Chapter 43

It was an odd room, Song mused.

Though the salon had been furnished in the Malani style, with colored wooden frames and stuffed leather cushions flanking polished shell tabletops, the walls and lamps were in the traditional brass-and-stone of Asphodel. By the impressed look Angharad had given the table these were genuine Malani shellfish shells inserted into the table and that that mother-of-pearl luster was not the result of the varnish, which made it somewhat obscene for such a ridiculously expensive object to now be laden with a veritable hilltop of papers.

As were the two smaller circular coconut wood tables and the two colorful woven baskets with gods of Malan presented as a parade. The sum whole of everything the rector’s palace had on the cult of the Golden Ram was as a forest butchered and inked. Thankfully, Song was not alone in sorting through the piles.

“These should be in the lictor reports,” Maryam said, handing Tristan a pair of sheets. “I’m not sure why they were put in the histories.”

The gray-eyed man took the papers and squinted at the first few lines.

“Angharad,” he called out. “House Androlakis?”

Sitting on the sole solid wood couch, a pile of books placed next to her in an appreciably neat pile, the dark-skinned noble flipped through the volume she was holding while muttering. Her walking stick was propped up against the side of the couch, next to the blade she had unbelted for comfort.

“I believe they might be,” she began, setting her book down and reaching for the last few pages of another. “There they are: Androlakis of Mount Chrysone. The line ended in 78 Sails, their lands passed to the Katechas.”

Maryam winced.

“Are they really going to class all the reports involving dead noble houses as histories?” she whined. “That’s going to take ages to filter out.”

“You asked for the palace records, children. Did you really think that the way the Lord Rectors sort their papers would be spared petty politics?”

All their eyes moved to Captain Wen, who had dragged the largest coconut wood seat to a corner of the room and then pilfered the cushions off two more chairs before settling there and cracking open a slender volume called ‘Household Tales’. He’d spent the last hour and a half ignoring them as he sipped through the fine bottle of red wine the palace servants had provided.

The only reason he was even here was that Song had requested the Watch records on the Golden Ram as well, the small pile of booklets piled up next to him, and those would not be allowed out of his sight until they were safely return to the Black House.

“Ah, I see,” Angharad muttered. “If there were records of suspicious activities in lands now belonging to another house, they could be used as a pretext to investigate the affairs of that family – to have them sorted as historical is conveying that will not be the case.”

“That is tortured,” Maryam said, rubbing the bridge of her nose. “How weak is the position of the Palliades that they have to play these sorts of games?”

“Weak enough that our brigades encountered both the Trade Assembly and the Council of Ministers within an hour of docking at the Lordsport, if you’ll remember,” Song bluntly said. “I suspect that the Lord Rector’s authority is significantly weaker in practice than we have been led to believe.”

Which was… worrisome, considering the unveiling of the Antediluvian shipyard. The magnates and the ministers had already been circling the throne. How much bolder would they become, now that there was a prize to seize beyond the mere end of House Palliades?

“Song is right,” Captain Wen said without raising his eyes from his book.

He flipped a page.

“The Lord Rector not only met you personally instead of leaving it to his majordomo or one of his courtiers, then effectively gave you unrestricted access to the palace records,” the bespectacled man said. “You did not make that good a first impression. He’s pinning hopes on your test.”

Song was still parsing through the implications when Tristan cursed.

“He’s not worried that nobles are using the cult as a way to conspire against the throne,” the Mask said. “He’s hoping for it.”

It fell into place for her. A formal investigation not by the lictors but by the Watch – a mostly neutral third party – implicating nobles with conspiracy and illicit cult dealings? It would give Lord Rector Evander a steel-plated excuse to get rid of some noble houses making trouble for him. Even better for the Palliades, should ministers try to rally support against him it would be seen as them supporting a cult and contesting the results of a Watch investigation.

The Thirteenth was being used by Evander Palliades to clean house.

“Fuck,” Maryam quietly said.

By the looks on the faces of the others, she was speaking for all their hearts. Their gazes moved back to Captain Wen, who sipped at his wine with an obnoxious slurping nose. He had to be doing that on purpose to annoy them, Song knew, but even more irritating was that it worked anyway.

“Welcome to the Watch,” Wen Duan idly said. “Our order has the unique privilege of being almost as much in danger from those we are to protect as from what we protect them from.”

