Heir of Fire (19 page)

A nod, and silence fell as she mea­sured and then poured some green-­looking liquid. He sincerely hoped he ­wasn't going to drink that.

“
Th
ey said . . .” Sorscha kept her spectacular eyes down. “
Th
ey said there was some wild animal roaming the halls a few months ago—­that's what killed all those people before Yulemas. I never heard whether they caught it, but then . . . your friend's dog looked like she'd been attacked.”

Dorian willed himself to keep still. She'd truly put some things together, then. And hadn't told anyone. “Ask it, Sorscha.”

Her throat bobbed, and her hands shook a little—­enough that he wanted to reach out and cover them. But he ­couldn't move, not until she spoke. “What was it?” she breathed.

“Do you want the answer that will keep you asleep at night, or the one that might ensure you never sleep again?” She li
ft
ed her gaze to him, and he knew she wanted the truth. So he loosed a breath and said, “It was two di
ff
erent . . . creatures. My father's Champion dealt with the
fi
rst. She didn't even tell the captain and me until we faced the second.” He could still hear that creature's roar in the tunnel, still see it squaring o
ff
against Chaol. Still had nightmares about it. “
Th
e rest is a bit of a mystery.” It ­wasn't a lie.
Th
ere was still so much he didn't know. And didn't want to learn.

“Would His Majesty punish you for it?” A quiet, dangerous question.

“Yes.” His blood chilled at the thought. Because if he knew, if his father learned Celaena had somehow opened a portal . . . Dorian ­couldn't stop the ice spreading through him.

Sorscha rubbed her arms and glanced at the
fi
re. It was still burning high, but . . . Shit. He had to go. Now. Sorscha said, “He'd kill her, ­wouldn't he?
Th
at's why you said nothing.”

Dorian slowly started backing out,
fi
ghting against the panicked, wild
thing
inside of him. He ­couldn't stop the rising ice, didn't even know where it was coming from, but he kept seeing that creature in the tunnels, kept hearing Fleetfoot's pained bark, seeing Chaol choose to sacri
fi
ce himself so they could get away—

Sorscha stroked the length of her dark braid. “And—­and he'd probably kill the captain, too.”

His magic erupted.

•

A
ft
er Sorscha had been forced to wait in the cramped o
ffi
ce for twenty minutes, Amithy
fi
nally paraded in, her tight bun making her harsh face even more severe. “Sorscha,” she said, sitting down at her desk and frowning. “What am I to do with you? What example does this set for the apprentices?”

Sorscha kept her head down. She knew she'd been kept waiting in order to make her fret over what she'd done: accidentally knocking over her entire worktable and destroying not only countless hours and days of work, but also a good number of expensive tools and containers. “I slipped—­I spilled some oil and forgot to wipe it up.”

Amithy clicked her tongue. “Cleanliness, Sorscha, is one of our most important assets. If you cannot keep your own workroom clean, how can you be trusted to care for our patients? For His Highness, who was there to witness your latest bout of unprofessionalism? I've taken the liberty of apologizing in person, and o
ff
ered to oversee his future care, but . . .” Amithy's eyes narrowed. “He said he would pay for the repair costs—­and would still like you to serve him.”

Sorscha's face warmed. It had happened so quickly.

As the blast of ice and wind and something
­else
surged toward her, Sorscha's scream had been cut o
ff
by the door slamming shut.
Th
at had probably saved their lives, but all she could think of was getting out of the way. So she'd crouched beneath her table, hands over her head, and prayed.

She might have dismissed it as a dra
ft
, might have felt foolish, if the prince's eyes hadn't seemed to
glow
in that moment before the wind and cold, had the glasses on the table not all shattered, had ice not coated the
fl
oor, had he not just stayed there, untouched.

It ­wasn't possible.
Th
e prince . . .
Th
ere was a choking, awful sound, and then Dorian was on his knees, peering under the worktable. “Sor­scha.
Sorscha
.”

