by Shannon Hale
“Don’t think I forgot how you pushed my friend Hemar into scratching you. He didn’t deserve a slow death in a desert.”
From behind a closed door came muffled voices laughing, and Razo let himself believe they were laughing at him, too. He took those laughs like punches, absorbing their impact, feeling the ache they left behind. He sidestepped again, and Tumas blocked.
“If you wanted to dance, you could’ve asked,” said Razo, eyes still down.
“Bayern scum.” Tumas glanced around as if afraid that others might come this way any moment, and he let Razo sidle by.
Razo was going to let it go, he should have let it go, but he was so tired of rolling over for the bullies, belly up like a puppy. As he walked away, he said, “You still sore that a Bayern boy whipped you with a wooden sword? Pathetic.”
The strike hit Razo’s back. A fist? A boot? He crunched to the floor, his breath in knots. Tumas picked him up by his tunic and yanked him into a dark room.
“Pathetic?” said Tumas.
A punch to the belly. A deep, groaning kind of pain.
“Pathetic?” said Tumas.
A jab to the nose. A shattering pain, piercing, blinding.
Razo’s voice was caged—he could no more yell for help than he could stop the low moaning in his gullet. He thought he’d been knocked around enough by his brothers to take any good pummeling, but there was murder behind Tumas’s strikes that left Razo breathless. He tumbled to his feet, pitching about, desperate to hit back before the next blow killed him. Laughter rumbled through the walls, and a single set of footsteps passed by the door.
Tumas spat a curse. “This is not over,” he said.
It was many dizzying moments before Razo realized that he was alone, slumped against a wall in a dim room, and, if the pain was any indication, still alive.
“Pathetic,” he whispered, wiping blood from his nose.
Talone was in his chamber with three soldiers when Razo burst in. After a glance at Razo’s face, he told the men to leave.
“What happened?” asked Talone.
“Nothing.” From a very young age, Razo had learned that tattling was a way to invite a worse thumping. “Just send me home.”
“No.”
Never before had Razo wanted to strike Talone.
“Why’m I here, Captain? To humiliate myself at sword practice? To go crazy thinking my best friend is a murderer? Which she’s not, by the way. I was wrong. This whole city is crossing its fingers for war, and I’m just tinder for the fire. Why me when you’ve got Enna and Finn and Conrad and all the best of the Own? I’m just . . .” He punched a wall. “I’m not deaf, I hear what everyone thinks of me, and they’re right, I’m no Bayern’s Own. My brothers always told me I’m slow in the head, my arms are wet rags, I’m only imposing to a bunny rabbit, I’m—”
“Who has ink-stained hands?” Talone interrupted.
Razo could not have been more stunned to stuttered confusion than if Talone had danced a jig. “I’m telling you that I’m pathetic, and I’m through here and . . . Ink-stained hands? What’re you—”
“Don’t think, soldier, just answer my question. Who has ink-stained hands?”
“Uh, Geric does, sometimes, on his right hand. But why do—”
“Who often has candle wax dripped on her dress?”
“I’m not in a gaming mood, Captain.”
“Candle wax.”
Razo threw up his hands. Talone was a boulder too heavy to push out of the way. “Isi’s waiting woman, the one who wears her braids in loops.”
“And who wears sandals far too long for his toes?”
“I guess that squat-nosed page does, the one who brings you messages from Lord Belvan.”
“Not everyone has such observation, or such memory, and you do it without seeming to pay attention to anything beyond dinner.”
Razo sniffed, and a grating sound and prickly pain made him wish he had not. “I don’t think it’s such a big thing. You noticed those things, too.”
“I had to probe my memory pretty thoroughly to come up with something to challenge you.” He’d been cleaning his boots and only now looked up. “You always were a good scout, Razo, and I have long believed that you have the makings of a very good spy.”
“Spy?”
“You fell into that role without my prodding. To answer your question—you are here, Razo, to continue the work you did for me during the war. Instead of scouting Tiran camps for troop numbers and locations, you will scout information: Who is trying to respark the war? Who is burning bodies?”
