“Probably shock,” Pike suggested. “I’d say you were in the heat of the moment, too, being woken up like that. You’re damned lucky he missed his first strike. Normally they don’t.”
“I must have moved at the last second,” Maeve wondered aloud. Rodan frowned at her and turned, leaving through his doorway. She stared at the area where he disappeared until he came back a moment later, holding the flask out to her. “Thank you.” She took a long swig of the bitter brew, pulling a face, but soon the warm tendrils of the potion spread through her as they did before, tending to the cut first before soothing away her bruised back from where she hit the armoire.
Rodan touched the freshly knit skin of her neck, the lines between his eyebrows easing. “I hate to see you hurt,” he murmured.
Pike coughed and took a small step to the side. “Why did someone want to kill Maeve?”
“It’s probably someone Sebastian sent,” Maeve said. “He tried to kill me before, in a dream walking. He thinks if he takes me out Rodan won’t stand a chance, like Sebastian wouldn’t have if I had not been there for him last time. The people knew we were coming before we got here, unlike the last few cities. There was time to prepare an ambush.”
Rodan put his arm around her shoulders and hugged her to him. “I’m sorry. I should have been here. Damn tradition, damn Bairam.”
She pressed her head against his chest, smiling a little at Pike’s reddening cheeks. “You both were here when it counted. I wouldn’t last against him in the long run. I only managed to stay one step ahead of him.”
The golden light of the sunrise began to fill the room, the dead body on the floor suddenly much clearer than moments ago. Maeve turned her head away. She had seen dead bodies before. Been the cause of one of them, but she never liked it. Death was altogether too final for her liking, and thinking about it too much made her heart race and her breathing difficult.
“Can we take this to another room?” Maeve asked.
Pike cleared his throat. “I’ll just—ah—get rid of the body.”
“You may want to wait for nightfall,” Rodan warned.
Maeve didn’t wait for Pike’s reply, moving through the door Rodan had disappeared through earlier. She didn’t want to think about the body and what Pike would do with it. Would they report it? Bairam may not respect Sebastian and his reign, but Sebastian still occupied the high seat. He remained, technically, the high king over this region. If one of his agents were discovered dead in one of their rooms, what were they supposed to say?
Maeve washed herself as she considered what that might look like: Rodan trying to explain the official quest to some hotheaded imperial guard. If Sebastian was behind this, he would deny everything, of course.
He would make up a story about how Maeve and Rodan were dispatching those loyal to Sebastian, innocent people, and trying to cover it up on their way to steal the throne. He would get the populous angry with them, so they could seek no quarter on their way to the challenge. It would undermine Rodan’s future rule and cast a stain on his name forever.
At least, that’s what he might be planning. Not so long ago, I would have slapped anyone who dared say something like this about Sebastian. She pressed the heels of her hands against her closed eyes and rubbed. She would be getting no more sleep this night.
Rodan’s hands descended upon her shoulders, and he pulled her to him, his arms lowering to wrap around her waist as her back hit his chest. She tilted her head so her eyes caught his. He was so tall he made her feel small, even though she was taller than average.
“What do you think?” she asked.
He reached a hand up and ran the back of his gloved fingers along the long line of her throat. “I believe Sebastian sees you as a viable threat. I think our progress is making him nervous.”
She nodded and looked down, turning in his arms so that she faced him, her hands smoothing out the soft shirt he slept in. The neckline was so low that she almost saw his belly button, his body lean and muscular and well-defined. She thought he would make a fine model for artists. Every piece of him was proportioned for his height and build. His feet were a little long, and some freckles scattered across his chest and stomach, and there was the scar over his heart, but otherwise he was perfection.
She ran a finger along one of the creases of his stomach, trailing up past his breastbone to his clavicle and resting her hand on his shoulder, looking up at him. “I’m going to stay with you.”
He nodded. “Always, my love. I’m sorry.”
She shook her head. “There’s nothing to apologize for. We should have realized something like this was bound to happen. He probably won’t strike at me if I’m with you. He’s still afraid of you, of what you’re capable of doing.”
