In the Enemy's Service (Annals of Alasia Book 2)

by Annie Douglass Lima

  Lasden picked up a candle from the table and turned to light it from a torch in the hallway. Setting it down again, he shut the door and reached out to pull the chair closer. He sat down in it right in front of the door so there would be no way Anya could slip around him and escape.

  “Now,” he began, carefully hoisting his injured leg with both hands to rest it on the edge of the bed beside him. “Why were you eavesdropping out there?”

  Half a dozen excuses flashed through Anya’s mind, but none of them sounded convincing, even to her. “Are you going to tell the captain?” she inquired worriedly.

  “I asked you a question, Anya,” the officer reminded her, ignoring hers. “Why were you eavesdropping on us?” His voice was stern.

  Anya decided on the truth. “I wanted to find out what was going to happen to Jommal and the others.”

  “How much did you overhear?”

  “Just about everything,” she admitted reluctantly, fiddling with the handle of the cup.

  “So you have your answers now. Are you happy?”

  “No.” Anya could still hardly believe that what she had heard was true. “Is Lieutenant Talifus really going to kill them?”

  “Yes.”

  “But it isn’t fair.” Anya was close to tears. “He can’t just kill innocent people.”

  “He can and he’s going to. But you are going to stay in here until we hear him come back so you won’t be dragged out to watch with the rest of them. You’re too young to have to live with a memory like that.”

  “So are you going to tell the captain on me?”

  Lasden frowned. “You shouldn’t get in the habit of eavesdropping. If you had overheard sensitive information, there could have been serious consequences. As it is, however, what we discussed is about to be made public anyway, so I don’t see the need to inform him this time.”

  Anya sagged in relief. “Thank you.” She hoped Lasden would never find out about her earlier snooping. He would be sure to say that was an entirely different matter.

  “You’re welcome.” The lieutenant reached across the doorway for a canteen hanging by its strap from a hook and tossed it to her across the room. “There’s a towel in the wardrobe over there. Wet it down and wipe that blood off your face. You look like you’ve been in a battle. Then you might as well have a seat and make yourself comfortable. It will be at least a half-hour’s wait.”

  When at last Lasden let her leave, Anya tiptoed through the halls as though any noise she made might get her in trouble, as indeed it might for all she knew.

  Everything seemed to have changed in the palace. There were workers around again now, busy at their usual tasks, but they were all quiet. Nearly all of them looked angry. Some were crying silently, wiping tears away as they worked. Anya had never seen a grown-up cry before. It was unnerving.

  She was afraid to ask; she didn’t want to know the answer, but she needed to. “Who did Talifus kill?” she whispered to a man carrying a basket of dirty dish rags toward the laundry room on the first floor.

  The man sighed and rested the edge of his basket on a nearby windowsill, staring out through the glass with unseeing eyes. “Be glad you weren’t there.” Slowly, he listed eight names, counting them off on his fingers. “And half of them weren’t even involved.”

  Anya breathed a tiny sigh of relief. Besides Sethius and Jommal, she didn’t actually know any of the men or women personally. Not that that made what had happened any less awful. But she was thankful Bronin was not among them. Nor Eleya, nor Tonnis.

  Stepping out into the courtyard, Anya was startled to see that it was snowing. Feathery flakes drifted past her face, and the ground was already covered with a thin dusting of white. The sight made her stop short. Ordinarily she loved snow, a treat not often experienced here in Almar. In fact, it had snowed only once so far that winter, but Anya had been in school at the time, and the teacher had refused to let the students out to play in it.

  As much as she had longed for it to snow again, Anya could take no pleasure in the weather now. The white sheet over the ground and roofs just made everything look bleak.

  As she began to trudge slowly across the courtyard, her bare forearms covered with goose bumps, she felt a pang of wistful nostalgia. Last winter Father had taken her and Arvalon sledding up in the hills to celebrate the start of their three-week holiday from school. All the way there her brother had protested that he was much too old to play in the snow, but he had ended up having as much fun on the sled as she had. Afterward he had helped her build a snowman, and then all three of them had engaged in a ferocious snowball fight.

