Red Tide (7 page)

Romany could certainly have fun finding out.

She halted. Mazana drew up in front of her.

“You're not the priestess I've been dealing with,” the emira said.

“The Lord has more than one, you may be surprised to hear.”

“And, what, your sister couldn't face the walk down from the temple?”

“If it were that simple, I would have carried her here on my back.”

Mazana gave a false smile. “We could share the burden, perhaps.”

Romany sighed with feeling. “Alas, the Lord has chosen me to attend you.”

“You are to join my councils, then? Is your god calling in his debt?”

“Yes, that sounds like a fair trade: the help my Lord has given you in exchange for the honor of me sharing your company for a time.”

“And if I should choose to send you back to your god?”

Romany smiled behind her mask. Oh, this was too easy. “You would dare to refuse his order?”

Mazana was tempted, she knew. Romany could see it in the way she pursed her lips to keep herself from speaking.
Do it,
the priestess silently urged. It was the only way for Mazana to save face with the Storm Guards who had witnessed the exchange. The soldier who'd escorted Romany was shifting beside her, clearly unhappy at the association that came from standing at her shoulder. The men behind the emira seemed no less embarrassed. One was pretending an interest in a wall. It was missing a chunk of plaster where some weapon must have struck it during the fighting on Dragon Day.

When Romany looked back at Mazana, though, the sudden quirk to the other woman's mouth suggested she was enjoying their chat as much as the priestess herself. Romany scowled. Oh, amusing was it? Would the emira still be smiling if the priestess took off her mask? Would she be smiling when Romany buried a knife in her back?

She stiffened. Plunge a blade into someone else's flesh? Just the thought of it brought a bitter tickle to her throat.

Just then she sensed a ripple along her web. It came from the corridor behind Mazana. Someone powerful was approaching, though in a place such as this there would be no shortage of those, she supposed. She looked past the emira.

And blinked.

An old woman in a servant's livery was shuffling toward them like she was dragging the weight of the world behind. No one that Romany recognized. She had a squint and a stoop that made her long hair fall over her face. Looked harmless enough. But there were some who would have said the same about Romany, and as a priestess of the Spider, you learned to look past the
seeming.

Sweat poured off the stranger. Perhaps it was just the heat. When you added in the darting eyes, though, and the hand tucked into her robe …

An assassin.

But an old woman? Didn't she know this was a young person's game? Was she trying to give the profession a bad name?

Romany's gaze brushed the stranger's. The woman's look was calm, but it was a forced calm with the merest hint of desperation mixed in. No prizes for guessing who her target would be: Mazana. Romany was less clear, though, on what she should do about the assassin. The Storm Guards hadn't noticed her yet, which meant she had a chance of reaching Mazana if Romany stayed quiet. Would it be a bad thing if the emira died now? Odds were, Romany would end up having to kill the woman eventually, and the sooner she went Shroud's way, the sooner Romany could return to Mercerie.

Yes, minding her own business seemed the most prudent course.

Alas, it appeared her gaze had already betrayed the stranger's presence. Mazana turned to look back just as the old woman reached the rearmost of her bodyguards.

The assassin sprang forward with unexpected agility. When she removed her hand from her robe, she was clutching a dagger that pulsed with dark sorcery. Plainly she knew nothing about wielding a knife, for instead of holding the weapon out in front and lunging for Mazana's chest, she lifted it high above her head.

Making it easy for the nearest Storm Guard to seize her wrist and stop the downswing before it even started.

The assassin had no second blade. She didn't think to butt the soldier in the face or drive her knee between his legs. Instead she engaged the man in a hopeless battle of strength. A second soldier made a grab for the knife. Teeth bared and sandals squeaking, the three antagonists lurched and grunted across the corridor like deadbeats fighting over a blackweed stick. The old woman was obviously stronger than she looked, because she kept her grip on the knife.