“Because we are also bait,” Song said, the realization sinking in. “Either we unmask the leaders of the cult for him, allowing his purge, or we get found out – and should the cult panic and try to get rid of us…”

Then even should they succeed they’d have killed watchmen, bringing the Watch down hard on the Lord Rector’s enemies. Part of Song was impressed with the cleverness at work. Evander Palliades was leveraging what tools he did have skillfully, turning third powers on each other. The rest was clenching its jaw at the realization that the same polite man who had welcomed them that morning was dangling them like a worm on a hook even as they undertook a contract on his behalf.

“Ah, there’s the face.”

Song’s gaze flicked to their patron, who had finally deigned to look away from his book – closed around a finger to avoid losing the page – to grin at her.

“Prodigies indeed,” Wen Duan said. “Most officers realize that we’re only ever handed lit grenades after a year or two on the field, so you’re clocking it early. Good on you.”

He snorted, reached for his glass.

“Keep the terms of the contract, stay uninvolved,” Captain Wen instructed. “As long as you do that, you can always count having the Rookery behind you – and with the guns of the Watch arrayed at your back, you’ll find even kings prefer to talk sweetly.”

Sipping loudly at his wine, he then cracked his book back open as if to signify he was done dispensing sage advice. Song breathed in, straightened her back. It was just another pitfall to dance around. She had known there would be dangers: how could there be glory in safety?

“It is as he said,” she told her brigade. “We stay out of intrigues as much as we can and fulfill our duty to the letter. Even fools will think twice at intervening with watchmen on official contract work.”

Angharad’s face was a wax mask and Tristan was smiling – which he often did when hiding his thoughts – while Maryam looked faintly worried. It was with a cloud hanging over them that the four of them resumed sorting through the papers.

After another hour Song called a halt so they might eat something and rest their eyes, which turned into an impromptu council about what they had learned. Tearing into mutton chops and baked tomatoes, both covered in the sauce of herbs and oil that was the local specialty, they shared what they had dug up.

“No one knows the true name of the Golden Ram save for its cultists,” Song informed them. “The Arthashastra historians based on Stheno’s Peak believe they had found the original story the god came from, however.”

She elaborated on the bare bones. It was a common sort of sacrifice myth about a golden, winged ram who was slain every winter solstice to bring about the return of spring. The sacrificial ram had been turned into a lesser god of rejuvenation and healing over the years, one whose face must have changed dozens of times with the centuries. The torch then passed to Maryam, who had inherited the history pile.

“This is the third known cult to the Golden Ram,” the blue-eyed woman shared. “The oldest on record was contemporary to the Second Empire, a lodge of shepherds that shared rituals with some mountain tribes. The second was… less pleasant. Packs of roving murderers sacrificing travelers in groves.”

“That does not sound like the desires of healing god,” Tristan noted.

“It might not have been a cult to the Ram at all. See, the rovers were recorded during the Century of Accord, during which Asphodel had a period of bloody chaos,” Maryam said. “They call it the ‘Ataxia’. Supposedly some rampant god was involved, the Hated One, and its cults loved to pretend they belonged to some other god.”

Song had got her hands on multiple volumes on the history of Asphodel, but the sections on the Ataxia were always sparse. As far as she could tell the priesthood of this Hated One had tried to usurp power from the Lord Rectors of the time and turn the island into their own kingdom, successfully ending the ruling house of the time but missing some of the nobles – resulting in half a dozen self-proclaimed Lord Rectors and several decades of civil war occasionally interrupted by the traditional war with the Duchy of Rasen.

“Either way,” Maryam said, “the Watch purged this Hated One’s cult and proscribed the name. This resurgent cult of the Golden Ram doesn’t appear to have anything to do with it, or even much with the first on record – for one, it is based in the capital instead of out in the countryside. Most likely we are dealing with an entirely different god come out of the same source.”

“If it is so different, are we certain the cult’s name is not a ruse?” Angharad asked, cocking an eyebrow.

Which was the cue for Tristan to step in, as the one who had combed from the Watch and Asphodel reports on the modern cult. He hummed, going fishing through his pile of papers and producing a sheet he handed her.

“This,” he said, “is what I believe is the most important document on the cult of the Golden Ram we are dealing with.”