  A tear trickled down Anya’s face, hot at first in the chilly air, but quickly turning to ice water on her cheek. She realized that she missed her family even more than she had thought. Was it snowing on them right now in Sazellia? Were they thinking about her and missing her too? And would she ever see them again, or was she going to be stuck here working in the palace, where danger and death would always be lurking right around the corner, for the rest of her life? At the thought, a second tear followed the first.

  Eleya and Tonnis were standing by the fireplace in the back room, talking in low voices, when she let herself into the clinic, wiping away the tears that just kept coming. When they saw her, both of them seemed to go limp with relief, and it occurred to Anya for the first time that they had probably been worried about her. Eleya, her eyes red and a damp handkerchief clutched in one hand, wordlessly opened her arms. Without a second thought, Anya ran into them and flung her arms around her. “I want to go home,” she wailed, burying her face in her friend’s bosom. The tears were flowing freely now, and she couldn’t hold back the sobs. “I just want to go home.”

  Chapter 9

  It was late in the evening, and Anya had been sent upstairs to get ready for bed while Tonnis and Eleya tidied up the clinic and settled the patients down for the night. Besides Wennish, there were two new ones, thanks to the morning’s skirmish in the city. Ordinarily Anya would have argued that she could stay up and help, but she didn’t feel like arguing tonight, or like staying up. She was too tired and too sad. At least when she was asleep she would forget where she was and the terrible things that had happened that day.

  She had gotten as far as brushing her hair with the brush Eleya had lent her when she heard the outside door open and then slam shut. Startled, Anya crept to the top of the stairs and peered down, wondering who had come in so violently this late at night. A moment later she saw Lieutenant Talifus storm through the doorway between the front and back rooms and stomp angrily past the stairs. Killing people had apparently not put him in a better mood, because he seemed to be even angrier than when she had seen him earlier. He was holding something that looked like a folded piece of parchment.

  “Tonnis?” he bellowed, and Anya heard Tonnis and Eleya hurry down the hallway, shutting a door softly behind them.

  “Hush, Lieutenant,” Eleya chided him. “We have injured patients back here who need their rest.”

  “I don’t give a fig about your injured patients.” Though Anya could no longer see Talifus from this angle, it sounded as though he had just slammed his fist down on the top of a cupboard. She could hear the glass jars of herbs and medicines rattling together inside.

  “What’s the matter?” Tonnis asked quietly, obviously trying by example to get the angry soldier to lower his voice.

  “Everything. Those stinking Malornians tricked me, that’s what.” The lieutenant let out a string of words that made Anya’s eyes widen. Her father had once given Arvalon a whipping for saying just one of those words at home. She had never heard anyone use so much profanity at once. Talifus must really be furious.

  “Shame on you,” Eleya scolded. “Young ears might be listening.” Instinctively, Anya withdrew a step, ready to dart behind the corner if anyone came to look up the stairway. “Clean up your language or go swear somewhere else,” Eleya ordered. “Unless you need medicine, we can’t help you with your problems an
yway.”

  “Oh, yes, you can,” the lieutenant growled. “Tonnis can, and he’s going to.”

  “You’ve been at the bottle again, haven’t you, Lieutenant?” Tonnis observed. He sounded nervous. “I can smell it on your breath. Whatever the matter is, why don’t you go to your quarters and sleep it off? Come back tomorrow and we’ll see what we can do.”

  “We’re going to do it tonight,” the soldier declared loudly. “I’ve had enough of their lies and blame, and it’s going to end now.”

  Anya wasn’t sure what he meant, but it sounded ominous, and she felt herself shudder. After today, she was more afraid of Talifus than of any of the Malornians, even Lasden or Almanian. After all, Talifus had murdered eight people just a few hours ago. Whatever he was planning couldn’t be good, especially if he had been drinking. She crept a few steps lower, trying to be sure she didn’t miss anything but still careful to keep out of sight and not make a sound.

