She raised an eyebrow. “Forgive me if I say I doubt that statement. Like I said, it’s been a while, but I do still remember that men who come to places like this do it specifically to have their ego stroked. Among other things.”
“Perhaps another time, but not today. I had something different in mind for this evening.”
“Oh?” she said, tension in her voice. Her eyes flicked to the knives on display across his chest and belt. Clearly ‘something different’ did not translate to ‘something better’ in her estimation. “What are you planning?”
He leaned forward and wafted some of the wine’s bouquet to his nose, then began to carefully decant it. “It begins with you and I enjoying some wine.”
Again her eyebrow rose. “This wine?” she asked, watching as he tipped a generous portion into her glass. “This is expensive stuff, isn’t it?”
“It is, and more importantly it is wine of impeccable quality. Far too exquisite to be enjoyed alone. If you are at all a wine drinker, I strongly suggest you take this opportunity to sample it. You’re not likely to have another chance to enjoy this particular vintage.”
She took the glass by the stem and imitated as he sniffed at the delicate bouquet. Not until he had taken a sip of his glass did she do the same for hers.
“There… that is how wine was meant to taste.”
“It is good stuff…” she said earnestly. “So what happens now?”
“Now? Now I will drink enough of this wine to loosen my lips and muddle my thinking. Then I will blather endlessly about myself and my problems, and you will interject with observations and commentary when appropriate.”
“That’s it? You’re going to get drunk and talk?” she said.
“Indeed.”
“And you want me to chime in now and again?”
“If you’ve got something useful to add.”
“When should I start doing that?”
“Whenever the notion strikes.”
“In that case, if it’s loose lips, muddled thinking, and blather you’re after, you could do it a lot cheaper with a bottle of applejack or whiskey. Or a few tankards of ale. Pretty much with anything but what you’ve got there. Drunk is drunk, after all.”
“Hah! You see? It is precisely that sort of insight and pragmatism that I was after when I selected you this evening. You make an excellent point, but I am of the opinion that if one wishes to reach someplace, even if it is a state of inebriation, then one owes it to oneself to do so in as worthwhile a manner as one can manage.”
“What’s it matter how you get someplace, so long as you get there?”
“The journey is spectacularly important. The journey is how you spend your life. The destination is practically inconsequential compared to the journey. The destination determines where a man arrives. The journey determines what sort of man arrives. It shapes you, alters you.”
“I still say drunk is drunk,” she said. She took another sip. “But this wine does go down lot smoother than applejack.”
“Agreed.”
“So you mean to tell me that we’re not going to be using that bed at all?”
“At some point I’ll sleep, and since you presumably don’t get a full night’s pay unless you spend the night, I imagine you’ll want to sleep there as well. But I don’t anticipate anything recreational.” He sipped. “Not to offend you. It just wasn’t the purpose for this visit.”
“An easy night’s pay is nothing to apologize for. So long as you’re as honest as you say.”
“Honest to a fault,” he said with a nod.
“Care for any suggestions for how to spend the time while you’re waiting for the wine to do its work?”
“Certainly.”
“The best thing on the menu is the shepherd’s pie. I wouldn’t say no to one, and you shouldn’t either.”
“Well then, by all means, let us have a meal.”
#
Desmeres refilled his glass, taking care to leave the sediment in the bottle. Though his guest for the evening was not shy about sharing the wine, she’d finished only two glasses. The rest had been his. Now his thoughts were beginning to swim in a pleasant haze.
“You know something? I’m quite impressed that you’ve only glanced at my weapons and not made mention of them,” he said.
“They are a subject I’d just as soon have avoided,” she said, pushing her emptied supper dish aside and wiping her mouth.
“Well, they are a subject that until recently has almost exclusively occupied my thoughts, so I’m afraid you’ll have to indulge me,” he said.
He leaned aside and pulled a weapon from his belt. Apart from the gold inlay and the mirror polish to the blade, it didn’t appear to be anything more than a simple dagger. The grip was small enough to fit comfortably in his palm and the blade was barely as long as his middle finger. Nevertheless, the woman leaned back in her chair and tensed at its appearance. As decent as he’d been thus far, she was not about to let her guard down with a drunk and armed man across the table from her.
“Watch,” he said.
Desmeres placed the edge of the blade against the neck of the wine bottle, just below the lip. With a swift, sudden motion of his wrist the blade flicked through the thick glass as though it wasn’t there, shearing the mouth of the bottle away with an icy tinkle. The ring of glass fell away and left a perfectly smooth cut behind.
“That’s…” She swallowed hard. “Remarkable.”
“It is. More so than you might realize. It took me sixteen years of study and trial to craft my first blade that could cut glass so easily. And another dozen years to hone my techniques until I could do it again and again without dulling.” Twice more he swept his blade through the neck of the bottle, slicing away two gradually larger rings. “How old do you suppose I am?”
“Tough to say. To look at your face I wouldn’t guess much more than thirty. But you’ve got a dash of elf in your features…”
“And a great deal of it in my blood.”
“So you could be any age at all.”
