Star of Darkness: An Inland Sea novel

By Shanon L. Mayer

On the run from killers who hide in the shadows, Jasika has made dangerous enemies and even more dangerous friends. When her guildmaster is killed under suspicious circumstances, she wants retribution. The price on her head, however, has her running for her life.

Soon, all she is left with are her dangerous memories and an ancient box that holds

• Language: English
• Publisher: Shanon Mayer
• Release date: May 12, 2022
• ISBN: 9781087907246

Shanon L. Mayer

After life growing up in the beautifully rainy Pacific Northwest, Shanon L. Mayer tends to keep indoors, writing story after story, building vivid worlds on paper while her thoughts hold everything but images. She tends to look at everything in her world for inspiration - especially her collections of skulls, dragon statues, swords and knives, and pretty much anything that fits her eclectic, geeky-gothic lifestyle. When her busy life feels like too much, she can be found relaxing with a hot mug of tea and a documentary on anything from theoretical physics to deep ocean wildlife to the most famous heists the world has ever seen.

Book preview

1

That’s very dangerous to have, you know.

I assume that means you know what it is, then?

The brightly polished lanterns cast long shadows across the room, flickering slightly as the flames burned through their liquid fuel. Aric fingered the rough pine lid, which was aged enough that the wood had long since turned grey and only the faintest trace of the etchings that had once covered the box were still visible on the surface. A few slivers of silver were all that remained of the once magnificently inlaid design. The lid folded silently down onto the matching weathered box on hinges that looked almost as old as the boards to which they were attached, but which had been more carefully maintained. I do indeed. A hefty bronze padlock clicked into place, ensuring that the package could not be opened again without some effort.

Aric thrummed his fingers across the box for a moment, thoughtful. I can offer you twenty tyros for it.

Jasika brushed a light brown curl off her face and tried not to get too irritated. That wasn’t the deal. He wants to know if you can authenticate it, not how much you’d pay for it. This meeting wasn’t going at all as she had expected it to. If Aric didn’t know what the contents of the box were, or wasn’t willing to tell her if he did, then she’d have to return home empty handed again.

As she looked around at the thick tapestries and rich velvets that covered almost every surface, some of them almost guaranteed to be enchanted for one reason or another, she had no doubts that the fat man could afford to offer her twenty gold coins. Aric’s desk held an assortment of baubles that were displayed to impress, small carved statues, pearl-inlaid snuff boxes, necklaces, brooches, and the occasional ring were carefully placed across his desk, demanding that guests realize how wealthy their host was. Jasika wasn’t impressed. The grandeur in the guildmaster’s meeting room showed quite clearly that he enjoyed far more opulent wealth than did the population he got it from.

Briefly, she wondered for a moment how he had managed to amass such fortune in Brum, but it was none of her business and she wasn’t going to ask. Any questions about the guild’s finances would be tacky at best and sorely offensive at worst.

Besides, twenty gold tyros would hardly be adequate compensation for the value that resided inside the box. Although she had been carrying the box from town to town, from guild to guild for months, she still had no idea what was inside – she’d never looked – but for Tuan to have spent so much effort in acquiring it and even more in finding someone to authenticate it, twenty tyros was an insultingly small offer.

The small amount of curiosity that occasionally reared to ask what was inside queried again, but Jasika stilled it with a silent reminder to herself that not even her own curiosity would cause her to prove Tuan’s trust in her misplaced. If he wanted her to know what was in the box, he would have shown her, or at least spoken of it to her. The fact that he had done neither was clear proof that she was not to know.

Not enough, Jasika? Aric sat back in his silk-covered chair, keeping his fingertips on the wooden box. What if I offered you two hundred? When she gave him not so much as a blink in response, he smiled, revealing two teeth in the left side of his mouth that were conspicuously absent. With another fifty for yourself, of course. His tiny black eyes, sunken deep in his face and surrounded by only the barest of lashes, glittered in the light from dozens of lamps. His eyes weren’t sallow, as Jasika had seen from plenty of people who lived their lives in the darkness of night with few if any glimpses of the sun, but instead were sunken behind mounds of flesh. Aric was easily large enough for two men, possibly even three, despite his short stature. Barely taller than her own five and a half feet, the man was almost as wide as he was tall.

