by Carol A Park
She held out her hand toward the room. “Please.”
He hesitated. “You know, I actually already rented a room at another nearby—”
“That isn’t what you told Ri Talesin’s messenger, was it? Best to keep your story consistent.”
She had caught him at his own game. “Right.” He slid past her and into the room.
To his relief, another woman appeared just then and met Sweetblade outside the door before they entered the room together.
Sweetblade shut the door and faced the other woman. “Aleena. I do believe you’ve met Dal Heilyn before.”
Aleena inclined her head. “Indeed, though he may not know me.”
He did, of course, since he had followed her to the inn, but they didn’t know that. Average height, average build—in fact, she was pretty much average all around. She wouldn’t stand out in a crowd and had the guileless, open face of someone you immediately felt you could trust. Plain, but pretty in her way. She didn’t seem the degenerate sort.
“Please ensure our guest is comfortable for this evening,” Sweetblade said.
“Is that code for, ‘rip his fingernails off while he’s sleeping?’”
Sweetblade ignored him. “We have been invited to Ri Talesin’s country estate to be honored for our heroism and courage in dispatching the bloodbane last night.” There was a touch of dryness in her voice, especially on the word “heroism.” “I will be gone for at least four days; please see to the inn in my absence.”
“Of course, Da.” Aleena then proceeded to relieve Vaughn of his bow and quiver.
“Please don’t lose those,” he said. “They’re…special.” Aleena raised an eyebrow, but didn’t reply. He wondered how much this Aleena was involved in her mistress’ affairs. Was she only a contact? Was she also an apprentice?
She tucked his bow under her arm and waited, though Vaughn wasn’t sure for what.
Sweetblade turned to Vaughn and started systematically patting him down, presumably looking for other weapons. “As for you, I have no way of discreetly locking you in a guest room until tomorrow. You will not, however, leave the inn.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” he said. “Is breakfast included?”
Sweetblade met his eyes, and her own were hard and not at all amused. “May I remind you of the precarious nature of your circumstances?” Finding nothing on him that resembled a weapon, she then riffled through his bag. She found the knife he used to make solid aether and gave that to Aleena. She paused at the leather case carrying the qixli, opened it, but then closed it again without comment.
“Precarious and I are close friends,” Vaughn said. In truth, while he was used to being Hunted, being expected to sleep while an assassin who was out for his blood lurked about? This was a new level of precarious for him. It was almost thrilling.
“I cannot decide if you are stupid, rash, or arrogant.”
“Likely a bit of each,” he said. “For instance, would it be stupid, rash, or arrogant of me to note that you have skilled hands?”
She narrowed her eyes, but he went on anyway. “Are you sure you found all my weapons? I wouldn’t mind if you checked again.”
She gave him a scathing look, but to his surprise, ran her hands over him again.
That was too easy. What was the catch? “If you’re not doing anything tonight, I happen to have come into possession of a private room with a comfortable bed…”
“How fascinating,” she said, and then moved even closer to him, tilting her head up a hair, as though waiting for a kiss. “You should know something, Dal Heilyn.”
“What is that?” He leaned in toward her, unable to resist her bait. There was something dangerously intoxicating about this woman.
“Men who find themselves in bed with me usually don’t get out again.”
“That’s all right,” he murmured. “I don’t mind the floor.”
A snort issued from behind him, and they both turned to see Aleena covering up a smile.
Sweetblade didn’t look amused. Vaughn didn’t have time to be amused, because a moment later, crushing pain nearly sent him to his knees. She had ahold of his balls and was squeezing…
“I pulled the balls right off a man once,” she said. “You don’t want the floor either.”
“I don’t…believe you!”
She twisted. “Shall we find out?”
“No,” he gasped. “No, I don’t think so.”
She released him, and he stumbled to the bed, sat down, and put his hands on his knees, waiting for the pain to subside. Damn woman.
“Sweet dreams,” she said, and then turned and left.
“It’s code for, ‘don’t let him out of your sight,’” a voice said from near the door.
He looked up. Aleena was still there, now leaning casually against the wall, and still looking faintly amused.
What was this? Why was she talking to him? “I see,” he said slowly. “But I have this handy trick to take care of that.”
She smiled, and it actually seemed genuine. “The inn is a place of safety for you right now,” she said. “As long as you’re here, she most likely won’t harm you. I wouldn’t chance leaving if I were you. Even the upcoming banquet may not be enough to save you if you make her angry enough.”
“Most likely? May not?” He didn’t want to hear qualifications right now.
“A word of advice: if you want her to trust you enough to let you go free, trying to seduce her is not the way to do it.”
Was this woman offering him help? He felt a tendril of hope. “That suggests there might be a way to convince her to trust me?”
“Unlikely. But if there were, that wouldn’t be it.”
“She trusts you,” he pointed out.
Aleena paused. “Yes.”
“Should she?” he ventured.
She chuckled. “I am an excellent judge of character, Dal Heilyn. I don’t believe you are a threat. But in this case, my opinion won’t matter.”
“So she really will kill me once she has the chance?”
Unfortunately, there wasn’t the slightest hint of hesitation before she answered. “Absolutely.”
