Fortune's Fool (Eterean Empire Book 1)

by Angela Boord

  Cursed man.

  I hauled Ilena to her feet.

  She looked up at me in surprise. “What are you doing?” she said. “Are you going to hit me?”

  “Only if you look like you need it,” I said, and dragged her outside.

  I got Ilena out the door but then she started kicking. My grip slipped and she tried to run away into the trees. I ran faster than she did, though, and I caught her by the arm and yanked her down into the dead leaves scattered on the ground. The heel of her foot dug up a fine spray of pebbles and dirt as she twisted, trying to get away from me, and by the time I’d struggled myself on top of her, my mouth tasted like forest.

  “Ilena!” I gasped. “I just want to talk!”

  She wriggled but I pinned her with my knees. I unsheathed the dagger from under my dress and spat the dirt out of my mouth.

  “Are you going to run away again?” I asked.

  She looked at the knife, and then she looked at me. Most of her hair had pulled out of its braid, and flakes of dead leaf burrowed in it like large brown lice. She had a scratch on her left cheek to match the bruise on her right.

  Finally, she shook her head. Tiny lines of anger radiated from the corners of her lips.

  “Mistress Levin will take you away regardless of your father,” she said.

  “Maybe, but she’s not here now, is she? Look—Arsenault had nothing to do with having Lobardin banished. If you want to blame anyone, blame my father. It was his idea.”

  Her lips trembled. “Do you expect me to believe that?”

  “It’s the truth. Arsenault said my father dumped Lobardin on the road. Lobardin begged my father but my father wouldn’t reconsider.” What Arsenault had really said was that Lobardin had begged my father to kill him rather than set him free for Geoffre to find, but I didn’t tell Ilena that.

  “Lobardin said he would come back for me.”

  I found that hard to believe, considering it had already been a month, but I didn’t say it. Instead, I said, “How much did Lobardin tell you? About what went on in the barracks?”

  “He told me that Arsenault hated him and was going to make life hard for him. He said I should watch out in case anything happened to him. He said that Arsenault had gotten his magic into you, too, and you would just follow him like a faithful dog.”

  I scowled. “You mean the same way you kept after Lobardin? How are you not with child by now? Are you infertile?”

  My cursed, cursed mouth. Ilena made a noise of pure fury and managed to wrench one of her arms free of my knees. She brought her hand up quick and hard to slap me.

  I didn’t mean to cut her, but my body reacted as Arsenault’s teaching had trained it. My left hand came up with the dagger in it to block her, and the blade sliced her knuckles in one neat bloody crease.

  She screamed and withdrew her hand with such speed that I hardly got a look at the wound before her hand was in her mouth and blood was trickling down her chin.

  “You cut me,” she gasped, taking her knuckles slightly down from her lips, rouged red with blood. “You cut me.”

  “I didn’t mean to, Ilena— Gods. Here, let me see—”

  I got off her and reached for her hand, but she jerked it away from me. “No!” she hissed. “Householder’s daughter lording it over the rest of us. Violating your sentence!”

  “I don’t have anything you’d want, Ilena. It’s useless to be jealous of me.”

  “You think I’m jealous of you?” She laughed, but it was too high-pitched. “I’m not jealous. What the Householder is doing, what Arsenault is doing, is an injustice. Arsenault threw Lobardin off the estate, and now where does Lobardin have to go? He’ll be at the mercy of Geoffre di Prinze! Your father wouldn’t even throw you to the Prinze, and what does he do to Lobardin? And how much more useful was Lobardin to him? He was a man, and he had both his arms!”

  “I keep telling you, Ilena, Arsenault had nothing—”

  “He took Lobardin away! I was watching!”

  “But he didn’t order it; my father—”

  “Yes, your father. Your father does everything that Arsenault wants, doesn’t he? But does he know that Arsenault is working for the Prinze? And you, following Arsenault around like a dog.”

  She raised her nose in the air and my grip on the dagger trembled.

  Lobardin knew about Arsenault. I had tried to determine how he knew, but I had never been able to find out who his “little bird” was. He had contacts in Liera, and I thought that maybe on his off days, he had been able to use them for information.

