Time's Assassin, page 29
part #3 of The Islevale Cycle Series
Risch took a step in her direction. “Your Highness, please. We were simply discussing—”
“Don’t,” she said, steel in the word. “You were conspiring against my house. I’m reasonably certain that one”—she pointed at Tobias—“has been harboring the daughter of Hayncalde’s lost duke.
And I believe I heard you say that she is currently a guest of your duchess back in Duvyn. That alone should be grounds for execution.”
Tobias could barely stand. Despair and terror weighed on him like stone. Mara and Sofya would die. So would he, and the friends he had brought here. Mearlan’s line would never be redeemed.
And yet what he felt most was fury. At the ill-fortune of arriving when Emella was here. At the duplicity of the woman. At the sheer audacity of any Sheraigh accusing others of treason! He refused to surrender to her.
True she was Noak’s sister, and she had her men with her. But there were soldiers from both Trohsden and Duvyn in the corridor.
At a word from Myles...
He looked back at Trohsden’s duke, hoping to see his own rage reflected in the man’s features. What he saw instead made him want to weep.
The duke’s face might as well have been carved from granite, his glower was directed not at Emella, but at Risch.
“Myles,” the princess said, “you have done well. The sovereign will be most pleased.”
Risch glared back at the man. “I’m certain she’s right. Your sovereign will honor you. Your God, though—he will have the final word.”
Myles flinched, shifted his gaze to Emella. “They will be placed for now in my dungeon,” he said. “They will not be tortured here, nor will they be denied any basic comforts. They will have food, water, blankets. Those are my conditions.”
Her smile chilled the room. “I’m not certain it’s your place to dictate conditions to me, but in this I will defer to your wishes. Whatever comfort they enjoy here will be temporary.”
“Yes,” Risch said. “I believe the sole value of such a gesture will be as a salve for your conscience.”
Myles pounded his hand on the table, nearly upsetting his cup of wine. “Don’t push me in this, Risch! Think of the boy, and your soldiers. I can just as easily begin your torment here.”
“Do you honestly believe it matters? Do you think your betrayal of me, and of Mearlan, is any less egregious because you give us an extra blanket? You’re a greater fool than I ever imagined.
She’s a child, Myles. Barely more than an infant. And you’ve sentenced her to death.”
The duke of Trohsden eyed him for another fivecount. “Guards!” he shouted, making Tobias jump.
His door opened. Two soldiers in gray entered the chamber.
“Take the Duke of Duvyn and this other man to the dungeon.” He hesitated. “Separate cells. Make certain they have blankets, food, and water.”
“Yes, my lord.”
They called for two more soldiers from the hallway and approached Risch and Tobias. The guards, all of them bearing muskets fixed with bayonets, disarmed them, took the sack holding Orzili’s tri-sextant, and led them toward the door. A guard walked on either side of Tobias, steering him, their grip on his arms firm, though not abusive. They hadn’t found his broken chronofor, not that it would do him any good.
He had lost everything that mattered and would soon be back in the one place to which he had vowed never to return: Hayncalde’s dungeon, at the mercy of Orzili and his torturers.
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Ejino watched Tobias leave the ship wearing his robe, weighed down with Risch’s things and the Walker’s own carry sack. He had done what he could for the man—the boy. Now it fell to Tobias and Risch to win Myles’s support.
As he stared after the lad, though, he saw a shadow detach itself from one of the warehouses near the wharf and steal after him.
Likely the same person who had followed Ejino back to the ship from the castle.
He spat a curse and drew breath to shout a warning to Tobias.
After a moment’s consideration, he kept silent, unsure of whether alerting Tobias would create more trouble for them. The shadow followed the Walker at a distance, appearing content to mark his progress rather than accost him.
The problem was, this person knew Tobias was not Risch’s Crosser.