“You’ve had me in mind as a spy all along? Since Bayern, even?”
“I waited to give you your assignment until the need presented itself. In the sword match, I set you up against Tumas because I don’t want the Tiran to think of you as a threat. If you seem weak, your invisibility increases.”
“You humiliated me and could’ve lost me an eyeball, and on purpose?”
Talone nodded.
Razo made a sound of exasperation and fumbled for words. “You . . . you know . . . back home, that kind of underhanded trickery would get you wrestled facedown in goat dung.”
Talone smiled. He actually smiled. And Razo smiled back. Foolishly, no doubt. He felt as though he had brought a fat hare back to his mother’s stewpot and been cheek kissed and head patted. This was usually the part where his brothers would jump him as soon as her back was turned, but there were no brothers around.
Here, Razo was a spy.
“So, you believe Enna is innocent? That is good news,” said Talone, accepting Razo’s assessment without further inquiry. “I suspect you have already latched on to new suspects.”
Razo realized that he had. “There’s Tumas, old pork-chop head.”
“Pork-chop . . . ? Ah, his ears. Yes, that firebrand has not been coy. There’s not a body in the city who doesn’t know he hates Bayern.”
“He had opportunity.” Razo played with a javelin, digging the tip between the tiles. “With the first murder, he could’ve ridden ahead of the Tiran escort and left that body by the river. But his captain, Ledel, he’s a strict fiend. I don’t think any of his men would scoot a toe over a line without his consent. Except maybe Victar. He doesn’t seem to give a rat’s tail for anybody’s authority. And then there’s Manifest Tira, that group I told you about who think Tira ought to return to war. Lord Belvan turn up anything about them?”
“Not yet. Any other suspicions?”
“Well, um, maybe, it’s not likely, but maybe . . . Dasha, the Tiran ambassador’s daughter?” Razo sniffed to show that he was not in the least convinced it was she, and his nose throbbed anew. “Ow. Once I found her prowling outside Enna’s room, and she was sneaking near the stable the day before they found the third body. She’d have to be working with someone else to have arranged the drop of the one by the border, and no way she could carry the bodies herself.”
“Hm,” said Talone. “Belvan mentioned that she was eager to volunteer as our liaison and live at Thousand Years. If it is Dasha, then she and her father might be conspiring together to sabotage peace. Our queen and king could be in peril. You said she was interested in Enna? If she knows that Enna is the fire-speaker, she may be targeting Enna herself.”
Panic swooped in Razo’s belly. “Isi was right, it’s too dangerous for Enna. I mean, I’m her friend, and I thought she was a murderer. If any Tiran even suspects that she was the fire-witch, she’ll be trussed and hanged by sundown.”
“You’re right,” said Talone. “Which means Dasha may not know.”
“Send Enna home.”
“No. We may need her. Besides, she won’t go.”
No, she would not, curse her. Razo knocked the bag of stones against his leg and swore to himself that he would do anything to help Enna keep from burning people again.
“Anyone else?” Talone asked.
“The day of our match, I overheard Captain Ledel say he was anxious to see Bayern soldiers fail without
fire fighting for us. But then again, he placed a death sentence on his own soldier who stuck me with a dagger, so it seems like he doesn’t have a grudge against Bayern. And, well, the prince hasn’t made a hair of an effort to get to know any of the Bayern, and he’d have the power to order murders himself, I imagine. Besides, remember how the crazy assassin who killed Veran in the barracks was shouting, ‘Long live His Radiance’? I heard from the pastry girls that ‘Radiance’ is what everyone calls Tira’s prince.”
“The prince . . .”
“But the more I think about it, the more I see that we don’t know anything, not even if there’s a genuine fire-speaker on the loose or just some crazy who burns victims in a bonfire to make it look like the work of a fire-witch. I almost liked it better when I thought it was Enna. Now I feel like I saw a spider drop under my bedcovers and I don’t know where it is or when it’ll bite.”
“And what would you do with the spider?”
“I’d get out of bed.”
Talone shook his head. “We leave Tira now, we look guilty. No, too much is at stake. The real threat of war is greater than the uncertain fear of assassination.”