  But now with Ilena smiling one of her dark little smiles at me, I wondered.

  Did she make a habit of hiding in the brush and listening?

  Did she want more than just for Arsenault to notice her?

  “I imagine that Geoffre di Prinze might like to have that bit of information, don’t you think?” she said.

  I shoved her back to the ground, then moved my blade to her throat. “Do you know where Lobardin is, Ilena?”

  Her eyes squeezed shut. “No,” she said, voice trembling. But then she opened her eyes and the smile returned, a little shakier than it had been. “But perhaps he’ll go to the Lord Prinze. Or his son. Or perhaps I will. You won’t be able to stop either of us.”

  The dagger blade trembled. Voices and footsteps approached, the thumping of scabbards and the jangle of metal—not just Mistress Levin but a contingent of gavaros, more than one.

  “You never mean to use that dagger, do you, Kyrra,” Ilena said.

  Contempt filled her voice. I looked at her face and then she moved, taking courage against an armless girl with the gavaros almost here, I suppose—reaching up with her cut hand to claw me in the face with her ragged fingernails.

  I jerked my head back. Then I plunged the knife into her neck as hard as I could.

  Her eyes bulged. She opened her mouth to scream, but nothing came out, only a small upwelling of blood that spilled down her chin and dripped onto my hand. She writhed and thrashed so hard that I was thrown to the ground beside her.

  Then she stopped. Just stopped.

  I stared at her. I sat there beneath the oaks and beeches, dappled in their shade, their lost and old leaves tangled in my hair, smeared with the dirt they had created. I sat there knowing that the gavaros could see us through the gaps in the branches, that the men had started shouting and running toward me.

  I heard my name. But nothing seemed to make any sense. Least of all the dead girl on the ground, wearing my dagger in her throat like a jewel.

  I lurched upright and threw up at her feet. I began to run even before I was done, wiping my mouth with my hand, stumbling over roots, stepping on rocks and twigs—hardly noticing. The afternoon light seemed filtered like the light sifting through the murky water of a pond. Sounds and images reached me as if I were underwater.

  My only thought was to warn Arsenault. But I’d started running too late. The gavaros were on me in a moment. And I’d left my knife in Ilena’s throat.

  I kicked and beat with my fists, clawed them with short, stubby nails. I fought like a cornered animal. I didn’t think. I didn’t remember Arsenault’s teachings. I just fought. And fighting, I was strong, even with only one arm.

  There was a lot of yelling. Finally, I looked up to see Verrin’s face inches away from mine as he hugged my arm behind my back. His hand locked around my wrist so hard that I realized it hurt. The hurting was sharp, and it brought me back.

  Sweat dripped off Verrin’s brow and stained the black curls that hung down in his forehead. It dripped onto my face, too. “Kyrra. I said, Don’t get in trouble, didn’t I?”

  “Arsenault—” I said. My voice came out hoarse and raspy, as if I hadn’t spoken in months.

  “Arsenault can’t save you now,” Verrin whispered. “There wasn’t time to get him. I sent someone to tell him, but—”

  “No,” I said, shaking my head. “No, tell him Lobardin—”

  I looked up. The other gavaro
s had crowded around.

  “Lobardin what?” one of them said, a man with a crooked nose and pale blue eyes whom I hardly knew.

  I closed my mouth and hung my head.

  Verrin glanced at them, then sighed. “Come on, Kyrra,” he said. “We’ll have to lock you in the caves until the Householder can talk to you.”

  It should have been Arsenault who handled my case, with my father involved in last-minute wedding details. Arsenault’s justice was swift, sure, and fair when he practiced it on other people. Making him judge my case would be a hopeless predicament, but since Verrin said he’d sent a runner, I hoped I at least got the chance to tell Arsenault why I’d killed Ilena.

  There was no doubt in my mind that when Ilena spoke of going to the Prinze, she was not bluffing. And maybe Lobardin had not gone to the Prinze, and what then, when Geoffre rode onto our estate sometime in the next few days?

