The Alchemists of Loom (Loom Saga #1)(39)
She leapt off her ledge, the cord pulling taught and spool whirring as she dropped in free-fall. Kicking her legs in front of her to swing, Arianna set her second line flying toward a crane that loomed high above the docks. The cable clipped to itself, locking with magic. As soon as the new line was fastened, the first unwound and retreated back to its spool.
Changing lines and cabling with her winch-box was mindlessly simple. Her hands knew how to move, her magic operating on instinct. She soared through the night unhindered. No barrier, no watchmen, could keep her out.
The wind howled in her ears and her nose singed with the smell of the sea. She was weightless as she soared high above the port. She was well out of the glow of the lamplight below, and the creaking and clanging of vessels against their tethers with the shifting tides masked the sounds of her lines and winch-box.
Arianna kept her knees loose, bending and curling her body inward to help absorb shock and sound as she landed against the building’s exterior. She cast a cautionary eye across the docks. A few sailors and pilots milled about, attracted to the glow of smoking parlors and bars.
Letting out the line, she lowered herself to the third floor windows of the port authority. Her goggles enhanced her Dragon sight, rendering the darkness a mere annoyance rather than a hindrance. The windows opened at the halfway point, no doubt to let in cool sea breezes during warmer months. Simple locks, nothing that would pose a real problem…
She fished through one of the smaller bags on her belt. She could just break the glass and be done with it. But Ari didn’t want to do anything that could raise suspicion before the ship they were on was well out of port. Her tool looked almost like a ribbon of gold, flat and hard, it didn’t bend as she shoved it halfway through the window jamb.
Arianna shifted her weight on the line, allowing tension and physics to hold her in place more than magic. With her mental capacities freed, she applied them to the strip of gold. It wiggled to life, working its way into the room. At her command, it wrapped itself around the lever of the lock and pulled. The window clicked open, and Arianna slipped effortlessly inside.
The office was well lived in. The leather wing-backed chair was cracking in places of heavy use. The desk had dimples from where forearms had rested for years.
You could learn a lot about a person from their home, and offices were nothing if not second homes. The man was a creature of habit. He paced when he was nervous—judging by the threadbare tracks in the carpet—and he never missed a day. His records had been methodically checked every morning and night for the past year.
Arianna flipped through the port manifest, the record of every vessel, its contents, and its crew. The cargo ship she’d selected for them was named Holx III. She suspected that a ship named after the capital city of Ter.4 would be headed in that direction. She slowly flipped through the papers, careful to do so in such a way that she could return them exactly as she found them.
“Holx III, cargo… Textiles, safe enough,” she mused aloud. “Arrives and departs at night.” There wasn’t much time; she flipped the papers back in place.
By ship, it would take just under twelve days to travel to Ter.4.2. The Holx III was a simple freighter and would likely cruise around 27,800 peca an hour—or 27.8 veca an hour. Arianna breathed a sigh of relief when she saw it ran with a refined engine. Most of the regular runners were outfitted with engines that could run on magic or steam to help save on coal. There would always be room for another Chimera on board a magically-propelled vessel.
Her fingers paused over the ledgers she had been returning in order. Her eyes narrowed and Arianna skimmed the records, trying to put her finger on what her mind was telling her wasn’t quite right. She flipped the page, then the one after, and the one after that. That’s when she found it—or rather, didn’t find it. Not one vessel had headed for Ter.2.3, the main port of the Alchemists’ territory, in nearly a year.
Arianna hunted like a Dragon on a blood scent through the port authority’s records for evidence of even one vessel headed for Ter.2.3. Sure, it was a far voyage and likely to only be made once every few weeks, even months. But to have none, in or out? That made no sense.
It had been the Alchemists who developed the first Chimera. The Rivets were the ones who’d soused out the refining process in their steel mills and all the applications for gold. The Revolvers were close behind, eagerly finding further uses in their guns and explosives. It was the Harvesters who supplied them all with their base materials and the Ravens who moved the entire world—people and goods. Yes, the Five Guilds of Loom were a connected system, a chain in which every Guild formed a link.
So why was one being cut off?
Arianna’s hands rested on the file drawer as she closed her eyes in thought. The Revolvers needed Alchemical runes for their weaponry and refining. The Alchemists’ Guild hall was in the city of Keel, nestled in the center of The Skeleton Forest, where they needed weapons to fend off all manner of beast. Stopping all trade from the Revolvers would basically be a death sentence for a city that lived in constant fear of wolves, bears, and the endwig.
Cries of reverie from the street brought Arianna’s attention back to her purpose: get them out of Ter.5. She’d let the anomaly surrounding the trade routes remain just that, simmering in the back of her mind until she had some explanation for it.
The port authority safe provided a sufficient distraction, pulling her mind fully back into the present. It was complex enough to be a challenge, but not enough to annoy—ideal, really. She lifted some of the tariff and taxes funds. Not so much that it would be immediately noticed or prove detrimental to the running of the port, but a tidy amount sufficient to grease a captain’s gears enough that he’d take on three extra crew.