Vow of Thieves (Dance of Thieves)

by Mary E. Pearson

  Wren was armed with her ziethes, and Synové carried her bow and a full quiver of arrows on her back. They also had Imara’s knives that they spoke quite fondly of, like they were furry pets. Ra mézhans. My sisters. It felt good to be walking beside them again. Jase’s Kbaaki wives. The whole ordeal was almost worth it, just to hear the crazy stories they told, though I knew Synové added a good bit of embellishment.

  When we reached some level ground, I noticed Synové eyeing Mason walking just ahead.

  I remembered the nasty threats that had been hurled at her and Wren. “The family is treating you both well?” I asked.

  “Well enough,” Wren answered. “Vairlyn is kind.”

  “What about Samuel? I was surprised that Jase chose him to go along, considering his hand.”

  Wren shrugged. “Samuel’s light on his feet. He knows how to be quiet and take orders, a much underappreciated quality. And his hand is strong enough. Those launchers aren’t exactly precision weapons. Plus he’s gotten pretty good with his other hand.”

  “Hmm,” Synové said, licking her tongue over her lips. “Pretty good at what?”

  Wren moaned. “Don’t start,” she warned.

  “What about you and Mason?” I asked. “What’s going on there? I hear you two spent the night alone in a ruin.”

  Synové shook her head as if surprised. “Listen to you!” she answered. “Asking all kinds of intimate questions! Is this what your husband did to you?”

  I smiled. “Maybe so. I’ve gotten better at sharing and talking.”

  She sighed. “I don’t know. As one of his other wives, I found his talking to be a bit boring. All he ever wanted to talk about was you.”

  “True,” Wren agreed.

  I looked directly at Synové. “You’re avoiding my question,” I said. “Well?”

  She didn’t have a quick comeback. Her mischievous smile disappeared. “It’s over,” she finally answered. “Mason’s civil enough. He dutifully watched my back. But he’s about as forgiving as a drunk soldier’s tongue. You’d think my lies were a true stab in his gut. Now he has all the passion of day-old bread. We’re done. Finished. Glad to be rid of him. He wasn’t a good dancer anyway.” She shrugged like it didn’t matter. Maybe it didn’t. Many had fallen by the wayside with Synové. Like Eben and several before him. She moved on. But as we walked, I noticed anytime Mason spoke, her attention perked up, and then she grew quiet.

  The blasts were louder from out here. Occasional bits of rock rained down. We speculated that the king was blasting from a spot above the vault not far from Greyson Tunnel.

  “Here, give me your hand,” Jase said. He reached down from a high ledge, helping each of us up. “Keep your voices down. It’s only another ten minutes from here,” he warned. We emerged on a flatter plateau, with plenty of forest and greenery. “Stay right behind me,” Jase advised everyone, pointing to the center of the plateau, “or you’ll end up back in the greenhouse. It’s a long fall.”

  From here Jase never let go of my hand, and I didn’t want him to. We’re together, and we will stay together, no matter what.

  My heart hammered in my chest. The last time I had approached Tor’s Watch with Jase—

  “Hold up,” I said to the others, and I pulled Jase behind a tree. “I know this is not the right time, but—”

  “What is it?”

  “I love you, Jase. No matter what happens up ahead. I want those to be the last words you hear from me. I love you.”

  He touched my cheek. “Hey, we’re going to grow old together. Remember?”

  I nodded.

  “And my mother lit a candle for you this morning. That makes you the patron thief of Tor’s Watch now. Which almost makes you a saint.”

  “I’ve been called a lot of things but never that.”

  He grimaced. “Yes, you’re right. It’s a stretch.”

  I punched him in his shoulder, and he pulled me into his arms. “I love you, Kazi of Brightmist, and I promise you, these will not be my last words. Or yours.” He pressed his lips to mine, warm and full and true.

  “Oh, green toads, stop, you two!” Synové hissed. “The world is about to end. There’s no time for this.”

