Melli"s chest was heaving. Her throat had tightened to a pinpoint and airflow to her lungs was constricted like sand in a gla.s.s. Tears streamed down her cheeks. "How did my baby die?"
Baralis tapped the bone. Tht. Tht. Tht. Tht. "I don"t think, my dear Melli, that you are in any position to ask questions." Baralis" gray eyes met hers. He pressed his thumb against the bulge. "Do you?"
"What do you want?" To Melli her voice sounded high, almost hysterical.
"Aah." Baralis let up the pressure. On the underside of her arm, his fingers nuzzled her flesh. "Ladies who play games should expect them in return." His fingers traveled up her arm and then along the bodice of her dress. The palm of his hand came to rest against her belly. "And games always end with a loser."
Like a_ drug, Baralis" scent heightened her senses. Even through the fabric of her dress, Melli could feel the rough texture of his palm. His touch was firm and cool. Slowly Melli"s body began to relax; her throat widened, letting in air, and her stomach settled down beneath his hand. "Good, good," said Baralis. "Now listen very carefully. I don"t know what you"ve said or done to Kylock, but I do know that you"re playing him for a fool. When he comes to you next, I expect you to be more than accommodating." Melli had a dim feeling she"d been through this before with Baralis. Him touching her, telling her what she would do. Even the sensations were the same: attraction, confusion, a vague thickening of her thoughts. What was he doing to her?
His hand was no longer on her arm, so Melli pulled away from him. As she moved, she caught a whiff of his breath. She paused a moment, waiting to feel his fingers trailing down her spine, before she realized it was a memory. Why did she feel so attracted to him? She didn"t understand. Clenching her teeth together and contracting the muscles in her neck and jaw, Melli forced herself to think clearly. It was so hard, though: her thoughts were heavy and her body was slow to move. She pressed the thumbnail of her good hand into the soft flesh of her index finger. The pain sent a shock wave through her head, and in the moment of vivid clarity that followed she managed to stand free from the bed. He followed her up, and as she tried to back away from him, he matched her step for step. Finally she could go no farther, her calves pressed against the chest by the wall.
"You disappoint me, Melli," he said. "I so much wanted to keep things pleasant between us."
Gone. The muddling of her thoughts cleared in an instant; the hot pulsing in her temples stopped as quickly as it started In the cold, pain-filled world that emerged, Baralis looked like a sharp-edged, sharp-eyed demon. He wasn"t a mysterious lover come to woo her. he was a man prepared to use all his powers to get what he wanted. She felt attracted to him because he willed it. Just like the time at the storeroom, only she hadn"t realized it then. Foolishly, she had flattered herself into thinking he felt something for her, but looking at him now-his face cast with shadows from the lamp behind his back-she realized Baralis felt nothing for anyone except himself.
He didn"t have a sensuous nerve in his body. He found his pleasure exclusively in control.
The myth of the powerful man succ.u.mbing to her charms died. Melli was left feeling naive and angry: Baralis had manipulated her with the force of his will not once but twice, maybe even three times, if the vague childhood memory was to be relied upon. He had pried his way into her brain and made himself master of her thoughts. It was a kind of rape, an invasion of the most intimate sort, and he did it without blinking an eye.
Baralis made a grab for her arm. Melli jerked backward. Her knees collapsed and she landed in a sitting position on the chest. In the second it took to settle herself, Baralis seized hold of her wrist. Straightaway his fingers slid to the break.
"Such a foolish, headstrong girl," he said, stroking the lump of broken bone. "You should learn to be better behaved." Melli"s right hand was trailing over the side of the chest. Very slowly, she moved it around to the back. In the s.p.a.ce between the chest and the wall lay the supplies she had stocked for her escape. To distract Baralis" attention, she kept him talking. "What will you do if I turn Kylock away?"
A push upon the bone. "Oh, you won"t turn him away, my dear. You most certainly won"t do that."
Melli stretched her hand down along the back of the chest. Tilting backward to increase her reach, she said, "Why wouldn"t I?"
