He wiped a hand down his face, calluses catching on stubble. Now or never.
He pulled a shiv from his back pocket and jimmied open the whitewashed door that led into the house. Held his breath, stepped into the room, and dropped into a crouch. The bed was bigger than most people’s flats. Two lumps lay in it. Rone slipped by, willing his eyes to adjust to the new darkness. The bedroom door was open. He passed through. Ernst Renad had two children, both grown and possibly out of the house. Rone wasn’t sure. He kept his guard up as he moved.
A rail followed the hallway and guarded passersby from dropping down two stories to the first floor. The architecture featured a huge square cut out of the second-and third-story floors so one could see all the way up to the highest ceiling upon entering the home. What a waste of space. Rone crept around the corner and counted doors. That one should be the sitting room—nope, that was a linen closet. This door . . . yes, this was it.
Rone stepped in and shut the door behind him, turning the knob hard to the right so it wouldn’t click when it latched. Even with all the shadows and darkness—only the smoke-covered moon illuminated the space—the room made his stomach turn. He could work every hour of every day of his entire life and not be able to afford half of this room’s furnishings. Gilded mirrors—he looked a little scruffy—framed paintings, and weird egg-shaped things with maybe-real, maybe-not-real jewels in them. Fine carpets and end tables with intricately carved legs, holding up board games with intricately carved pieces. And was that a harp? Rone rolled his eyes.
His quarry was in the corner, behind a thick, droopy rope that was meant to tell the entitled, Look, but don’t touch. Purely ornamental. He stepped over it and approached the wire dummy wearing an incomplete Noscon armor set. The breastplate had a chunk missing, and the edges were eroded. A millennium or so stuck under another’s city would do that. The original settlers of Kolingrad hadn’t even cleared out all the ruins before building on top of them. Rone settled his hand over his pocket. Then again, he should be thanking them for that.
A muscle in his shoulder tightened and stabbed him with a pain that said, Hurry up.
Rone lifted his eyes from the armor to the headpiece settled on top of the dummy’s head. A sort of gold-braided crown, beaded with jade. A triangle-shaped bluish gemstone marked the front, meant to rest against the forehead. Worth a fortune, of course—not because it had any magical properties like the amarinth, but because it was old. Why his employer wanted this specifically, Rone hadn’t asked. It wasn’t his job to ask.
It was his job to do what others thought impossible. This wasn’t a great example, but sometimes he did achieve awe-inspiring feats.
Rone swiped the headpiece with little grace and marched to the nearest window, unlatched it, and dropped down to a chipped cornice.
He scaled the side of the house carefully before dropping to the ground on the balls of his feet, but that damnable quartz wrapped all the way around the house, and it crunched audibly under his six-foot frame. Slipping the artifact into his coat, Rone did not go out the way he’d come in—he jumped the fence and crossed the neighbor’s yard to the next street.
Why did everyone in this neighborhood use crunchy rocks in their landscaping?
Rone shoved his hands into his pockets and kept his head low, striding with purpose down the lane. He was almost out.
The moment lamplight crossed his path, he sighed.
“You there.” A policeman in a deep-scarlet uniform hurried toward him from the north. Two others followed behind. Yes, three scarlets to patrol the wealthy neighborhood. Someone was probably being beaten up for a crust of bread in the smoke ring right now.
Rone lifted his head and smiled. His mom had always told him he had a nice smile. So had a number of other, very pretty, women.
“Is there a problem?” He shielded his eyes from the lamp.
“Odd time to be out for a jaunt,” the policeman said, looking him up and down. His gaze lingered on the tailored collar, a style favored by the rich. “Do you live here?”
“Just up ahead.” Rone pointed.
“Someone turned on their panic light. Said they saw a shadow.”
Rone raised an eyebrow and put on the most incredulous expression he could muster. “A shadow? At night? I can count two dozen from where I’m standing, you being one of them.”
The scarlet knit his brow. Glanced back at Rone’s collar. Hand still in his pocket, Rone pinched the edge of his amarinth. If he couldn’t blandish his way out of this, he’d have to run, and then he’d have three guns pointed at his back. The amarinth would give him sixty seconds to outpace them. Glancing past the accusing policeman, Rone sized up his companions. He could do it.
The officer lowered his lamp. “Just up ahead?”
Rone gestured with a tip of his head. “The one with the light on.”
There were two houses matching that description.
“Go on, then.” The officer seemed disappointed. If Rone really were fancy, he’d be offended. “Keep indoors at night, son. You waste our time, frolicking out here.”
And you waste taxpayer money, strutting around these villas, answering the calls of anyone who lights a red lamp. God knew he hated Kolingrad. Then again, he also hated God.
He tipped his head in good nature toward the police officer and continued on his way, matching the pace he had kept before.
The minute the lamplight turned from his back, he cut across another yard, lifted a manhole cover in the street, and dropped into the sewer.
Chapter 3
Fire.
Need.
Sandis started awake with an odd pressure in her skull—like she’d dived too deep into a canal. Her eyes were dry. Each breath burned her sinuses. She reached for her water and fumbled to get the last swallows from her pitcher to her cup to her mouth.
The pressure and impressions gradually eased away. Sandis rolled her neck, hearing it crack multiple times. Her hair, falling just past her chin so as not to cover her script, masked either side of her face. Her bowels churned with nerves. Looking around the room and seeing only darkness, save where dim light highlighted the edges of the door, she calmed herself with the thought Not tonight. He doesn’t need you tonight.
A vessel never got used to the agony of summoning. At least she didn’t.
Sandis lay back down, listening to the even breathing of the others, punctuated by a muffled scream winding its way through the hallway.
The hairs on her arms stood on end. Pressing her face into her pillow, she thought, It’s just the wind. Never mind that she was two stories underground. Never mind Heath’s talking about the screams.
She closed her eyes and tried to sleep, but those sensations—which she was still convinced came from Ireth—nagged at her mind and drove sleep away. What time was it? There was no clock in this room. No lamps or candles.
Fire. Need.
It had been a man’s scream.
Sandis lifted her head off her pillow, squinting through the darkness. Their beds formed a sort of horseshoe, close together without being side by side. Everyone was head to toe, with Sandis being nearest the door. Alys’s still form slumbered ahead of her, and then Kaili, Heath, Rist, and Dar.
She squinted harder. Gritting her teeth, she slipped off her bed, lowering herself onto her hands and knees on the floor. Crept forward, her clothes gently swishing. The vessels slept in their day clothes—simple pants and, for the women, those baggy, high-necked shirts that hung open in the back. A draft cruised up the length of her golden scars.
Sandis paused. Licked her lips.
Heath’s bed was empty.
He could easily be out with Kazen, though it usually woke Sandis when Kazen and his nasty little sidekick Galt opened the door to summon one or more of them.
Heath’s fear-fed words from earlier rattled in her ears.
“I’m next. He hates me. Summon that thing . . .”