“No idea,” Taniel said. “I’ve never seen her do magic. Not what we think of as magic, anyway. No fingers twitching, no summoning elemental auras.” He’d long ago stopped trying to figure out her sorcery.
Gothen cleared his throat after a minute. He didn’t look at Taniel directly, but a sly smile crossed his face. “Julene and I, we have a bet.”
Taniel tapped out a line of powder on the back of his hand and snorted it. “What’s that?”
“Julene thinks you’re bedding the savage. I say you aren’t.”
“Not exactly the bet of a gentleman,” Taniel said.
“We’re all soldiers here,” Gothen said. His grin widened.
“How much was the wager?”
“A hundred krana.”
“So much for women’s intuition. Tell her she owes you a hundred.”
“Thought so,” Gothen said. “Men are so much easier to read than women. You look at her—the savage—like that once in a while, but even then it’s only a hint of longing, not the look of a lover.”
Taniel scowled at the magebreaker and shifted in his seat, not sure how to respond. In an officers’ setting he’d call a man out for that. Here, though… well, like Gothen said, they were both soldiers.
“She’s nothing more than a kid,” Taniel said. “Besides, the whole time I’ve known Ka-poel, I’ve been engaged to another woman.”
“Ah. Congratulations.”
“The engagement is off.”
“Your pardon,” Gothen said, looking away.
Taniel tapped out another line on the back of his hand. He waved his snuffbox in the air dismissively. “Think nothing of it.” He snorted the black powder and took a deep breath, then leaned his head against the side of the carriage. He listened to the patter of rain on the rooftop, to the clatter of the horse’s hooves and the wheels on the cobbles. So many noises that could drown out his thoughts.
Where was Vlora, he wondered, at this moment? Perhaps just arriving in Adopest. Maybe already here and gone, sent off on assignment by Tamas. He’d forced the question out of his mind every silent moment since he’d nailed that fop to the wall, wriggling on his own sword like a pinned butterfly. What had gone wrong? He’d made a mistake, going off to Fatrasta like he did. Getting tangled up in a war just to impress Tamas. He’d left her alone for too long. The man who’d bedded her was a professional philanderer. It wasn’t her fault.
He made a fist, reeled in his anger. Was he mad because he loved Vlora? Or was he mad because another man had sullied his woman? Had Vlora truly been his woman? Taniel couldn’t remember a time at which he wasn’t going to marry Vlora. Tamas had thrust them together in every possible situation. She was a gifted powder mage, and chances were their children would be gifted as well. Tamas had encouraged them to be together for years. If anything, Vlora was more Tamas’s future daughter-in-law than she was ever Taniel’s future wife. He swallowed that thought, and with it the satisfaction with Tamas’s disappointment. Now Taniel didn’t have to marry at all if he didn’t want—or he’d find a wife of his own, not some prearranged powder-mage bride. Maybe Ka-poel. Taniel chuckled aloud, ignoring Gothen’s curious glance. Tamas would be absolutely livid if Taniel married a foreign savage. His amusement died down, and he resisted the urge to open his sketchbook and look at Vlora’s drawing.
“Awfully nice part of town,” Gothen said, pulling Taniel from his thoughts. The magebreaker held back the curtain just enough to see outside. A moment later the carriage jostled to a stop. Taniel opened the door.
They were in the Samalian District. Thick smoke hung over the entire city, mixing with the light rain and stinging Taniel’s eyes. The place was silent—the mob had been quelled two days prior and in their wake had left little of what had once been rows of stately manors. Smoldering ruins and gutted houses were all that remained.
Except this one. The townhouse was three stories tall, and made of ancient gray stone. It had been modeled after castles of old with parapets and walks. The walls were blackened from the fires raging around, but the building itself seemed undamaged. It was easy to see why.
The parapets were manned by soldiers. Cobbles had been torn up from the street and made into a waist-high wall in front of the main entrance. More soldiers squatted behind that, their muskets at the ready, watching Taniel’s carriage with outright hostility.