
"Heard that one before," Siggy said.
Ehren tossed a pair of coins at the big man, and Isana saw the glitter of gold in the light of the single furylamp outside the front door.
"I'm prepared to make it worth his time," Ehren said in exactly the same voice as before.
"Come in," Siggy said. He pocketed the coins and led them into the entry hall, a large room obviously used as a reception area, centered around a large (and largely defunct) fountain with its own pool. The water was dark and stagnant. Siggy paused for a moment as Varg crouched to come through the door, and stared at the Cane. "Wait here. I'll go get him."
"Charming," Tavi murmured to Ehren, after Siggy had gone.
"It helps to speak the language," Ehren said.
"Appius?" Tavi asked.
"Everybody in this part of the Realm has at least two or three aliases. If you don't pick up a couple, you'll never fit in."
"This Ibrus," Tavi asked. "Can we trust him?"
"Absolutely," Ehren replied, "to do whatever benefits Ibrus most."
Tavi nodded, looking around the shadowy hall. "I don't like it. If there was any other way to secure mounts..."
"There isn't," Ehren said firmly.
Tavi growled beneath his breath, looking around them. "Still."
More footsteps sounded, and another light approached. Siggy bore a fury-lamp in one hand and a heavy cudgel in the other. A man walked beside him. He was a little taller than average and well built, his thick red hair and beard shot with grey. He wore a fine robe, much like those sported by Senators and the most pretentious of the Citizenry, though it was rumpled and stained with what Isana hoped was wine.
"Appius," Ibrus said. He yawned. "I was just finishing a rather fine evening's entertainment, and I cannot adequately express how annoying your presence is."
Isana found herself focusing more intently on Ibrus. Though the man looked and sounded both bored and mildly angry, his true emotions were considerably different.
He was tense. Afraid.
"You're a middleman, Ibrus," Ehren replied. "Everyone wants to see you in the middle of the night-or in the middle of a bonfire. There's not much in between."
"Someday your mouth is going to get you into trouble, Appius," Ibrus said darkly.
Ehren lifted a purse and jingled it. "I'd better move it to where it won't disturb you, then. 1 need horses."
Ibrus scowled, then rolled his eyes. "Siggy."
The big man held out his hand, and Ehren tossed him the purse. Siggy dumped the coins out in his palm, looked at them, and then dumped them back into the purse, which he handed to Ibrus with a nod.
"There's not going to be much to choose from," Ibrus warned him. "The Free Alerans were grabbing anything they could get their hands on."
"What have you got?" Ehren asked. The two men got down to haggling over horses.
As they did, Isana became increasingly aware of the discrepancy between Ibrus's manner and his actual state of mind. That was nothing unusual, really. Most people could dissemble reasonably well, in that sense. After all, it was part of being polite and showing common courtesy to others. But ever since her venture into the leviathan-haunted sea, her watercrafting senses had become increasingly fine, able to distinguish details and nuance with greater and greater clarity. Ibrus's emotions were not simply a repressed reaction he preferred not to display. He was actively worried, impatient, and increasingly frightened.
"You're expecting someone," Isana said sharply.
The conversation stopped, and every pair of eyes in the room turned to her.
She hadn't meant to say it aloud, but the die was cast. She stepped forward, locking her gaze to Ibrus's and spoke clearly. "Who are you expecting, Ibrus? Why does a simple horse trade frighten you so?"
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Ibrus replied.
Tavi's eyes narrowed. He traded a quick glance with Isana, and said, "You're sweating, Ibrus. Even though it's a lovely, cool evening."
Araris, who had become motionless once Isana began speaking, abruptly moved. His sword cleared its sheath as he spun, and the blade struck through what looked like empty air.
A spray of blue sparks and a ribbon of blood spilled forth from nowhere, splattering the floor and Ibrus's fancy robes. There was a cry of pain and a man appeared, tall, slender, dressed in mail, and bearing a sword. Araris's blade had sheared through his armor like a knife through cheese, and a long, gaping wound in the metal links was matched by the far more gruesome wound in the flesh beneath. The man went down, screaming, dropping his sword to clutch at the innards spilling from his belly.
Isana recognized the man. He had been one of Senator Arnos's singidares.
Which meant...
There was an enormous roar of shattering stone, and the wall nearest the party suddenly fell inward, toward them, shattering along the way. Isana saw Araris leap back-directly into Tavi, pushing him away from the falling stone. Araris went down underneath the fall of white marble and screamed.
Isana found herself falling backward, and realized that Kitai had seized her by the back of her dress and hauled her away from the deadly rain of marble. Ehren flung himself into a neat forward roll, toward Ibrus, and when he came to his feet again, the young Cursor sank one of his knives to the hilt in Ibrus's throat.
Siggy whirled toward him and leapt on Ehren, flattening the smaller man to the floor. He seized Ehren's throat between two huge hands, and Isana saw the young man's face turn purple.
She rolled and came to her knees, then gestured at the fountain of stagnant water and called to Rill.
A jet of water leapt from the pool and flashed across the room. It slammed into Siggy's maimed face and simply clung to his head, filling his, eyes, nose, mouth, and ears. The big man released Ehren's throat in a panic, reaching up to claw uselessly at the water covering his face.
Ehren arched his body and threw Siggy off him. Before the big man could fully settle to the floor, Ehren had produced another knife and flicked its razor-sharp blade across Siggy's throat.
The man's terror flooded over Isana, layer after layer of it, like a landslide of some kind of hideous, stinking mud. It weighed her down relentlessly, magnified by her contact with the dying man, but she kept the tendril of water on his face until his movements went frantic, then suddenly slackened, his fear abruptly vanishing.