The Autumn Republic (38 page)

“Don’t I know it.” Tamas shook his head. “Some men lead from the back. I prefer to do it from the front.”

“It just takes one lucky musket ball. One thrust of a bayonet.”

“That knowledge has never stopped me before.”

“When will your luck run out?”

Tamas extended a hand. “Maybe today. Maybe never. Help me up. I have another king to kill.”

“I thought you just meant to capture him.” Gavril helped Tamas climb to his feet.

Tamas grimaced. “I will. Wishful thinking, I suppose. I’ll be out in a minute.”

Gavril went on ahead. Once he was alone, Tamas leaned over, hands on his knees, and took several deep breaths. He’d made a horrid mistake. Many of them over the course of this short war, now that he paused to look back. Too many. Misplaced trust. Bad timing. This final misstep with the Kez – it needed to be his last. When it was all over, he had to put down his pistol and walk away, or else everything he had fought for would be for naught and his vision would come true.

Straightening, Tamas adjusted his sword and checked his pocket to be sure he had enough powder charges, then marched out into the sun.

It was time.

A
damat’s questioning of the kitchen staff revealed two important things:

The first was that Ricard’s security was not nearly as good as he claimed it was. The second was that a man named Denni of Rhodigas had left the blasting oil behind the silver over two weeks ago. He told one of the scullery maids that they were bottles of imported vodka specifically for Ricard’s next birthday and gave her a fifty-krana note to keep quiet about the “surprise.”

The poor girl had broken down weeping when Fell told her what, exactly, the bottles were. It was enough to convince Adamat that she wasn’t in on the plot, though he still told Fell to have her watched for a few days.

Adamat knew Denni, but only by reputation. He was a jack-of-all-trades – a con man, muscle-for-hire, thief, and smuggler. He lacked both ambition and vision, and while he had helped Ricard set up the first union, he had not wanted the responsibility of actually running anything.

“He’s really not a bad guy,” Ricard repeated for the third time in as many hours.

Adamat leaned against the cold brick wall of the basement Underhill Society secret room, clutching his cane in one hand, the head already twisted so he could withdraw his sword swiftly. The candelabras were lit, a deck of cards laid on the table, and cold drinks set out. Everything was prepared as it should be for the society, in addition to hiding two of Ricard’s enforcers in the basement niches and placing SouSmith innocuously near the front door of the hotel.

“He tried to kill you,” Adamat replied.

Ricard sat behind the card table, fiddling with a corkscrew. “He might not have known.”

“Oh?” Adamat rolled his eyes. “That you, the head of the union, would have been at a union function in your own headquarters when he threw a bomb into your office? Or maybe he threw the second bomb, the one that landed beside your wine collection, where you spend plenty of time.”

“He might not have thrown the bombs at all,” Ricard said. “He might have bought them for someone else.”

Fell sat beside Ricard, chewing thoughtfully on a handful of cashews. “That’s what we mean to find out.”

Adamat felt for Ricard. He really did. The members of the Underhill Society had been his closest friends and allies for over twenty years and secrecy was part of the mystique of their business cabal. Betraying something like that was very difficult.

But it had to be done.

“He’s late,” Adamat said, checking his pocket watch.

“He’s always late,” Ricard responded.

“You’ve delayed the others?” The only way to get Denni to come in was to hold Ricard’s regular weekly meeting. Everything had to seem completely normal. That required invitations to everyone else in the society.

“Yes,” Fell said. “They’ll all be at least a half hour late. Denni isn’t usually more than ten minutes behind schedule.”

“And you’re sure he’ll come?”

“I’m sure,” Ricard said. “He doesn’t get a lot of work these days. Lots of time on his hands.”

“Unless he suspects something,” Adamat muttered.

“He was here last week,” Fell said.

Ricard asked, rubbing at his bald spot, “Is this really necessary? I could just talk to him.”

“You’re being naïve, Ricard,” Adamat said.

Ricard picked beneath his fingernails with the corkscrew and gave an exasperated sigh. “All right, all right. Maybe I am. Get on with it, damn it. Look at me, bullied around by my own hirelings.”

“If I was just another hireling, I would have turned down the job,” Adamat said sharply. “I am here as your friend. Understand?” He opened his mouth to continue, his ire raised by Ricard’s unwillingness to do what was necessary, but the sound of footsteps on the basement stairs caught his attention. It was a heavy tread and it came down the hallway without hesitation. He tightened his hand on his cane.

