The Pirate's Lady

by Julia Knight

  Van Gast didn’t turn to look, or raise the gun, despite what his muscles tried, what the silver pulse of pain told him. Sweat coursed down his face, soaked him, stuck him to the stucco wall. “Josie.”

  Rillen pursed his lips in irritation. “Will be free, just so long as you shoot him. Now.”

  Van Gast didn’t believe him, but he had no choice. He had to take the chance. Rillen slipped back so that he couldn’t be seen through the arch, and took Ilsa with him. When Van Gast looked, Rillen was kissing her, whispering into her ear with a sly, happy, vicious look. Her look at him was no better.

  Oh, Holden, you poor bastard.

  The bond on his arm seemed to raise his wrist without his thought, lifted the gun, set his finger on the trigger. Through the beads, Van Gast could make out a commotion along a corridor—some guards, what looked like a trader or two, and there, that must be the one. A fat man in gilded robes, looking flushed and drunk and angry.

  “How!” the fat man shouted. “How in Kyr’s name could racks break into my strong room? They were in the cells, and it’s your job to keep them there.”

  A low murmur from one of the guards—one of Rillen’s men, who Van Gast recognized from earlier.

  The fat man stopped dead and turned on him. “I don’t care what they say about Van Gast, my cells should hold him.”

  Muttering to himself, the fat man came on, ponderous and weaving, the armpits of his robe sweat-dark. The bond tightened on Van Gast’s wrist, squeezed his bones, his head, with what he was supposed to do.

  If he shot this man, he’d be dead in hours, hung on Oku’s wall with a nail through his wrist and left to roast in the sun. He had no doubt—Rillen was using him for just that purpose, to take the blame for this death. If Van Gast didn’t shoot, he’d be dead soon enough at the rate the poison of being bonded unwilling, of fighting it, crawled along him arm, arrowed for his heart. Even shooting Rillen, tempting as it was, would bring no relief. Van Gast knew that much about the bond—the one who put it on had to take it off, or die, and the mage was who-knew-where. Too smart to hang around, especially given how his old master had ended, shot by his own bondsman.

  Van Gast was a dead man. Again that phrase rattled around, trying to find a home. He shook his head—he needed to be thinking clearly, but he couldn’t, not with the iron will that held him, seemed to crush the soul out of him.

  Two choices. Fight or not. End result would be the same. In which case, might as well be stupid and go out in a blast. At least he could still call his soul his own. He shut his eyes for the closest he ever got to a prayer.

  Kyr, show me some mercy now. Remember, I put that devotional back rather than steal it.

  Odd, how he could swear he heard the sound of bells then. Maybe Kyr was agreeing. Maybe she wasn’t. Didn’t matter.

  His hand tightened on the butt of the gun as the fat man approached his hideaway. With teeth clenched so tight they squeaked, Van Gast dragged the gun away from the curtain of beads, inch by painful inch, and pointed it at Rillen. His hand shook hard enough that the barrel of the gun seemed blurred, and he steadied it with his other hand and with the last ounce of strength he had left. The black lines wriggled past his elbow, burning as they went.

  “No.” Rillen pushed Ilsa behind him. “No, you can’t fight it. You have to obey Bissan and he said obey me. Obey me.”

  All Van Gast had to do was pull the trigger, and still he’d be dead. The jingle of bells came again, closer this time. He shook his head—he had no time for hearing things that weren’t there. All he had to do was pull the trigger, but the strength was gone from his hands, from his arms, replaced by pain, a silver throbbing agony that crumpled him to his knees. Still, the gun was pointed at Rillen. Close enough, anyway.

  The beads rattled behind him, but Van Gast couldn’t be swayed, he wouldn’t be. If he killed Rillen, set all his guards into disarray, then maybe, just maybe, Josie had a chance.

  “What the—”

  The fat man’s voice, petulant and confused. A heavy weight hit Van Gast’s back and sent him crashing to the floor. He squeezed off the shot as he fell, but the bullet went wide, skittered off the wall in a shower of plaster and dropped to the tiles. Van Gast watched it as he lay, the weight crushing him, the tiles cool under his feverish face.

