Whatever else she might feel, wherever her loyalties might lie, she loved him.

Oh, my Jiwah Ka, Jardir thought sadly. How I have wronged you.

‘The Deliverer is not to be disturbed, khaffit!’ Jardir heard Hasik’s growl even through the covered walls and door of Inevera’s pillow chamber. With the crown atop his head, he could hear the wind buffeting the wings of birds high in the sky, and his ajin’pal was not a quiet man.

Jardir sat up, waking Inevera in the process. Abban.

He looked at Inevera and smiled, trying to convey all the love he felt for her, and knowing it fell short. Inevera’s return smile was genuine, and her aura gave back his love with equal fervour.

He kissed her again. ‘Duty calls, beloved.’

She nodded, helping him into his raiment before seeing to her own. When they were composed, they left the chamber, returning to the throne room.

It was empty, but it was little surprise after Asome’s lesson. Jardir sniffed, smelling the blood of the Damaji spattered on the carpet.

He pointed to a few drops. ‘Ichach.’ He sniffed again and turned, pointing a few feet away. ‘Qezan.’

Inevera nodded, taking special cloths from her pouch and carefully blotting up as much of the blood as possible for her spells. If his Damaji were to turn on him over this indignity, he wished to know of it. His Jama and Khanjin sons were still in their nie’dama bidos, but he would raise them himself if necessary to keep his tribes unified.

He strode up the steps to the Skull Throne, throwing back his warded cloak as he sat. He waited for Inevera to join him on the dais, then clapped his hands loudly. Immediately, Hasik appeared at the door, bowing deeply.

‘Show Abban in,’ Jardir said. Hasik had a surprised look on his face, but he nodded, and a moment later the fat khaffit appeared at the door, bowing as low as his crutch would allow.

‘Abban, my friend!’ Jardir beckoned the khaffit. Inevera shifted beside him, and he did not need to see her aura to know what she was feeling. He had seen Abban’s aura, and knew the khaffit harboured similar feelings towards his First Wife.

No matter, he thought. They must learn to abide each other.

Abban stopped at the base of the dais, but Jardir waved him still closer. ‘You may climb three steps,’ he smiled, ‘one for each of your legs.’

Abban smirked, tapping his crutch against his leg. ‘My wives would tell you that meant I could take a fourth step as well.’

To Jardir’s surprise, Inevera laughed at this, and Jardir nodded. ‘I remember you in your bido, and think your wives flatter you, but the sound of the Damajah’s laughter pleases me. You may take the fourth step.’ Abban ascended quickly, not questioning his fortune.

‘We have consulted on your plan, and find it sound,’ Jardir said. ‘We will attack Docktown on first snow. Begin the preparations, but say nothing to anyone.’

Abban bowed. ‘The longer the secret is kept, the less chance the Laktonians will have to flee. If I had my way, even your generals would know nothing until the time came to signal the attack.’

‘It is sound advice,’ Inevera agreed.

Jardir nodded. ‘But that is not why you come to me today, Abban, and I have not summoned you. What draws you from the centre of your web?’

‘My people have made a … delicate discovery,’ Abban said. For an instant his eyes flicked to Inevera.

Jardir sighed. Was there no trust to be found anywhere in his court? ‘Speak.’

Abban bowed again, reaching into a pocket in the fine tan vest he wore over his colourful silk shirt. He withdrew the hand, holding out a lump of silvery metal.

Inevera stiffened, and Jardir, too, recognized it immediately. He was out of the throne in an instant, snatching it from the khaffit’s hand. He hadn’t held it a moment before Inevera snatched it in turn, holding it to the light, this way and that.

‘This is the same metal as the Spear and Crown of Kaji,’ she said, voicing all their thoughts.

Abban nodded. ‘Our metallurgists have long sought to unlock the secrets of the artefacts of the first Deliverer. Too pale to be gold, but neither were they silver, or platinum. Our best guess had been white gold, an alloy made by adding nickel to pure gold. Jewellers in the bazaar have been using it for centuries.’ He smiled. ‘Cheaper than gold, it sells for nearly twice the price to fools who think it exotic. This,’ he pointed to the lump of metal, ‘is electrum.’

‘Electrum?’ Jardir asked.

‘A natural alloy of silver and gold, I am told,’ Abban said.

Jardir’s eyes narrowed. ‘Told by whom?’

Abban turned, clapping loudly as Jardir himself had done before. Immediately Hasik appeared at the door. ‘Show in our guest,’ Abban called. Hasik glared at him, but when Jardir did not countermand the order, he vanished, escorting a Rizonan man into the room. The man was old, squinting in the light, his face and hands smudged with dirt. He held a hat in his hands.

‘Rennick, master of one of Shar’Dama Ka’s gold mines,’ Abban introduced. Hasik grabbed the man roughly, forcing him to his knees and pressing his forehead to the floor.

‘Enough,’ Jardir said. ‘Hasik. Leave us.’ The warrior pursed his lips, but bowed and vanished again.

‘You, Master Rennick, approach the dais,’ Jardir called. ‘Tell us what you know of this metal.’

Rennick approached, wringing the hat in his hands like a laundress. ‘It’s like I said to Abban, Yur Grace. That there is electrum. Seen it once before, when I was a boy working another mine down south. The signs are in the rock. Vein of silver ran into the gold. It don’t happen often, and there ent much of it. Yur mine is safe.’

Safe, Jardir thought, as if I care a whit for gold.

‘Can you make more of it?’ Jardir asked.

The miner shrugged. ‘Reckon so, though maybe not as pure. But why? Might fetch a fair price as a novelty, but it ent worth as much as pure gold.’

Jardir nodded, then clapped again, signalling Hasik to remove the man. ‘Make sure that man does not speak to anyone,’ he told Abban.

‘Already done,’ Abban said. ‘He will be taken right to the forges where my private smiths work, and never seen again. His family will be told he was killed in a cave-in, and compensated handsomely.’ Jardir nodded.

‘I must take it to my chamber and confirm its power,’ Inevera said.

Jardir nodded. ‘We will wait.’

Inevera looked at Abban, and Jardir cut her off with a chopping motion of his hand. ‘I am not a fool, wife. I see how you and Abban look at each other, circling my throne and marking it with your piss. But I have chosen to trust the two of you, and in this, at least, you must trust each other.’

Inevera drew in her brows, but she nodded, disappearing into her chamber and returning several minutes later.

‘What is more precious than gold?’ she asked.

Jardir looked to Abban, and both men shrugged.

‘It is an ancient question of the dama’ting seeking the Damajah’s sacred metal,’ Inevera said. ‘Precious metals conduct magic better than base ones, but even gold cannot transfer without loss.’ She held up the lump of electrum. ‘At long last, we have found the answer.’

Jardir took the lump, studying it. He lifted it and put his teeth to it, seeing the imprint they left. ‘But the crown and spear are harder than the finest steel. No hammer or forge can even scratch them. This metal is soft. It will not even hold an edge.’