  There was a rustling noise, and she remembered the folded parchment Talifus had brought in. “I finally heard back from them in Sazellia,” he announced angrily, “but Regent Rampus couldn’t even be bothered to write to me himself. Some aide of his wrote the message. It was a week and a half ago that I sent my first letter reminding him of what I was promised, and he never answered, so I wrote again, and then again, and now after the fourth time I finally get a reply.” He gave an inarticulate growl of rage, and there was a rustling thud, perhaps made by his fist thumping down on the parchment on the examining table.

  “I take it your murderous treachery on behalf of Malorn didn’t earn you the high respect you so richly deserve,” Eleya suggested, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

  “No, it didn’t,” the lieutenant snapped, too angry – or perhaps too tipsy – to notice. “They say that I must continue to serve as a lieutenant and to follow Almanian’s orders, and that I will be considered for promotion in the next few years if I prove myself loyal and a worthy soldier. The next few years! If I prove myself!” He slammed his fist down again. “I hate those lying, cheating, conniving Malornians! They tricked me into this! They promised to make me at least a major right away, and that I’d be on the fast track to further promotion. They promised me as much gold as I could ask for, and a fine house in Sazellia’s wealthiest neighborhood. But they were lying all along! They betrayed me!”

  “How appropriately ironic,” Eleya mused, and Anya could hear the sarcasm in her voice again. “Do you expect us to feel sorry for you? Especially after today?”

  “I expect you to help me,” Talifus snapped. “Tonnis owes me a favor, don’t you, Tonnis? Don’t pretend you’ve forgotten. I spared your life that day outside the prince’s room, and you’re going to repay me now.”

  “How?” Tonnis replied nervously.

  “I’m fed up with that Captain Almanian. It’s all his fault. He could have put in a good word for me and the regent would have listened. He only made me a lieutenant, but I shouldn’t have to follow his orders when I was supposed to be his superior by now. I should have been put in charge of this whole operation. I’m sick of him ordering me around like an inferior, and I’m not going to take it any longer. The way he treated me today would have been the last straw anyway, ordering me to my quarters and then docking my pay for what Sethius and the others did. But this letter is just too much.”

  “At least you get paid,” Eleya pointed out. “The rest of us are slaves.”

  “Shut up. That’s not the point.”

  “So what are you going to do? Run away?” Tonnis sounded even more nervous now.

  “Don’t be so stupid. How would that help my position? Anyway, I wouldn’t need your help for that. No. You, my friend, are going to get rid of that villain Almanian for me once and for all, and then I can take his place. It would only make sense for them to promote me, not Lasden, since I’m the one familiar with the palace and all the workers already.”

  Anya’s jaw dropped. “What?” gasped Tonnis, sounding as horrified as she felt.

  “You heard me. Besides, he hasn’t had a chance to send his report about today back to Headquarters yet, so they won’t have anything to blame me for. I’ll be the obvious choice, as long as we do this now.” There was the sound of a cupboard door opening. “What do you have in here that’s poisonous?”

  “Get your hands off our herbs,” Eleya snapped. “This is a clinic, not an assassin’s laboratory. Here we work to save lives, not end them.”

  “Well, you must have something that would do the trick. Like a medicine you’d rub on a wound that isn’t meant to be swallowed? Or maybe two herbs that are harmful when combined?” Anya heard jars rattling together as Talifus rummaged through the cupboard.

  “Even if we had such things, I wouldn’t make poison for you,” Tonnis declared indignantly. “I’m not a murderer, no matter what that man’s done.”

  There was the soft sound of a sword being drawn from its sheath, and she heard Eleya and Tonnis both gasp and step back. “I’m not offering you that choice,” the lieutenant bellowed. “You owe me a favor, Tonnis, and by your life, I’m here to claim it. You will mix me up something poisonous this moment or I’ll run your wife through, and then the little girl and you too. If you don’t believe me, remember how I dealt with those eight today.”