  She was right. There was never time for last words.

  * * *

  We lay flat on a ridge that overlooked almost all of Tor’s Watch. From here we could see Cave’s End, the main house, Raehouse, the workyard that led to Greyson Tunnel, the gardens. It was nearly a perfect bird’s-eye view. The three other houses were mostly hidden behind the granite overhang of Cave’s End. I could only see one small corner of Darkcottage. From below, I never guessed this ridge existed. It just looked like a sheer, foreboding granite backdrop to the entire fortress.

  We could also see the front gates from here. Paxton was right. Now that they had something worth guarding, the soldiers stationed here had tripled. Where was their treasure hidden? I studied the grounds, looking at where soldiers were posted.

  “I counted twenty walking the walls,” Jase whispered. “Fourteen on the ground, that I can see.” He smiled. His family knew of this ridge—a potential weak spot in their security. They always had an archer posted on an interior wall above the workyard just for the purpose of watching this part of the mountain. Banques had no one posted on the interior wall. Only the outer walls were secured.

  “Oh, such easy shots,” Synové moaned. The guards’ backs were mostly to us, because they were looking out past the walls for potential intruders, not ones who were practically inside already.

  “Steady, girl,” Wren whispered back. “Toppling guards will only bring the whole hive down upon us.”

  The plan was to search Greyson Tunnel first. I had managed to slip through it undetected more than once before, and it was the obvious choice for storage. Its back entrance, where the poisonous dogs had once been posted, lay just below us—fifty feet down sheer, sloping rock. Slide on your stomachs, Jase had instructed us. Don’t make noise when you land. He made it sound easy. I remembered my bouncing cascade down the canyon face. I had made a lot of noise.

  “Ready?” Jase whispered.

  I nodded. Priya went first to show us. Apparently the Ballenger brood had done this before. “But I didn’t have breasts then,” Priya complained, nervous about going down too. The folded curve of the mountain covered most of her descent from guards on the walls. Mason, Imara, and Samuel followed, always waiting for Jase’s signal to be sure the guards’ heads were turned away.

  But as I watched the pacing guards, something else caught my eye beyond the walls. Through the trees, a quick shimmer of light. A sword? And then I noticed movement. In the forest past the back gates were more soldiers. A lot of them. Once I knew they were there, it became clear. They were guarding the road. Why not the front road leading into the fortress?

  I looked back at Tor’s Watch, studying it more closely. In the gardens just in front of Darkcottage were four soldiers, not idly going from one place to another, but stationed. I looked at the distribution of other guards. The workyard only had one, the front gates only two, and yet Cave’s End had four on its short stretch of fortess wall, two in the shadows of the foyer, and more stationed just beyond on the road. I suddenly pictured Montegue patting his vest, his interior pocket close to his heart where his treasure was stored. It made sense. A small, safe interior pocket.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT

  JASE

  Another blast shook the air.

  I forced myself to keep my focus where it needed to be and not worry about what was happening in the vault.

  “Kazi, your turn,” I whispered. And when I was sure all the guards were looking the other way, I said, “Go.”

  She slid down the cold rock, her hands spread to slow her descent the way I showed her. I knew she had only recently fallen down a face of rock, and her body still had all the bruises to show for it, but she was calm and skilled and slid to the ground as smoothly as a leaf. Once she made it to the bottom, I followed. We
all barely fit in the small crevice of space outside the guards’ view. I planned to make a quick dash to open the tunnel gate and wave them through—hopefully before one of the guards turned and saw us. “No,” Kazi whispered, “We don’t need to search Greyson Tunnel. The munitions are here.”

  * * *

  Kazi eyed the shadows of the interior wall, the trees, the roof of the cave, charting her way across the grounds before she ever moved. Once she left, she varied her steps and pace, a shifting shadow in the landscape. When she made it to the other side, I followed in her steps. We told the others to wait until we signaled them from the other side.

