Soulwoven: Exile

Chapter 31

~31~

Fourteen days before the destruction of Nutharion City

A-

I was right.

Dil held Blackarrow's letter with steady fingers. There had been time to grieve, and the sorrow in her had hardened into something new. Whoever these people were who had killed Quay and disappeared Ryse, whatever they wanted, she was going to stop them.

Eavesdropped on Willow and Thinshadow. They've been busy. Thinshadow in confidence of his mother. Heard through her that his father's planning to off Koe. Elpion and Pendilon both in on it.

Dil's heart sped up. This was what she'd been waiting for. Proof of what was happening in Eldan City. House Elpion and House Pendilon were plotting to take the throne. Pendilon had killed Quay to get him out of the way. Elpion, through the Temple, had done something with Ryse to make sure she couldn't tell anyone about it.

Willow pissed. Thinshadow unhappy. Fought about what to do. Elpion and Pendilon's plan seems very thorough. Several scenarios thought out, inc. attempt to break off Blackgrab early. Willow went to father. Knew about plot and could do nothing. Willow then convinced Thinshadow to sneak warning to Koe via Djqfodx Rgddoykoo.

Dil sighed and rummaged through her desk until she found a cipher beneath a false panel. Names with no agreed-upon shorthand were scrambled by means of letter substitution. Djqfodx Rgddoykoo translated as Charles Steelhill.

"Have you got something?" Allenbee asked from across the room.

Dil ignored her.

Stupid plan. Doubt they'll succeed. Thinshadow likely to get caught and knows it. Don't know what father will do, but won't be pretty. Thinshadow to go through Desperhorn.

Desperhorn was a new shorthand for Densel. Found by the docks. Dil shivered. The place where everything had gone wrong for Quay and Ryse.

Last letter for while. Been taking too many risks. Need to lie low.

- Blackarrow

"So that's it then," Allenbee said over her shoulder. "Do you believe him?"

Dil laid Blackarrow's letter on the desk and closed her eyes. There was a chance that the spy was misleading them for some reason, but everything he'd written felt true. If Aegelden Elpioni had been aiming for the throne of Eldan from the start, it would make a twisted sort of sense for him to suppress knowledge of the destruction of the heart dragons; he'd want the full attention of Eldan on taking revenge against the necromancers so that he could pressure Molte Eldani into a dangerous situation. And if what Allenbee had said about the Eldanian nobility being willing to do anything for the throne was true, then it explained why they were ignoring the threat of the dragon as well.

"Yes," Dil said. "I do." She twisted around to face Allenbee.

The Violet Lady nodded. Her face had grown serious. "I do too," she said.

Dil felt the flush of action―finally, after all these months―hit her veins. Now was the time to move. To help Ense Pendilon get his warning to Charles Steelhill before it was too late. She'd failed to save Quay, but she might not be too late to save his father. "So what do we do?"

Allenbee crossed to the window and looked out on Nutharion City. The metropolis was already beginning to empty; many of the houses were boarded up and locked, and the streets were regularly filled with wagon trains carting the belongings of those who lived on the Skylevel out of the city.

"There's nothing we can do," Allenbee said.

"But this warning—"

"Has very likely either succeeded or failed already." Allenbee turned around. "It takes Blackarrow's letters several days to get from Eldan City to me. Ense Pendilon is probably in Densel already, if not beyond. And by the time we could get anyone there, he would certainly have passed through." She drummed her fingers on her arm, then delivered a withering glare to Dil and stormed over to her desk. "You and Blackarrow took too long to figure this out. I dislike feeling powerless, Dilanthia Lonecliff. I dislike it very much."

Dil ignored the rebuke and thought about how long it would take her and Cole to get to Densel. Her stomach twisted. She didn't even know what Ense Pendilon looked like, let alone where he'd be or how she could help him.

Still, she had to do something.

Allenbee dropped into her chair, put her feet on her desk, and focused her glare on the window. "I see what you're thinking, and I want you to stop. That man's best hope right now is that my informers are better than anyone else's. Anyone we send, anything we do, is more likely to compromise him than help him. I know it's hard, and I know you want revenge, but now isn't the time to get it."

Dil's hand tightened on the edge of her desk. The Second River pulsed at the boundaries of her consciousness. She wanted very much to channel something like a bear or a lion, pick up the desk, and hurl it through the window.

Instead, she sat back down and thought.

"So we wait," she said.

Allenbee's frown edged upward ever so slightly. "Yes."

Dil's mind took the puzzle and flipped it in a different direction. "Whatever they do in Menatar won't be the end of it. Even if they get rid of Quay's father, only one of them can take the throne. They'll probably start stabbing each other in the back the minute it's vacant."

The frown grew into the beginnings of a smile. "Yes."

Dil nabbed several sheets of paper and a quill. She'd been sending directions to Allenbee's agents in Eldan City for over a month, and she was used to the process. "So while we can, we get ahead of them. Arayi Elpioni's been named heir, so we know what House Elpion is getting out of the coup. We need to know what the other houses are getting in return for their help or their silence. Which ones are involved. Who thinks they have a shot at the throne and how they plan to get it."

The smile broadened. "And then?"

Dil wrote furiously, scribbling instructions. "And then we find someone to help—someone who'll do what Quay would have done, if he was still alive. Someone who'll marshal Eldan to fight the dragon. Ense Pendilon, maybe. And we help them take the throne."

Allenbee let out a pleased-sounding puff of air. "Precisely, Dilanthia."

Dil glanced over at her. The Violet Lady's eyes were focused on the city outside the window again. They looked hard as iron.

"Precisely."