Shyla won the match three points to two. They bowed again and Durva left. Hanif brought in the next acolyte—an over-muscled bruiser named Tobbar. He didn’t waste energy blocking. Instead he absorbed the hits without slowing down. Tobbar only let her attack once, and then he went on the offensive for the rest of the match, winning it three points to two.
Chago was the third and last acolyte. He was a lanky young man who was freakishly fast even with his thoughts. Shyla just managed to stay ahead of him. And she had to sacrifice a couple points to probe his mind. By the end of the match, her energy lagged and Chago won four points to one. At least she’d held him off longer than he’d expected when he’d sized her up in the beginning.
Hanif consulted with the two other monks before they left. She ripped off the veil as soon as they were out of sight. The material had clung to her damp face while she fought. Then she pulled off the sweat-soaked turban. Ugh. She reeked.
“You need practice,” Hanif said.
“Tell me something I don’t know.”
“You did better than I thought you would.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“Did you…?” He tapped his forehead.
“Is that code for ‘read their souls’?”
“Shyla.”
She enjoyed annoying Hanif much more now that she was an adult. “Yes. Durva and Tobbar are legit. Chago isn’t. He’s the Water Prince’s cousin.”
“Seven hells.”
“He’s very good. And you’re going to have to decide what to do with him.”
Hanif’s gaze sharpened. “What do you mean?”
“If you kick him out, then he’s going to suspect I was somehow involved. Which will no doubt bring Captain Yates back.”
Another string of curses burst from Hanif.
“How long can you delay them from taking the oath?” she asked.
“Not long—five or six sun jumps. They’ve met all the requirements.”
Too soon. “How about allowing him to become a monk and just keeping him from sensitive information?”
“That would be difficult.”
“If you prevent him from passing along information, I can erase his memories later.”
Hanif considered her offer. “How much later?”
“When we unseat the Water Prince.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
Figured he wouldn’t accept a vague answer. “I don’t know. We’re still rebuilding. We have limited resources and people. It might be impossible.” She plopped onto a stool and rested her head in her hands. That was the first time she’d admitted out loud that the task of overthrowing the Water Prince and Heliacal Priestess may very well be unattainable for her and the Invisible Swords.
A warm hand rested on her shoulder. “You have a history of doing the impossible.”
She lifted her head. “I do?”
“Yes. You survived on the surface during the killing heat. You woke The Eyes of Tamburah. You convinced Captain Rendor to turn his life around. You rescued Banqui. All things I would have sworn no one could possibly do.”
“But this is different.”
He raised an eyebrow—a familiar and exasperating gesture. “Is it?”
Yes. It was. Maybe. Scorching hells, at this point she’d no idea. And Banqui was missing. Again. She sighed.
He patted her shoulder. “You’ll figure it out.”
Easy for him to say.
“And I’ll deal with Chago,” he said. “Perhaps I’ll feed him some misinformation for fun.” An evil little grin spread across his face.
Shyla almost felt sorry for Chago. Almost.
After she cleaned up, she joined Jayden in Hanif’s office. He’d spread the nine torques out on the desk. “Only the two are new, the rest are old.”
Which didn’t tell them much.
“I’d like to take these back to our headquarters. Maybe we can learn how they work and figure out a way to bypass it,” Jayden said.
“What if we’re raided?” She’d hate for the torques to be used against them.
“I can hide them in the sand. So can you.”
True.
“And when I’m done I’ll melt them down.”
“Too bad we can’t sell the platinum.” Then she wouldn’t have to worry about getting coins.
“It would be nice, but the priestess would just buy it and make more.” Jayden gathered the torques and tucked them into his pack. “When the priestess is no longer in power, we’ll sell it for a bundle of osees.”
Shyla paused. This was the first time Jayden sounded confident that they would overthrow the priestess. She wondered what changed.
Unaware of her regard, Jayden said, “If we hurry we can get back before darkness.”
They left the monastery at angle one-seventy. The sun squatted on the horizon. It had swelled into a giant red sphere that warped the pink sky into bands of purple, orange, and yellow. As they walked through the cooling sand, Shyla mulled over what had happened at the monastery.
She’d never considered that the Water Prince and the Heliacal Priestess would send people to infiltrate the monks. Growing up with the acolytes, she hadn’t noticed anyone being too curious or too observant, which was more of an indication of her observational skills than theirs. The most alarming realization was that of the fifteen acolytes that had volunteered to be Invisible Swords, one or more of them could be spies.
After she’d woken The Eyes, they had rushed to rescue Jayden, then they’d hurried to move into the temple and had been scrambling to secure basic needs since. She’d never formally accepted them, nor had she asked them to pledge an oath—not that swearing to be loyal meant they would be. If Hanif allowed Chago to become a monk, the man would lie.
Shyla hadn’t wanted to scare or upset anyone by abusing her power. But now that she thought about it, she needed to formalize the membership. At least for the acolytes since they weren’t Invisible Swords before.
“Jayden, did the Invisible Sword require all members to pledge their loyalty to the organization? Does everyone have the mark on their shoulder?” It was an invisible mark that only other members could see.
“I was thinking the same thing. Yes, everyone who helped us pledged their loyalty. Only those in the upper levels bear the mark.”
“We need to do that for the new recruits.”
“I agree. Are you going to read their souls, too?” he asked casually.
“If I do, then I should do it for all the Invisible Swords as well. It’s only fair.”
He stopped. “No it isn’t. They all swore their loyalty. If you do that, they’ll be insulted.”
Just like Jayden was at the very idea. Except they’d made their vow before Shyla woke The Eyes. “Yet someone betrayed us.”
He rounded on her. “Not someone. Banqui. You just refuse to see it. Which is why no one believes you about Rendor.”
This was an old argument, but she couldn’t help saying, “There’s no evidence Banqui did it. And why would he? He has no reason.” Plus he’d promised her he’d say goodbye. And perhaps she was being naive, but she trusted Banqui to keep his promises.