Benjmur drew in a breath. “I would agree to certain exceptions.”
“In that case, the meeting will take place at a tavern called the Flask and Fishes.”
~
The carriage driver delivered Johzar to the slave markets, turned the vehicle around, and trundled over the cobbles toward the harbor. Alone with his thoughts, Benjmur scowled at the slaver’s arrogance. A return of slavery? Johzar suffered from the same madness as Sajem, and he knew too much. And Benjmur would never forget or forgive the arrow through Nallea’s back.
Gulls squawked overhead, beating their wings in a battle with the winds. He stared at the whipped-up sea and brooded over his next steps. Johzar numbered only one of his problems. Sajem defied all reason, an unpredictable threat, and one day Benjmur would have to dispose of him too.
The carriage wheels rattled, the springs useless on the lower city’s uneven roads. He called to the driver, directing him uphill to a quaint inn with a public house. The place teetered on the delicate edge between genteel enough for discretion and low enough to accommodate slavers. He alit into the street and instructed the coachman to wait.
The visceral stench of Sajem and his slavers pervaded the taproom like the musk of an animal marking its range. If Benjmur guessed correctly, they’d cleared the other tables of visitors, and not a chit had passed hands for the drink spilled on the floor. Two servers huddled like rabbits at the bar’s far end while the bald slaver paced at the windows, a predator growling to himself. His crew of nearly twenty inked men and women tossed bone dice and drank while casting their leader a smattering of wary glances.
One of the slavers noticed Benjmur. “Sajem, visitor.”
Sajem twisted his muscled bulk, savage eyes blazing. The fractal tattoos on his body and face shattered across his skin like shards of smoky glass. His eyes narrowed and he grinned, a mouth of serrated teeth crimson with blood. Benjmur cringed at the sight. Had the slaver bit someone else or himself?
“Ah, my lord Benjmur Demiris. Come with fresh instructions for your dogs?”
“May we speak in private?” Benjmur asked.
“They can hear you. No one escapes them.” The slaver pointed two fingers at his head, and his eyes shimmied with a wild excitement as he neared. “Kill, kill, kill. It’s getting so they don’t care who. You know how that feels, don’t you? The craving feeds on itself. Effortless.” He twisted his hands as if breaking a neck.
Benjmur stiffened, all eyes awaiting his reaction. “I see you are in no condition for rational conversation.” He turned to leave. The day that dawned free of slavers couldn’t arrive soon enough.
“I wouldn’t walk out without spilling a little gold,” Sajem warned. “I brought the whole crew across the sea for you.”
“Outside,” Benjmur said over his shoulder. He strode into the daylight and distanced himself from the carriage driver’s ears.
Sajem squinted in the sun’s brightness. “One of these days, they’ll convince me to stab a knife through your eye.”
“Your voices?”
“My souls.” Sajem licked a drop of blood welling from a cut on his lip.
Benjmur grimaced. At least the man refrained from dining on his kills. “I shall keep this brief. There’s a meeting tonight, and Danzell plans to attend. I want you to slay her. And while you’re at it, you might kill Johzar before he kills you.”
Sajem’s half-lidded eyes glinted, and he thrust out his bloody lip. “You worried about me?”
“I’m worried about Johzar. I’m worried about the whole lot of them. Kill anyone you choose, Sajem. Let your…souls enjoy themselves.”
“Anyone but you?”
“Anyone but Nallea and me.”
“One gold chit a head?”
“Agreed.” Benjmur raised a finger to the coachman, signaling a moment longer. “Then our business will be concluded forever, and if you should appear on my doorstep again, I shall order you drowned.”
Sajem laughed. “Our business will never be done. You have a fondness for murdering your problems. No different than me.” He grinned. “Now who’s mad?”
Benjmur strode to the carriage without a word. He’d one additional visit to conclude before returning to his rooms and asking his daughter to remain behind.
~
Johzar limped through the slave market’s midday spectacle, an eye out for Belizae in the event she showed up. He hadn’t much hope, but the trade in human lives sometimes entailed overlapping travel until a placement stuck. He chatted with slavers, most known to him, and none had heard of her. She counted one sable-haired woman among hundreds unless they had some unusual reason to remember her. Most likely she’d passed hands without notice.
