I cut him a dirty look. “For god’s sake, please just hear me out. The ring is also described to erase magic. If I drew a map to it tonight, what’s to stop you from hunting it down without Alastair ever knowing? What if we could use it to erase the magic in our contracts?”
He looked up at the ceiling, exasperated. “There’s no way to know if that would work. Most artéfacts are more nuanced. I doubt the ring is as simple as it sounds.” Bel’s expression darkened. “Did Alastair take you through that hall by his office?”
He’d taken me down a hall where three suminaires sat hunched over artéfacts. I assumed that was what Bel meant. I nodded.
“One uses a scrying bowl to see people across the world, another has a set of sticks that sometimes determines where we take the hotel, the third has metal letters that can answer certain questions. Nothing as direct as an artéfact that points to magic, but their artéfacts are all enough to keep them cooped up day and night. They’re all searching for that ring. It could be dangerous,” he said seriously. “Unless we uncover the real reason why Alastair wants it so badly, I don’t think you should draw a map to it.”
He didn’t get it. Except . . . “Why would it matter to you? You spend your days hunting down Alastair’s artéfacts.”
“I’m not foolish. I never bring an artéfact back if I get a feel for it and suspect it might hurt someone.”
“What about the ones you can’t get a feel for? Do you bring those back?”
“You don’t understand. I have to.”
“I understand perfectly. You help him because you have no choice. Now I have no choice. If you won’t help me track down the ring, will you at least tell me how to use the cosmolabe?” When he didn’t answer, I pushed my face dangerously close to his. “Tell me how to use it,” I demanded.
“I can’t.”
“Liar.”
“You chose the cosmolabe from Alastair’s collection. Using it should come as easily as breathing. You figure it out. I need another drink.” He walked back to his game.
“Men can be salty when they don’t get exactly what they wish for.” I jumped. The market guard stood three feet from me, leaning against a stone pillar. “Do you want me to kill him for you?” She smiled, coy, then clicked her little scythes.
I shrugged. “Go right ahead.”
My escort was still queasy from the climb. He groaned and slumped against the hallway wall, while I ran into the map room and slammed the door. Flinging parchment on the table, I ripped open the charcoal with my teeth.
Maybe I didn’t need Bel to find the ring for me. If I drew a map to it and somehow convinced him to take us there, I could search for the ring myself before Alastair could get his hands on it.
Holding the cosmolabe in one palm, I ran my fingers over the catalogue of artéfacts. I traced my pointer finger along the entry for the signet ring. Nothing happened. I glanced at the painting of the woman. “This might go quicker if you told me how to use this thing.”
I concentrated. The magic from the cosmolabe tickled up my wrist. I closed my eyes to see if a map would come to me, but nothing did. After each try, the magic hummed higher up my arm. Yet no map.
The society handbook was still jammed in a corner of the dusty shelf. I snatched it up and flipped through every section mentioning artéfacts, but there was nothing that told me how I might use one. Frustrated, I hurled the book across the room.
When Zosa was little, Maman would give her lessons in the most basic songs, moving up in difficulty until my sister could sing alongside her in different keys. The catalogue entry for the ring was only a small scribble. It might be too difficult for a beginner. I could try starting with something simpler.
Scanning the shelf again, I snatched a tiny vial of pink sand and poured some onto my palm. I lifted the cosmolabe. This time, when the magic drifted up my arm, I felt something.
Sunshine heated my tongue and a soft tickle of surf skittered up my legs. It was like the umbrellas from my first day here but different. More, somehow. I was in the room, but my mind was in Elsewhere. I poured the sand back and the feel of it was still there, in my nostrils, between my toes.
Next to the sand was an old piece of bark. At my touch, my senses filled with a winter night. Closing my eyes, I could picture a village blanketed by thick snow. Pale, hollow-cheeked children slurped watery broth. My stomach growled from hunger and I couldn’t tell if it was my own hunger or conjured from the bark.