Ch. 47: The Work of Waiting and Ch. 48: Establishing Rapport

Chapter 47: The Work of Waiting

Allandra had made the correct decision.

This was unfortunate, because while incorrect decisions could be reversed, correct decisions had to be endured.

She stood at the council table with both hands braced against its edge and looked at a map of western Myrae.

She reminded herself for the sixth time that Serali was not gone. Allandra knew exactly where she was: at the tide stair. With Daravan. With guards covering the approach and Harrek commanding the Watch beyond it.

Allandra had reviewed the arrangement. That had not made letting her go easier.

Verya sat opposite her, comparing property records with the notes from the recording. Yvander had three ledgers open. Merrow occupied the other end of the table with a street plan that appeared to predate half the streets on it.

Hagen stood near the door, receiving reports and pretending not to watch Allandra whenever one arrived.

A pale communication stone rested in a brass holder beside the map. Harrek carried its pair; the matching sigils linked the two, allowing a voice spoken into one to be heard through the other.

Allandra could answer him directly. Daravan could use the same field stone when they were together.

It was silent, which Allandra disliked more with every minute.

There were excellent reasons for the queen to remain in the palace.

If the meeting was a diversion, someone had to direct the response elsewhere. Someone had to keep the search moving while the people at the stair dealt with the trap.

If Serali was taken—

No.

Allandra stopped that thought.

She could feel Serali. She was angry, focused, and afraid.

She wanted to reach through the bond and pull her home. Instead she offered warmth, gently enough not to demand an answer.

For a brief moment, cool affection brushed back against her.

Then Serali’s attention moved away.

Allandra made herself look at the map.

Yvander tapped one ledger. “Three of the old pearl holdings changed lease management within the last six months.”

Verya looked up. “Actual ownership?”

“Still tracing it.”

“The new management may be legitimate.”

“It may.”

“Then keep the distinction on the list.”

Yvander added a note.

Allandra appreciated them both for refusing to make uncertainty disappear simply because she wanted answers.

“Which have lower rooms?” she asked.

“All three,” Merrow said. “But not all three have usable ones.”

He drew his old plan closer.

The lower buildings near the stair had been altered repeatedly. Drying rooms became storage rooms. Offices were added above warehouses. Service passages survived changes in ownership because removing them cost more than closing a door.

Some doors had been reopened.

Some had only been described as closed.

“The records disagree here,” Merrow said, indicating two neighboring properties. “This passage belonged to the old shell yard. The later leases treat it as part of both buildings.”

Hagen leaned over the table. “Convenient.”

“For a dispute, certainly.”

“And for someone wishing not to be seen entering either house.”

“Possibly.”

Verya marked the passage for verification.

Allandra looked at the notes beside it.

Water. Enclosed sound. Metal against wood.

Marielle’s voice.

She moved the page far enough aside that she could read the property names without seeing the line about the restraint.

“We do not know the meeting place is near her,” she said.

“No, Your Majesty,” Yvander answered. “The other districts remain under review.”

“Good.”

The agents knew the stair. They had chosen it. That made the surrounding buildings worth checking.

It did not put Marielle inside one.

Allandra could not send the whole search toward a place simply because Serali was there.

A clerk entered with two reports collected overnight.

Hagen took them before the man had finished bowing.

“The lower store at Orrel’s yard,” he said. “Flooded.”

Merrow looked up. “Since when?”

“The last spring tide. The keeper showed the Watch officer the access.”

Yvander found the entry.

“Could someone occupy the upper level?” Verya asked.

“Yes. But the stone room we marked is under water.”

Allandra nodded. “Remove that room from the immediate list. Keep the rest of the property under consideration.”

Hagen opened the second report. “A supposedly vacant lodging house has received lamp oil and bread twice this week.”

“Watchmen?” Merrow asked.

“The caretaker says no one is staying there.”

“A caretaker might require bread,” Verya said.

“Several loaves at a time.”

Yvander held out his hand for the account. “Which supplier?”

Hagen passed it over.

The ledger turned. A name was found. An amount compared.