Ejino watched the figure for a breath longer, then ran below, grabbed his golden Bound aperture, and left the ship. He followed the follower, moving with stealth, keeping to shadows. Rather than pass through the gate, he cut away from the path and followed the contour of the city wall until he was alone. He scanned this part of the wall, saw no soldiers on the wall walk.
Satisfied that none could see him, he pulled off his clothes, wrapped them around a large stone, and tied the bundle tight with the sleeves of his shirt. He checked the top of the wall a second time, scanned his surroundings. Seeing no one, he heaved the bundle with all his might, watched it soar over the wall. He listened for the thud of its landing on the far side, but heard nothing.
Hoping it had cleared the battlement, he threw his shoes over as well. Next, he spread his aperture so that the hinged blades opened, creating a ring wide enough to accommodate him. Then he pressed the device to the city wall.
The gold melded to the rough texture of the stone like wet plaster. The metal began to vibrate, like strings under a bow.
And a gap formed in the wall. Ejino took a deep breath and launched himself into the shaft he had created.
Darkness took him. Stone pressed on him from all sides, squeezing his chest, scraping his skin, threatening to choke him off from the night, the air, the world he knew.
Apertures worked on stone and wood. Not on forged metal. Some nobles, he knew, set spikes within the walls of their castles as proof against Crossers. Once a Cross began, once one of his kind entered the press, there was no going back. A well-placed spike could kill.
Always at the beginning of a press, Ejino wondered if this was the one that would end his life.
It wasn’t.
The wall was thick. The press seemed to last a long time. There was little air here, no light or sound, no room for extraneous movement. Just creeping progress, like the flow of honey.
In time, he emerged from the press, as if birthed into the city.
He tumbled from the stone, the aperture clutched in his sore hands, his body raw from the journey. He was in a small garden plot, surrounded by dry wisps of grass and shrub. A dog barked from an adjacent yard. His balled-up clothes and shoes lay a short distance ahead of him. He crawled to the bundle, untied it, and pulled on his clothes, sucking air through his teeth as the shirt sleeves and the legs of his breeches rubbed his tender flesh.
Once dressed, he hurried on to the castle. Finding a lonely stretch of wall here proved more difficult, and he didn’t dare throw his clothes into the castle courtyard beyond the ramparts.
He undressed in an empty alley, left his folded clothes and shoes in a neat bundle, tucked by a wooden shed, and crossed the lane to the wall.
Working quickly, he spread the aperture again, and entered the press a second time. As before, he held his breath, fearing a steel spike or rod. He managed to pass through this wall unscathed as well.
Now, though, he was naked within the castle. No one had spotted him yet. Keeping to shadows, flattening himself against walls when necessary to avoid being seen, he crept through the grounds, into the castle, and along various corridors, managing to avoid detection. It was a large fortress, at least compared with Duvyn Castle, but he had been in other castles, and this one was structured like most.
Before long, he heard voices ahead, saw torch fire flickering at the intersection of two corridors. He slowed, eased to the corner, peered into the next passageway. It was choked with soldiers, four wearing Duvyn colors, a similar number dressed in gray, most in Sheraigh blue. The guards from Duvyn had been disarmed.
Not good.
“Guards!” Even from within the chamber, the voice rang in the corridor. Two of the Trohsden guards entered the room. Moments later, the other two joined them, and not long after that, they returned to the hallway holding Risch and Tobias between them.
Several of the Sheraigh guards took hold of the four soldiers from Duvyn and fell in step behind these others. Ejino had no doubt that they were all being taken to Trohsden’s dungeon.
Worse, all of them were headed in his direction. He ducked back around the corner and ran, the slap of his bare feet covered by the approaching steps of the soldiers and prisoners. He tried the first door he saw, but it was locked. The second opened, and he slipped into a dark room, only to freeze when he heard soft snoring nearby.
If he was found now, naked, in a stranger’s bedchamber, his duke in the castle dungeon, they would kill him on sight. He thought about searching the room he was in for a pair of breeches, but didn’t dare. He listened at the door as the guards marched by.
