Tamriel frowns, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. He bends down and picks up the candelabrum, then places it atop the fireplace’s mantle. His fingers hover an inch away after he releases it, then he shakes his head and straightens, turning toward Mercy. “No,” he says.
“No?”
“I can’t dwell on this anymore. I’m done wracking my brain trying to make up excuses for that pitiful, broken man. All I can do is try to fix his mistakes,” he says. He stares into the fire, the light from the flames turning his olive skin copper. “You’re not here to listen to my whining and my problems. That’s not why I asked you to come.”
He steps closer, and she holds up a hand. “Don’t. Please, Tamriel.”
For every step he takes closer, she steps back, feeling her resolve crack a little more with every inch. Remember your vow. Remember how Lylia tortured you all those years. Remember Calum. Yet how can she focus on anything but the way Tamriel is watching her, his lips curling into a crooked smile, and how her heart races whenever he is near? “Everything we’ve accomplished, we’ve accomplished because of you,” he murmurs. “On Solari, Pilar came looking for you; she spoke to you. You suggested we seal Beggars’ End days before a mob tried to raze the neighborhood. You figured out my father was hiding the cure.” His smile widens. “Because of you, we will save thousands of lives.”
Closer.
Back.
“I wouldn’t give myself that much credit.”
He shakes his head. “You’re extraordinary, Marieve.”
Tamriel places his fingertips under her chin, tilting her head up until their gazes meet. His eyes search hers with a question he doesn’t dare voice, but he reads the answer on her face. She swallows painfully when he cups her cheek, his thumb softly brushing her skin.
Traitor! the voice inside her mind screams.
He leans forward.
She lifts her face in response, her fingers tracing the light stubble along his jaw. When their lips are an inch apart, she closes her eyes and whispers, “We shouldn’t do this.”
He smiles, and his breath tickles her lips when he responds teasingly, “What are you afraid of?”
So much.
When their lips meet again, a jolt goes through Mercy’s entire being. She clutches him to her as his teeth graze her lower lip, and he pushes her back until she’s pressed against the bookshelf, her spine arching with pleasure. The bookshelf digs into her back, but she doesn’t care, hardly notices as his hands trail down her sides and rest on her hips.
Then he shifts, and his fingers brush her back just above the handles of her daggers. Mercy stiffens, reality crashing back into place, and pushes Tamriel away. She darts around him and picks up her cloak from the couch, putting it on and clutching the fabric around her, wishing it could protect her from what just happened.
“What’s wrong?” Tamriel doesn’t move closer, doesn’t reach out for her, just watches with sadness and hurt in his eyes.
Mercy takes a deep breath, raking her fingers through her hair to remove the memory of his touch. She feels unsteady, uprooted. Her vision swims and, when she turns and almost stumbles, she has to catch her balance with the back of the couch before she straightens. “I told you we shouldn’t have done this,” she says, then bolts from the library.
Tamriel watches Marieve’s cloak swish behind her as she runs, twisting around her legs when she pauses to open the heavy door. When the sound of it crashing closed behind her echoes through the empty library, Tamriel leans his head back and stares at the ceiling, running a hand over his face as he groans. What does he think he’s doing? What—What in Creator’s name compels him to act this way around her?
“Shit,” he sighs, dropping has hand back to his side. He bends down to where he’d been sitting and picks up the three books, then stacks them on the table beside the settee, staring down at the top book’s worn cover. A moment later, he shouts in frustration and knocks the books off the table. They crash onto the ground loudly and splay open, several pages bent or torn.
Tamriel sinks onto the corner of the couch, cradles his head in his hands, and closes his eyes.
44
“I told you we shouldn’t have done this.”
