Time's Assassin, page 32
part #3 of The Islevale Cycle Series
It felt different this time. Maybe because she was doing it herself, without Orzili. Maybe because she had made up her mind to finish her life doing the one thing at which she was most skilled, even if that meant working for this man.
“Do you think you can still serve me in those capacities?” he asked after some time. “Let’s be honest, you can’t Walk back far.
Not anymore.”
“Whose fault is that?” She said it with more asperity than was wise. As before, she didn’t much care.
“Beware your tone, Walker.”
“Or what?” She laughed again. “You’ll kill me? As you’ve pointed out yourself, I haven’t much life left to lose.”
“That isn’t my fault.”
She sobered. “No, it’s mine, for allowing you and Orzili to control me as you have.”
“You were paid quite well for all that you did on my behalf.”
“I was, for the most part. Where’s my gold for this last Walk?
Fourteen years. And fourteen more to come back. Mearlan is dead, your war with Daerjen is won. Where is my gold?”
His expression shifted in odd ways, settling at last on something akin to annoyance. “I paid some to Orzili.”
She shook her head. “I didn’t get more than crumbs.”
“That is...unfortunate. And something I can rectify. As to the rest...” He shrugged. “Yours is a young person’s profession. I can’t imagine what sort of assignment I might give you.”
“With all respect, Your Excellency, that shows a lack of imagination. As I’ve learned in recent days, a woman as old as I appear can go unnoticed in places where a man like Orzili would draw attention.”
His eyebrows rose. “Interesting. Perhaps as a spy, then. But as an assassin? I remain unconvinced. And, I’m sorry to say, I don’t lack for spies.”
He stepped to his desk, pulled from a drawer a leather purse. He poured the contents into his hand—gold rounds, a good many of them—counted them and slid them back into the purse. “Take this,”
he said, holding it out to her. “Fourteen rounds. That should allow you to go anywhere you wish.”
She took the purse and slipped it into a pocket within her gown.
She needed the coin, of course, but, she realized, she wanted the work. However ancient she looked, she wasn’t ready to be old.
“You’re making a mistake,” she told him.
He shrugged. “It wouldn’t be the first.” He crossed to his door, opened it. Their conversation was at an end. “May the Goddess keep you safe, Lenna, and bless the rest of your days.”
She walked to him, bowed, pressed his hand to her brow.
Straightening, she said, “And yours, Your Excellency.”
“Miss Stenci is to be allowed to enjoy the castle grounds for a bell or two if she wishes,” he told one of the guards outside his door. “When she chooses to leave, no one should stop her. She is, and will always be, a friend of this court.”
“Thank you,” Lenna said.
The autarch merely smiled.
She left the chamber, peered back as Pemin closed the door. One of the guards walked with her to an entryway. Once outside again, she did linger briefly. She had always admired the autarch’s gardens and fountains. Mostly, she was confused, disappointed.
Her encounter with Pemin hadn’t gone as she expected. She had gone in believing that he would leap at the chance to use her again. His dismissal had been abrupt, his gift of gold too quickly bestowed.
On the thought, she glanced around, noticed men watching her, some in uniforms of brown and black, others dressed entirely in black. Too late, it occurred to her that Pemin would never willingly let her go. She knew too much about things he would prefer no one knew. Which made her wonder why he had allowed her to leave his chamber at all. It would have been easier to have her taken to his prison and left there to die.
She smiled at one of the men, gazed at the fountain for another fivecount, then started toward the castle gate, keeping her bearing casual. No doubt she was allowing fear and suspicion to twist her perceptions. If Pemin wanted her dead, he wouldn’t have sent her from his chamber.
Except that two of the men in black now followed her from this section of the garden. To make certain that she went directly to the gate?
For the moment, they kept their distance. But they had positioned themselves the way she and Orzili would have had they been stalking someone for assassination.
Her weapons were with the gate guards. She had no way to fight off these men should they attack. And they were closer now, still gaining on her. She sensed that they were herding her toward an archway that loomed ahead. Did more men await her there?
Best then to fight these two. If they killed her, so be it.
Lenna halted, faced them. They were young, vaguely handsome, muscular without being bulky. She had no doubt that they knew how to fight. Likely they were experienced killers, though not as experienced as she.
“Shall we do this here, gentlemen?”
They slowed, exchanged glances, continued to advance on her. Both men had knives in hand. She hadn’t noticed the blades before. She cast a quick look at the area around her feet, desperate for any sort of weapon. Sand and fine gravel. Nothing more. She stooped, swept up a handful. It would have to do until she managed to disarm one of them.
She edged closer to the larger of the two men. He was probably stronger than his companion, but she guessed that he would be slower as well. At her “age,” she valued speed over strength.
The other man altered course, closing on her faster. Still, the big man would reach her first. She spied a stone on the ground—
nearly the size of her fist. She seized it with her free hand.
The big man grinned.
“Smile all you like,” she said. “I’ve killed more men than you have. It’s not even close.”
