“The very same. He will be no bother. I only want him to learn firsthand what you do and report his findings back to me. I want to know the fate of the horn—that it is safe, and with it, the future of the empire.”

“That’s assuming I go to Dibben.”

“Of course.”

“Which I’m not.”

“I understand.”

That was the problem. Farilane believed Proust understood far too much.

Chapter 7: The Ferry

Chapter Seven
The Ferry

Farilane threw her cape on the floor, once more remembering her forgotten mental note to obtain a coat rack or at least a wall hook. She crossed the maelstrom of her office and took a seat at the desk, where she thumbed through some recently obtained parchment pages that lay in two piles. She stared at them for no more than a minute before screaming in frustration, then followed this by pounding her forehead on the desk.

It’s all so pointless, she thought in frustration. Even if I win, I lose—

She heard breathing that wasn’t hers.

Looking up, she spotted Kile seated near the window. Most of him was hidden by a monstrous stack of scrolls. Leaning back, she peered around the pile. The scrivener sat on the big, cushioned chair that she’d been using as just another storage space. The recently dislodged pile of clothes—topped with the remains of yesterday’s dinner and a hairbrush she thought she’d lost—were placed as neatly as possible on the floor. Kile sat with his feet flat, knees together, elbows in, palms on thighs, and fingers dangling off his knees like epaulet fringe. On his face was his puppy smile. If he’d had a tail, she imagined it would be wagging.

“What are you doing here?”

“I wanted to let you know I’m packed and ready to go.”

“So you’re saying goodbye?”

“No.” The puppy face faded to a puzzled frown.

“Then I don’t understand. Why have you packed?”

Kile continued to appear confused. Then his eyes focused on the center of her forehead.

She pretended to look up. “There’s a mark, isn’t there?”

“Small one.”

She sighed and shoved back from the desk.

“Something wrong?” Kile asked.

“Remember that horn we discussed? Well, I’m certain now that it’s missing. What’s more, I strongly suspect its absence could cause the death of thousands—real old-world, Great War-era kind of destruction. According to all the ancient scrolls, the elves weren’t pushovers. Some accounts even suggested we were losing when Nyphron challenged the elven leader to single combat. My grandfather won’t speak to me anymore, so he’ll be of no help, which means no one else will, either. And I have so little to go on, even though”—she waved at the room about them—“this is likely the greatest accumulation of knowledge in the world. So much so that I’m actually running out of space.”