by Elise Kova
“Was all this happening when we were here last summer?” Baldair interjected.
Nana nodded.
“And you let us stay?”
Erion read in the prince’s tone that he was as shocked as he was wounded by the idea of Nana potentially putting him in harm’s way.
“Things had quieted with you here, and I had yet to find anything conclusive. I ended up resigning the mysterious affairs to some children and tests of bravery in the Imperial manor, nothing more harmful than that.” Nana hung her head in shame.
Erion shifted in his chair. This was what happened when the staff had too much leeway to make their own decisions. He kept his tongue for Baldair’s sake.
“It was the night before you were scheduled to leave last year that I was approached. They demanded I removed you, or they would torch the manor and everyone in it. Knowing you were departing anyway, I used it as an opportunity to earn their trust, saying I would see you gone within the next day if they let me join them.”
“Clever,” Erion whispered.
“Thank you, Lord Erion.” Nana gave a nod in his direction. He hadn’t meant to say it aloud.
“Why didn’t you go to the guard, or tell me?” Baldair asked.
“The moment guards begin crawling around this place, they will shift their tactics, or make people ‘disappear’ in such a way that their deaths would be written off to the curse.” Nana sat back in her chair and held her breath for a long moment, letting her words stew. “I didn’t want to involve you, my prince, because managing the manor is my responsibility, as it has always been. And putting you in harm’s way went against that creed.”
Erion sighed on her behalf. It wasn’t the smartest course of action. But, if what she said was true, it was taken up with noble intentions. He caught Baldair’s eyes, and the prince seemed to be on the same page.
“Well, we’re involved now.”
“That you are. And Renalee, oh sweet Renalee.” Naan shook her head sadly. “If only the girl could have realized the treasures she already possessed.”
“What actually happened with the lass?” Erion pressed the woman to continue.
“She was fascinated by the lore of Adela when it would’ve been best to be frightened. She uncovered the truth of the smugglers while working in the jewelry shop—The Jeweled Crest is one of their largest customers for underhanded goods—and joined the criminal group the second she could in a bid to get closer to the manor. She wanted Adela’s treasure, and she knew the tales of how this building was attached to the old pirate strongholds.” Nana motioned to the table, still filled with papers. “Her only mistake in it all was when she began to wear that ruby, giving one to Rowin to wear as well. The presence of a Western ruby made the portmaster suspicious, and he began to investigate the ships and markets more closely. Which, as you can imagine, the group didn’t like.”
“Where did she get the earring?” Erion asked.
Nana shook her head. “She told the jeweler it had been given to her as a gift. Same thing to the smugglers. But no one had any record of it.”
“So they killed her and marked her a thief.” Erion scowled. He did not want to think he was the sort to shy away from the administration of justice, even when it applied to broken oaths he might not entirely agree with. But he struggled to detach sympathy for Renalee, even knowing she had willingly wrapped herself up with dangerous folk.
“The only other explanation was that she had found Adela’s treasure. And, if she had, she was marked for dead anyway by not sharing its location.”
“Why kill her here?” Baldair asked. “Surely they knew we would investigate.”
“Ah, my prince, they thought the opposite.” Nana wore a sort of sad smile that Erion couldn’t discern the meaning behind. “Most see you as a socialite and nothing more.”
The news was clearly a shock to Baldair.
“Is this true?” he asked Erion.
“Surely you knew?” Erion didn’t know what else to say. He also thought it was obvious. “Just think of how you act in town.”
“But that’s only at times when it doesn’t matter…”
Erion refrained from bringing up the “game” he played with his brother the previous summer involving ladies. Or his well-known reputation in Court. Or the fact that he never showed up to morning drills with the Majors at the palace.
Something about Baldair’s deeply reflective gaze gave Erion the sense he was already considering all these truths.
“So they didn’t think I would investigate the death of a young woman under my roof?” Baldair turned back to Nana.