The two assassins shared a second glance. Lenna took the opportunity to dart around the nearer man. It was midday, and the sun was high, but to the extent that it angled at all, she had it at her back. She also now had the big man between her and the second assassin. Another advantage.
The big man slowed, waiting for his companion. Lenna couldn’t allow that.
She strode toward him, covering the distance in three paces. He raised his blade hand, lashed out with his other fist. She ducked, almost stumbled, orbited to the side. Already she was breathing hard.
She lunged at him, hoping to lure him into an error, willing to endure the bite of his blade if she could knock the weapon from his hand. He swiped at her, she dodged the attack, tried to slam the stone into his blade hand. Missed, losing her footing again.
Blood and bone!
She couldn’t trust this body to respond as she wanted. She knew what to do but doubted she could actually do it.
He launched himself at her, his knife carving at her, a silver blur in the sun. She tried again to evade him. A burning pain in her side. She’d failed. Still, she hammered the stone into his blade hand as it swept past her. He snarled, dropped the knife.
Lenna threw the sand in his face.
He cursed, twisted away. Lenna pounced. She pounded the stone into his face. Blood spurted from his nose. As he clutched at it, blood running between his fingers, she kicked him, once in the gut, a second time in the groin. He doubled over, dropped to his knees. She smashed the stone into the back of his skull. He sprawled onto the ground and didn’t move again.
Lenna grabbed his knife, turned in time to meet the attack of the second man. He slashed at her. She dove, rolled, was on her feet again as he spun to face her. No stumble this time. The more she fought in this body, the more at ease she felt.
They circled. She kept herself beyond his reach and outside his blade hand, forcing him to match her movements. He shifted his blade to his other hand. She did the same, as good with her left as she was with her right. Surprise widened his eyes. Lenna laughed.
She bled from the wound the other man had dealt her but could tell it wasn’t a deep cut. This man’s life was hers.
She leapt at him. He jumped to the side. As she had known he would. While still in motion, as he still moved as well, she threw the stone at his head.
The man flinched away. Lenna shifted, perhaps not as quickly as she would have before this last Walk, but fast enough. The man saw her blade hand swing his way. His eyes went wide. He opened his mouth to cry out...something.
She buried her knife in his chest. He lashed out, too. His knife sliced into her arm before dropping from his fingers. Another shallow cut. Carelessness, age, lack of recent practice. It didn’t matter.
Lenna pulled her blade free. The man fell to the ground, not far from where his companion still lay.
“Impressive.”
She spun, bloodied knife held before her.
Pemin stood some distance from her. Close enough to have seen all. Close enough that he didn’t have to raise his voice for her to hear. Far enough that she didn’t pose a threat.
Two men stood with him, both with full-cocked pistols in hand and aimed at her.
“If you wanted me dead, why did you let me leave your chamber?”
“Lenna, my dear, if I wanted you dead, you would be dead.”
She stared back at him, confused. “These aren’t your men?”
“They are. Were. Are both dead?”
“Only this one.” She pointed at the second man. “Why would you—”
Again she stared, understanding breaking over her like a wave.
“You were testing me.”
“You want to be my assassin, my Walker. I needed to know if you still possess the skills I saw in you so many years ago.” His gaze dropped to her arm, her side. “You’re wounded.”
“Yes. Nothing serious.”
“And yet...”
“Working as your assassin, I wouldn’t be unarmed, fighting two trained killers.”
“You can’t really be certain of that, can you? That sort of work is hardly predictable. You might find yourself in all sorts of peril.”
Enough. She no longer feared him; a part of her hated him. She had enough gold to leave. Yes, she wanted to keep working—for him, for somebody—but she was willing to endure only so much.
“Then don’t use me, Pemin.” She took some satisfaction in the way his jaw tightened at her use of his name. “Let me go, or tell your men to shoot. But stop wasting my time with games.”
“The problem is, I can’t simply let you go. You know a great deal about things I’ve done. I don’t want you as a living enemy.”
She lifted a shoulder. “Then kill me and be done with it.”
“I’m intrigued by what you said before, about how you are noticed less now. There are certain assignments for which you might be ideal.”
They held each other’s gazes. Lenna tried to keep from smiling.
Eventually she failed.
“Come back to my chamber,” the autarch said. “Have a bit more wine. I’ll summon my healer, and he can see to your wounds. And we can speak of ways you might continue to serve my autarchy.”
She let her knife hand fall to her side, then tossed the blade to the ground beside the man she had killed. Pemin’s guards lowered their pistols.
Lenna walked to where the autarch waited, her smile lingering as he studied her again.
“You are to call me ‘Your Excellency.’ Always.”
They started back toward his chamber.
“I’m your elder, now. If I have to call you ‘Your Excellency,’
you should have to call me ‘Miss Stenci.’ Or ‘ma’am.’”
He was still chuckling as they entered the castle.