She'd gaped at him, unable to
fi
nd the words.

Amithy drummed her long, bony
fi
ngers on the wooden desk. “Forgive me for being indelicate,” she said, but Sorscha knew the woman didn't care one bit about manners. “But I'll also remind you that interacting with our patients outside of our duties is prohibited.”

Th
ere could be no other reason for Prince Dorian to prefer Sor­scha's ser­vices over Amithy's, of course. Sorscha kept her eyes on her clenched hands in her lap, still
fl
ecked with cuts from some of the small shards of glass. “You needn't worry about that, Amithy.”

“Good. I'd hate to see your position compromised. His Highness has a reputation with women.” A little, smug smile. “And there are many beautiful ladies at this court.”
And you are not one of them
.

Sorscha nodded and took the insult, as she always did and had always done.
Th
at was how she survived, how she had remained invisible all these years.

It was what she'd promised the prince in the minutes a
ft
er his explosion, when her shaking ceased and she'd
seen
him. Not the magic but the panic in his eyes, the fear and pain. He ­wasn't an enemy using forbidden powers, but—­a young man in need of help. Her help.

She could not turn away from it, from him, could not tell anyone what she'd witnessed. It was what she would have done for anyone ­else.

In the cool, calm voice that she reserved for her most grievously injured patients, she had said to the prince, “I am not going to tell anyone. But right now, you are going to help me knock this table over, and then you are going to help me clean this up.”

He'd just stared at her. She stood, noting the hair-­thin slices on her hands that had already starting stinging. “I am not going to tell anyone,” she said again, grabbing one corner of the table. Wordlessly, he went to the other end and helped her ease the table onto its side, the remaining glass and ceramic jars tumbling to the ground. For all the world, it looked like an accident, and Sorscha went to the corner to grab the broom.

“When I open this door,” she had said to him, still quiet and calm and not quite herself, “we will pretend. But a
ft
er today, a
ft
er this . . .” Dorian stood rigid, as if he ­were waiting for the blow to fall. “A
ft
er this,” she said, “if you are all right with it, we will try to
fi
nd ways to keep this from happening. Perhaps there's some tonic to suppress it.”

His face was still pale. “I'm sorry,” he breathed, and she knew he meant it. She went to the door and gave him a grim smile.

“I will start researching to­night. If I
fi
nd anything, I'll let you know. And perhaps—­not now, but later . . . if Your Highness has the inclination, you could tell me a bit about
how
this is possible. It might help me somehow.” She didn't give him time to say yes, but instead opened the door, walked back to the mess, and said a little louder than usual, “I am
truly
sorry, Your Highness . . . there was something on the
fl
oor, and I slipped, and—”

From there, it had been easy.
Th
e snooping healers had arrived to see what the commotion was about, and one of them had scuttled o
ff
to Amithy.
Th
e prince had le
ft
, and Sorscha had been ordered to wait ­here.

Amithy braced her forearms on the desk. “His Highness was extraordinarily generous, Sorscha. Let it be a lesson for you. You're lucky you didn't injure yourself further.”

“I'll make an o
ff
ering to Silba today,” Sorscha lied, quiet and small, and le
ft
.

•

Chaol pressed himself into the darkened alcove of a building, holding his breath as Aedion approached the cloaked
fi
gure in the alley. Of all the places he'd expected Aedion to go when he slipped out of his party at the tavern, the slums ­were not one of them.

Aedion had made a spectacular show of playing the generous, wild host: buying drinks, saluting his guests, ensuring everyone saw him doing something. And just when no one was looking, Aedion had walked right out the front, as if he ­were too lazy to go to the privy in the back. A staggering drunk, arrogant and careless and haughty.

Chaol had almost bought it. Almost.
Th
en Aedion had gotten a block away, thrown his hood over his head, and prowled into the night, stone-­cold sober.