  We slipped into a terrace room that still bore the evidence of a messy search. Cushions tossed, tables overturned. From there we watched the two guards who stood in front of one precise section of stone wall—the section that had a door that blended in with all the other stone. It was the hidden doorway I had been so fascinated with when I was a child. Zane must have told them about it, otherwise they never would have known. The guards held launchers cocked and ready to shoot, with their backs tight against the stone, staunch in their duty. There was no slipping around them.

  “How can you be sure it’s in there?” I whispered to Kazi.

  “It’s in the heart of Tor’s Watch,” she answered confidently. “Away from all the exterior walls, easy to guard, deep underground, impossible to shoot like an icehouse, and it was already empty, waiting to be filled. Like a little pocket in a vest.”

  I studied the guards. How would we get past them? Whatever we did, it couldn’t be loud so it would alert other guards. The fact that their launchers were cocked was disturbing. Even a fall could set them off, and a struggle certainly would.

  Kazi stepped away from the tiny slit in the drape we peeked through and looked around the room. She stopped in front of a tapestry on the wall and eyed it. “I have an idea,” she said as she shed her cloak. She pulled the tapestry down and wrapped the colorful silk around her waist.

  “What are—”

  But she was already moving on to another item, some plan already concocted in her head. She grabbed a crimson runner from a table and began tying up her hair as she told me her plan. “Color is the best of distractions,” she said as she scooped up three silver goblets, “or anything shiny. It tends to make almost anyone senseless, much like a fish, at least for a few seconds.”

  I began to object, but she stopped me cold, pressing her hands to my chest. “Jase, this is the waltzing in the light of day that we talked about. Trust me.” Every muscle in my neck pinched, but I nodded, knowing she wouldn’t back down, and with steady blasting continuing to echo around us, it was no time for arguing.

  She stumbled into the foyer, laughing, carrying two goblets in one hand and pretending to sip from the one in her other hand. She acted startled when the guards raised their launchers at her and then she began laughing uncontrollably. “I’m in the wrong place, aren’t I?” she whispered, like they all shared a secret.

  I stared, barely able to breathe. The guards’ launchers remained aimed at her as she smiled, entertained, and risked everything to save people she barely knew.

  One of the guards cursed, uncertain what to do. She clearly had no weapons on her.

  “Have you seen Zane anywhere?” she asked. Kazi knew that name would get their attention—the lieutenant. And he did have quarters here and probably a reputation to go with them, if her discovery of a chemise in his room meant anything.

  The guards rolled their eyes, exchanging a knowing glance. “He told me to meet him here,” she giggled, “and I’m afraid I got a little bit ahead of him.” She lifted the goblet as evidence. “Want some?”

  They stepped away from the door, walking closer toward her. My pulse raced. Their launchers were still cocked.

  “How did you get in here?” one of them growled. “Did—”

  Kazi stumbled, a silver goblet slipping artfully from her grasp and into the air but she managed to catch it just as gracefully. Their eyes were fixed on her now. “That was lucky, wasn’t it?” she said. She pretended to down the rest of her empty goblet. “I’m actually not bad at this. Zane always loves it. Want to see?”

  “No. Come along now. You need to—” One of them uncocked his launcher and rested it against a pillar and marched toward her.

  But then she began tossing the goblets in the air, spinning them in a higher and higher arc as she stepped backward—and they stepped closer. Their eyes followed the spinning silver. It was convenient, I thought, that they were the same height. It would make it easier. A little farther now. She threw the goblets a little higher, and one of the guards actually let out an astonished huff of air. They were far from the door now, the one soldier dangling his launcher from his lowered hand, like he had forgotten it was there.

  Far enough. I nodded to her.

  Kazi let all the goblets fall back into her hands. “There you are, Zane! Finally!” she said, looking past their shoulders at me. They both turned, but as they did, I swung and my sword swept over their throats. Kazi grabbed the dangling launcher from the one soldier’s hand as they both fell with dull thuds to the floor.