Mercy’s words hardly register in Calum’s ears; it takes him a few moments to realize what she has said—and that she hadn’t killed him— and he draws back into the shadows of the bookshelves just before her black-clad silhouette rushes past. She doesn’t notice him, but it’s still instinct to duck out of view after years of nobles kicking him out of every private function. Often, he’d been spotted halfway through and promptly kicked out, but after a while, it had become something of a game between the cousins to see just how long he could hide. As he and Tamriel grew, the game had continued, the stakes raised with increasingly larger wages. Calum would invariably win and collect his earnings with a sly smirk as his younger cousin turned out his pockets of every last aurum. After a while, Calum had refused to accept any more money from Tamriel, but the proud prince still found a way to repay his debts every time—even going so far as to have one of the cooks stick the coins into a slice of Calum’s birthday cake one year, ruining the entire piece.
Calum chuckles soundlessly at the memory of his teeth striking the hard coin mid-bite, the horror which had dawned on him at the thought of having broken a tooth. Seated to his father’s right at the dinner table, Tamriel hadn’t laughed, but his smug grin had been enough to convince Calum they were much too old to play such a game any longer.
Across the library, Tamriel lets out a frustrated bellow and something thumps as it hits the ground. Calum jumps. He stands and peers around the corner of the bookshelf. Tamriel sits slouched on the couch, his back to Calum, the firelight creating him in a gold aura.
Calum pulls his dagger from the sheath on his belt, stepping out of his hiding spot and into the center of the library. His fingers tighten on the smooth leather grip of his dagger. Why couldn’t Mercy have killed Tamriel when she had had the chance? The coward! Where is the vicious, heartless assassin he’d met in the Forest of Flames, the bloodthirsty elf who had wished so much to become a Daughter she had risked death to cheat her way into the Trial?
After all these years, I should’ve known better than to rely on anyone else.
Calum creeps forward. On the couch, the prince lies on his side with his head propped on his arm like a pillow, his eyes shut and legs tucked in close to accommodate their length. His face is calm and relaxed, no trace of its usual sharpness. Calum fidgets with the dagger in his hand, the handle slick in his palm.
One slice, right across the throat.
Now, before he wakes.
Calum steps over the books splayed on the floor, biting his lip as he moves closer. Tamriel shifts and his hand falls over the side of the couch, grasping the air, and Calum pauses, the sound of shattering ice ringing in his ears.
The little prince’s laughter is cut off by a shriek of terror which is ripped from his lips by the whistling, biting wind as the hole opens underneath him. Bluegrass Valley’s frozen lake swallows him.
Calum screams, running, stumbling over the snowdrift and past the young boys who stand petrified by the shore. One boy grabs Calum’s wrist, but he shoves him off without slowing, his eyes locked on his six-year-old cousin’s hand as it bobs once above the water and disappears. He breaks into a sprint, his feet pounding on the ice which threatens to give way underneath him. Tamriel surfaces again, his face pale and eyes wide.
“Calum!” he screams. “Help!”
He’s lost one of his gloves. His fingers scratch at the ice but cannot find a hold, and he screams again as his body is pulled under by the weight of his coat.
“Tam!” Calum cries. He dives onto his stomach as he nears the hole, nearly sliding in as he plunges his hands into the frigid water. His skin prickles as if stung by a thousand needles, and he cries out at the pain.
No no no please Creator please—
He reaches as far
as he can into the water, scrabbling for a hold on something familiar—Tamriel’s hand, maybe, or the hood of his coat. Anything. The water numbs his fingers, but something twines between them. Tamriel’s hair? Calum pulls at it but comes back with nothing but a handful of seaweed. He tosses it aside, a choked sob escaping his frozen lips, and plunges his hands back into the water.
Someone has run out after him and tugs at his boot, shouting to come back, that it’s not safe, that he won’t find him. Calum grunts in response and kicks at the hand around his ankle. He reaches in further, the water up to his shoulder.
Creator please don’t let him die Creator—
His arm strikes something solid. Calum lets out a cry of victory as he recognizes the thick pelt of Tamriel’s jacket and closes his hand around his cousin’s forearm, dragging him up and out of the water. Tamriel coughs and sputters, his eyes going wide, and Calum nearly loses his grip when Tamriel kicks and jerks away in terror. He wraps his arms around Tamriel’s chest and yanks him up, not letting go until he’s pulled him back to the shore.