He'd trailed from the shadows as Aedion le
ft
the wealthier district and strolled into the slums, taking alleys and crooked streets. He could have passed for a wealthy man seeking another sort of woman. Until he'd stopped outside this building and that cloaked
fi
gure with the twin blades approached him.

Chaol ­couldn't hear the words between Aedion and the stranger, but he could read the tension in their bodies well enough. A
ft
er a moment, Aedion followed the newcomer, though not before he thoroughly scanned the alley, the roo
ft
ops, the shadows.

Chaol kept his distance. If he caught Aedion buying illicit substances, that might be enough to get him to calm down—­to keep the parties at a minimum and control the Bane when it arrived.

Chaol tracked them, mindful of the eyes he passed, every drunk and orphan and beggar. On a forgotten street by the Avery's docks, Aedion and the cloaked
fi
gure slipped into a crumbling building. It ­wasn't just any building, not with sentries posted on the corner, by the door, on the roo
ft
op, even milling about the street, trying to blend in.
Th
ey ­weren't royal guards, or soldiers.

It ­wasn't a place to purchase opiates or
fl
esh, either. He'd been memorizing the information Celaena had gathered about the rebels, and had stalked them as o
ft
en as he'd trailed Aedion, mostly to no avail. Celaena had claimed they'd been looking for a way to defeat the king's power. Larger implications aside, if he could
fi
nd out not only how the king had sti
fl
ed magic but also how to liberate it before he was dragged back to Anielle, then Dorian's secret might be less explosive. It might help him, somehow. And Chaol would always help him, his friend, his prince.

He ­couldn't stop a shiver down his spine as he touched the Eye of Elena and realized the derelict building, with this pattern of guards, positively reeked of the rebels' habits. Perhaps it ­wasn't mere coincidence that had led him ­here.

He was so focused on his thundering heart that Chaol didn't have a chance to turn as a dagger pricked his side.

19

Chaol didn't put up a
fi
ght, ­though he knew he was as likely to receive death as he was answers. He recognized the sentries by their worn weapons and their
fl
uid, precise movements. He'd never forget those details, not a
ft
er he'd spent a day being held prisoner in a ware­house by them—­and witnessed Celaena cut through them as though they were stalks of wheat.
Th
ey'd never known that it had been their lost queen who came to slaughter them.

Th
e sentries forced him to his knees in an empty room that smelled of old hay. Chaol found Aedion and a familiar-­looking old man staring down at him.
Th
e one who had begged Celaena to stop that night in the ware­house.
Th
ere was nothing remarkable about the old man; his worn clothes ­were ordinary, his body lean but not yet withered. Beside him stood a young man Chaol knew by his so
ft
, vicious laugh: the guard who had taunted him when he'd been held prisoner. Shoulder-­length dark hair hung loose around a face that was more cruel than handsome, especially with the wicked scar slashing through his eyebrow and down his cheek. He dismissed the sentries with a jerk of his chin.

“Well, well,” Aedion said, circling Chaol. His sword was out, gleaming in the dim light. “Captain of the Guard, heir of Anielle,
and
spy? Or has your lover been giving you some tricks of the trade?”

“When you throw parties and convince my men to leave their posts, when you're
not
at those parties because you're sneaking through the streets, it's my duty to know why, Aedion.”

Th
e scarred young man with the twin swords stepped closer, circling with Aedion now. Two predators, sizing up their prey.
Th
ey'd probably
fi
ght over his carcass.

“Too bad your Champion isn't ­here to save you this time,” the scarred one said quietly.

“Too bad you ­weren't there to save Archer Finn,” Chaol said.

A
fl
are of nostrils, a
fl
ash of fury in cunning brown eyes, but the young man fell silent as the old man held out a hand. “Did the king send you?”

“I came because of
him
.” Chaol jerked his chin at Aedion. “But I've been looking for you two—­and your little group—­as well. Both of you are in danger. What­ever you think Aedion wants, what­ever he o
ff
ers you, the king keeps him on a tight leash.” Perhaps that bit of honesty would buy him what he needed: trust and information.