15

Later the same night, after Edric had stolen, perused, and returned the visitor log, he found himself again invisible in the inn. This time, however, he was at the entrance to the common room where the one named Dalibor and his companion were listed as having stayed for over a week. The sun was down, and most of the beds were full, but it was impossible to tell just which of the multiple Sabwa staying there was the one he needed. So, once he was in place and fully invisible, he called out to the room. "Hey! Dalibor!"

Several people grunted and tried to shush him, but none of the jackals stirred. Instead it was a young Homin woman that sat up on her cot and looked around. "Did you hear someone call you?" she asked. Edric had the feeling that she wasn't local. Her command of the Language was too precise and languid to be anything other than Italian.

"Even if I had," growled the Sabwan man lying on the cot next to her, "I still wouldn't let a stranger know who I am."

"Oh," said the woman.

"Hey, you called us," Edric said from the door. The woman turned to look at him, but he was still invisible, so her eyes scanned the entrance in confusion, trying to find who was talking. "Meet us outside. We need to talk."

"Should we go?" the woman asked.

The jackal sighed. "Well, we should now," he said. "Not like we can hide who we are at this point, and I'm sure the others here would prefer the noisy people leave the room."

"You got that right!" someone shouted.

A minute or two later, Edric and Simend watched the man and woman cross the street. The jackal was unremarkable as far as Edric could tell. He had sandy fur, an average height, and a well-groomed tail that was frozen at alert. His undyed tunic and thick parka seemed excessive for the slight chill that evening. He might have been a bit whiter under his muzzle and down his throat and a bit darker in the tail than most Sabwa he'd seen, but there didn't otherwise seem to be much to distinguish him.

The woman, though. The woman was stunning. He'd been right in his earlier assessment that she wasn't from Thracia. Her skin was the olive of southern Italians, and the flowing tresses of her dark hair seemed to burn almost red in the lights of the lanterns along the road. She wore only a simple tunic underneath a thick, open robe, but they both seemed to cling to every curve along her form. He was struck by how small she was to have curves like those. She had to be well over foot shorter than he was. He wasn't certain he'd seem a full-grown adult so small, but he could tell by the way she moved, by the way she held herself, and by those curves themselves that she was entirely adult.

Simend elbowed him in the side. "I see that she's a snack, Ed, but she's not on the menu," he whispered.

Edric took a deep breath and shook his head. "I don't know what you're talking about," he hissed.

"Hmph. Sure you don't," the dancer said beneath his breath. "Your eyes are just going to fall out of your head all on their own. And I don't get how you can have eyes for that tiny nibblet at all when there's an entire banquet walking next to her. Love's tits, Ed, I've not seen such a perfect piece of Sabwan tail since I left Aegyptus." The supposedly perfect Sabwa's ears flicked, and he cast a suspicious glance at Simend. Simend smirked at him and said something in Sabwan.

"Sorry," the unfamiliar jackal replied. "I don't speak Sabwan."

Simend gasped as if insulted. "What do you mean you don't speak Sabwan?"

The other jackal shrugged. "I'm not from Aegyptus," he said. "Only my great-grandparents spoke Sabwan. But are you two the luminaries we were supposed to meet?" he asked. He was walking very close to his companion. Gods, had he seen Edric ogling her too?

"We were told to meet a Sabwa named Dalibor at the Drowned Dog Inn," Simend said. "Is that you?"

"Only if you're the luminary hunters out of Meleko I was told to look for," he answered.

Edric nodded. "That's us," he said. "I'm Edric, and this is Simend." He extended his augmented hand.

"Nice to meet you, Edric," Dalibor said, shaking his hand. Edric was impressed that the jackal didn't hesitate to touch the metal-laced hand offered to him. Most people wouldn't touch what appeared to be an active Astral relic to save their lives. Stories about how the cursed radiance of Astral relics caused a slow, painful death in anybody around them were widespread and entirely accurate. He wondered how much experience this Dalibor had with other luminaries, since the light of their symbiotes was harmless. "My name is Dalibor of Mtskheta. My companion's name is Sara."

"Bullshit," Simend said. "Your companion's name is Sabina Augusta."

Edric would absolutely have believed the confused look and head tilt that Dalibor gave them had the woman beside him not gasped and taken a step back, at which Dalibor closed his eyes and sighed. "How do you know that?" the woman asked. "Who are you working for?"

