Servant of the Crown (8 page)

Tamas’s mouth snapped shut. He couldn’t exactly argue with that. He chewed on his words, trying to form a response. He was her elder by seven or eight years. The gap between them was not uncommon, but it made him feel as if he should be in control of their relationship. In reality, he felt anything but.

“You should go somewhere your family can shield you from the wrath of royal cabal,” Tamas said.

“I will. Once you’re safe.”

Tamas almost scoffed at that. He was the experienced soldier, and she the sheltered noblewoman. Why would
she
be protective of
him
? “That might not happen.” Tamas was still trying to come to terms with the consequences of their fight with the Privileged, trying to decide if he could salvage his career.

“I’m young,” she answered, “I have all the time in the world.”

He shook his head. “Why would you bother?”

Erika settled back with one elbow beneath her. “Because I like you. Or did I not make that clear?” She paused for a moment, then said, “You think I’m naive and foolish, don’t you?”

“A little.”
She liked him.
The phrase made Tamas feel like a giddy schoolboy, and he immediately felt ashamed of it. He was a soldier. He was a commoner, proud of his birth, rising above his station. What was he doing with a noblewoman?

“I
am
naive,” she admitted. “But I am not foolish. Do you think I’m here because of some passing fancy? That I’m looking for the thrill in the arms of a dangerous man?”

“It had crossed my mind,” Tamas said honestly, immediately wishing he hadn’t.

Erika pressed a finger against his chest. “You asked me why I want to learn to use my powers. Last night, you asked me what I meant when I said I was returning the favor by saving your life. I will answer both those questions, Captain Tamas. I first heard your name when I smuggled a fugitive powder mage child past the Kez Longdogs and into Budwiel not more than a few days before we met.”

“You
did
that?” Tamas breathed. The Longdogs were the royal magehunters. Had Erika been caught, she would have been tortured and executed despite her family name.

Erika went on, ignoring his question, “The child I brought across the mountains was able to enter Budwiel because the guards there were prepared for fugitive powder mages and let her in despite the Longdogs on her tail—on
my
tail. They didn’t do it for money. They did it for a little wine and some new boots that you brought them. But most importantly because they admired and respected you.”

Tamas was astounded. Nobility, he had always found, put themselves before others with very little exception. Erika had already proved herself above any noble he had ever met, but this was beyond his imagination. “You risked everything,” Tamas said.

“I did.”

“For what?”

“To save the life of a child who didn’t deserve to die. That seemed good enough cause. That’s why I want to learn to be stronger and faster. Because it won’t be the last time I do something like that.”

Everything Tamas had ever fought for seemed suddenly so petty. Certainly, he strove for rank so that he could one day make a difference for the common man, but he battled primarily for his own gain and honor. In the end, he had nothing to lose but his life. This woman had so much more to lose and nothing to gain.

“Perhaps I’ve been wrong about the nobility all this time.”

Erika laughed. “Oh, you’re right about most of us. But there are a few who try to be better than what’s expected. My point is, neither of us would not have escaped had the guards on the Adran border not thought so much of you. You saved my life and hers, and that, ultimately, is why I sought you out.”

“I am … humbled.” Tamas took her by the hand, touching her knuckles softly to his lips, and wondered if he might, against all odds, be in love. It was a gut-wrenching, forbidden thought.

“Don’t be. I have never seen fire in the eyes of a man like I saw in yours the first time we met. You will do great things one day.” She looked down at her hands. “Now see, I just refused to have this conversation and here I am having it. I think that’s enough.” She leaned over and kissed him, and he forgot about the world for the next few minutes.

Tamas made a decision. He was not going to wait and hide, wondering if the cabal was hunting him, wondering if his life and career had been destroyed. The cabal be damned.

Tamas climbed to his feet and rubbed the stiffness out of his legs.

“Where are you going?” Erika asked.

“To see the king. He’s the only one who can call off the royal cabal.” Silently, he added,
It’s the only hope I have to keep my life here in Adopest, near you
.

“Is that a good idea?”

“No,” Tamas said. “Not at all.”

