The Captain met the party along the road. It was clear that the travelers were the ones he was looking for by the fact that two members of the party were tied to their horses. Still, he glanced at the young slave for confirmation. Shajita rode over to his master and immediately started complaining, which was its own sort of confirmation.
He studied the prisoners for a moment, immediately dismissing the girl as insignificant. Normally he’d question her and possibly issue her a fine based on whether or not he believed her or the slave’s testimony that he’d been assaulted more, but the man wanted by the Whisperers was more important.
He was surprised at the youth of the unbound members of the party. The prisoners wore standard tunics that any member of the citizenry could expect to afford, while the three captors wore red and white robes stained with the dust of the road. But while one of them was old enough to be a Master of cultivation, there were supposed to be two masters, and he had a hard time picturing either of the teenagers as fitting that role.
Still, there was no mistaking that he’d found the right party. He motioned for the other lawmen to spread out around them and rode forward.
“I am a Captain of the Law,” he said. “I understand you have made a pair of citizen’s arrests that you wish to bring to my attention?”
“Greetings, Captain,” the man said calmly. “A member of our party was assaulted yesterday by this young woman. We bring her in for questioning about that assault and judgment by the law. The young man we bring in with charges of kidnapping her and holding her hostage. These are crimes that I witnessed myself and am prepared to testify on, if necessary.”
“I admit to the assault and am prepared to pay the fine,” the woman said quickly. “I wish to put this nonsense behind me. He was just a slave, I believe the appropriate fine is five ren?”
“Assault is assault. The fine is fifteen,” the captain said. The woman cursed, but nodded.
“I have the coin. Can someone please untie me so that I can be done with this foolishness and be on my way?”
“You don’t wish to testify against your kidnapper?” the elder of the party asked, surprised.
“He’s in enough trouble! His name is Juri, and he’s a traitor to the Empire! Wanted by the Whisperers and--”
“And that’s more than needs to be said out loud,” the Captain said curtly, inwardly cursing the girl’s tongue. He glanced at the young sergeant who was much more than a sergeant, and the woman nodded back to him. Reaching into her saddlebags, she pulled out a birdcage and released a pigeon. “I’m afraid that this situation will take some unraveling. You’re all coming with me, to be hosted by the Empire, for at least a day or two.”
“We’ve done nothing wrong,” the boy in the red and white robes protested. “If anything we’re victims. You have no right to—”
“You are not under arrest. You are being held, as witnesses, for questioning,” the Captain clarified. “Which means that I can hold you until my questions are satisfied.”
The boy cursed, but quieted.
“Now come, this is not the proper place for an interrogation.”
~~~~~~~~~
“Juri has been found,” Qiste said, interrupting Jazirqe’s evening exercises. She frowned, looking at the older spy with a questioning upside down glance before springing back onto her feet.
“What do I care?” she asked.
“He was with your cousin. Rena Anzabos,” Qiste explained. “And another old acquaintance of yours, Baturya Etrus.”
Jaz cursed. Then she cursed more creatively. “I want nothing to do with it. Whatever it is, I want nothing to do with it.”
“Too late, I’m afraid. Having an Agent of Fortune practically hand delivering a spy with a direct connection to you puts you back into play,” her instructor said. “Get your things. We ride through the night. Until we figure out what thread is pulling at the boy this time, we can’t leave him alone, and the two of you are bound together.”
Jaz wanted to curse the woman as a superstitious fool, but she knew better. She had seen enough to know that while the superstitions of the Orders were not always understandable, it often paid to listen to them. “The last time we interacted, it caused a civil war,” she pointed out. “One that’s still happening, by the way.”
“We know,” Qiste said patiently. “And it was one that needed to happen. But you’re the best one to get close to him and figure out what is happening.”
“How do you figure that? Last I checked, he still hated me for stealing from him,” she objected.
“Which will give you something to talk about. Now let’s go. You have thirty minutes to gather your things, then we leave.”
