“I beg your pardon,” said Locke, adopting a helpful, slightly confused smile, “but I don’t know anyone by those names. Jerome?”
“There must be some mistake,” said Jean, picking up Locke’s exact tone of polite bewilderment.
“No mistake, gentlemen,” said the archon. He slipped the file open and briefly examined the contents, about a dozen pages of parchment covered in neat black script. “I received a very curious letter several days ago, through secure channels within my intelligence apparatus. A letter rich with the most singular collection of stories. From a personal acquaintance—a source within the hierarchy of the Bondsmagi of Karthain.”
Not even Jean’s hands could squeeze a Verrari crystal goblet to fragments, Locke thought, or that moment might have seen the archon’s office decorated with an exploding cloud of shards and blood.
Locke gamely raised an eyebrow, refusing to give in just yet. “The Bondsmagi? Gods, that sounds ominous. But, ah, what would Bondsmagi have to do with Jerome and myself?”
Stragos stroked his chin while he skimmed the documents in the file. “Apparently, you’re both thieves from some sort of secret enclave formerly operating out of the House of Perelandro in Camorr’s Temple District—cheeky, that. You operated without the permission of Capa Vencarlo Barsavi, no longer among the breathing. You stole tens of thousands of crowns from several dons of Camorr. You are jointly responsible for the death of one Luciano Anatolius, a buccaneer captain who hired a Bondsmage to aid his plans. Perhaps most importantly, you foiled those plans and crippled that Bondsmage. Overcame him, at close quarters. Extraordinary. You shipped him back to Karthain half-dead and quite mad. No fingers, no tongue.”
“Actually, Leocanto and I are from Talisham, and we’re—”
“You’re both from Camorr. Jean Estevan Tannen, which is your real name, and Locke Lamora—which isn’t yours. That’s emphasized for some reason. You’re in my city as part of a scheme against that scrub Requin—supposedly, you’ve been making preparations to break into his vault. Best of luck there. Need we continue with your charade? I have many more details. It seems that the Bondsmagi have it in for you.”
“Those assholes,” muttered Locke.
“I see you are personally acquainted with them,” said Stragos. “I’ve hired a few of them in the past. They’re a touchy bunch. So you’ll admit to the truth of this report? Come, Requin is no friend of mine. He’s in with the Priori; might as well be on their damn councils.”
Locke and Jean looked at each other, and Jean shrugged. “Very well,” said Locke. “You seem to have us at quite a disadvantage, Archon.”
“To be precise, I have you at three. I have this report extensively documenting your activities. I have you here at the center of all my power. And now, for the sake of my own comfort, I have you on a leash.”
“Meaning what?” said Locke.
“Perhaps my Eyes did not embarrass me, gentlemen. Perhaps you two were intended to spend a few hours in the sweltering chamber, to help you work up a thirst that needed quenching.” He gestured at Locke and Jean’s goblets, which now held only dregs.
“You put something else in the cider,” said Jean.
“Of course,” said Stragos. “An excellent little poison.”
4
FOR A moment, the room was utterly silent, save for the soft fluttering of artificial insect wings. Then Locke and Jean stumbled up from their chairs in unison, but Stragos didn’t so much as twitch. “Sit down. Unless you’d prefer not to hear exactly what’s going on.”
“You drank from the same bottle,” said Locke, still standing.
“Of course I did. It wasn’t actually in the cider. It was in your goblets, painted into the bottoms. Colorless and tasteless. A proprietary alchemical substance, quite expensive. You should be flattered. I’ve increased your net personal worth, heh.”
“I know a thing or two about poisons. What is it?”
“What would be the sense in telling you anything more? You might attempt to have someone assemble an antidote. As it stands, your only possible source for your antidote is me.” He smiled, every pretense of contrite gentility shed from his features like a molted insect’s husk. A very different Stragos was with them now, and there was a lash in his voice. “Sit down. You’re at my disposal now, obviously. You’re not what I might have wanted, by the gods, but perhaps just what I can best put to use.”
Locke and Jean settled back into their chairs uneasily. Locke threw his goblet down onto the carpet, where it bounced and rolled to a halt beside Stragos’ table.
“You might as well know,” said Locke, “that I’ve been poisoned for coercive purposes before.”
“Have you? How convenient. Then surely you’ll agree it’s better than being poisoned for murderous ones.”
“What would you have us do?”
“Something useful,” said Stragos. “Something grand. According to this report, you’re the Thorn of Camorr. My agents brought me stories of you…the most ridiculous rumors, which now turn out to have been true. I thought you were a myth.”
“The Thorn of Camorr is a myth,” said Locke. “And it was never just me. We’ve always worked as a group, as a team.”
“Of course. No need to stress Master Tannen’s importance to me. It’s all here, in this file. I shall keep you both alive while I prepare for the task I have in mind for you. I’m not ready to discuss it yet, so let us say that I’m keeping you on retainer in the meantime. Go about your business. When I call, you will come.”
“Will we?” spat Locke.
“Oh, it’s well within your power to leave the city—and if you do, you will both die rather slow and miserable deaths before another season passes. And that would disappoint us all.”
“You could be bluffing,” said Jean.
“Yes, yes, but if you’re rational men, a bluff would hold you as surely as a real poison, would it not? But come now, Tannen. I have the resources not to bluff.”
“And what’s to keep us from running after we’ve received the antidote?”
“The poison is latent, Lamora. It slumbers within the body for many, many months, if not years. I will dole out your antidote at intervals so long as you please me.”
“And what guarantee do we have that you’ll continue to give us the antidote once we’ve done whatever task you’d set us to?”
“You have none.”
“And no better alternatives.”
“Of course not.”
Locke closed his eyes and gently massaged them with the knuckles of his index fingers. “Your alleged poison. Will it interfere with our daily lives in any way? Will it complicate matters of judgment, agility, or health?”
“Not at all,” said Stragos. “You won’t notice a thing until the time for the antidote is well past, and then you’ll notice a great deal all at once. Until then, your affairs will be unimpeded.”
“But you have already impeded our affairs,” said Jean. “We’re at a very delicate point in our dealings with Requin.”
“He gave us strict orders,” said Locke, “to do nothing suspicious while he sniffs around our recent activities. Disappearing from the streets in the care of the archon’s people would probably qualify as suspicious.”
“Already taken into consideration,” said the archon. “Most of the people who pulled you two off the street are in one of Requin’s gangs. He just doesn’t know they work for me. They’ll report seeing you out and about, even if others do not.”
“Are you confident that Requin is blind to their true loyalty?”
“Gods bless your amusing insolence, Lamora, but I’m not going to justify my every order to you. You’ll accept them like my other soldiers, and if you must trust, trust in the judgment that has kept me seated as archon for fifteen years.”
“It’s our lives under Requin’s thumb if you’re wrong, Stragos.”
“It’s your lives under my thumb, regardless.”
“Requin is no fool!”
“Then why are you attempting to steal from him?”
“We flatter ourselves,” said Jean, “that we’re—”
“I’ll tell you why,” Stragos interrupted. He closed his file and folded his hands atop it. “You’re not just greedy. You two have an unhealthy lust for excitement. The contemplation of long odds must positively get you drunk. Or else why choose the life you have, when you could have obviously succeeded as thieves of a more mundane stripe, within the limits allowed by that Barsavi?”
“If you think that little pile of papers gives you enough knowledge to presume so much—”
“You two are risk-takers. Exceptional, professional risk-takers. I have just the risk for you to take. You might even enjoy it.”