Theodosius Valkorion's Arc

Chapter 22 of 22

The general sat in irons in the western keep's cellar, but his papers were on Theodosius's table. The chest from the chapel road had traveled back under Thraxes's own guard. Inside were ledgers, a coin purse, and a folded page with a fourth name written in the general's hand. The name was a merchant's alias, not a man. Theodosius knew it for what it was: a rented mask. If he did not tear it off within the day, whoever wore it would hear of the arrests and be gone. He sent for Master Inag Divondûn and Guardsman Serett before the lamps were trimmed. Inag came in his black plate, visor dulled by cellar dust. Serett came behind him without armor at all, in a clerk's coat, his face still the face only three men living had seen. Theodosius put the folded page between them. "A false name," he said. "Rented from the wine merchant's chain. I need the man behind it before the sun sets tomorrow." Inag read the page once. "The chain has three houses left standing. He drew coin from one of them." "Which house?" Serett asked. "The counting house by the river gate," Inag said. "The clerk there took the general's payments." Serett nodded. "Then the clerk knows the face." "Take him alive," Theodosius said. "Not in the street. In a room. I want the name spoken, not guessed." Serett tipped his head once and was gone before the door finished closing. He worked through the night. He watched the counting house from a wine seller's stall across the lane. At the second hour past dawn the clerk came out to empty a pail. Serett walked past him, said one word, and the clerk went white. They went back inside together as if the clerk had forgotten a ledger. Serett came to the palace at noon. He did not sit. "The clerk paid the alias four times," he said. "He knows the face. He drew it for me." He set a small square of paper on Theodosius's table. A charcoal sketch. A thin man, clean-shaven, a scar cutting through the left brow. "He sits on your council," Serett said. "Third bench. Keeper of the seals." Theodosius knew the face at once. The keeper of the seals had stamped every provincial copy of the unified code. Every rider, every route, every watcher's name had crossed his desk. "Longhall takes him at the evening session," Theodosius said. "Before he touches another seal." Inag nodded once. Serett was already at the door. By dusk the keeper of the seals sat in irons beside the general's papers. The fourth name had a face and a body in a cell. But the code he had stamped had gone out to every province in the empire, and Theodosius did not yet know which copies had been marked before they rode.