Calum drops Tamriel and peels off his cousin’s soaked coat, tossing it aside and wrapping his own around his cousin’s shoulders. The prince curls up on his side and vomits dark lake water onto the snow, and Calum sobs with relief when Tamriel reaches behind him and clasps his hand in a vice grip, his hand small and trembling, but strong.
Calum stumbles away from the couch, the clarity of the memory making him weak. “Damn it,” he whispers, then sheathes his dagger. His fingers shake when he lets go and he clenches them into a fist to stop it. He turns and sneaks out of the library, easing the door shut behind him without a sound.
In the hallway, he makes it three steps before he stops and turns back, reaching for the door handle.
Just one slice, and it’ll be done.
“Coward,” he curses himself. “Go back inside and—” He tugs at his hair. Tamriel is innocent—innocent and as close to a brother as Calum has ever had. The king is the one who hired the Assassins to kill his father, the man who had murdered Liselle to keep her toxic ideals from weakening the kingdom. He had done nothing more than his duty, protecting Beltharos when the king was too blind to see the threat she posed. Does his father not deserve to be avenged? For all the pain the king has caused his family, losing his son and his throne seems a fitting punishment.
And yet, does Calum betray the man who had brought him into his home, who had raised him, to avenge the man who had sired him—a man Calum never knew?
Calum takes a deep breath. He pivots on his heel and walks down the stairs to the great hall, then mumbles, “The prince is asleep in the library. Make sure he doesn’t burn the place down,” to the first guard he sees. She nods and begins to run, her footfalls echoing through the empty hall as Calum opens the double doors and walks out into the night.
Something pings on the window.
Elise looks up from her painting, her brows furrowing in confusion. A second later, the sound comes again, and she sighs and places her palette and brush on the stool beside her. Moving to the window, she cups her hands around her eyes and peers out.
“Oh, Creator,” she sighs. She turns and walks into the hall, pausing at the sound of her parents’ voices drifting from her father’s study. If she’s quiet, they won’t hear the whisper of her slippers on the staircase. Liri has already gone home after serving dinner, and Aelyn is likely busy in the kitchen. Biting her lip, Elise tiptoes down the stairs and hurries to the front door.
“Elise?” Elise cringes and turns. Aelyn stands in the archway of the dining room, wiping her hands with a towel. She raises a brow. “Everything okay?”
“Of course. I just need some air.” Upstairs, her mother laughs, and Elise’s eyes dart to the front door. After her outburst the other night at dinner, her parents have been watching her with eyes like a hawk. She hopes Aelyn hasn’t been commanded to do the same.
“Okay, just be careful out there—don’t go near anyone who could be sick. I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me. Would you like some tea when you return?”
“That’d be lovely.”
“Okay, it’ll be ready in a few minutes.” She smiles and walks back into the dining room, then stops and turns back. “Do you think Calum would like some as well?”
Elise nearly chokes. “Aelyn!”
She holds up a hand. “I won’t tell them he’s here, but you must get rid of him. Your father won’t take kindly to him lurking outside. He needs to accept the fact you’re betrothed to someone else.”
Relief sweeps over Elise. “I know. Thank you.”
Satisfied, Aelyn walks away, and Elise waits to leave until she hears the elf humming in the other room. Elise slips outside and pulls the door closed behind her, then rounds the corner of the house. Calum stands just below the window to her studio, one hand full of pebbles and the other poised to throw.
“What are you doing here? You’re not supposed to—” Elise begins, but Calum’s kiss cuts her off. Elise lifts a hand to push him away, but before she can, he pulls back, frowning.
“She didn’t do it.”
“She didn’t—what? Mercy didn’t kill him? Why?”
He shakes his head. “She”—kissed him—“ran away. I tried to do it, to get it over with, but . . . Elise, he’s my cousin. He’s the closest thing I have to a brother—to any real family.”
She frowns. “Your father was your family.”
“I know, but I can’t be the one to kill Ta—” He glances around, then lowers his voice. “I can’t be the one to kill Tamriel. I just . . . can’t do it.”
