Born Assassin Saga Box Set

by Jacqueline Pawl

  Mercy’s head feels foggy, stuffed with cotton, yet the name on the papers she’d found comes back with startling clarity. “Drake Zendais—he was the queen’s brother. So you’re Calum Vanos—”

  “—Zendais,” he finishes. “Vanos was my mother’s maiden name. I use it when I travel. A little less conspicuous, don’t you think?”

  “The contract is fake, isn’t it?”

  Calum doesn’t respond. He stands and unties Mercy’s wrists and ankle, then crosses to the ottoman and picks up the bottle of wine. He pries it open with one of Mercy’s knives and takes a drink straight from the bottle, then holds it out to her. “I’ll explain everything if you can make it all the way over here. If not, feel free to rest, take a nap, build your strength back up. I won’t hurt you.”

  “I find that extraordinarily hard to believe.”

  “Whether you believe it or not, it’s true.” He settles onto one of the cushions and pours wine into one of the goblets, which he extends to her with a raised brow. “You’ve already ruined my plans for the night—I might as well see this through.”

  When her expression doesn’t change, he lets out an exasperated sigh. “I’ve invested too much in you to kill you, Mercy. And although you won’t admit it, you’re not nearly as strong as you pretend to be. You wouldn’t be able to stop me if I changed my mind,” he says. “Luckily for you, you’re still in my good graces. However, I’m certain I can come up with plenty of ways to make you do what I want without killing you, should you choose to make this difficult.” The entire time he speaks, his expression does not waver from his pleasant smile, yet Mercy does not underestimate his sincerity. His effortless charm is what caused her to trust him in the first place, and it is not lacking now.

  Mercy rises slowly, feeling the tendons in her neck strain as she lifts her head, then her back vertebra by vertebra. A thick bandage is wrapped around her head to stop the bleeding, but it does nothing for the pounding headache, the simultaneous feelings of lightheadedness and leaden extremities. Fully upright, she swings her legs over the side of the mattress until her bare feet brush the cold stone. Only then does she realize that she is no longer wearing her Solari gown, clad only in the gold leotard she had worn underneath. Her bare legs prickle with goosebumps.

  “Your blood ruined the dress,” Calum says as she frowns down at her exposed skin. “I had a slave bring something from storage, so it might not fit. It’s over there.” He waves to the wardrobe across the room. “You might want to wait until you’re more steady to dress, though.”

  “I’m fine.” Mercy stands and takes a step, and the world seems to slide out from under her. Her legs almost give out and she clutches the bedpost. She lets out an involuntary groan.

  “Lie down, Mercy.”

  She shakes her head. “When I make it over there, I am going to flay you alive.”

  Calum’s chuckle is the only response.

  One step at a time, Mercy shuffles away from the bed and half sits, half falls onto the cushion opposite Calum. It’s only a few feet from the bed, but in her pain-filled haze it had felt like swimming through syrup. Calum offers her the glass of wine and she drinks the contents in a single gulp, soothing her dry throat. He fills the goblet again, and his own, and they drink in silence. After a few minutes, the throbbing in her head lessens and a warmth emanates from her stomach as the alcohol courses through her veins.

  “Drake Zendais was my father,” Calum finally says. “When I was two, Ghyslain had him killed by one of Illynor’s assassins because of Drake’s involvement with Liselle’s murder. The assassin who murdered my father snuck into our house in the dead of night and stabbed him in the heart with a letter opener. She left him in his study, lying in a pool of his own blood, for one of his slaves to find.

  “My family wasn’t nobility, but my father and grandfather supported the Myrellis line and had worked closely with King Alaric before his heart attack and Ghyslain’s ascension. They were loyal and had grown wealthy buying and selling valuable art, and that’s part of the reason why Ghyslain and Elisora’s betrothal had been supported by the nobility.”

  “Why are you telling me this?” Mercy crosses her arms and frowns at Calum.

  “How much do you know about your parents, Mercy?”

  “You know exactly how much I know.”

  “My father’s second wife was unable to have children, and he had divorced his first wife before she could give him children. So, to continue his bloodline, he raped one of his slaves so she could bear him a bastard child he and his wife could pretend was legitimate. That slave was your mother, Mercy.”

