A grease-stained paper pamphlet fluttered in the void wind three inches from Elder Sterling’s nose.
“He isn’t a traitor, Holt,” Elder Sterling whispered sharply, holding the pamphlet with two trembling fingers. “General Han took the poisoned wine to protect the third princess. A man of that caliber would never sell the northern garrison for twenty carts of silk.”
“You have cabbage between your ears, Sterling,” Barnaby Holt hissed back, crouching behind the stone battlements. “Look at page thirty-four. The man wears a curved mustache and keeps three mistresses in the capital. Anyone with facial hair like that is smuggling salt for the bandit prince.”
Linnea sat on an upturned wicker basket three paces away, calmly adjusting the focus on her brass telescope.
“The mustache is a distraction, Master Holt,” Linnea murmured without looking up from the lens. “If you cross-reference the court logistics in Book 15, the minister of revenue was skimming grain shipments six months before the general even arrived.”
Above their heads, another barrage of Frost-Flame artillery struck the outer defensive barrier.
Chime.
The amber dome flared with soft golden brilliance, reflecting the incoming fireballs into the black void like skipped stones across a pond.