  Bells—he could hear bells again, sweet discordance, a sound he always associated with the sea, with wide skies and a fair wind and the world to do with as he wanted. That all seemed impossibly distant now. Feet moved around him, guards’ boots, a pair of slippered feet under gilded robes.

  Shouts—he couldn’t hear what they were saying, all mingled together so that it was hard to tell one voice from another over the throb in his head. The stomp of more guards, and bells. Still bells, faint, as though Kyr was taunting him but didn’t want anyone else to hear. Another shot in the hubbub, and a gun fell by Van Gast’s hand, smoke gathering around the muzzle. A body fell—the man in the robes, that fat man, his florid face slack now, and a neat hole in his forehead between staring eyes.

  Rough hands grabbed him up from the floor. Rillen shook him, his face twisted with indignant rage, but he couldn’t hide the flat-eyed glee, not from Van Gast.

  Van Gast tried not to see over his shoulder, tried not to know, because they’d take him before the mage, were bound to, and a mage could see inside the head of a bonded man, so they said. So he tried to ignore the faint bells, tried not to have seen Skrymir’s broad, worried face, or the flap of Holden’s shirt as they darted away, unnoticed in the hubbub. Tried to be grateful that Josie wasn’t in Rillen’s hands anymore, and that this gave her more time, perhaps. Time to get away, sail out of Estovan and never come back.

  * * *

  Rillen grabbed up Van Gast from the floor and shook him. “We have our man. I say we hang him from Oku’s wall.”

  Van Gast’s head lolled back for a moment, his eyes fixed on something far away. Yet then he stood straighter and fixed Rillen with a leery, cocksure grin that had Rillen itching to throttle him.

  “I wish you would,” Van Gast said. “I’ve never been to a hanging before.”

  Rillen thrust him into the waiting arms of the guards before he did something he’d regret. How dare Van Gast try to fuck up his beautiful plan? Calm. Be calm. He could get away with this, still blame it on Van Gast.

  “Sergeant!”

  His man-at-arms hurried back through the curtain, wiping his sword free of blood. “Sir.”

  “Well?”

  The sergeant allowed himself a tight smile, satisfied at a tricky job done neatly. “Sad to say, sir, the two councilors ran straight into the rest of the racks.”

  “Very sad, sergeant. I’m sure you did your best.”

  The sergeant slid away his sword. “Oh yes, sir. I even found one of their bells, you see?” He held up a single silver bell, and peered down at Van Gast’s leg. “Ah, look, his bells are one short. It’s truly shocking what these racks will do for money, sir. And shocking the way he chopped up those poor, innocent councilors.”

  Don’t take it too far, man. Rillen turned to his father’s guards. His now, or they would be just as soon as the formalities were over.

  “I think we’ve got proof enough, don’t you? Set all the guards you can find to seal the palace, try to catch the rest of them, and what they stole. Let me have a few moments with my father before you have him laid out with all the pomp we can muster.”

  The palace guard captain hesitated, but only a fraction. Rillen’s men outnumbered him and his men, two to one. His patron was dead, and in the melee no one had seen Rillen grab his gun and shoot. The wind was blowing only one way, and the captain could smell it. “Yes, sir.”

  They left, one set of guards taking a grinning and entirely too confident Van Gast back to the cells. Only Rillen and Ilsa remained, and the body of his father.

  Yet Rillen felt no relief at the death, no thrill of victory, no sense of revenge earned. Only more hatred welling up, from nowhere it seemed. A p
art of him so long, he couldn’t now get rid of it. Hatred, plans, and a lot of money that used to be someone else’s.

  Ilsa caught his eye and cocked her head. No innocence now. No naiveté. He might have missed it, except for how she’d embraced his plans, and him. How she’d come to life in their shared hatred, her mind sifting and sorting. Thinking, as he did. A true match.

  “The mage,” she said with a curving sneer. “How sure are you of him? Do you trust him? He might still betray you.”

  “I don’t trust anyone. Not even you.”

  “In that case, do you want to know the best way to kill one? Or shall we find a way to control him, before he controls you? Because he will try. Remorian mages always want control.”