Denni of Rhodigas was a little shorter than Adamat but built like a strongbox with broad shoulders, thick arms, and very little body fat. He wore a brown tailored suit and held a top hat in one hand and a cane in the other. His curly black hair was cropped above his ears. His eyes went to Fell, sitting beside Ricard, and he frowned. Then he saw Adamat waiting over by the wall.

“Denni,” Adamat said. “We have some questions for you.”

Adamat threw himself out of the way as Denni leapt forward, swinging his cane like a truncheon. He raised his own cane, ready to deflect another attack, but it had only been a feint. Denni was already gone, sprinting back up the hallway.

“Now!” Adamat cried. He set upon Denni’s heels, with Fell right behind him. By the dim light of the basement hall he caught a glimpse of a struggle. “Careful!” he said. “He might have —” There was a spark, and he was deafened by the sudden blast of a pistol going off in the confined space.

One of Ricard’s enforcers collapsed. By the time Adamat reached the scuffle, the second enforcer was reeling beneath the butt of Denni’s pistol. He stumbled backward and tripped, falling into the hotel’s wine collection. The roar of a hundred glass bottles smashing to the floor at once seemed distant in Adamat’s deafened ears.

Adamat swung his cane, but only managed to strike air, as Denni was already on his way up the stairs. Adamat was pushed aside by Fell, who he scrambled to follow.

Adamat rushed through the halls of the hotel, then the kitchen and the pantry, and then out a back door into the alley behind the building, barely catching glimpses of Fell’s back as she chased Denni. He passed another of Ricard’s enforcers lying in the alley behind the hotel, clutching at a fresh knife wound. Adamat was already breathing hard, his heart pounding, when he reached the main road.

The avenue was not crowded at this time of the evening, but there was enough traffic to worry Adamat that Denni might have the extra bottle of blasting oil on his person. He tried to search his memory as he ran, picturing Denni as he came into the Society room. Had there been a bulge in his jacket pocket? One at his belt as well? That explained the pistol, but the other one could be anything – his knife, another pistol, or the bottle of blasting oil.

He caught sight of Denni sprinting down the thoroughfare, cane in hand, his hat dropped somewhere along the way. Fell was close behind him, but not gaining quickly enough.

Adamat cut across the street as Denni ducked into an alleyway, running parallel to Denni’s escape route until he reached the next street. He rounded the corner a moment later, his lungs burning, and ran toward the next alleyway.

Denni appeared from that alley a moment later. He swung around, heading straight toward Adamat.

“Stop!” Adamat shouted. He drew his cane sword and planted himself in Denni’s path.

Denni didn’t even slow down. He raised his cane and swung with his powerful shoulders, forcing Adamat to parry the blow or risk being brained about the head. Adamat felt the cane sword wrenched from his fingers and saw it clatter off down the cobbles. Denni planted a shoulder in his chest, and Adamat felt like he’d been hit by a charging horse. He was flung to the ground with enough force to rattle his bones.

He rolled onto his hands and knees, spitting blood and cursing. He looked up, expecting to see Denni disappearing down the street.

But Denni had stopped and turned toward Adamat, just twenty paces away. Adamat’s heart leapt into his throat as Denni pulled a stoppered glass vial from his pocket. He didn’t have time to think as Denni flung the vial at him and turned to sprint away.

Adamat threw his arms up over his face. The whole world seemed to slow to a crawl, every regret and mistake flashing before his eyes as the blasting oil arched toward him. He’d seen the power of the stuff. There wouldn’t be enough left of him to scrape off the cobbles, and he found himself grimly hoping that Denni had misjudged the distance and was still within the blast radius.

There was a flash of movement as Fell sped past him. She reached out one hand and snatched the blasting oil out of the air. She pivoted on one leg, spinning, and went to her knee, setting the blasting oil carefully on the cobbles before Adamat’s eyes. A moment later she was off again, chasing after Denni.

Adamat’s hands trembled, but he snatched up the blasting oil lest a passerby accidentally kick it. He wondered how the pit the stuff hadn’t gone off during the scuffle and chase, and chastised himself for ever doubting Fell.

“I thought you said he wouldn’t be armed!” Adamat said as Ricard rounded the corner behind him, huffing and puffing.

Ricard gasped out, “He wasn’t supposed to be.”

“He either got tipped off or he was planning on finishing the job tonight. Hold this.” Adamat put the vial in Ricard’s outstretched hand. “Don’t drop it!” He grabbed his cane sword and set off in pursuit of Fell, hoping that Denni didn’t have the other missing bottle on his person.

He sprinted down the road, listening for sounds of the chase over his own labored breathing. He caught sight of Fell as she raced across a side street. Adamat followed, then crossed another road and ran into a shoe shop. Shoes lay on the floor, shelves tipped over by Denni in his rush to get away. An old cordwainer crouched behind his workbench and let out a startled moan as Adamat tore through the front room, down the hall, and out into the alley.

