She wasn’t about to let that continue.
Around her the six other towers of the Chromeria rose as if in an embrace, but they were set lower than the Prism’s Tower, like children hugging her legs, offering encumbrance instead of comfort. Responsibilities to fulfill, duties to attend to, and too many of both. Karris, who had always had an affinity for the blue virtues of order and hierarchy—an affinity oft buried by her wanton drafting of green and red—was making a list not just of the facts facing her, but also of the actions she would need to take regarding each, shelving her emotions for the time being.
She had only minutes before Andross Guile arrived, and she needed all her faculties for the confrontation. She had to make her own plans before he arrived, because if she weren’t firmly set on her course before he began speaking, he would steer her toward his destinations so skillfully that she would come out thinking it had been her idea.
Gavin was gone. Her husband, her broken Prism—to save whom she had risked war with Paria and Ruthgar both—had vanished. As soon as she’d gotten out of the ceremony anointing her the new White, she’d sent an entire squad of Blackguards to the chirurgeons’ clinic where he’d been left. It had been wrecked. Everyone gone. Blood splattered about. The door splintered off its hinges.
I have a contact who owns a tavern on that street.
Ask contact if any unusual men were in the neighborhood today.
But what counted as unusual on a Sun Day? The city was packed with visitors for the holy day festivities; everyone from pilgrims to pirates piled into the city to celebrate.
In the distance, the cannon tower that had guarded East Bay still smoked. Seventy dead there. Sixty-four of them confirmed as Andross Guile’s Lightguard thugs. Six unknown.
No, five unknown; one of the dead is reported to be Commander Ironfist himself or maybe his brother Tremblefist.
Go view the body myself to confirm which of my friends it is.
No, that wasn’t right at all.
Go view the body myself to confirm its identity.
She breathed out slowly. Tears weren’t an option now. Not when her people needed her. Her Blackguards needed to know that she was strong. Andross Guile needed to know she wasn’t weak.
Next, two great crenellations had dropped from the top of the Prism’s Tower, becoming counterweights for two different great escape cables that had sprung up from hidden places—escape routes that Karris had never heard so much as a whisper of. Apparently no one else had known of them, either, because no one had maintained them. One had malfunctioned.
The other had worked, though, and Kip and his squad—the Mighty, they were being called—had escaped.
Question Carver Black. Did he know of this escape route?
Coordinate with Carver Black to assign engineers and slave teams to put the crenellations back in place and fix the broken mechanisms.
Assign drafter-builders and divers to repair and bury the cables again.
Why the Mighty had needed to escape was still a question that needed answering. And if Karris was furious that someone had exposed an ages-old secret of the escape route, she was more furious that they’d had good reason to do so. While Karris and the Colors and High Satraps had been sequestered to choose a new White, someone had been killing Blackguards in the very same tower.
Kip was gone. In addition to being her stepson, he had been her discipulus for nine months, and she cared for him a great deal, even if she had been wretched at showing it. According to the Blackguard, the Lightguards had attempted to murder Kip without provocation, gunning down Goss, one of Kip’s Mighty. The Blackguard had apparently been ordered to stand down, and, damn them for their obedience, they had.
Find out who ordered them to stand down.
Interview each of the watch captains.
Interrogate the member of Kip’s squad who was left behind, Daelos. Did he get his injury during the escape?
Tisis Malargos, the younger sister of Eirene Malargos—the real power in Ruthgar—was gone. She was far down the list of Karris’s immediate problems, but there was still a war going on, and such details couldn’t be dismissed. Tisis had been the Chromeria’s hostage, guaranteeing Ruthgari loyalty. Why had she fled now? A hostage’s leaving without permission was a breach of treaty and thereby technically an act of war.
Find Tisis’s friends and slaves. Interrogate.
Commander Ironfist was missing. Promachos Andross Guile had relieved him of his position, but Karris would fight tooth and nail to reinstate him. Of course, first she had to find him, and he’d last been seen heading to the docks—which was exactly what she would have done if she’d found herself suddenly without a position and knowing Andross Guile was against her.
Dear Orholam, what if it is Ironfist dead down at the cannon tower?
Destroy the Lightguard. Failing that, place spies high within the organization.
Regardless of whether it was Tremblefist or Ironfist dead, how had he died? What had happened?
Interrogate some Lightguards directly.
Consult with Carver Black.
Find locals who saw what happened.
How would she find Ironfist? How could she bring him back?
Tell all the Blackguards to look for Ironfist. Offer a reward. Do everything. Offer him whatever he wants if he’ll come back.
Ironfist was the one person Karris could trust without reservation, because—
Marissia was gone. Hard as it was to admit, for Karris’s new duties this was the worst blow of all. Marissia had been the head of all the White’s spies for years until Karris had recently begun to take those over.
Karris thought they’d become something like friends, so Marissia’s betrayal bit deep. And who knew what she’d taken with her?… Or whom.
Dear Orholam. What if Marissia had taken Gavin? But what could Karris do? It seemed hopeless. There were no hints at all about Marissia’s whereabouts—or Gavin’s. But the woman couldn’t have absconded with him without help. She had no retainers or family, so that meant she had money.
Check in with all spies. Determine if each one is loyal to me or to Marissia still.
Shift all monies to new accounts.
Determine how much Marissia has stolen, if possible. How? By leaning on Turgal Onesto? The young banking scion will have the opportunity to prove his worth now.
The only good news was that regardless of how high she’d climbed, Marissia was still a slave. Her clipped ear meant she would have trouble keeping power if she didn’t have money. Money. Money’s the answer for that snake.
But all this was recovery. All this was merely treading water after a shipwreck. That wasn’t enough. Karris needed to swim for shore.
She was the White now. That meant all the drafters in the Seven Satrapies were her responsibility. It meant the Chromeria and Big and Little Jasper were her responsibility. Taking care of those meant that the physical, brute-force weapons she’d loved for so long were inadequate to the task before her.
She had to win the war.
Win the war.
She made it an item on her list, as if something so immense might be better comprehended if she wrestled it into words.
Winning battles wouldn’t suffice. By sheer numbers killed, the Seven Satrapies had won battles. But their numbers bled away every night while the Color Prince added to his.
Karris’s war wasn’t going to be fought on battlefields. It was up to her to give the people of the Seven Satrapies reasons to fight, to bleed, to die, and to kill. Others would be the sword in this fight. She would be the lash and the pen.
She must unite the Seven Satrapies for this war. Any who opposed that goal, who opposed her, must be brought into line or crushed.
There was a knock on the door, and the now omnipresent Blackguards announced Andross Guile. He was only the first test.