House of Dragons: Royal Houses Book One

by Linde, K. A.

  His words were precise and severe. As if this would be the end of their bond. That helping her would close the loop. He clearly did not like the idea of being in her debt.

  She watched him walk away, perplexed. Who exactly was Fordham Ollivier?

  21

  The Dawn

  Clover

  Clover hadn’t been this tired in a long time. Not since the night she had slept among the bones. A small shudder ran down her back, and she pulled out her father’s old locket. She should be asleep. Kerrigan had gone off to walk out her anxiety and fear, but Clover didn’t have the same nervous energy. Her constant companion was pain.

  Even though she knew Kerrigan would kill her, she pulled out a smoke, striking a match to light it and taking a good, long drag. Instantly, her muscles relaxed, and the spasms stopped. Everything felt more like it should. More like… before.

  Probably, she should finish the cigarette and then get some sleep. Dozan wouldn’t care how tired she was tomorrow when she had to deal. He’d just dock her pay for being worthless to him. Still, she couldn’t sleep.

  Maybe it was the empty bed on the other side of the room. The bed that had belonged to Darby for as long as Clover had known Kerrigan. Clover had snuck in more nights than she could count and found the beautiful woman lying in her nightclothes. The white underthings brilliant against her dark onyx skin.

  She teased Hadrian to death. They fought like cats and dogs. But Darby… sweet, innocent Darby, she was an entire world of different. Clover had never been able to bring herself to make that move. Not when Darby was about to be a lady in a Bryonican aristocracy’s household. Darby had been too good for Clover long before that.

  Clover flopped back onto Kerrigan’s bed and put out the smoke with a sigh when a soft knock sounded on the door. She sat up real quick.

  “Kerrigan? You change your mind?” she called.

  The door creaked open, and there Darby stood, as if Clover had conjured her up from a dream. “Oh, Clover,” she whispered, ducking her chin to her chest. A lantern was clutched in her hand. “I didn’t… I thought—”

  “Why don’t you come on in?”

  “You’re sure? I was just looking for Kerrigan. I didn’t know—”

  “I’m sure. She went off to wander all night. It’s almost dawn. You can come in.”

  “Oh… all right,” Darby said. She stepped daintily inside and closed the door behind her. “It feels odd to be sleeping in different quarters… after living here for so long.”

  Clover sat up on her elbows. “You can sleep here. I don’t mind.”

  “Thank you,” Darby said.

  She went about the room like it was her own, which it had been up until a few days ago. She found extra blankets and a fresh pillow and bundled up into the bed across from where Clover lay.

  “Do you think she was right?”

  Clover faced Darby with the lantern light between them. “Do I think Lyam was murdered?”

  “He was, wasn’t he?”

  “Kerrigan has good instincts.”

  Darby frowned, and Clover decided right then and there that she didn’t like it one bit. “I knew we were all about to start our own lives, but I thought it would be like it was… but bigger,” she admitted. “Like we’d have this new adventure in society and still have this group we always grew up with. That was… kind of naive. I see that now.”

  “Maybe a little naive,” Clover conceded. “But why shouldn’t you get everything you’ve ever wanted?”

  Darby’s eyes landed on her own. Dark as midnight and as earnest as she had ever seen them. “I thought that I was getting that when Lady Sonali picked me.”

  “Life doesn’t always work out the way we want it to,” Clover said, rubbing the locket and tucking it back under her shirt.

  “Thank you for talking to me. I guess I wasn’t quite ready for sleep.” Darby punctuated that with a large yawn and then a tinkling laugh. “Or I was, but my brain wouldn’t shut off.”

  “Why don’t you try to sleep now?”

  “Would you sing to me?” Darby whispered through another yawn, her eyes already closed.

  “Sing?”

  “Mmm,” Darby muttered.

  Clover swallowed. She hadn’t sung in a long time. Not in five years. Not since her parents had been killed. But she still remembered the tune her mother used to sing as she laid her down to sleep. She hadn’t thought of it in so long, and still, it came back to her with ease, the words following close behind.

  Sleep, my little darling.

  May dreams soothe and obey.

  Turn the charm one, two, three times.

  Don’t leave. I want you to stay.

  Sleep, my little angel.

  Open the heart, and I’ll appear.

  Speak my name one, two, three times.

  No fear. I’ll always be near.

  Darby softly snored in the opposite bed before Clover finished the lullaby. It was for the better. She wouldn’t see Clover swipe at the tear that had rolled down her cheek.

  Clover crept out of bed and carefully tugged the covers under Darby’s cheek. She brushed a lock of her dark hair out of her face. Then, she extinguished the lantern and crawled back into bed, trying to forget the memories the lullaby had dredged up.

  22

  The Disappointment

  Isa

  Isa dealt in death.

  She enjoyed a good day of espionage like anyone, but the tip of her dagger in a warm body was preferable.

  Her hard leather boots were soundless against the stones as she traipsed up to the back of the building. She could have used the front, but she’d rather less people knew who she was. A shadow in the night was more fearsome than a girl with a shock of white hair and a pretty little face. Being pretty sometimes helped get her into buildings, but more often than not, it was a nuisance. People assumed a lot about pretty girls. Namely that they were stupid and weren’t going to slit you from nose to navel for touching them. For Isa, they were wrong on both counts.