“I’m over a hundred years old. From my earliest years, my every thought has been devoted to honing this craft,” he said, twisting the blade in the light. “My goal was perfection, and I honestly believed it was task enough to fill my years, however many there might be. I suppose it was the first of a great many mistakes I’ve made…”
“Oh? You mean to say you regret devoting your life to making weapons?”
“No, my dear. I regret thinking I would never perfect them.”
She tipped her head forward and aside, looking at him askance. “You actually believe you’ve perfected making weapons?”
“My weapons ended the longest war in history. I’ve made weapons that have killed demons. The gods themselves have held my creations.”
“I think you’ve had a bit too much of that wine. Ignoring the other silly claims, you mean to tell me that your weapons had something to do with ending the Perpetual War?”
“I don’t need you to believe me. I know the truth. Maybe I haven’t done all there is to do. My armor has never been as good as my weapons. And I’ve still got the puzzle of how to arm a dragon or a shapeshifter… But the greatest challenges are behind me.”
“Is that all?” she asked. “Is that what’s got you out of sorts enough to drink yourself under the table and buy yourself a shoulder to cry on?”
“If you knew me, you’d know that losing my zeal for weapon-craft is quite a bit,” he said, sheathing the blade. “But no. Trying as it is to see my purpose fulfilled… Now that I say the words… I don’t think that’s what’s wrong with me. Not the whole of it.”
“Well, good. Because if I have to listen to a rich man mope about achieving all of his goals for the rest of the night, I’m not liable to have the patience for it.”
“I can appreciate that,” he said, pulling a second blade from its sheath.
This new blade was shorter and narrower than the first. It was more of a tool for car
ving than for killing. He picked up the severed lip of the bottle and admired it for a moment. Without a word of explanation he began idly rotating the cut edge of the lip against the blade, peeling away the wax that remained and effortlessly scraping away glass.
“So what real problems do you have?” she asked, eyes firmly focused on the weapon and the apparent ease with which it performed a task that would blunt a normal knife in moments.
“I’m not certain… I have a weight on my chest. My mind is thick as mud. I can’t think most days. I felt certain it was that my purpose was gone… With no focus to my life, I’d begun to lose my edge.”
“What sort of thoughts are troubling you?”
“Memories mostly. Doubts. Mistakes. Things that shouldn’t have been done…”
“Sounds to me like you feel guilty.”
“Mmm,” he murmured, returning to the shaping of the ring as though he was whittling a piece of pine.
“No need to be coy about it. We’re paid to be discreet.”
“I know. It’s the reason I chose a place like this and a person like you.”
“So perhaps if you confess, it will lighten your load.”
“One night won’t be time enough for that.”
The tension in the woman’s face and posture increased. Desmeres sensed it more than saw it. He smiled.
“Relax. There’s very little blood on these hands. I’ve made weapons, and my weapons have committed some heinous deeds, but I’ve not been the one holding them at the time… Except…”
“Yes?”
He glanced at her. “The details would make matters needlessly complicated. Suffice to say, I had a rather lengthy business relationship that ended badly. We’d been quite well-suited to one another’s needs. He was nearly unmatched when it came to putting my creations to proper use, and I was able to show my face and raise my voice in places where he could not. When he chose to turn himself from the task that had served us both so well, I had little recourse but to seek out one of the only alternatives. This alternative was, by coincidence, in direct conflict with my former partner.”
“So you betrayed him?”
“It wasn’t an act of spite or malice, but I suppose it could rightly be called a betrayal. There are certainly many who feel that way.” He stopped carving long enough to take a sip of wine.
“Did anything unfortunate result?”
“A number of things. My former associate was captured, as were the allies he’d been working with. The mother of my child lost her life…”
She raised her eyebrows, as much at the nonchalance with which he’d delivered the line as at the line itself. “You lost your wife?”
“Not my wife, the mother of my child. We’d never had anything as formal as a ceremony, but I believe we both knew that there was no one else for us. She must have known, as she named our son for my grandfather. The boy has my family name, not hers. … I suppose it could have been out of shame and a desire to distance herself from him. I choose to believe it was out of reverence for tradition. She always was very traditional. Elves tend toward tradition. Long lives and all that. Most of us were alive when a given tradition was created…”
“Still. Losing a loved one is a fine reason for a malaise. Plenty of men come to Clennock’s looking for comfort after their wives pass on. Or when their wives lose interest. Or when they lose interest in their wives. You’ve got a better reason than most.” His blade squealed against the glass in his fingers, drawing her attention to the weapon. An unasked question seemed to hang in the air.
Desmeres grinned. “Curious how directly involved I was with the loss of my woman, are you?”
“We are paid not to be curious, and situations like this are precisely why.”
“Well, rest assured, I didn’t take her life. If I had, I don’t think there would be any mystery about my sorry state of mind. She was killed by poorly placed loyalties and poorly timed epiphanies.”
“I see. Then perhaps you feel badly about your associate being captured.”
“He escaped shortly after. There was a bit of torture, but it was nothing he hasn’t had to endure in the past.”