Then another Storm Guard stepped in and punched her in the face.
Sloppy,
Romany thought. The way he'd curled his fist like that, he could have broken his fingers when he hit her. Better to use the ball of the hand …

Gods, what was wrong with her?

The old woman was sent reeling by the punch. She collided with the wall and lost her grasp on the dagger, then slumped to the ground. The weapon fell to the floor with a ringing sound. There was blood on the blade, Romany saw. The assassin's? No, one of the Storm Guards had a cut to the back of his hand. He cradled it to his chest. He'd probably inflicted greater wounds on himself while shaving, but still he screwed up his face in pain like the hand had been lopped clean off.

Silence.

Romany waited.

The guard who had punched the assassin was shaking his hand out. The others, even the ones who'd played no part in the scuffle, were huffing like they'd just wrestled a titan.

Mazana tapped a foot as she surveyed them. “Well done, sirs—oh, well done indeed! I thought I'd need a dozen guards to protect me from old women, but no, you've proved six is enough.” Then she turned her gaze on the assassin. When she spoke, her tone was a mix of amusement and foreboding. “Well, well, Mistress Darbonna. What a pleasant surprise.”

Romany tried to place the name among the others she'd heard since arriving in Olaire.
Of course, the librarian from the Founder's Citadel. The priestess of Fume.
The flesh round the old woman's left eye had started to bruise and swell. Her orbs were glazed, but she still stared at Mazana with a look of arresting malice.

“Leave it!” the emira snapped in a voice that could have flayed skin.

One of the Storm Guards had moved to collect Darbonna's knife. He froze at Mazana's command, and the emira bent to retrieve it herself.

Some instinct made Romany open her mouth to shout “no!” but it was too late.

Mazana's fingers closed around the weapon's hilt.

There was no flash of light, no roll of thunder. Romany didn't know why she'd nearly called out, yet her intuition told her something important had just happened. Something portentous. For an instant, Romany felt a sense of danger so strong she thought Mazana might turn toward her and plunge the blade into her chest.

Instead the emira lifted it with wary tenderness. It must have been an emotional moment, because the red tinge to her eyes became more intense.

A dozen heartbeats passed, then she glanced at Romany. Her smile was back, but there was a calculation in her expression too. Clearly she knew she might have died here, had it not been for Romany's awareness of Darbonna's approach.

The priestess sighed. She'd been sent to kill the woman, and the first thing she'd done was save her life.

She felt a tug in her guts, sensing what was coming next.

“Welcome aboard,” Mazana said.

 

C
HAPTER
3

A
MEREL GAZED
out of the window of her third-story room. For some reason, the Erin Elalese spy in Dresk's court had chosen to put her up in a brothel. From the windows below, painted ladies leaned out and shouted bawdy greetings to the people in the marketplace. The market was covered by a reeking haze from the fish boileries. Voices floated up from the murk, peddling coral birds and Elescorian brandy, fish-bone jewelry and Alosian patchwork dolls. Curled around the stanchions of one stall was a vast tentacle, thick as the trunk of a ketar tree. The shop's owner was doing a roaring trade, hacking off slices of the ever-shrinking limb for an unending flow of customers. At the next stall a man was selling plates with gold decorations that would have graced any king's banquet. Yet they were being hawked for the same price as the tentacle, and drawing less custom besides.

A market this size, you'd think it was the center of trade for the civilized world, but there were few signs of civilization on show. A woman lay facedown in a fountain to Amerel's left, and a man was urinating on her. At the center of the square, a crowd had gathered around a pit in which two naked men were wrestling in the dust and rubble. Beyond, a splash of color caught Amerel's eye, and a group of red-cloaked figures emerged from the throng with a gaggle of orphans and beggars in tow. Their stony complexions made them look like they'd just stepped from a rock face. So little attention did they draw from the Rubyholters, you might have thought walking statues were a common sight in these parts. No doubt someone somewhere in the market was selling them for a breeze.

