“Leave my maid alone.” She addressed herself with an outward show of assurance to the dead slush eyes. “Don’t touch her again.”
He looked her up and down unhurriedly, then observed, “So. Skinny. Prinked up. High-nosed. About what I expected.”
Expected? She had no idea what he meant, and no inclination to analyze. “Reeni?” Jianna started forward. “Can you answer me? Are you badly hurt?”
“You stay still,” the bare-faced man advised, voice flatly expressionless.
He took a step toward her, barring her path, and she stopped, intimidated by his looming muscular bulk and his impassive square face, her brief rush of courage already ebbing. Ashamed of her fear, she lifted her chin and commanded, “Stand aside.”
He neither moved nor spoke. She forced herself to return his gaze, and discovered that the heavy-lidded eyes in the broad face were so wide-set that it was nearly impossible to meet both simultaneously. The opaque eyes revealed nothing at all, and her concealed fear deepened.
Reeni sat up slowly, looking dazed. Her jaw was twisted violently awry; beyond doubt it had been broken. When she met her mistress’ eyes and tried to speak, an unintelligible gabble emerged, concluding in a whimper of pain. Tears spilled from her eyes.
Jianna’s anger flared anew. “Do you vicious louts know who I am?” she inquired with an air of icy contempt. They had probably recognized the coat of arms on the carriage, but best to be certain. “My father is the Magnifico Belandor. He’ll pay well for our safe return. But if you hurt me or lay another hand on my servant, he’ll hunt you down wherever you hide and nothing in the world will save you. You’d do well to remember that. Now get out of my way and let me go to her.” Reeni’s assailant stood like a monolith. Sidestepping him, she advanced.
Despite his palpable menace, she was unprepared for the iron pressure of his grip on her arm. Taking her above the elbow, he swung her around and gave her a shove that sent her sprawling.
“I told you to stay still,” he said.
She lay on her back in the mud and the wet leaves, staring up at him. Never in her eighteen years had anyone lifted a hand against her. Even in the midst of obvious danger, an unconscious part of her had continued to view her physical self as somehow sacrosanct. Now her reluctant mind opened to new possibilities. She became aware that the fall had displaced her skirts, exposing the slender length of her legs. His flat gaze pressed her thighs. His four companions were motionless and piercingly watchful. She went cold inside. Determined to mask her terror, she climbed to her feet, met the empty grey eyes squarely, and remarked, “I’ve always believed that it is only the weakest and most cowardly of men who turn their wrath on women.”
His face did not change in the slightest. She might have thought that the insult went unheard had he not stepped forward to deal her cheek an open-handed blow that knocked her down again.
“You need to learn some manners,” he told her unemotionally. “Get up.”
Her ears were ringing and she could taste blood in her mouth. She shook her head to clear it.
“Up. Don’t make me wait.” Grasping her coil of dark hair, he hauled her to her feet. “Now, what was that clever remark you made just then? I don’t think I caught it all the first time, and I wouldn’t want to miss a single word, so you’d better say it again. Nice and clear. Come on.”
She stared at him.
“I said, spit it out. Are you really going to make me tell you again?”
“My father,” Jianna attempted, voice shaky. “My father is the Magnifico Aureste Belandor. He—”
“Have you forgotten what I told you to say? Or are you trying to make me angry?”
“Listen to me. My father—”
“Still not what I told you to say. You learn slowly. Maybe a reminder will help.”
He slapped her and she tottered, but his grip held her upright. Her eyes swam for a moment, but she was able to see his hand come up to strike again and she also saw Reeni, broken face contorted, behind him with a rock clutched in her fist.
One of his gang shouted a warning and his reaction was startlingly swift. Releasing Jianna, he wheeled in time to dodge a blow intended to smash his skull. The descending rock missed him by a whisper. He smiled slightly and Reeni shrank away from him, but there was no place to go. He caught her wrist and twisted. She cried out in pain and the rock dropped from her hand. Wrenching her arm behind her back, he forced her to her knees.
