Farrin pulled a chair from beneath an oblong table at the center of the room and sat down, propping his elbows up on the table and resting his chin atop interlocked fingers. “Have you given any thought as to how, exactly, you’re going to reach this lead of yours? Getting a boat through there is nearly impossible in the best of conditions, and scaling the Riven itself is suicidal. You may be able to construct a siege bridge from the Frontier side, but one good gust of wind through the canyon will blow it apart.”
As his reply, Vinzens turned and stared at her. She wrapped both hands around her spear and leaned on it like a walking stick, returning his stare with as vapid a smile as she could muster, so as to force him to answer the question on his own. After all, she was getting paid to make sure he didn’t wind up dead in a ditch somewhere, not relay his words like some court page because he disliked talking. Having a conversation wasn’t a threat to his life.
At least, not in Rivenwall.
Frustrated with either her silence or her expression, he grumbled a curse under his breath and turned back to the magistrate. “The mercenary says she knows of a machinist who’s taken up residence in the ruins of Celsus and who may be able to help.”
“In the ruins of…” Farrin’s eyes widened as he looked past the Vahagan. “Zosime Elketos?”
That a noble-born man would know the name shouldn’t have been as surprising as it was. “You know her?”
“Of course I do.” He chuckled and slouched back in his chair. “Her books were the aspirations of all my teenage years.”
A small laugh escaped her. “Academic or tawdry?”
The man gave a lecherous purr. “Tawdry, of course. What boy blossoming into manhood wouldn’t want to imagine himself able to command so many sultry… favors.” His mood shifted back to an investigative tone. “Anyone in Aushan’s higher academia is aware of the exiled Sophist’s love of machines. But I hear she’s gone utterly mad. Are you certain she will have whatever it is you require?”
“She has fair and foul days, but was never a woman wont to abandon her own works. There’s quite a few gadgets knocking about in her head that she would die rather than surrender, or even put to paper, for that matter.”
Farrin hummed in thought. “And you are certain she will help you?”
“If I ask it of her, she may.” She smiled at the man. “She has no love for the Aushani aristocracy, however, and will like as not set fire to any of you who would think to try.”
The magistrate’s cheeks bunched up in a devious smirk. “Perhaps we should put a bag over the Vahagan’s head, just to make sure she’s amenable to the request.”
Deciding he had no further desire to participate in the conversation, Vinzens uttered a half-frustrated, half-disgusted sigh. “I would ask that we be allowed to stay in the keep for the night before setting out in the morning, Farrin.”
Pale blond brows raised at the request. “I thought you favored staying with our friend out in the farmlands.” He gave the man a vaguely predatory grin. “Beyond my immediate ability to needle you about your life choices, prejudices, and needless solitude.”
After a moment’s consideration, the man shook his head. “I hired vagabonds in an attempt to dissuade the mercenary from her pursuit. I suspect I am no longer welcome there, as I likely caused damage to his tavern in doing so.”
There was an appreciable amount of contrition in both the man’s expression and tone, so much that it seemed wrong to leave him steeping needlessly in guilt.
“His tavern’s fine. I generally avoid damaging the property of people who don’t deserve it.” She slung her spear across the back of her shoulders and moved to look out the windows properly. There was something about being so high above everyone else in the city that was inexplicably funny. “Try it again, though, and I may just bring one of them with me to snap over your head when I track you down.”
Something about the man’s reaction caused Farrin to laugh like a child. “I do have a wonder if Lord Bel had any idea of how capable a foil you would prove for his son. I’ve not seen that face on you since we were schoolboys, my friend!”
“My request still stands,” said Vinzens, voice distinctly more annoyed than a few moments before. “May we overnight here?”
“Yes, of course. Yours has remained untouched. I’ll have the chambers next to it prepared for our newest of friends.”