Tamas was shocked to find a messenger in the king’s colors waiting for him just outside the city with immediate summons from the king. Tamas was led east, skirting the walls of Adopest, straight toward Skyline Palace.

Tamas and his lone escort reached the palace by late afternoon, and Tamas’s unease deepened as they took the gravel drive that wound up the hill. He could feel the eyes of every royal guard on his shoulders, and he remembered realizing that they would do nothing if Duke Linz attacked him.

The guards, after all, were for the safety of the king. Not some commoner upstart. If they hadn’t been willing to step in against Duke Linz, they would not protect him from a Privileged.

Once they reached the front of the palace Tamas saw Privileged Dienne only a moment before she saw him. She stood outside the silver doors to the main foyer, arms crossed, jaw set, surrounded by a brand new cadre of guards. She looked none the worse for the wear of their battle, her hand likely healed by one of her compatriots.

Their eyes locked and her lip curled, and Tamas edged his hand toward his carbine only to remember that the guards had already relieved him of it. He braced for the inevitable onslaught of sorcery.

Nothing happened.

Dienne’s sneer turned into a cruel smile, and she watched as Tamas was led past. He turned in his saddle to look back at her, worried now about that smile. Why had she not come after him? What did she have planned?

The messenger led Tamas down the facade of the palace until they reached a small door where they dismounted. As he was taken inside he realized this was the first time he had entered the palace in daylight. And the first time they had taken him this particular way. Did either of those items contain any significance? Or were they mere coincidence?

He was kidding himself. The Iron King was still playing a game with his Privileged. One that would get Tamas killed.

Inside, he did not recognize the myriad of narrow servant’s passages that he was brought through until he was, once again, ushered into the Iron King’s billiards room.

Manhouch stood with his back to the fireplace, hands clasped, and fixed Tamas with a long, thoughtful look the moment he came through the door. Tamas thought it was the first time he had locked eyes with the king, and he felt a cold sweat break out in the small of his back.

Tamas had prepared a speech for when he had managed to bribe, bully, or fight his way into Manhouch’s presence. Now that he had been led in without incident, he had forgotten it all.

“Your majesty,” Tamas said, dropping to one knee.

“Stand up,” Manhouch said.

“Yes, my lord.”

Manhouch strode toward Tamas and did a quick circle. Tamas stood stiffly during the brief inspection. The king finished his circuit to stand in front of Tamas, studying his face for several moments before he returned to the opposite side of the billiards table.

“Captain Tamas,” he said. He shuffled through a number of documents spread out across the billiards table. “On your first campaign at the age of sixteen, you were commended for valor in the field on seven separate occasions, suffering eleven wounds in that campaign alone. On the next campaign, as a sergeant, you single-handedly ended the siege of Herone. As a lieutenant in charge of just thirty marksmen on special assignment you captured the town of Lukanjev and held it against two companies of Gurlish cavalry.”

“There are at least thirty letters here from infantrymen and non-commissioned officers whose lives you saved at one point or another. Commendation, commendation. Thirteen recommendations for rank advancement. Thirteen!” The Iron King flipped absently through the rest of the papers before finally throwing them down in apparent disgust. “Tell me, Captain, why are you not a general?”

Tamas guessed it was a rhetorical question, but answered it anyway. “Because I’m a commoner, sir.”

“That’s right. You’re a commoner. And my noble cousins would rather hang themselves with their own belts than take orders from someone of lesser birth.”

“As you say, my lord.”

“Nothing to be had for that at the moment, though,” Manhouch said, stepping away from the table. “Last night, you and the duchess-heir of Leora killed eight members of the cabal guard and wounded a member of the Adran royal cabal.”

How the pit did he know about Erika
, Tamas wondered. He felt a surge of panic. If the king knew, the cabal might know, and Erika was surely in danger. “My lord, the duchess-heir …”

Manhouch cut him off. “I don’t really give a damn about the Leora girl. Privileged Dienne is not aware of her identity, and I’m not about to admit that I spy on my own cabal just to impart such a trivial bit of information. Now then,” he continued, “you did not have my attention before because you were a nothing more than a diversion. Something to annoy the cabal. But last night one of my spies witnessed your altercation with Privileged Dienne and saw you shoot her through the hand.” Manhouch barked a laugh.