“Let her go. Please.” Jianna found her voice; a high, thin voice, but adequately steady. “Don’t hurt her, she was only trying to protect me. She’s a servant of House Belandor, and my father will—”
“I know all about your shit-licking kneeser father,” the slush-eyed man returned, shocking her into silence. “You want to see what I think of your father and all his precious little servants? Pay attention, I’ll show you.” Drawing a dagger from his belt, he deftly slit Reeni’s throat wide open.
A red torrent gushed from the wound. Reeni dropped to the ground. A few spasms convulsed her small frame, but very soon she lay still.
Jianna’s mind attempted to reject the reality of the scene, tried to dismiss it as a hideous hallucination, and failed. She stood staring for a numb eternity at the dead girl stretched out on the dead leaves. At last, her eyes rose. Reeni’s murderer was watching her, and his face told her nothing at all. She discovered in that instant that she hated him more than she had ever hated another human being.
“Come here,” he said.
He still clasped the bloodied dagger, and she wondered if he meant to use it next on her. She stood motionless and let the hatred show on her face.
“Disobedience. Disrespect. Two big mistakes,” he told her. “But you’ll learn.”
Three long strides brought him to her. She did not allow herself to flinch. Before she recognized his intention, he jabbed a short punch to the midsection that doubled her neatly. A second blow took the point of her chin. The world exploded around her, then ceased to exist.
* * *
She emerged from nothingness to find herself blind, sick, and disoriented. Her head throbbed cruelly. Various body parts ached. Her position—face down, head dangling—was momentarily incomprehensible. She could see next to nothing, but an animal odor filled her nostrils and she could hear men’s voices close at hand. She was moving, carried queasily along on something. Her wrists were bound behind her back, her ankles were likewise tied, and a blindfold wrapped her eyes.
They had trussed her up and dumped her like a sack of flour across the back of a horse or a mule, she realized. She had no idea where they were taking her or what they meant to do with her. Her confused mind struggled to resume normal functioning. If they intended rape and murder, she reasoned laboriously, there was no particular reason to remove her from the site of the attack. Probably they planned to hold her for ransom. They would let the Magnifico Aureste Belandor know the price of his daughter’s life and honor, they would tell him how and where to pay it, and they would set a deadline of some sort. Then they would settle back to wait. And while they waited, the Magnifico Aureste would contrive to track them down, and then he would see to it that they were hanged as they deserved for what they had done to Flonoria, Reeni, the driver, and the bodyguards.
So she bravely assured herself, but the thought of her murdered companions brought dreadful images. She saw again Aunt Flonoria’s staring dead eyes, and the fountain of blood spurting from Reeni’s severed throat. Nausea seized her then, and her flesh went clammy. She retched, but it had been hours since her last meal and there was nothing left in her stomach to lose. Only a very little while ago, she had been plotting to force Aunt Flonoria to dine this evening in the common room of the Glass Eye. It had seemed so tremendously important at the time.
She could see a sliver through a hairline gap at the bottom of the blindfold. She glimpsed dead leaves, churned mud, and nothing more, no matter how she shifted and strained. The movement only intensified her nausea, and she retched dr
ily again. Untie me, let me sit up. The words quivered on her lips, but she did not let them fly. Into her mind thrust the vision of a square, impassive face with dead grey eyes, and she would not let herself ask anything of that face. A moan sought escape and she held that in, too.
Her mouth was dry and foul. She could not judge how long it had been since she had last tasted water, for she had lost all sense of time. The world had reduced itself to sick pain, bewilderment, and fear that left room for only one comforting certainty: No matter where these murderers were taking her, the Magnifico Aureste would find and rescue his daughter. Jianna Belandor would be safe at home within days or less, and her abductors would be punished. All of them.
The miserable blind span seemed to stretch on forever. Her thirst waxed and her headache sharpened. Eventually her limbs went cold and dead. At one point the band halted briefly, perhaps for relief and refreshment, but she could not be certain, for nobody removed her blindfold, loosened her bonds, or offered her water, and she refused to beg for it.
