“Watch it.” Keyon jabbed a finger at Janco. “If you’re going to rent a room, this little fella might charge you double.”
“Sorry, sir,” Janco said. “But you have to admit, compared to my partner here, even I’m considered a little fella.”
The man conceded the point.
“Besides, they can stay with us. Come on up to our rooms,” I said. Ari put me down, and I led them up to the fifth floor.
Mara and Esau stood in the center of the suite with weapons in hand when we entered. They relaxed as soon as they spotted Ari and Janco.
Janco immediately flopped into a chair. “We’ve been traveling all night.”
“What happened? We expected one of the guild members a couple days ago,” I said.
“That was the plan, but things got hot in the Citadel.”
“Hot?” Mara asked.
“Bruns has brought in more soldiers to patrol the streets. He closed all the gates except the east gate and doubled security, checking everyone coming into and leaving the Citadel.”
Not good. “How hard is it to get in?”
“For you, impossible.”
“Even if I wear a disguise?”
“Yes. They’re yanking off hoods, checking for wigs and even have a magician scanning for illusions.”
“But you managed to get in,” I said.
“No. We didn’t even try,” Ari said. He sank onto the couch. Exhaustion lined his face. “Fisk has people along the roads to the Citadel. They recognized us and sent us here to rendezvous with you.”
“Do you know when the extra security measures started?” Onora asked Ari.
“Four days ago.”
“The same day we rescued Mara and Esau,” Onora said.
“Rescued?” Janco asked.
We explained about Cahil tipping us off, the ambush and Valek’s mission to find Leif.
“Valek will find him. No doubt,” Janco said with such confidence, Mara smiled.
It was nice to see her happy. I considered the timing of the security. Bruns’s magicians must have used a super messenger to communicate between the garrison and Citadel.
“Fisk thinks it’s best for all of us to avoid the Citadel right now,” Ari said. “He’s going to let everything settle down and then find an HQ outside the Citadel, but still close enough that we can observe who is coming and going. It might take a few weeks.”
“But—”
“I have a package for you in my saddle bags from Fisk.” Ari inclined his head at Esau. “It’s all the notes from Councilor Bavol Zaltana, plus the location of that farmhouse those glass panels were delivered to.”
Perfect. Fisk knew me so well.
“And Fisk says that Councilor Zaltana owns the farmhouse.”
That was interesting.
Janco jumped to his feet. “And we have news! Humongous news!”
We all waited, but Janco needed more prodding. “And?”
“I found where the Cartel’s been producing Theobroma and Curare. And I met the Master Gardener!”
Shocked, I glanced at Ari. “Why didn’t you tell me this sooner?”
“He thinks the man was the Master Gardener, but we were unable to confirm it.”
“Who is it?” Esau asked.
Janco took a deep breath and held it, as if about to make a big announcement. Then he let it all out at once, deflating. “He looks familiar, but I can’t recall his name. It’s been driving me crazy for days!”
“What does he look like?” I asked.
“Like half the men in Sitia,” Ari said. “Janco’s descriptive skills are as bad as his artistic skills. We were hoping to find a magician who could peer into the chaos that is Janco’s mind and identify him.”
“Ha. Ha. Not funny.”
“Is it Bavol?” Esau asked.
“No. I’ve met him.”
“We can travel to the factory and I can take a look at the guy,” I said. “And we could also sabotage it, cutting off the Cartel’s supply.”
“If that’s their only facility,” Janco said. “It was in the middle of the Greenblade forest and hidden by an illusion.”
I wondered if that was generated by Rika Bloodgood. Her strongest magical ability was creating illusions, and she was one of Owen’s closest colleagues. Her last known location was the Commander’s castle in Ixia.
“Plus the place is huge and well guarded,” Ari added. “And doing something big like that will need to be included in our grand plans to stop the Cartel. Fisk’s messenger said they’ve changed, but we don’t know what they are.”
“Regardless, we need more information,” I said.
Janco dug into his pockets and pulled out a handful of leaves. “I took these from one of the hothouses.” He handed them to Esau.
Esau’s green eyes lit up as if Janco had just given him the perfect present. If only we could get my father into one of those glass hothouses.
“No can do,” Janco said when I mentioned it. “After I was caught, they put extra security around them. Then we hightailed it out of there.”
I considered our options and remembered the glass hothouse that might be in the Avibian Plains. Explaining the possibility, I said, “We can find that one and see if there’s any information of value there before we continue on to the one you found. It’ll give us something to do while waiting for Fisk to regroup.”