Allandra watched them make a question precise enough for someone in Myrae to investigate.

Suddenly, fear struck through the bond.

Her fingers closed against the table edge.

She tried to keep the rest of herself still. Smooth her expression before anyone looked up.

Serali’s concentration sharpened beneath the fear. Anger rose, then something hard and urgent that Allandra could not separate into useful information.

No image or voice telling her where to go.

Only the woman she loved afraid somewhere beyond the palace walls.

“Your Majesty?” Verya asked.

Allandra looked up.

Everyone was waiting. She had clearly missed a question.

“Repeat it.”

Verya did, without comment. “Permission to examine the caretaker’s payment records alongside the deliveries.”

“Granted. Keep the request specific.”

Verya turned back to her notes.

Hagen’s gaze remained on Allandra a moment longer.

She did not meet it.

The sigils on the communication stone brightened.

Harrek’s voice came through, clipped and clear. “The meeting has become an engagement. Support is moving. Further report when the position is secured.”

Allandra stared at the stone.

There was no assurance that the position could be secured.

Hagen stepped nearer it. “The approach teams have their orders.”

“I know.”

He stopped.

She had spoken too sharply.

Allandra made herself open her hands. “Continue.”

Merrow found a household name beneath the altered lease.

Verya found that the household had appointed an agent to manage the property.

Yvander found payments made through a different business.

None proved anything alone.

Together, they gave the Watch someone else to ask.

Allandra approved the inquiry.

Then, pain flashed through the bond.

She drew breath too quickly.

She made herself release the table. By the time she had arranged her face into something she hoped was ordinary concentration, Verya was watching her.

“Are you well, Your Majesty?”

Hagen looked up too.

The official publication page is where the author publishes this chapter; this copy was taken without consent.

“A headache,” Allandra said. “Nothing requiring us to stop.”

Verya glanced toward the clerk beside the door. “Ask Mistress Lia to send something for Her Majesty’s headache. And water.”

The clerk bowed and went.

Allandra had meant the explanation to end the inquiry. Instead, she had acquired treatment.

“Thank you, Lady Verya.”

Verya inclined her head. “Of course, Your Majesty.”

Allandra reached for the nearest report and found she could not read its first line.

Serali was still there.

The pain did not tell her how badly she was hurt. It did not tell her whether someone had cut her, struck her, or done something Allandra had not thought to fear.

She wanted to leave.

Not send another order.

Leave.

Cross the city and make every person between her and Serali understand that they had become an obstacle.

Yvander waited with his pen above the ledger.

There were people between Allandra and Serali already.

Daravan. Harrek. Pell. Orran. Officers whose names she had read before approving their assignments.

They were doing the work she had entrusted to them.

She put the report down.

“Which entry?” she asked Yvander.

He showed her.

She read it slowly enough to understand it this time.

“Send that with the inquiry.”

His pen moved.

Another rush of feeling came from Serali. Fierce concentration, then shock so abrupt Allandra lost the thread of Merrow’s explanation.

She gripped the back of her chair. Something had happened.

Allandra knew only that.

Merrow stopped speaking.

Hagen moved as though he might come around the table.

Allandra shook her head once.

“Finish, Lord Merrow.”

He did.

She listened to every word because making him repeat it would take time, and time was one of the things she could not spend lightly, for Serali’s sake, and for Marielle’s.

The next report came after Serali’s fear had begun to ease.

The fear had not vanished, but it had become small enough to feel manageable.

Allandra had been holding to that distinction while Verya prepared the authorizations for the remaining candidates.

The clerk returned with a glass of water, two small stoppered bottles, and a folded note. “Mistress Lia’s instructions, Your Majesty.”

Allandra opened the note.

Blue for the headache. White, if the discomfort requires no medicinal treatment. Empty the selected dose into the water.

She looked at the white stopper. It was probably something she could take in front of the council when the pain troubling her belonged to someone else.

Allandra hated how insightful Lia was.

Across the table, Verya continued arranging the authorizations, but Allandra noticed her watching the bottles. She had asked for medicine because she was concerned.

