Purattu’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Isn’t it supposed to be secret?”

“High Mystic,” Archon Shabadras said, “as I explained in our previous meeting, our group was selected for a very specific reason. We’re all members of the One Faith here.”

Purattu didn’t see what that had to do with it. Although it was true that he believed in the One Faith, whose members were generally viewed as being paragons of honesty and loyalty… he didn’t know Archon Shabadras or General Kamaru-Ayyabu personally. And because of that, he was hesitant to trust them outright.

Unfortunately, they outranked him, and he could tell that they wanted an answer to the question.

“Jehannemid,” he said. “The Key’s on Jehannemid.” It was the starisle where he’d run across almost an entire continent in a morning, while the Seers he’d conscripted had pissed the day away on shopping and sightseeing.

“Jehannemid,” the general said, tapping his cheroot free of ash. “Why there? Or was it random?”

“I don’t do random things,” Purattu answered. “Of all of the nine starisles subsidiary to Humusi, Jehannemid has the most tenuous political climate. The Mage Parliament is aligned with the dominant faction, but there are other sovereign states which vie for supremacy. One of them is ruled by Sheik Hatim, who’s married to one of High Archon Kingallu’s daughters.”

“Kingallu has a daughter on Jehannemid?” Archon Shabadras said.

“No surprise,” said General Kamaru-Ayyabu. “The man’s over six hundred years old. He’s had dozens of wives through the years, and that’s not to mention all the concubines. I wouldn’t be surprised if he has hundreds of progeny. Thousands even.”

Shabadras frowned. “He has a family member of Jehannemid. So?”

“So he cares for her,” Purattu said. “Before leaving for Humusi, I paid for information about the starisles I visited. I found that, as General Kamaru-Ayyabu just suggested, High Archon Kingallu does have progeny scattered throughout dozens of the starisles subsidiary to Ku-Aya, which is where he originated. But there are only a few that he’s truly interested in. His daughter on Jehannemid is one. Her marriage to Sheik Hatim was the result of political network considerations spanning dozens of starisles. Kingallu himself personally attended the wedding.”

“On Jehannemid?” Shabadra said in shock. “A Stricken starisle?”

“I can’t prove it beyond the shadow of a doubt,” Purattu said, “but I’d bet money on it.”

“It’s not uncommon for mages to go to lower starisles,” the general said, “but for a High Archon to go to such an ignoble place is definitely out of the ordinary.”

“What’s more, he regularly corresponds with the girl. When I found out about that, an idea occurred to me. So I dug for some more information about Jehannemid. And when I was there, I took the liberty of placing some gold shekels in the right hands to, well—” he cleared his throat “—set up a bit of an insurrection.”

“What?” Archon Shabadras blurted. “You did what?”

“I know, I know, it’s illegal,” Purattu said coolly. “But we’re talking about keeping a Gateway Key out of the hands of the Abhorrent. Isn’t a bit of rule-breaking called for? The point is, all it will take is the right message getting to the right person, and a lot of chaos will break out on Jehannemid. And Kingallu’s favorite daughter will be trapped in the middle of it.”

“Well-played, High Mystic Purattu,” the general said. “Very well-played. Over the next month or two, I can lay the foundation with the High Archon, by providing a word here and there about ‘the tenuous situation’ on Jehannemid. When the time comes, I tell him his daughter is going to be in danger, and convince him sending a small force down is the best way to keep her safe. It would be too scandalous for him to personally go there, obviously.”

“If the High Archon himself believes the mission’s purpose to be about his daughter,” Shabadras said, “then even if he’s a cultist, it won’t matter.”

“You think he might be the traitor?” Purattu asked, the hair on his forearms rising up.

“No,” Shabadras replied. “But the traitor does exist. And that… caused us to think of another idea.”

“Oh?”

“We want to spring a trap. Snag this betrayer red-handed.”

“You sure seem to have a lot of time to make plans.”

The General exhaled a long stream of smoke. “We’ve identified one of the new recruits that we think is clean. In fact… we’re certain of it. She’s not from your group, so I won’t bother explaining who she is. But she has a history of conflict with the cult. Her brother was a member, and she uncovered the truth. Killed him in the process.”

“Damn,” Purattu said. “But… how do you know she didn’t kill him because she’s also a member?”

“We know,” the General said. “You can read the report if you want the details. The point is that we trust you, and therefore, we want you to pick her partner from your group of recruits. Someone you’re certain doesn’t have any connections to the cult.”

Purattu fanned smoke out of his face as he thought. “Well, there are three that come to mind.” He turned his eyes up in thought. “No, that one wouldn’t work. Two. Wait. No. One.”

The general reached into a pocket, pulled out a small wax writing tablet with a stylus attached, and slid it across the table. “Write the name there.”

Purattu did so. When he pushed the tablet back across the table, Shabadrass glanced at it and smiled. “I guessed he’d be your pick.”

“I can imagine why,” Purattu said. “Anyway, going back to the mission to get the Key. Like I said, I’ll need to send at least two messages down to Jehannemid. When. And how.”

“Easy,” said Archon Shabadras. “The Parliament already passed an emergency measure to establish contact with all of the Stricken and Deeply Clouded starisles every six to eight weeks. Slip your message into the mix four months from now. By the time news gets back the following later, we can have High Archon Kingallu sufficiently prepped.”

Purattu thought about the timeline. “I suggest acting earlier rather than later. The longer my gold sits in idle hands on Jehannemid, the less effective it will be.”

The general frowned. “Our goal is to have all of the new students reach the High Seer level before we deploy them.”

“Is that more important than getting the Key?”

The general and the archon glanced at each other.

“It will take even more finesse with Kingallu,” Shabadras said, “but we can probably make it happen.”

“Good,” Purattu said. “In the meantime, what do I do? Go back to Ku-Aya and try to flush out the cultist assassins?”

“I’d prefer if you kept a low profile,” Shabadras said.

“I was kidding.”

The general stubbed the final bit of his cheroot out in an ashtray. “Very funny. Go back to Ku-Aya and stay low. Maybe try to spread the word of how convinced you are that you didn’t have the real Gateway Key.”

“Isn’t that what they’d expect the person with the real Key to do?”

“You weren’t supposed to know that you had the real Key.”

How do people like this end up in charge of things? Purattu thought, closing his eyes so the two men wouldn’t see him roll them. “If I figured out which one was the real Key, don’t you think others might have been able to also? I put the pieces together with information, not by doing tests on the thing.”

Shabadras and General Kamaru-Ayyabu exchanged a glance.

“Anything’s possible,” the general said. “Just do whatever you can to confuse the enemy. Get ready to send that message, and also plan out your route once the entire operation is carried out. You have six months.”

“Or less,” Purattu said.

“Or less.”

Purattu pushed his chair back and stood from the table. Sounds like things are going to be boring for a while.