  We dragged their bodies into the terrace room and gave the others the signal to start coming over when it was clear. Imara came first. I told her to stand watch while we checked the cellar. “Tell the others to wait for us when they get here.”

  I cautiously cracked open the tunnel door that led to Darkcottage. No soldiers occupied it, and we crept silently to the other end. Three casks were stacked near the passage door, as if set aside for some purpose. Maybe more supplies readied to be shipped to town to replace the supplies we had blown up? Or maybe they were for blasting into the vault.

  I paused, staring at one of the casks.

  “Forget it, Patrei,” Kazi whispered. “I know it’s tempting, but we don’t need anything to slow us down. You try running with that, and we’ll all be dead.”

  Tell me about the stars, Nisa asks.

  She does not mean the ones in the sky,

  But the ones that fell.

  Aaron Ballenger said only two came from the heavens.

  The rest were flung by the anger of men.

  How is that possible?

  I do not remember the stars falling anyway.

  I only remember the storms that followed.

  The smoke in the air.

  The shaking ground.

  The burning skies.

  The billowing mountains,

  The churning seas.

  The cries of people—and the screams of those who preyed upon them.

  Instead I tell Nisa the story that was told to me.

  Once upon a time, long long ago,

  Before monsters roamed the earth,

  All the stars hung quietly in the sky,

  And great cities made of wonder and light,

  Reached up to the heavens to meet them,

  But then a star was flung to earth by the gods,

  To destroy the wicked—

  We hear the scavengers howl at the end of the tunnel.

  They rattle the bars of the gate.

  We will kill you, they call. They roar like animals.

  Let’s go back inside the vault, I say.

  I will tell you the rest of the story there.

  —Miandre, 18

  CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

  KAZI

  I felt this same trepidation the first time I walked down this tunnel and didn’t know what I would find at the other end. I pressed my ear to the passage door, listening for the smallest sound. There was none, and I eased it open.

  The cellar was lit with a single lantern hanging from the wall. I stepped out of the hidden passage and looked at the top of the cellar stairs. The door was closed. I signaled Jase out, then stepped farther into the cellar. The first time I had been here, I had searched this room in complete darkness. I didn’t realize how large it was, or how high the ceilings were—and now all of it was filled with row after row of ca
sks that reached to the rafters, and they still reeked of vinegar and wine.

  It’s a beautiful thing. Imagine the possibilities.

  This was what we came for, what we hoped to find, but the reality still stunned us both into silence. What Jase was thinking I wasn’t sure. Maybe he saw all the months that Beaufort had strung him along, all the false hope he had nursed for a fever cure, the king knowing his family’s weakness. Maybe he saw his home, his history, whole centuries disappearing in a single fiery cloud. Maybe he saw a vault that couldn’t withstand all this.

  I saw a room bursting with dreams. Karsen Ballenger’s dreams, Vairlyn’s, Montegue’s. Different dreams that had all gone very wrong.

  “Let’s get busy,” Jase finally said, and began pouring the kerosene on the floor. I pulled the fuel-soaked cording from a skin in my pack and began laying it between a row of casks, then carefully ran it through the passage door. Jase poured more kerosene partway into the tunnel. I extended the cording about another thirty feet past it.

  And then I turned around. “Jase,” I whispered. “Put the kerosene down.” He spun to face the other end of the tunnel with me. A soldier stood there, his launcher aimed at us. He seemed to know he didn’t dare shoot it or we’d all go up. Behind him our crew was pinched between six very sharp halberds.

  “Come out,” the soldier called to us.

  Jase didn’t move. Neither did I. “That would be a mistake on our part,” Jase answered, his gaze stone cold. “Why don’t you come in and get us?”

  The soldiers’ eyes blazed with anger. “Come out of there!” he ordered.

  Jase remained unflustered. “No.”