Watching Holmes walk away, Mekas drew her brows together. A mask fragment in her hand kept shifting shape.
"Always meddling."
Mekas crushed the fragment in her hand and gave a cold snort.
As Holmes walked away, he studied the mask fragment in his hand, his expression deeply conflicted. When he saw it wriggle and change shape, he sighed.
"It seems the captain already has his suspicions. Mekas, I only hope we're both wrong."
With that, Holmes tightened his grip and ground the wriggling fragment to powder.
"An evil thing like this is better off gone."
"Useless."
Smog sensed everything through the fragment and spat out the word coldly.
Knock, knock, knock. Someone knocked on the doors of the great hall. Smog lowered his head and clasped his hands before him.
"Your Majesty, Smog requests an audience."
The hall had been quiet, but in the next instant it filled with the sounds of women singing and laughing. Then came a voice that sounded both remarkably young and strangely mature.
"Come in."
Smog pushed open the doors. Inside, he found a scene of drunken, decadent revelry.
A boy who looked remarkably like Chen Cheng and was nearly the same age had an arm around each of two beauties, flirting with them, while a crowd of women sang and danced before him.
The beauty on his left picked up a wine cup from the table and fed him a drink with a provocative look. The boy laughed, then took the cup from her hand. In the next instant, the women and all the decadent revelry vanished.
When Smog looked again, there was no trace of that extravagance. There was only a boy, a low table, a wisp of smoke, and a pot of hot tea.
"Please, sit."
The boy gestured for Smog to