Page 65 of The Sundered Realms

Not the part where he wanted to accuse Liris as a spy, but since she’d told Vhannor not to worry about that he was apparently taking her at her word.

That, Liris wasn’t sure if she’d get used to.

She hoped so.

“We now also know,” Vhannor said, “neither of us was acting in bad faith: someone is, provably, trying to prevent either the coalition or Otaryl’s entry into it. Before you dispel the sabotage, you have an opportunity to track where your messages are being redirected. If your own vetted casters’ efforts aren’t successful, send a messenger to me on foot.”

Representative Hyorem rubbed his temples. “You know it’s not that simple, Vhannor. This anchor is monitored by guards who are also vetted—admittedly not by me personally, but the guards for my official seal are. That Otaryl could be infiltrated this easily with all our precautions doesn’t bode well. What if we welcome in outside agents from Special Operations, and they take us over? How could we know they are who they say they are, and how would anyone else?”

Vhannor regarded him steadily. “Will you let criminals decide for you, then, whether you support the Coalition?”

Representative Hyorem glared again, though his heart didn’t seem to be in it. “That’s not what I said.”

“I imagine,” Liris said quietly, “you may be considering that tightening restrictions, and your walls, is the only way to be safe. I promise that won’t work the way you want it to.”

Hyorem looked at her, the person he suspected hailed from doomed Serenthuar.

And looked away.

As they left, Liris asked Vhannor quietly, “Do you think we mattered? I feel like even though we helped by solving a mystery, we turned Hyorem’s insistence on joining the Coalition into doubt.”

“Nysia will take it from here,” Vhannor said. “Now that she knows the problem, she’ll be able to handle it. That was our mission, and we succeeded.”

They had. And it had taken both of them.

But Liris was quiet the rest of the way, because he hadn’t directly answered her first question. And despite the previous miscommunication between them, she wasn’t sure she wanted to know for sure if that had been on purpose.

Something was afoot. All she was really sure of was that she was several steps behind. Now that Jadrhun knew they could catch him at this...

He was either going to get subtler, or he was going to do something really, really big.

Chapter 10

Periannolu speaks a mashup of High Enchor and a Methilari-adjacent dialect that resulted in an extremely infuriating ablative case, but fortunately they’re great with loan words, even more so now that it’s fashionable post-Sundering. Surprisingly little tension between proponents of traditional agrarian lifestyle versus modern industry, but only because those battles were fought openly in the early days of recovery. It wouldn’t be impossible to re-stoke, but the potential gain for Serenthuar makes the effort not worthwhile—Periannolu is too many portals away.

It could easily be worth it for Periannolu’s less wealthy neighbors, though. And as closely as their shipping operations are monitored, given the scale of the operation, I know exactly how I’d go about slipping through.

You know, if that were ever called for.

Liris had only been training with Shry for a few minutes when Vhannor interrupted them on the mat.

“We have a mission, and we need to go now,” he said without preamble.

Liris glanced up at him, startled by Vhannor’s appearance here—and he stood out, not dressed for sparring.

No doubt that was why people were staring.

Or maybe it was because the Lord of Embhullor had casually strode into their gym and publicly treated Liris like an equal partner. Hard to say.

She bowed slightly to Shry. “My apologies. It appears I’ll have to reschedule.”

“Oh, I’m coming too,” Shry announced, looking like she was daring Vhannor to argue with her.

His expression didn’t crack. “Fine, but you’ll be bored.”

Her grin was sharp. “Last-minute missions have a way of making themselves exciting.”

Liris said, “I’ll go pack—“

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