by Jayla Jasso
TO SEDUCE AN
ASSASSIN
JAYLA JASSO
To Seduce An Assassin
Copyright © 2017 by Jayla Jasso
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, stored, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or by other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
One
Yavi checked the grappling hook to ensure it was secure before vaulting himself over the windowsill in his room and lowering himself down the smooth stone wall of the palace. A full moon hung low in the sky, illuminating the palace’s tall spires and sleek, white walls. Yavi dropped soundlessly onto the balcony below, retrieved his hook, then hung it over the next balustrade so he could descend another fifty feet to a second balcony.
Their palace was bloody tall, he thought as he landed with a soft oof on the stone floor of the lower balcony. One more long jump down—no rope necessary—and he’d be within a few feet of the stables, where he could slip in, steal Sikar, and be off before anyone noticed the emperor had left the premises. Especially his pest of a brother, who would insist on tagging along if he knew what Yavi was up to.
Sleep, my brother. Keep that lovely wife of yours warm tonight.
Besides, should something go wrong on this little mission, Yavi wanted Yajna to be safe and sound back at the palace so he could go on ruling Nandala in Yavi’s absence. They had come a long way toward restoring peace and stability in Nandala over the past six years, but the famine had not completely broken, and there were still many hungry mouths to feed in their homeland.
Yavi slipped easily past the stable hands and found Sikar’s stall. The muscular black horse snorted softly at Yavi’s approach, nodding his approval at seeing his master dressed for a midnight ride. Yavi quickly saddled him and led him out of the stable by the back gate. He ducked into the shadowed side of the outbuildings, then mounted Sikar and headed past the guards’ quarters to the southern gate of the palace grounds.
The guard on duty at the gate stepped forward in alarm. “Halt! Who goes there with the emperor’s horse?”
Yavi pulled his hood partially aside so the moonlight illuminated his face.
“Emperor!” the guard gasped, kneeling.
“Keep your voice down,” Yavi whispered, covering his face with the hood. “Open the gate.”
The guard rose and did as he was ordered.
“Not a word of this to anyone, Guardsman.”
“Yes, Mahaj.”
Yavi was sometimes annoyed by such formal address, but knew it came from deep respect on the guard’s part. He and Yajna had a fiercely loyal armed guard, and despite tensions over their unexpected deposing of Thakur as well as an abysmal lack of palace funds, they were managing to maintain a small but dedicated army faction based in Darpan as well.
“I’ll be back by dawn.”
“Godspeed, Mahaj.”
Yavi nodded curtly and disappeared into the night.
Ularian Road led east out of Darpan, and Yavi saw it as he crested a hill just beyond the city’s wall. The route was notorious for bandit attacks, since it was the main road from the capital city to Ularia, a large Nandalan fishing port along the Blue River. Yavi paused within the shelter of some trees to survey the road below him in the moonlight, alert for any sign of movement or activity.
An arrow sailed past his nose and landed with a thunk in a nearby tree trunk. Yavi swore and turned to see his grinning brother riding closer, his horse’s hooves crunching lightly in the snow.
“You didn’t think you’d go after that stolen caravan alone, brother?” Yajna chided.
Yavi glared at his twin. “You should be in bed, making love to your wife right now.”
“Already did. Now I’m ready to go hunting with my brother.”
Yavi bit back a retort, unwilling to let his jealousy show so openly. He was truly glad to see his brother happily married and in love. But living in constant close quarters with Yajna and Jiandra’s obvious affection for one another ripped a dagger through Yavi’s lonely soul each and every day. He knew that he and his twin had each gotten what they deserved in love. Yajna had always been cautious and faithful, and had won the heart of a true queen. Yavi had toyed with love, bedded various women of his choosing in his youth, and had ended up causing an innocent young woman to be killed by a jealous sorceress. After Svana’s death he’d sworn never to seduce another woman again, unless Tejeshwar blessed him with a woman like Jiandra.
But who was he kidding? He knew that, beyond his brother’s wife, such a woman didn’t exist.
“Yajna,” he said tiredly, “go home. It’s too dangerous for both of us to risk our lives and leave Nandala without an emperor. If something happens to me, I want you to be there to guide the country to prosperity and peace. Go.”
“No need for that kind of precaution. If something happens to both of us, Jiandra can rule Nandala better than we do anyhow.”
Yavi sighed. His brother had a point.
Yajna guided his horse alongside Yavi’s and surveyed Ularian Road. “That highway is crawling with bandits. Admit it, brother. You’ll need me and my bow.”
“I have a bow, and I can use it almost as well as you.”
Yajna grinned smugly. “Almost, but not quite.”
“Swords are faster anyway. I can slice off the attacker’s head before you can even string one arrow.”
“Arrows kill without me getting anywhere near an attacker, thus keeping me out of sight and ready to take down an entire patrol if necessary before they find me.”
“But when they do find you, you get surrounded, and you’re helpless to fight them off since you can barely swing a sword. So you need me there to protect you as well.”
“I have a sword, and I can swing it almost as well as you.”
“Almost,” Yavi returned coolly, “but not quite.”
