Warlord

by Jennifer Fallon

  “You need to take a few court’esa to war with you, for one thing.”

  “War is no place for court’esa.”

  “I agree, but that’s the opinion of a sane and rational man.”

  “And I’m supposed to be an inexperienced, lecherous fool?”

  “Precisely.”

  “I’ve got a bad feeling I’m not going to like where this is leading, Tejay,” Damin sighed, crossing his arms with a frown.

  “But you do understand the problem.”

  “I suppose.”

  “Then you will accept the gift I’m going to give you without complaint.”

  “Tejay …” Damin began, but she ignored him, turning to snap her fingers in the direction of the door.

  At her command, three court’esa entered the room. In the centre of the trio was a young man with a physique that looked as if he’d been carved out of a single block of rich dark wood by a Harshini artisan hoping to depict a god. He had long dark hair threaded with tiny gold beads reaching almost to his waist and an expression of arrogant condescension. The women were of equally impressive beauty and just as disdainful. Both were dark-skinned and dark-haired and of similar statuesque proportions.

  Damin looked at them in surprise and then turned to Tejay. “Denikans?”

  “This is Lyrian,” she told him, pointing to the stunning, dark-eyed young woman on the left. “And the other young woman is Barlaina.”

  “And him?”

  “This is Kraig.”

  “I thought all Denikans died within a few months if you tried to enslave them?” Damin asked in surprise.

  “Most of us do,” the man replied in a deep and surprisingly cultured voice. “So it’s a good thing we’re not actually slaves.”

  Damin looked at Tejay in confusion. “Free court’esa? Now there’s a novel concept.”

  “The court’esa collars are merely a disguise, Damin,” she said. “A necessary one.”

  “Are you going to tell me exactly what’s going on here?”

  She pointed in the direction of the cushions around the low table in the centre of the room and then looked up at the male court’esa. “Would you like to join us, Kraig?”

  Tejay sat down as Barlaina closed the door. The man said something in his own language to his companions before taking his place beside Tejay as if he was her equal, not her slave. The two Denikan women moved to stand behind him in a manner that reminded Damin more of sentinels than servants.

  As Damin joined them on the cushions around the low table, Tejay introduced them formally. “Damin Wolfblade, heir to the throne and Prince of Hythria, allow me to introduce Prince Lunar Shadow Kraig of the House of the Rising Moon, heir to the throne of Denika.”

  Damin studied the Denikan in shock then looked at Tejay. “This is a joke, right?”

  “Do you consider it a joke that a slave could be a prince, your highness?” Kraig asked in his deep, measured voice. He spoke without accent but carefully enunciated each word, making it clear Hythrun was not his native language. “Or is it the idea a nation as barbarous as you perceive Denika to be has any notion of what it means to be ruled by kings or princes that you find so humorous?”

  Damin stared at the young man warily. “Neither, your highness. I was merely referring to Lady Lionsclaw’s apparent belief she could hide someone as important as the heir to the Denikan throne by disguising him as a court’esa and expecting me to take him to war.” He glanced up at the two women who were glaring at Damin threateningly. “Your court’esa, I suppose?”

  “My bodyguards.”

  “I see. How long have you been here?”

  “I’ve been in Hythria since just after the plague began,” Kraig told him. “I came to your country in response to a request from your High Prince to negotiate a treaty between our two nations. When I got here, I discovered your people beating my people to death in the streets.”

  “I imagine that put paid to the treaty negotiations.”

  Tejay didn’t appreciate his attempt at levity. “Enough, Damin.”

  “Sorry,” he said. “Old habits die hard. How did you finish up in Cabradell, your highness?”

  “With emotions running so high—and the danger of the plague—Princess Marla thought it unwise to let us remain in Greenharbour,” the Denikan prince explained.

  “By then all the Denikan ships had fled in fear of their lives. So she sent him here,” Tejay continued, “in the hope Chaine could get him over the border at Highcastle and then onto a ship bound for Denika out of Tambay’s Seat.”

