Ana held up the book, open to the page she’d stopped at earlier. “Then tell me, Scholar, how is it possible to create an Affinity and bestow it upon someone else? One fundamental law of alchemy is that the source of power in the world is finite.” She thought of Tetsyev’s pale face, his fear and urgency almost palpable. “If this artifact exists as I understand it, then there must be a cost to what it does.” She stepped closer, lowering her voice. “Scholar Tarschon, a mad empress is searching for this artifact—the same empress that would slaughter thousands of innocents. I don’t need to know where the artifact is, or what it is. But I need to understand what could happen if this thing falls into her hands.”
Tarschon was quiet for a long time. The lamp between them burned, casting flickering shapes onto the ceiling. The figures on the mural seemed to ripple, as though the Bregonian gods themselves were watching their conversation.
And then Scholar Tarschon said, “The artifact that you seek does not exist.”
Ana looked at him a moment longer, feeling only flat disappointment. She’d tried her best. If he would not yield, then she would bring this to Godhallem tonight.
Without a word, she turned and began to walk away.
She was halfway through the Livren Skolaren when she heard the scholar speak again, his voice so quiet that she almost missed it. “We do not have such a weapon because it is impossible to create power.”
Ana spun around. The scholar’s face was swathed in shadows; he stood as still as if he had been carved from rock.
“To create, you must also take.” His words reverberated in the space between them. His eyes were dark, distant pools. “This weapon you seek does not bestow magen upon its bearer by creating them. This weapon bestows magen by stealing them.”
“Two queens of steel, and a knave of coins!” Daya slapped her cards down and clapped her hands in delight. “Victory is mine, Amara bless! Hand over the coins, Quicktongue.”
Ramson rubbed a hand over his face. How was he losing at Crib the King? “Gods be damned,” he muttered.
It was evening on the second day of his arrival in Bregon. The sun had set and a wind had picked up, ushering clouds over the scattered light of the stars. The air had grown cold over rippling ocean waters, but the lamp in Daya’s captain’s cabin provided warmth.
Ramson fished out one silverflake from his pocket and flipped it to her. Daya caught it but raised an eyebrow at him. “Two more cop’stones,” she said, holding out her palm. “Don’t be petty.”
Ramson handed her the remaining sum, watching as his money vanished through a twirl of her fingers. “I need a break,” he said, glancing out the smudged glass window. The port had almost emptied; it was time.
He left Daya in her captain’s cabin, ducking out the door and taking care to shut it behind him. It was imperative that nobody knew they were here, camping out. He walked to the mast and easily swung himself up, the ropes stretching taut beneath his boots as he climbed. With a hop, he was on the crow’s nest, one leg dangling over as he balanced precariously, the thrill of the fall shooting adrenaline through his veins. From here, he could see most of Sapphire Port, smudges of shadows in the night sprinkled through with the light of candles inside windows. The docks, though, were completely dark.
The sound of the ocean and gentle rock of the Black Barge lulled him into a stupor. He didn’t know how much time had passed when suddenly, he jerked up.
Silhouettes, darting through the docks. It was too dim to make out their faces, but they were headed for the far end of the port.
Ramson followed, sliding down the mast and stealing across the docks, from the shadow of one ship to another.
True to his suspicions, they stopped at the very end of the quay, in front of the ship Ramson had inspected the day before. Ramson stood in the shadows of another large galley. He counted about a dozen of them.
A long whistle sounded in the night, followed by two short ones, raising the hairs on the back of his neck. It was a code that the members of the Order had used.
Daya had told him, back when they’d first met, that she suspected Alaric Kerlan still had men waiting for him in Sapphire Port. Now, watching as the gangplank was lowered and the men stole onto the ship, Ramson began to have an inkling of just how deep his former master’s secrets ran.
Ramson waited a while more, counting the seconds to himself. It was well over five minutes by the time he heard footsteps again. As the men began to make their way back down the gangplank, Ramson listened to their low conversation, wondering if he would recognize their voices. Bogdan had to be here, somewhere.
The sound of the Order members’ quiet murmurs drew farther away, and silence fell again. It was now, or never.
The ship was bobbing up and down more violently as he approached it, the waves stirred up by the wind and approaching storm. Ramson shinnied up the anchor line, his hand slipping several times as the ship tossed about. He paused at the railing, peering over.
The deck appeared to be completely deserted. Still, he took caution as he hauled himself on board, scanning the blur of shapes to catch for any movement.
When he found nothing, he made for the hatch. This time, it had been left unlocked. Anyone else might have assumed it was out of carelessness, but Ramson had learned to never make assumptions when it came to Alaric Kerlan.
He pressed his ear against the trapdoor and listened.
And then he heard it. At first he thought it was the wind, but as he listened, the sound registered as human: a faint keening, like a high-pitched moan, coming from belowdecks.
Daya had said she’d heard screaming.
Ramson lifted the hatch a crack, and then all the way. From his hips, he drew his smallest knife—an oyster shuck he’d stolen from the Blue Fort—and slipped in.
The air was still dank, and from the shapes of the crates, it seemed as though nothing had moved. Ramson frowned as he looked around again, slowly. The moaning sounds had stopped, but as he cocked his head to listen, he couldn’t hear the sound of anyone alive in this space.