“Will she give up the chase if I get away?
“No.”
Great. He had come into this hoping to get rid of one pursuer, and instead would come out with two. He had to find a way, before this was over, to convince Sweetblade he wasn’t a threat to her. “I don’t suppose you would talk to her?”
“Good night, Dal Heilyn.” She moved toward the door.
“Wait—”
She turned and raised an eyebrow at him.
“Did she really tear off a man’s balls?”
Aleena smiled. And left.
Vaughn shuddered and tried not to think about it.
He flicked his eyes up to the mantle over the fireplace. A full bottle of lupque rested there. Probably came with the nicer rooms, like this one. Either that or Sweetblade was trying to entice him into drugging himself.
If only. He walked over to the mantle, picked up the glass bottle, and after considering the milky white substance inside, unstopped it and downed the entire bottle in a half-dozen gulps. It was enough to knock a normal man out cold.
He tilted his head, the neck of the bottle still dangling from one hand, and waited, hoping that this time it would be different. But it wouldn’t be. It never was.
And sure enough, aside from the pungent taste and the burning in his throat and stomach, he felt fine.
He refrained from hurling the bottle across the room, which was a vast improvement in his self-control compared to eight years ago. Instead, he set it back on the mantle and walked over to the window. He pulled back one curtain and looked up at the moon, hanging half-full in the evening sky.
“Is the lot you gave me not bad enough, without also giving me some way of escaping it?” he asked it, not for the first time. As usual, it lazed about silently, unconcerned with him and his problems.
He let the curtain fall
back in place, the familiar feeling of despair rising within. Sweetblade was right. He had bought himself some time, and that was all. Would the three or four days he had with her be enough to convince her he wasn’t a threat?
He smothered the darkness with a practiced hand. Well, if he had less than a week to live, he might as well make the best of it.
“Da?”
Ivana didn’t look up from her books. She had spent the past two hours furiously trying to glean anything there was to know, anything she might have missed, about Banebringers before taking this trip. Was there a way to thwart his invisibility, for instance?
Bah. She shoved the current book she was looking at away. Useless, all of them. She would be better off researching how to fight various bloodbane, should it come to it. At least material existed on that. “Why aren’t you watching our guest?”
“I thought you might be interested in his activities since leaving him.”
“Not at the expense of his slipping away,” she said, rising in a physical effort to contain her frustration. Aleena knew better.
“He’s not going anywhere for a few minutes.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“He left his room shortly after we did. He then spent the next hour in the dining room socializing—”
“Socializing? With whom?”
“Who do you think?”
Ivana pressed her lips together. “Where is he now?”
“Back in his room. With Ohtli.”
Ivana swept by Aleena, out of her rooms, and marched down the hallway toward room four, pulling out her master key ring as she walked.
Aleena kept pace just behind her. “Ivana,” she said. “Don’t do anything you’ll—”
Ivana unlocked the door, flung it open, and stood at the doorway, surveying the scene inside.
Dal Heilyn was putting his comfortable bed to good use, as she had suspected.
Ohtli let out a muffled gasp at the sight of her mistress and scrambled to cover herself.
Ivana folded her arms across her chest and pierced Ohtli with what she hoped was a suitably withering gaze. “Out,” she snapped, pointing to the hallway. “Now.”
The girl didn’t even bother to dress—she gathered up her clothes, threw on her robe and was already hurrying toward the door even as Ivana spoke.
She curtsied when she reached Ivana. “I’m so sorry, Da. I—I’m so sorry.”
Ivana shook her head. She had known Ohtli would have trouble with the requirements for working here when Ivana took her in—but she had wanted to give the girl a chance. At least she seemed genuinely distressed. “Later,” Ivana said.
Ohtli curtsied again and rushed out of the room.
Ivana turned her gaze to Heilyn. He had stood up to clothe himself without even a moment of hesitation or apparent embarrassment, far too skillfully donning decent attire in the short span of time Ivana’s conversation with Ohtli had lasted. Obviously, a man used to being found in bed with women.
Once he finished, he had the gall to remark, “Is it normally your habit to burst into the rooms of your guests unannounced?”
She didn’t give him the courtesy of a response. Instead, she glared at him and shut the door. “He doesn’t leave the room,” she said to Aleena.
“What are you going to do about Ohtli?” Aleena asked.
“I don’t know yet. For now, I’m going to go to bed. I have a feeling the next few days will be long.”
Chapter Seven
Expectations
Ivana waited while Ohtli pushed a biscuit around her plate, ostensibly soaking up the dregs of her gravy.
She had been waiting silently the entire time Ohtli ate her breakfast. She was patient.
“I’m sorry, Da,” Ohtli said finally, mushing the last of her biscuit into a gummy mound without looking up. “I…I don’t know what came over me.”
“A charming smile and a talent for flattery, no doubt,” Ivana said.
As she knew too well.
She folded her hands on the table in front of her, as if she could physically suppress that unwanted thought. “You agreed to the requirements I set for those in my employ, did you not?”
Ohtli bit her lip. “Yes, Da.”
“When I took you and your son in, it was not an invitation to add to the population under my roof.”