  She scaled the small stone wall and landed with ease into the garden on the other side. A black mask obscured her features, but still, she drew her cloak further forward, putting her face in deeper recess. Now, she was ready.

  With purpose, Isa stalked through the manor home deep in the heart of Riverfront territory. Wealthy enough to be a solid benefactor, but not nearly as much of a nuisance as some of those royal pricks in the Row. New money. The entire estate reeked of it.

  Not that she much cared one way or another. As long as she was paid.

  She strode forward with the grace of her training and the confidence of someone who feared only one person in her life—her father. And he wasn’t here.

  A pathetic excuse for a guard stood outside of the entrance to the main room.

  “I was called,” Isa said with disdain evident in her voice.

  “He has been waiting for you,” the guard said. He turned the knob and announced her presence.

  She pushed in before him and lazily strolled into the living area. It desperately wanted to be a four-hundred-year-old Row mansion but didn’t quite pull it off. Hardwood in a deep chestnut covered the floor with a collection of recently designed furniture in various neutral shades. Objects of import lined cedar shelves built into the walls, and a man stood at a full glass window display overlooking the river.

  “You’re late,” the man said.

  Isa plopped down onto one of the couches. She poured herself a glass of amber liquid out of a crystal decanter and then propped her feet up. “I’m not a dog. I don’t come when I’m called.”

  “You are in my employ.”

  “And I did what you’d told me. So, where’s my money?” She took a sip of the bourbon and sighed. At least he’d forked out for the good stuff.

  The man never turned to face her, but she could feel his anger emanating off him. “You killed the wrong person and made the mistake of leaving the body for the Guard to locate. You failed miserably. You will get
nothing.”

  Isa dropped her feet onto the intricately woven rug. She sure hoped that she’d crushed dirt into the delicate fabric. “No one is going to have any idea that I killed him. I am talented at my profession. They will think that it was an accident. I made it look like a robbery.”

  “But you didn’t get the girl!” he cried, finally whirling around to face her.

  “One thing at a time, boss,” she crooned.

  “Do you not understand how any of this works? I hired you to kill one girl. Not to off a full-blooded Fae male on a whim.”

  “Is that what you think of me?” Isa asked with humor in her voice. “That full-blooded Fae was tracking your girl. If I hadn’t noticed his movements, then he would have surely seen me come after the girl. One step at a time. It’s a delicate process.”

  “You are a disappointment,” he snarled.

  Isa rolled her eyes and finished the liquor. “I’m going to kill the girl.”

  “You’d better, or you won’t be paid.”

  “Why do you have it out for this girl anyway?”

  The man’s eyes blazed with anger. “She is a half-Fae bastard. Is that not enough for you?”

  “There are plenty of those running around in the Dregs right now. Hell, there are plenty of filthy humans,” Isa said with a shrug. “What makes her special?”

  He turned back to the riverfront. His body stiff and unyielding. “She is powerful. More powerful than anyone knows. If she comes to her full potential, she could wreak havoc on our entire world.”

  “No half-Fae is that powerful.”

  “And none ever will be once you’re finished with her.”

  Isa came to her feet. “Then, if she’s that dangerous, I’m going to have to double my rate.”

  His jaw set as he glanced at her. “Fine. Just do it and do it right this time. Dispose of the body and let no one know when you’re done.”

  Isa smiled, imagining all the money she was going to rake in from this one job. Almost enough to get her own place. Almost enough to escape. Almost enough to finally be free.

  “Consider it done.”

  23

  The Search

  “You’ve been busy,” Fordham said the next afternoon as they strode together out of the mountain.

  He’d recently come from the baths, and his dark hair was still wet and slicked back off his face. He wore the same black-and-silver clothing he always wore. Much too fine for her, and she had a sharp memory of him handing her his cloak and just how much nicer it was than anything she had ever put on her body.

  “What? Did you expect me to nap?” she asked, returning to her chiding demeanor now that they weren’t alone under the cover of darkness together.

  “How exactly did you get the location of where your friend’s body turned up?”

  “I bribed a guard,” she said simply.

  He shook his head but said nothing else as they exited the mountain and headed toward the Wastes. The roads were so familiar. She’d walked them hundreds of times. More times than she could even count with Lyam at her side or trailing in her wake, as if he thought that she wouldn’t notice. And now, she would never walk them with him again. Not even get annoyed that he was tailing her.

  She swallowed back the lump in her throat and continued through the streets. But as fast as she was going, Fordham kept pace with her, even as he stared around the streets as if he had never seen a real city before. He didn’t gawk—that would be beneath him—but there was something like awe in his expression.

  There were so many questions that she wanted to ask. But she didn’t want him to shut down again if she asked about his home. So, she veered off course, abruptly turning them away from the Wastes and toward Central which housed the Square.

  “Haven’t you been out in Kinkadia since you got here?” she asked him.

  He shrugged. “The once for the ceremony.”

