Lord of Secrets Read online

  Lord of Secrets

  Breanna Teintze

  Contents

  Cover Page

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Acknowledgements

  First published in Great Britain in 2019 by

  Jo Fletcher Books

  an imprint of

  Quercus Editions Ltd

  Carmelite House

  50 Victoria Embankment

  London EC4Y 0DZ

  An Hachette UK company

  Copyright © 2019 Breanna Teintze

  The moral right of Breanna Teintze to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  EBOOK ISBN 978 1 78747 623 3

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  www.quercusbooks.co.uk

  For Phillip:

  This is all your fault.

  One

  Rather inconveniently, I happened to be invisible that day. I hate invisibility. All the optical conjuration spells give me a headache and a sore throat – I think it’s because you have to swallow the runes – but invisibility is the worst.

  Of course, there are reasons to put up with a sore throat. If nobody can see you, they can’t catch you and hang you. The miserable thing about invisibility, though, is the spell’s action. It manipulates light to confuse the eye of the observer, but it also alters the vision of the person inside the spell in nauseating ways. By the time I found the barn, I had been nursing a migraine for three days and wanted nothing but to pass out on a haystack until the spell wore off. Well, and a cup of hot water and honey, but that wasn’t going to happen. A leaky sod barn on the cold moors outside Fenwydd that did not contain twenty shitting goats was already a piece of luck. You can’t have everything.

  I probably would have noticed the woman sooner if I hadn’t been invisible and trying not to look at anything. She certainly would have seen me when she came sprinting into the barn and dove into my haystack. And my lap.

  ‘What the hells—’ She twisted on top of me, digging a sharp elbow into my gut.

  ‘Ow,’ I said.

  Even in the dim light of the barn, I saw her eyes fly wide a split-second before she inhaled. I grabbed her shoulder and clapped my other hand over her mouth. ‘Please don’t scream.’

  She punched at the air in my general direction until she connected with my elbow.

  ‘Ow, dammit!’ I let her go, cradling my numbed hand.

  She scrambled away from me, but didn’t run for the door. ‘Where are you?’

  ‘Sitting on a haystack, hoping you didn’t just break my arm,’ I said. ‘Where does it seem like I am?’

  ‘Why can’t I see you?’

  ‘I’m a ghost,’ I suggested. ‘Wooooo. Go away.’

  She squinted at the haystack. ‘Is it magic?’

  Gods and little saints. ‘No. Invisible people are an entirely natural phenomenon.’ I took a deep breath and endeavoured to peer past the migraine enough to examine her. ‘Are we going to have a problem?’

  She must have been somewhere in her mid-twenties, but for someone with a wicked left hook, the woman wasn’t very big, disappearing inside a homespun shirt and trousers made for someone much larger. She had dark brown eyes with an odd circle of green around the pupil, light hair and a spray of freckles across her nose and jaw like a constellation. And her feet were bare, which made me pause. Even farm servants usually had moccasins. All in all, I didn’t think her reason for being in the barn was any more legitimate than mine.

  ‘You are a wizard, then,’ she said.

  An alarm rang in my head. ‘Yes. No.’ I pressed the heels of my hands to my throbbing eye sockets. ‘I’m not anything. Why are you here?’

  ‘Don’t hurt me,’ she said. ‘I just – I need a place to sleep.’

  I winced. ‘So sleep. Whatever you want. Of course I’m not going to hurt you. Just be quiet.’

  I saw her searching eyes find my outline, probably from the motes of hay dust stuck on me. I tried to decide whether I dared lie down again. Even if she ran off and told someone I was here, what were the odds they’d believe that an invisible wizard was sleeping off a spell in their barn? The Guild won’t even officially admit invisibility exists.

  Then again, the woman hadn’t run away, which was a bad sign by itself. Most normal folk view magic with distrust at best, and with active superstition at worst. I had too many people hunting me to waste a couple of hours dealing with a curious interloper who, alas, would certainly remember me. It was time to leave, before she could learn what I looked like.

  I got to my feet, but I’d been down long enough that my bad knee had locked up. A pop of brilliant, multicoloured pain burst over me and I had to wait and breathe until it passed. I must have groaned.

  ‘Are you . . . sick?’ She stretched out a hand, creeping closer.

  I wasn’t going to stand around and be felt for. ‘You can have the barn. I’m leaving.’ I tried, unsuccessfully, to push past her.

  ‘No! You have to stay here!’ She clawed at the air and caught my sleeve. ‘Just wait. They could still be out there.’

  I halted. ‘Look, my head really hurts. Who could still be out there, and why should I care?’

  She hesitated, a shade too long. ‘The men chasing me.’

  ‘In case that isn’t a lie, I promise not to tell them you’re here.’ I wrenched my arm away from her. ‘Let go.’

  ‘But they’ll see you.’

  It took me a second to get the implication past the roaring pain in my skull. I looked down and saw my own trouser-clad knees shading into existence. At exactly the wrong time, the spell was finishing. Shit.

  The woman stared at me. Or past me, actually. A wash of cold air across the back of my neck made me turn around. The spear pointing at my belly made me raise both hands.