"Sara," Dalibor said, rubbing his eyes. "We've talked about your panic response."

"Oh," she said, shrinking back behind Dalibor. "You didn't actually know who I was, did you?"

"Well, we do now," Simend said.

"We suspected," Edric said. "You hired us to fight the Enforcers, and we heard on the way that the Enforcers are hunting for the runaway princess. It wasn't hard to figure it out from there."

"Back up a second," Dalibor said. "We didn't hire you, so you had better not be expecting us to pay you."

"Excuse me?" said Simend. "Are you our contact or not?"

"I am," Dalibor said. "But I wasn't the one who called you. We're just the ones you're supposed to help protect."

"We are hunters, not bodyguards," Simend growled. "We're here to kill your pursuers."

"Who called us up then?" Edric asked.

"Bartholomew Myrddin of Drumanagh Maritime," Dalibor told him.

Edric grunted in surprise. "Well, his credit's certainly good," he said.

"Can I talk to you for a moment, partner?" Simend said. He dragged Edric away from the others and began to whisper at him in a furious hiss. "This is not what we do, Ed. We need to just leave them."

"Oh, are you having second thoughts finally? It's a wee bit late now, don't you think?" Edric whispered back. He glanced over his shoulder at the princess. She and Dalibor were having their own whispered conversation, and her jackal looked almost as angry as his did. "But if the client really is Bartholomew Myrddin, we might get paid yet."

"He's obviously lying!" Simend whispered. "How could he possibly know Myrddin? He's just picking the name of some rich guy to try and trick us into helping them. And will you please stop ogling the princess!"

Edric spun back to face Simend, and he could feel the blush in his cheeks. "I'm not ogling her!" he insisted.

"Son of the Sun help me," Simend groaned, running his hands over his ears. "We can still just ditch them, Ed. Leave them here, and be off on our merry way. Just you and me together. But you're going to make us do this, aren't you?"

"I mean," Edric whispered. He looked back over his shoulder. Sara was looking back at him this time. He frowned at her and looked back to Simend. "They need help, Sim. If the Enforcers really are after them, they're in huge trouble. Besides, you're the one who accepted this job. All for that Star-cursed archive."

"Yeah, but that was when I still thought we were just going to have to murder a few people, luminary Enforcers or no." Simend spread his arms. "There's no endgame here, Ed. If she's the emperor's daughter, he's not going to stop looking for her even if we do kill his Enforcers."

"That's still the contract though, right?" Edric asked. "Kill the Enforcers, then they're on their own."

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

"Are they?" Simend asked. "You really think you're going to be able to walk away from her once we kill the Enforcers? You're going to be able to leave her to her father?"

Edric looked back at Sara again. She was still watching him, her head tilted slightly to the side and her brows knit. Dalibor was eyeing Edric now as well, but the jackal just looked angry. "I do," Edric lied. "Absolutely."

Simend sighed. "Fine," he said. "Have it your way." He bumped into Edric—hard—on his way back to the others. "We've decided to honor the original contract. We kill the Enforcers chasing you, then you're on your own."

"That was what Myrddin told you?" Sara asked.

Simend's tail went rigid when Sara mentioned Myrddin's name again. "Yes," he said. "Why?"

"We haven't seen the Enforcers since we left Aquitania," Dalibor said. "Myrddin told us he'd find someone to help us with the luminaries the Star Cult was probably going to send after us."

Simend's fur bristled, and his clenched fists began to shake. "Star Cult luminaries?" he growled.

Edric shook his head. It was luminaries, but it was the crazy ones. At least they probably wouldn't be as dangerous as Enforcers with symbiotes. "Do you think Kamissa lied to us?" he asked Simend.

"I am very certain that she did, yes," Simend said through clenched teeth, still trembling. "She knew from the start, and she knew I'd say yes to get that archive back. Either that or her friend lied to her." Simend closed his eyes, unclenched his fists, and took a deep breath. "Okay. Here's what we're going to do. You're going to go get your things, then we're going to find a different inn or tavern where you can tell us the entirety of what the two of us just walked into."

"Why can't we do that here?" Dalibor asked.

"We got banned from the Drowned Dog after we murdered somebody in their dining room," Edric said.

"Oh!" Sara said. "That's you two on those posters!"

Dalibor and Simend's ears folded back in unison. "Maybe we should find a place across the strait," Edric said.

"I know a good campsite a ways outside of town," Dalibor offered.

