Akstyr stuck his head into a cabin a few doors down. “Nothing in any of them. She’s probably long gone.”
“I don’t think so. If she wants to get to this meeting, I bet this boat’s the fastest way there.”
“She’s doing a good job of hiding then.”
“On that point, I’ll agree.” Maldynado opened another suite door, this time pausing to regard the bed, specifically to share with it the yearning gaze of lovers kept apart for too long. “We’ve searched every cranny at least twice. She must be moving around, changing hiding spots often.”
Akstyr leaned against one of the doors, stuck his hands in his pockets, and turned toward the river. Maldynado finished checking the suites on his half of the deck and stopped a couple of steps away. From one of the waterside homesteads, a dog barked at the steamboat’s passage.
“Think Am’ranthe is still alive?” Akstyr asked.
“Yes,” Maldynado said.
Akstyr gave him a sidelong look. “Really?”
“Yes.” Maldynado wasn’t prepared to accept any other possibility.
“If she’s not… ”
“Don’t worry about it. Books knows about your deal with her, that you get some of that money the emperor brought so you can go to school.”
“That’s not why I was asking.”
Now Maldynado was the one to give Akstyr a sidelong look. “Really?”
Though the boy had a few unique skills and had proven useful to the group at times, Maldynado had never seen evidence suggesting he cared for anyone except himself. The team watched his back, so he did what Amaranthe asked. That seemed to be the extent of anyone’s relationship with him.
“Yes, really, all right?” Akstyr jammed his hands deeper into his pockets. “I don’t want some ugly Sicarius-type torturing her. She’s like… ” He scuffed the deck with his boot.
“A sister?” Maldynado suggested.
“I guess. I never had one. I never had anyone. You know my mother is trying to have me killed?”
“Someone mentioned that, yes. Because some hoodlums put a bounty on your head, right? And she’s trying to get a piece of the reward.”
Akstyr nodded. “When I was little, I wished I had a real family. Where people didn’t yell at you and hit you and… Well, that doesn’t matter now. It’s just that Am’ranthe was the first person to… ”
“Care?”
“Yeah. I don’t get why she would, but I wish I’d told her… that it mattered, you know? If not for her, you and the others would’ve never… ” Akstyr shifted his weight and scuffed the deck with his other boot. “She’s sort of like a big hunk of chewed up chicle. Things stick to her, things that wouldn’t normally stick together otherwise.”
“Chicle?” Maldynado couldn’t help himself. The comparison of Amaranthe to chewing gum made him throw back his head and laugh. “It’s a good thing you’ve got talent as a wizard because you’d never make it as a poet.”
“Aw, eat street, Maldynado.” Akstyr scowled and stepped away from the door. “And they’re practitioners not wizards.”
Maldynado grabbed his shoulder. “Sorry. I know what you mean. I do. Truly.”
Akstyr’s scowled faded slightly, though his eyes remained suspicious.
“You’ll get a chance to tell her that you appreciate her… gum-like nature,” Maldynado said. “She’s alive, and Sicarius will find her, and we’ll all meet up again.” Where and when, he didn’t know, but Akstyr seemed to find some reassurance in the words, for he leaned against the door again, the tension seeping out of his shoulders.
“I can’t wait to finish up this stuff with the emperor,” Akstyr said. “I want to go study, and none of the gangs will be able to find me if I’m on the Kyatt Islands. That bounty isn’t big enough that anybody would go halfway across the world to get to me.”
“Probably not,” Maldynado said.
“You should visit me over there sometime when I’m studying. All of you. Well, maybe not Sicarius, but Am’ranthe and the others for sure. It’d be like a vacation. I heard some of the women go topless on the beach too.”
Maldynado probably shouldn’t poke fun at Akstyr, not twice in five minutes, but this uncharacteristic rambling tickled his sense of humor. “Aw, I see what this is about. We might be on our final mission together and you’ll get to leave soon, and you’re realizing you’ll miss us.” He slung an arm around Akstyr’s shoulders.
“I will not.” Akstyr shoved the arm away. “I just thought you might like the Kyatt Islands. That’s all.”
