I hated to admit it, but Mistra had a knack for scrying and other divination methods which made her not a bad fit as my apprentice. I had half hoped at the start of working with her that I would find her painfully lacking in the right kind of magical talent so I could use it as a reason to find anyone else that I might trust more, but she took to it like a fish to water. Demon bastard or not, she would be able to satisfactorily take over some of my duties and perhaps I could keep up with some of the most sensitive ones myself until it became imperative that I had them over. At least I could try to minimize letting information into the wrong hands for as long as possible.

It wasn’t that I hated Mistra, I just would never be able to fully believe that her intentions would ever fully align with the best interests of the House Yser. Demons are undeniably different from humans in a plethora of ways, especially when it came to their ideas on power and alliances. Humans tended to value and honor alliances even when only sworn on word only, while demons were prone to stabbing each other in the back whenever they found an opportunity that might suit them slightly better. Evonia had always implicitly trusted the Draks and thought that I was paranoid for wanting to keep secrets, she wouldn’t listen to me and staunchly upheld the belief that they would always keep to their word. It always worried me how blindly she allowed herself to trust them and I was afraid that Toria might be following down the same path, I certainly would never even entertain the idea of keeping a demon in my bed.

“I cannot see Matilda,” Mistra said as she motioned towards the basin of water in front of her, “I can sense she exists, but I can’t get a clear image.”

Frowning, I set aside a fresh batch of letters that I was preparing to send out to my informants to warn them not to try to contact me until I contacted them again and made my way over to the table where Mistra had been tasked with checking on some various informants I hadn’t heard from in a while. She moved from the chair in front of the basin and I took her place, letting the water settle from the vibrations of us moving before extending a tendril of my will over the surface and letting it hum at the natural magical frequency of water. The surface of the water responded by rising up and melding with my will, smoothing out into a perfect mirror through which I only had to express my desired image. I focused on who Matilda was and where she should be and felt the water tense as it began to search. After waiting for longer than I would usually expect, the basin quivered and showed a very cloudy image that could have been anything or anyone.

“That’s exactly what I was getting,” Mistra said. “I’ve tried several times and I can’t get the image to clear.”

Forcing more of my will into the tendril caressing the water I tried to brute force the image to clear. The whole basin began to shake as I poured more and more power into the connection, but even though I scaled up until the basin threatened to splash everywhere I could not gain any additional clarity. Something was not right, someone or something was creating a barrier around Matilda to prevent her from being being watched. It was not something I had ever run into before, generally it seemed that people, even the few who were magically aware were not cognizant about the possibility of magical spying. Furthermore, Matilda was not even aware how exactly I watched her and I had never given her cause to suspect, so I would doubt she would come to the conclusion or be skilled enough herself to stop it even if she did.

“Could it be she’s around some sort of material that causes magical interference?”

“It’s in the realm of possibilities,” I replied, “though that would have to be something intentionally set up to do so, unless she’s underground in some sort of cave filled with the right kind of crystals.”

“Not likely then, she must know she’s being watched.”

“That shouldn’t bother her, she knew I kept close tabs on her always, even if she didn’t know the method. In fact, that’s exactly what she agreed on when she pledged herself as an informant. If she’s suddenly blocked from me it’s not of her own doing.”

“Would the people around her be able to figure it out and have the means to do this? What about her makes her an important informant?”

I glanced at the demon sideways and considered just how much I was willing to tell her. Matilda was not at the top of my list as far as someone I needed to keep under wraps at all costs, but she did have access to very valuable information that would be sorely missed if her communication was to be interfered with or corrupted. On the other hand, it seemed that perhaps that was already happening.

“Figure it out?” I considered aloud. “It would depend on the wrong person getting involved with her which has never been a problem before, though it’s technically possible and maybe even plausible. As for if they would have the means, that’s certainly true, they could easily both determine the materials needed and be able to find someone with the knowledge to set it up, cost would be of no consequence for them either.”

“Ah, so the Great Church is involved,” she said, recognition flashing across her face. “They would want to seal that avenue off for certain if they expected anyone like the Ysers listening in.”

Of course the girl was going to easily figure it out, she was clever. It was likely a fool’s errand trying to keep anything from her to start with, though that wouldn’t stop me from at least trying.

“Matilda is a relatively low ranking priestess who has intentionally never let herself shine in any particular area and keeps to herself, I see no reason why she would end up being noticed for anything. We have been working together for well over two decades with no one the wiser, it seems strange they would figure it out now after all this time.”

“People slip up as they age,” she suggested, “perhaps she wrote something down she shouldn’t have or spoke something aloud she meant to only think. Sometimes older people find it hard to keep their thoughts quiet and motives stealthy.”

“She’s still decently young,” I said with a glare, “somewhere around forty if I remember correctly. Though if I listen to you perhaps I’m not to be trusted for my memory or judgment.”