"The only way I'm sleeping on the ground is if you're underneath me, handsome," Simend told him, and a shudder ran down the entirety of Dalibor's body, fluffing his fur out on its way. "So let's find a place nearby with private rooms for rent."

Before long, the four of them were huddled in one of the two private rooms they'd rented at an entirely disreputable establishment a few streets over. Both jackals had scrunched up their noses at the smell of the room, and it appeared to Edric that the bedding hadn't been changed between the last few hourly clients. Sara had nearly sat on the bed before Edric insisted that she take the lone chair in the room. He himself sat on the bed, Dalibor on the floor, and Simend leaned against the wall near the door while Dalibor and Sara took turns retelling their travels over the past several months. Every passing minute of their story reaffirmed to Edric that he'd made the right decision in choosing to help them, even as he could tell that each minute was leading Simend further towards the opposite conclusion.

"So it's the Star Cult that wants you dead," Simend summarized once they were done. "The emperor's in on it, but he's trying to give you to the Star Cult. You managed to fend off the emperor's goons outside Massilia at the end of summer but got caught in Cibalae by the Star Cult a month ago. Then Bartholomew Myrddin called in a favor with Kamissa to get us to protect you from the Star Cult's luminaries until you figure out another way to disappear."

"What kind of favor would Kamissa owe to Myrddin?" Edric asked.

"I've no idea," Simend said. "I'd figure Myrddin would owe her since she gave him a symbiote."

"He found his own symbiote," Dalibor said. "He's actually the one who found the crater in Daras and did the initial excavations."

Edric's jaw dropped. "What?" he said. "Myrddin founded Meleko?"

"No," Dalibor said. "Not that I know of, anyway. There wasn't a city when we were there."

"What do you mean, 'we?'" Simend asked, his eyes narrowing.

"I mean we," Dalibor said. "I was his warlord for that first voyage to the crater ten years ago."

"Wait, wait, wait," Simend said. He shook his head. "You expect me to believe that you, a goat rancher from Aquitania, are actually a Verdant warlord who was in the employ of the head of the Drumanagh Maritime Consortium?"

Dalibor cocked his head at Simend. "Yes?" he said.

"And that you were part of the initial excavation of Sarmara that would give rise to Meleko?" Simend went on.

"I don't know what Sarmara is, but yes, I was on the first voyage to the crater in Daras," Dalibor said, his ears folding back. "I spent two days in that ruined husk of a house there while Myrddin and his sailors scrounged up relic after relic. Had to drink cursed water created by one of the relics they dug up the entire time we were in there too."

Simend's tail drooped, and Edric chuckled. "I think he's got you, Sim," Edric said.

"What was the house like?" Simend asked.

"Ruined," Dalibor said. "The outside was overgrown with the weird glowing vines that covered the rest of the crater. The lower floors were crushed, so the main floor was mostly just one big room. I remember the rooms upstairs had these creepy beds that might have been crypts built into the walls."

"Yep," Edric said. "That's your house, Sim."

"Your house?" Dalibor asked, his tail curling up. "You live in the crater?"

Simend sighed. "No, I don't live in Sarmara," he said. "Me, Edric, and a small team of luminaries from Meleko carried it back to the city. I fixed the hole in the roof and put a new door on it, and now I live there." He shook his head. "Kamissa never said how she initially found the crater. Just that it was where most of her stock of relics came from. Turns out that's because old Myrddin found it for her. I should know better than to believe anything that woman says at this point."

"I don't know," Edric said. "If she tells you one of her relics will kill you, you should probably listen."

"That's fair," Simend said.

"Are you going to help us then?" Sara asked.

"We will," Edric said with a gentle smile.

Sara smiled back. He wondered if she'd have done so if he'd shown his teeth. "Thank you," she said.

Simend stopped pacing and dropped into a crouch in front of Dalibor. "If you're a warlord, you must have had a plan for this," he said.

"I did, but not even I like it," Dalibor said with a sigh. He rubbed his eyes. "There's no attainable victory condition that I can see. How do you stop the New Roman Emperor and the Star Cult from pursuing what they want without deposing the emperor or tearing down the cult?"

"You'd need an army," Simend agreed.

"And while luminaries are apparently terrifying, the two of you are not an army," Dalibor confirmed. "Especially since we know both the emperor and the Star Cult have luminaries of their own. It would help if we knew why they wanted Sara in the first place, but we're in no position to stroll into the Grand Temple of Cibalae and ask."