The journey resumed and the knife-edge of fear dulled as Jianna sank into a stuporous state. Thought and sensation receded; there were lost intervals during which consciousness may have lapsed. The voices around her faded. Either conversation had ceased or else she did not hear it. The tiny slice of the world visible below her blindfold was darkening. Night was coming on, or perhaps her eyes were failing.
Measureless time passed. She was chilled to the bone, parched, and light-headed when they finally halted. Someone cut the cords at her ankles, lifted her down, and set her brusquely on her feet. Her legs gave way at once and she would have fallen but for the support of a powerful arm whose touch was intolerable, for she knew on instinct whose it was. Expressionless square face, wide-set heavy-lidded eyes of dirty slush.
She tried to pull away from him, and his grip tightened. Then he was hurrying her along, forcing her on when she faltered, never slackening his pace when she stumbled. Resistance was pointless and she offered none.
He steered her up a low set of steps, probably stone, and through a heavy door or gate that groaned shut behind her. The still, musty quality of the air and the level flooring underfoot told her that they had entered a building of some sort. On they went for some chilly, drafty distance before she sensed herself passing through another doorway into a perceptibly warmer atmosphere. She caught the whiff of wood smoke and heard the crackle of a fire.
They stopped, and the man beside her spoke.
“Here, Mother. See what I’ve brought.”
“Well done, boy,” answered a woman’s voice, unusually deep and assured. “Get that rag off her face and let me take a good look at my new daughter.”
THREE
A hand fumbled at the back of her head, and the blindfold dropped from her eyes. Jianna blinked and looked around her, devouring her surroundings at a glance. She stood in a moderately spacious chamber with walls paneled in dark wood, smoke-blackened beams exposed overhead, and a couple of narrow, deep windows presently admitting no light. Cold, dusty stone floor underfoot, no rugs. Big, old-fashioned fireplace with a plain stone mantel and a generous blaze within. Split logs stacked beside the hearth; a giant brindled boarhound and a brace of lesser canines sprawled before the fire. Not much furniture. A crudely fashioned, heavy table of oil-finished wood supporting a pitcher and several earthenware goblets; a few substantial chairs innocent of upholstery; a three-legged footstool; nothing more.
The only illumination came from the fire and from a pair of utilitarian oil lamps hanging from the rafters. By that warm-colored glow she observed the faces of four companions. One of them she recognized too readily, with revulsion but without surprise—the hulking slush-eyed murderer, standing beside her. Three others sat at the table—one male, two females. The man was youthful, muscular, snub-nosed, and square-jawed. One of the females was likewise youthful, translucently pale of skin and hair, emaciated to the verge of invisibility. The other woman was much older, well advanced into middle age, with grey streaks marbling her mass of brown hair and deep lines framing her lips, but hardy and strong-looking. She was dressed in an unadorned gown of some sturdy dark stuff, no better than an upper servant might have worn, although it was obvious that she was no servant.
Jianna hardly noted the costume; she was caught and held by the other’s marked resemblance to Reeni’s murderer. There was the same coloring of hair, eyes, and skin. The same broad, square, heavy-jawed face, same assertive nose and full lips, the same wide-set, thick-lidded light grey eyes. While the size, shape, and color of the eyes were identical in mother and son, the expression differed. Where the son’s eyes were chill and seemingly vacant, the mother’s glowed with active intelligence.
They were scrutinizing Jianna with equal attention, and presently the woman remarked, “She has something of her father’s look. It’s in the eyes and brows, I believe. We shall soon know if she’s inherited his nature as well.”
The authoritative contralto carried an unexpected aristocratic accent. Jianna contained her surprise. Facing the other, she straightened her spine and lifted her chin. “My father—” she began, but her dry sticky mouth and tongue played her false, and only a hoarse croaking emerged.
“Sounds like a sick Sishmindri,” the woman observed with amusement. “One thing I’ll give her father, he could speak.” A new thought appeared to strike her, and she inquired, “Has the girl been properly watered?” There was no immediate reply and she prompted impatiently, “Onartino, speak up.”