He spared them the need to read it by summing up the contents. It was a report from a captain in the lictors dating three years back, recounting having stumbled across a hidden hunting lodge in the Tratheke hills during midsummer. Within were vividly described golden rams painted on the walls, the scent of half a dozen vices and roasted lamb whose flesh remained but lacked so much as a thimble’s worth of fat.

“That sounds like a revel cult,” Song said.

“It does,” he said, “but what’s not on there is almost as important as what is not. For one, there is not a single mention of a ceremony taking place on a solstice. The old season rituals have clearly been abandoned.”

He paused.

“Second is that this took place in nice hunting lodge and the cultists could afford drugs and to waste a lamb,” Tristan said. “Most of the current suspected cultists are nobles or at least wealthy. Interestingly, of the seven names we were given five are men and all are older than fifty.”

“Healing,” Maryam said. “You think the new cult set aside the old season myths to center itself on the rejuvenation part of the story.”

Tristan thinly smiled.

“Now, keep in mind that this is speculation. But given difference with the historical fabric of the cult and the provenance, I think that this began with a scholar of means looking through old gods and contacting the actual Golden Ram by accident. He got his boon, or his contract, and spread it around. Given the revel turn, I expect it was mostly a way for the aging rich to pay for getting rid of problems like…”

He raised his little finger and wiggled it luridly, which had Angharad looking appalled and Song hiding a smile.

“Only the god they got their hands on was willing to dole out the goods so they kept expanding their circle, at some point realizing their little club had roped in some fairly influential people that could help each other. Hence a cult was formed, formalizing the arrangement.”

“Much of that is speculation,” Song said.

“It is,” Tristan agreed. “Though the local Watch garrison agrees with me on the likely source of the cult, at least. Their theories run along much the same lines, though they seem to believe the god was chosen with the building of a cult in mind from the start.”

“And the recent expansion?” Maryam asked. “It’s why the Lord Rector became convinced they’re a conspiracy, isn’t it?”

“See, in simple numbers the cult isn’t believed to be that large,” Tristan said. “That expansion is thought significant because of who is believed to have joined up.”

And his eyes flicked to Angharad, who folded her hands in her lap.

“I believe some small context is necessary,” the Pereduri told them. “House Palliades is originally from the western third of Asphodel and has traditionally favored nobility from there – one might argue as a way to secure its reign, given its weak blood claim to the throne and largely accidental rise to power.”

“So the eastern nobles have it out for them,” Maryam said.

“Those houses have been the core of the opposition to House Palliades,” Angharad conceded. “Yet the landscape of Asphodel changed with the rise of the Trade Assembly, the old rivalries between east and west instead turning to ministers and magnates.”

She paused.

“As a result, the eastern nobles – who own the largest and richest estates – are now the leading lights of the Council of Ministers and the entrenched, consolidated noble opposition to the Lord Rector,” she continued. “Which is why it is particular significant that three of the names on Tristan’s list of seven are from prominent eastern noble houses.”

Song leaned in.

“So the Lord Rector is concerned that the Council of Ministers is using the cult as a ways of expanding its influence,” she said.

And in Tratheke, too, the heart of Palliades power. Every gain here was not just that but also a loss for the Lord Rector. No wonder he means to use us to thin them out, Song thought.

“One might assume, yes,” Angharad cautiously replied. “Why is why I would request, Song, that at tonight’s reception you study one woman in particular.”

Song cocked her head to the side, curious. The Lord Rector had, surprisingly swiftly, arranged for Angharad to be introduced at the nameday feast of one of his allies as a guest of the man in question. It was to serve as the prelude to her insertion into court proper. Song herself was to begin investigating those same guests for cult connections with her contract, making Angharad’s request nothing out of the ordinary.

“Who?”

“Minister Apollonia Floros,” Angharad said. “Not only is she one of the most powerful eastern nobles, she is the head of her house – which, by blood, has the strongest remaining claim to the rule of Asphodel.”

Song had read about Lady Floros, as it happened. She had been regent to Lord Rector Evander in his youth and spoken for Asphodel in diplomatic negotiations with Rasen over some matters of privacy that had been brokered by Sacromonte and attended by the Watch.

“So if she has a Golden Ram contract, they’re definitely riding that horse to a coup,” Tristan summed up.

“Rams are bovids, Tristan,” Maryam sneered at him. “It’s not even the same family.”

“No one would ride a ram to a coup, Maryam, think of the stairs,” he scorned right back.

“I am definitely imagining you going down a set,” she said.