She shook her head slowly. “They thought you would pass it off to the city guard, who is well past tired with and scared by the idea of chasing pirate ghosts. The smugglers ring had been asking for you gone for some time, but I couldn’t produce this summer because you had no intention of departing, and I had no reason to demand it. Renalee was a convenient way to tidy up a loose end as well as scare you away.”
“Why did this pirate group want us gone with such urgency?” Erion asked.
“They have a large shipment of jewels they need to move to the capital. The buyer is getting impatient, and the only paths out of their hideaways large enough to transport the cargo into a cart that’s away from all the town’s eyes—”
“—is here,” Baldair finished.
Erion followed the prince’s gaze back to the table where all the blueprints lay. Baldair walked over to them, tracing their lines with his fingertip. Erion stood as well, feeling the energy of action beginning to ignite the air.
“Forgive me, my prince.” Nana stood and gave a low bow.
“You are forgiven, Nana.” Baldair faced them both with purpose. “But now we need your help.”
“My true loyalty has been, and always will be, with Solaris.”
“Good, for we will need the best armor stored in this place, some basic supplies, and an entrance into these passages.”
“My prince, be careful. It will be dangerous,” Nana cautioned.
“Nothing will be more dangerous than me when I am hunting down the murderers and thieves who currently have my friend.”
Baldair looked to Erion, and they both gave a nod of resolve. Their chase was only just beginning. But for the first time, the winds had shifted in their favor.
22. JAX
HE RUBBED HIS sweaty, blistering palms on the thighs of his pants, smoothing away the aches in his muscles from scaling the rock wall.
“So, how are we going to find them?”
“Patience.” Nox shrugged, starting in for the darkness.
The smallest mote of flame tracked over her shoulder behind her, giving them just enough light to see by, but not enough light to illuminate more than an arm’s length in front of
her.
“And what if we get lost in here?” Jax couldn’t stop himself from asking. Nox’s seemed a very carefree way of approaching their predicament. The tunnel system in the cliffside was no doubt vast, and it wasn’t unlikely that they could be turned around and lost forever.
“Then I suppose it’s a good thing we’re both people who’ve lived colorful lives. We’ll have a lot to talk about while we wait to die.” She gave a coy smirk over her shoulder.
“This, coming from the woman who wouldn’t even tell me her name,” he muttered, trying to keep his voice down.
“Well, maybe if we’re on the brink of death, I’ll tell you everything.” She didn’t look at him when she spoke. All he saw was the illumination of the flame against her black, braided hair, the way her shoulders swayed slightly as she walked with purpose and a certain recklessness into the
hostile darkness. “Though, it’d take more lifetimes than what we have.”
“You love playing the mysterious card, don’t you?” Jax could only grin. There were worse people to be stuck with. He could already tell this woman was going to be a problem when Baldair laid eyes on her. Coy, curvy, competent: the trifecta of Baldair’s wea
knesses.
“I am what I am.” She shrugged. “Quiet now. The ship docked in an inner cove to the south of town.” That explained their immediate left turn upon entering the caves. “I’m trying to listen for the workmen.”
They trekked along winding stone, natural and carved walls alike, deeper and deeper into the mountainside. Jax made it a point to listen for anything his ears could pick up that would betray life, but all he heard was dripping water, the rush of distant breezes, and the echoes of crashing waves.
Just when he had reached a point of concern, words reverberated to them. Faintly at first, he almost thought them tricks of the howling sea winds. But, sure enough, they persisted and grew.
Nox turned quickly, stopping him with both hands. The woman leaned forward to whisper in his ear. Jax wasn’t accustomed to women who were nearly his height; she didn’t have to stretch entirely onto her toes to reach him.
“I don’t know where this is going to put us out. We should stay low, make for good hiding the second we see it.”
He nodded, catching her eyes when she pulled away.
