Page 231 of Sky’s Edge

Oh.

Good.

“And?”

“They feel the traces of what’s in that blood could conceivably counteract truth serum. I don’t know enough about this subject, but apparently, the authors of such things leave signatures. And this particular signature is of an apothecary who we can trace to line-item payments from the castle for services rendered to Tatra. He’s also, conveniently, disappeared. Went on ‘vacation’ the day after the troll attack, and he hasn’t returned. He is not at the resort where he said he’d be, and he’s also not answering any comms.”

“That doesn’t sound convenient at all,” I bitched, and then it was me who took the ball from Hurley and threw it. After I did that, I asked, “What about Arnaud?”

Tanyn actually smiled.

“What?” I pressed.

“When it was granted, he made a big stink about appealing the warrant to take his sample. It was a rude awakening that he wasn’t in Sky’s Edge anymore.”

It was known everywhere that the judicial system in the Edge was a quagmire. Appeals were rampant and the hearings for them granted for just about any reason a barrister could dream up. It took ages to get anything through the magisterial system in Sky’s Edge. Which was one of the reasons why it took years for them to grant the fact that Riland had illegally circumvented the Act of Succession to cut out Tanyn and finally declare Tanyn as rightful king.

This news made me smile. “I bet he didn’t like that much.”

“No. And before you ask, his blood had the same properties.”

Hurley was back, and Tanyn took his turn with the ball.

“What now?” I asked after Hurley ran after it.

“We need either to wait until the effects of it wear off, and we don’t know how long that will take, or we need to better understand it so we can find a chemist to formulate something to counteract it, which will undoubtedly take even longer. It’s rare a drug will remain in the system for a long time, though not unheard of. So Aleksei has, first, petitioned that Arnaud not be released until we’re sure this drug has exited his system, with an added request for permission to regularly take bloods and administer the serum again when that drug has cleared. Arnaud’s attorneys were ready for this, because the petition was barely filed before they filed their own to demand refusal of it.”

“That’s telling,” I murmured.

Hurley was back, so it was my turn with the ball.

“Aleksei’s concerned. They’re not as free and breezy with the serum as we are. It took some talking just to get the bloods.”

I knew that.

“It’s become an indication of guilt if you refuse to take it,” I remarked.

“And they’ve reminded Arnaud of this. He, and his attorneys, have dialed up the demands for release, as they say with the first administration of it, he proved his innocence.”

“So he’s making this messy.”

Even if that was the truth, Tanyn smiled again.

And he explained it, “I guess he threw a fuck of a tantrum when they tried to take his blood sample. They had to restrain him.”

That was amusing.

But there was something that was not.

“He’s in on it.”

“He’s in on it,” Tanyn agreed.

“None of that control drug in his blood?”

Tanyn shook his head.

Hurley came back.