“The son gets it.”

“Right, and doesn’t know what it is. Maybe even knows it’s important, that it’s magical, but like you said, if he ever tells the mages, they’ll take it from him or from his heirs sooner or later. So he keeps it, and he keeps it secret. After enough generations pass, it becomes just another jewel in the royal treasury. By the time seven hundred years go by, it’s switched hands dozens of times, but no one has a clue what it is. Until one day, Khalidor’s God-king demands a tribute that includes one particular jewel, and a remarkably stupid king gives the very same jewel to his mistress.”

“You mean—” Kylar said.

“I just found out today that Niner gave Lady Jadwin the silver ka’kari, the Globe of Edges. It looks like a small, oddly metallic jewel, like a diamond with a silver tint to it. It also happens to be one of Queen Nalia’s favorite jewels. She thinks it’s lost, and she’s furious, so tomorrow night, someone the king trusts—I don’t know who—will be sent to get it back. The Jadwins are having a party that night. So tomorrow, the ka’kari will be exposed. No royal guards, no mages, no magically warded treasury. Lady Jadwin will either be carrying it or it will be in her room. Kylar, you need to understand what’s at stake. The ka’kari supposedly choose their own masters, but the Khalidorans believe they can magically force a bond. If the Godking succeeds …imagine the havoc a Godking would wreak if he could live forever.”

It made prickles go up the back of Kylar’s scalp. “You really mean this, don’t you? Have you told Durzo?”

“Durzo and I …I’m not too inclined to help Durzo just now. But there’s more, Kylar. I’m not the only one who knows this.” Anguish twisted her features and she looked away.

“What do you mean?”

“Khalidor has hired someone to get it. That’s how my spies found out in the first place. Supposedly the job is a smash-and-dash.”

“Supposedly?”

“They’ve hired Hu Gibbet.”

“Nobody would hire Hu for a smash-and-dash. The man’s a butcher.”

“I know,” Momma K said.

“Then who’s his deader?”

“Take your pick. Half the nobles in the realm will be there. Your friend Logan has accepted his invitation, perhaps even the prince will be there. Those two do seem to be inseparable; for all that they are night and day to each other.”

“Momma, who’s your spy? Can you get me an invitation?”

She smiled mysteriously. “My spy can’t help you, but I know someone who can. In fact, despite my best efforts, you know her too.”

36

Kylar had walked up to men in broad daylight within paces of the city guard to kill them. He’d crawled under tables while a cat clawed him as guards searched the room for intruders. He’d had to break into a vat of wine and hide inside it as a noble’s wine taster had picked out an appropriate bottle for dinner. He’d waited a yard from a fully stoked oven after he’d poisoned a stew while a cook debated with himself on what spice he’d added too much of to make it taste so strange.

But he’d never been this nervous.

He stared at the door, a narrow servants’ entrance, in dismay. He was a beggar today, come to beg a crust. His hair was lank and greasy, smeared with ash and tallow. His skin was tough and brown, hands gnarled and arthritic. To get to that door, he had to make it through the guards at the estate’s tall gate.

“Oy, old man,” a stumpy guard with a halberd said. “Whatcha be wanting?”

“I heard my little girl is here. Miss Cromwyll. I hoped she might find me a crust, is all.”

That woke up the other guard, who had only given Kylar a cursory glance. “What’d you say? You’re related to Miss Cromwyll?” The protective air around the man, who must have been nearly forty, was palpable.

“No, no, she’s not mine,” Kylar protested, scraping a laugh across his lungs. “Just an old friend.”

The guards looked at each other. “You gwyna go find ’er and bring ’er out here at this time of day with the goin’s on tonight?” Stumpy asked.

The other shook his head, and with a grumble, started patting Kylar down gingerly. “Swear I’ll get lice off of one of Miss Cromwyll’s strays one of these days.”

“Ah know it, but she’s worth it, inn’t she?”

“You’re not so magnamorous when you’re the one patting the beggars, Birt.”

“Ah, stuff it.”

“Go on. Kitchen’s that way,” the older guard told Kylar. “Birt, I’m lenient with ya, but if you tell me to stuff it one more time, I’ll show you the business end o’ my boot—”

Kylar shuffled to the kitchen favoring a stiff knee. The guards, for all their talk, were professionals. They held their weapons like they knew what to do with them, and though they hadn’t seen through his disguise, they hadn’t neglected their duty to search him. Such discipline boded ill for him.

Though he took his time walking and memorizing the layout of the estate grounds, the walk wasn’t nearly long enough. The Jadwins had been dukes for five generations, and the manse was one of the most beautiful in the city. The Jadwin estate overlooked the Plith River, and directly faced Cenaria Castle. Just north of the estate was East Kingsbridge, which was ostensibly for military use, but it was rumored to be used more often for the king’s nocturnal liaisons. If Lady Jadwin really was the king’s mistress, the Jadwin estate was perfectly placed for easy access. The king also kept the duke running all over Midcyru on diplomatic missions that everyone but the duke knew were pure pretense.

The manse itself was set on a small central hill that allowed it to look over the river, despite twelve-foot spiked walls that bordered the entire property.

With a trembling hand he masked as a palsy, Kylar knocked at the servants’ entrance.

“Yes?” The door opened and a young woman wiping her hands on an apron looked at Kylar expectantly.

She was a beautiful woman, maybe seventeen, with an hourglass figure that even through a servant’s woolens obviously would have been the envy of any of Momma K’s rent girls. The scars were still there, an X on her cheek, an X across her full lips, and a loop from the corner of her mouth to the outside of her eye. The scar gave her a permanent little grin, but the kindness of her mouth eased the cruelty of the scar.

Kylar remembered how her eye had looked, swollen grossly. He’d been afraid she would never see out of it. But her eyes, both of them, were clear and bright brown, sparkling with goodness and happiness. Doll Girl’s nose had been broken to mush, and Elene’s wasn’t completely straight, but it didn’t look bad. And she had all her teeth—of course, he realized, she’d been young enough that she’d only lost small teeth in the beating.

“Come in, grandfather,” she said quietly. “I’ll find you something to eat.” She offered her arm, and didn’t seem offended by his staring. She took him to a small side room with a narrow table for the servants who needed to be within earshot of the kitchen. Calmly, she told a woman ten years older than she was that she needed her to take over while Elene took care of her guest. From her tone and the older woman’s reaction, Kylar could see that Elene was adored here, and that she took care of beggars all the time.

“How are you, grandfather? Can I get a salve for your hands? I know it’s painful on these chilly mornings.”

What had he done to deserve this? He’d come as the most foul sort of beggar, and she showered him with kindness. He had nothing to give her, yet she treated him like a human being. This was the woman who had almost died because of his arrogance and stupidity, his failure. The only ugliness in her life was because of Kylar.

He’d thought he’d set aside his guilt two years ago when Momma K had told him the simple truth that he’d saved Elene from worse than scars. But looking at those scars up close threatened to throw him right back to that hell.