Chapter Twenty-Two
21st day of Sipar’s Ascent, Year 634
With gold in her purse, a knife hidden in her bodice and another in the sheath at her calf, she left Hayncalde on foot. For many years, years she shared in memory with the other Lenna, who had gone forward in time to where she belonged, she had journeyed by ship and by chronofor. Her device was gone, smashed by her own hand. And ships—there were plenty at Hayncalde’s wharf, and perhaps in time she would board one. She found them confining, though. As much as she loved the open sea, she saw little difference between staring out at swells and troughs from a deck, and gazing down upon gardens and courts from a castle window.
For the first time in her life, she was free to do as she pleased, to go anywhere she desired, by any means she chose. She went north, and she did so on foot. Because she could.
Lenna spent that first night in a nearby village but thought it too small for a lengthier stay. She left the next morning and by evening had come to a larger fishing town—Sleeton—nestled in a small cove along the shore of the Gulf of Daerjen. There she took a room at the town’s lone inn, enjoyed a fine, simple meal of roasted bullfish, and went to sleep contented and at peace.
Her comfort in this new home lasted no more than a ha’turn.
One night around the middle of the God’s Ascent, after supping again at the inn, Lenna walked down to the shoreline. She often walked the strands at night. In a village as small as this one, she had little to fear. And she remained confident in her ability to protect herself.
As she watched a gibbous moon rise from the gulf, blood red and full, like spring buds, she heard a footfall behind her, light and tentative. She tensed, reached for the knife within her gown.
“I know you.” A child’s voice, flat, emotionless.
She turned. Before her stood one of the Tirribin she had met in Hayncalde the first night of her existence, when she was still addled from her encounter with herself. He was dark-haired, fine-featured, with milky blue eyes.
“Yes,” she said. “I remember. I’ve forgotten your name.”
“Teelo.”
“I’m Lenna. Where is your sister?”
She remembered the other Tirribin being nasty, menacing. She had sensed then, though, that the two demons rarely strayed from each other.
Still, she wasn’t prepared for his answer.
“She’s dead.”
Several moments passed before she could respond. “I’m so sorry.
I... I’m not sure what to say. I didn’t think... Forgive me for asking, but it’s uncommon for one of your kind to die, isn’t it?”
“It is.”
She wanted to ask how the girl died but knew better—he would think the question rude. Instead, she asked, “Is there anything I can do for you?”
He regarded her with surprise. “It’s kind of you to ask. Walk with me. Please.”
He set off along the strand, away from the village. Lenna fell in beside him.
“I didn’t want to leave Hayncalde,” he said. “I wasn’t going to.
Maeli wouldn’t have wanted us to be anywhere else. But a friend... Someone told me that staying would be difficult. She was right.” After a fivecount, he peered her way. “Why are you here?”
“A long tale. I needed to get away from a man in the castle.”
His expression turned stony. “The one who is after Tobias?”
Another surprise. “Yes, that’s right. Do you know him?”
A bitter smile touched his lips and fled. “I believe you once sent us to feed on his years. He distracted us with a riddle, which seemed at the time like a fair trade. I know better now. If we’d taken his years then, Maeli would still be alive.”
“What did he—”
Teelo shook his head. “It’s too much to explain. He was helped by an Ancient, or was helping the Ancient. Commerce I don’t understand. Because of him, Belvora were summoned.” He gave a second shake of his head. “I don’t want to think about it.”
An instant later he faltered, halted, looked up at her with pleading eyes. “Unless... You’re a Walker. You can change it all.
You can go back and keep him from calling for the Belvora.
Something.” Tears ran from over his cheeks. “Please.”
Lenna’s eyes stung as well. “I’m sorry. I have no chronofor. I can’t go back.”
He sagged, nodded, resumed walking. “I see. All right then.”
“If I could—”
“It’s all right. To be honest, I don’t know if my kind can be saved in that way. We sense the folds of time, are aware of misfutures. That might make us immune to corrections in history as well.”
His voice sounded normal, but his tears continued to flow. Lenna didn’t know what to do for him.
He stopped again to face the village. “I should probably hunt now.”
“I’d like to help you. Truly I would.”
“The Ancient who summoned those Belvora—my friend intends to kill him. This man deserves to die as well. If I could take his years, I would. Can you get close to him?”
Lenna was taken aback by the baldness of the question. “You want me to kill him?”
“You said you wanted to help. More than once, now. You can’t Walk for me, but you can do this.”
“I do want to help, but this... I’m not sure I can. I loved him once.”
“Before you sent us to take his years?”
She should have known better than to try to match wits with an Ancient, even one who looked like a child. “Yes, before then.”
His lips twitched. “I’m going to hunt now. I would speak with you again, if you’re willing.”
She smiled, nodded, and watched him blur away. When she couldn’t see him anymore, she started back toward the inn.
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Lenna didn’t sleep that night. Her thoughts were roiled like a stormy sea. She didn’t love Orzili. A part of her hated him, though, out of consideration for the other Lenna, she had kept that feeling in check, refusing to act on it.
She didn’t care about the young Walker Orzili hunted. Not really.
But she had come to respect him. She didn’t know how often she had Walked back in time to give Orzili another chance to capture the boy or prevent his escape. Many, she believed, and each time he bested them. How could she not admire that?
Maeli meant little to her.