When they had passed, and he could no longer hear their footsteps, he let himself out of the chamber, crept down the corridor again, and peeked around the corner. To his dismay, two Sheraigh guards stood by Myles’s door.
Fortunately, they didn’t remain there long. After a few spirecounts, the chamber door opened, and Emella Sheraigh stepped into the hallway, followed by two more of her men. She closed the door, and with the soldiers arrayed around her, she walked away, in the opposite direction. Ejino walked on his toes to the door, but before he reached it, he heard the lock turn.
He assumed Myles was alone in the chamber. And he assumed as well, since he remained free while Risch and Tobias had been taken, that he had cast his lot with the Sheraighs.
Ejino sensed his options dwindling. He could flee to the ship, order the soldiers there to sail from these waters, and abandon Risch and Tobias to their fates, which he refused to do. He could bring the soldiers back here, and the seven of them could raid the castle and win the duke’s freedom. Or, knowing that he would never get six Duvyn soldiers through Trohsden’s castle gate, he could free the duke and the Walker himself.
No one who knew Ejino would have called him brave, but neither was he a coward. He had come to love his duke. The man was honest, generous, he cared about the people in his duchy, and he would have given his life for Daerjen. Chances were, he would in the next few days. He had earned Ejino’s devotion and whatever sacrifices circumstance demanded of him.
Myles’s door had iron bands across it. Who knew what metal might lurk within the wood? Better then to Cross through the stone wall.
He walked a few strides back toward the other corridor, expanded his aperture, set it against the stone, and, when the shaft opened, he slipped into the press.
It didn’t last nearly as long as had his other two Crossings.
Within a few tencounts, he toppled out of the press onto the floor of Myles’s chamber.
“Who’s there?” The duke was on his feet, squinting into shadows, a sword in hand. “Show yourself.”
Ejino stood, stepped forward into the light of the lamp and fire.
The duke peered at him. “Crosser? Is that you?”
“It is, my lord.”
Myles lowered his sword and slid it into its sheath. “For pity’s sake, put on some clothes.”
“I have none. They’re outside the walls of your castle.” He held up his aperture by way of explanation.
The duke heaved a breath, crossed to another door, and left the chamber briefly. When he returned, he carried a pair of breeches and a shirt.
“These won’t fit, but you’ll be decent.”
He tossed them onto a chair, tended to his hearth.
Ejino crossed to the chair and pulled on the clothes. They were huge, but they warmed him. “You can turn around.”
Myles eyed him, the handsome face resolving into a scowl. He drank the rest of whatever was in his cup and poured himself more. “Miejan red. Would you like some?”
“Thank you, my lord. I would.”
Myles filled a second cup, set it on the table beside his own, and sat, indicating with a brusque flip of his hand that Ejino should do the same.
“You came to beg for his life?” Myles asked as Ejino took the chair beside him.
“Yes, my lord. I suppose I did. And the life of the Walker.”
“A waste of time. One that will likely prove fatal.”
He didn’t sound angry or menacing. Just weary. And a good ways gone with drink.
“You shouldn’t have come. Any of you. I said as much today. You heard me. I told Risch it was a mistake. I hoped he would take that as a warning, return to his vessel, and sail from these waters. I think he might have gotten away at that point.” He shook his head, gulped more wine. “But no. He had to request a chamber for the night. And then he had to bring that damned Walker to me.”
“The Walker is no more than a boy,” Ejino said.
Myles rounded on him, making his chair shift with the scrape of wood on stone. “The Walker is the reason Risch has to die!” His voice rose enough that Ejino had to keep himself from hushing the man.
“He gave offense?”
Myles stared, his anger sluicing away. “You don’t know, do you?”
“I know that Risch is your friend.”
“You should go. You have a chance to get away, and you should take it. I’ll...I’ll let you leave the castle, and I’ll have my fleet allow the vessel to sail from the firth. I don’t want your blood on my hands, too.”