  She freezes. “No.”

  “Your mother and father had been slaves of my father for five years. They were married at the time. Drake Zendais raped her and she gave birth to me,” he says calmly. “A few years later, she and your father had you, then fled after Llorin killed Drake. Your father was the slave who found her standing over his body, and your father gave you to the Guild so that he and your mother could escape—”

  “Don’t lie to me, damn you—” She jumps to her feet and staggers, and Calum extends a hand to steady her. She jerks away as if burned.

  “Mercy,” he says. “A child between a human and an elf is born human. You know that. Affairs like those are not at all uncommon among the nobility; there are more elf-blooded bastards in Sandori than anywhere else in the country.”

  “How could you possibly know? When you arrived in the Keep, how did you know it was me?”

  “Several of my father’s former slaves still work in the city. They’ll tell almost anything for the right price.”

  Mercy clenches her fists as she searches Calum’s face for . . . for anything. Anything but the blatant honesty shining in his eyes. He wears no guard over his emotions, nothing to hide the way he stares at her, watching her process this information.

  “What do you want me to do now, Calum? What do you want? Some heartfelt family reunion?” she finally says. “I have no reason to believe a single word you say.”

  “You’re right, you don’t. I’ll bet you’ve heard talk about me, though; the nobles like to gossip.” He stands and opens the wardrobe, pulling out a carefully folded dress. When he hands it to her, she recoils, and he does not fail to notice. “Ghyslain took me in when I was two, and Tamriel and I were raised and tutored together. Last year, I joined the Strykers under our mother’s name and used the opportunity the travel provided to collect on debts owed to my father from his clients. With that and what he had stored in banks across the sea, I’ve amassed a small fortune. Nothing like what we had before when the estate was lost to the crown when Ghyslain became my guardian.

  “So, what do I want, Mercy? I want the prince dead,” he says. “I want the prince dead, and I want the king to appear complicit, so the nobles will be clamoring to remove him from power. There will be no one left to rule, and the city will be thrust into chaos. Everyone will be vying for the throne. Now, my claim is only through marriage, true, but with my castle upbringing and my position in the guard, I’m a better choice than some stuffy nobleman’s son. The council will no doubt agree.”

  “The contract’s void,” Mercy says. Her head swims and the wine has turned sour in the back of her throat. “That’s not Ghyslain’s signature, it’s a forgery.”

  “The only people who know that are in this room, Sis.” He bares his teeth in a smile eerily similar to her own. “And you won’t tell a soul, because I know you’re going to go through with it.”

  “Oh, you do?”

  “I do. Because if you don’t, you’ll return to the Guild a failure. A laughingstock, just like you’ve always been. I know how much you want to be a Daughter, how much you hunger for Mother Illynor’s approval—I saw it in your eyes when we met. You tell them it’s a fake and you’ll be back where you were two weeks ago, bullied, ignored, underappreciated—just like when you were an apprentice. Is that who you want to be, Mercy? Do you want to return to that life?” His eyes gleam wicke
dly. “Complete the contract, and no one’s the wiser. You’re a Daughter—not any Daughter, but the Daughter who murdered the prince. Can you picture the envy on Lylia’s face? And Faye? She might even forgive you for the stunt you pulled in the Trial. With me on the throne, the Guild will want for nothing. There will be nothing I cannot provide for you.”

  As he speaks, Mercy begins to tremble. Her desire to be a Daughter has started her heart beating fast, until she can feel it throbbing in the back of her skull. One phony contract stands between her and the life she’s been training seventeen years to attain, and here is the chance to outshine the apprentices who had picked on her and pinched her ears as she had grown up. She remembers the terror she had felt when Tanni and Sienna had walked her to what should have been her execution, the way the rope had cut her wrists as she knelt before Mother Illynor in the clearing. She remembers Lylia’s hand on her shoulder as they stood atop the wall in the middle of the night, and Lylia’s voice as she threatened to shove Mercy off the ledge. She remembers Faye’s screams as she threw a plate at her head.

