Born Assassin Saga Box Set

by Jacqueline Pawl

  “The Kelaya and Ehren families may have been the ones who bribed him. The heads of each estate have had a long-standing rivalry, but a few guards reported seeing them speaking outside Kelaya Zavian’s art gallery in the Plaza several times since we returned from the Islands. Pierce did a little digging into the gallery’s finances and noticed a large withdrawal from its account at the bank, ostensibly to purchase a painting from a private collector, but there hasn’t been a delivery to the gallery in months. He’s looking into Ehren as we speak. We think the money was used to pay Drayce for the attack.”

  “How do you know Ehren wasn’t just looking to buy a painting?” Mercy asks.

  “Ehren Tallis has been blind for the past ten years, and his only relatives live in Bluegrass Valley. He’s not in the market for home furnishings.” Tamriel brushes his knuckles against hers, his expression grim. “They were involved. I’m sure of it. Once Pierce finishes his investigation into Ehren, we’ll root out the snakes in the court, starting with those two.”

  “Good.” Ghyslain nods and rises. “Send for me when the guards bring them in. For now, I have to go make sure my Master of the Guard doesn’t unwittingly hand over my kingdom to that Cirisian witch.” He grumbles to himself as he leaves the room, mumbling something about wishing Master Oliver were here to guide the troops. Cassia and Matthias slip into the council chamber before the doors swing shut behind the king. They immediately drop into low bows before the prince.

  “Your Highness.”

  “Stand, please, and call me Tamriel,” he says, extending a hand for them to shake. Cassia raises her brows, clearly surprised and impressed that he would greet her as an equal, and smiles as she clasps his hand. He turns to Matthias next, who is staring at him with an appraising look. “I’ve been told you’ll stand with us against the nobles.”

  “We’ll do anything for Mercy,” her sister vows.

  “And for Liselle,” Matthias adds as he shakes the prince’s hand.

  Tamriel gestures to the long table in the center of the room, and they sit, Tamriel at the head, Mercy to his right, and her siblings opposite her. When the prince leans forward and props his chin on his hand, his dark eyes roving over Cassia and Matthias, she catches a glimpse of the king he will one day be—handsome, like his father, but that is where the similarities end. He’ll always fear for her safety, she knows, but he’ll risk the nobles’ anger to do what is right for her and the rest of his people—human and elven alike. The light of the candelabrum in the center of the table gilds his black hair, and she has no trouble at all imagining the sparkling diadem which will one day sit atop his head.

  Tamriel straightens, apparently finding whatever he’d been searching for on her siblings’ faces, and runs his fingers over the table at which his father’s courtiers and councilmembers have sat and argued and threatened for so long. “Well,” he says, leaning back and propping an ankle on one knee, “where should we strike first?”

  31

  Calum

  Four days after the attack in Graystone, Drake and Myris are working on training drills with some of the elves they had liberated when a shout rises from somewhere across camp. Drake pauses in the middle of demonstrating a move, a ripple of whispers already working its way through the group of former slaves he’d gathered that morning, and he tosses aside the blunted practice sword. The Cirisians in the surrounding tents peer out at the commotion.

  One of Firesse’s scouts appears at the opposite end of the valley, a small company of elves trailing his horse down the rocky slope of the hill. Calum recognizes the bronze-skinned warrior at the front a second before Drake’s surprise flashes through him. Kaius. His group, alongside Faye’s, were supposed to meet them outside Rockinver tonight for another attack. From the haunted looks on the faces of the soldiers shuffling along behind him—one of them holding a bloodied rag to her arm—something had gone terribly wrong along the way.

  Firesse steps out of her tent, the beads in her braids flashing in the sun as she whirls around, searching for the source of the disturbance. “What’s going—Kaius!” She barrels through the camp and seizes Kaius by his shoulders. Her eyes are wide, her face bloodless, as she scans him for injuries.

  “Take a break,” Drake calls to the slaves he’d been training, and they scatter as he starts across camp toward Firesse and the hunter.