Allandra emptied the white bottle into the glass.

The water was sweet.

“Thank Mistress Lia,” she told the clerk, then drank and folded the note into her palm.

Verya slid the next authorization toward her. Allandra set down the glass and reached for it.

The communication stone sounded again.

Daravan this time. “Your Majesty. Lady Serali is secure with us. The landing is held.”

Allandra closed her eyes.

Only for a moment.

“Injuries?”

“A blow to her forearm. No broken skin. She can move the hand. Lia should examine it when she returns.”

Allandra put her palm flat on the table. The wood was solid. That helped.

“And you, Captain?”

“A cut at my side. Bleeding controlled.”

Lia would have more questions about that.

Allandra would ensure she had the opportunity to ask them.

“The agents?”

“The caster is dead. The leader and the limping woman escaped through a prepared lower passage under concealment. Both wounded. Commander Harrek has officers in pursuit.”

Verya wrote.

Yvander drew the water-access plan closer.

“Lady Marielle?” Allandra asked.

“Was not present. We have no new confirmation of her condition.”

The relief inside Allandra stopped cleanly.

Serali was safe, Daravan was alive, but Marielle was still gone.

“They used her as leverage throughout,” Daravan continued. “The leader’s last statement was that there would be no further negotiations. He threatened further harm if Lady Serali continued refusing him.”

Allandra looked at the map.

At all the little spaces that might contain a woman waiting for help.

“His exact words in the written report,” she said.

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

Verya’s pen moved more firmly.

Hagen looked toward the stone. “Did they take the box?”

“The copy is broken. They know it was false.”

“And the caster was the man responsible for the transport?” Allandra asked.

“Likely. We cannot establish that he was their only means. If he was, they now require physical transport. Lady Serali identified a cord on his wrist that produced the same response as Lady Marielle’s blood. It is being secured separately for Mistress Lia.”

Yvander closed one ledger and opened another.

“Keep the body and spell remains for examination,” Allandra said. “Lady Serali returns to Mistress Lia. Captain, you are examined as well.”

A brief pause.

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

She knew the sound of a man considering an objection and deciding against it.

“Commander Harrek retains the city operation. Send the passage information immediately.”

“It is being copied now.”

Good. There was still work they could do.

The stone fell quiet and Allandra remained standing.

She wanted Serali in this room. Wanted to see the arm, touch her face, find the ordinary physical proof that the report could not provide.

Yvander tapped the transport ledger. “Carriage. Cart. Boat. Anything capable of moving an injured woman without attracting notice.”

“And somewhere to take her,” Merrow said.

Verya turned the authorizations toward Allandra. “The candidates remain candidates. We should not abandon them because the fight ended elsewhere.”

“We will not.”

Allandra took the pen.

The first signature was less steady than she liked.

The second was better.

“Activate the closure,” she said. “Controlled passage at the land gates and harbor. Commander Harrek directs the searches. Notify the private docks as well as the public ones.”

Hagen called the clerk back.

“Transport hired before dawn,” Allandra continued. “Unexpected departures. Houses receiving people or supplies through service entrances. Send the confirmed leads to the Watch as they arrive.”

Yvander began marking the relevant accounts, Merrow returned to the household names and Verya reached for the seals.

Allandra could still feel Serali. Frustration, and some pain.

Later, Allandra would ask what had happened.

For now, she signed the next authorization.

Chapter 48: Establishing Rapport

The Commander, Vaelis, and Edrin left for the tide stair before dawn. Marielle had been relieved when she realized that Tairn was the one being left to watch her. Apparently she had preferences among her kidnappers.

Marielle had spent the night failing to get enough sleep to think clearly or to find a flaw in the safe house she could exploit. She was reasonably certain the two failures were related.

It was also unfortunate that the second safehouse was substantially better constructed than the first. The door was reinforced, the drainage grate was too narrow, and most insultingly, the post behind her was exceptionally sound.

Her hands remained bound in front of her, tethered to a ring. Enough room to shift them. Not enough to reach anything useful.

