The Mask of Mirrors by M. Carrick; (different e readers txt) 📕

his feet and slipped it back on. Black silk and leather flowed over his limbs, sheathing him in the armor of his cause.

“We don’t kill,” the Rook whispered to the oblivious city. “But we can destroy.”

The Charterhouse, Old Island: Fellun 7

Ren hid the shawl behind her skirts while the clerks passed. As kind as it was of the Rook to return it, she didn’t know what to do with it now: a piece of Ren’s life, when she was supposed to be Renata.

In the end she stepped into a narrow, darkened corridor and hiked up her skirts to tie it beneath them, around her hips. The knot made a slight lump, but hopefully no one would notice.

When she was about to step out again, she heard the footfalls of someone approaching. Ren held her breath and remained still. She didn’t want anyone asking why she was hiding in the shadows.

Especially not Derossi Vargo.

Her old Finger instincts flared to life as he passed. Ren slipped her shoes off, the marble floor cold against her stockinged feet. She waited until Vargo had turned a corner; then she followed him, silent as a cat.

His path took him to the Caerulet offices, where clerks were already bringing Indestor’s furniture and files out. Ghiscolo Acrenix directed them, keeping out of the way as four burly men heaved Mettore’s monumental desk through the double doors and down the corridor.

“I see you survived my mother,” Ghiscolo said, waving Vargo back down the hallway toward Ren. She retreated swiftly, finding an unlocked office—the Rook’s doing?—and slid inside. Leaving the door cracked risked them noticing, so she eased it shut and pressed her ear against the wood.

“Your mother is a formidable woman,” Vargo murmured. There was still an edge of deference there, but it was a deference between equals. “I don’t believe I let anything slip. I assumed you’d want to inform her yourself.”

Ghiscolo snorted. “That’s a remarkable bit of discretion, given your recent behavior.”

Vargo’s cane tapped against the marble floor. “Bringing Mettore down was never going to be discreet. But it was effective—Your Mercy.”

Caerulet’s title. Ennoblement charters didn’t fall from the sky, nor were they given out of simple gratitude… but in exchange for opening up a seat on the Cinquerat? That was all too plausible.

“An effectiveness that I trust has been duly appreciated, Eret Vargo.”

“Oh, yes.” Vargo’s voice smooth. “But there’s no reason for it to end here. I’ve been enjoying our partnership. Haven’t you?”

Ren flinched. There was no hint of flirtation in his tone… but those were the exact words he’d used with her.

Ghiscolo merely said, “I suppose it depends. Will your association with the Traementis be a problem? Their lovely cousin in particular. You went to some lengths to help her after the Night of Bells, even at risk to yourself.”

“The risk was minor, and the gain significant. She’s useful as well as attractive, and my investment in the Traementis is paying off even better than I hoped. But if you’re worried that it will interfere with anything, you needn’t be. I don’t get attached to my tools.”

Safely hidden behind the door, Ren bit down on her lip. She knew that tone—the cold, careless response of a man who no longer needed to hide behind a mask.

But now she saw his face. And she would never make the mistake of trusting him again.

“Very well,” Ghiscolo said. “If I don’t bring you into the Illius Praeteri, someone else will anyway; you’ve made yourself interesting enough to ensure that. Now if you’ll pardon me, I need to see about getting the Vigil in order. Mettore was far too patient with the rampant nepotism and incompetence. Good day, Eret Vargo.”

The steady beat was Ghiscolo walking away. Ren waited, ear pressed to the door, for Vargo to move… but either he was as silent as the Rook, or he was still standing outside.

Like a spider at the center of his web. And Ren could feel its strands around her, snaring her tight.

“Will you be all right?” Vargo’s voice broke the silence, causing her to start. Ghiscolo was gone; had someone else approached, without her hearing?

“I’ve survived worse,” a man replied in the crisp, aristocratic tones of Nadežra’s Liganti nobility. Ren thought she had met everyone of importance in the city, but she didn’t recognize the voice at all. “And it was a necessary step.”

“Yes.” More tapping, Vargo’s cane on the marble. “It’s going to get harder from here.”

“You mean, you’re going to have to be even more ruthless.”

Vargo laughed darkly. “Isn’t that what I said?”

Sweat broke out on Ren’s forehead. Being caught right now—he might kill her. But she had to know whom he was talking to.

With the same steady, feather-light hand she’d once used to pick locks and lift purses, she turned the handle of the door and eased it open the tiniest crack.

Vargo’s hands were planted on the sill of a window, his back to her as he looked out over Eastbridge to the shining rooftops of the Pearls.

“Concentrate on winning their trust now. Worry about the rest later.”

The words came in that same aristocratic voice—and from the empty air at Vargo’s side. He was unmistakably alone… but not.

He talks to himself sometimes, Sedge had said.

Not to himself. To someone else. A spirit, maybe—but not the Rook. Maybe whatever she’d seen him bound to, when she glimpsed the connections in the amphitheatre that night. Maybe whatever kept him alive, when he took wounds that ought to kill him.

Vargo’s head turned slightly. Ren froze, fearing he was about to notice her, not daring to swing the door shut because then he would. But he stopped, showing only a sliver of his profile—enough to see the cynical smile on his face.

“Trust is the thread that binds us… and the rope that hangs us.”

“Hanging is what spiders do best. Let’s go home, my boy.”

Vargo chuckled. Ren remained utterly still, not even breathing, as he sauntered off down the corridor, cane swinging and clacking against