Rodan’s face hardened. “He would be wise to be.”
She fingered a few locks of his hair. “How long until we go visit Bairam?”
Rodan stared out the window—his open, exposing a brilliant view of the city’s skyline—and checked the location of the twin suns. “In another few hours, probably. He likes to sleep in a little, as do his sons if I remember correctly.”
Maeve grinned and pressed herself up against him a little tighter. “I wonder what we’ll get up to in the meantime,” she asked in a quiet sing-song voice.
Rodan grinned and shook his head, “You’re incorrigible.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Maeve
THEY WENT TO BAIRAM’S PALACE late in the morning and spent most of the day there. For several hours in the afternoon, Maeve sat with some of the other women as Rodan came up against each of Bairam’s grown sons. At first, one at a time, and then two, three, or four of them would attack Rodan at once with the wooden practice swords.
Rodan beat them all without seeming to so much as breathe rough. He grinned as they trained together, looking over to catch Maeve’s eye and give her a little wink.
The other women noticed, and a few of them gave Maeve a playful nudge or made a sly comment. The elder wives turned their noses up and didn’t say a word, their silence speaking for them, all except for one, the one who Maeve sat next to at the table yesterday when they first arrived.
“Alexis,” she said, giving Maeve a hand to shake. Her skin, thin but soft as silk, stretched over slender bones and long fingers. Alexis little resembled the rest of the wives. Fair of skin and hair, and her eyes were a pale brown instead of deep brown or black like the others. She had to be in her late fifties or early sixties, and today she wore an emerald dress with golden embroidery in intricate patterns. Jewels glimmered and shone from within the embroidery, catching the faintest of light as she moved. “I heard much about you in the last thirty years. You did a great amount of the work to get Sebastian Sekou on the throne, if half of the rumors are true.”
Maeve flushed and shook hands with Alexis, giving her a shy smile. “I was a young girl when I came here the last time with Sebastian, I didn’t know then what I know now.”
Alexis gave her a warm nod of approval. “Indeed. Who among us did, when we were that age?”
They spoke a little of this and that while the men dueled in the arena. It was unshaded, but the rows of seats around it were, with the same ornately decorated cloth that sheltered them in the courtyard. Servants moved among them, offering wine, water, or figs. Maeve took a fig and water, her stomach rumbling a little. The fighters had been at it half the day, and something delicious cooked from not far away.
Bairam laughed as Rodan deflected all his sons at once, rolling under and over their attempted blows before spinning and striking out at three of them, managing to hit them on their nose, knee, and ankle, respectively. He clapped his hands and shot to his feet. “Bravo,” he called. “As always, it is a wonder to see you at work, my friend. If it were not for outside forces, there is no way a human could beat you to gain the throne all those years ago. Your skills are unmatched.”
Pike, who had not joined them until an hour before, snorted. “His skills fighting yo
ur young dancers are unmatched, aye, but Rodan wouldn’t last long in a real fight.”
The entire arena fell silent. Rodan’s smile widened, and he gestured to Pike. “Come on down here and test yourself on me.”
Pike hesitated only for a moment before he stood up, dusting off his clothes and unbuckling the belt around his waist, which held his twin daggers. He set them on the cushion he sat on and ambled down the few short steps to the arena. He didn’t swagger, per se, but he did exude a certain over-confident attitude as he stepped on the arena floor and picked up two practice daggers from the hanging racks.
Alexis and Maeve both leaned forward as the fight began, as did a number of the other ladies. For all the training Maeve did with either one of them, they never matched against each other.
Rodan possessed reach on his side, not only because he stood taller than Pike by a good six inches, but because his weapon of choice was also a foot longer than either of Pike’s daggers. Yet Pike was quick, surprisingly so for someone of his age.
They tested each other for a few minutes, circling one way or the other and letting a weapon whip out every now and again. Both of them dodged, and neither of them landed a blow on the other. Maeve saw Rodan’s expression go from faint amusement to a firm determination. Fighting Pike made him put up his guard.