  “They found us in the middle of the night,” Kaius is saying when he approaches, shaking his head. “The Beltharans took out the men on watch before they could so much as scream, then found our camp and killed half my people in their tents. It was chaos. The soldiers were everywhere. We only managed to take down a few before I had to call a retreat.” He glances at the five elves who remain of the group he’d been leading, pain and guilt in his green eyes. “We barely made it out with our lives.”

  Firesse throws her arms around him. “I’m so glad you’re alive.”

  “No one is more glad of that than I,” he responds, and steps out of her embrace. “We need to discuss how this will affect our attack tonight.”

  “You’re right,” Drake cuts in. “We’ll need a new strategy now that ninety percent of your troops are missing.”

  The archer’s expression doesn’t change, but Calum can see the hatred smoldering in his eyes as Firesse agrees and leads them into her tent. The archer has never liked Calum, and it’s obvious he only puts up with Drake for the sake of winning the war.

  After an hour, they emerge with a plan.

  Like Graystone, the fishing village of Rockinver is not protected by walls or gates, spilling over the land in a cluster of stone and wood houses just off the highway to the capital. Unlike Graystone, however, the people of Rockinver are awake, the village alive and thrumming with energy, when Drake and the elves approach from the eastern woods just shy of midnight. They’re celebrating the Bounty Fest—the fishing sector’s version of a harvest festival. If not for the Cirisians currently camped outside their village, Calum knows, the revelry would continue well into the next day.

  Myris’s group slips away from Firesse’s to take up a defensive position along the southern rim of the town, each soldier wielding a razor-sharp dagger or arrows steeped in a poisonous concoction they’d made from a plant they’d stumbled upon that morning. Faye’s group is doing the same in the north. Together, they’ll maintain a perimeter and press inward, forcing the city guards and any soldiers stationed within to fight in the cramped streets among the civilians they’re sworn to protect.

  As they near the village, Calum can hear the laughter and joyous music drifting over from the feast outside the town hall. He and Tamriel had attended one Fest when they were children—way back when Ghyslain still bothered to tour the country over which he ruled—and Drake had had no qualms with digging through Calum’s happy memories of that night to learn about the town’s defenses.

  A dozen men in plate mail are standing guard at the edge of the town’s main road, blades in hand as they stare out into the darkness. Firesse lets out a low whistle, and six of the guards—Cirisians in disguise—immediately shove their swords through the backs of the men in front of them. The elves lift the visors of their helmets and drag the Beltharans’ bodies into the cover of the woods.

  Faye stalks out of the shadows, her ink-black hair and dark leather armor rendering her nearly invisible. “Lucky for you that we encountered those soldiers on the way here,” she says, nodding to the armored elves now sheathing their swords and resuming their post, looking to the world like Beltharan soldiers on watch. “Be careful in there. The king’s soldiers have set up checkpoints around the town square. Half of them are armed and wearing full mail, and the other half are disguised as civilians. I sent the few archers I could spare into the town already. Creator willing, they’re already in position on the rooftops with Kaius’s men, ready to provide cover. Just give the signal”—she raises a hand over her head and clenches her fingers into a fist—“and they’ll shoot.”

  “Thank you, Faye.”


  She dips her head and glances once at Drake, no doubt remembering their last conversation. “I’ll see you at the feast,” she says as she melts back into the night.

  Firesse surveys her soldiers one last time, their blades and leather armor hidden under the cloaks and peasant clothes they’d pilfered on the trek from Graystone. With the colorful face paint hiding their tattoos, the only hint that they are not human are the tips of their pointed ears, tucked away behind artfully pinned braids or low-brimmed hats. She nods, smiling faintly, and murmurs an order in Cirisian—Go.

  Drake and the rest of the soldiers slip out of the forest and begin making their way in twos and threes into the village, stopping every so often to watch the revelers dancing in the streets or to sample a piece of fried fish from one of the merchants’ tables set at every corner. Like the humans, they ooh and aah at the paper lanterns strung from building to building, the soft orbs of light guiding them toward the heart of the village.

