Devin gasped. “Bait? Whatever for?”
The marshal didn’t respond, placing his hands in the pockets of his black suit coat, his sharp eyes narrowed to fix Kari with their vigilance. Soon the priest of Zalkar was likewise staring at Kari, clearly wondering if the veteran demonhunter had any idea what the succubus might be after or why.
Kari sorted through what she knew, but before she spoke, she walked to the doorway and asked her other three companions to join them. She introduced the marshal and the priest to her friends and Sharyn and filled them in on what conclusion the marshal had come to.
“Any idea what she’s truly after?” Sharyn queried when Kari was finished.
“I have… a suspicion,” Kari said slowly, carefully. She didn’t want to betray any more of Eli’s secrecy than she already had without asking him first. All along, Kari had assumed the assassin was after her. If the marshal was right, however, and the succubus wanted to use her as bait, there was only one creature Kari could think of that might be the target of such a ruse. “For now, I don’t want to say what it is, but Marshal, I might be able to at least point you in the right direction. Does Lord Black keep any powerful wizards in the city or on his staff?”
“Not on his staff, no. However, there are a couple of fairly powerful arcanists who reside in the city, and Lord Black does call upon them from time to time. What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking the assassin’s real target is a sorcerer… and a very powerful one,” Kari added, cautious not to reveal too much. Sherman started to ask a question but Kari held her hand up to stifle him, shaking her head. “This information stays between the six of us. Right now, we can’t let the assassin know that we may be on to her and what she’s really after. And we absolutely can’t let her actual target know.”
“You will explain this in more detail, I assume?” Marshal Saracht asked. In his patient demeanor and gaze, Kari could see he trusted her a lot more than she trusted him.
“As soon as I can talk to Eli,” she answered. “If you or one of your men can find him, have him meet me at the inn for supper. I’ll meet the rest of you at Zalkar’s church after supper and fill everyone in then. Also, see if you can get one or more of these wizards to come; we can use their help to see if my suspicions are right. For now, take care of this victim, and see if Lord Black has any intention of resuming martial law.”
Marshal Saracht bowed his head to her. “As you wish, Lady Vanador.” He walked to the door and began to instruct the guards waiting outside.
“I’ll explain everything, but not here, and not yet,” Kari assured her friends.
The paladins and the ranger glanced to each other and then nodded to Kari.
“I will see to it that the temple is kept clear of visitors after the dinner hour,” Devin said. “I will see you all soon. Be safe.”
Kari dismissed the others with a casual gesture and made her way back to the inn. Along the way, she turned the theory that she was bait and not the actual target over in her mind, and each time it made even more sense. She wondered why she hadn’t seen it herself, but in the end, all she could do was give thanks for having met Marshal Saracht.
Eli arrived for dinner, and at Kari’s request, Alyssa served them some fresh stew and left them to speak privately. Kari was curiously impressed by the marshal’s ability to find Eli, particularly if he was trying not to be noticed, but then she guessed it wasn’t too difficult to find a half-corlyps in a city with only a handful of resident serilian-rir. She stared at her friend and wondered if he had found anything of interest, and what he had spent the day doing. He didn’t strike her as the type to get up before dawn, so the fact that he’d left before sunrise was odd.
Kari took a moment to give thanks for her meal, and Eli glanced around the common room. There wasn’t anyone close to them, so once Kari finished praying and met his gaze, he spoke quietly but freely. “So, you know that church of Achirun that you were telling me about?” he asked. He cracked a half-smile as she nodded. “You don’t need to worry about them. Well, at least not about them worshipping or trying to summon any sorts of demons.”
“What do you mean?” She began to eat while she waited for him to explain.
Eli glanced around again. “Let’s just say that the whole demon-worshipping thing is a cover,” he said, and then he spooned up a mouthful of stew and raised his brows at her.
Kari considered what he meant. Was he telling her he’d found the Black Dragon Society in the most unlikely of places—or was it the most likely? Aeligos often spoke of hiding in plain sight. How had Eli located them so easily, even with his familiarity with assassins’ guilds and their habits? Did Kaelin Black know that his lawyers were, in fact, his enemies—and probably using and manipulating him to their own ends?
There was still the possibility that Black actually was the same person as BlackWing, and he was running both his government and its nemesis. It seemed improbable now, and that was a game Kari wasn’t even sure Aeligos and Eryn could pull off—and they were two of the smartest, most manipulative people she’d ever met, in either life.
She took a sip of water and glanced around before she met his eyes again. “But if it was really BlackWing that came to see us in DarkWind, then he may be working with the succubus—which means the Society might be working for or with her, too.”
“They’re not,” he countered, leaning over his food to keep his voice down. “In fact, your little succubus has killed a couple of their number, so they’re not exactly fond of her. Seems most likely that BlackWing really did want your help, he just didn’t want you to know you were helping him. The Society’s been trying to find the succubus, too, but they suspect she hangs around Black–”
“Lord Black,” Kari interrupted, and Eli’s face scrunched up. “It raised the marshal’s hackles a bit when I referred to the earl casually. We need to be careful not to disrespect him, or we may lose what help we have.”
“Good point,” he agreed and made a gesture that could’ve been all at once apologetic and dismissive. “Anyway, the Society suspects the succubus hangs around Lord Black, just like he suspects she hangs around them. Obviously, that’s not the case if Markus is keeping the earl busy, so I think it’s safe to assume she’s not working with or hanging around either of them. Have you found anything out yet?”
“Yes, that’s why I had the marshal tell you to meet me for dinner,” she said. “I need to know how much of what you’ve told me can be shared with others. I know you’ve been careful not to tell me certain things, but you were willing to break your oath to Bosimar, so I need to know if I can tell the others what you’ve told me.”
“If I didn’t want you to use the information, I’d have just kept my mouth shut like Tor. Kari, I came with you and I’ve been letting you in on Bosimar’s secrets so you can kill this demon and figure out what’s going on. Like I said, if Bosimar wanted to keep all this stuff secret, he should’ve just killed the lot of us, because nothing stays a secret forever,” he said. “What did you want to tell the others? Maybe it’s something I can elaborate on.”