  You could have taken her to your father to find out. To let him take care of her, the small voice in my mind insisted on adding, allowing doubt to crawl in anyway, like a worm in a peach.

  I could still see the way the blood burbled out of her mouth. I could feel the skin of her neck on my hand as I rammed the knife in. Her skin had been soft there. Thin.

  I hoped, as I had not thought to hope while I was stabbing the blade into Ilena’s throat, that Sight had something to do with my actions. It was strange how you could hate a woman when she was alive and then realize, when it was your hand that delivered her death, that the feeling you’d borne her in life didn’t run deep enough to be hate. Ilena had been like the needle she’d dropped on the floor—small, irritating. Except that in the end, she’d revealed herself less a needle than a dagger.

  No. I’d had no doubt.

  I kept expecting Arsenault to overtake us on the path, but he didn’t.

  The caves were not where anyone awaiting justice was routinely kept—only those who committed serious crimes, like the Forza captain. Whether they were natural caves or holes in the rock hollowed out by the Etereans—or a people even older—no one knew. They might even have been tombs, but if they were, the bodies that once lay in them had long since turned to dust.

  I had never actually seen these caves. They were near enough to the villa and the barracks that a number of gavaros could be called there quickly in case of emergency, but far enough away that the prisoners couldn’t bother the main house. In any case, prisoners in the caves usually hung within three days.

  Three days from now would be my father’s wedding.

  As we walked down the path, I kept a lookout for opportunities to escape, but there were none. I was unarmed in more ways than one and surrounded by three gavaros, two of whom watched me warily and bore marks on their faces from my struggles. Verrin just looked worried and gripped my left arm so hard that my bruised forearm ached.

  The path led through the trees, then uphill, where the trees became increasingly sparse and finally gave way to stands of tall yellow grass and purple thistle. The villa loomed up before us, its windows like eyes watching from across the ravine. The servants who swarmed around it, readying the grounds for the wedding, were as small and stick-like as if a child had drawn them, all out of proportion to the house. Four gray horses pulling a mahogany coach clattered up the drive while we stood there watching, catching our breath before the descent into the ravine. Its flags glinted in the sun—silk flags, woven of the bright, soft fibers on which our family had built its fortunes.

  The flags were blue and silver.

  Prinze.

  A shiver laced my spine. I stood hardly breathing as four people disembarked from the coach: one of the men was Geoffre, but the other man could have been Devid or Cassis, except that the younger woman had dark hair.

  Devid’s wife was blonde. Therefore, the woman must be Camile di Sere. Which meant that the man at her side, the man I couldn’t recognize from this far away, was Cassis.

  “So, they came,” Verrin breathed.

  “The Mestere’s let a viper into a nest of chicks,” the other gavaro murmured.

  My whole body seemed to harden at once. I might have been made of wood.

  I barely noticed as Verrin cast me a worried glance, then tugged me forward with a sigh. The rocks and sand slipped beneath my feet, and the villa and its guests disappeared over the ridge of the ravine that held the caves, lost to the silk-blue sky.

  Inside, the caves were cool, dank, and dark, a maze of small rooms, most of them big enough only for one person. When Verrin struck a flint, you could see the string of these rooms leading up into the bowels of the hillside, many, many more than I had ever imagined. The walls were smooth yellow stone stippled with bands of ochre and black near the floor. Faint outlines of ancient paintings marched along the length of the narrow passageway—the stiff, brush-like mane of a horse, a man wearing the head of a bear and dancing among faded orange flames. Gooseflesh lifted its bumpy heads along the length of both my left arm and my stump, and then Verrin nudged me into a room near the entrance.

  It had a bench carved into the wall, but it was barely big enough for one person. Verrin had to bend over to stand in the doorway, and he wasn’t tall. A pile of small bones lay in the corner, mice perhaps, and the knob of a bigger bone jutted out from the stone itself. It looked like a man’s leg bone, and it unnerved me that stone could bear such a resemblance to something so human. I sat down on the other side of the bench, as far away from it as I could get.