The arena grew silent except for the clack of wood on wood, the spectators holding a collective breath. Pike went in, blades blurring as he struck out, slashed, and moved away once more. Rodan tried to pursue, but Pike proved too quick for him, and he came in close once more—almost too close for Rodan to strike at him in any meaningful way—dodging and ducking blows, his expression seeming to sharpen.
Pike pressed his advantages, the old battle-scarred scrapper staying in close, so Rodan was forced to fight him off with fist and the hilt of his sword, its length useless in such close proximity.
For a few moments, Maeve was almost certain Rodan met his match. That despite his two thousand years, Pike possessed more ingrained talent for this sort of work. His moves were not graceful. There was no flourish to each slash or stab, but he fought like he needed to fight, as though he fought for his life. As beautiful as Rodan’s moves might be, he rarely came across something that presented him with a real threat. He wouldn’t use his magic on Pike, Maeve knew, but he may not be able to fight him off with sword and fist alone.
And then something shifted.
Rodan’s face closed down, a frown darkening his brow, and he almost flew backward, away from Pike’s close movements. Pike hesitated, uncertain as his foe moved with a supernatural quickness. There was no time to register the change, however, before Rodan fell upon him. One of the practice daggers went flying, hitting an empty seat in the arena with a clatter. Pike raised an arm to deflect the next blow, taking the edge of the practice sword against his forearm.
Rodan spun the sword, sliding it along Pike’s forearm and finding an opening, thrusting forward to touch the old man’s chest with the tip.
Maeve caught her breath and noticed for the first time that Rodan’s chest heaved. A glimmer of sweat shone upon his brow.
Pike grinned and lifted his arms in surrender, letting the second dagger drop to the packed dirt of the arena floor. “I yield.”
Bairam erupted in laughter and clapped, the women and his sons soon joining in the applause. Even Maeve put her hands together. “Excellent! Spectacular!” the Sultan boomed, “Pike, my sons would learn a great deal from you, I’m sure. Maybe next time they’d give the king a proper challenge.”
Rodan gave the slightest of bows and Pike grinned, waving at the spectators as though he had been the one to win the fight. He leaned forward and said something to Rodan, whose face broke into a smile as he glanced up to Maeve in the stands.
Her heart fluttered.
They used only practice swords, but a part of her had worried as the two of her closest companions clashed. She only imagined what it might be like if they fought for real. Pike proved himself to be an adversary worthy of the title, but Maeve had fought with him as well, and Pike fought dirty. If it ever came to it, Pike would probably find a way to slip one of his daggers in Rodan’s back, not face him in open battle as he had this day.
The two of them smiled together now, Rodan’s hand on Pike’s shoulder as he spoke to him over the laughter, diminishing applause, and chatter of the surrounding people. Maeve couldn’t hear a word they said to one another, but their expressions told her this experience made them grow closer.
“King Rodan is something to behold, is he not?” Alexis asked, drawing Maeve’s attention back to her companion.
Her cheeks warmed a little. “Yes, he is. I have never seen him lose a fight.”
“Haven’t you?” Alexis said, a tilt to her head. “You were there when he fought Sebastian, weren’t you?”
Maeve remembered that day all too well. Remembered how Rodan staggered under the weight of her spell work. She hesitated in that final moment, pulling away from the spell as everything inside of her wanted to finish it, see it through. Magic was like that, sometimes. Like an unbridled force she must ride to its inevitable conclusion. When she cut the power short, Rodan reached for the space between the worlds and disappeared from view.
The duel for the high seat was supposed to be to the death, but Rodan must have known multiple forces worked to undermine him. He fought not one enemy that day, but two. Running, instead of staying to die, was the only way Rodan survived to challenge Sebastian anew. This time, there would be no death magic. They would fight in a duel which would be fair, and not tainted by the blood of an innocent.