"The two of us might be able to, though," Simend said, jerking a thumb at Edric. "They don't know us."

Dalibor uncovered his eyes and tapped his muzzle, staring at Simend while he thought. "How many Star Cult luminaries have the two of you murdered?" he asked.

Simend folded his ears back and looked away. "Okay," he said. "Never mind. They do know us."

"The best option I have is to disappear again," Dalibor continued. "The first step is to get out of the Empire and into Geyk territory, but I don't know the lay of the land this far east. My plan had been to find passage from Phrygia into Aegyptus, but I would have had to hire a guide to find a port since we wouldn't be able to trust a caravan."

"Edessa's landlocked," Simend said. "But Antiochia's just across the border with Syria, and it has access to the Internal Sea."

Sara frowned at him. "I've heard stories of Antiochia," she said.

"All of them good, I'm sure," Simend said.

"Not a single one, in point of fact," she replied. "Is it true that it's run by pirates?"

"Technically, no," said Simend.

"But effectively yes," added Edric.

Dalibor began to rub his eyes again. "Is Syria as lawless as the Aegyptians claim it to be?" he asked.

"Oh yes," Simend said. "One hundred percent."

"He's Aegyptian, don't listen to him," Edric said.

"You tell them then," protested Simend.

"It's a lawless wasteland," Edric confirmed. "The Fall of the Star was not kind to it."

"Isn't there a major Star Cult temple there?" Sara asked.

"Yes," Edric answered. "But everybody there hates them just as much as they hate non-Homines. The Star Cult has no friends in Syria."

"Or Aegyptus," Simend said. "It would be a good place to hide from both the Empire and the Star Cult. Alexandria's a nice city. You could definitely disappear in Memphis, though. Place is disgusting. Nobody would look for a princess there."

"That's the plan, then," Dalibor said. "Make our way overland to Antiochia, then find a ship that will take us to Alexandria. Preferably a ship that is not run by pirates."

"Works for me," said Simend.

"And you're okay with that?" Edric asked Sara.

She shrugged. "It's a good plan," she said.

"We can leave tomorrow," Dalibor said.

"What's the rush?" Simend asked. "No ships are going to sail during the winter pause. We can wait until spring."

"Has the pause started already?" Dalibor asked.

"It will have by the time we reach Antiochia," Simend said.

Dalibor tipped his head back and groaned. "Great," he said. "What's Edessa like? Is it safe to winter there?"

"Let's just cross the strait and winter in Chalcedon," Simend said. "It's Phrygia on that side, so you should be safe. Well, safer."

"Fine. I'll trust your judgement," Dalibor said. "We can always leave early if we need to."

"Thank you both," Sara said. "We really appreciate your help."

"Yeah, yeah," Simend muttered. He stood up and stretched. "I'm going to have words with Kamissa when we get back home."

"Remind me not to be there for that," Edric said. He removed the bed's sheet from the back of his tunic where it had stuck to him and took a deep breath to calm his stomach. "We'll see the both of you tomorrow morning for breakfast."

"Good night," Dalibor said.

Edric closed the door behind them and lingered momentarily in the hall. Simend glared at him from the open door of their room across the hall. "You know they're sleeping together, right?" he asked.

"I do," Edric said. He did know that. He really did. And he had Binta back home waiting for him besides. Sara was distractingly attractive, though, and so small. He couldn't help but want to keep her safe. He shook his head and followed Simend into their own room. "I'm not sleeping on that bed," he said.

"Suit yourself," Simend said, flopping down onto the stained sheet.

Edric rolled out his bedroll, took off his tunic and sandals, and laid down on his belly, chin resting on his crossed arms. His thoughts raced too fast for sleep to come, images of Binta and Sara both swirling unchecked through his head. He had a mate. He didn't need another woman. He and Simend would do this job, see Dalibor and Sara safely into Aegyptus, and then he could go back home to Binta. Just like always.

On the other hand, though, he and Binta had agreed that they could sleep with other people while he was away from home. He was sure she had her own men that kept her satisfied back in Meleko. He scrunched his eyes shut. He didn't want to think about that. He also needed to not think about Sara since she was very obviously attached to a man of her own. He forced his breathing to slow down and tried to will himself to sleep. He would not think about the princess anymore.

He dreamt of her instead.