Tairn sat near the door, touching his swollen jaw.

She remembered a principle from accounts of captivity: encourage a captor to see a person instead of a prisoner. Sympathy might buy hesitation. Hesitation might buy an opportunity.

Tairn had already shown some capacity for it. He had also helped abduct her, restrained her during the recording, and checked the lock before sitting down.

Those facts did not cancel one another.

The useful question was whether she could make him hesitate about the next instruction.

Marielle looked at him.

He noticed. “Stop.”

“I am sitting still.”

“Stop looking at me.”

“There are very few other things to look at.”

“Look at the wall.”

“I have.”

“Again.”

Marielle considered the wall. “Mortar failure along the lower course.”

Tairn closed his eyes. “You are doing this deliberately.”

“Yes.”

Deliberately irritating him was easier than deliberately making him care. Unfortunately, she needed him to care.

She needed another approach.

“You are worried about Edrin.”

His eyes narrowed.

“All right,” she said. “Not that angle.”

“Stop trying to work on me.”

“I am not working on you.”

“You are.”

“I am establishing rapport.”

He stared.

Marielle regretted the sentence. “That sounded less sinister in my head.”

“Did it?”

His mouth moved slightly. Enough to be encouraging, provided she did not confuse encouragement with an unlocked door.

“I am not good at this kind of conversation,” she said.

“Then stop.”

“I am good at other kinds.”

“I know.”

“You do?”

“You complained about the foundation while being questioned.”

“It was subsiding.”

“I remember.”

The corner of his mouth moved again. This was a good sign, possibly.

Marielle had rules for procurement disputes, material inspections, council arguments, and repairing things other people insisted were not broken.

She had fewer rules for persuading a man who had held her shoulders while Vaelis hurt her and later brought her water.

“How is your jaw?” she asked.

Tairn looked at her.

Too abrupt, apparently.

“You keep touching it.”

“Your guard is the one who hit me.”

“Preventing my abduction was his job. You made hitting you necessary.”

“And now you are asking whether it hurts.”

Marielle considered this. “Both seem appropriate.”

He looked away, but not quickly enough to conceal the reluctant smile.

She had reached him a little.

Later, Tairn brought the water without being asked.

Marielle let him hold the cup while she drank. Her throat hurt and the cut beside her mouth pulled when she swallowed.

“Thank you,” she said.

He paused, and she realized she probably said it too carefully.

“You can drink without making it another attempt,” he told her.

Marielle looked at the cup. “I can also be grateful for water without being grateful for captivity.”

His expression changed.

She could not tell how much of the change was irritation.

“You would have been given water,” he said.

“Eventually.”

“Yes.”

“By someone who might enjoy making it difficult.”

He did not answer that.

When he lowered the cup, he checked the tether. Pulled it once to make certain it held.

There it was, the reality of the situation, demonstrated for her convenience.

Marielle leaned against the post. She was frightened, exhausted, and beginning to find every conversation more work than it should have been.

Pretending otherwise had not improved anything.

“I would like to go home,” she said.

Tairn’s hand stopped at the knot.

She hadn’t given him a request he could deny, she had stated a fact about her.

He stood and returned the cup to the table.

“Serali wants to stay here,” Marielle added. “You know that, don’t you?”

Tairn turned. “Do you think everyone in Lyehira wants to be there? That what people want matters?”

Marielle went still. His voice was not loud, which made the anger in it harder to miss.

“It should,” she said.

“Sometimes there are no choices.”

“There are always choices.”

She knew immediately that it was too easy.

Tairn laughed once. It was an ugly sound.

“Sometimes there are orders, and punishment, and people above you who call disobedience treason and obedience loyalty.” He looked toward the door. “Sometimes there is only surviving the shape already built around you.”

Marielle had no clever answer.

She had been trying to make him think about her as a person.

Apparently the process was not entirely one-directional.

“I am sorry,” she said.

Tairn looked startled. Marielle was also startled.

She clarified. “That was not strategy.”

His expression twisted. “Do not be sorry at me.”

