Page 78 of The Eyes of Tamburah
“No, I told him the symbol represented a secret organization who claimed they could use magic.” And that reminded her of a question that’d been bothering her. “Why did you leave your…our…symbol in the vault for Banqui to find?”
“We wanted him to know we had The Eyes,” Ximen said.
“Why not just tell him?” It would have saved her a lot of trouble and pain.
“Too easy. Our members must prove their worth. Banqui suspected we existed and he was close to discovering the truth. And his will is strong—none of our magic worked on him, which is one of the signs of our true leader. We hoped the symbol would allow him to make the connection and find us.”
“It did,” she said, remembering his reaction and his crazy story. She needed to apologize to him.
“But right after you discovered the symbol, the prince’s guards arrested you both,” Ximen said. “You had some nice moves. Too bad you were outnumbered.”
She rounded on him. “You were there. Why didn’t you help?”
“Nothing I could do.”
Still.
“Do the vagrants know you’re part of the Invisible Sword?” she asked Jayden.
“Only those who are members as well. And no, Mojag is not one of the them. Not yet.”
“Did you sing me to sleep after you rescued me from the deacons?” she demanded.
“You were injured and too stubborn to accept help. I—”
Ximen cleared his throat. “Back to the plan, Jay.”
“Right. So you’re our prisoner for a few sun jumps and then you ingratiated yourself into our organization, helping us with our efforts. It takes a while, but we start to trust you and then…pow!”
“Pow?” Now he sounded more like Mojag.
“You steal The Eyes and make a run for it. We pursue you, but you bolt for the monastery and as soon as you get inside the monks will protect you. We back off and put a bounty on your head.”
She sighed. Another bounty. “Do you have to do that?”
“Yes, so everyone believes you stole them from us.”
“Us? I though you…we were invisible.”
“We are, but treasure hunters are not.”
Lots of details and even more questions. “Your…our members pretend to be treasure hunters?”
“No pretending. Many are. How do you think we finance our operations?”
Clearly she had a lot to learn about the extent of this Invisible Sword. “So I’ve been helping you find treasures?”
“Yes.” Ximen beamed at her as if she’d just mastered a new trick.
“But if you put a bounty on me, then I won’t make it to the Water Prince.” Not alive—an important detail.
“The captain is still at the monastery. He’ll escort you back. As soon as you reach the city, he’ll have you surrounded with armed guards. Once we hear the news that the Water Prince has The Eyes, we’ll drop the bounty,” Ximen explained.
“And you can tell Rendor that the secret organization was just a group of treasure hunters who’ve been laying low until all the ruckus over The Eyes has died before selling them,” Jayden added.
She considered. Convincing Rendor about her adventures would be difficult, he’d demand details and he wasn’t stupid—far from it. Then what would happen if the prince reneged on their deal? So many things could go wrong.
“Let’s say by some miracle everything works as planned. Then what?” she asked.