She tracked the Augerans' progress as they disappeared and reappeared among the stalls. One of their number was the largest man she had ever seen, yet she found her gaze drawn to the smallest member of the group—a man with spiked hair and a skip to his stride like he was dancing a step with each Rubyholter he passed. Amerel tried to read in the group's expressions how their meeting with Dresk had gone. She was too far away, though, to see their faces clearly, and in any event the longer she looked, the more she felt a sensation like she was being watched in turn. An irrational fear, perhaps, but still she withdrew into shadow before the stone-skins reached Harbor Road.

She shifted her gaze north. Behind the market was a stretch of rooftops that ended at the curtain wall of Dresk's fortress. Beyond the wall, the top part of the Great Hall was visible, along with a single tower flanking it—the other tower had collapsed in the time since Amerel was last here. A very different Amerel that had been, before she'd killed her first man as a Guardian and realized too late what all those years practicing with pieces of sharpened metal had been for. When she'd heard Dresk's spy needed help, she had volunteered to go. Foolishly she'd thought a diplomatic mission might spare her the need to blood her sword again. But she'd quickly learned that diplomacy was nothing more than the gilding on the scabbard of a hidden blade. In recounting to Noon how she'd steered Galantas's suspicions away from the Erin Elalese spy, she'd neglected to mention how she had fixed them instead on a servant in Dresk's court. She never found out what happened to that servant. Worse still, she knew she didn't care.

Noon was whistling behind her. She looked back to see the Breaker sitting on his cot, assembling the various parts of a crossbow. He wouldn't ask her, of course, but he'd be wondering what she planned to do next—as indeed she was wondering herself. Should she present herself to Dresk and press the emperor's case, as planned? Risky, now that the stone-skins were here. Or should she track down the Augeran commander and assassinate him? It might put a dent in the enemy high command, but could she be sure the stone-skins would hold the Rubyholters responsible? Might they not point the finger at Erin Elal instead?

It was a chance Amerel couldn't afford to take, for she had set her sights higher than thinning the enemy's numbers by one. Nothing less than a rift between the Augerans and the Islanders would do, and an unbridgeable rift besides.

Noon said, “While we're waiting for this spy to show, maybe now would be a good time to start my Will-training.”

“Have you mastered the mental exercises they gave you in Arkarbour?”

“No.”

“Then we have nothing more to talk about.”

Noon fastened the shoulder slides to the sides of the crossbow's barrel before attaching the shoulder stock extension. “I thought you were supposed to be teaching me the Will, not the finer points of meditation.”

The way he said it, you'd think meditation wasn't a priority for an assassin. “Before you can manipulate energies with the Will, you must first learn to perceive them,” Amerel said. “But don't worry if you find it difficult at the start.” She gave a half smile. “It took me years to master the art.”

“Stone-skins aren't going to allow me that luxury, Princess.”

“Yes, that is a problem. Makes me wonder why the emperor is so keen for the Breakers to learn the Will at all.”

“Your friend Borkoth has been getting results. Heard a woman knocked him off his feet with her Will when he suggested how she could repay him for his training. And yet
you're
the one who's supposed to be the great teacher.” He paused. “Anyone would think you're not as willing to share your knowledge as you'd like Avallon to believe.”

He was right, of course. And not out of misplaced loyalty to the Guardians either. When the emperor had come knocking, it had been easy for Amerel to turn her back on the order, because she'd started the process herself many years previously. The hard part had been accepting Avallon's authority over her. At least in this small way, though, she could fight back. “A teacher is only as good as her pupil. You know how many Fenilar children make the grade? One in fifteen. The Will can't be learned like swordsmanship. Either you have the ability or you don't.”

“But you said I can only use the Will if there's no doubt in my mind that I can do so. How can
anyone
know they can use it, if they've never done so before?”

“They can't.”

Noon inserted the crossbow's trigger components into the stock. “And you don't see a contradiction there?”

“The Fenilar learn the Will as children. They are taught to believe they have the skill before they learn the cynicism that comes from failure.”

“But only
Fenilar
children do the learning.”