“Topless women, you say?” Maldynado decided not to tease the boy any more, at least not for expressing his feelings. His ancestors knew that opening up and making overtures of friendship to people wasn’t Akstyr’s strength. “You reckon you’d know what to do with one?” There, normal manly teasing, that shouldn’t bother him.
Akstyr crossed his arms. “I know what all the parts are for, yes.”
More jokes popped into Maldynado’s mind, but he restrained himself. He didn’t want Akstyr to feel overly punished for sharing his feelings. All he said was, “When we do reunite with Amaranthe, make sure you tell her the gum thing. Women can usually figure out that you appreciate them, but they like to hear it too.”
Akstyr’s eyebrow twitched. “Have you told Sergeant Yara that you appreciate her?”
“What? No. I mean, why would I?” Maldynado groaned inwardly. Why did that subject make his tongue fumble so?
“Uh, because you like her?”
“I barely know her. She’s only been with us… Emperor’s warts, has it even been two weeks since we started on this crazy adventure?”
“I’ve seen you talk a lot of women into beds, usually without paying-” Akstyr’s lip curled in envy or perhaps disgust, “-and you’re usually so smooth and confident that they don’t gag on your dumb lines, but you can’t talk to Yara without saying something stupid.”
“I hardly think that’s true. I-”
“Spelunking,” Akstyr said.
This time, Maldynado’s groan wasn’t inward. Seriously, had everyone heard that? Or had it simply gotten around? “Fine, fine, I’ll tell her I appreciate her next time she’s not insulting me.” He yawned. He needed to find some sleep. “You check that one?”
Akstyr turned around and tried to open the door he’d been leaning against. “It’s locked.”
“Oh? It wasn’t locked when we searched yesterday.”
At first, they’d encountered numerous secured doors with passengers hiding on the other side, unwilling to exit the steamboat prematurely. Maldynado and the others had evicted all of those folks, though, and he remembered all of the suites being unlocked on his last search.
Maldynado gave it a harder tug and, when it didn’t budge, knocked.
“Do you actually expect a stowaway to answer the door?” Akstyr asked.
“No, but it seems polite to knock before barging into someone’s room. Can you use your magics to tell if someone’s inside?”
“Magics,” Akstyr muttered, clearly disgusted at Maldynado’s ongoing irreverence for words related to his studies.
Maldynado made a note to continue using the term.
Disgusted or not, Akstyr placed a hand on the door and closed his eyes. “Yes, I think so. One person.”
“A woman?”
Akstyr tilted his head, brow furrowing. “Yea. She doesn’t have, uhm, yea.”
Curiosity piqued, Maldynado asked, “What exactly do you see when you do that?”
“Stuff.” The boy had mastered the art of being vague and unhelpful.
“ What stuff? Can you see me through my clothes?”
“Ew, no, why would I want to?”
“I’m just wondering… ” Maldynado sighed. “Never mind. I don’t suppose you’d like to bash down the door? I’ve done a bunch of them over the last couple of days, and my shoulder’s bruised and sore.”
“Can I use the Science?”
“Sure,” Maldynado said, envisioning
him picking the lock somehow.
“Really?” Akstyr’s eyebrows flew up, and Maldynado realized they might not share the same vision.
“Wait, how would you do it?”
“Well, the door’s made of wood, and wood burns… ”
“Never mind,” Maldynado said and applied his shoulder. Three jaw-rattling thumps later, the door flew open, crashing against the inside wall.
Maldynado expected darkness inside, but a couple of lamps burned at low levels, creating two soft bubbles of light in the seating area. The suite appeared identical to the one Mari had occupied, though no thoughtless intruders had shot up the furniture in this one.
Akstyr stepped past him, halted, and grunted in surprise. Expecting an enemy, Maldynado pulled out his knife while missing his rapier anew. Akstyr wasn’t staring at an enemy poised to attack, though; he was ogling a woman’s undergarments that were draped across a chair beside a door leading to the sleeping area. As if drawn by a string, Akstyr stumbled forward. He held a dagger, but it drooped, forgotten, by his waist. Maldynado hung back. While he found the notion of a naked woman as intriguing as the next man, he doubted Brynia would be lying on the bed, waiting for them.