  Oh, my little laceflower, I love you. Rillen kissed her soundly, loving the way her eyes lit up, the way she seemed to come alive at his touch.

  “Well, then,” he said at last. “Let’s go and find our mage. And seal my place as the new Yelen. No council now. Just me. And you.”

  * * *

  Holden and Skrymir ran back to where they’d forced Josie to wait with Tallia and Haban, impatience in every twitch of the sword in her hand, in every jingle of bells when she tapped her feet.

  “Well?” One eyebrow arched, trying for confidence, her sharp words that covered everything, almost. She was too brittle and Holden could see through the cracks to her terror.

  Skrymir didn’t wait for Holden to speak, but grabbed her round the waist and hoisted her up. He ignored the teeth, the knees and elbows, and half-carried, half-dragged her away. “They’re going to hang him. He’s back in the cells, with a host of guards, and we’re leaving.”

  “We are sodding well not!” She wriggled out of his grasp and stood square before him, her sword loose but ready, even against Skrymir. “I’m not. I can’t.”

  Skrymir’s face twisted, with regret perhaps, deep thought creasing his forehead. “You are. I promised, Josie. I oathed, to you. On my soul. I oathed to keep you safe as I could, and I have. I promised Van, before. He wants me to keep on keeping that oath, and I will. Don’t make me break it, not another. We have to go, and now, before half the palace descends on us.”

  She looked down, a Josie Holden had never seen before. She’d always seemed so confident, always knowing exactly what she was doing and why, and the rest of the world would just have to fall into place around her. Now her fingers worked on the sword hilt, her eyes blank as she searched inside somewhere. All was torn away from her, all her games, her pretence, the sharp words that hid her from the world.

  “I can’t leave him here,” she said at last. “We can’t.”

  “We can,” Holden said. “And we have to. Right now. But not for good, Josie. Van Gast says you’ve got the twistiest mind he’s ever seen. We’ll think of something, some way. But unless we get out now, we’re as dead as he is.”

  A shout from behind underlined his words, punctuated by a bullet that puffed out plaster from the wall by Holden’s head. They ran, all of them, to the sound of bells endlessly praying.

  * * *

  “What do you mean, they escaped?” Rillen advanced on the luckless guard sent to inform him of Josie and Skrymir’s break for freedom.

  “I—I—” The guard swallowed heavily and gathered himself. “Another two jumped the guards on their way to the river, before they even left the palace.”

  Holden and Tallia, no doubt. Holden, that made sense. But why Tallia? Why was she involved with racks? I can deal with this, I can. My plan can still work.

  Rillen surprised the guard with a tight smile, rather than the fist or worse the man had obviously been expecting. “Make every effort to catch them. Every effort. One of them knows the palace, so check all the little-used passageways. Man every door, every window if you can find the men for it. Skrymir at the least should be easy to spot.”

  The guard hurried out, like a man unexpectedly set free from a death sentence.

  Rillen stared at the shut door. “What do you think?”

  “They’ll try to rescue him, you know that,” Ilsa said from the low couch. The rustle of silk on linen was intoxicating. “But you can use it too.”

  They would come for Van Gast, no doubt. At the hanging. Well, best be sure that guards were looking for them.

  “That’s exactly what I was thinking.” He sat next to her, watched her as she thought.

  “A trap there. And the mage?”

  Ah yes, the mage. To keep him, harness his power, the fear men held for him and his bond? Or to be rid of someone who knew what he had done? Who could discredit him with a blink? Once he was established, that would matter less. Now, it was critical that he be seen to be blameless before the traders. A hint that he’d stolen their money, that he might do so again, and Estovan’s trade would be dead quicker than his father, the death throes as painful as Van Gast’s would be. Rillen wouldn’t be far behind.

  “What would you do?”

  Her mouth curved into a sly smile, one that he wanted to run his finger over, kiss and feel it. “You need the mage for now—to keep Van’s bond on. If the mage dies, so does the bond, and that’s all you have to control him. Once he’s dead…or as he’s dying, then you should strike. A trap, for both the racks who’ll come to rescue Van, and the mage.”

  Rillen frowned. “How?”

