broken and bleeding behind him.”
Yasir rubbed at his face. “It’s done. And if I’m screwed, so be it. Doesn’t mean we can’t use whatever tools we have at our disposal to find him.”
Gods, when they found Vasili, Niko was going to kill the manipulative bastard. He stared at the Caville ring on his finger and had half a mind to throw it at Yasir. It suited him—the prince’s sorcerer. Niko was just the prince’s assassin.
Taking the Yazdan ring from his pocket, he placed it on the finger next to the Caville’s ring. Maybe sometime soon, he’d pick a side. A family he didn’t know, or the lying prince he did?
“You want to use the dark flame to find him?” Niko asked.
Yasir nodded. “What have we got to lose?”
Only your soul.
Chapter 18
Yasir cleared his desktop of charts and navigating equipment and replaced them with a beautiful hand-drawn street-map of Seran. The city’s spiderweb network of concentric streets branched out from the old town and the docks at its southern edge.
Niko was admiring the elaborate artwork when Yasir lit a black candle and carried it to the table. “This may not work. It’s just a theory at this stage… I haven’t been able to do much more than shape shadows.”
“Did Vasili show you how?”
“No, he told me the Cavilles rarely use their magic. They leave that to their sorcerers. He can, I think, but he doesn’t like to.”
Niko recalled Vasili telling King Talos that using the flame wasn’t the Caville way. Had he meant it literally? It could be the more he used it, the more the flame tried to free itself from his grasp.
He glanced again at Niko. “The information I found was penned by Yazdans. Their past seems to be inextricably linked with the Cavilles.”
Niko snorted. “Of course it is.”
“But from what I’ve read, it doesn’t appear to have been a friendly relationship. The Cavilles and Yazdans have been at each other’s throats for forever.”
“There’s a surprise,” Niko drawled.
Yasir used another candle to light the wick of the black one. The new flame spluttered to life, tinged purple. “Do you think your mother had a reason for going to Loreen?” Yasir asked idly. “Something to do with the Cavilles?”
“Maybe.” Niko thought of Amala, the flower-seller, and Roksana, the privateer. He’d only just found them, and now they were gone. Now he’d never know them.
Yasir dripped black wax onto the map, pooling a globule near the commerce district.
“Do you know what you’re doing?” Niko asked.
“Vaguely.” Yasir grinned. “No, not really.”
“Then this is reckless.”
“So is every time I go to sea, but I’m still here.”
“Because you can only die once,” Niko added.
Yasir half smiled. “I see why he listens to you.”
“Who?”
Yasir chuckled, set the candle down, and spread both hands over the map with the hardening wax pool in the center. He focused on that pool, spread his fingers, and breathed out.
Niko inched back and rested his hand on his sword’s pommel. Julian had learned to wield the preternatural forces of the dark flame well enough to summon fiends. Those encounters would forever haunt Niko’s dreams. Willfully inviting the dark flame into being seemed like opening the door to all the nightmares best kept locked far away. But if it could help find Vasili, then perhaps it was worth it.
Yasir whispered harsh, hissing words Niko couldn’t decipher.
The wax shifted, liquefying again into a shiny bubble. Yasir’s whispers grew louder, and the wax shimmered, gathering itself together in a tighter nodule.
Niko leaned closer.
The wax rippled. A drip stretched out like a tentacle, following the twisting outline of Seran’s old streets. It flowed around bends and through junctions, marking a pathway. Then it stopped and suddenly solidified again, freezing its jagged line rigid.
Yasir puffed a hard sigh and bowed his head.
Niko kept his hand on his sword. The captain’s pistol was within reach. If Yasir went for it, Niko would draw. The possessed had burned his home, almost killed the prince, and had probably done a whole lot more Niko didn’t yet know.
Yasir cleared his throat and straightened. “All right?” he croaked. The dark briefly swam in his eyes and was gone. He blinked and frowned at Niko’s grimace. “Not good?”
“Something to keep an eye on.”
Yasir shuddered, flicked his hands out, and regarded the map. “The Fortisque.”
“The coffeehouse Roksana mentioned?”
“The same.”
That couldn’t be a coincidence. “Vasili’s there?”
“Something clearly is.” He straightened his cuffs and cleared his throat again. “Let’s go and find out.”
The Fortisque was a grand building in Seran’s commerce quarter. It looked