"Because I will have to punish you if you do."
Melli"s hand closed around the cool stem of the gla.s.s. "Really. And what will that punishment be?"
"Warning and punishment, I think." Baralis clasped her forearm just below the elbow, and with his other hand grabbed her wrist. He meant to break the bone.
Panicking, Melli raised the gla.s.s. She smashed it against the wall, sending splinters flashing into the air. The fragment that remained in her fist she thrust straight for Baralis" face. Dropping her arm, Baralis jumped back. The shard of gla.s.s caught his chin, drawing blood. Melli saw his lips move. The smell of metal in a furnace filled the room.
"No!" she screamed. "Hurt me now and Kylock will destroy you."
Baralis closed his lips.
She held the gla.s.s out before her like a shield. "He thinks I am his one chance of redemption. Take that away from him and he will never forgive you. Never."
Baralis formed a fist to wipe the blood from his chin. His eyes were as dark as slate. "You have just made a fatal mistake, Melliandra. Do you really think you can hold me for ransom? I have shaped men and countries, lives and fates. I have changed lineages of kings and signed death warrants for dukes, and no silly little girl from a family filled with fools is going to get in my way."
Baralis was shaking now. His beautiful voice was honed sharp like a blade and each word was a cutting blow. "Don"t think for one moment you can get the better of me. Don"t even think it in your dreams. Take me on and I will win every time. I know of nothing but victory: it is what I live for. And you, my dear Melliandra, with your proud, flaunting ways and your fast-working tongue, are nowhere near a match for me."
He took a step toward her. Melli raised the gla.s.s. Baralis smiled, and Melli suddenly felt like a child with a child"s toy.
"So you think I can"t harm you, eh? I could kill you now in a hundred different ways and Kylock would never know who did it. I could stop your heart, or harden your liver, or clot the blood in your brain. I could block the air in your lungs, or halt the juice in your belly, or prevent the poison in your kidneys from getting out. There is nothing I couldn"t do to your body." Baralis waved a dismissive hand at the gla.s.s. "That, my dear Melliandra, has just cost you your life. If you refuse Kylock again, then I will design a death so slow and painful you will beg for the end to come. Accommodate his wishes, however, and I will kill you with one clean blow. The choice is yours."
Baralis looked at Melli a few seconds longer, and then turned and walked away.
The second the door closed behind him, Melli dropped the gla.s.s. The shard had cut a deep pit in her palm, and she hadn"t even felt it. Cradling her left arm, she lifted herself off the chest and made her way over to the bed. Settling amidst the covers, hugging her frail limb close, Melli gave way to the blinding tension that had been building inside of her and cried herself into a frenzy.
She was tired of being strong, sick of being on her own, incensed by all the waiting. Where was Tawl when she needed him? Why hadn"t he come to save her?
As a rule, Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse always closed early on nights when the pits were covered. No matches meant no spectators, and no spectators meant no loot. Heavy sleet, rain, or snow didn"t prevent the matches from being fought--a desperate man would fight under any conditions-but it did make it hard to keep the torches lit. A fight in the dark was as good as no fight at all to the bloodthirsty men of Bren.
Still, even though tonight was deemed too wet to fight, Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse was enjoying a rare boom in business. Tomorrow morning a large portion of the new recruits were going on a four-day training expedition north of the city, and they were out in search of a little feminine comfort before they left. Of course, they didn"t pay well-these days no one did-but a bucketful of coppers was better than nothing at all. Things had settled down a bit compared to right after the victory over Highwall, but there was still little profit in whoring. Which meant that Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse had to take anything she could get.
A sharp rapping came at the door. Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse was in the process of rubbing rat oil into her scrawny neck, so she sent Franny to see who it was. Half a minute later Franny returned. " Two gentlemen to see you," she said.
Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse put the lid firmly on the rat oilon cold nights such as these it could get cloudy unless it was well covered. "What"s the look of them?"
"One looks a bit simple, but the other"s quite handsome. Both big, they are."
Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse peeked her coifed and powdered head around the comer into the main room. Half a dozen blackhelms were currently lounging beside her girls. Her practiced eye knew immediately that the men had reached the stage where no more money would be spent: they were too drunk to eat, drink, or wench. A few more customers more would not go amiss. Gathering her second-best shawl about her, Madame Thomypurse made for the door.
"Gentlemen, gentlemen. Come out of the cold." She held a hand out for kissing. Neither man took her up. "I have a warm fire, strong ale, and the best girls in town."
The stupid-looking man in the felt hat lunged forward. Clasping a hand over her mouth, he yanked her out onto the street. Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse tried to scream, but her lips were pressed tight against her gums. The second man slammed the door shut, and then Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse was dragged into the alley at the side of the building.
Her first thought was for her shoes: silk-the slush would ruin them. Her second thought was for her complexion: the freezing cold would dry out her skin. Only when these considerations had whipped through her mind did she actually begin to panic. She might be robbed, raped, killed, or maimed!
The felt-hat man drew a knife. Raising it to her recently oiled throat, he said, "One scream from you and you"re dead." Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse nodded vigorously. Her eyes flicked to the front of the building. Surely Franny would notice she"d gone?
"Now," said the felt-hat man, easing up his hold on her mouth. "Tell me what you know about Melliandra." Madame Thomypurse"s hearing was nowhere near as good as her sister"s, but she was certain she heard screaming from inside the building. Screaming and the sound of furniture being upturned. "What are you doing?" she cried. The knife came closer. "You didn"t answer my question." The lights in the brothel started to go out. Smoke, lots of it, began billowing from the s.p.a.ces beneath the shutters. Madame Thomypurse"s knees buckled under her. Her business was under attack! The strong arm of the man stopped her from falling to the ground. Even in her distraught state, Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse could appreciate the man"s firm grip. She tried a little feminine wheedling. "Sir, if you could only tell me what exactly you want to know, I"ll be more than pleased to help you." She finished her request with what she hoped was a beguiling smile.
"Listen very carefully, woman. I need to know where Baralis is keeping the Lady Melliandra. I"ve had it on good information that your sister runs the palace, and if you don"t tell me everything you know in the next thirty seconds, then my boy inside the building is going to stop smoking your customers out and he"s going to start burning, instead. Is that clear?"
As the man was speaking, the light from the building across the way caught his face. Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse recognized his features at once: it was Tawl, the duke"s champion. Strange, but his voice wasn"t at all as she remembered it. He sounded a lot more dangerous now.
The second man was standing at the corner of the building, keeping an eye on the front. People were running past the alleyway, screaming about ghosts and smoke. So much for the blackhelms!
Madame Thomypurse was, above all, a practical woman. She had no intention of having her throat cut in a heroic attempt to guard her sister"s secrets. If the man wanted information, then that was what he was going to get. "Come to think of it, I have heard a few things," she said with a teasing pucker of her lips. Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse prided herself on being able to flirt with anyone--even potential murderers. "You know, one or two things here and there."
"What things?"
"Well, Lord Baralis charged my sister with looking after the little b.i.t.c.h. First they held her in one of the northern turrets, then there was some sort of incident with fire, so they moved her to an annex not far from the n.o.bles" quarters. Too good for her sorts by far, I"d say."
Tawl relaxed and lowered his blade. He took several deep breaths. "Has she been moved since then?"
"I don"t know. I haven"t seen my sister for over two weeks now. Bit strange it is, as she usually pops in at least once a week with-" Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse caught herself. She wasn"t about to tell him about Mistress Greal"s penchant for smuggling dead n.o.blemen"s valuables away from the palace and then selling them for a tidy profit. "-kitchen sc.r.a.ps for the hens."
"Has anything happened in the palace these past couple of weeks to stop her from coming to see you?"
Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse patted the hair around the nape of her neck. "Can"t say. But last time I saw my sister she mentioned that the little b.i.t.c.h was near her time."