He entered the dimly lit alleyway just in time to see Fell corner Denni at a dead end. Denni whirled toward her, his spent pistol held by the barrel. When he saw Adamat, he lunged at Fell, likely hoping to take her down before Adamat could help.

The first swing went wide. Fell leapt, catlike, to one side and jabbed Denni in the throat with one hand. The blow would have sent any other man to the ground, windpipe collapsed, but Denni seemed to shrug it off and swung his pistol again.

“We need him to talk!” Adamat shouted, his voice echoing down the alley.

Fell caught the falling pistol butt with one hand, dropping to one knee beneath the force of the blow. Her fist shot out once again, slamming Denni hard in the balls before she got to her feet and closed the gap between them, her hand clawlike on his throat. She ducked, slipping beneath one arm, and came up behind Denni, stiletto in her hand, pressed against his cheek just below the eye.

Denni froze.

The whole fight occurred in the time it took Adamat to reach them. He slowed to a walk, and his heart felt near to bursting. He had to put a hand against the alley wall to support himself.

When he’d finally recovered, he stood up and straightened his jacket, stepping up to Denni with his cane sword in hand. “You have a lot of explaining to do. Where is the last vial of blasting oil?” Adamat asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t have it.”

“Who has it? Who hired you to bomb the union headquarters?”

Denni sniffed, putting up a tough façade.

“The easy way gets your ass thrown in a cell. The hard way, and she carves out one of your eyes, and then we break your kneecaps.”

Denni choked, then inhaled slightly as Fell pressed the stiletto harder against his cheek. “It was Cheris!”

“Excuse me?” Adamat lowered the tip of his cane sword.

“Cheris, the head of the bankers’ union! She sent me to buy the blasting oil. She had me hire men to throw those bombs into Ricard’s office, and she told me to kill him tonight at the Society meeting.”

“That was easy,” Fell said. The tip of her knife didn’t leave Denni’s cheek.

“Bloody pit! Bring him with! Ricard,” Adamat said as the union boss entered the alley from the cordwainer’s back door. “Get the police. We have to move quickly.”

N
ila felt exhausted. Her head drooped and she had to wrap the reins around her hands to keep them from slipping from stiff fingers as she rode. Every inch of her body throbbed from the pain of running and riding, and she wanted nothing more than to lie down in the grass, wet though it was with morning dew, and sleep.

But she knew that if she did that, Olem would die.

If he wasn’t dead already.

Bo looked worse than she felt. He seemed to have gained a second wind, head up and eyes alert, but she could see the rings under his eyes and the grimace that he tried to hide as he was jostled in his saddle.

“Your leg,” she said quietly as they rode just behind the vanguard of the Riflejack cavalry. The scouts were up ahead, following the trail her Kez pursuers had left.

Bo slouched in his saddle. “What about it?”

“They couldn’t…”

“No, they couldn’t. The flesh was too damaged at the knee. Healers can work miracles, but there’s a limit to what they can do. If they
had
managed it, I’d be two inches shorter on the left side and unable to bend my leg.”

Nila imagined Bo strutting down the street, jerking along like a marionette, trying to look casual. She swallowed an inappropriate laugh, covering her mouth, and tried to play it off as Bo glared at her. When he finally looked away, he said, “Yeah, that would have been kind of funny.”

“I’m so sorry, Bo.”

“Don’t be. I’m lucky to have everything above the knee. Let’s just get this over with so I can get out of this bloody saddle. Are we getting close?”

Nila looked around. “It all looks the same in the fog,” she said, then pointed to a scuff in the dirt on a hilltop. “That’s one of my marks.”

“All right.” Bo took a flask from his pocket and took a swig.

“Should you be drinking before a fight?”

“Better I drink now than pass out from the pain halfway through the battle.”

They rode on in silence until word was passed quietly back that they were to halt. One of the scouts approached Nila and Bo, and tipped his hat. “We have them, Privileged. They’re camped in a valley over the next hill.”

“Carry on,” Bo said.

“Do you want me to stay close?” Nila asked.

“Any other time I would say yes,” Bo said with a tired but flirtatious smirk. “But not this time. The magebreaker might know about you by now. He might not. Regardless, he’s gonna think there’s only one Privileged with the cavalry. If we stay well apart, he might not be able to cover us both with his nullifying sorcery. Remember, air in front of you to stop bullets. Keep your fire to a short distance, lest you blast our own people. A fight like this requires deft execution, not brute force.”

