“They are not stupid, and now Melkior has far more time to think about his decision and change his mind without me trying to manipulate him.”
“You don’t know Hillmen. A fish is more likely to change his mind about living in the ocean than a Hillman change his mind about a flatlander.”
“Even if I could use his son’s tragedy to barter for his help, it would be dishonorable and sow resentment,” Adam argued. “A relationship or alliance cannot stand on such an unstable foundation. It needs to be built upon trust and respect, not manipulation.”
“Manipulation has served me pretty damned well over the years. Hell, my career is built upon it.”
“You argue my point better than I ever could.”
“Even if it means The Guild hunting you down and killing your sister once they no longer need her?”
Adam watched the snowflakes falling as they entered the torchlight. “Yes. Just as Melkior would not risk others’ lives for the sake of his son, I will not let a boy die even to save my sister or myself. One life is no more or less valuable than another even if familiarity wants us to think otherwise.”
Melkior listened to the flatlanders but pretended not to hear. “Check our course, boy.”
Adam stood, repeated the ritual, and pointed. “That way. I think we are getting close.”
The trees vanished and the incline steepened the farther they traveled toward the towering peaks. Close was a relative term. It took two more hours and several readings before they finally found the cleft in the mountainside. The Hillmen drew weapons and charged inside, ready to fight bears or even demons should they occupy the dark cavern. The only thing they discovered was Aage wrapped in the bear’s hide he had partially cut from its carcass before blood loss made him too weak to finish the job.
“Aage!” Melkior called out and dropped to his knees next to his son.
The boy did not respond. His face was pale and his breathing shallow. Blood soaked through the makeshift bandages and several layers of wool.
Adam knelt next to him. “He has lost a great deal of blood. I fear he may still be bleeding internally. I can use my magic to help with that if you will let me.”
Melkior despised the thought of a god-touched using his infernal power on his son, but his desire to see his boy live outweighed his distrust. “Do it, but it does not change my decision no matter what happens.”
“I understand.”
Adam knelt over the young man and began chanting. A strange tingling filled the air as the magic coalesced around him. He guided the power into the boy’s wounds and felt the tissue mend.
“That is all I can do. It isn’t much, but hopefully we got to him quick enough to stabilize him.”
The Laird and a few of his men gently laid Aage’s unconscious body upon the sledge and covered him with blankets. Melkior took a minute to finish skinning the bear and laid the frozen hide fur side down atop him as well. It would make a fine trophy for him when he recovered.
***
Something struck the simple bed upon which Adam lay. “Wake up. You flatlanders want to sleep away the entire day?” Adam opened his eyes to find Albrekt looming over him. “Grab your crap and follow me.”
Garran took a great deal more prodding, but the two of them gathered their gear and dutifully followed the warden leader through the steading. Adam was mildly surprised to find that he was leading them not to the edge of the village, but to the center where the great hall stood. He was even more surprised to find it packed with even more people than they had seen at their arrival. There was barely enough room left in the center to reach the dais where Melkior and Leila sat.
“My son woke early this morning,” the Laird said without preamble. “I told you that it would not make a difference in my decision.”
Adam ducked his head in acknowledgement. “I expected nothing in return for doing what was right and respect your decision.”
“Don’t interrupt me, flatlander!” Melkior softened his scowl. “I said what you did wouldn’t matter, but why you did it does. You proved that you are a man of honor, something greatly lacking in your people. A lesser man would have made any promise I wanted to hear to gain my help, but you were honest about the limitations of your authority. I could not live with myself if I passed up the opportunity to return my people to their rightful homes, but like you, it is not entirely my decision to make.
“I gathered my clan, and with my recommendation, they have asked me to help you. I have sent runners requesting a gathering of the clans. I will ask each of the Lairds to enter into this treaty with me. Make no mistake, this will be a hard sell to the hardest-headed people this world has ever known, but I will try.”
“Thank you, Laird Melkior. A man cannot ask for more than that,” Adam replied.
“Just know that the clans cannot gather until spring melt clears the high passes. I can return you to the Anatolian lowland, or you are welcome to sit the winter with us.”
Garran said, “We welcome your hospitality. The lowlands are an unwelcome place for us just now.”
“They have been an unwelcome place for us for half a millennia. Perhaps you will learn to appreciate that fact and the resentment we all still hold. Albrekt will show you to your own lodge. Some of my people expressed discomfort with your man’s sleeping habits.”
Adam whipped his head toward Garran. “What did you do last night?”
Garran shrugged uncomfortably. “I’ve been told that I sometimes touch myself—vigorously—in my sleep.”
“What is wrong with you?”
“How is this my fault? It’s like snoring!”
“It’s like raping yourself in your sleep!”
“Oh, don’t start with that again! That thing is willing even if blithely ignorant, which is precisely the argument I have been trying to make.”
“I am not getting into this with you.”
Garran turned toward Melkior. “Melkior, if a man and a woman are really drunk, and they both pass out, or possibly one of them passes out before the other during sex—”
Melkior raised a hand. “I need to attend to my son. Go with Albrekt.”