  Three Beltharan soldiers in commoners’ clothes wander toward Drake. They had opted for ease of access rather than true disguises; the bulk of their swords is visible through the folds of their lightweight cloaks. He averts his gaze as they near, pretending to watch a young girl with pieces of tinsel braided into her hair dance as her father plays the fiddle. Farther up the street, Drake sees Kenna surreptitiously touch her hair to ensure her elven ears are hidden as another group of soldiers—these ones in mail—cast a wary gaze over the crowd.

  Someone bumps his shoulder.

  “There are more soldiers in the streets than I thought,” Firesse whispers as she passes. He hadn’t even heard her approach. “I sent messengers to Myris’s and Faye’s men to advance their lines sooner than we’d planned. Be at the square in ten minutes.”

  He watches her out of the corner of his eye, and only when she has reached the end of the block does he risk another glance around. As far as he can tell, the houses on either side of him are empty, but it’s likely the guard-commander has posted men cloaked in black in the windows or on the rooftops of the surrounding buildings. The paper lanterns don’t penetrate the darkness enough for him to get a clear view. Below, however, the winding roads and shadowed alleys are crawling with guards and soldiers. Drake can tell by the way they move, the way their eyes linger too long on the faces of the people around them and not on the spectacles of the holiday, that they had been sent to defend the town. No matter. They’d planned for it. Most of the Cirisians who had followed him into Rockinver have already disappeared, and soon Faye’s and Myris’s troops will sweep through, cutting down citizen and guard alike to distract them from the chaos Firesse is going to unleash at the feast.

  Drake trails behind Firesse as she weaves her way toward the square. She grins at everyone she passes, bouncing on her toes with excitement and swaying her hips to the music, the picture of delight. Calum can tell the display is not entirely feigned; growing up in the Islands, she has never seen a celebration aside from Ialathan, and the joy of the revelers they pass is infectious. Her hair is free of its braids and swept up into the high bun favored by the young women of the fishing district, her locks glowing like a crown of flames under the light of the lanterns swaying languidly overhead. She slips around a blind corner, and he nearly slams into her when he follows.

  A huge crowd is gathered in the street. The people around them are shouting over one another, pushing and shoving in an effort to get closer to the town center. They’ve arrived at one of the checkpoints. Drake cranes his neck, and over the sea of heads he spies four soldiers standing in a line in the middle of the block, carefully inspecting every person who steps forward before deciding whether to let them pass. “They’re turning away all the elves,” he tells her as he watches a slave slip back into the crowd.

  A half-dozen Cirisians are clustered among the waiting villagers, glancing nervously at the soldiers and whispering to one another. They’d been ordered to resort to violence if necessary, but they’re outnumbered and trapped in the middle of a human city, Myris’s and Faye’s soldiers too far away to lend aid if this turns into an all-out fight. If the Beltharans realize that the Cirisians have infiltrated their city earlier than Firesse had planned, the elves might very well lose this fight.

  “Get ready to run,” Firesse murmurs. She whispers something under her breath—an incantation.

  At the checkpoint, two of the soldiers stumble, clutching their stomachs. Their faces turn an almost comical shade of green a heartbeat before they double over and vomit onto the cobblestone, eliciting cries of disgust and surprise from their brothers-at-arms. The second their line breaks, the revelers—annoyed and impatient after being kept out of the festivities—surge forward like water through a burst pipe. Drake and Firesse let the current of bodies carry them through the broken checkpoint. From the chaos which erupts on the streets they pass, Calum realizes that Firesse had done the same to each checkpoint around the heart of the town.

  “Clever girl,” Drake murmurs, and she grins up at him, her skin slightly wan from drawing on so much magic.

  “Hold on.” Someone snags Firesse’s arm and yanks her off her feet. Drake whirls in time to see a soldier hauling her back, fighting against the sea of people running past. With his free hand, he smears Firesse’s colorful face paint, revealing her Cirisian tattoos. “I thought you looked familiar, girl. You’re to face trial in the capital.”

  “Unhand her,” Drake growls, his voice so low and vicious that the man actually pauses. A second later, recognition lights up his eyes.