  Verrin glanced over his shoulder at the entrance, where the other gavaros milled about restlessly. “What did you want to tell me about Arsenault?” he whispered, hunched over so his head wouldn’t hit the ceiling.

  I moistened my lips. “Ilena wanted to expose him. The work he was doing for my father. That’s why—” My voice faltered, and I cursed myself for a coward. Verrin watched me out of concerned black eyes, his gaze unwavering. I swallowed and went on. “It’s vital that the Prinze not discover Arsenault here on our land. Ilena would have exposed Arsenault to the Prinze if I hadn’t killed her. Lobardin put her up to it, I think.”

  Verrin’s eyes widened. Then he nodded. “I’ll tell him, Kyrra. Maybe you’ll be out of here soon.” He smiled at me, a little ruefully. “Arsenault was with the Householder. Your father will know.”

  I wasn’t sure what that would mean for me, but it made me uneasy. Surely, my father wouldn’t punish me in the way that those usually incarcerated in these cells were punished. Surely, he would see that I had acted only to preserve the integrity of our family.

  Verrin backed out of the cell without saying anything else. Then he slammed the heavy wood door and locked it. The light winked out; there was a small crack of a window in the door for guards to peek into, but that only let in a sliver of dimness from the entrance.

  Verrin’s footsteps faded into the distance, leaving me alone with the steady drip-drip-drip of water somewhere far away and the silence of rock.

  I sat on the bench for a moment, but then I had to move. I wanted to pace, but the floor was too small. I waved my arm instead to keep warm but also out of sheer frustration. Surely, Arsenault and my father would come soon.

  I shoved on the door, testing it. It held fast. It was an old door but unrotted, and on the way in, I had noticed that the locks were all made of iron. So, there was no immediate way out.

  When I thought I couldn’t wait anymore, I heard voices.

  I looked out the small window, but in the faint light from the entrance, all I could make out were the black shapes of men.

  “I put her in the first cell...” That was Verrin.

  Someone said something; I couldn’t tell what it was. It might have been Arsenault, but it didn’t sound like him. Then keys jangled.

  “I’ll talk to her myself. Alone.”

  My father. I stiffened and moved away from the door just as he jammed the key into the lock. The door opened with a screech, and the flame of the candle he held fluttered in the wind. Its light illuminated both of us.

>   My father’s lips pressed together in a thin, pale line. The candle made it all too easy to read the rage in his dark eyes.

  I don’t know what he saw in me. Ilena’s blood dried black on my hand—my dirty dress, my bare, brown feet. He pushed the door shut while I was looking over his shoulder for Arsenault.

  “Sit,” he told me.

  I lowered myself to the bench without looking away from him. The stone was cold against my legs. “She was going to expose Arsenault to Geoffre di Prinze. Lobardin had figured out that Arsenault was spying for you. I don’t know if Ilena had been spying on Arsenault and told him, or if it was the other way around and Lobardin just figured it out.”

  The candle trembled. “Has Arsenault told everyone on the estate what he’s been about?”

  “He told no one!” I said, my chin jutting upward in the way Arsenault chided me for when I was fighting. “Ilena liked to hide in the bushes and eavesdrop on conversations. And Lobardin had seen Arsenault in Liera before. You sent him away for such long stretches, it probably wasn’t hard for Lobardin to piece things together. Ilena had it in for Arsenault because he snubbed her.”

  For me, I thought, but of course I didn’t say so. Wouldn’t it just look like a lover’s spat if I did?

  “Dammit, Kyrra. Stop being so smug. You just killed a girl.” He ran a hand through his hair, then looked around for a place to put the candle. He found one near the ceiling, a ledge with a shallow depression in it. The candle leaned against the wall and cast grotesque shadows of my father and me, but we did not look like people.

  When I looked at him again, he was watching me as if he wanted me to speak.

  “What do you want me to say, Father? I told you why I did it.”

  “And you have no remorse at all?”

  Did I? I looked at my hand lying there in my lap, still speckled with blood. My first death. Did gavaros feel remorse when they cut men down in battle?

  I clenched my hand into a fist to stop its trembling. “Would you rather I’d left her to do her damage?”