A fist slammed into the back of his shoulder. He spun, one hand balled into a knot, the other on his hilt. Draeva smirked. “Well, give me a bucket to shit in, Johzar. Gods forbid you’d force me to cross the sea again. I was beginning to think you were avoiding us.”
He dropped his fist and shook his head in warning, though he couldn’t hide a smile at seeing his tall second. Behind Draeva his seven-member crew grinned and chuckled. “I wish you’d found me in Avanoe.”
“We heard rumors,” Draeva said. “A few of Sajem’s crew are ready to mutiny. We got a little chummy with one of them; she said you’d gone back to Tegir. To be honest, it didn’t sound right, you running off without us. So, lucky us…we skipped a chance to eat and drink, hightailed it to the harbor, and boarded the same fucking ship we arrived on.”
“He sold me.”
Draeva’s mouth twisted. “Harsh.”
“When the other choice is death, it’s an easy decision. Needless to say, I’ve yet to kill him.”
She scratched her scalp. “You don’t look like anyone’s slave.”
“Raze bought me and freed me.”
“That’s one man who’s hard to figure out,” she admitted. “I’m surprised he didn’t let you rot.”
“It’s complicated.” Johzar angled his head toward a tavern. “And I’m making up for it. I’m the one person in our little conspiracy with a stockpile of chits I can draw on.”
“An unfortunate consequence of wealth.” Draeva rolled her eyes, walking beside him. “Sajem sold you, huh? Someday, we should give him a taste of his own justice.”
“Sajem is here.” Johzar scanned the market. “He makes a habit of showing up on whatever side of the sea Benjmur is on. The lord just encouraged me to kill him.”
“Then let’s bury him. He, his crew, and all the shit screaming in his head.”
~39~
According to Johzar, the second-floor room of the Flask and Fishes generally served as a meeting place for a ring of Tegir’s most successful smugglers. They shipped oils, spices, and rubies from the Far South, furs and silver overland from points west. The price for an evening’s rent could support the freehold through a winter, and Raze didn’t care. Johzar’s gold paid the price.
Tegir was a foreign world to him, so he’d left it to Danzell and the slaver to approve the site. Danzell he trusted, Johzar less so, but he’d come to accept that the man possessed some sense of justice despite his trade.
Arms folded over his chest, Raze leaned on the wall by the door. The plan worried him. Too many agendas skulked in the corners, those already stretched by too many variables. They grated against Samoth’s cautious nature and left Raze with a lack of confidence he couldn’t shake. Distinguishing allies from enemies was like sorting Lanya’s seeds—too many of them looked the same. Betrayals nipped at his heels, and if he turned around, any number of foes might lurk there, knife in hand.
The space would serve. A single door led into a corridor, and a rear exit spilled onto a rickety staircase. Two windows offered a third means of escape with a survivable drop to an alleyway, though the pile of refuse below them would make for a risky landing. A long table lay in the room’s center beneath several dangling lanterns. No thing of beauty, the surface had been gouged and carved by men and women with id
le time on their hands.
Rydan sat at one end, the Lord of Kestrel demonstrating his authority. His skin appeared less sallow than it had only a morning ago, but each day, Raze saw with greater clarity that the strapping father of his youth would never return. The arrow from a slaver’s bow had left an indelible mark.
“Are you sure you won’t rest?” Raze asked. “Azalus can represent Kestrel, and I will support his decisions.”
Azalus ceased his pacing. “I’d feel better about that as well. If we should need to run from this place…”
Rydan glanced up, a glint in his eye. “Are you suggesting I’m a liability?”
“On the contrary,” Danzell said. “Your wisdom and leadership are too precious to risk.” She rolled her shoulders, limbering up for the battle ahead. Her breastplate and tasset plates wore a coat of indigo enamel, the color of the Tegir Empire. Sword and knife hung ready at her hip.
“You’re too generous with your compliments, lady,” Rydan said and turned his attention to Azalus. “Do you believe Benjmur will betray us with Nallea present?”
“He threw us all in a storeroom in Avanoe,” Azalus replied.
