Page 39 of The Tainted Cup

“W-well…say you want to apply a suffusion to a riverweed,” said Nusis. She was rattled now, a gleam of sweat on her brow. “Tomake it grow less in a river. But you find the alteration also causes mold in the river to growmore,and the mold then turns highly acidic when it washes up on a dam downstream, slowly weakening it, imperiling a town below…that kind of thing. These changes have to be well thought out. The slightest alteration threatens enormous effects. Apothetikals and Engineers are the most frequent liaisons on these evaluations, and Blas was very active with us.”

“But what the hell did hedo,exactly?” asked Ana, frustrated.

“Well…he reviewed artifices, infrastructures, and constructions that could either be vulnerable to or might enable the escape of contagion from Talagray,” she said. “This is not terribly unusual work, mind…”

“Hm. I see…” Ana said, now sounding bored. “And Captain Miljin? Didyouknow Blas?”

Miljin shook his head. “Saw him at a distance, ma’am,” he said. His voice was deep and raspy, like his throat was lined with smoking oil. “But never so much as heard the man’s voice.”

“Fine,” said Ana. “So…would those who had met him please tell me more about thenatureof the man? I’ve heard precious little about that aspect.”

Uhad shrugged. “He was the image of professionalism. Polite. Studious.”

“Very well admired,” agreed Kalista. “Especially within my Iyalet. He had no enemies that I was aware of.”

“He spoke wisely, and when he spoke, he was listened to,” said Nusis.

“I see…” said Ana. She flapped a hand at me. “Thank you. Now—Din. Do the thing.”

I’d tried to make myself inconspicuous thus far, and didn’t much like having so many superior officers look at me. I stood up, bowed, but paused. “Ah—what exactly would you like me to tell them, ma’am?” I asked.

“All of it,” she said. Another flap of her hand. “The full vomit, boy!”

“Right…” I said. “Well. Hold on, then.” Again, I took out the vial of lye-scent, sniffed it, let the memories come pouring into the backs of my eyes, and started talking.

—

I GAVE THEMthe exact same description of the events as I had to Commander-Prificto Vashta. I left nothing out. When I finished, there was a long, lingering silence. I sat back down, replaced the lye vial, and sniffed at the grass one to make sure I captured the rest of the present moment accurately.

“So…” said Uhad slowly. “The groundskeeper met the assassin. But…their face was swollen?”

“Such was his testimony,” said Ana. “I believe there are many disfiguring grafts one could apply, with varying levels of permanence…”

Captain Miljin rumbled to life, clearing his throat rather extensively. “This is so,” he said. “Dernpaste is the preferred one. Swells the areas you apply it to, makes it so your own mother wouldn’t know you. Skin tone’s harder to alter, but…Well. They have stuff for that, too.”

“And I suppose if you all had seen some shadowy figure with a swollen face,” said Ana, “skulking around Blas here with a piece of dappleglass in their hand, you’d have mentioned it by now.”

“Of course,” said Uhad. “But Blas was very active. He moved around a great deal.Manypeople knew him.”

“What investigatory steps have you taken for him here?” asked Ana.

“With the wet season approaching,” said Uhad, “we’ve only been able to do the minimum, unfortunately. The Apoths reviewed Blas’s offices and living quarters. They found nothing of note.”

“All right…” Then Ana paused. She seemed to be waiting for something. Her smile slowly retracted, and she swiveled her blindfolded face about the table. “Is thatall? No one hasanythingelse to say on the matter?”

An uneasy silence followed. Kalista watched Ana, her dark eyesheavily lidded. Nusis stared at the floor, like Ana had just made some embarrassing blunder in etiquette. Uhad watched nobody, his pupils dancing as memories flooded his mind. And Miljin, to my surprise, watched me, arms crossed, his gaze inscrutable.

“Unfortunately,” drawled Kalista, “nothing comes to mind.”

“I see…” said Ana. “Well then. One critical takeaway is that the perpetrator had to be operating here, in Talagray, for weeks if not months. This is the only way they could have known Blas’s movements.”

“That doesn’t necessarily narrow it down,” said Uhad. “There’s a lot of movement here in the months before the wet season.”

“Of course,” said Ana. “But there’s been one distinct signal that dappleglass gives off. One that even Din here, who’d never heard of it before, noticed right away.”

They all looked atme.

“Fernpaper,” I said. “It stains it.”