Garran glanced at Adam as Albrekt led them to a small lodge not far from the great hall. “What are you grinning at?”
“I guess tits on a pickle aren’t so useless after all.”
“You don’t honestly think this was your doing do you?”
“Are you trying to tell me you planned all of this?”
Garran shrugged. “I didn’t not plan it.”
“What does that even mean?”
“It means you are obviously out of your depth.”
Adam rolled his eyes. “The only depth is the amount bullcrap you sling. You are unbelievable.”
“Thank you.”
“It wasn’t a compliment.”
“Are you sure?”
CHAPTER 12
Ada threaded her way through the mass of pedestrians thronging Leva’s sidewalks. The crowds made it easier for her to blend in, but it made it all but impossible to watch for anyone following her. In the end, she decided it did not matter. She was a handmaiden not an agent and would likely not know how to spot someone if they were spying on her.
She needed to purchase a bigger order. Her nerves simply could not handle these covert escapades, but with Evelyn’s forced marriage only days away, she needed the herbs more than ever. Ada glanced up and down the walkway before entering the apothecary. The same kindly old man waited behind the counter and greeted her warmly.
“Good day, madam. What can I get for you?”
Ada’s eyes darted around the small shop nervously. “Do you happen to recall my previous purchase? I was here about three weeks ago.”
The chemist thought a moment. “Oh, yes, the stop root and jitter tonic.”
“Yes. I would like more of the same. Can you mix me a larger batch? I would rather not make this trip more often than I must.”
The old man smiled and bobbed his head. “Of cou
rse, I understand.”
The man disappeared into the back of the store and returned several minutes later. The parcels he set on the counter were more than twice the size of the previous ones with a price to match. Ada thanked him, stuffed the medicinals into her bag beneath the shawl and sweater she had purchased earlier, and departed the apothecary with great haste.
The small bells hanging over the door chimed again just moments after Ada left. The chemist looked up, suspecting that the woman had forgotten something.
“Can I help you?” he asked the man who entered.
“Aye, I need to know what that woman who just left bought.”
“I’m sorry, but it is my policy not to discuss my customers’ problems or purchases.”
Dragoslav caressed the hilt of the dagger hidden beneath his waistcoat. “Is that right? Well, I do love to break policy.”
***
Evelyn sat on her sedan, wringing her hands and glancing at the door to her rooms. Ada should have returned hours ago, and she feared something dreadful had happened. If she got hurt, she would never forgive herself. The Queen leapt to her feet at the sound of the door opening but sat back down when Gordon and two other men entered.
“What do you want?” she asked without attempting to hide her scorn.
Gordon smiled as he approached. “You look disappointed to see me. Were you expecting someone else?”
“I am always disappointed to see you, as is anyone who knows you, although I doubt my disappointment could match that of your parents and brother.”
“You say such hurtful things to your soon-to-be husband.”
“We might be married under the law, but you will never be my husband where it matters.”
“I suppose it depends on what matters to whom. For me, the heart is largely inconsequential. I suppose my needs are a bit…lower than yours.”
Evelyn glanced at the two men standing next to the door. “Have you decided not to wait until our marriage? Are you so depraved that you invited your dogs to watch?”
“Why must you be so combative? This is far from the first arranged marriage in history, and I am as much a victim as you are. I have no more choice in it than you do.”
“You are a liar and a scoundrel. You are a willing participant, and that difference is a chasm so vast that no bridge can span it.”
“I made the best of a bad situation. Speaking of bad situations, have you looked out of your window recently?”
Evelyn did not resist when Gordon took her hand and guided her to a window overlooking one of the palace’s courtyards. She gasped and pressed her hands over her mouth at the sight of Ada standing upon hastily erected gallows with a noose around her neck.
Gordon raised and dropped his hand. The executioner pulled a lever and Ada fell until the rope snapped taut a fraction of a second later. Evelyn cried out and tried to fall to the floor, but Gordon wrapped his arms around her and forced her to stand and face the window. She closed her eyes, but the brief sight of Ada’s dangling, twitching corpse seared itself into her mind.
“What have you done?” Evelyn cried.
“I did what a good king does to traitors.”
“She was not a traitor. She only did as I asked.”
“That makes you both culpable in your attempted regicide. I am fully within my right to strike your head from your shoulders for such a heinous crime.”
“We never—”
“When you willfully took measures to prevent the conception and birth of my heir that is precisely what you did. You call me a monster, yet you would murder your own child before it could take root. Since you have proven that you cannot be trusted, I have assigned two of The Guild’s agents to watch over you night and day.”
Gordon began walking from the room but stopped and turned in the doorway. “Do try to cheer up. You are to be married in a few days. You should look the part of a joyous bride, not a grieving widow.”
Evelyn clamped off the flow of tears through sheer force of will. “Becoming a widow will be the most joyous day of my life.”
