I SLAM OPEN THE HEAVY OAK DOOR TO DOMUS TELIMUSwith my shoulder, stumbling from drizzling darkness into warm lantern-light. Curse my complacency as I shove it closed again and then lean briefly against the wall, rain-soaked and wheezing.Vek. Too close. More shouts echo from outside, urgent questions called and answered as the Quintus and his men continue their search for me.
I let the metal of my mask, so tremblingly close to slipping throughout my escape, return to my chest atop Ostius’s stone medallion. Same with my arm. The manipulation of the Harmonic imbuing happens easily now, constant use over the past two weeks building that muscle in my mind into something close to instinct.
Diago darkens the archway to the atrium as the iron triangles slide from view, padding over and giving me a vaguely concerned sniff before licking at my bloodied side. I swat him away and immediately groan at the motion, collapsing to a nearby bench. The crossbow wound is a graze, but it’s more than thoroughly bleeding. “Kadmos!”
The balding Dispensator appears within a few seconds of my shout, the Will-locked alarm he keeps on his person no doubt having already alerted him to my entry. His relief at it being me—we haven’t yet had any invasions from enterprising mobs looking for proscribed fugitives, but he’s all too aware of what’s happening out there—segues to concern as he sees my battered state.
“Master Vis.” He’s brushing my hand to the side and examining the injury with an apprehension that quickly degrades to tutting irritation. “Again? Rotting thugs out there. Stay here. I’ll fetch some gut string and—”
“No time for that. We need to clean it and hide it, and I need fresh clothes. A robe—I’m sweating and wet, I’ll have to say I was using the baths. And prepare some tea. There are people chasing me but they don’t know it was me, and they will almost certainly be checking in here soon.”
Kadmos, to his credit, suppresses his questions and immediately fetches what he needs as I start stripping off, layering my iron triangles to the hidden underside of the bench I’m sitting on. Kadmos knows there’s a search on forthe man who executed Military’s leadership and continues to haunt the city, but he doesn’t know it’s me. The streets are dangerous, and so he hasn’t questioned my injuries thus far.
I don’t think he would give me away. I am a Telimus and he has expressed, several times, that he thinks that what happened to Princeps Exesius and the others was simply justice. Plus, his technically Military-affiliated name was kept off the Proscriptions only at my insistence, with me officially taking possession of all things Telimus. But still. There is no benefit in exposing either him or me unnecessarily.
Once the metal triangles are concealed, I use the cleanest parts of my tunic to wipe up droplets of blood that have spattered on the bench and mosaic underfoot, still cursing myself. After two weeks of effective and increasingly notorious nights skulking Caten’s streets, I should have expected the trap. Too much success, too much flaunting. Too predictable in only targeting those going after the proscribed. I know word has spread rapidly of my interventions. Iron mask bringing the terror of what they think I did to the Princeps. Sharpened iron pyramids leaving moaning, and bloodied limbs, and grateful Octavii and Septimii escaping in my wake.
Governance and Religion were inevitably going to feel that my continued appearances were making them look either weak or complicit. Thus, the Quintus and Sextii forming the loudest of the mobs tonight: hardly the most complex of ruses, and if I’d checked for just a moment before rushing in, I could have sensed their Will.
Within a minute Kadmos is back with water and cloth and bandages and a robe, wincing as he sees the dark bruising across my chest, but swiftly going to work on the more immediate problem.
“You should know, Master Vis,” he says as he cleans with painful but necessary efficiency. “You have a visitor.”
“What?” My heart clenches. “Who?”
“He wouldn’t give a name. A middle-aged man. He has been nothing but courteous, though, and said to give you this.” He hands me a stylus; at first it means nothing but as soon as I touch it, I feel the Will—my Will—in it. One of the imbued ones I gave to the Iudicium survivors. “I’ve made him comfortable in the dining room, but if we are expectingmorevisitors …”
Vek. My classmates who are still in the city, from Religion and Governance, wouldn’t need to send someone anonymously.
Punctuating the fear, a bashing on the front door ricochets through the house like an angry shout. I flinch at its announcement. Diago growls.
“Put him and anything with blood on it in Ulciscor’s office. Seal the door. Eat the gods-damned key if you have to.” I whisper it. Keeping my arms raised as Kadmos finishes winding the bandage around my stomach, ties it off painfully, and scoops up all traces of our medical intervention. Then I shrug on the robe and slick back my hair a little. “Can I pass for just having bathed?”
He never thinks I bathe enough, and I can see him almost physically restraining the joke he wants to make, despite the urgency. Instead he summarizes it with the faintest of smiles. “Having been interrupted, at least, Master Vis.”
I make a face at his back as he hurries off to conceal our mysterious visitor. Wait a few seconds—allowing a second thumping at the door, this one even more urgent—and take a deep breath. Straighten, ignoring the lingering pain of my body, and feign bemused concern.
“Hail?” I open the door a crack, checking who it is, then widen it as if relieved to see the dripping Quintus standing outside. “Tanrius?” One of Quartus Laurentius’s commanders. Military, but at least nominally on our side. My promotion to the same rank as him, after the carnage of the festival left so many openings above me, allows the more familiar greeting.
“Catenicus. I am sorry to bother you at this hour.” Tanrius is a big man. A thick, rain-beaded black moustache stretches across his face. “We’re chasing Carnifex. He disappeared around here. Have you seen or heard anything?”
I frown. “Carnifex?”
“The man who assassinated Princeps Exesius and the other senators.”
“Oh. Rotting gods.” I hide my discomfort behind an apprehensive reaction.Executioner, in Vetusian. I wonder who came up with the name. I haven’t heard it before. “No, Quintus. Sorry. All’s been quiet.”
He nods and almost turns to depart, then eyes my attire. “You’ve been bathing?”
“Yes.”Vek.
“So you wouldn’t have heard if someone got in.”
“My Dispensator is around. And Diago would have noticed, I think, too.” I give him a crooked smile as the alupi pads up to us, sniffing Tanrius suspiciously.
“Of course. Of course.” Tanrius eyes the animal nervously. “Why didn’t your Dispensator answer the door?”
“I’ve instructed him not to under any circumstances. He’s not on the Proscription lists, but even so …”