  Anya froze, her knees suddenly weak. For a foolish instant she wanted to run back upstairs, dive into her bed on the sofa, and pull the covers over her head. What was it about being under the covers that had always made her feel safe? But that was silly. If this man came after her to stab her, he could do it right through the thickest blankets. Instead she forced herself to stay where she was, clenching her hands around the railing to keep them from shaking. Scared or not, she had to find out what was going to happen.

  There were two quick footsteps and then a low shriek from Eleya, and Anya jumped, gripping the bannister even more tightly. She wasn’t sure whether to run upstairs or down. Was that brute going to make Eleya his ninth victim here and now?

  “Stop it!” Tonnis shouted, panic in his voice. “Let her go!”

  “Then do as I said,” Talifus bellowed.

  There was a pause, in which Anya’s heart seemed to be beating right in her ears, and finally she heard Tonnis’s footsteps shuffle forward, followed by the clink of jars. “All right, all right,” he mumbled, a note of defeat in his voice. “I’ll put something together. Just don’t hurt her.”

  “Don’t do it, Tonnis,” Eleya exclaimed desperately. “You know what will happen if any more of them come to harm at our hands.”

  “Yes, but the same thing will happen if Tonnis doesn’t do it,” Talifus smirked. “At least this way you all have a chance, right? Who knows, maybe no one will find out who poisoned the captain.”

  “You wouldn’t be talking this way if you hadn’t been drinking, Lieutenant,” Eleya scolded, her voice trembling. “Don’t make a hasty decision like this when you’re not in complete control of your faculties. You’ll regret it later.”

  “I didn’t drink all that much,” the lieutenant snapped back. “Not any more than any reasonable man would have needed in my circumstances. It’s all the Malornians’ fault, anyway. I only really started drinking after they contacted me to arrange about the Invasion. Besides, I know exactly what I’m doing. Almanian’s been asking for this for a long time, the way he treats me. I’ve had enough of it. Hurry up there, doctor; and whatever brew you’re putting together had better work. If it doesn’t, I’ll kill the three of you anyway and tell the Malornians it’s because I found out you were involved this morning after all.”

  “The brew won’t work, because the captain would never be stupid enough to drink it,” Tonnis grumbled over the splash of water into the kettle. “What are you planning to do, just hand him a cup of poison and say, ‘I brought this for you, sir’?”

  “No, you’re going to do that, and you’d better make it believable,” the lieutenant informed him.

  “Me?”

  “One of
you. I don’t care which. Tell him it’s medicine, or a sample of a new kind of wine, or… or something. You’ve got to be convincing, because if he isn’t dead by the end of the evening, the three of you will be. And don’t even think of trying to tell him the truth. He’d never believe you anyway, and I’d just say you wanted to kill him as revenge for the king and queen, and that you were trying to frame me as revenge for my part in it. And for those eight deaths earlier. It all makes sense.”

  He’s right, Anya thought worriedly. But if the captain does drink the poison, someone will find out who brought it to him, and then his soldiers will kill us all anyway. But how could they even get him to drink it? He was sure to make whoever brought it to him taste it.

  “He won’t have any unless I take a sip first,” Tonnis protested, obviously thinking the same thing.

  “Put the cup to your lips and move your throat as though you’re swallowing,” Talifus shot back.

  Will that work? Anya wondered. Will the captain be fooled? She didn’t think so. He always watched so carefully when she tasted his medicine. But if Almanian didn’t drink it, Talifus would kill her and Eleya and Tonnis. It seemed there was no way out.

  But maybe there was. The beginnings of an idea stirred in Anya’s mind. It might not work. It would be dangerous. But anything was dangerous at this point, including doing nothing. And she had an important advantage: Talifus didn’t know that Captain Almanian liked her. At least, Anya hoped the captain liked her. He had been sort of nice to her, anyway.

  Making up her mind, Anya took a deep breath and resolutely hurried the rest of the way down the stairs.

  “Anya!” exclaimed Tonnis in alarm, looking up from where he was spooning ingredients into a wooden cup on the counter. “What are you doing down here?”