  “It was night, and you only saw a ballroom,” she scoffed. “We’re going to need to get you acquainted with my city.”

  “That’s not part of our mission.”

  “Well, can we at least stop for a meat pie?” she asked. “I know the best place in town.”

  He narrowed his eyes as if he were trying to find deception in it but finally nodded. “I could use sustenance.”

  “Princeling, this isn’t sustenance. This is living.”

  Fordham grumbled something under his breath, but he followed her through the winding city streets until they came upon the Square. It was more or less the center of Kinkadia. A giant stone-paved square with shops boarding three sides and the ruins of a once-grand church taking up most of the center. Her heart clenched at the sight.

  “What happened here?” Fordham asked. His gaze raked over the falling stones and burned-out roof.

  “Something tragic,” she said softly.

  “I didn’t think the Fae had a religion other than the Society.”

  “Most don’t,” she agreed, turning them away from the church that still made her feel sick to her stomach. “This was a human church for the Laments.”

  Fordham eyes widened slightly. “Humans built that? Without magic?”

  She nodded. She’d always thought the twenty-story building with its sweeping spires and high, arched bell towers was a truly magnificent sight to see. Even burned and out of use, it still drew quite a crowd of tourists and followers of the Lament.

  “Many humans still follow the way of the Laments, but after the protests and riots five years ago, so much of it has had to go underground or on the outskirts of town. Human religions aren’t welcome in such public places in Kinkadia. They draw the wrong kind of attention. There are small Lament churches on the outskirts of town. None quite as grand.”

  Fordham looked perplexed. She wondered more and more what it had been like to live his life in the House of Shadows. By his reaction, he clearly didn’t have much interaction with humans.

  Kerrigan tilted her head away from the church and stopped in front of a food cart. She ordered two meat pies and tossed coins to the seller. She passed one to Fordham, who took a tentative bite before his eyes doubled in size.

  “What is this?” he asked.

  She laughed. “Magic.”

  He finished his pie in two more bites and went back for two more.

  “I see you’re a fan.”

  He finished off the next one in record time. “You were not lying about this.”

  “Nope. The best damn pie in the city. Shredded quail meat with just a hint of spice. I don’t know what he does, but it’s the best.”

  Fordham ate the third pie slower than the first two as they walked around the square. There were chocolatiers and candlemakers and cheese vendors. A glassblower was showing off her latest creations. A skilled blacksmith worked before a forge. Anything and everything a person could want was for sale in the Square. Only the finest quality and generally a few extra coins more than outside of the Square, but she figured for the experience and the quail meat pie, it was worth it.

  “All right, we have veered off course enough. Where was his body found in comparison to this?” Fordham asked. “I cannot think that a dead body would be easily concealed in this neighborhood.”

  “No,” she agreed, coming back to reality. This was about Lyam, not about gallivanting around the city with one wicked prince. “He was found in the Dregs, near the Wastes.”

  “The Dregs… that sounds pleasant.”

  “It’s a nickname for the neighborhood, but no one actually calls it Glenwoods,” she said with an eyeroll.

  After a twenty-minute walk, it became completely transparent why no one called the neighborhood by its given name, instead going by the Dregs. The street grew narrower and narrower. A smell lingered in the air, as if sewage waste were still being thrown into the streets or there were too many taverns with customers vomiting and pissing nearby. Instead of Fae dressed in their best, musicians playing on the streets, and dances breaking out, there were taverns, taverns, and more
taverns. Mostly humans, half-Fae, and some poor Fae lived in these parts. They walked quickly with their heads down, hastening to another job because most had more than one here.

  Fordham’s brows came together, the deeper they walked into the Dregs. He was still in his crisp black-and-silver attire. She should have told him to wear something less conspicuous, but it was too late now.

  He said nothing as Kerrigan led the way with ease, stopping when she reached the intersection the guard had given her earlier that day. It was a darkened alcove running off the main thoroughfare of the Dregs. She didn’t remember whether or not she had walked down this street the night of the ceremony. She had been in such a hurry that she’d all but run the entire way. None of her movements came back to her.

  “This it?” he asked, stepping into the alley.

  “Yes. This is what the guard said.”

  She followed Fordham down the length of the alley. She tried to see what it must have been like at night, walking down this darkened cove. It was near a tavern, but everything was in this part of town. The alley opened on both sides. Not exactly great concealment for a robbery.

  Fordham stooped down near a pile of refuse and prodded it around.

  She wrinkled her nose and came over to look. “Anything?”

  He pointed to the left. “Blood. From what I can see, he was stabbed here.” He pointed at a footprint that she’d missed completely. One foot had landed in the dirt. It was mostly gone already. “And fell backward into the garbage, where he bled out.”

  Kerrigan shivered at the thought. “They left him in the garbage?”

  “Appears so.” Fordham rummaged through the trash and came out with a small gold chain. “This look familiar?”

  Kerrigan’s jaw dropped. “That’s Lyam’s compass.”

  “Looks like he might have had it out or was fiddling with it when it happened. Dropped it into the garbage before… whoever did this could get to him.”