Beneath the rim of the felt hat, Tawl"s face visibly hardened. "Go on," he said. "Get back to your business. One word to anyone about what happened here tonight, and I"ll personally return to burn the place down-and I won"t come knocking first. Now get out of my sight."
Madame Thomypurse never moved faster in her life. Her second-best shawl went flying to the mud and her skirts flew up around her knees. She ran past the second man and up the stairs to her door. A steady stream of smoke billowed out of the building, and after gritting her teeth and calculating the smoke-resisting capabilities of rat oil, Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse ran straight into the flow.
As she raced toward the shutters in the main room, she came face-to-face with a small, masked demon. Black from head to foot, reaching only to her shoulder, the demon was carrying a bulky sack in one hand and a handful of smoking reeds in another. Catching sight of her, the demon raised the reeds in greeting. Madame Thomypurse took a deep startled breath, inhaled two lungfuls of smoke, and promptly keeled over onto the floor.
"You should have seen "em run, Borlin. The old fearless blackhelms took one look at me and scaddled for their lives. Thought I was the grim reaper." Nabber bent his head to take a drink of his ale and a small landslide of soot skidded onto the floor. ""Course, blocking off the chimney was the worst. That roof was as slippery as a tinker"s tongue-nearly fell to my death, I did. Worth it, though. That place filled up so fast that by the time I"d squeezed through the back window, I couldn"t see my hands in front of my face. Hardly needed the reeds."
"You weren"t supposed to show yourself," said Tawl. He was leaning against an old upturned dyeing vat, and he did not look pleased. "I told you not to go into the main room."
"I had to get some loot, Tawl. It was only fair: last time I met the rat woman she robbed me of my contingency." Nabber smiled, encouraging Tawl to forgive him.
Tawl didn"t return the smile. Since he"d questioned Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse about Melli he hadn"t smiled once. They were sitting around a pressing slab in a derelict dyemaker"s shop. As planned, they had met up with the others earlier outside of the Br.i.m.m.i.n.g Bucket. Andris and his men had made it through the gate successfully, and they had spent their time scouting around the city for a safe place to hole up. They had managed to lay their hands on ale, fresh food, hay, and candles, and everyone had enjoyed their best meal in days. No one wanted to risk lighting a fire, so the place was bitterly cold, but the two candles on the granite slab gave a cozy feel to the room, and the brandy in their bellies warmed like a well-stoked hearth.
The dyemaker"s shop was one in a row of disused, rundown businesses located in a pitch-black street in the southeast of the city. The roof leaked, and all the wooden surfaces were damp; there were no doors, no shutters, few floorboards, and a lot of drafts. The one room that had no windows to speak of was the storage bay. Half above-, half belowground, the large, low-ceilinged room was where Andris had made his camp.
"I say we go in tonight," said Tawl, bringing the conversation around to the one topic that was on everyone"s mind. "We know for sure Melli"s there now, so there"s nothing to stop us from moving ahead. The blackhelms aren"t expecting any trouble-as far as they"re concerned they thrashed the enemy eight weeks ago. They won"t be on their guard."
As he spoke, Jack noticed that Tawl was the only man in the room who was not sitting down. He hadn"t eaten his food, either. It lay untouched on a cloth on the floor.
Crayne shook his head. "No, Tawl. I say we wait. We"re all bone weary; we"ve had seven days in the saddle without one good night"s sleep between us. We need to rest."
"Crayne"s right, Tawl," said Borlin, picking his huge teeth with a chicken bone. "We"ve been up since before dawn this morning. If we go in tonight none of us will be at our best-you know that." Borlin waited for Tawl to acknowledge the truth of what he was saying. A mere tightening of lip was all the response he got. Borlin wasn"t put off. "Besides, if we wait until tomorrow night, there"s a chance there"ll be fewer trained men in the palace."
"Why? What have you heard?"
Borlin let Crayne answer the question. "You were right about the blackhelms, Tawl. They all went south to Camlee with Kedrac. The ones left in the city are a mixture of mercenaries, new recruits, farmers, and fortune hunters. Kylock"s ordered a four-day training exercise for them just north of the city. They leave in the morning."
