Perfect Shadow Read Online Free PDF Page B

back. The man wasn’t there. Gaelan made it up to the rooftops, jumping from wall to wall. He strung his long bow and checked his arrows.
    True to his word, Polus Merit was walking slowly, not two blocks away, along the edge of the Plith. A quiet section where it would be easy to dispose of the body. A hundred paces away.
    ~You’re better than this. This isn’t you, Acaelus.~
    It is now. Half a breath out, the blessed stillness before murder.
    He released the arrow. Perfect shot, base of the skull. Instant death. Polus crumpled.
    When he went to roll the body into the river, Gaelan found a note in Polus’s hand. It had just two words: “Thank you.”
    * * *
    Nigh unto seven centuries ago, there was a magical conflagration at the Fall of Trayethell, the Battle of the Black Barrow. Magic to blot out the sun, to rend the earth. Magic seen two hundred leagues away, and felt across the oceans.
    It was said that on that last day, having lost friends, wife, and battle, and hope, the Emperor Jorsin Alkestes took up the two greatest magical artifacts ever made or found. He was the first and only man ever to hold both at once. With them, his magical abilities, already legendary, were amplified a thousandfold. He took in all the power of Iures and Curoch—and it killed him.
    But it didn’t kill him alone.
    * * *
    “What do you know of the ka’kari?” I ask Yvor Vas, draining my fourth ale.
    “I know about them,” the freckled idiot says. “Otherwise why would I be talking with you? And you know everything about them, so why are you asking?”
    “I know what I know. What I don’t know is what you think you know. And if you use that tone again, you’ll be picking it up from the floor.”
    “What tone?” Yvor asks, petulant.
    My fist crosses the boy’s jaw. He flies off his stool and lands flat on the floor. Most satisfying.
    “That tone,” I say.
    “You broke my fucking tooth!” the boy complains. His lips are bleeding.
    “My knuckles, on the other hand, are pristine. Odd.”
    Hot, barely restrained rage flares in his eyes. The boy picks himself up and takes a moment to master his anger. I watch his eyes closely. Finally, he says, “There were six ka’kari. One for each of Emperor Jorsin Alkestes’ Champions of Light. They were created by Jorsin’s archmage, Ezra, during the Battle of Black Barrow. The Society of the Second Sun believes they confer immortality—the bearers of the ka’kari can still be killed, but if not killed, you live forever. Maybe not forever, but at least seven hundred years, which seems close enough to me. Most in the Society believe that you were originally Shrad Marden, bearer of the blue ka’kari, friend of Jorsin Alkestes.”
    Friend? Did you have friends, Jorsin? I thought I was one, but now I’m not so sure. “And you? What do you believe?”
    “I think you were and are Eric Daadrul, the bearer of the silver ka’kari. Impervious to blades and able to form them in your hands by thought alone.”
    * * *
    “There’s a small rumor that Polus Merit might be dead,” Gwinvere Kirena said. “Something about him giving a fortune to one of my girls.” They were in one of her houses, in a small, well-appointed library. She was wearing a casual blue dress that still managed to accentuate her curves.
    “Can you hush it up?” Gaelan asked.
    “This is the kind of thing that can get worse if you try to quash it. Wetboys frequently disappear for weeks at a time. Sometimes they give money to their favorite rent girl in case they don’t come back. It doesn’t mean anything yet. I don’t know the girl well enough to lean on her and be completely sure what she’d do. So I’d say we have four nights.”
    “Who’s next?” Gaelan asked.
    “Saron and Jade Marion.”
    “Two at once? Siblings?”
    “Husband and wife. More than a little crazy.”
    “Anyone who chooses this work is crazy,” Gaelan said.
    “They have a seven-year-old son.”
    “So I’m making an orphan.