“At you?”

“It is worse than arguing.”

“I will make a note.”

“Do not make notes about me.”

“I am tied to a post. The notes are internal.”

He pressed a hand to his jaw.

For a moment, she thought he was fighting another smile.

Then her arm pulled. It was not the ordinary dull ache she had been ignoring since they first used her wound to drag her across the city.

It felt like a hook beneath the wound.

Marielle’s breath stopped.

Tairn’s head jerked up. “What?”

The second pull was worse. She bowed against the tether, and the rope cut into her wrists.

Tairn dropped beside her. “What is happening?”

“How would I know?”

He reached toward the arm, then stopped before touching the wound.

The pressure tightened again.

Marielle could not get enough air to swear properly.

Something was happening to the magic in her arm. Something involving Edrin, the meeting, Serali. Maybe.

She knew none of it.

The pull broke so suddenly she sagged against the post.

Pain remained, but the reaching sensation had changed into an ache that seemed to ring through her bones like a struck brace after impact.

Tairn stared at the bandage, then toward the stairs. “Edrin,” he said under his breath.

He brought water, waited until she could swallow, and held the cup carefully.

Marielle drank because she needed it, but she was careful not to mistake the care for release.

When he put the cup down, he examined the dressing without disturbing it. A little blood had reached the outer linen.

“Has it stopped?”

“The pulling stopped, but it still hurts more.”

He looked toward the door again.

Then paced three steps, turned, and walked three back.

Marielle tried counting the drips beyond the wall. She lost her place, then began again.

After an eternity of waiting, the upper door opened.

Vaelis came down first. Blood darkened her upper sleeve, beneath a hastily tied strip of cloth. Her limp was worse when she reached the final step.

The Commander followed, one forearm held close to his body. His sleeve was torn and wet with blood.

There were only two of them.

They had not brought Serali, which Marielle considered a success.

Tairn stood too quickly. “Where is Edrin?”

Vaelis looked at him and the room changed.

Tairn’s face emptied. “No.”

“The princess killed him,” she said.

Marielle’s heart lurched. Serali had been alive long enough to fight.

She could not make the statement tell her more than that.

Tairn looked as if someone had cut through a support inside him and the building had not yet realized it should fall.

The Commander shut the door. “Tairn.”

He did not move.

“Tairn.”

This time he looked up.

“Not now.”

Quiet.

Tairn swallowed. His face closed piece by piece. “Yes, Commander.”

Marielle watched him.

Vaelis noticed. “Do not pity him.”

“I can dislike someone and recognize grief simultaneously.”

“How generous.”

“How observant.”

Vaelis’s eyes narrowed.

Marielle looked away before the woman could decide the answer required correction.

The Commander crossed to the table. “We move.”

“Now?” Vaelis asked.

“They have the recording. They have examined the stair and its approaches. We do not remain in a cellar nearby while their council compares rooms.”

Marielle thought of Yvander’s ledgers. Verya’s questions. Harrek insisting an observation and a conclusion were different things.

People doing work she could picture. Apparently, the Commander could picture it too.

“The third house,” he said. “We prepare departure from there.”

Tairn glanced toward Edrin’s materials.

“No circle,” the Commander added. “Contact the carriage.”

Vaelis nodded, then looked at Marielle. “And the princess?”

“If she offers herself, we take her. We do not wait for it.”

He began gathering papers with his uninjured hand. “If nothing changes, we take the engineer to King Vulmar.”

Marielle had known she was valuable to them without Serali. They had told her, explicitly.

She had understood it as a danger held in reserve. Something they could do if their preferred plan failed.

Now Vaelis was checking the supplies. The Commander was selecting what to carry. Tairn had turned toward her restraints.

“No,” Marielle said.

The Commander looked at her. “You object?”

“Substantially.”

Vaelis picked up the gag and Marielle’s body tightened before she could stop it.

Tairn saw.

His hand hesitated at the tether, but only for a moment.

Then he began untying it to move her.

He knew she wanted to go home, but he would still take her to Vulmar.