Gordon smiled and left her alone with the two men guarding the door.
Martin looked to his partner. “Take the first shift. I will relieve you in the morning.”
Evelyn sat huddled at the base of the window. “Can you at least stand outside the door? I would rather be alone.”
“Fear not, Majesty, for you are not alone.”
Evelyn gasped and studied the man intently. His words were exactly what was written on the paper from the apothecary. He was young but still several years older than she was, perhaps in his mid-twenties. He was handsome and well groomed. His speech and bearing marked him as someone of breeding and education and not a simple hire sword or goon.
Evelyn stood and walked toward him. “Who are you?”
“My name is Aniston Pickard, and you do not have to be afraid of me.”
“You wrote that note.”
Aniston walked around the chamber, searched the walls for spyholes, and glanced into the other rooms. “I did.”
“But Gordon said you work for The Guild.”
“I do and have done so for nearly three years.”
“Why would you help me? The Guild is responsible for all of this.”
“It is a long story.”
Evelyn sat on the sedan and patted the space next to her. “I have nowhere else to be, and it does not appear that you do either.”
Aniston hesitated a moment before sitting down. He told Evelyn about his first encounter with Garran, their antics in school, and Garran’s eventual betrayal.
Evelyn laid a delicate hand on Aniston’s knee. “That must have hurt you deeply.”
“It did. I thought we were friends. I suppose Garran thought so too, but his definition of friendship is vastly different than that of normal people.”
“Is that when you went to work for The Guild?”
Aniston shook his head. “No, I had no desire to work for The Guild, although I did work for my father, which is only slightly removed from it.”
“He works for them?” the Queen asked, casting her eyes toward the floor.
“Anyone who is more than moderately successful has to get a Guild charter and follow their bylaws. He is more influential than many, but he avoids their politics as much as he can. Not everyone who works under the auspices of The Guild is a participant in its machinations. That is one reason why Garran and I were unable to uncover the greater details of their grand scheme.”
“That is good to know. So how did you come to work for them?”
Aniston smiled as he conjured the image to his mind. “Garran showed up at my office a little over a year after he got me expelled and told me he needed my help.”
“What did you do?”
“I kicked him the groin and told him if he ever came back I would ensure that he was the last of his line.”
Evelyn tried to suppress her grin. “Did it work?”
“Naw, he probably has bastards from one end of the realm to other.”
“No, silly, did he come back?” she asked, playfully shoving his shoulder. “He must have since you are here.”
“He did, every day for the next week, and every day I kicked him in the crotch.”
“You must have figured out that whatever he wanted was very important if he was willing to put himself through so much abuse.”
“I did, but I knew there was something more, and it took me some time to figure it out. With Garran, there is always something in his motives beyond the obvious.”
Evelyn leaned closer, intrigued by his story. “What did he want?”
Aniston felt his face heat up at her closeness and the touch of her hand on his leg. “He wanted me to hurt him. It was his way of repaying me for what he had done.”
“Wouldn’t it have been easier and less painful to simply apologize?”
“Not for him. Garran will never apologize for anything he does no matter how heinous his actions. To do so would be to admit that
what he had done was wrong, and he never thinks he is wrong.”
“He sounds positively awful!”
“Oh, he is. He is the worst person I have ever met in my life.”
Evelyn cast her eyes toward her feet, and her entire body seemed to shrink. “And this is the man who has my brother and is supposed to set everything right again. How am I supposed to feel the slightest bit of confidence in him?”
“Because above everything else, he is the best agent this kingdom ever produced. I thought he was all lies and bluster for a long time, but even his cheating during our exams showed his brilliance. His amazing ability to circumvent every rule and obstacle makes him the best chance we have at keeping you and your brother safe and taking down The Guild for good. The only thing Garran holds better than his liquor is a grudge, and he holds his booze better than anyone I know. It’s practically mystical.”
“So, he convinced you to help him to do what exactly?”
“Garran knew that The Guild liked to recruit promising Diplomatic Corps students who failed to complete their training to work for them. The fellow you saw me with just now is one of them, but do not trust him. He is a Guild man through and through. Garran had been unable to get close to anyone within the organization who mattered, so he had me do it. Unfortunately, I could not get into the hierarchy fast enough to discover the particulars of their endgame.”
Evelyn nodded and gave him a wan smile. “So what do we do now?”
Aniston felt his face flush once more, this time from embarrassment. “I’m not really sure. This was all a contingency plan, and a remote one at that. Neither of us could have imagined how quickly everything fell into place once The Guild moved against your family. For now, I watch over you so that what happened to your maid does not befall you. Hopefully, Garran can get a message to me soon explaining our next move.”
Evelyn looked away and glanced around the room. She looked beyond the painted plaster and artwork and saw the prison cell it truly was. She saw the walls meant to contain and control her, and her fury grew.
“No,” she declared, “I will not sit idle while my brother and others fight for me and my kingdom.” She twisted back around to face Aniston. “You are an agent, right?”
The Agent Page 11