The cavalry split into two groups and created a horseshoe-shaped formation around the valley in which the Kez had camped. Nila could smell cook fires now, and she thought she heard muffled voices in the fog. Her wedge of cavalry formed up and she was assigned an escort of two heavily armed cuirassiers to keep her safe.

Nila tried to steady her breathing as she waited for the signal. She didn’t have the training for this kind of fight. She didn’t have the training for
any
kind of fight. All she knew how to do was unleash herself, and even then it only seemed to work half the time.

She didn’t have time to panic any longer. A horn was blown and the cavalry leapt forward, charging the Kez camp. They swept down into the valley, swords at the ready, and thundered in among the tents and fire rings.

Nila resisted the urge to summon fire to surround her hands – not only would she burn through her reins but she would work best with the element of surprise here.

She heard the clash of swords and the fire of muskets and carbines, while her own wedge of the cavalry continued forward unopposed. One man beside her commented on the lack of resistance, but they surged on, spurred by the sounds of the clash up ahead.

She recognized this bit of the camp. She remembered sneaking through it last night on her flight out. Somewhere nearby was the poor sentry whose neck she had burned through.

She saw the body of an Adran soldier lying in the mud. “Olem!” she shouted, digging in with her heels. Her horse jumped forward, nearly throwing her. She drew close enough to realize that the body did not belong to Olem. But the man’s head was near slashed from his shoulders, fresh blood pouring from his neck. She saw another body in a similar state, then another. The Kez were killing their prisoners.

A Kez soldier emerged from the fog standing above the kneeling figure of an Adran soldier. She recognized the scourged shoulders and the blood-caked beard of the kneeling man.

The Kez soldier’s sword flashed.

Nila reacted out of panic and instinct, her fingers twitching, and her fire took the Kez soldier’s head off as cleanly as a cannonball. The Kez’s body fell, and slowly, tiredly, Olem raised his head.

Nila fought to gain control of her horse as her bodyguards clashed with several other Kez soldiers on foot. When she had calmed the animal, she slid from the saddle and threw herself to the ground beside Olem. He had fallen from his knees to his side. She cut his bonds, only for him to wrench the gag from his own mouth.

“Behind you, you fools!” he bellowed.

Entangled with the few Kez remaining on foot, the Adran cavalry struggled to turn back toward the sudden charge coming up behind them. The bulk of the Kez dragoons slammed into their flank with a thunderous concussion, cutting their way through Adran cuirassiers that had only moments ago held the upper hand.

Nila stretched out one hand, her flames consuming a horse and rider heading straight toward her. Startled by her own precision, she turned and repeated the gesture, searing through another Kez dragoon.

“A sword!” Olem yelled, though one of his arms hung uselessly at his side. He caught a weapon tossed by one of his cuirassiers and spun to deflect the swing of a Kez dragoon. The dragoon roared past and spun to charge forward again, intent on plowing Olem beneath the hooves of his mount, but one of Nila’s bodyguards came at him from behind, slicing neatly through the base of his neck.

Nila helped Olem get back to his feet.

“Ignore me,” he said. “Keep up the fire!”

She flung a ball of flame the size of an ox, consuming the closest Kez dragoon, and then felt a blackness touch the corner of her mind.

Fear seized her as the flames dancing on her fingertips went out.

The magebreaker.

She could sense his influence grow around her, and when she reached for the Else once more, there was nothing to touch. Panic rose in her chest, threatening to overwhelm her. She could not fight with a sword or shoot a pistol. Her one strength was now gone.

She couldn’t pinpoint the location of the magebreaker. Her preternatural senses failing her completely, she threw herself back toward her horse, hauling herself into the saddle, knowing that her options were now limited to fleeing.

There was a flash of lightning in the air behind her, and she turned in time to hear two large explosions somewhere in the fog. She had forgotten about Bo. If the magebreaker was here, if she could keep him distracted, maybe Bo would be able to end this single-handed.

A man screamed out of the fog astride the biggest, fastest horse she’d ever seen. He was clothed in black furs and brown leather, swinging an immense, curved sword. He galloped toward her, blade flashing through the throat of one of Nila’s bodyguards, and then he was past.

Nila raised her hands, only to remember she had no sorcery to throw at him. “He’s going for Bo!” she shouted. “After him!”

Not stopping to see if Olem’s cuirassiers were following, she urged her mount toward where she’d seen the flashes of sorcery.

The Kez camp was now a field of bodies of the dead and the wounded, Kez and Adran alike. Horses galloped through the fog riderless, and unseated cuirassiers and dragoons stumbled about, locking in combat when they came across one another.