Maeve swallowed hard at the thought and looked away from Alexis’s piercing gaze. “He didn’t lose anything that day,” she said, her words thick with emotion. “It was stolen from him.”
Her companion’s eyebrows rose, but she said no more.
Bairam made a grand sweeping gesture as he stood, his attendants falling away from his side. “Come! Let us adjourn to the courtyard. My chefs made us a fantastic meal.”
Maeve rose with everyone else but waited for Rodan and Pike, Rodan taking her hand as soon as he neared and lifting it to his lips, dragging them across her knuckles. “Did you enjoy yourself?”
She nodded, heat flooding her face, and noticed that Pike had decided to stare skyward and rock back on his heels. “It looked close there, for a moment. You trounced the rest of them.”
He smiled at her, his eyes seeming to darken as they swept down the length of her body. At the insistence of some of the women, Alexis heading them, she let herself be led to the women’s quarters and dressed in a red and gold dress which reminded her of a sari. Pleated skirts covered her feet, a sash crossed her front, and a strip of her midsection remained exposed. They helped her braid her hair, and it fell to her shoulders, a few strands loose to frame her face. She wore no adornments, unlike the rest of the court, but she felt better without them.
Rodan pulled her a little closer and bent down, his breath tickling the shell of her ear. “You are beautiful,” he murmured. “You appear more so every time I gaze upon you.”
She wanted to kiss him, but she was aware eyes lingered on them. She didn’t want to insult their hosts, so instead she pulled away and offered Rodan a shy smile. “Thank you.”
The experience and the dress reminded her of dressing up some secondhand dolls she played with in houses growing up. Not everyone owned girls’ toys, and those that she did encounter had been played with until they were almost falling apart, but she had enjoyed dressing and undressing those dolls in a variety of outfits, making some of her own out of paper and crayon scribbling. This had been like that, but better.
Rodan offered his arm, and she took it, wrapping her hand into the crook of his elbow. He led her out of the arena and into the courtyard beyond, where all those heavenly smells came from. Pike closed in behind them, and as they followed their hosts out, he hissed, “I got rid of the body.”
A cold trickle went down her b
ack, and she glanced over her should at him. “How?”
Her friend shook his head. “Later. I wanted you to know it’s taken care of.”
Rodan gave Pike a respectful nod and Maeve a hesitant smile, unsure whether she should be happy at the news. Regardless of what transpired, that man was a human life. She now held herself responsible for three deaths.
That I know of, she rectified. How many of the people Sebastian slaughtered might be laid at my feet, for bringing him to power? How many lives would she claim before she began calling herself a murderess?
She tightened her grip on Rodan’s arm, a heavy lump forming in her breast.
They sat at the table in the same arrangement they did the day before, except this time with another long table set up so that they dined in a U-shape, with the women along one side and the men on the other. The shorter end of the U was where Rodan, Bairam, Maeve, and Pike found themselves. Alexis also sat with them, and Maeve learned she was Bairam’s second and oldest surviving wife; his first had died in childbirth long ago.
“Tell me,” Rodan said during their meal, “has there been any unrest in your city as of late? Any problems?”
Bairam raised his bushy eyebrows, dark eyes glinting. “Unrest? In Visantium?” He laughed. “My friend, you know we are a peaceful people, and I am a good ruler. Why would there be unrest? My people are happy here.” He spread his arms, encompassing the courtyard, with his many family and all their attendants. “Look around you.”
Rodan nodded. “Of course. I only wondered - well, we are running the trials for the throne. Each of the Realms is supposed to offer up a challenge.”
“I do not know where you may find your challenge here, my friend. Perhaps you need to go to the desert and wrestle with the sand worms, eh?” Bairam laughed. “They would give you a challenge, unlike my sons.” He tapped his goblet with the long nail of one finger. “I will do something for you, old friend. We will throw a party - in your honor. A small gathering. You will meet many of my subjects and see how well we are. It is the full moon in two days’ time, shall we have it then?”
Catching Pathways Page 29
