Mistress of the Night - Don Bassingthwaite [44]
Bolan bent and scooped up the velvet altar cloth.
"It seems to me," he replied as he folded the cloth, "that you're the one with a hold over him. Keph and Jarull both. Every time I meet with that orc-blood Jarull, all I can see in his eyes is you."
Variance raised an eyebrow. Bolan's mouth twitched, the most expression she had ever seen break through his flawless face. He looked away.
"It is your prerogative, Mother Night," he mumbled.
He laid the cloth on the altar and murmured a prayer to Shar-not magical, simply devotional. When he bowed to the altar, Variance bowed as well.
Bolan straightened and began covering the braziers that had illuminated the ceremony. The smell of dying coals and hot metal filled the air. The darkness in the temple deepened.
"I still think we should have had someone who was truly bound to Shar," he said. "Someone to take Cyrume's place." His stained fingers clenched on the lid of a brazier. "I'd like some time alone in my laboratory with that Selunite monster who killed him."
"His remains were scarcely identifiable when I found him," lied Variance. She folded her hands and added sadly, "Shar will bless him-he died in her service. A shame he wasn't able to complete his mission before the Selunite caught him."
She kept her face as expressionless as Bolan's.
The alchemist nodded and said, "The cultists are saying it was an entire pack that took Cyrume down. His martyrdom grows in the telling."
"The better to inspire others," Variance said.
He returned her nod and turned it into an obeisance. "I thank the day that the Temple of Old Night sent you to me, Variance. Together we'll bring Moonshadow Hall low."
Variance smiled and said, "Thank you, Brother Night."
Bolan lit a candle from the embers of the last brazier before he covered it, then turned toward one of the many patches of deep shadow that cloaked his temple. To human eyes, perhaps, the shadow was impenetrable. Variance, however, saw through it easily enough. Beyond lay the narrow passage that Bolan-and Variance as well-used to enter and leave the tunnels. The priest probably thought he had a few more secret exits hidden from her. Variance was willing to allow him that delusion.
She followed him through the shadow and into the passage beyond, walking with surefooted ease where Bolan stumbled by flickering candlelight. If he'd guessed over the tendays since she had arrived in Yhaunn and presented herself to him that her confidence in the darkness was anything more than the blessing of Shar, he said nothing.
As they reached the end of the passage, however, he said, "I think Shar has held her hand over us, Variance. We've been lucky."
"How so?"
"The Selunites must have figured out what Cyrume intended, but they haven't taken any action against us. They didn't even tell the city guard."
Variance froze dead in the passage. Bolan continued on several paces before turning to look back at her.
"Mother Night?" he asked.
Variance forced herself to remain calm.
"You know something you haven't told me," she said.
In spite of her best efforts, her anger must have been clear. Bolan shook his head sharply.
"I only just found out myself, Mother Night!" His voice cracked with poorly concealed fear. "I have a client, a devotee of Selune, who comes to my shop to buy tinctures and medicines for Moonshadow Hall. She gossips, though I'm certain she has no idea who she gossips to. She says the guard interviewed the Selunite werewolf, but the werewolf claimed an alibi. The beast must have taken Cyrume's holy symbol too, because the guard has no idea that he was a Sharran or what he intended to do. Only the Selunites know. And we've been watching for signs of reprisal, but there are none. From what my client says, the Selunites are more concerned with some internal matter than with us." He spread his hands and repeated, "We're lucky. Our own plans can proceed uninterrupted."
Variance bit back a curse.
Bolan must have interpreted her silence as anger, because he quickly added, "I can see if there's anything more we can learn-"
"No need,"