  “Yes,” she says. “I’ll do it.”

  31

  Calum dismisses his guards before he allows Mercy to leave. While he’s outside, she slips into the dress he’d given her and finds her shoes tucked under the bed. She can’t resist searching the nightstand and desk for her knives, even though she knows they won’t be in there; Calum isn’t that stupid. When he returns, he finds Mercy elbow-deep in the wardrobe, silks and velvets tossed over her shoulder.

  He leans against the closed door and crosses his arms over his chest, smirking. “Looking for something, love?”

  She shoots him a dirty look. “Don’t call me that.”

  He smiles. “If I heard correctly, His Highness is on his way to the council room at this very moment. You’d better hurry.”

  “I can’t do anything now, Calum. They’d kill me on sight.”

  He rolls his eyes. “Yes, I understand that.” He crosses the room and lifts the clothes from her shoulder, reaching over her head to place them on the highest shelf of the wardrobe. She turns around and glares at him. “But something is going on with this mysterious disease, and I’d like to hear what they plan to do about it. I may be the king’s nephew, but His Majesty is too paranoid to allow me a seat on the small council. He thinks the power would go to my head. Imagine that.” He plucks the bandage off Mercy’s head, and she rubs the sore spot at the back of her skull, where a large, tender bump protrudes. He frowns. “Don’t worry about that. Your hair covers it. Now go.”

  He places a hand on her lower back and pushes her to the door. Just before she reaches for the doorknob, he catches her arm and places one of the knives in her hand. “Hide this well,” he says, then shoves her out of the room.

  Three feet.

  Tamriel is close enough to touch, standing in the doorway of the small council room with his arms crossed over his chest. His clothes—the same ones he’d worn since the celebration—are rumpled and a dagger gleams on his hip. A heavy black cloak hangs from his shoulders; he hadn’t bothered to take it off when he returned to the castle.

  His face is stark white.

  “Three hundred,” he breathes, and the room goes silent.

  “What did you say?” Landers asks, blood draining from his face.

  “Three hundred infected, at least. We found two dozen hiding in the Church in the market district, and I have soldiers guarding it now to make sure no one enters or exits,” he says. “At minimum, there are two hundred infected in Beggars’ End; the soldiers arrived to seal the gates before we could make a complete count.”

  “They looked like Pilar?” Mercy says. “I was there two days ago, and I didn’t see—” She bites off the rest of the sentence, remembering the body she and Elise had seen in Beggars’ End. Her gaze drifts to Seren Pierce, who has slumped into one of the chairs at the long table, eyes glassy as he stares at nothing. Everyone else is oblivious, gaping at her.

  “You went into Beggars’ End?”

  “Voluntarily?”

  “Oh, no,” Mercy says, ignoring their horrified expressions. “Atlas.”

  Almost imperceptibly, Seren Pierce nods. He suddenly looks decades older than his forty-odd years, wrinkles creasing his skin. “Atlas.”

  Mercy turns to Tamriel. “Did all the soldiers stationed in Beggars’ End make it out before the gates were sealed?”

  He thinks for a moment, then slowly shakes his head. “I’m not certain; so much was happening.” He glances at Seren Pierce, sympathy on his face. “It is entirely possible not everyone made it out in time, but we will do everything we can to help those inside.”

  Seren Pierce drops his head in his hands.

  “Okay—Okay, so we set up a hospital for them in the fields outside of the city,” Leon pipes up. “That can hold the people in the Church and as many from the End as we can fit. The rest will have to stay in Beggars’ End until we have more room for them, when the patients recover or, uh, or . . .” he trails off and clears his throat. “When there are empty cots for them.”

  “There’s too much of a chance of them infecting other citizens in the transport. We must quarantine the End.” Ghyslain, who has heretofore sat silent and grim-faced, stands. He takes a deep breath and rests his hands on the back of his chair, but not before Mercy notices how severely they tremble. Of all the people in the room, Ghyslain is the most devastated. When he glances up, the emotion in his eyes causes Mercy’s breath to catch in her throat:

  Agony.

  Despair.

  Acceptance.