They both dropped to a crouch and shuffled along as ambient light began to merge with the weakening shadows on the rock around them. Nox waved away her mote of flame, leaving Jax’s eyes to adjust in the near-blackness. As they came into focus, her face was before him again, her nose a mere finger’s width from his own.
Jax narrowed his eyes, unwilling to be thrown off-guard by the proximity of a woman.
“Do you want a ‘we may be about to die’ kiss?” He gave her an arrogant, toothy grin.
“This is not the place where you die,” she whispered with certainty.
Who is this woman?
“But this is the place where you will kill again.” She grabbed his hand with a swiftness he didn’t know she possessed. Sparks flew around their fingertips. For Jax to feel heat in her palm meant she was quite a powerful sorcerer indeed. But Nox didn’t apply intention to burn him, so the tiny flames were nothing more than orange streaks over a touch he hadn’t invited but was finding more reassuring than he expected. “You have to fight. You must fight for yourself, fight to live.”
Jax tried to pull his hand away. He hated this woman with a sudden fury. He hated her knowing stare and the truth in her words.
He opened his mouth to speak, but a finger rose to silence it.
“Just be quiet, and take the advice of a friend, Jax.”
She was moving again before he could formulate a proper reaction. His hand was aflame with invisible fire. It burned from where she’d touched him, shooting tendrils of heat up his veins and into his heart. For the briefest blissful moment, it burned away the voice in the back of his mind that whispered horrors at every action he ever took.
Luck would give with one hand and take with the other when it came to Jax’s life.
They ended up having no option but to crawl as the cavern narrowed to a chute. Side pressed against side, they looked through the small opening into a large room beyond. Half of their vision was obscured by boxes and crates, not unlike what he had seen on the Lady Black. In the flickering orange light of a Firebearer’s flames or lamplight, they saw feet moving. Voices spoke.
“… their bodies recovered,” a woman was speaking. “None of you are to rest until their bloated corpses are here on a spike to warn the next captain who even thinks of challenging us.”
“Henrietta, they’ve surely been lost to the sea.”
“Silence!” the voice—presumably Henrietta—snapped. “It was your incompetence that got us into this mess. I’ll hear none of it.”
“Henrietta is their leader,” Nox whispered. “You’ll know her by the scar over her right eye. Go for her first.”
Jax nodded in agreement.
Nox took a deep breath. The woman was undeniably brave. But she was still human, and her hands trembled a brief moment before she began to wiggle toward the opening. Jax made space and watched as her crouched feet and fingertips disappeared to the right—in the direction of the boxes and out of his vision.
Elbow over elbow, he crept up to the opening, more of the room coming into his view in the process. It was a sort of bowl shape, with all manner of goods stacked against the natural terraces along the perimeter between the stalagmites and rock columns. The discussion was happening toward the bottom, where a group of six were in heated conversation.
Not a particularly impressive bunch, he wondered briefly how they’d managed to get so far. But it wasn’t a stretch to assume they had hands beyond these caverns, and, even if they didn’t, they had the legend of one of the most infamous and feared pirates behind them. A pirate who would never not pose a threat, dead or alive.
Rocks scraped into his forearms as he pulled himself through the narrow tunnel. He waited for a moment when the group seemed to have shifted their focus toward a smaller stack of boxes near the sheltered dock built into the mouth of the cavern. Jax curled himself into a crouch, making haste to where Nox was pressed against a larger crate. He planted his back alongside hers, taking a deep breath.
She leaned forward, looking around the box’s corner at the group, then turned back to him and pointed to a stack of canvas on the next tier down. She moved one finger, pointed to him, and motioned with a second finger to join the first.
Jax nodded.
Like this, they crept one at a time nearly to the lowest rung without detection. Jax’s heart raced. They were well outnumbered. But if they kept the element of surprise, they had a shot. He and Nox could each take out one before any of the others even realized they were there. Jax swallowed hard, his breath quickening.
He was going to burn them.
He was going to burn them alive.
