Page 23 of Turncloak

“Of course,” she replied indignantly. “Otherwise why are we here?”

“The end result never justifies the means? We should never, I don’t know, lie in an interrogation to trick a suspect into confessing. Or rub shoulders with unsavory individuals in the pursuit of information.”

There was something behind that last statement, a subtle leaning forward, a revealing of his conversational intent. A knowing keenness to his gaze. Disquiet trickled down Auria’s spine like a melting icicle.

“It is lawful to lie in an interrogation room,” she said carefully, “but I still prefer not to. Ditto cavorting with criminals in any capacity.”

He chuckled mirthlessly. “You exemplify my earlier point perfectly. If the Flane boy had survived, had pulled you into his treasonous orbit, would that not have made you feel dirty?”

Auria felt the rare but acute desire to punch his smug face. “There is still no hard evidence that Tiernan was turned by the Bloodmoons, Sergeant Karvas.”

The very edge of his lip quirked almost imperceptibly, a subtle hook, gone in a flash. “Actually, it’s Captain Karvas.” A performative glance at his pocketwatch. “Or rather, it will be in the next four minutes or so.”

Stomach in freefall, Auria fought the urge to groan aloud.

“Oh, and Marriosan? My first order of business will be taking you off the Bloodmoon case.” An overly rueful smile. “You’re too close to it, too much emotional skin in the game. You’ll be reassigned to the Whitewings.”

Frustration knotted Auria’s belly. “But—”

“Personal vendetta is a dangerous thing. It addles the judgment, skews the moral code. Rots inside the chest, poisoning from the heart outward.” A sickly half beat, a loaded stare, a hammer finally dropping. “Just ask Saffron Killoran.”

13

• • • •

Aforementioned Dangerous Pursuit

Saffron wandered the streets of Atherin for days, but did not stumble upon a stray Whitewing organically.

She wore her scarlet cloak brazenly, beckoningly, knowing the scarlets were targets, knowing she could be jumped at any moment for the audacity of existing in red. She stalked Dubias Row and Buckbeak Place and Arollan Mile with her shoulders hitched up by her ears, wand in hand, nerves fizzing through her like sherbet, a low clench to her belly—but, as so often happened when one went looking for trouble, trouble averted its gaze.

Time to force the matter.

Despite her bravado while taunting Levan over her murderous threesome, returning to Golden Hour brought Saffron little arousal. She was here because she had a job to do, and though the danger did heighten her senses somewhat, she was too focused on staying alive to feel any sort of erotic charge. This was business and business alone.

Just as she was paying the lofty cover charge, however, she spotted a potential mark. Another male Whitewing, this one short and dark-skinned, with a barrel of a stomach and an imprecise gaze, black eyes blurred with liquor. He stumbled out of the pleasurehouse with his white cloak askew, the strings of his tunic still untied and his belt dangling limply by his crotch. Saffron made a show of not having enough coinage, nodded her feigned apology to the doorman, and set off after the drunken foe.

Silencing her boots, she clung to him like a shadow.

The Whitewing staggered down Broad Row, but rather than heading for the portari gate or another tavern, he cut a strange path through the city’s darkest alleys, muttering into his wand as he walked. His words were slurred, his sentences both incoherent and incomplete, but Saffron picked out enough detail to add color to her report of the evening’s investigation.

By the time she eventually lost her mark in the bustle of Velclaw Street, she was both excited and afraid to tell Levan what she’d learned.

Levan was not alone when his wand tip crackled.

He and Segal were going over a set of gamehouse accounts in the kingpin’s office, ensuring the loxlure earnings they’d laundered through the roulette wheels were not so plentiful as to raise flags with the city auditors. Beneath the desk, Levan was idly pressing the nib of the quill into his thigh, but the cutting sensation was barely enough to impact his magic. Pain was like that; diminishing returns.

“Et vocos, Levan Celadon.” Killoran’s voice was accompanied by the vague din of a busy street.

“Go ahead,” he replied evenly. Segal watched him with equal parts curiosity and impatience—he hated going over the accounts, and every passing second was another in which he was not inhaling bitterale. “Dismissed,” he added, and the Risen henchmage slipped out of the office without so much as a farewell.

“I have good news and bad news.”

Is the good news that you had another orgasm at the hands of my sworn enemies? Levan thought, with a bitter stab of jealousy he did not care to examine.

“Alright.”

“The good news is that I have not perished in the line of duty. I know you’re probably wringing your hands with worry, peering out the library window like a mother whose son has gone to war, et cetera. As for the bad, well—do you recall that I slew a Whitewing in a bold effort to regain your favor?”