He narrowed his eyes.

“Funny you would mention bovids, since you’re being a bit of a co-”

“Tristan,” Angharad cut in, outraged. “She is a lady.”

“Well,” he defended, “I wasn’t calling her a bull.”

The pile of paper hit him on the side of the head, sprawling everywhere. Maryam smiled triumphantly even as the thief began to reach for his own pile and Song immediately rose to her feet.

“No,” she strongly said. “The first of you to throw something will-”

The vellum scroll bounced off her forehead, dropping limply on the table. Song turned an incredulous look on Angharad.

“I could not resist,” she admitted.

I took half an hour to put the papers back in order afterwards, but at least Song got her back with a cushion to the face.

—

Lord Menander Drakos was a pleasant man in his fifties, whose impressive imperial mustache grew defiant of gravity.

He was also clearly used to deal with Malani: shortly after informing Angharad he would introduce her as a friend of his traveling nephew, he pulled up a contract for her to sign that declared her friendship to Philippos Drakos. After she signed he immediately burned the paper and beamed, declaring now her a friend of his nephew’s in fact.

“You do not seem unpracticed in such matters,” Angharad observed.

“My services in these matters are employed by both the Lord Rector and the Council of Minister,” Lord Menander replied. “It makes me an intermediary of some value to both.”

Things were different out here in the Trebian, Angharad reminded herself. It was not as in Peredur, where to bring someone into good society was to stake your reputation on their subsequent appropriate behavior. To think of the man as an introductions pimp would be unkind, if not entirely untrue. Honor looked a different beast to these Asphodelians – she’d read there were hardly any duels at all on the isle, that they were frowned upon.

Though Angharad had been prepared to use her sole fine dress twice in a day, she was pleasantly surprised to find that arrangements had been made otherwise. Lord Menander opened to her the wardrobe of his house, allowing her to borrow garments that would be adjusted to fit before the reception. The Pereduri ended up picking a conservative high-necked gown with puffed sleeves, green velvet with matching slippers, keeping her Uthukile bead bracelets for sole jewelry.

The long sleeves also hid her mirror-dancer’s stripes, which was for the best.

She would admit to some nervousness in the hour preceding the beginning of the reception, not helped by the way Song was pacing back and forth across the waiting room like an irritated tigress. The Thirteenth’s captain had learned that she was to have a minder while she studied the guests from a hidden gallery, which had her displeased.

“It does not seem unreasonable to require watching eyes as you use your contract on courtiers,” Angharad delicately tried.

Song’s piercing silver eyes turned on her.

“A simple watcher I would suffer with little grumbling,” she said, “but the way they refuse to give me a name or title for them bodes ill.”

Angharad simply nodded, keeping her thoughts to herself. The Lord Rector was free to do as he wished inside his own palace, she figured, but it would not do to pull the tigress’s tail. Song did not resume pacing afterwards, which had the noblewoman cursing herself. She had avoided the presence of Song Ren as much as she politely could over the last few weeks, but there could be no avoiding rudeness in insisting on silence while they waited together in a room.

“Have we any notion of when Maryam will return?” she asked.

That could turn talk to her contract, at least, which would be better than-

“Late tonight,” Song replied. “It will take some effort to give her a discreet tour of the gardens.”

-better than her near future, Angharad miserably thought.

“And before you reach for Tristan in your despair, the majordomo has him practicing so he won’t dishonor the livery leant to him,” Song mildly added.

Angharad awkwardly coughed into her fist. It always felt ungrateful, to avoid Song, but what else could she do? She would not feign comradery with a woman who had treacherously murdered someone she cared for, though it sometimes slipped out of her against her will. It had been… easy, to play with the Thirteenth earlier. But she could not be one of them, not really, even beyond Song.

She was here for the infernal forge. It would be unworthy to drag the others in what may yet turn out to be ruin.

“He seems to be taking to that task without discomfort,” Angharad said. “I expected some discontent on his part in playing the servant for nobles.”

“If there is one thing I admire about Tristan Abrascal,” Song evenly said, “it is how he will fold his pride like a paper crane if that is what it takes to get where he wants to go.”

She cocked an eyebrow.

“Unlike you and I, who occasionally struggle in cramming it through wide open doorways.”

Angharad’s lips thinned.

“I am grateful for the favors done to me,” she said.

“But.”