  A small door at the side of the barn was open. A priest in a dirty, cream-coloured robe and three other men stood just inside; one had a crossbow trained on the woman. Another was pointing the spear at me, goggling at my robe and, presumably, the parts of me that were still invisible.

  ‘Don’t move! You’re under arrest!’ The priest’s shrill voice cut through the air – and my head – like a steel spike. He was looking from the woman to my mostly-revealed left wrist, where my forged licence sigil was tattooed. ‘Careful! He’s a wizard – we’ll have to gag him.’

  I flinched. ‘Keep your voice down. I haven’t done anything illegal. You can inspect my licen
ce if you want.’ I waggled my wrist. My sigil had got me out of similar situations in the past. It was expensive, and realistic.

  ‘Tie his hands,’ the priest said. ‘We’ll let his own people sort him out.’ But none of his helpers moved, watching me uncertainly. Angering the Mages’ Guild isn’t done lightly.

  ‘The Guild has feelings about outsiders arresting its members.’ I forced my voice into bored, threatening tones. ‘What do you suppose they’re going to say about you poaching on their prerogatives?’

  He smiled thinly. ‘What do you suppose the Guild will say to you consorting with a blasphemer? You’d obviously arranged to meet here with your criminal associate.’

  Dealing with a blasphemy shakedown was another bother I didn’t need. I didn’t know much about the laws in this part of Varre, but blasphemy was sometimes punishable with death, and rarely a nice, quick death, either. I glanced at the woman, whose carefully flat expression did not quite hide the fine edge of terror in the lines of her body.

  ‘All we’ve established is that I am standing in a barn that all of you are also standing in,’ I said. ‘If you arrest me, I’ll demand a representative from the closest Guildhouse. I will be angry. The Guild officer will be angry. You will be forced to explain how a low-level priest thought it would be a good idea to importune a wizard—’

  ‘Turn out your pockets.’ The priest rounded on the woman. ‘Thief! Do as you’re told!’

  ‘—with trumped-up charges that Temples doesn’t have jurisdiction over anyway.’ The priest was ignoring me, grabbing at the woman.

  ‘I’m not a thief,’ she growled. ‘Don’t touch me!’

  He clutched her arm. ‘Temples has jurisdiction over anyone caught violating sacred property. I know you have it. Nobody else could have taken it.’ The priest thrust his hand into the depths of the giant, shapeless garment she wore, and pulled out a pair of small gold icons, no bigger than my thumb. ‘There!’

  She twisted in his grasp. ‘That’s not mine! You planted that!’

  He smiled. ‘No, you were bringing it to your accomplice. He just hasn’t had time to hide it yet.’ He gestured to the others. ‘Gag this man. And tie his hands.’

  This time they obeyed.

  *

  We were soaked through by the time they marched us through the rain back to Fenwydd, which I had only seen briefly three days earlier. This visit confirmed my earlier impressions of it as a farm town which gave itself airs. The houses crammed inside the city wall were all stacked on top of each other, mismatched. Timber cottages squatted next to brick neighbours whose upper storeys overhung the street and dumped random streams of freezing water on to passers-by. The only important thing about it was a squalid little castle – a fort, really, with walls that were half earthworks – which looked just large enough to contain a decent dungeon.

  The woman had been talking constantly while we walked, maintaining her innocence without convincing anyone. As our captors turned us down a narrow lane that led towards the castle, she fell silent.

  We passed into a courtyard with claustrophobic stone walls and slippery brown cobblestones. Two soldiers lounged at a booth near the entrance, straightening as we appeared. A pair of stocks loomed beside a stained wooden block the size of a table, the axe grooves hacked into the block testifying to its purpose.

  My stomach turned over. Maybe this was a duchy where they beheaded you for blasphemy.

  ‘Open the gate.’ The priest gestured at an ugly wooden door. I don’t know that I would have dignified it by calling it a gate. Still, it was thick, and a problem. I had been hoping for an ecclesiastical prison, where the doors are usually very old and decorative.

  The men who had helped capture us left now, after being admonished to deliver their official testimony about the capture to the militia captain. The thrice-cursed priest did not leave, supervising as the soldiers hustled the woman and me inside. They brought us to a low, dank room lit by a couple of high, narrow windows. A thick layer of rushes covered the floor, an unsuccessful attempt to keep down the stink of vomit and old blood. A set of manacles dangled from rings in the ceiling, and an unpleasant collection of rusty iron instruments littered a table nearby.

  They clapped the woman into the manacles, backed me into a corner and threw my leather satchel on the table. Only then did they remove the twist of cloth tied around my mouth.

  ‘Gods, that gag was none too clean.’ I spat on the floor and looked at the priest. ‘Well? Where’s the Guild representative? What’s this all about?’

  ‘You and your accomplice are charged with blasphemy and unsanctioned incantations. Because blasphemy is the more serious matter, you’ll answer to Temples before the Guild is alerted to your crimes.’ He folded his arms. I suppose he was trying to look menacing.

  ‘She isn’t my accomplice,’ I said. ‘I don’t pick accomplices out of mud puddles.’

