Spitting bits of fuzz onto the cave floor, Radane started babbling. “You can’t possibly believe that. It’s a plant! You can’t take its word over mine. I have been granted authority—”
“You see why we gagged her,” Caz said.
“Caz prefers ‘he,’ and Meep is ‘they,’ ” Kiela said. “And I haven’t heard anything that says you weren’t casting a spell.”
Radane glared at her, which was less effectual given that she was lying on her side, squirming like a trussed-up chicken. “He and they are mistaken. I was checking to see if it truly was a spell. I didn’t want to act without full knowledge.”
“You confiscated my parents’ cookbook without any hesitation,” Kiela said. Radane would have no need to read aloud any of the spells to know these were spellbooks. The word “spell” was literally in half the titles. Plus, open any of them, and she’d see the First Language. The spellbooks didn’t try to hide what they were, which was why she’d kept them in a crate hidden beneath a tarp on the boat and quilts in the cottage. Kiela asked Caz, “Which spell did she try?”
Meep scurried over to the boat and returned with a book, open to a page three-quarters of the way in. Kiela thanked them, took it, and read. “Invisibility?” She had disregarded this volume because it wasn’t nature-related. Looking closer, she saw it was more of a stealth kind of spell, to dampen one’s footsteps and make clothes, eyes, and skin less reflective. It had a list of ingredients, including a very rare and expensive gem. Checking the spine, she saw it was aimed at hunters. The spell was designed to make it easier to sneak up on their prey. “Among other ingredients, she’d need a ruby with no inclusions, three carats, for it to work.”
“See!” Radane said. “I wasn’t casting a spell. I was merely reading out loud when your monstrosities jumped me—”
Caz reached toward her neck with a tendril, and Radane flopped onto her stomach. Meep butted against her bare wrist with their prickles. Radane yelped and flinched, and Caz used the moment to seize a necklace around Radane’s neck. He pulled it out of her shirt to show the ruby pendant. “Well, look at that. Exactly the specific ingredient for the spell. What a coincidence.”
Radane pressed her lips together and glared so hard that Kiela was half surprised that lightning didn’t spark out of her eyes.
It was a highly improbable coincidence that Radane had chosen the one book in the collection with the one spell that used the very jewel she wore around her neck—a very expensive jewel that an imperial investigator had no business wearing in the first place. “Who are you?” Kiela asked her.
“I am an imperial investigator charged with—”
Caz leaned closer to her face. “Kiela is a nice person who doesn’t think about extreme solutions to any situation. It didn’t occur to her that the revolutionaries would throw the emperor out a window. Or that they’d allow anyone to burn the library. Or that anyone would really come after us. Yet here you are. I would like to point out, though, that if you are who you say you are, an imperial investigator who crashed on our island, then no one knows you are here. You could have drowned in the storm.”
“The islanders know—”
“But they don’t like you,” Caz said. “They want you to leave, and if they think you left on your own after finding nothing more suspicious than a cookbook owned by a jam-maker, do you really think they’d ask questions?”
Kiela frowned. She wasn’t certain what Caz was getting at, but it sounded an awful lot like he was about to threaten Radane with something dire. “Caz—” she began. The cactus poked her in the ankle.
He loomed closer to Radane’s face and spread his leaves wide. “You’ll note the water here is deep. Your body wouldn’t even wash to shore. If we attached a few heavy rocks—”
Radane’s eyes widened.
Appalled, Kiela said, “Caz!”
“I’m just explaining options to her,” Caz said.
“We can’t . . .” Kiela couldn’t even say the word “murder.” That was much too far. They should definitely not even be having this conversation.
Caz fixed his attention back on Radane. His leaves were still puffed up, and all his tendrils were vertical. “Kiela is my best friend.”
“Meep!”
“And practically Meep’s mother.”
Kiela startled at that. She hadn’t thought of herself as anyone’s mother. Certainly she’d never acted or felt motherly toward the cactus. Was she supposed to? “I don’t think—”
“If it makes you feel better, Meep says they consider you more of an aunt.”
Okay, that was nice, but . . .Stay focused. Potential murder talk here.“Caz, we are absolutely not going to—”
“Youaren’t going to,” Caz said. “You’re going to sail the boat back to the cottage, put away the books, and then have lunch with your nice handsome neighbor. Meep and I are going to continue our conversation with our new friend, Radane.”
“I’m not leaving if you’re going to . . .” Kiela swallowed.
“Kiela . . .” Caz said.
“No.” She began to tug at the ropes that bound Radane. “I don’t know who you are or what you want, but you aren’t an imperial investigator, and we aren’t murderers. So we’re going to have a conversation like civilized people, and you’re going to tell us why you’re on Caltrey and what you want. I am not letting my best friend commit an act he can’t undo and will regret.”