Disgusting.

His tunic and trousers were stretched almost to their limits, even though they had obviously been cut specially for the guildmaster. Pale green velvet covered most of his tunic, bordered by threads that could easily have been pure gold, threads that continued onto his dark white breeches. His boots ended fashionably mid-calf, but the leather had been strained from reigning in his bulk and hung loosely despite the shining buckles. Gold and silver rings strangled each of his fingers, and a massive emerald-encrusted golden charm hung from a silver chain around his neck.

His hair hung in dark brown waves that would have looked better had it been cleaned recently. His hands, every bit as pudgy and bloated as his face, were soft and bereft of callous, further stating that this man had been guildmaster a long time and had not labored with his hands since becoming such.

In stark contrast to his luxurious attire, Jasika was simply dressed. As usual, she wore a plain cotton tunic, once brown but faded by the sun, and darker brown breeches beneath with a belt to match. Her belt held two small pouches, one cotton and one leather, and a small sheath which held her only visible weapon: a six-inch dagger. Even her boots were plain brown and scuffed from months of wear. Her hair, purposefully kept short, was currently a light brown in color and blue-green eyes stared unblinkingly at the mass of moving flesh across the desk from her.

Five hundred, Aric leaned forward in his chair, eager to close the deal. Five hundred tyros for your guildmaster and an additional hundred for you. He smiled at her but his eyes were cold, calculating. She could almost smell the greed as it oozed out of him, sickly sweet offers of gold in amounts that most people could ill afford to turn down. He dropped another covetous glance down at the box and she resisted the urge to slap his eyes deeper into his head for fear that they would fall out, considering how much he was ogling her charge.

Unfortunately for Aric, Jasika was no ordinary person and needed none of his gold.

She blinked slowly at him, a trick one of her dearest friends taught her long ago. For him to increase the offer by such an amount, plus adding in an obvious bribe the item in the box had to be worth a substantial amount after all, and letting him see how disinterested she was would only cause a man with an ego as large as Aric’s to talk more, perhaps talk enough to give her something of value to take home besides just his offer of gold. Despite her external indifference, a tingle of excitement ran up her spine at the realization that Tuan hadn't been wrong. Whatever was in the box was valuable.

She was careful to not let her excitement show, however, as she calmly reached across the cluttered desk and slipped the box out from under Aric’s sweaty hands. I think we’re done here. She stood and turned to leave.

As I have already told you, I am here for an appraisal, not to sell.

Wait, my dear, Aric was swift to his feet as she moved. Just a moment, would you?

She turned to face him, suppressing a derisive snort as he stepped around the desk and stopped next to her. She wouldn’t have suspected that the guildmaster was capable of getting out of his chair so swiftly. The chair, meanwhile, let out a sigh of relief at the weight being lifted from it. What is it? she demanded. If you lack the knowledge my master seeks, then there is no reason to waste any more of your time. She turned to the door again before adding, Or mine.

Of course, Aric rested a palm on the door before her. Tuan is such an old, dear friend of mine that I was merely acting in his own best interests. I was serious about that being a very dangerous artifact, both for him to own and even more so for you to be carrying about in public. He lowered his voice conspiratorially, although there was no way anyone, no matter how good a spy they had been trained to be, could have overheard any part of their conversation.

I’m sure Tuan is aware of the danger, she said without looking directly at the man. What he needs is a writ of authenticity.

Of course, of course. He moved his hand from the door and rested it on her arm, gently guiding her back to take a seat once more. And I will do that for him. An old friend, he is, of course I will authenticate it.

Jasika resisted the urge to shake the sweaty pig’s hand from her sleeve but instead allowed him to lead her back to the chair she had just vacated. Worse men than Aric had touched her in the past, she reminded herself, but at least her encounter with him was soon to end. No further conversation would be needed, so she sat and waited to see what his next move would be.

Aric stepped to the far side of his desk. Withdrawing a sheet of parchment from a drawer, he dipped his brightly-colored quill into an inkwell and began to write. He grunted and harrumphed to himself as he wrote and Jasika resisted the urge to lean forward and read what he was putting to paper. One of her talents, of which she had many, was the ability to read upside down, and in more languages than most people realized she knew. This, however, was one of the few times when that skill would not be needed.