Nila felt completely vulnerable in the fog and suddenly realized again how helpless she was. Should she try to help Bo now? Or would she just get herself killed?

It was too late to wonder. She came out of the densest fog and upon a string of sorcery-made corpses. Horses and men alike lay dead, murdered by spikes of dripping ice.

She saw Bo, still astride his horse, reins in his teeth to leave both hands free, frost clinging to his sideburns. He twisted in his saddle toward a charging group of Kez dragoons, and wind slammed into the lot of them, sending horses and men tumbling and screaming, carried off into the swirling mist.

Something moved in the fog behind Bo. At first she thought it was a riderless horse, running terrified and confused. But the creature stalked forward with an implacable gait and the shadow became something more like a man. It was large and twisted, fury etched on its mangled face as it crept up behind him. She had only seen Wardens from a distance. Close up, it was all the more terrifying.

“Bo!” Nila shouted.

Bo swung around as the Warden leapt. His fingers twitched, and the creature was suddenly impaled upon icicles as long as spears. The Warden snapped the icicles off at its chest, blood and water dripping behind it as it loped forward, seemingly unaffected. Bo’s fingers twitched again and the creature was thrown backward as easily as a leaf, screaming angrily into the gust of sorcery-fueled wind.

It managed to land on its feet, and Nila waited for Bo to finish the creature off as it resumed its charge toward him. But his attention was grabbed by the sudden arrival of more Kez dragoons. They raced toward him from the side, only for their horses to stumble against his sorcery. Bo swayed in the saddle, looking like he was ready to fall at any moment. He was too tired to continue this fight, and she could sense the dark presence of the magebreaker. Any second now Bo wouldn’t be able to use his sorcery at all.

Nila snatched at a rock on the ground and flung it at the charging Warden. The rock skipped off its shoulder and it skidded to a halt, its massive misshapen head turning toward her. Her breath caught in her throat at the sight of its malevolent, beady eyes. The Warden bellowed and charged straight at her, head lowered like an angry bull.

Nila backed up, then turned to run. What could she do? The creature would tear her limb from limb. It would kill her and then it would kill Bo, and all she had fought for would be for nothing. The sound of its heavy footsteps pounded behind her and she spun to meet her death face-on.

Panic, anger, and desperation snatched at the Else through the ribbon of darkness that was the magebreaker’s influence. Nila tugged at the Else, forcing the tiniest blast of fire into the world and shoving it like a spike through the Warden’s eye.

The Warden stumbled and fell, a smoking black hole through its head.

Nila’s breath was dashed from her as she was suddenly flung to the ground. She hit hard, rolling to absorb the impact but feeling her arm twist unnaturally beneath her. The magebreaker charged past her, sweeping toward Bo. Bo raised his hands, face twisted in anger, but his sorcery sputtered and failed and only his sudden jerk at the reins carried him out of the way of the magebreaker’s heavy scimitar. The Gurlish rider disappeared into the fog.

Nila struggled to her feet, checking her arm, thankful that it was not broken, and ran toward Bo. “Quick,” she said. “We have to go. We can’t fight him.”

Bo seemed to agree. He urged his horse toward her, reaching out one hand.

Out of the corner of her eye, Nila saw the magebreaker’s charge. The Gurlish Wolf was pounding straight for her on his charger, his scimitar swinging, and she could do nothing about it. She opened her mouth to scream.

Bo’s horse hit the bigger Gurlish stallion on the shoulder. Both horses bucked and reared, throwing their riders and flailing and neighing in panic.

Nila ran toward Bo as he struggled to sit up. She could see his prosthetic still in the stirrup, and as he tried to roll onto his front, the magebreaker had already regained his footing and was sprinting toward Bo, sword at the ready.

Nila felt the tears in the corners of her eyes. She strained at the blackness that cut her off from her sorcery, reaching through the inky depths for the Else. She had pushed through it once and she had to do it again.

It was there. She could feel it, seemingly just beyond her reach. She clawed for the Else and it felt as if it were there at her fingertips.

The magebreaker’s shirt burst into flames. He threw himself to the ground, rolling to put them out, his face a mixture of confusion and rage. Nila strode forward. The Else slipped from her fingers and she drew up, trying desperately to reach it. The magebreaker whirled on her now, sword held in both hands, and she scrambled to recover the Else.

She threw herself out of the way of the first swipe. Flames sputtered in front of her hands, singeing the magebreaker’s arms. It put him off long enough for her to scramble away, but in only a moment he was after her again.

Out of the corner of her eye she could see Bo crawling toward her, helpless to stand without his leg, and his prosthetic still stuck in the stirrup.