"A training mission like that won"t affect the palace guard count."
"I think it will." Crayne"s voice was firm. The candlelight brought out the gray in his hair and threw deep shadows across his face. Jack realized he had never seen Crayne laugh or share a joke with anyone: the leader of the knights was a serious man. Crayne continued, his eyes focused steadily on Tawl. "Who are the best-trained men in the city now that Kedrac has taken the blackhelms?" He answered his own question. "The palace guards, that"s who. Kylock is going to need highly skilled men to train these upstart blackhelms, so he"s bound to send some of the best guards from the palace on the training mission."
Behind Crayne, one of the horses nickered softly. They had brought six mounts to the city between them, and Andris had laid a makeshift ramp down to the storage bay so their presence could be concealed.
Before Tawl had a chance to say anything, Borlin spoke up again. "There"s things we"ll need to purchase tomorrow," he said. "New bridles, stirrup straps, saddles. At the moment the horses are a dead giveaway. Everything on them is yellow and black. If one of us is going to wait outside the palace with them, then their tack needs to be changed."
Everyone grunted in agreement with this. "Same with us, too," continued Borlin. "We took a big chance coming into the city looking the way we do. We all need to get some discreet clothes, and you and Jack need some chain mail for under your tunics."
Tawl looked at Jack. "What do you think? Should we wait until tomorrow night?"
Up until now, Jack had just been an observer at the meeting. The knighthood was a closed rank and he was just an inexperienced outsider. He knew nothing of tactics and predawn raids. He wasn"t a fighter-though he could fight-he was someone with one specific job to do. He had to murder Kylock. Up to this point, Jack had deliberately pushed the details to the back of his mind; details were the things that frightened him, the things that made the whole situation seem real. And hopeless.
What Crayne and Borlin said made good sense, and Jack agreed with them, but they hadn"t come up with the real reason why they shouldn"t enter the palace tonight. Only he knew that.
He wasn"t ready.
The journey here had been one mad, breathless gallop, and Jack hadn"t had a moment to think. He rode, he slept, he rode some more. Always there was the knowledge he was drawing closer to Bren, but never once had he stopped to consider what he would do once he arrived. He needed tonight to prepare himself. Not for the details-there was no way to plan for the unknown-but the reality of the situation. It was time he came to terms with what had to be done. The responsibility was his alone.
"I say we go in tomorrow night," he said.
Tawl looked down, disappointed, but the faces of the other men visibly relaxed, and Jack realized he had misjudged them. They didn"t think he was an inexperienced outsider after all: they would have moved tonight on his sayso. It was a sobering thought, and as the night drew on and plans were made, refined, and then finalized, it became the first of many.
Thirty-two.
They left the dyemaker"s shop at midnight: Jack, Tawl, Crayne, Nabber, and Hervo who, besides Borlin, was the best marksman in the party. By turns, it had been sleeting, raining, spitting, and drizzling all day, and the streets were thick with sludge. Like they did when they entered the city, they had split up into groups to avoid any unwanted attention. Andris was head of the second group, Borlin head of the third.
Only half an hour before, Jack had put chain mail on for the first time in his life. It was heavy, confining and it itched like mad. It was like wearing a rack of cutlery next to your skin. Tawl said it would have helped if the mail had been custom-made, but personally Jack couldn"t see it: if anything, it was a relief that the metal rings ended at his stomach, not his vitals.
Nabber had been forced into wearing mail, too, and was currently walking with an exaggerated stagger. "It"ll be wet in the dungeons," he said, holding his palms up to catch the rain. "All the water that can"t find its way around the palace ends up running through it."
"That"s good," murmured Tawl. "No guards will want to be down there if it"s running with water."
Hervo grunted. Like Borlin, he wasn"t a large man, but his arms were as thick as a butcher"s block and his eyes were as sharp as a cleaver. He was carrying his bow in an oilskin bag under his arm, and his arrows were tucked into his tunic. Jack had watched Hervo preparing himself earlier: he had kissed each arrow before putting them into his quiver. Crayne said he had chosen Hervo because although he was first and foremost an archer, he was also an expert with the long-knife.