Raze raked a hand through his hair. “It’s not just Benjmur and Kyzan who should concern us. There’s Sajem—let’s assume he knows something about our plans—and Johzar.”
“Johzar won’t betray us,” Danzell said.
“What leaves you so certain?”
“I’ve charmed him.” She canted her head, a corner of her lip tilted up. “And most of all, it’s in his best interest.”
“If you’re wrong, you’re dead,” Raze warned her.
A sequence of raps on the door meant, for better or worse, the evening’s trials had begun.
Azalus unlocked the latch, and Johzar entered. Draeva lurked in the hallway, armed and armored, bow strung. Like his second, Johzar had dressed for war in leather armor, his cloak draped from his shoulder, sword at his hip. “Benjmur and Nallea are on their way. Soldiers are amassing at the palace. Give us as much time as you dare, but don’t wait too long, or they’ll trap you here.” He raised an eyebrow at Danzell. “Let’s go.”
She strode out and didn’t look back, an empress intent on reclaiming her throne.
Raze sighed and regarded his brother and father, the entire Anvrell family in one room awaiting an ambush. His mind whirred like a waterwheel. They might lose again—might lose badly—yet the alternative was to surrender their futures to a lifetime looking over their shoulders, hounded by fear.
Briyon remained largely absent save for a maudlin sentimentality, and Raze burned away those feelings with a deliberate recall of the seething fury that once knotted his fists and ended with his face bloodied. Benjmur and Sajem had destroyed his freehold, murdered his friends, and stolen the woman he loved; all for nothing. Then the fury too, he set aside to harden. The time had arrived for Samoth to assume the lead once again. Time for smooth and steely calculation.
Another knock on the door announced their guests’ arrival. Raze shared a nod with his brother, and they drew their swords. Raze pressed his back to the wall beside the door as Azalus clasped the latch and slowly lifted. He inhaled and yanked, stepping out of range of any sharp edges.
Nallea flinched in the doorway, her surprised eyes crinkling into sheer joy. “Azalus!” She leapt forward, heedless of the poised weapons and the animosity directed at the man behind her. She embraced her husband and kissed him, a sensuous gift of her lips. “I’m so relieved to see you. We’ll put all this behind us soon.” Sword raised awkwardly over her head, he returned the affection.
The flicker of distaste on Benjmur’s face vanished, replaced by a humble nod as if he were a temple monk presiding over the acquisition of a new soul. Except monks didn’t wear ancient daggers at their hips. Raze thumped the door closed behind him.
Benjmur surveyed the occupants, and Raze resisted an urge to smile as the man found himself surrounded by Anvrells. Was that what had elicited his initial grimace? Or was it the kiss? “I expected Lady Danzell,” Benjmur said.
“She’s on her way.” Raze replied. “She preferred to follow you in the event her brother set a trap.”
Benjmur’s eyebrows arched. “Cautiousness will serve her well.”
“Wisdom.” Rydan opened a palm to the chair at the table’s other end, inviting the governor to join him. “Wisdom will serve her.”
“Indeed.” Benjmur accepted the seat.
Azalus guided Nallea to the table where she leaned over to kiss Rydan’s cheek. The elder lord squeezed her hand, his smile full of warmth. She and Azalus settled into chairs facing the door.
Too restless to join them, Raze stood at the window and gazed out over the alleyway. Shadows deepened, what remained of the sun buried in clouds and rolling toward twilight. He leaned his forehead against the pane.
Nallea broke the silence, “I suppose we have air to clear, for which we don’t require Lady Danzell’s presence.”
Benjmur’s face softened as she clasped his hand. “My daughter has convinced me that my loyalties to the Emperor were misguided and ultimately destructive, not only to people whom I should regard as allies but to our lands. The Anvrells have nothing to fear from me in my capacity as Lord of Avanoe or Governor of the Vales.”
“We appreciate the assurance,” Rydan replied. “However, your swing from loyalty to treason strikes me as rather abrupt. Why the change of heart? Why risk the Emperor’s wrath?”
“Kyzan is incompetent and dangerous.” Benjmur leaned back in his chair. “He has no sense of loyalty to anyone but himself. Lady Danzell, as you noted, is gifted with wisdom and a stable mind. She appears more amenable to the desires of the Vales.”