Akstyr stopped at the doorway, his posture rigid. Maldynado started to ask if there was a problem, but Akstyr waved for him to come closer. Maldynado checked behind the furnishings in the outer room and inside a large clothes trunk before joining Akstyr. If Brynia had shot Mari, she was a dangerous woman.
Still standing in the doorway, Akstyr hadn’t moved an inch. He was staring past the bed at an opaque screen set up between a wardrobe and the lavatory door. A lamp burned behind it, illuminating the silhouette of a woman’s body, a woman’s naked body, one with voluptuous curves that tantalized even the thoughts of such a seasoned bedroom warrior as Maldynado.
Akstyr crept forward. Only his ancestors knew what he thought he’d do when he reached the screen, but he was stalking over there as silently as a cat.
Again, Maldynado hung back. This had to be a trap, a trap designed to capture horny male outlaws. Without advancing an iota, he looked about, checking the room’s nooks, shadowy corners, and even eyeing the dark recesses of the ceiling.
A premonition flicked at the back of his neck. Maldynado spun around as a slender figure dressed in black slipped through the outer doorway. Though she’d changed clothing, and added a sleek black hat to her ensemble, the fitted garments didn’t disguise feminine curves. Brynia.
She saw him at the same second he saw her. Her arm lurched up, a pistol in her hand. Maldynado threw his knife at her even as he flung himself behind the sofa. She lunged to the side, evading the weapon, but the movement threw off her shot. The bullet struck a lantern on the wall, almost knocking it onto Maldynado’s head. He caught it before it hit him, doused the flame, and threw it to distract Brynia while he slipped around the other end of the sofa. With only one light left in the room, the shadows hid him. He crept forward three steps, sprang over a cider table, and leaped at her.
The movement drew Brynia’s attention away from the sofa, and she lifted the pistol for another shot. It was too late. Maldynado crashed into her, bearing her to the deck. Despite her willingness to shoot people, she lacked combat experience, and he soon had her disarmed and face down on the floor.
“It’s a stupid doll,” came Akstyr’s voice from the doorway.
“What?” Maldynado looked up.
Akstyr held up a shapely doll. “It was propped in front of a candle, making the shape look big on the divider.”
“Don’t you think the fact that the silhouette wasn’t moving should have been a clue?” Maldynado pulled Brynia to her feet. “Congratulations, my lady. You’re our prisoner again. The emperor still wishes to see you.”
Brynia lifted her head. The hat had fallen off and her straight blonde locks tumbled about her face. She smiled up at Maldynado and leaned back, pressing her body into his. “What’s the hurry? It’s a long trip downriver.” She spared a smile for Akstyr too. “The doll is based on the real thing, my handsome young fellow. Perhaps you’d like to see?”
Akstyr stared at her, then at the doll, then at her. “Uh, really?”
“We need to get you a woman, Akstyr,” Maldynado said.
“That can be arranged,” Brynia said.
Maldynado gave her a warning shake and, without relinquishing his grip, readjusted her so a couple of inches of air separated their bodies. A flash of irritation crossed her face, but she molded it into an interested smile and kept beaming it in Akstyr’s direction.
Maldynado turned Brynia around, intending to march her out the door. Something pink on the deck made him pause. A feather. He gawked. “That’s my hat. You stole my hat?”
“Not at all,” Brynia said. “I claimed it after its owner abandoned it.”
“Abandoned it? I was knocked unconscious.”
“The truth is elusive, depending on who speaks it, isn’t it?”
Maldynado shoved the woman outside. She was slipperier than wet soap. They’d have to watch her closely for the rest of the trip, maybe have Sergeant Yara guard her. He hoped Sespian was brighter than Akstyr and wouldn’t fall for those batting eyelashes.
Amaranthe had no memory of collapsing on the trail or falling asleep, but when she woke up cradled in Sicarius’s arms, she knew it must have happened. Cicadas droned from the trees, and twilight had finally come to the swamp. At least, she hoped it was twilight and that she hadn’t been asleep for hours, forcing him to carry her all night. But, no, he was following the muddy prints and cleared foliage that the Behemoth team had left. He wouldn’t have been able to do that in the dark. Probably. It was Sicarius, after all.