Crayne himself was a study in concealed weaponry. Subtle but deadly bulges broke the line of his tunic, his britches, his sleeves, and his boots. Knives, throwing spars, a sword, a small crowbar, and a coil of metal rope were just the items that Jack had spotted. The leader of the party was quiet as they walked through the city, his face drawn into hard-earned lines, his gaze never resting in one place. On the few occasions he did speak, it was to whisper terse, oneline orders in a voice well used to command.
Tawl seemed content to let him take the lead. Whether that would remain the case when they were actually in the palace was another matter entirely. Jack couldn"t imagine Tawl even listening to orders once he caught sight of Melli. "Are you sure you know how to get to the n.o.bles" quarters?" asked Tawl for what must have been the fourth time that day.
""Course I do," said Nabber with an indignant squeak. "I even think I know the annex old Thomydraws mentioned. There"s quite a few areas leading from the n.o.bles" quarters, but if I remember rightly, only one of them is out of the way enough to conceal furtive coming and goings."
Tawl was quiet after that. The remark Madame Th.o.r.n.ypurse made about Melli being near her time had affected him deeply. Jack had seen it last night in the alley, and he saw it now as they made their way across the city.
The knight"s face was a shield of taut flesh, and on both sides of his body, his hands were curled into fists.
Like Tawl, Jack had chosen not to load himself down with weapons. A sword and two knives, one concealed. Jack had strapped his second knife against the lining of his boot.
He could feel it there now, the covered blade pressing into his skin with every step forward.
"Andris will be starting out any minute now," said Crayne. "He should be less than an hour behind us."
"Aye, he"ll keep good time," said Hervo in his soft, drawling voice. "It"s Borlin who"ll be dashing ahead of the game. He hates to be kept waiting." Hervo laughed softly and even Crayne managed a smile. Obviously a tale or two there, thought Jack.
Borlin and the other two men in his group, would bring the horses across the city. Two archers and one swordsman, their job was to wait at the entrance to the tunnels-the swordsman with the horses and the archers concealed at shooting distance---and provide cover for the escape. Andris, Gervhay, and the last archer were to wait on a prearranged street comer near the palace until Nabber appeared, gain access to the tunnels, and follow Crayne"s party up through the palace, covering their backs, keeping the escape route clear and watching out for trouble.
That was the plan. Everyone knew it, most of the night had been spent in fine-tuning and coming up with various contingencies, and now they were about to put it into action.
They made good time crossing the city. There were fewer blackhelms to avoid than the night before, and the bad weather and the lateness of hour combined to make the streets almost deserted. Nabber was in charge of choosing the route, and Jack had to admit it was a good one: dark alleyways, sleazy back streets, deserted courtyards. The pocket knew his stuff. Earlier Jack had pulled Nabber aside and asked him where Baralis and Kylock"s chambers might be located. Nabber, always pleased to show off his knowledge, had told him the exact location of Baralis" chambers and the possible location of Kylock"s-the old duke"s quarters. Jack had asked Nabber not to mention this to the others, and the pocket had sworn an oath to that effect, spitting upon his palms and calling upon Borc to strike him down with the ghones if he broke it.
Jack didn"t so much mind the others knowing, it was more that he didn"t want to distract them from their mission. They had enough to deal with already. His plan was simply to slip away once Melli was safely in hand.
"Almost here now," said Nabber with a theatrical whisper. "Remember, it"ll be wet down here, so hold all your necessaries above your heads."
They came to a halt at the end of an alleyway. The two walls to either side were running with water, and the eaves of overhanging buildings were sending streams of run-off pouring onto the road. It was very dark. The surface of the road was more dirt than cobbles, and it was heavily cambered.
"Are you sure Andris will be able to find this place?" The dark form that was Crayne"s head moved from side to side. "It"s further out of the way than I thought."