“That’s basically what Megina was talking about when she wouldn’t let Belvan move us somewhere safer.”
“Sometimes she seems surprisingly wise, doesn’t she?” Talone looked out the window. “Razo, I have some misgivings about this assignment. We both know you’re not the most . . . subtle . . . person. Don’t throw yourself into trouble you can’t handle. Just observe, and always come back to me with what you know. And I want you to work this alone. The more people who know what you’re about, the more danger you’ll be in, besides the fact that the murderer could be anyone—even one of our own.”
“So, although Enna could be in danger, or Lord Kilcad could be plotting to kill Isi and Geric, or fanatical Tiran citizens might try to slit all our throats, we’re staying.”
“It sounds to me, my boy, like you had best get to work.”
That night, the Bayern folk took their evening meal in the barracks. The bread was rubbery and the soup cold (on purpose, apparently, another inexplicable Tiran custom).
After refusing to tell Enna and Finn why his nose looked like a pickled beet, Razo stood alone by the window and practiced identifying people from a distance. He watched two men cross a courtyard and successfully named Tumas and Ledel before their faces became clear in the folding dusk. Tumas saw Razo, but instead of smirking at his swollen nose and black eyes, the soldier glanced at Ledel, edgy and uncertain. Apparently Tumas did not have his captain’s approval to pounce on a Bayern and was afraid Ledel would find out. A man like Tumas afraid. The thought made Razo itchy.
He plunked down beside Enna, begging for a back scratch, and asked, “Do you two know someone who has ink-stained hands?”
“Razo,” said Enna, scratching lazily, “yet again, I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.”
“I mean, have either of you ever noticed someone we know well who’s always got ink stains on his hands? Uh, hand actually. Just one . . . No guesses? But if I say Geric, now you’ll remember, right? . . . No? But if you had to guess which hand is always ink-stained, you’d know that? The right one? You probably knew it was the right one and I just said it too fast.”
Enna continued her stare. Finn’s brows raised, halfway between surprised and amused.
Razo laughed self-consciously. “I’m just . . . I . . . Never mind.” He turned back to his soup. Still cold.
Maybe Talone was right about him. And except for the threat of immediate death to him and his closest friends, this spying business might be something of a lark.
11
What the Kitchen Girl Found
Razo woke feeling strangely eager to get up and see the day happen, as though he were ten years old on the morning of the wintermoon festival. Then he remembered.
He was a spy.
The other soldiers ate breakfast sullenly, but Razo whistled a dance song. He stopped after a few glares warned that he was either too jovial or just plain out of tune.
“At least the Tiran didn’t murder us in our sleep,” said Razo.
Conrad snapped a boot lace pulling it too tight. His eyes were heavy with sleeplessness. “If they’re going to, I wish they’d get it over with already.”
“This whole mess is a bit more complicated than watching geese or sheep, isn’t it?”
“Sometimes I miss our old animal keeper days, and then I remember.” Conrad looked directly into Razo’s eyes and whispered, “We’re in Bayern’s Own.” He laughed, as pleased as a gaggle of geese on a spring morning. “I still can’t believe our luck.”
Talone came midmorning with unexpected orders. “Lady Megina will go out into the city and dine with the chief of assembly today.”
A few soldiers chuckled. “She’s bold, that one.” Others raised eyebrows, questioning if it was wise. When Talone named Razo part of the guard, he thought he detected an uncertain flicker in several of his comrades’ faces.
I’m a spy, he wished he could explain to them. I’m not completely useless. At least, I won’t be. Eventually. Hopefully.
They rode in closed carriages to the chief of assembly’s palace, smaller than Thousand Years but more decadent, its capstones and pillars twisting with stone vines and plaster flowers.
“Lovely place for a massacre,” Razo whispered to Finn as they climbed the steps.
The door guard let Megina and Enna pass but stopped Razo, Finn, Talone, and the five other Bayern soldiers, demanding they leave their weapons at the door.
“Do it,” said Megina.
