A Drop of Corruption

Thelenai demands that Ana explain herself. Ana recalls that Thelenai only gave her a list of the living Apoths who could access the lockbox. When she looked at dead officers who might have had access, she found Immunis Sunus Pyktis, who died in an unspecified accident after working for three years in the Shroud. Thelenai and Ghrelin recognize the name but balk when pressed to disclose details of working in the Shroud. When Ana produces the copied symbols, however, they agree to reveal everything.

Thelenai and Ghrelin explain that the precarious political situation of the Shroud, as well as its distance from the central Empire, led to a project to see if leviathans’ marrow—something they were previously unable to transport—could be moved without risk of contamination. This would diminish Yarrowdale’s political significance and increase the potency of grafts. It would further lead to other medical developments, such as ameliorating the side effects of augmentations.

They found this project to be a “logistical nightmare.” They sought to use ossuary moss to preserve and transport the marrow safely. The symbols Din saw represent the most successful process to preserve the marrow. They learned, however, that the marrow adapted too quickly to make a static process work. Seeking a way to predict the marrow’s mutations, they created “augury,” an alteration that “grant[s] people unusual patter-identifying abilities” (216). These augurs can glean information from even slight data, but, if left altered for more than a few years, they become consumed with finding patterns in every detail of their surroundings. Some develop paranoia. These side effects meant that the augmentation was not certified for use in the Empire, so Thelenai and her colleagues used them exclusively in Yarrow—which is not technically the Empire. One such presumed-dead augur, Pyktis, escaped and is now “using those powers of prediction for slaughter and sabotage” (218).

Pyktis’s death, Thelenai explains, was attributed to an accident in the Shroud; an accident with the kani warped several bodies beyond recognition. Pyktis was assumed among their number. Ghrelin can offer little information about Pyktis’s personality because augurs communicate only by tapping, as spoken language overwhelms their augmented minds. Augury lasts a few months for each dose of the augmentation; Pyktis is assumed responsible for missing doses that were previously dismissed as mathematical errors. Due to the length of his augury, Pyktis will be suffering from paranoia and volatility. Ana contends that he will know that he is likely to burn out soon from this lengthy heightened state, which makes him more dangerous.

Ghrelin confesses that the lockbox held a report that confirmed the success of their marrow transportation process and included instructions on the process to do so. The report would have told Pyktis that the “tremendously unstable, dangerous chunk” of marrow is being stored on the Shroud (222). In leaving the symbols in the smugglers’ camp, Pyktis was “flaunting” this knowledge.

Malo and Din are horrified that Thelenai intended to transport the highly volatile marrow through populous Yarrowdale and up the canals. Thelenai’s superiors in the Empire know of the project’s success, but not that it was found via augury. Kardas is unaware of the project, which will soon demolish his longstanding diplomatic endeavor. If Pyktis succeeds in accessing and detonating the marrow, it will destroy most of Yarrowdale and “bring the Empire to a shuddering halt” (224).

Ana wonders why Pyktis has thus far only used a small portion of his stolen fertilizer, concerned that this indicates that he has a larger plan. Ana proposes sending Din to the Shroud to interview the augurs who knew Pyktis, with Ghrelin going as his translator: As a former augur, Ghrelin knows the tapping language. Thelenai agrees, but only if Din enters during the next scheduled opening, 20 days later. Din is convinced that going into the Shroud will spell his doom. Ana requests that Thelenai supply her with “many exotic classes of flesh” upon which Ana will dine (288).

Din recounts his experience in the camp, watching horrified as Ana eats a long parade of ghastly foods. Ana cites the “exotic banquet” as a tradition from the Empire’s early days. Malo reports that wardens are searching the swamp for Pyktis. Ana’s reports give little information about Pyktis, aside from that his birth year may have been incorrectly reported. (Ana later learns that Pyktis is the Yarrow prince’s twin, whose birth in the Empire was falsified to make him appear a regular Imperial citizen and thus an ideal spy for Yarrow’s plot to destroy the Shroud.) Pyktis’s apparent death occurred when a pollen contamination on a worker’s suit led to a violet kani transmutation.

Ana posits that Pyktis arranged for the pollen to be there and planned for his crimes before becoming an augur. She proposes he has wealthy allies who helped him bribe the smugglers. She wonders why Pyktis hid his face when sailing down the river and when traveling with the smugglers. (They later learn that this is because Pyktis is the identical twin of Prince Carmak.) Malo hopes that Thelenai will face punishment for her reckless experiments, while Ana contends that Thelenai’s pride led her to believe her actions a fair price for progress.

Ana puzzles over how Pyktis gained any information about the shipments that he so effectively robbed. Malo explains that oathcoins are given by the king to nobles, then by nobles to others, as a token of regard. The coin allows the bearer to ask a favor of the person who gave it to them. While theoretically a lower-ranked person could skip asking the noble who granted them the coin and appeal directly do the king, Malo offers that “[going] higher risks punishment” (236), as the king is obliged to grant the wish but not prevented from torturing or killing them after.

Ana learns that the boiled nuts Din found at the shrine are kerel nuts; when their shells are boiled, they make a powerful poison that is especially deadly if absorbed through the blood. Ana is uncertain whether the poison marks Pyktis’s next planned murder or is mere distraction, as the clues were suspiciously easy to find. Ana directs Din to send a speedy “scribe-hawk” to Kardas, warning him. She noticed that Pyktis’s thefts never occurred during the first week of the month, the week that Kardas meets with the king.

Malo complains that Ana demanded she and Din wear their dress uniforms the following day, then refused to explain her reasoning. She stalks off; Din has another sexual encounter with the Yarrow warden. They wake in the middle of the night to bells that announce that the king of Yarrow is dead. When Din stumbles to Ana’s room, she is impeccably dressed. She scolds him for privileging sex over sleep and indicates that she predicted the king’s death, though she didn’t know precisely which member of the court would be killed.