Tamas did not see what was so funny. “It was instinct, my lord.”

“Instinct, when faced with a Privileged, is to flee. Instinct is to cower. You did none of those things.”

“Fleeing from a battle usually makes things worse.”

Manhouch nodded sharply. “Something that few people truly understand. Captain Tamas, you now have my attention.”

The question
, Tamas asked himself,
was whether he truly wanted the king’s attention
. Tamas tried to consider where this conversation would go. The king wanted something. Otherwise Tamas would not be here. But what? He bowed his head. “My duty is to serve, your majesty.”

“Everyone’s duty is to serve,” Manhouch said. “Even I, king of Adro, live to serve my people. It’s the way of civilization.” He began to pace the room, clearly agitated. “But the cabal does not see it that way. They feel that they are above reproach, even from me. They need to be disabused of this notion.”

Tamas suddenly knew where this was going, and he did not like it one bit. Working moisture into his mouth, he repeated, “My duty is to serve.”

“You’re a remarkable soldier,” Manhouch said. “You may, if you survive the next few decades, one day make it to general. To do so you will need a powerful patron. One who doesn’t give a damn about who leads his armies, as long as they win their battles.” Manhouch stopped pacing and crossed the room to stand beside Tamas. “And I, Captain, need killing done.”

“He wants you to
what
?” Erika demanded.

Tamas was in Budwiel, a week after his meeting with the king. He had decided that Adopest was not safe and had sent word for Erika to meet him here, at a small apartment he kept under a false name on the Kez border. She was still in his arms, both their jackets already on the floor, when he told her the news.

“Kill Privileged Dienne,” Tamas repeated.

Erika stepped away from him and snatched the blanket off of his bed, throwing it around her bare shoulders. “You’d be mad.”

“I shot her once. I can do it again.”

“And you have to be sure that shot is lethal this time.”

“There’s that,” Tamas admitted.

“Why does he want her dead?” Erika asked.

Tamas retrieved his jacket from the floor, wishing he had kept his mouth shut until
after
they had some time together.

“Don’t put that on, I’m not done with you,” Erika said. “Tell me why he wants her dead.”

Tamas took a deep breath. This was a bad idea. He shouldn’t have told Erika any of this. Pit, she shouldn’t even
be
here. As far as the he was concerned, he was still a wanted man. He knew that he couldn’t trust anyone at court or in the city.

“Because,” he said, “the cabal has been flexing their muscles. They’ve ignored his summons. Disobeyed his orders. They have more than a hundred and fifty full-fledged Privileged. That’s enough to raze the entire country if they wanted and they know it. They’re growing drunk with their own power. Privileged Dienne bungled a major operation on the last campaign in Gurla, so she’s the best choice for an … example.”

“It has the added benefit,” he continued, “that Dienne’s job is to see me dead or disgraced. It’s not me against the cabal. It’s just me against her. This is no longer impossible.”

“You’re still a madman to try it.”

“I have no choice. The king forbade her from killing me outright but even he admits that his grasp on the cabal is tenuous. She’ll try for my head sooner or later.”

“You said it’s her assignment. Does that mean if you kill her this will be over? Or will they just send someone else? What if she gets reinforcements?”

Tamas hesitated. “I’m not sure. The king claims that no one else actually knows about our fight with the cabal guards. He says that Dienne will try to kill me on her own to avoid losing face with the rest of the cabal. Oh, and he knows you’re involved.”

Erika dropped down on the bed and bit absently at one of her fingernails. “How does he know?”

“He has prominent members of the cabal followed, and his spies told him about our fight. Somehow they knew who you were.”

The information did not seem to faze her. “How will you kill her?”

Tamas patted the rifle he had leaned against the doorpost. “Bullet to the head from a half mile. It’s my only real option.”

“Can’t do that,” Erika said.