  ‘Even if she isn’t your accomplice, you’re still a thief,’ he said. ‘She stole from the temple, and then you stole her. If you stop wasting my time, you might suffer less before this is over.’

  Stole her? I needed time to think. ‘What precisely am I supposed to have done? Which unsanctioned incantations, I mean?’

  ‘I don’t truck with wizards’ impious attempts to manipulate nature,’ he said, coldly. ‘The incantations are a matter for the Guild to determine. My concern is rectifying your violation of the sanctuary of Jaern.’ He dug in his pocket for the tiny gold icons. ‘These were stolen from that temple library.’ He reached into my satchel and came out with a book. ‘And this is a restricted codex, taken from the temple of Neyar three days ago. Blasphemous intrusions, the both of them.’ He fingered the seal embossed on the front, and then glanced inside and frowned. ‘You stole an accounts book?’

  It was actually the food purchase records for a group of Guild prisoners, forced labourers at the stone quarry in Denelle, fifty miles to the east. It had been a false lead.

  ‘They owe me money,’ I said.

  He handed the book and icons to one of the soldiers. ‘Regardless, clearly a criminal act. And demonstrating an unhealthy interest in meddling with books.’

  I shrugged. ‘In that case, I see nothing for it but to decapitate us immediately. There can’t be any other punishment for book-meddling.’

  ‘Agreeing with me won’t buy you leniency.’ The priest, who had evidently never been exposed to sarcasm in his life, waved the soldiers towards the door. ‘She was obviously bringing the icons back to you.’

  ‘Obviously.’ I slid the heel of one foot through the litter on the floor. Under the rushes was a brownish-black, crusty stain that I didn’t want to identify at that moment. The rushes didn’t stay parted long enough for my purpose. Besides, even this dolt would probably notice by the time I got six runes traced on the floor.

  ‘This isn’t right,’ the woman said. ‘You’re not supposed to—’

  ‘Shut up.’ He slapped her, hard enough to turn her head. ‘Did I tell you to speak? Don’t toy with me, tart.’

  ‘Ugh,’ I said. ‘Don’t make us imagine someone toying with you.’

  I didn’t see him move. The fist that he sank in my gut took my breath away, and for a moment I couldn’t see. When my vision came back, his face was inches from mine.

  ‘Leave,’ he said, without taking his eyes off me. Both the soldiers who had accompanied us into the room departed, the door clanging shut behind them.

  He wandered over to the instruments and selected one, a slender knife with teeth and a hooked tip. ‘This is a surgical knife.’ He brought it to me and pressed the serrations against my cheek. ‘It’ll go through bone. It takes a long time, but . . . eventually . . .’

  A pulse of cold, instinctive fear flooded my veins. I could deal with pain – practising magic teaches you that quickly enough – but I recognised the dreamy contemplation in his voice. He wasn’t just out to get answers. He intended to enjoy hurting me. If I didn’t end this conversation soon, he’d carve me and the w
oman up regardless of what we said.

  ‘Now.’ Saliva clung to the priest’s teeth. ‘You and I are going to understand each other.’

  Something boiled over inside my skull, flowing down to the tips of my fingers. I scratched a curving symbol into the dirt on the wall behind me. ‘You’re spitting,’ I said.

  He frowned. You could almost hear the creaking as he tried to think. ‘I—’

  ‘You’re going to hurt me if I don’t answer questions,’ I said. ‘Understood. So ask something.’

  He drew the serrations sideways. The cut was small, but it burned. ‘I know you want to steal something from my god. It’s the codices, isn’t it? Like the one you stole from Neyar-temple?’ A drop of blood rolled down my jaw. His eyes followed it lovingly. ‘You won’t get them, but I do want to know who told you they were there.’

  Codices. The word was significant enough that it momentarily distracted me from the knife. Jaern-temples were usually just places of worship, but some of them had libraries. Because priests of Jaern take secrecy seriously, the rich and important pay the librarians to store things that they want kept secure and private: royal financial accounts, say, or torturer’s interrogation notes. Or locations and inmate lists for the Guild’s secret prisons.

  ‘I don’t know what codices you’re talking about.’ I forced myself to concentrate on the pattern growing behind me. ‘I thought this was about icons.’

  He made a second cut, flicking my earlobe with the blade. It surprised me, driving a gasp from between my lips. But it gave me time to scratch another symbol.

  ‘Stop it!’ The woman’s voice was low, fierce. ‘This is illegal. You said the Guild was supposed to deal with him. This is—’

  ‘I’m not going to be lectured by a temple-robbing little witch,’ he hissed. ‘This isn’t Guild business. He’s carrying a book from Neyar-temple. He’s stealing secrets. So—’ He put the tip of the blade just below my eyebrow. ‘Who told you? I can take your eye. Or one of hers, if you don’t find that convincing.’ His gaze, glassy with desire, wandered towards her.

  Most libraries were nearly impossible to break into without knowing the correct countersigns. If this woman had gotten inside the library and managed to escape afterwards, she had abruptly become more interesting. I needed her, and she would presumably be less able to circumvent complicated wards if she was missing an eye.