  “You’re the traitor Calum Zend—”

  Firesse twists, shoving the dagger she’d concealed under her tunic into the man’s stomach, and jerks out of his grip, allowing the crowd to carry her back to Drake’s side as he stumbles and falls. Someone shrieks at the sight of the dying soldier, but he and Firesse are already turning the corner into the town square when the soldiers begin shouting, searching for the culprit.

  Tables laden with platters of fish, roasted vegetables, colorful fruits, and hard breads spill out over the stone slab in the heart of the town. The fountain in the center has been covered in strands of silver tinsel which reflect the light of the stars. Music spills through the open windows of the tavern in the middle of the block, ebbing and flowing as the revelers—

  Calum jolts out of darkness, panic consuming his every thought as he struggles to orient himself. Drake and Firesse had just arrived in the town square when that strange blackness had come for him, swift and unforgiving as an icy wind. It has been happening more and more often as the days pass—falling into that strange, featureless void as he does when he uses up too much energy fighting Drake’s presence—but it has never happened so suddenly, so completely. He’d done nothing to provoke it—merely watched through eyes he cannot control as Drake had marched into the square at Firesse’s side.

  One second there, the next gone—to where, he still doesn’t know. All he’s certain of is that the gaps in his consciousness are growing longer and occurring more frequently. One day, he realizes with a jolt of panic, he may not return at all.

  “Look at that,” Firesse breathes, oblivious to the change within him. They’re standing on the rim of the fountain, the eye of the storm. Most of the feast tables lie on their sides, the porcelain platters in shards among the remains of rotted food covering the ground. The fish which had sat in pools of rich gravy now buzz with flies. The skin of the once-ripe fruit is now wrinkled and pitted with spots of green and white mold. One of the silver-blue fish which are unique to this town seems to twitch and flop on the cobblestone as if it’s still alive—although after studying it more closely, Calum realizes the fish isn’t moving at all; the creature’s body is crawling with fat, writhing maggots.

  Firesse’s magic.

  Just like the guards at the checkpoints, every person who had partaken of the feast doubles over and retches, their half-digested food crawling with bugs. Firesse had turned it putrid inside their stomachs, a power he didn’t know she posse
sses. All he’d heard in their planning was that she would use limited quantities of her magic, and that she’d been sneaking out of their camp late at night to conduct whatever barbaric rituals were necessary to rebuild her strength and her magic.

  A few of the villagers stumble and collapse, the vile food poisoning them so thoroughly Calum doubts they’ll last the night. A few yards from him, a little girl hugs her knees close to her chest and rocks back and forth, a waxy pallor to her sun-kissed skin. The sight sends Calum into a rage.

  How can you let her do this to your countrymen? he snarls at his father. To this child?

  I’ll do whatever she asks if it means I get my revenge on the king, Drake responds coolly.

  A complement of soldiers rushes into the square, swords drawn and armor splattered with fresh blood—Cirisian blood. Firesse goes still as death at the sight. Faye, Myris, and their people have made it into the city, then, and taken losses.

  The soldiers gawk at the scene before them. They’d come expecting a fight. Instead, they found the festival they’d tried so hard to protect in shambles—rotting food, violently ill villagers ducking behind the overturned tables for shelter, and a Cirisian girl and human man standing in the middle of it all, smiling. The Beltharans are still gaping when a hail of arrows rains down upon them. Six of the seven crumple to the ground, blood leaking from the holes where the specially-crafted arrowheads had penetrated the weak points of their armor. The last one turns to retreat, but not before Kenna emerges from a dark alley and steps in front of him, a wicked grin gracing her lovely lips. While the soldier is distracted, Farren approaches from behind, scoops up a dead soldier’s sword, and slashes in a wide arc. Blood sprays out of the man’s neck where his head had been connected.

  “Thank you, Kaius,” Firesse whispers, looking up at the archers on the rooftops. Drake turns to her, ready to catch her should she fall like she did on the battlefield outside Fishers’ Cross. Her skin is pale, her gaze distant and dazed, but she does not seem in danger of losing consciousness. He hops down from the wall of the fountain and extends a hand to help her down when a sudden movement in the corner of his eye catches his attention.