Yajna frowned. “We were trained to work together, brother. I’m as eager to track down that missing caravan as you are, and I’m not going back to the palace without you.”
Yavi shook his head, then covered it with his hood. “All right, you stubborn bastard, let’s go then.”
§
Graciella Stovy peeked in the parlor into check on her brother. Elio was sitting at the desk in the corner going over farm ledgers by candlelight.
“Elio.”
He looked up, his blue eyes strained.
“Haven’t you figured out how we’ll pay for the new wine barrels yet? It’s late; you’re exhausted.”
Elio sighed. “Jiandra was so much better at managing the books than I am.”
Graciella pressed her lips together. “I miss her. And Rafe.”
“Me too.”
She swallowed down a painful lump that formed in her throat, then forced a smile. “Well, I’m off to bed. See you in the morning.”
“Good night, sister. I’m spending the day with Solange tomorrow, by the way. I’m expected at the castle by ten. Should be home for dinner.”
“All right. Give the queen my love.”
“I will.”
“Good night.” Graciella climbed the stairs and popped her head into the first bedroom, where their housekeeper, Shirali, was busy brushing through her daughter’s long platinum-blond hair.
Shirali looked up. “You off to bed, Miss Grace?”
“Yes, unless
you need any help with the children.”
“No, Miss, everything is under control here.”
“I’ll bid you good night, then.”
“Good night, Miss.”
Graciella went into her own room and closed the door. She washed up for bed, slipped into her long nightgown, and knelt by the bed to say a prayer. It was a habit from her childhood, something Jiandra had done with her when she was little, after their parents were killed. After the quick prayer, she reached under the bed to retrieve her carved wooden strong box, set it on the mattress, and opened it to count her coin. She’d saved up almost fifty silver from baking bread and selling it in the market square over the years, money she intended to use to buy her own bakery shop someday.
She closed and latched the box, replaced it under the bed, and blew out her candle. Stretching out under the covers, she settled her head into her feather pillow and stared at the swath of moonlight on her bedroom ceiling. She replayed in her head for the millionth time the last time she’d seen Yavi of the Zulfikars.
Yavi, her tall, handsome brother-in-law, her sister’s husband’s twin.
He’d been dressed in wedding attire from Jiandra and Yajna’s wedding, wearing a gray waistcoat over an open-necked white shirt that revealed just a hint of his chest muscles and black leather breeches tucked into tall black boots. Graciella had easily and perfectly memorized his expressions, his gestures, and the lines of his muscular physique because she had stared at him all evening. He was more serious than she’d ever seen him before, a hollow look of weariness etched into his silvery eyes, a grimness set into the line of his sexy lips. Of course, he’d lost his father in the battle with Emperor Thakur only a few months prior and had been hailed alongside Yajna as the new joint-emperor of Nandala. As the elder twin, Yavi was the one who bore the primary responsibility for ruling his suffering, destitute nation, and the heaviness of that responsibility had begun to show.
Graciella knew from Jiandra’s letters and yearly visits to their family farm in Villeleia that progress in rebuilding Nandala had been slow, that the palace’s first few crops had failed, and that Nandala’s wintery curse from the Old Gods had not started to show signs of lifting yet. The twins carried much weight on their shoulders, and though it was obvious they were born to fulfill the role of rulers, still, it was a burden.
Graciella had been bold enough to ask her new brother-in-law to dance the night of the wedding banquet. He had accepted, smiling kindly as one would smile at a child, for she was a child in his eyes, only fourteen at the time. But being near him made her feel like a woman in every fiber of her being; from the moment Jiandra had first brought him to Stovy farm, Graciella’s heart had beat madly for Yavi of the Zulfikars.
Their dance lasted only a few moments. Precious scarce moments with her small, trembling hands held securely in his large, strong ones. When the music ended, he had thanked her and bowed his head, and soon after retired from the banquet hall for the night.
And she had not seen him since. Only his twin, when Yajna accompanied Jiandra to visit the farm.
Graciella sighed and rolled over, fluffing her pillow a bit before sinking her head into it again. Jiandra hadn’t yet answered her most recent letter, in which Graciella had asked, as she always did, how Yajna and Yavi were. Knowing her younger sister’s infatuation all too well, Jiandra usually put in at least a short note specifically about Yavi. He’d been spending a lot of time with his sparring partner, honing his sword-skills. Or he’d been happy, along with his brother and Jiandra, to see the cabbage seedlings emerge in their cabbage fields. Or he and Yajna had been cleaning out and restoring various buildings on the palace grounds. Once Jiandra wrote that she’d caught Yavi practicing climbing on the side of a tower of the White Palace with his grappling hooks, and when she’d scolded him for doing something so dangerous, he’d done a back flip into a swan dive and landed in a haystack on the ground. Jiandra wrote that she’d screamed in alarm as he fell, and that Yavi had laughed a good long while about it. It was rare to hear him laugh like that of late, Jiandra had said.
Graciella pulled her pillow into her arms and hugged it snugly against her breasts, pretending it was Yavi she was holding and comforting. She was no longer the awkward fourteen-year-old he once knew; she had turned twenty in March. When she saw her brother-in-law again, it would be as a grown-up, and she intended to make sure he noticed she wasn’t a child anymore.