His long, sure strides covered the ground efficiently. Amaranthe wondered how many miles had passed beneath his feet in the last week. His arms supported her knees and her shoulders, bearing her weight easily, as if she were a toddler. She had no memory of wrapping her own arms around his neck and laying her head against his shoulder, but she had to admit, despite the aches pulsing through her body with each step, it was a nice place to be. Bandages made from torn strips of clothing wrapped her wrists where those pins had pierced. She sensed the support of other bandages around her shoulders and thighs. Thinking of the intimacy those bandages implied made her flush.
Amaranthe lifted her head. The slight movement brought fresh pain, something reminiscent of the blasting headache one might suffer after a night carousing with Maldynado. Not that she’d been foolish enough to do that. More than once anyway.
“We will stop soon. It has been some time since I heard sign of pursuit.” Sicarius’s dark eyes lowered to meet hers, and a little flutter teased Amaranthe’s gut. Given what she’d endured, she probably shouldn’t be in the mood to melt over looks from men, but they hadn’t spent a lot of time with their heads close together, and his eyes held a gentleness she’d never seen in them before. It seemed impossible to believe, but he must not have pieced together the fact that she’d betrayed him. Maybe he’d been too busy figuring out how to thwart Pike.
Amaranthe broke eye contact and cleared her throat. “They probably stumbled across Pike. I assume from that scream that he’s dead.”
Sicarius’s focus returned to the trail. “Yes.”
“Thank you for not… eliminating anyone else.”
“As you said, they were not a threat once their leader was gone.”
A perfectly logical way to say it, one that meshed with his philosophy of not leaving enemies alive behind him, but Amaranthe preferred to think that he’d made the decision because he knew it would please her. Some men brought women flowers. Sicarius chose not to kill people. The latter seemed a tad more momentous. Of course, his solicitude might all be in her head.
He didn’t come all this way because of logic, girl, she told herself. He cares.
Unless he’d come because he was worried that she would, under the pressure of torture, betray his secrets. Even now he might be waiting for the moment t
o ask if she’d blabbed.
Amaranthe grimaced. Why couldn’t she just enjoy the fact that she was snuggled in the man’s arms?
“You are thinking,” Sicarius said. A hint of censure laced the words.
Amaranthe forced her thoughts away from treasured secrets cast upon the wind like dandelion seeds. “Yes. Is that not allowed?”
“Your body and mind need rest.”
“We’re following the trail of enemies we’ll have to confront. I think the rest portion of the exercise comes after we deal with them.”
“The trail is cold. We will not likely encounter them until we reach their destination.” He flicked his gaze toward the twilight darkness of the sulfurous, alligator-and-snake-filled, strangled-by-vegetation swamp, no doubt implying it unlikely that the Forge meeting place was anywhere nearby.
“So, I should simply lie snuggled against your chest without thinking for a while?” If only she could.
“Yes.”
Amaranthe laid her head against his shoulder. She managed to keep her brain-and her mouth-still for almost thirty seconds. “How did you find me?”
Tired and aching though she may be, she couldn’t help but smile at the hint of disapproval that flattened his lips. Someone else wouldn’t see it at all, or would take it as a sinister glower. She knew he was simply irked at her inability to obey an order to rest.
“They flew in a straight line.” Sicarius stepped over a creek and left the trail, turning to follow the gravely bed upstream.
“I’d forgotten your knack for answering questions with terseness bordering on obscurity.” Amaranthe touched his jaw fondly to let him know she was teasing. Her fingers brushed against the short hair of his fledgling beard. “If you’d let me use that sharp black knife of yours, I could clean this up for you.”
“Sespian has the knife.”
“Ah. Another blade then. I’m sure they’re all sharp. Of course, you don’t have to opt for a clean shave. The scruffy look has merit. The growth just needs a little tidying.” Amaranthe supposed, by babbling on inane topics, she could avoid the one that awaited sharing.
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