He could do it. He would do it. He must do it. This was his destiny now as the Empire’s monster. And what good was a monster if it could not be made useful for killing?
A warm hand closed around his, clutching him so tight the bones in his fingers popped. Jax looked over and found Nox staring at him. An unspoken promise given magical form, fire licked between them once more.
She waited as Jax’s breathing slowed. When he nodded at her, they both shifted to a ready position, prepared to shoot out of their hiding spot like two fireballs.
“Drop the boxes,” a booming voice spoke out. Its echo was so loud, it successfully hid Jax’s groan. “You are under arrest by the will of the crown for smuggling, theft, murder… and many other horrible things.”
There was a stunned silence. And then two simple words. No gloating. No explanation. No bartering. The briefest touch of laughter and then, simply, “Kill him.”
23. ERION
ERION TUGGED AT the leather jerkin that covered his chest, adjusting the lacing for a bit more slack. It wasn’t a perfect fit, but nothing was. They were in borrowed armor carrying tarnished weapons. The only thing he trusted was his sword.
He ran his fingers over the pommel, reminding himself that nothing else mattered other than the quality of his primary blade and his skill—both of which had been honed by years on the practice field. Granted, only on the practice field.
The familiar leather grip squeaked softly under his white-knuckled grip. He had to have faith that, when the time came, he would be ready to kill for his Empire. This was what he had been training for. If he was not to inherit the estate or take after his ancestry as a merchant, he had to be ready to lay claim to the legacy of a battle-tested soldier.
Nana led them into the room Jax had been occupying. Carefully prying open a groove in the wall to the right of the bed, she exposed a hidden pulley and gave it a solid tug. A separate panel in the wall to the left of the bed, half the height of a regular door, clicked open.
“This was why Renalee was found here. A murder in a locked room with no murderer,” Erion observed. “And how Abaveil saw ‘ghosts disappearing’ into thin air.”
Nana gave them a nod. The Mother could be cruel in her designs of fate when she wanted. If Jax had chosen any other
room in the manor, the whole affair would have nothing to do with him.
“My prince.” Nana stopped Baldair right when he was about to stoop into the entry of the caves. “I will fetch the guard, as you asked, but please be careful. Are you sure you cannot await reinforcements? For, should anything befall—”
“Worry not. Erion and I have had years of training from the greatest swordsmen in the Empire.” Baldair waved away her concerns. “Plus, this is what I was born for. Doing all the reckless activities my brother is too stuck up for.”
He gave a toothy grin and disappeared into the darkness.
“I’ll keep him safe,” Erion vowed. Nana gave a solemn nod without any trace of doubt, as if she saw something in Erion’s resolve that he hadn’t even realized was showing. “But make haste in fetching the guard. If these folk are as dangerous as you make them out to be, we can use the help.” Even if the help is currently at half strength due to the Emperor’s mysterious need for swords.
“I will.”
Erion gave Nana one final look—one he hoped inspired confidence in them both—then followed behind Baldair.
The prince held aloft the lantern Nana had the sense to equip them with. By the light of its single flame, they could prevent themselves from tripping over any uneven pitches in the floor and check Renalee’s maps, but it offered them little visibility otherwise. The tunnel curved around, exposing some of the rooms marked on the blueprints.
“What do you think the point of all this was?” Erion looked into the dusty, damp rooms as they passed. The sparse furniture had been left to rot, threads picked apart by the hands of time.
“Same thing I suppose all the passages in the palace are for: escaping in a time of need.”
“Seems more likely to be for letting other people in,” Erion murmured.
“Just because I didn’t know about them doesn’t mean that others didn’t. Like my Father.”
Erion remained silent. What was the real connection between the Emperor Solaris and the pirate Adela? Their sovereign would’ve been no older than they were now when his father died and the pirate queen fled the capital with the supposed crown jewels. If he had wanted to erase the woman from time, why leave her passages? Why leave any word of her at all?