“What did the Walker do?”
Myles set down his cup and pointed at the door. “Go. Now.”
“First tell me.”
“If I tell you, you’ll have to die.”
That gave Ejino pause, though not for long. He had figured when he entered the chamber that his life was forfeit.
“So be it.”
Myles deflated, gazed into the fire. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Clearly it does, my lord. You don’t want to tell me.” He pondered this. What could Tobias have told him that would ensure their deaths?
“There’s a way to defeat them, isn’t there? The Sheraighs, I mean. Tobias knows how to best this new supremacy.”
“If you don’t know, why are you here? Why come all this way?”
The kernel of a strategy took form in his mind. “I came because the duke needed me as a distraction for Belvora.”
A frown flickered across the duke’s face. “What?”
“Tobias has been hunted by Belvora, and other Ancients as well.
The winged ones are drawn to Traveler magick. By bringing me along, my duke hoped to keep the demons from knowing Tobias was with him.”
“And you agreed to this?”
He raised his chin. “I serve my house. And my isle.”
Myles looked away again. “You believe I deserve to be shamed.
This is more complicated than you know.”
“It’s not complicated at all, my lord. If you defy the Sheraighs, you risk your life, your lands, your family. You might even risk a civil war that would plunge the isle into blood and darkness.
It’s easier and safer by far to acquiesce. And if Tobias and Risch have to die... Well, that’s a reasonable cost, isn’t it?”
Myles kept silent.
“I like men. Did you know that?”
The duke eyed him sidelong, shook his head.
“I tell you this because while men and woman like me are accepted now, we weren’t a century or two ago. We were burned alive for loving within our same sex. That changed, not because we hid in shadows, but because a few declared and showed their love openly and were punished for it. And their punishment so horrified the Sanctuaries, and some in royal courts, that the laws were amended.”
“I know this,” Myles said. “I’m not ignorant.”
“Perhaps not, but you’re ignoring history.”
Ejino thought of his duke, of the patience and reason with which he had convinced Trohsden’s soldier earlier that very day.
“Allow me to ask two questions, and if you can answer them truthfully to my satisfaction, I will leave your castle and your city and never trouble you again.”
Myles hesitated, nodded, much as his man had done at the wharf.
“Do you value this new supremacy more than you do your friendship with my duke and your memory of Mearlan?”
At first the duke offered no response, and when at last he did speak, it was only to ask, “What’s your second question?”
“If love and friendship aren’t worth dying for, what in the Two’s world is?”
Chapter Twenty
18th Day of Sipar’s Ascent, Year 634
Tobias clung to the bars of his cell. Sweat ran down his face, and he gritted his teeth against wave after wave of sickness.
Maybe all dungeons smelled of piss and vomit and rot, of blood and fear. Maybe they all were cold, dank, oppressive. Maybe the flicker of torch fire on ancient stone looked the same in all of them.
He couldn’t be sure. He knew only that upon entering this dungeon and being locked in this cell, memories of Hayncalde’s dungeon flooded his mind. His joints began to ache. His scars burned with the remembered agony of smoking hot blades and handfuls of lye.
Risch spoke to him in low tones. Trying to reassure, or, failing that, to distract. None of his words penetrated Tobias’s terror.
He would be tortured again before he died. Not because Orzili needed anything more from him—the Sheraighs knew where Mara and Sofya were hidden, and Tobias could do nothing to warn them—but because Tobias had wounded him and bested him more than once. The assassin would have his revenge before he allowed Tobias to die.
Death didn’t frighten him. Not really. Torture though... He would take his own life before he submitted to more torment.
The door scraped open at the top of the stone stairway, and footsteps echoed on the stone treads. Tobias heard voices—someone speaking to the Sheraigh guards outside the dungeon door. An instant later a breath of clean, cool air brushed against his face. He closed his eyes, savoring the sensation.