  “I heard Van say it. She came for a little light robbery—and revenge. The Master bonded her to try to catch Van Gast, and it nearly killed them both. She doesn’t take that lightly, not from all I’ve heard. I’m betting she wants all Remorian mages dead, that’s the revenge she was after. And she’ll come for Van Gast, I’m sure. Her and Skrymir and Holden. So use them. Use her. If she wants Van truly free, she’ll have to kill the mage, kill the bond. So have Bissan somewhere nice and tempting, where she’ll think she can kill him easy. When she does—you’ll have her to hang, and him dead by her hand. The other two mages will see a message too, become more tractable. They always thought they were invulnerable, and they were, perhaps, till the Master died. If he can die, so can they. Bissan’s death will bring that home even more.”

  Rillen didn’t say anything, didn’t even think anything for once. He leaned forward and kissed her, kissed the sly smile, tasted the hatred and found it sweet. No thoughts came as he slid off her dress, shivered at her touch when she ran her hands under his tunic.

  She turned her face to greet him, welcomed him with her lips, with her arms, with herself. This was new for him, who’d only known disdain or hatred, and he wallowed in it, in her.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Rillen stepped up onto the dais, loving the feel of every man’s eyes on him, the way every trader, big and small, had deferred to him as he entered the main atrium, eager to know how things would play. They way they’d simpered, the “little gifts of condolence” they’d sent in hope of currying favor. Probably expecting him to be just like his father. He had to concentrate to keep the sneer off his face. Poor, deluded fools. But fools who would fall over themselves to gain his support.

  “It is with great regret that I must announce the death of my father, and the rest of the Yelen, at the hand of racketeers within these palace walls.” Though, if you knew that my only regret was I didn’t do it sooner… “Van Gast led a raid upon the strong room, from within the dungeons. They took everything.”

  A collective gasp, muttered swearing, and a few of the richer merchants paled and fanned themselves as they calculated how much they might have lost.

  Rillen held up a placating hand. “Van Gast is in my custody and will hang from Oku’s wall. I’ve every reason to expect the capture of the rest of them, and the return of what they stole.” Several of the more astute looked wary, angry or ready to seize an opportunity. But I’ll keep you where I want you. “In the meantime, the Yelen is now under my control, with the assistance of Bissan.”

  All eyes turned to the mage behind Rillen, drank in the monstrous sight of him. Rillen could almost hear the way their minds rattled a
long new tracks as they took in the slaves that stood at the rear of the dais. Men-who-were-not-men. Slaves, minds gone, bodies pale and pliable.

  One of the more headstrong merchanters tore his gaze away from Bissan and looked up at Rillen, calculating perhaps whether Rillen meant what he thought. Rillen let a smile stretch his mouth, but it did little to comfort the merchanter, who covered his unease with a hasty hand to his lips.

  You know what I threaten here.

  The merchanter inclined his head to Rillen, all due deference, but his gaze kept jerking between Rillen and Bissan. “This seems more than acceptable, Rillen. Will contracts be renegotiated?”

  They thought he’d learned nothing of trade from his father, just the bastard second son, only fit to be captain of the guard. They thought they could play him, fool him. But he’d hooked them on his line.

  All the merchants looked at him now, assessing, balancing, seeing his reaction. Seeing if he was like his father. Now would be the time he hooked them all, or played the line too hard and lost them, lost his chance. He kept the smile steady. “All in good time, all in good time. First, I need to show Estovan and the racks how I deal with people who displease me. I expect you’ll take as much pleasure as I in Van Gast’s final debt-payment.”

  A threat, and an offer, all in one. Van Gast had stolen or conned from every man here, most like. Yet no mention of racks being punished, and the hint of “people who displease me” had hit home. Lips tightened, skin paled, men looked away from him. Subtle—you couldn’t be a successful merchant without hiding your true feelings—but there. He could almost smell the fear on them. Good.

  Now, once the fear was there, the tempting bait. What would keep them on the hook, keep Estovan’s trade alive and well, keep Rillen rich. “And once he’s disposed of, once you can trade without fear of him robbing you blind, then contracts will indeed be renegotiated. I’m prepared to be most generous. Most generous, to those whose trade will benefit Estovan.”