Silver eyes unblinking, metal cold as snow. The Pereduri breathed in.

“What do you want from me, Song?” she asked. “I have not challenged your authority or refused your orders. The rest is beyond the remit of our bargain.”

“I want you to decide what it is you’re after,” Song Ren replied. “You flit back and forth like a moth in a hall full of candles, blown by wind and whim.”

Angharad’s jaw clenched.

“I look at you and I see a dozen intentions, none of them yours,” Song continued. “We are stone shaped by the chisel of life – best get your hand on the tool, Angharad, or you may not enjoy what others made of you.”

The Tianxi pushed off the wall, brushing her shoulders.

“I should prepare supplies for my part of the evening,” she said. “Good luck out there.”

Angharad curtly nodded back, not trusting herself to open her mouth and offer anything but venom. The sheer nerve of her, to serve up a lecture as if Song Ren were not taut as a pulled bowstring under that thin layer of calm. She had seen harps not as high-strung as the Tianxi.

Though her face was calm again by the time Lord Menander’s servants came to fetch her, embers burned beneath and stayed as she was led out into the hall.

This narrative has been purloined without the author’s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

The palace feasting hall that had been leant to Menander Drakos as a sign of the Lord Rector’s favor was impressive, the floor and walls green marble of a hue matching that of the strange green glass so common on Asphodel. The hall was a long rectangle, but one would not know it from a glance: there was a maze of glass panes and lamps on the sides that projected myriad tricks of the eye, lending the room a hundred different shapes. Only subtle gold reliefs on the walls displaying the owl of House Palliades allowed one to tell the true apart from the false.

She forced herself to smooth the last of her anger out of existence as she was led to the side of the host.

“Ah, and there she is,” Lord Menander happily said. “Lady Angharad herself.”

He was standing with a pair slightly older than he, both men. The short, white-haired man with the sea snake embroidered on his red jerkin must be the head of House Cordyles – which ruled over the largest western port of Asphodel – while the slender man with the soft hand and spectacles was given name by his silver belt buckle in the shape of crossed sickles. House Arkol: eastern nobles, the largest grain fields outside of Tratheke Valley, she mentally recited.

She waited after having met their gazes to curtsy. Not the duelist’s, this time. It would have been a lie.

“It is an honor to meet you, my lords,” Angharad said.

“Is it now?” Lord Cordyles drily said.

“Naturally,” she smiled. “The ships under red-and-gold of the Cordyles are a known for their bold sailing, and I have been curious to try the famous Arkoli bread.”

Precise phrasing, here. The Cordyles were known for boldly resorting to piracy on Raseni shipping, and the regional breaded delicacy known as ‘Arkoli bread’ was reputedly so full of garlic one continued to sweat it out for days afterwards. Lord Arkol only snorted, eyes unreadable behind the glasses, but Lord Cordyles seemed quite flattered.

“It is good to know even in such peaceful time my house is remembered,” Lord Cordyles smiled. “Menander tells us you are a friend of his nephew’s, come from the isle of Peredur?”

Angharad inclined her head.

“Circumstances led me to Asphodel, and will have me remain here for some time,” she said. “It was a great kindness for Lord Menander to invite me at his nameday feast.”

Lord Cordyles’ eyes dipped down to her cane, curiosity obvious on his face.

“Court has been getting a little stale,” Lord Arkol mused. “Perhaps some fresh blood will wash out the endlessly circling conversations.”

Lord Menander chuckled, wagging a finger in warning.

“No politics tonight, Phaedros,” he chided. “We are here to eat, drink and make merry.”

“That and celebrate your forty-fifth nameday for what – the seventh time now?” Lord Arkol grinned.

“Mine is a timeless soul,” Lord Menander airily replied, grinning back. “Come, Lady Angharad. I will deliver you from these old crows, see if some finer company cannot be rustled up.”

He whisked her away, toward more guests, though on the way he slowed his steps to slide in a word.

“Nicely done with Lord Cordyles,” he murmured. “He loves nothing more than the battle honors he lacks. Arkol is always stone-faced until he’s had a few drinks, worry not there.”

He glanced at her almost approvingly.

“If you can continue as you’ve begun, we will have you a darling of the court in no time.”

