The Drowning City - Amanda Downum [67]
“He’s keeping me close. It’s all very polite, but I can’t leave the Khas.”
“What will you do?” Zhirin set her plate on the bench, nudging it toward Isyllt.
Shadows rippled across the woman’s face as she frowned. “I don’t know. Escape would only give him reason to arrest me.”
“You could leave, couldn’t you? Go home. You’ve done what you came to do.”
“Not until the supply ship arrives and Jabbor has the cargo. I won’t leave the job half finished.” Isyllt took a pastry, tearing off a bit of crust.
The job. Zhirin picked at a black-marbled egg. Revolution must be easier if you didn’t have to stay to watch. If you didn’t have to live in the ashes.
“What is it?” Isyllt asked, watching her.
She almost held her tongue, but she’d trusted the woman this far…“It’s more complicated than we realized.” Haltingly, she told Isyllt about the diamonds, about the warehouse raid and the conversation with her mother.
Isyllt whistled softly when she was finished. “That’s quite a thing to keep hidden. And why bother, when the Emperor could simply claim the stones as tithe?”
Zhirin shook her head; her mouth was dry and tepid wine did nothing to help. The sour smell of the eggs turned her stomach.
She nearly dropped the goblet as Isyllt grabbed her arm, cool fingers digging into her flesh. She followed the woman’s nod in time to see a man and a woman cross the terrace; lantern-light flashed on long brown hair and the man’s familiar hook-nosed profile. They walked to a shadowed corner and the hedges blocked the sight of them.
“Can we get closer?” Zhirin whispered.
“I have an easier way.” Isyllt reached into her skirt pocket and pulled out a silk-wrapped shape. A mirror—black glass gleamed as she unwrapped it. “Be quiet. Sound travels both ways.” She turned toward Zhirin and held the mirror between them.
The surface shimmered like water and images rose and vanished one after another—strangers’ faces, lights and ceilings and floors, a dizzying series of angles and views. Finally one remained, a scattering of darkness and light. After an instant Zhirin realized it was water dripping into a puddle, as seen from below the surface. Looking closer, she saw a man’s outline reflected in the rippling pool.
“What is it?” Faraj’s voice drifted faintly from the mirror, dull with annoyance or resignation.
“The Laii girl has been snooping around.” Jodiya. “She may already know about the mine, and she keeps company with the Jade Tigers. I can make sure she doesn’t talk.”
“No. I need her mother’s ships, and if Fei Minh even suspects we hurt her daughter, she’ll make more trouble than Zhang could have dreamed of. I’ll tell Fei Minh to keep her quiet, but you don’t lay a finger on the girl.”
“What about the foreign witch, the necromancer? She’s taking more interest in Asheris than I like.”
“Her you can dispose of, if you need something to keep yourself occupied. But for the love of heaven, not here. The last thing I need is an international incident. Make it quiet, and quick.”
“They’ll never find the body.”
A moment later they were gone, and Isyllt wrapped the mirror again.
“What are we going to do?” Zhirin whispered. Her hands shook and she clenched them tight in her lap.
Isyllt shrugged. “Be careful. Watch our backs.”
“I could go into the forest with Jabbor.”
“And that will be exactly the excuse that little assassin needs to kill you when she finds you and blame it on the Tigers. And we still don’t know who murdered Vasilios. If it wasn’t Faraj or his killers, then even more people want to put knives in our backs.” Her expression softened. “Stay quiet and don’t draw attention to yourself.”
Zhirin shook her head hard enough to shift a braid in its pins. “How do you do it? How do you live like this?”
Isyllt smiled, quick and rueful. “I don’t remember any other way.”
Clouds rode the jungle canopy, blurring the tops of the trees in gray. Not yet heavy enough to rain, but the air below was thick and sticky and clung to Xinai’s skin in a clammy false