The slush-eyed hulk beside Jianna stirred uncomfortably. His flat gaze wandered.
“Now.”
“How would I know?” The murderer addressed as Onartino shrugged. “That’s a business for servants.”
“You imbecile.” The woman spoke with an air of confirmed expectation. “You want to kill her before you’ve had the good of her?” Without awaiting reply, she commanded, “Nissi, see to it.”
At once the blanched young girl rose from her chair, took up one of the earthenware goblets, came around the table, and raised the vessel to Jianna’s lips.
Jianna gulped down watered wine. When the glue that seemed to line her mouth had dissolved, she looked up to encounter Nissi’s luminous, almost colorless eyes inches from her own. The lashes were exceptionally long, but pale and fine as cobwebs. The image of Innesq Belandor’s haggard visage flashed across her mind and it seemed to come from nowhere, for there was no discernible resemblance between her uncle and this wraith of a girl. For an instant the eye contact held and then, as if responding to some spoken command or plea, Nissi set the goblet down, shifted position, and applied herself to the cords that bound Jianna’s wrists. Her touch was cool and weightless as mist, but surprisingly effective. Within a moment, the cords fell away. Jianna brought her hands before her and stared at them in amazement. Her fingers were cold and numb, but when she flexed them, they stiffly obeyed.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“No one gave you leave to turn her loose, you little maggot,” Onartino observed. “Have you lost the few insect wits you ever owned?”
Nissi appeared deaf.
“Put those ropes back on her,” Onartino commanded, “or else I will. Which d’you think will be the worse for her, maggot—if you do it, or if I do it?”
Nissi regarded the floor attentively.
“Shut your mouth, boy,” the older woman suggested. “You’re not out in the woods.”
“Mother, this is my concern.”
“And I wish I could trust you to manage matters intelligently, but you’ve all the judgment of a stag in rut.”
The hitherto silent young man at the table guffawed, and the speaker turned on him. “You hold your tongue, Trecchio,” she advised. “You’re not one particle better than your brother—in fact, you’re not as good; you haven’t half his courage.”
Trecchio’s laughter promptly died. “I’m no coward,” he declared with a glower.
“There’s my little hero.” She bent an
unkind smile upon him, then returned her attention to Jianna, demanding, “You are Aureste Belandor’s daughter?”
“The Magnifico Aureste is my father,” Jianna replied, voice emerging clear and composed. “He will pay my ransom.”
“His title is false,” the other informed her, “and there will be no ransom. Shall we trade one of our own for money? You look confused, girl, as well you might. Allow me to enlighten you. I am the Dowager Magnifica Yvenza Belandor, widow to the Magnifico Onarto Belandor. Is that name familiar? No? It should be. Onarto Belandor is the kinsman whose title and life your father stole some twenty-five years ago. These two likely lads here are my sons, Onartino and Trecchio. The elder, already known to you, is the rightful Magnifico Belandor by the laws of inheritance. This girl, Nissi, is undeniably Onarto’s daughter, but she is not mine. For the sake of the blood that she carries, she has a place in my house, which is not grand, yet meets our immediate needs. We do not live in high state here at Ironheart, but have no fear—we anticipate great change in the near future. My dear—distant niece, I suppose I must call you, for now—your long-lost family members bid you welcome to your new home.”
Yvenza Belandor fell silent and Jianna stared at her in frozen incomprehension. The woman’s words, while clearly and cogently spoken, amounted to so much gibberish. Some sort of response seemed to be expected, however, so she collected herself to answer, “I don’t understand what you mean by all of that. You seem to be playing a game, but I don’t know the rules. I only know that your men attacked my father’s carriage on the open highway, killed everyone I was traveling with, and carried me here against my will. You seem to be telling me that you are not ordinary criminals and highwaymen. Perhaps you aren’t ordinary, for you chose your target with unusual care. You know who I am and you know that my father will pay well to secure my return, as soon as you name your price.”
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