She sighs and entwines her fingers in his, stroking little circles with her thumb. “I know. I don’t want to hurt Tamriel either, but this was your idea, remember? I love you, but I’m betrothed to someone else.”
“Leon,” Calum spits his name like a curse.
“Yes, and you know I have to marry him—”
“You don’t.”
“Yes,” she says, tightening her grip on his hand, “I do, because no matter what my brother does, they’ll never make him a Cain—not after they found him with Julian.” She levels her gaze at him and he looks away. “Now he’s locked in Beggars’ End, surrounded by people who are sick and dying, and it’s only a matter of time before he—” Her lip trembles and she takes a deep breath. “So it’s my responsibility to care for my family, and I can do that by becoming a Nadra. I can’t marry you, Calum, not if you’re a commoner.”
He hangs his head and slips his hand out of hers. “I know.”
“I have to go before my father notices I’m not in my studio.” She waits a moment, half-expecting him to object and beg for a minute longer. When he says nothing, she turns and begins to walk away, not hiding the hurt on her face.
“Wait—” he says, and she pauses.
“What?”
“Tomorrow night, I need you to go to Blackbriar and escort Mercy to Tamriel’s meeting with the nobles an hour early—tell her he asked for her to come. I’ll speak to that skittish handmaid of hers and have her send a letter back to the Guild saying Mercy’s in trouble. With any luck, they’ll send someone to collect her and complete the contract before his birthday next week, and we won’t have to do a thing. If not . . .”
“It’ll be up to us.”
He nods grimly.
“I understand. Goodnight, Calum.”
“Goodnight, my love.”
45
Tamriel’s eyes fly open when the library doors bang shut a second time. He sits up, rubbing his eyes. “Marieve?” he calls, his hopeful voice echoing through the cavernous room. No response comes. He groans. Look what you’ve done, you idiot. Not for the first time, you’ve made a fool of yourself. He remembers with a flush of embarrassment the look of surprise on her face when he had kissed her, the way she had tensed when his lips had met hers. For a moment, he’d been seized with panic when she hadn’t immediately kissed him back, but it had all vanished a second later when she’d melted in his
arms.
Everything—the fear, the nerves—had come crashing back, had threatened to choke him, when she’d backed out of his embrace and darted from the room.
She hadn’t looked back.
Tamriel shoves the memory away. He stands and piles the ruined, torn books on the table beside the couch, then blows out the flames of the candelabrum sitting on the fireplace’s mantle. He drums his fingers against his thigh as he walks the length of the library and out into the hallway, nearly colliding with a guard who rounds the corner too quickly.
“Forgive me, Your Highness,” she says breathlessly. She wears no helm, but perspiration sparkles on her upper lip and forehead, and she tugs at the neck of her chainmail shirt. “Your cousin sent me to watch over you, Your Highness. He didn’t want you left alone.”
Tamriel squints his tired eyes, and finally her name comes to him—Vela. She’s been in his father’s service for the better half of a decade, loyal to a fault. “How did he know I was in the library?”
“He came to speak to you, I believe. He didn’t say why.”
“He does know I’m a grown man, right? I can take care of myself.”
“Rightly so, Your Highness. Shall I escort you to your chambers?”
“No, thank you.” He starts in the direction of his rooms, then pauses. “The healers in the makeshift infirmary have been working on cures, haven’t they? And they’ve sent samples here for Alyss to test?”
“Yes, but she hasn’t come to collect them in several days. Rumor has it she’s been infected too.”
“Can you take me to where they are being stored?”
The guard bites her lip, then nods. “Follow me if you would, Your Highness.” She starts down the hall and leads him to a room adjacent to the king’s study. As they pass the wide wooden door, Tamriel averts his eyes. His anger over being forced to maim Hero had faded to a dull blaze in the face of the busyness of the past few days, but he hadn’t been able to stomach being in the same room as his father after learning of the king lying about the potential cure.
Born Assassin Saga Box Set Page 39