It was not what Angharad had come for, not truly, but neither would she balk at making a good impression. Gently he led her forward, waiting on the rap of her cane, and Angharad put on a smile. She must impress Lord Menander, enough that he might make the right introduction. And though she owed the Thirteenth good service, that was not why. Uncle Osian had given her a name to investigate, one that would be the key to all this.

Lord Cleon Eirenos was rumored to know the hills of Tratheke better than anyone, and that was where the entrance to the shipyard was meant to be – and thus the way to the infernal forge she had come here to claim.

—

The viewing gallery had, despite the name, plainly been made for spying: it was a long, narrow rectangle of a room just wide enough for seats that overlooked the banquet hall. The glass pane windows were green as the ones below and the marble around them, but set close to the ceiling at an angle that would make them seem part of the wall when seen from inside the hall. Cleverly built, and no doubt the Lord Rectors had long made use of it despite the mild discomfort of the narrowness of the room.

Only it was not having to tuck her legs beneath the chair that had Song feeling stiff as a board.

When the two lictors at the door made her surrender her knife and pistol before patting her down, Song thought it laughable. What did they expect of her, to shoot some lord through the glass like Vesper’s most terribly incompetent assassin? Only it was not the men below the lictors were frowning at her about, but the one seated inside.

Lord Rector Evander Palliades was leaning forward, chin on his palm as he studied the nobles below.

“Captain Ren,” he acknowledged without turning. “Your cabalist is doing well – she’s charmed Triton Cordyles, which effectively guarantees her introductions to half the guests. He’s an amiable soul, if prone to stepping on toes.”

“Your Excellency,” Song got out, bowing as much as she could inside the cramped gallery.

The lictors were glaring at her back as if this were her idea, only closing the door when the Lord Rector glanced at them through his spectacles.

“We shall dispense with the most physical of the courtesies,” Evander Palliades told her. “I fear it would take the removal of a few seats for them to fit inside.”

Song cleared her throat.

“As you say, Your Excellency.”

He gestured impatiently.

“Sit,” he said. “I will only make an appearance shortly before the banquet begins, so you will have to tolerate my presence until then.”

Dark eyes flicked at her through the spectacles.

“If you’ve inquiries about the souls below, I am your disposal.”

Stiltedly, Song went to sit down. The mostly blank journal she had brought along with her favorite ink and fountain pen now felt heavy as stone – it was one thing to take notes about the nobles of Asphodel, another to do so when their ruler was mere feet away from her. She left a seat between them and would have left a second and third were she not worried about giving offense. Treating the man like he had the plague was unlikely to be well received.

Keeping her face calm, hand on the chisel, Song opened her book and turned the pages until she reached the notes she had prepared in advance. The list of seven suspected cultists and a column outlining the leading eastern houses of Asphodel. Entirely shameless, the Lord Rector leaned over to look at what was written without even pretending otherwise.

She had written in Cathayan, naturally, but her hopes that would be enough to stop his scrutiny were laid to rest when he quite clearly began reading the characters. It was an effort not to scowl.

“Neither the Doukas nor the Elanos will be showing so early, but Lady Kirtis is the woman in the rust-red gown sneering at servants,” he told her.

It did not take long for Song to find the woman in question, the trail of that gown long enough it needed carrying by a handmaiden. The sneer was, as advertised, being turned on the liveried servants offering drinks. More interesting than that expected yiwu ugliness was that Penelope Kirtis had a contract, which thankfully was in Antigua touched with local flavor.

That the old Cycladic cant native to the isle was effectively a dead tongue was a relief, as it would have forced her to mark down everything she saw and attempt translation later.

Lady Kirtis was contracted to a deity called the ‘Clement Reverence’, having obtained the power to imbue a particular concept with a powerful sense of shame in the minds of those around her. The price was one of those deceptively vicious ones, forcing the noblewoman to confess to her own shames or become sick. Song wrote notes and, all too aware of the Lord Rector’s eye, kept them both short and mixed.

She abandoned classical Cathayan altogether, weaving together Centzon, Machin and Samratrava so he would not be able to decipher what she wrote. She braced herself for coming tantrum, ready to take refuge behind the neutrality of the Watch, only instead Evander Palliades let out a quiet laugh.

“I have some Centzon, but my Samratrava is trash and is that Machin?”

She coughed into her fist.

“It is, Your Excellency,” she admitted.

“Well, you may consider me successfully warded off,” he drily said. “I had to fight to learn proper Cathayan, Machin was never in the cards.”