  Acceptance?

  His gaze fixes on Mercy’s.

  “Seize her,” he says to the guards flanking either side of the door. They spring into motion, but before they can grab her, he yells, “Don’t touch her skin!”

  “Don’t you dare—” Mercy steps back, a hand automatically reaching for the knife she’d tucked into the sash waistband of her dress, then stops. Best not to let them know she’s armed.

  Tamriel cries out in surprise and reaches for her, but one of the guards elbows him out of the way before clasping a hand on Mercy’s arm, careful to catch her sleeve. Tamriel’s face contorts in anger and he marches forward, but Landers snags his cloak and pulls him back. The prince shouts objections as the two guards pin Mercy’s arms behind her back. She bristles.

  “Father!” he yells.

  Ghyslain ignores him, and the torture the king feels is written across his face. His shoulders slump and he raps his knuckles against the table; for a brief second, it is the only sound in the room. He looks defeated.

  Tamriel’s expression shifts from anger to alarm. “Father?”

  “Quarantine her in the infirmary. If it is true that the sickness in Beggars’ End manifests in two days, we shall soon see whether the priestess’s touch has infected Lady Marieve. I pray it has not, but I cannot have her free to roam the city and take the chance she may spread the disease,” he responds, then turns to the guards. “Take her down.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty.”

  “Are you not going to have them take me?” Tamriel asks. “Pilar touched me, too.”

  “Fieldings’ Blisters is transferred through touch. She did not touch your skin. Your place is here. Guards, escort her out. Now.”

  One of the guards pushes her toward the door and chuckles when Mercy trips over her feet. His hand is clamped tightly enough around her arm to inflict a bruise, and she shoots him a glare as the other guard steadies her. “Watch your step, elf.”

  “Hold your tongue, Raiden,” Tamriel snaps. “She is a guest.”

  “Tamriel!” Ghyslain says. “Calm yourself or leave.”

  Tamriel’s jaw works. He shrugs off Landers’s hand from his shoulder and straightens his cloak. Without hesitation, he pivots on his heel and strides past Mercy and the guards, not slowing as he says, “I will escort you to the infirmary, Lady Marieve. Raiden, you lay another hand on her, and I’ll break your nose.”

  Ra
iden’s hand drops from her arm. “Yes, Your Highness.”

  He continues down the hall, Mercy and the guards trailing after him. When Mercy glances back, the king’s gaze is focused on the retreating form of his son. Everyone else mills around the table in awkward silence.

  Tamriel leads them around the corner and down the stairs to the great hall, the heels of his boots tapping on the stone floor. Every slave they encounter lowers his head and skitters out of their way.

  It probably has something to do with the murderous expression on the prince’s face.

  Before they reach the stairs down to the infirmary, Tamriel stops and turns so quickly Mercy and the guards nearly plow into him. He pulls his arm back and punches Raiden in the face, his fist connecting with a loud crunch. The other guard shouts and pulls Mercy back as Raiden groans and stumbles backward, his hands flying to his face. Within seconds, his fingers are coated in blood.

  “What the hell! I didn’t touch her!” he cries.

  When Tamriel pins him with a glare, he stiffens. “I trust you will remember to treat our guests with more respect next time.”

  “O-Of course.”

  “If you ever speak to, touch, or even look at Lady Marieve without her express permission, I will have your head. Do you understand me?”

  “I-I do, Your Highness.”

  “Then get out of my sight.”

  Raiden hesitates, and his gaze turns to Mercy, searching for pity. She narrows her eyes and offers none. Raiden nods, bows to the prince, then tucks his tail and runs, muttering an apology to Mercy as he passes. Tamriel sighs and says to the other guard, “Go after him. Patch up his nose, then tell him he’s on duty guarding Beggars’ End for the rest of the day, effective immediately. I don’t want to see him within these walls.”

  “Yes, Your Highness.” The guard bows and runs after Raiden, leaving Mercy and Tamriel alone.

  The prince flexes his hand and frowns at the purple bruises blossoming across his knuckles. “I forgot how much it hurts to punch someone. It’s not as easy as they always make it sound, is it?”