  “But Hablet closed the borders before you could get out of Hythria,” Damin concluded, beginning to understand the problem. “And now you’re stranded here in Cabradell. I can understand you fleeing Greenharbour, but why the disguise?”

  “People believe it was the Denikans who started the plague, Damin,” Tejay reminded him. “They were ready to stone any free Denikan they found walking the streets of Greenharbour. Court’esa, on the other hand, are property, therefore much less obvious targets.”

  “And what does Terin think of all this?”

  “He doesn’t know,” Tejay replied. “He thinks your mother bought Kraig and the girls at the slave markets in Greenharbour just before they closed, as a gift to Chaine. He believes Kraig is a Loronged court’esa and that Lyrian and Barlaina are simply a passing fad his father was going through.”

  Damin admired the two statuesque young women, thinking he could easily indulge in a passing fad like that given slightly different circumstances. Then he cursed himself for a damned fool, and turned to Tejay.

  “Then why do you need my help? You seem to have everything under control.”

  “Chaine is dead, Damin, and sooner or later it’s going to occur to Terin that his father’s court’esa are still in the slave quarters and that they’re not earning their keep. He’ll either decide to sell them for a profit or worse, decide to make use of them.”

  “Neither scenario is particularly desirable,” Kraig remarked.

  Damin sympathised with their plight, but wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do about it. “And just exactly what do you expect me to do with your Denikan visitors?”

  Tejay glanced at Kraig before she spoke. “I want you to take Kraig with you, Damin, and Lyrian and Barlaina, too. The only way to get them home now is to take them back through Greenharbour.”

  “But I’m going to war, Tejay, not Greenharbour.”

  “I know, but you will get back to the city eventually and when you do, you can arrange for Kraig to get home on one of Luciena’s ships. In the meantime, Kraig and the women can provide you with the cover you need by pretending to be your court’esa.”

  “They can, can they?”

  She looked a little annoyed he hadn’t immediately fallen in with her clever plan. “It all works perfectly, don’t you see? I’ll tell Terin you spied the Denikans in the court’esa quarters and expressed your curiosity, so I gifted them to you to keep you happy. He’d never dare ask for them back because of the huge insult to ask the High Prince’s heir to return a gift. Their identity remains a secret. Better yet, word will get back to Hablet that you have court’esa in the battle camp with you, court’esa of both sexes, which means the Fardohnyans will quickly jump to the conclusion you’re just as wanton as your uncle, and therefore just as foolish. They’ll fall for whatever trap you devise, you will defeat the Fardohnyans, and then after the war is done, you can get Kraig back home without him being stoned to death on the streets of Greenharbour for bringing the plague down on us.”

  “You make it sound far too easy, Tejay.” Damin studied the Denikan prince doubtfully. “And what do you think of this, your highness? Are you really willing to pretend to be my slaves … my sex slaves … on the off-chance I can get you home?”

  For the first time, the Denikan prince cracked the faintest hint of a smile, folding his perfectly sculpted arms across his massive chest. “Pretend is the operative word here, Prince Damin.”

&nb
sp; Damin grinned. “I’m glad you feel that way, your highness, because I have to say, you’re really not my inclination.”

  Kraig stared at Damin in silence.

  “That was a joke.”

  “I know,” the Denikan prince replied unsmilingly.

  “Good thing you’ll be posing as my court’esa,” Damin remarked. “You’d have a hard job convincing anyone I’d taken you on as my court jester.”

  “Damin, behave,” Tejay warned. She turned to the Denikan prince apologetically. “You’ll have to forgive my foster-brother, Kraig. He’s got a bad habit of not taking anything seriously.”

  “I can see that.”

  There was a hint of condescension in the Denikan’s tone that Damin didn’t much care for, but he had no chance to respond to it. The door opened without warning and Rorin burst into the room, breathing heavily, as if he’d run all the way here.