During the meal, Razo watched the ambassador carefully as she devoured slimy sea creatures cooked in their shells, appearing to relish every bite. And the talk . . . Razo’s eyeballs itched with annoyance. She did not even mention the burned body or assert Bayern’s innocence. She just gabbed—about the weather, about food, saying things that made the chief of assembly laugh.
“What do you think about Megina?” Razo asked Finn. They stood on the far side of the room and under the noise of dining could speak without being heard.
“You don’t think she’s trustworthy?” asked Finn.
“I don’t know. . . . Geric thought she was, but . . . well, I guess lately everyone’s looking squirmy to me.”
“I wish she’d negotiated about our weapons.” Finn patted his belt. “I don’t like being without my sword. Feels like I’ve lost a limb.”
“Lost a limb? Not hardly. Javelin’s all right for reaching a back itch, and a sword’s a good prop, but no weapon feels easy in my hand.”
“What about your sling?” asked Finn.
Razo blinked. A sling was not really a weapon, not unless you were a squirrel.
The third hour of the dinner hobbled on, and Razo was almost wishing for a brawl with the chief of assembly’s guards, just to break the boredom.
“Finn, do you think I can hit Enna with a pebble from here?”
“Not a chance,” said Finn, though there was the suggestion of a smile around his mouth.
Enna was sitting behind Megina, leaning back on her hands, staring at the ceiling. Razo eased a small pebble out of his pouch, and keeping his arm down straight at his side, he flicked it, striking Enna on the shoulder.
“What . . . ?” Enna sat up.
Razo bit his lip to throbbing to kill his laugh and stared straight ahead. Finn breathed out an almost silent chuckle.
“Did you ask something?” said Megina.
“No, my lady,” said Enna. “Just a cough.”
Razo felt a sting on the side of his neck and slapped it, thinking it was an insect. Until he smelled burning hair. He looked at his palm. She had singed a single hair from his neck.
By the time they dragged into Thousand Years, the sun was making a show of setting, the sky all rust and gold and heaving with clouds. After hours of standing at attention, Razo thought he could eat his saddle raw. The pastry kitchen was empty, the on
ly sound a low fire snapping at a log. No sooner had he started to poke around for a treat than Pela hopped through the door, her shrubs of yellow hair flopping. Instinctively, he moved toward the door, not feeling safe alone around a girl like Pela with so many sharp knives about. But she’s become friendlier, he thought, remembering how she touched his hand when giving him a cup of tea.
“There you are.” She set down an empty tray. “I have something to show you.”
“You do?” Razo hoped it was something to eat.
“Yes, but it will cost you.”
He was about to protest his poverty when in some slur of movement, some hitch of skirt, leg wrapped around leg, hop, and a trip, Razo found himself sitting on a stool against the wall, Pela on his lap, her legs bestride his.
“Oh,” he said. Or perhaps grunted. She was pleasantly robust. He squeezed his arms against his sides in case she tried to tickle him.
“I don’t want much,” she said, affecting a shy face and toying with his lummas.
Enna often declared that when it came to catching innuendo, Razo was as slow as a dead hare fleeing, but he thought he had a handle on this.
“What is it?” He was appalled to find that his voice had tangled in his throat and came out less of a manly inquiry and more of a squeal. He did not want her to think that she was the only girl ever to climb onto his lap, so he grumbled his throat clear and asked again, “What is it?”
She leaned in closer, her lips just separated from his.
“A parchment,” she whispered. Her breath tickled his face, and he tried not to squirm. She smelled nice, like salted meat, and that made him want to hold very still so that she would not go away.
“What’s on the parchment?” His hands were still tight to his sides. Should he put them on her waist or back or something?
“I don’t know, but when I entered Lady Dasha’s room, she stuffed it away, hiding it all suspicious-like, and since you were nudging for any information on her the other day, I pinched it for you this morning. And all I want for it is—”
“You took a parchment from Dasha’s room?” He bolted upright, sending Pela tumbling to the floor.
“I’m sorry,” he said, leaning over her, trying to help her upright. “Whoops, that was awkward.” She reached for his hand, but he was trying to lift her from under her shoulders, and she fell on her rump again.