Cursing, Jaz went to her cottage to obey. Twenty minutes later, she and Qiste left the village of Tharn behind.
The assault began an hour after they had left, just after dark. It ended five minutes later, as the assassins were overpowered by common villagers whom they had dismissed as nonthreatening. Only one of the dark clad assailants made it through to the target, bursting into the cottage with weapons bared. The woman immediately threw her poisoned knife at the unmade bed, only to find it empty. Uma cursed, and a moment later was apprehended by the village smith, who resolved the situation by rendering her unconscious with the primary tool of his trade.
Such was the result of three weeks of careful preparation.
~~~~~~~~~
Baturya paced the inn room, impatiently scratching the tracking mark that he had reluctantly allowed to be placed upon his left hand. The ki imbued in it itched against his own, and it was difficult to suppress the temptation to simply blast it away, until only the ink remained. But he had agreed to be tracked until the situation was resolved.
“I hate this. They’re treating us like criminals,” he complained. “We did nothing wrong!”
“We brought forth some very serious accusations against a young man,” Gyre reminded him. “Even his victim is being tracked at the moment. You had might as well settle down for the night, Baty. There’s nothing to do except wait for the situation to resolve itself. I have a feeling that something more is going on behind the scenes, but we should be free to leave in a few days.”
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
“What am I supposed to do?” he complained. “I can’t even cultivate. Not without wiping out the stupid magic in this damn stamp.”
“The Law isn’t truly meant for handling those above the third Reformation,” Gyre admitted. “If powerful cultivators become a problem for public order, then it is other cultivators who are tasked with their apprehension. Which is why we’re in this situation to begin with. It is part of our duty to the empire, just as we might be called to arms in the instance of a true invasion. Although I’m a little surprised that the Captain didn’t have the authority to simply release us himself. The young man we brought in must be a dangerous individual indeed.”
“He is, but he’s not a criminal,” a voice said from the hallway. “Thank you for not hurting him.”
At the voice, Baturya tensed, rushed over, and flung the door open. “You!”
“Yes yes, I stole your sword and I’m very sorry about that,” Jazirqe said, waving it away.
“Don’t forget that you helped kidnap me,” he reminded her.
“I had nothing to do with that foolishness,” she objected. “That was all Shajita and his fool bodyguards. I’m the one who set you free! And I’m here to do it again.”
“I was stabbed because of you,” he objected. “You expect me to--”
“I heard about that, but in no way will I accept responsibility,” Jaz interrupted. “Look, I’m just here to tell you that you’re free to go. The Captain only detained you because the man you captured was wanted alive by the Whisperers. You sort of ruined the training exercise, actually, but it’s fine. He’d already proven himself capable of evading detection. It was just a bit of bad luck that he was discovered when and where he was, and there’s never any accounting for luck.”
“Stop being a Rockhead, Baty,” Ita said impatiently, lifting her head from the pillow. “Only Ryt is to blame for Ryt stabbing you. Why are you holding a grudge against someone who--”
“She’s trouble! I want nothing to do with you, Jazirqe Anzabos.”
“Can’t say I blame you for that,” Jaz admitted. “Unfortunately, you’re my next assignment. See, the Whisperers think you’re an Agent of Fortune. They think that either the ladies or the old man is interested in you. And they’re funny about such things. It’s taboo to interfere with anything you happen to be doing, and in fact just about everyone I know is terrified to even say hello to you. But seeing as we have a connection, I’m either already tangled up in the web the gods are weaving, or I’ve already picked up the dice. So they sent me to ask you why you’re not in Shefdon where you belong.”
“None of your damn business,” Baturya said reflexively. “I’m a free citizen, I can travel wherever and whenever I wish!”
“I didn’t say otherwise,” Jaz said, sighing. “Whatever. You don’t have to tell me. But I’m coming with you until you settle down again. You can either make this easy on both of us or--”
Baturya slammed the door in her face.