Ohtli’s eyes flew to meet Ivana’s. “Oh, no, Da. He took precautions…” She trailed off and bit her lip again, averting her eyes at Ivana’s look.
Ohtli stared down at her empty plate, seeming very young.
Sometimes it was hard for Ivana to remember that the girls she employed were, on the whole, not much younger than herself. Not all were as naïve as Ohtli, but she still felt decades older than any one of them, save, perhaps, Aleena.
“He said I was beautiful,” Ohtli said softly. “Even after…” She lifted one arm and trailed it along one shoulder, and then let it drop. “Said they looked like rivers of liquid pearl.”
Ivana took her meaning well enough. She had seen the thin, white scars that crisscrossed the girl’s back and shoulders—a gift from her last place of employment.
Ivana closed her eyes briefly and sighed. “Do you work today?”
Ohtli’s throat worked. “Yes, Da,” she said, voice tight with trepidation. “Morning shift, here in a few minutes—”
“Has Garin been to see the circus yet?”
Ohtli paused, brow furrowed, and then she shook her head.
Ivana slid a setan across the table. “It will only be in the city for another day. Take the day off and take him to see it. Every little boy needs to see the circus.”
Ohtli stared at the setan, and then at Ivana, her eyes wide and liquid. “Yes, Da. I-I will. But—”
“In fact…” Ivana flicked her eyes over to the window directly across the room from her and added a couple more setans to the table. “Round up all the girls and their little ones and take any that desire it with you. I’d wager we’re still not going to see much business today.”
Ohtli tentatively stretched out her hand to take the setans, as if afraid they would bite her. “Yes, Da. Thank you,” she said, tears filling her eyes.
Ivana flicked her wrist in dismissal of her gratitude. “You’re beautiful, Ohtli. But not because any man tells you so. Take one look at your little boy and tell me he wouldn’t still adore you if you had two heads, five hands, and a giant wart on both your noses.”
Ohtli’s stifled a giggle. “Yes, Da.”
“Don’t let it happen again.”
Ohtli stood, curtsied, and scurried away.
Yes, it was better to have the girls and the children gone for a while. The carcass of the monster wasn’t a sight they needed to obsess over.
Movement in the room caught her attention, and she turned to see Aleena headed her way. The woman slid into the chair that had recently been vacated by Ohtli, across the table from Ivana. “Your turn,” she said.
Ivana glanced down the hall to the guest rooms. “Ri Talesin’s man should be back to retrieve us soon, anyway,” she said. “No movement?”
“No. Or sound.” After she had been certain all the girls were asleep, Aleena had strung bells on a rope outside Heilyn’s door and window; if he opened either, the bells would ring loudly, on the off chance she fell asleep while keeping watch.
“Good.”
“That was sweet of you—what you did for Ohtli,” Aleena said, settling back in her chair, a grin splitting her face.
Ivana frowned. “Sweet has nothing to do with it,” she said. “I’m annoyed. I’m extra nice when I’m annoyed, lest I accidently take someone’s head off.”
Aleena snorted. “No, I don’t think so. I’ve seen you take plenty of people’s heads off when you’re annoyed.” She gave Ivana the slightest wink.
Ivana rolled her eyes.
“Let’s face it,” Aleena said. “You’re an old softie at heart.”
Aleena had a way of seeing through facades. It made her an exce
llent informant, but a downright irritating second. “Don’t be ridiculous. I might as well be a cold-hearted killer, for all the softness I have in my heart.”
Aleena wagged her finger in Ivana’s face. “You don’t fool me.”
“Yes, well, whatever you may think, don’t go spreading rumors. I have a reputation to maintain.”
Aleena merely grinned again.
Ivana glanced around to make sure the room was still empty. “And while we’re on that subject, when I’m trying to intimidate someone, laughing rather ruins the effect, don’t you think?”
Aleena’s grin turned sheepish. “Sorry. I find him amusing.”
“And you wonder why I don’t take you with me…places.”
Aleena raised an eyebrow. “I thought that was because you don’t want me involved in that way.”
“It is. I was…” She trailed off and sighed. “Reverting to my previous point—”
“Was that a joke? Were you making a joke?”
“—don’t grow too attached.”
“Do you really think he’s that bad?”
“I found him in bed with one of the girls.”
“If that’s the worst sin you can ascribe to him…”
This was a strange turn of conversation. Ivana looked at Aleena, hard. “If I didn’t know any better, I would think you were sleeping with him as well. Why this sudden interest in our guest?”
She shrugged. “Honestly, I don’t think he’s a threat.”
And that was why she was the assassin, and Aleena was her informant. “This isn’t about who or what he is, other than, perhaps, foolish. This is about the fact that I cannot afford the luxury of trust. You know that.”
Aleena looked out toward the hall, as if considering.
This was unusual, for Aleena. She had never questioned Ivana’s judgment before and certainly had never tried to convince Ivana not to kill someone.
The situation obviously didn’t sit well with Aleena, and that didn’t sit well with Ivana.
“You trust me,” Aleena said.
“I trusted you before there was more at stake than my own well-being,” Ivana said. Aleena had been the first whom Ivana had taken under her care—and wasn’t precisely under her care anymore.