  “Sorry to interrupt, but I just snatched this out of the hands of that nosy little Karien friend of Terin’s.” He crossed the room and handed a crumpled letter to Damin that bore the Hythrun royal seal. “A messenger just arrived from Greenharbour. Renulus got to him first and was apparently planning to read the royal dispatches before passing them on, so I took the liberty of delivering them myself.”

  Damin was less concerned about Renulus than about what the letter might contain. He tore it open expectantly. Hopefully, it was the commission he’d been waiting for, awarding him command of Hythria’s combined army. And news Lernen had agreed to lower the age of majority.

  Damin read the letter and then read it again in growing disbelief, his eyes widening in horror as he realised the disaster they were suddenly facing.

  “What’s wrong?” Tejay asked in concern.

  He read the letter twice more, not sure he believed his own eyes.

  “Damin?”

  Finally, he looked up. “You’re not going to believe this.”

  “Has something happened to your uncle?”

  “Apparently he’s lost his mind.”

  “What’s it say?” Rorin asked.

  “It says we have our general.”

  “He’s given you command?” Tejay asked.

  Damin handed her the letter, certain she wouldn’t believe it either until she’d read it herself. “No, he hasn’t, Lady Lionsclaw. My uncle has decided to lead us into the fray himself. The new commander of Hythria’s combined armies is the High Prince of Hythria, Lernen Wolfblade.”

  CHAPTER 32

  Maria was at the palace going through the day’s correspondence when Corian Burl announced she had a visitor. She’d been burying herself in mundane tasks in the hope that if she didn’t think about it consciously, her distraction would magically produce a solution to the problem of her brother’s intention to lead their troops to war.

  It hadn’t happened yet, but she did get a lot of work done this way.

  She looked up curiously, glad of the new distraction. “Who is it?”

  “He refuses to give his name, your highness.”

  Marla sighed. “Show him in.”

  “But your highness …”

  “It’s all right, Corian. I know who it is.”

  Unhappily, the slave bowed and did as she bid. A moment later Galon Miar stepped into the room. The assassin bowed politely and looked around at the erotic murals with interest.

  “Fascinating taste you have in art, your highness,” he remarked, tilting his head to the side to study one couple engaged in a particularly optimistic position. “How ever do you get any work done in here?”

  “By ignoring them,” she replied. “What are you doing at the palace?”

  “I brought you a gift.” He reached into his vest and produced a flat, silk-wrapped parcel. The pale blue silk was stained with blood.

  “What’s this?”

  “Tarkyn Lye’s slave collar. I tossed up the idea of bringing you his head as a token of my loyal service, but decapitations are so damned messy and one tends to get odd looks from passersby when one walks the streets of Greenharbour carrying a disembodied head.”

  “You mock me at your peril, Master Miar.”

  “I think if I was worried about peril, your highness, I might have chosen another line of work.”

  Marla studied him curiously, wondering if it was a personality trait that allowed men like Galon Miar to kill so easily, or simply the training he’d received as a boy. Maybe it was a little bit of both.

  “Does it bother you?”

  “That I just killed someone?” He shrugged. “It’s my job.”

  “You seem so … unaffected.”

  “You ordered the killing, your highness,” he reminded her. “I’m just the tool you used to do the job. In the eyes of the law, I’m no more guilty than the blade I used to slit his throat. I don’t see you falling apart with remorse and guilt.”

  “You think I have no conscience?”

  “Not a shred,” he replied. “It’s probably what I find most alluring about you.”

  She didn’t like it when he smiled at her like that. A change of subject was definitely in order. “So, does Alija suspect you of Tarkyn Lye’s assassination?”

  “I don’t know. She probably doesn’t even know he’s dead yet. I’m not all that inclined to be around when she finds out, either.”

  “I’m sorry,” Marla said insincerely. “Has my involvement in this affair cost you a lover? Imagine how devastated I must be at the very idea.”

  Galon didn’t rise to the bait. “What did Alija Eaglespike do to you, Marla Wolfblade, to make you hate her so much?”