Imagining that meeting, a smile curved her lips, and she drifted off to sleep.
§
Two black-cloaked, hooded figures rode hard into the night along Ularian Road, stopping after a couple of hours to rest and water the horses by a creek, and then setting off again. They reached the site of the caravan attack within another hour, finding it just as their escaped guard had described: three palace guards dead, a few heads of the cabbage and other vegetables they’d packed strewn here and there amongst the patches of snow, and no sign of the carts or horses.
Yavi’s blood boiled as he surveyed the wasted food. Produce they had worked so hard to grow, had invested so much time and coin in. Here it was, carelessly flung along the roadside while families in Ularia were starving, waiting for that caravan to arrive.
Behind him, Yajna muttered an oath in Nandalan. “Shall we gather up what we can salvage here, brother? Pack it onto our horses and carry it into town?”
“No. The trail of those thieves is getting colder by the minute.” Yavi let himself down from Sikar’s back to look around, examine the wheel tracks and hoof prints. “They left the road, headed off to the north through these trees, took the wagons with them. We can move much faster than they can with those carts over the wooded terrain.”
“Let’s go, then.” Yajna guided his horse off the road, toward the trees.
Yavi mounted Sikar and followed him. They found a path of sorts through the woods and urged their horses into a gallop, flying through the darkened trees with only slivers of moonlight to light their way. After a while the trees opened up into a meadow, and they followed the cart tracks in the half-melted snow for another mile or two, until they came to another forest thick with trees. As they made their way through it, they caught sight of the faint glow of firelight ahead, and the brothers halted their horses in the dark shelter of the forest.
Yavi slipped silently to the ground, and Yajna followed suit. They tied the horses to some low-hanging branches and moved quietly through the trees until they saw the bandits’ camp just ahead, in a small clearing. There was a campfire glowing in the center, with a couple of tents pitched around the perimeter and the palace’s still-loaded carts and horses standing nearby.
There looked to be about eight men total at the campsite—five sitting around the fire, two others rifling through the contents of the carts, and one leaning against a tree trunk off to the side, some distance from the others. He was the only one who was alert for intruders. Yavi made eye contact with his brother, who nodded and strung his first arrow.
The arrow sliced through the air, struck the bandit who stood off by himself in the throat, cutting off his airway and ability to warn the others. He stiffened, then crumpled to the ground near the tree he’d been leaning on.
Two more arrows flew, hitting each of the two thieves in the back who were rummaging through the carts. The men sitting around the fire jumped to their feet, drawing their daggers. One of them rushed toward his horse, but Yajna took him out on the way with a fourth arrow.
Yavi drew his scimitars and rushed in for the attack, leaping into the air while swinging the blades in a double spiral that sliced the throats of two of the bandits who stood by the fire. Yavi’s hood fell back when he landed, and the remaining three men gaped at him.
“It’s one of the emperors!” a bandit gasped, backing up.
Another bandit turned to run. An arrow stopped him midflight, and he fell to the ground.
Yavi grabbed the nearest bandit by the throat, forcing him back a bit on his tiptoes. “I sent a caravan of food
and supplies to help my people in Ularia, and you vermin—” he tightened his grip and pressed a dagger to the underside of the man’s jaw, “—slaughtered my guards and stole it? If you were hungry, all you had to do was send word to the palace for food and supplies. We would have shared what we could.”
“Sire…we…just work for Uman,” the man choked, holding onto Yavi’s wrist with both hands.
“Who’s Uman?”
“Our leader. I think you killed him. He was standing over there by the trees.”
Yavi glanced back to where the first man had fallen with Yajna’s arrow in his throat, and then addressed the bandit near the carts, who stood frozen with his hands in the air. “You. Re-hitch the carts to the horses. Move, or my brother’s arrow will find its mark.”
The nervous fellow hurried to do as requested.
Yavi released the man he’d been holding. “You and your friend here have two choices. You either help us drive our carts to Ularia, or we hang your carcasses on these trees for the birds to find.”
“We’ll drive,” the bandit responded.
Yavi pointed a finger of warning in his face. “Just so we’re clear, you go as our prisoners. If you try to escape on the way, we’ll execute you ourselves on the spot. And when we get to Ularia, you’ll be turned over to the local authorities. If you don’t care for that arrangement, we can fight it out here and now.”
“We’ll drive your carts, Sire.” The man held up his hands. “You’ll get no further resistance from us.”
The other man had finished hitching the carts and bowed low. “At your service, Mahaj.”
Yajna emerged from the trees, and Yavi gave orders to the prisoners. “Get on those carts, and let’s get going.”
§
When the Zulfikar twins were completely out of sight, Uman’s body lifted itself off the ground awkwardly, as if pulled up by invisible strings, and stood itself on its feet. His eyes popped open, having become solid dark gray disks, as his pale face twisted into an unearthly grimace. He grasped the arrow that was lodged deeply into his throat with both hands and yanked it out, dark crimson blood seeping from the wound.