When Aric was done, he rolled the parchment into a narrow tube and slipped a ring off the thumb of his left hand. Jasika raised an eyebrow at this: signet rings were usually worn on the last finger of the hand. Given his girth, she suspected his ring placement wasn’t a personal style choice but rather that it no longer fit in the standard position.

A smear of red wax sealed the scroll and Aric pressed his symbol into the quickly cooling wax before handing it over. I hope, for both of your sakes, that you pass my offer to Tuan, he said soberly as she tucked the scroll into a small case and dropped it into her boot top. And that he gives serious consideration to it.

I will tell him of your concern, she assured him as she pulled a small cotton pouch from her belt. This is for your services and Tuan sends his thanks. She dropped the purse on his table, listening with half an ear as the coins inside rattled, before tucking the box more securely under her arm and turning to the door once more. If he chooses to sell to you, I’m sure he’ll be in touch.

Take good care of it, girl, Aric called out as she walked through the doorway. Both the box and the scroll. Should the wrong people know that either is in your possession, many bad things could befall you.

Wrong people? Jasika asked with a glance back over her shoulder, one eyebrow raised in derision. I am the emissary from one of the most powerful guilds in the empire and the scroll of authenticity is signed by your own hand. She lowered her brow and smiled wryly. I think that they have already been in the possession of the wrong people, and for some time now.

Let me at least send a guard with you, he suggested. It could be dangerous for a slip of a thing like you to be out there all alone with an item like that.

Jasika didn’t even bother to suppress the snicker at his comment. Do you really think that Tuan would send something this valuable with me if I wasn’t capable of safeguarding it? She headed for the stairwell without another look back. I’m far more dangerous than any guards you could possibly provide.

Although her mission had only been to get the scroll now firmly tucked in her boot, Jasika wanted nothing more at that moment than to show Aric just how dangerous she could be. She resisted the urge, however, as she recognized that eventually the greedy guildmaster may prove to be useful yet again and she was not excited to discover who would be his replacement if she were to remove him from his coveted position.

Making her way back out of the guildhouse was fairly easy, although it was apparent that care had been taken to make the underground corridors as maze-like as possible. Jasika had spent most of her life in complexes far more challenging than this, however, so the task of exiting was remarkably easy. Despite the bravado she had shown to the guildmaster and while in his domain, she couldn’t hold back the sigh of relief when she emerged through the back door of an old run-down tavern and onto the street beneath the sunlight once more. Being this far away from her own guildhouse, she knew that she ran the risk of raising the ire of some of the locals if she was to stay for too long. It wasn’t often that a stranger could enter a foreign guildhouse and demand audience with the guildmaster. Even less often was the occurrence of that audience being granted, a fact that had no doubt been noted by plenty of hiding eyes.

Jasika had arrived in town early for her scheduled appointment with Aric, partly due to her hope of finding interesting entertainment while she was in town, but mostly because she had been able to find only one ship heading to Brum and therefore had needed to travel on the ship’s schedule. Travelling by ship was much faster than travelling over land, but it required patience as the ship’s captain insisted on maintaining his normal schedule of stops between where she boarded and her intended destination. Because of these factors, she had been forced to wait in the dingy flophouse that passed for an inn for more than a week. She hadn’t been to Brum before this trip, and she sincerely hoped she would never have to again, despite recognizing the valuable resource in the guildmaster two floors beneath her boots. Brum was nothing more than a sparse population of run-down buildings and bored, broken people that barely passed for a town.

Jasika couldn’t wait to leave.

The concept of cobbled streets, common in most of the towns that she frequented, seemed not to have reached Brum yet. The streets were paved with dirt, with deep creases in the roads waiting for a hapless cart to get stuck. No horses trotted up and down the streets, carrying their passengers to and from their destinations. Instead, the only traffic on the streets was by pedestrians, many of whom were lacking shoes and whose clothes hung from them like rags. Nighttime hours had not been so bad, as most of the townspeople had been safely ensconced within their homes, or at least within buildings which passed for homes in this hovel of a town. During the daytime, on the other hand, was a different story.

Here, women walked through