hold it, but by the time she’d picked one, it was gone. Grimly she persisted until her eyes began to water and ache.
Once more, she thought, biting her lower lip. One, just one… She imagined hooks magically tethered to her eyes, and sank them into a flash of crimson. Then she fought to keep her eyes in one position. They wanted to flick aside to capture another of the images that raced by like a river in flood. She widened her eyelids and refused to let them jitter, staring instead at what she had caught. Slowly the image cleared as the fight to keep her eyes steady got harder.
Suddenly she realized what she saw. Excitement surged through her, cutting the vision free of her grip, but Tris didn’t care. Her eyes began to dance again as eyestrain tears streamed down her cheeks.
She had seen something real.
“A ship, Glaki!” she said, reclaiming her spectacles. “I saw a ship on the wind! A ship with a crimson sail and a sun emblem on it!”
“Course you did,” the little girl replied, for all the world as if she were Tris herself. “There’s all kinds of ships down in Piraki harbour.”
It took some time for Tris’s vision to clear. When she could actually see, she asked Glaki, “Show me the ships?”
The girl pointed. Far below, through a gap in the rocky hills between Tharios and Piraki, Tris saw the ant-like shapes of vessels anchored in the harbour. Above one was a dot of red: the red-sailed ship Tris had seen life-size on the wind.
“Supper now?” Glaki pleaded, tugging her skirt.
Tris hugged the child to her side. “Definitely supper.” She looked around for Chime and saw the glass dragon on the wall a few metres away, inspecting the guards and tourists as they inspected her. “Chime, come,” Tris called. The dragon took flight and returned to her, while the tourists clapped. “Show-off,” Tris murmured as Chime wrapped herself around Tris’s neck.
“But she’s beautiful,” protested Glaki. “She should show off.”
Tris smiled. “Spoken like a yaskedasu’s daughter,” she said. “Come on. Maybe Keth caught the Ghost.” Her pride would suffer if he did, but her pride wasn’t important. Sending that murderer to a place where he could kill no more was.
Two hours after he left the arurimat, Keth returned to Ferouze’s. To his considerable surprise, Dema was there with Tris and Glaki. The older man stared gloomily into a cup of water. “You can hear it from me,” he told Keth. “We found her in a rubbish bin, in Perfume Court. We tracked him to the temple of the All-Seeing, where it looks like he vanished into thin air. Of course, the place is hip-deep in cleansing spells, enough so that they stick to you when you come out of it. He’s gone, and we lost him.” He got to his feet. “Sorry, Keth. You did all that work, and we failed you.” He walked out without even saying goodbye.
Keth sat down hard. “All I did was stop for supper on the way,” he complained. “And a bath. And this Ghost killed and escaped. Maybe he is a ghost. Maybe we need an exorcist, not mages.”
Tris shook her head. “He’s just a man who knows Tharios from top to bottom,” she told Keth. “Look at it this way — tonight your globe brought the arurimi down on him before he could even smuggle his prey out of Khapik. You get closer every day.”
Keth smiled crookedly at her. “I won’t be happy until he’s in chains, and neither will you.” He looked at Glaki. “So what did you have for supper?”
They had just finished the dish washing when Tris straightened, staring at the door. “What is he doing here?” she asked. Before Keth could inquire into “his” identity, Tris had run out of the room. Little Bear galloped at her side, barking furiously as his tail wagged hard enough to create a breeze.
By the time Keth could reach the door, Niklaren Goldeye had stepped on to the second-floor gallery. “No, Bear, you know better,” he informed the dog as Little Bear danced around him. “Just one pawprint on my clothes and I will make myself a Little Bear rug.”
Keth’s eyes bulged as he took in Niko’s appearance. Even for Khapik the mage dressed well: tonight he wore a crimson sleeveless overrobe with a gold thread subtly worked into the weave, loose black trousers, and a cream-coloured shirt. His long hair was combed back and secured with a red-gold