Page 83 of Night's Reckoning
“That’s nothing to them. And I wasn’t her partner,” he muttered. “Obviously.”
“Oh, bullshit.” Fabia measured the water levels in a tank that had just had new artifacts put in. “You have one fight—”
“It’s not one fight. It’s years of constant fighting. Constant bickering. Her constantly ignoring my advice—”
“And you ignore her advice too,” Fabia said. “You’re like an old married couple. I don’t know what changed.”
“Puerto Rico changed it.” He shook his head. “I changed, and she won’t. I’m human, and she’s not, and I finally realized why this is all doomed to failure, so I’m cutting my losses and getting out.”
Fabia was crouched on the deck, looking at a broken jar through the clear plastic. She looked up. “She has changed, Ben. You spend most of your time with her, so you don’t see it. But she’s changed. She’s different now. She doesn’t scare me anymore.”
“She should.”
Fabia snorted. “Now you just sound like an ass. You sound like the guy who breaks up with his girlfriend and then tells everyone she’s crazy.”
“You do realize—” Ben cut himself off. He knew Tenzin was mentally unstable, and she had been for years. She only had a tenuous grip on reality at times, and her moral code was forged in prehistory. But he didn’t need to share that with Fabia. “Let’s just focus on this. How much of the cargo would you estimate has been removed?”
Fabia shook her head. “Honestly, it’s very hard to tell. If the ship was packed evenly—”
“Cheng said to assume that it was. Balance thing.”
Fabia nodded. “That makes sense. Then I’d say that in one night, they’ve removed approximately a third of the remaining cargo.” She stood. “Which is just… superhuman.”
“Considering they are superhuman, that makes sense.”
Her voice dropped. “That third is counting the parts that are not showing up in the official record, by the way.”
Ben looked up from his notebook.
“Come on,” Fabia said quietly. “I told you they were documenting the location of each jar. I can see the gaps. Did you think no one would notice? It was fairly clear that artifacts had been removed, even before they started the actual excavation.”
Ben kept his voice soft. “I have been told that nothing of unique historical significance—”
“And do you believe them?” Fabia cocked her head. “Really? I mean, you’re taking their word for it. How do you know that Cheng and his men—”
“Stop.” Ben drew her away to a far corner of the aft deck where the wind carried their words away. “Okay, continue.”
“How do you know that Cheng is being honest? He could have his own aims in all this.”
“He was hired because Tenzin trusts him.”
“And is that a good idea? Is he worthy of that trust? I am honestly asking because I do not know. You said that the loss of this artifact—this priceless sword—could mean war between the East and the West. Do we know that war would not benefit Cheng?”
Ben had been working on the assumption that Tenzin could trust Cheng, but maybe that was a mistake.
“I’m just saying,” Fabia said. “I like Cheng. I like Kadek. Cheng is very charming and very respectful to me and all the human crew. And Kadek is gruff, but I’ve never felt unsafe with him. He’s very competent. But if Penglai is involved in a larger dispute with foreign vampire powers, then they’re not going to be looking his direction. That works to his advantage.”
“So does Zhang owing him a favor.”
“True.” Fabia lifted her hands up. “I don’t know, Ben. You know about all this far more than I do. I am just saying that if they’re willing to hide some things, they could be willing to hide others.”
“You’re not wrong.” Ben took a deep breath. “I need to talk to Zhang, but I don’t know how to get in touch with him. And Tenzin will be pissed off if I even imply I don’t trust Cheng, because she’ll see it as a personal insult.”
“You can contact Zhang,” Fabia said. “Call Andrew. The guy with the plane, remember? Didn’t Zhang’s letter say Andrew reported to him directly? Tenzin wouldn’t even have to know if you didn’t want her to know. Though if I were you, I’d tell her you were contacting—”
“I’ll talk to Andrew first,” he said. “Tell her later.”
Fabia pursed her lips. “Whatever you think.”
