The eight statue was of a woman of stunning beauty, her gown tossed around her as if in a terrible wind, her hands reaching out as if to seize someone. Kylon sensed tremendous sorcerous power within those statues, and the entire web of arcane force over the Desert and its Candles centered upon that fountain.
He was more concerned about what he sensed from Caina at the moment.
“Caina?” he said again.
“The star is the key to the crystal,” she whispered, grabbing at his right arm for balance. “The star is the key to the crystal. The Moroaica’s father told me that.” She waved a hand at the fountain. “That’s the crystal, right there.”
“I see,” said Kylon. Her emotional sense all but burned with something between horror and fascination. Her sense was cold, colder than the Desert of Candles. He had never wanted to tell her, but the only other time he had felt emotional senses that cold had been when fighting hardened killers.
But for just a moment, when they had talked and he had admitted that he found her lovely, that ice had started to crack a little.
Now the strange fountain held the entirety of her attention, and something else brushed against Kylon’s senses.
“Nasser,” he said in a low voice, gesturing at the dark-clad figure at the edge of the fountain. Nasser stood a few yards from the fountain’s low, decorative wall, gazing at the crystalline statues. His back was to Kylon, and he caught a flicker of the man’s emotions. There was quiet contemplation there, weariness, and…
Regret? Sorrow? He wasn’t sure.
“Ibrahaim Nasser,” said Caina, the words slow. “Nasser Glasshand. Glass hand…”
Her voice trailed off, and suddenly her eyes grew wide as a jolt of stunned realization shot through her sense.
“Oh,” she said. “Oh, I’m an idiot. A blind idiot, Kylon.”
“You’re really not,” said Kylon.
“I should have seen it sooner,” said Caina. “All the little things. A glass hand! It was right there before my eyes. And when we summoned Samnirdamnus before the Maze. To taunt Nasser, he took on the form of the woman in the fountain. Idiot! I should have realized sooner. ”
“If you feel like a blind idiot,” said Kylon, “imagine how I feel, because I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
She looked up at him, and her aura went cold and icy all over, the way it did in a crisis. “I’ll show you. Come on.”
Caina hurried across the clearing, heading towards the fountain, and Kylon shrugged as he followed her. She made no effort to hide her footfalls, and Nasser turned well before they reached him. The master thief was a shadow in the gloomy light from the crystalline statues atop the fountain, his expression calm and untroubled, though Kylon felt the unease in his emotions. He hadn’t expected to see them.
“Ciaran, Lord Kylon,” said Nasser. “I trust nothing is amiss?”
“Your left hand,” said Caina. “You never move it.”
Nasser lifted his eyebrows. “You’ve seen me punch through an Immortal’s skull. I daresay that qualifies as movement.”
“Fighting for your life is one thing,” said Caina. “But when we’re not fighting, when we’re planning or drinking coffee or simply talking, you never move your left hand. You don’t use it for anything.”
Nasser shrugged and flexed the fingers of his gloved left hand, his expression unchanging.
Had Kylon not been focused upon him, he would not have detected the faint ripple of pain that went through Nasser’s sense at the movement.
“You don’t use it unless you have to because it hurts,” said Caina. “There are other things, too. The sorcerous aura around your hand. How you know so much about ancient Iramis. The mortal arrow wound you survived at Silent Ash Temple. Your personal grudge against Callatas. The fact that Morgant hates you.”
“Morgant hates everyone,” said Nasser.
“He doesn’t like anyone,” said Caina. “That’s because he’s lived for too long and seen too much. You, however, he hates specifically and personally. Which means it happened when he was still young enough to feel strong emotion, before Callatas sent him after Annarah…and that means you’re as old as he is. Maybe older.” She stepped closer to Nasser, and Kylon tensed, wondering if Nasser would react violently. But Nasser remained motionless, his expression calm. “But there was something else.”
“Ah,” said Nasser, closing his eyes and then opening them again. “Your ability to sense sorcery. I should have realized.”
“That woman in the fountain,” said Caina. “She’s reaching for something. Or she was reaching for someone when she was killed.”
Still Nasser said nothing.
“I think