“You can do that,” she finished, sighing. Then she yawned. It was late, two or three in the morning, and she hadn’t expected to find them awake. With the noise Baty had been making, she figured it would be fine to reintroduce herself, but despite her politeness she figured it an outside chance that they would simply allow her to tag along.
“Sorry, Baty, but I’m not so easy to get rid of,” she said through the door. “We don’t have to be adversaries. Everything that happened before was simply a misunderstanding. I really am sorry about your sword. Look, I have to go say hello to someone, but we’ll talk tomorrow.”
She didn’t expect a response as she left.
~~~~~~~~~~~
The Lawmen pulled Rena out of her cot in the early hours of the morning and threw her back into the interrogation chambers with little ceremony. There was a woman waiting for her, one she didn’t recognize.
“Your aunt made her move tonight,” she said. “We weren’t ready for her. Weren’t expecting it quite yet. Might have actually succeeded, except for a bit of luck. I’m actually a little impressed. We knew it was coming, but not when, and I’m not certain how she managed to get through our patrols to do the scouting.”
“Am I supposed to know who you are or what you’re talking about?” Rena asked. “I have a large family with a lot of aunts, and we’re--”
“Uma Anzabos tried to kill her daughter tonight,” the woman clarified. “And almost succeeded. What I need to know is if you were a part of it or not.”
Rena was silent for a moment. She glanced over at the lantern, then at the small window that would provide light during the day, then back at the small woman whose age she just couldn’t quite place. “I didn’t know that my aunt had located her yet. It doesn’t surprise me that I was cut out of the chain of command after my previous failure. I take it you’re one of the so called Whisperers that lured her away from us, then?”
“Girl, your fool family kicked her out! Can you really blame us for taking in such a talented young wafe? Well, I use the word talented loosely, and don’t you dare tell her that it slipped out of my mouth. Anyway this whole ‘who betrayed who first’ debate isn’t what I’m interested in,” the woman said. “How would you like to join us? Do some good, instead of just enriching your elders? Maybe unlearn some of those bad habits of yours and pick up some useful new talents. I can tell just from standing across from you that your cultivation is all a mess, we can help you fix that.”
“You hang half of my family and then offer me a job?” Rena scoffed.
“We only hang traitors and criminals. What does it say about your family that we hanged so many?” the woman challenged, and Rena had no easy answer. “For what it’s worth, we weren’t expecting to have such a significant backlash. Your family was a bandage on a purulent wound, but we didn’t realize the patient was septic until we ripped it off. It’s our own fault for letting the situation get so bad. We were focused on foreign enemies, allowing domestic ones to spring up like mushrooms.”
“I hate metaphors.”
“That last one was a simile.”
“I care about the difference like a turnip cares about how it tastes.”
The Whisperer woman chuckled. “So, are you interested?”
“I’m not turning my back on my family,” Rena insisted.
“Who said anything about that? Believe it or not, we want the Anzabos to rebuild themselves. Without the traitors this time. That was an experiment gone wrong, but your clan has a long history of being useful. All you have to do is let go of vengeance. Do that, and you’ll have the official backing of the Empire,” the woman promised. “Same for any other members of your family willing to take a Binding Oath.”
“Binding Oaths are a myth,” Rena objected.
“So are the Whisperers. They exist all the same. There’s much more magic in this world than you know, girl. Binding your cultivation upon an oath is the least of them.”
“Is that how you turned Jaz?”
“This isn’t about Jaz. This is about you, Rena. And your family. You can either cling to hatred and vengeance, or let it go and rise again from the ashes.”
Rena was quiet for a moment. “This offer … we put aside hunting for Jaz and the rest of you who exposed us, right? Is it good for any of us? I won’t turn on my family, but some of us don’t like what Jaz exposed about what the elders were keeping secret. We’re not happy either way, but a lot of us are just unhappy that our livelihood was disrupted. A lot of us just want to rebuild.”
The woman grinned. It was more predatory than friendly, but Rena refused to back down from it. “I was hoping you’d say something like that, child. Call me Auntie Qiste.”