  “That’s none of your business.”

  “Actually, it is,” Galon corrected. “You made it my business when you asked the Raven to tell me who commissioned the kill on Tarkyn Lye.”

  “Then content yourself with the knowledge that her crimes against me and those I care for are numerous and heinous and leave it at that.”

  “It can’t be just because she’s a Patriot,” he speculated, as if she hadn’t spoken. He was moving around the room slowly, studying the murals as he went. “If you were in the habit of assassinating people just because they’re Patriot sympathisers, a good third of the highborn families in Hythria would have been wiped out by now and I’d be a very rich man. I suspect it’s personal.”

  He continued to work his way around the walls, examining Lernen’s explicit murals as if they were the most absorbing thing in the room. “Does your hatred of Alija have something to do with your missing dwarf?”

  Marla looked up, instantly on the defensive, but he had his back to her and she couldn’t read his expression. “What do you know about Elezaar?”

  “Only that he’s missing.” Galon shrugged. “And that Alija seems desperate to find him and you don’t—which would seem to imply you know where he is and she doesn’t.”

  “Elezaar is dead.”

  Galon glanced over his shoulder at her. “Did Alija kill him?”

  “I did.” It wasn’t actually a lie. Elezaar’s fear of Marla’s reaction to his betrayal was the reason he took his own life. She was just as responsible for his death as Alija.

  “And I thought you were merciless when it came to your enemies.”

  She glared at him. “Is there something you want, Galon Miar? Or did you just come here to aggravate me?”

  “Ah, now that’s a little complicated,” he said.

  His study of the murals had taken him around the room until he was on the same side of the long table as Marla. She debated standing up from her chair, to enable her to escape him more quickly if the need arose, but if she moved he would know she feared his proximity and she was in no mood to give this man any sort of power over her.

  “It’s a simple enough question.”

  “But a very complex answer.”

  He moved even closer. Marla tensed, wondering if she was about to die. Perhaps she’d misjudged his affection for Alija. Perhaps the thought that he could never touch Alija again without the High Arrion dis
covering he was Tarkyn Lye’s murderer was enough to make him break the cardinal rule of his profession: never undertake a kill not sanctioned by the guild. Maybe Alija had actually ordered a kill on Marla and she’d just welcomed her own assassin into her private sanctum, thinking she was the clever one …

  He was right behind her, so close her spine tingled. Before Marla could move, Galon leaned over her, placing a hand on either side of her on the table, effectively trapping Marla in her seat.

  His lips were next to her ear. “I want what you have,” he breathed softly.

  “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

  “I think you do.”

  Marla was rigid but it wasn’t out of fear. Galon’s hot breath on her exposed neck disturbed her in a way that was both thrilling and alarming. The goosebumps that prickled her spine were caused by emotions dangerously out of place in a situation as fraught with peril as this.

  “You see, Marla, I’m not the second most powerful man in the Assassins’ Guild just because of my good looks and winning personality,” he whispered. “Yet you managed to set me up, and you did it brilliantly. There aren’t many men in this world who’ve done that, so I actually admire you for it.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about …”

  “Oh, yes, you do, my sweet,” he purred softly. “You knew that by commissioning a kill on Tarkyn Lye and making sure I carried it out, I’d never be able to go near Alija again, unless my mind was shielded. But even more puzzling—you had the Raven tell me it was you who ordered the job. So I started to wonder why you weren’t afraid of Alija’s mindreading abilities yourself. Now, I’m no expert on Innate magicians, but she doesn’t need an embrace to read your thoughts, does she? Just a touch. It set me thinking. This trouble between you and her goes way back, I suspect, yet you’re not in the least bit worried about what she’ll take from your mind.”

  “Maybe I’m just very careful about letting her touch me,” Marla suggested stiffly, wishing Galon Miar had found a less distracting way of confronting her. It was all part of his game, she knew; all part of his strategy to rattle her.