“Have you spoken to her?” Azalus asked.
“Not since my wedding to dear Athren,” Benjmur confessed. “But my daughter assures me of her integrity, and what other choice do we have? Are there other Tegirs I’m unaware of?”
“I didn’t murder Lady Athren,” Raze said, facing the man.
Benjmur straightened his back. “Of that, I am not convinced, but I am willing to accept that I may be mistaken.”
“What do you expect to gain in an arrangement with Lady Danzell?” Rydan gestured to the window, and Raze returned to his watch. They had to call an end to the discussion soon.
“That my station remain unchanged,” Benjmur replied. “I shall retain the governorship in Avanoe. Nothing more.”
Nallea brushed a stray strand of hair from her face. “And an end to bondage of any sort in the Vales. No slavers.”
“Why now?” Raze asked, his attention fixed on the alley. “Why are you in Ezar?”
“Nallea would have traveled without me, otherwise. We intended to find Azalus, which we’ve accomplished, and Bel, which we have not. It pains me that Athren sold her, and I wish to undo that wrong.”
“Sold her to Johzar?” Raze swiveled around and studied the man’s expression.
“A slaver. Those were her words,” Benjmur admitted. “I assumed she meant Johzar.”
Raze narrowed his eyes. An answer for everything. Benjmur was an exceptionally skilled liar.
Azalus rose from the table. “We need to go.”
“Why?” Nallea asked. “Where’s Danzell?”
Raze glanced out the window and slapped a hand on the wall. “Now!” A man in indigo armor peeked around a corner and ducked out of sight. “Soldiers in the back alley.”
Azalus pulled Nallea, still sputtering, to her feet, and Rydan headed for the door. Raze strode toward Benjmur, his sword leading the way. He’d expected treachery, planned it as a means to draw Ezari soldiers from the palace, and yet it fired his blood. “You’ve betrayed us for the last time.”
“Nae!” Nallea wrenched free of Azalus’s grasp and stood between Raze and her father. “What are you talking about? How could he? You never told us our destination.”
“We have to run,” Rydan ordered.
Benjmur held up his hands, backing toward the w
all. “Johzar betrayed you, Lord Raze. He told me where this meeting would take place. I intended to tell you when Danzell arrived. The slaver has played us all.”
Raze glowered at Benjmur. “You told Kyzan.”
“Nae.” Benjmur met his eyes. “It was Johzar spreading the word, or perhaps Kyzan has spied on us since we arrived. Trust me when I swear to you, I wouldn’t risk my daughter.”
“Raze!” Rydan unlatched the door.
“There’s some mistake,” Nallea pleaded, panic welling in her eyes. “My father wouldn’t betray me.”
Azalus grabbed Nallea’s hand and pulled her through the door. Benjmur turned and followed. Alone in the room, Raze faced his father.
“Could our traitor be Johzar?” Rydan asked. “Is Danzell in danger?”
“Nae.” Raze needed to rely on his instincts. Johzar was supposed to inform Benjmur of their location. The question was who had informed Kyzan? And they’d run out of time. “Let’s go.”
Raze strode into the hallway ahead of his father. Azalus halted at the top of the stairs, Nallea and Benjmur crowding behind him. A fight had broken out in the taproom on the first floor. Shouting voices blended with the racket of shattering furniture and glass. In an establishment known for its illegal practices, it seemed everyone assumed they were the focus of the raid.
Sword in hand, Raze jogged forward and joined his brother. “We go now or retreat.”
“I’ll lead.” Azalus started down.
Four soldiers crammed into view at the bottom of the stairwell, and one yelled, “We have them!”
“Azalus!” Raze bellowed. His brother spun and climbed. Raze grabbed Nallea and Benjmur and pushed them ahead of him. “Back to the room.”
Already inside, Rydan wedged a chair against the rear door leading to the alley, but it wouldn’t hold long. Soldiers pounded on the other side. Dust shook from the walls and the frame cracked. Raze smashed a chair and passed a wooden leg to his father to use as a club. “We have to break the windows. We get one chance.”
Legacy of Souls (The Shattered Sea Book 2) Page 24
