Free Jonathan Moeller - The Ghosts 08 - Ghost in the Mask by Jonathan Moeller Page A

Surge, and the lords of New Kyre bowed to the will of the feared oracle of the storm and sea.
    “Priestess,” said Kylon. “Forgive my rudeness. I am…troubled.”
    The priestess regarded him for a moment…and her eyes turned the flat black of a dire winter storm.
    “The Surge knows of your grief, High Seat of House Kardamnos,” said the priestess, “and she summons you at once. You must save your betrothed. For if you do not save Thalastre, New Kyre will burn. All nations will burn. The entire world shall burn, and become a graveyard for all of eternity.”

Chapter 5 - Followers of the Dead
    For the first time in her life, Caina dressed in the black robe of a magus of the Imperial Magisterium.
    It would not do for a magus to be seen leaving the home of Anton Kularus, so Halfdan had arranged for rooms at an inn on the western edge of Malarae. Here Caina and Corvalis and Muravin could disguise themselves, and then depart to the west. 
    Her room had a mirror, and Caina examined herself in it. 
    The black robe made her look stark and forbidding. Her pale face and her dyed blond hair made a marked contrast with the black robe. Caina pulled her hair back in a tight tail to emphasize the lines of her jaw and cheekbones, and did not bother with makeup. A woman like Rania Scorneus would consider such fripperies to be the province of lesser women. 
    She tied a red sash around her waist, and hooked her sheathed ghostsilver dagger to it. The robe’s loose sleeves provided ample room for throwing knives, and she strapped two to each forearm. Theodosia of the Grand Imperial Opera had also prepared a few tricks for her, and those went up Caina’s sleeves as well. She could not wield sorcery, but she knew how to bluff…and sometimes a good bluff was more valuable than a pile of gold coins. 
    Caina tucked a pair of daggers into hidden sheaths in her boots, examined herself for a moment in the mirror, and nodded to herself.
    She left the room and swept into the inn’s common room. The inn was neither luxurious nor shabby, and catered to the merchants who hauled goods through the hills of the Caerish provinces to the barges of the River Marentine. Wagon drivers in rough clothes and merchants in furred robes sat at the tables and benches, eating breakfast and talking.
    They fell silent as Caina swept into the room, and took care to avoid her gaze. No one in their right mind wanted to draw the attention of a magus. Caina ignored them and strode across the room, her heels clacking against the floorboards, her expression frozen in a haughty mask. No one who looked at her would see Sonya Tornesti or Anna Callenius or Marianna Nereide or any of the other identities she had assumed over the years.
    Which was the point.
    Two men in black plate armor sat at a table near the door, their cuirasses adorned with the sigil of the Magisterium, an eye upon an opened book. Muravin had taken to the role of a Magisterial Guard simply by keeping to his usual practice of scowling at everyone in sight. Corvalis, though, Corvalis looked deadly. The black armor suited him, made him looked lean and wolfish and dangerous. 
    Which, for him, was no disguise.
    He had shaved his beard and mustache, thank the gods. 
    “My carriage, captain,” said Caina in a cold voice, coloring her High Nighmarian with the accent of a woman raised in Artifel. “Is it ready?”
    Corvalis rose and bowed. “It is, mistress. We may leave whenever you wish.”
    “And I wish to leave at once,” said Caina. 
    “As you command,” said Corvalis. He stood and beckoned to Muravin, and the older man rose. They fell into escort around Caina, and walked to the courtyard.
    “I am surprised,” murmured Corvalis in a low voice, “how well you can speak an Artifel accent, given that you’ve never been there.”
    “Many easterners visit Malarae,” said Caina, keeping her haughty mask in place. “It is simply a matter of listening to them.”
    “And,” said Corvalis, “how