“And that doesn’t concern you? That a friend you betrayed was tortured and has since escaped? Aren’t you worried he could be looking for you, seeking revenge?”
“Why should I be?”
“Well…”
The woman was notably silent for a moment, a look of concern flickering across her features once more.
Desmeres glanced at her, grinning slightly. “Putting some pieces together, are you? About what sort of a business my associate—and therefore I—might have been in?”
“Putting the pieces together is another thing we’re paid not to do.”
“Yours is a more complex trade than I’d realized.”
“You don’t know the half of it. But it seems you’re paying a tidy sum to discuss you, not me.”
“Bah, speak!” he said, waving his hand irritably. “I paid for you because I was interested in insight.”
She paused, but finally decided to indulge him. “You made weapons for this associate of yours, and said he was suited to them. I would imagine that means he was either a soldier, an assassin, or a mercenary. And you say you could show your face in places he couldn’t. That says to me he was a criminal, and that means assassin. And if someone as… mindful of his own skills as yourself found him to be suitable, he must have been a very good one.”
“Your reasoning is certainly sound, to a point.”
“So, imagining that I’m right, explain to me why you shouldn’t be afraid of reprisal.” She took a shaky breath. “To be perfectly frank, I’m a bit worried about sharing a room with you, if such a man is likely to be after you.”
“Ah, and there, your reasoning falls apart.”
“Oh?”
“There may be reason for me to fear, but none whatsoever for you.”
“Forgive me if I’m not convinced.”
“Allow me to explain. By your very sound logic, you suppose I worked with an assassin who, at this moment, is out to kill me. Now let us imagine as you’ve suggested that this is a very skillful assassin. As with most professions, great skill translates to great cost. As a peerless weapon crafter and alleged betrayer, the chances are high that I’m worthy of that class of ‘service,’ so to speak.
“While I’m certain that you are exceptional at your profession, I very much doubt you’ve reached the level of fame or infamy necessary to draw the attention of such a man.”
“That’s not to say he wouldn’t kill me along with you.”
“Ah, but that is sloppy. One does not kill more than one has been paid to kill. And we’ve presupposed this man is skilled.”
She cast her eyes aside, considering his words.
“That stands to reason, I suppose. But reason alone won’t keep a knife out of my back. And certainly won’t keep it out of yours. Even if I’m safe as a babe in her mother’s arms, I’m not keen on waking beside a dead man.”
“Fair enough, but even so, I don’t think his vengeance is likely. He’s dead now. Another victim of dedication to a practically unachievable end.”
“If he’s dead, then I’d think that revenge would be impossible.”
“You don’t know him. With all of the souls he has delivered to their grave, the Grim Reaper might have given him a pass out of professional courtesy.”
Another look of concern flicked across her features.
“Perhaps we’ve strayed too much from the topic at hand,” Desmeres suggested.
“Yes, quite… Perhaps it is the betrayal that troubles you. Perhaps you should make amends.”
“I thought I’d done so. I violated my own policy of arming only those worthy of my weapons in order to put my arsenal into the hands of the group he’d chosen to ally himself with. Their subsequent victory was largely my doing. I’d thought that would be enough, though in the eyes of many it seems I am still a turncoat and a scoundrel.”
<
br /> “Depending on the nature of the betrayal, I hardly feel that the gift of a few weapons, even weapons as remarkable as yours seem to be, could make up for it.”
“It wasn’t a gift.”
“You mean you made them pay?”
“No. I’ve simply been taking them back now that the fighting is through. I’m nearly finished with that particular task. It has been a pleasant distraction, but it has earned me a few enemies…”
#
Three weeks earlier…
In the Castle Verril, one of the most northerly parts of the Northern Alliance, Queen Caya marched the halls. She was a young queen in many ways. At thirty-four years of age, she’d taken the throne far earlier than her predecessor, the deposed King Erdrick III. She was also quite fresh to her reign, having only taken power in the weeks following the conclusion of the so-called Perpetual War. After more than one hundred-fifty years of hostilities, one of the conditions of the current armistice was that the rulers responsible for the last few decades of war be ousted and replaced by individuals more amenable to peace. As Caya had been pivotal in freeing the capital city from iron fist of the corrupt generals who had held it since the earliest years of the war, she was quickly swept into power.
Since her coronation, the sheer scope of the task ahead of her had become quite clear. For as long as most of her subjects could remember, the whole of her kingdom had been driven by the single-minded desire to overcome the enemy. Now she had to find a way to keep her people united and to attempt to heal the rift between the Alliance and Tressor, its former enemy to the south. Ages of battle had weakened her people and weakened her land, and in overcoming the threats that were eating away at her homeland from within, she’d all but crippled her own military. If the war were to reignite, there was little doubt that the Northern Alliance would be crushed by the comparatively healthy military of Tressor.
It was a heavy burden for even an experienced leader, but despite the fact she’d until now only been tasked with leading a small rebel force, she faced the trials ahead with iron resolve and defiant confidence.
The Redemption of Desmeres Page 2