“I didn’t mean it like that.” She had the decency to look flustered and she let out a long sigh. “I often forget that you are old at all, your glamour is so young and convincing and you are still very sharp.” The girl was lying through her teeth, there was no way that someone with her magical prowess couldn’t see right through my glamour, but I had to at least give her credit for having the insight to feign inability to help save my pride. “Also, you know that demons live much longer, I’m used to a hundred being early middle age, my father has lived at least double your life time and is still just on the cusp of being considered a bit old, it’s sometimes hard to make my mind make the necessary transitions, especially now that we’re in the demon realm.”

“How does that work with you?” I asked, hoping to steer the conversation focus off of me and my aging body.

She shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know, demons seem to age much like humans for the first couple decades of their lives, then rapidly slow down and hover at what you would call young adulthood. I’ve just reached that stage, so it might be another twenty years or so before it can be judged if my aging is human or demonic. I’m torn on between which I would like it to be.”

“Torn?” I laughed a bit bitterly. “I would think you’d want the extremely long lifespan, most anyone would.”

“It has its downsides, a lot of my favorite people and friends are humans, it would be very sad to watch them all fade away and leave me behind.”

“You would find new ones, life goes on.”

“It isn’t just that simple,” she said softly, “not everyone can be replaced so easily.”

I figured she was alluding to Toria, though I wondered if like earlier she was just saying what she thought I wanted to hear. If that was what she intended, she was missing the mark anyway, it actually made me feel very uncomfortable to even consider the possibility of her outliving Toria. With no current plans for a proper heir, I didn’t want Toria letting whatever feelings she may have for her consort get in the way to of logic and have her end up declaring that the demon could sit on the throne. I would like to think Evonia and I had done enough work to ensure she would not do something so reckless, but I had seen loving affection get in the way of logic one too many times in my life.

“We’re getting too far off topic,” I muttered and returned my gaze to the basin of water. “Let me try one more time, perhaps it was just some kind of error that I haven’t seen before or there was some unlikely event that she was just in a protected area.”

Entangling my will back into the water, I again brought up my knowledge of Matilda and manifested the same hazy image from before. Frustrated, I was going to give it to the count of ten while infusing as much of my power as I could before giving up when I felt a dam breaking and the image began to sharpen. It did not have to clear very much for fear to grip my heart, the Yser facial structure was very easy to pick up, even when muddled.

“It’s a Yser,” Mistra exclaimed with wonder.

The image of Aela curled it’s lips into a cruel grin as if she could hear what was said.

“I know what’s happened now I think,” I said weakly. “I should have known when there was any interference at all.”

“Yes, you should have.” The voice was very clearly Aela herself.

In a panic I snapped my will away from the water, the sudden severing of power causing the water in ripple violently and spill over the edges of the container.

“Did she just…” Mistra’s eyes were wide. “I didn’t know that could happen.”

I stood up from the table and tipped the basin off the table in anger, getting a bit of satisfaction from hearing the ceramic shatter on the hard stone floor. I couldn’t believe that she was again one step ahead of me and I was not picking up on it until it was already too late.

“It shouldn’t,” I snapped, “but I guess now the mystery of what her specialty is has been solved for me. Aela has always kept her affinity close at hand and I don’t think anyone outside of her sister and maybe the very top of the hierarchy of the Church knew. No wonder she’s risen through the ranks so quickly, they must absolutely love having someone like her in their ranks.”

“What does this mean for us?”

I couldn’t stop shaking and it wasn’t just from rage, this had such far reaching implications that my mind was a chaotic buzz. Everything I could have been working on for the past several years might need to be thrown out, all my contacts in the Church at the very least were now no longer trustworthy. I looked to the stack of ledger books I kept with encoded information I received and fought the urge to immediately chuck them into the fire.

“Nothing I have found out since… who knows when can be trusted anymore,” I whispered. “Every single informant who isn’t in the Church will need to be vetted and double – maybe even triple checked. I can say goodbye to anyone with any Church affiliation, if she’s got the scent she will hunt every single on of them down in no time. She probably already has, she is not the type to show her hand until she thinks she already has all the cards she wants and thinks she knows what you’re holding too.”

Mistra didn’t say anything and instead bent over and began to pick up the pieces of the basin and set them on the table.

“All of this work has been for nothing.”

“I will help you piece everything back together,” she offered.

“You just don’t understand,” I said with a low groan, “if she is this powerful, then she far surpasses what I can do with clairvoyance and therefore I will never be able to be sure if she’s listening in or not.”

“So we find someone who can match her.”

“Someone who matches that level of skill?” I asked rhetorically. “I think I would have done that long ago if I have ever caught wind of someone like that.”

“Yes, but you mostly focused on the humans you knew,” Mistra said gently, “I know a whole other subset of people. It might still be a long shot, but there are plenty of powerful demons and other creatures who might be of use.”

“And I will trust none of them.”