Zane Halloway: Omnibus Edition

by P. T. Hylton

  Across the room, Faraday was leaning close and speaking passionately on some topic Lily was too far away to hear. But Zane’s eyes were still distant. He wasn’t engaged in the conversation. His mind was elsewhere. It was the same look he wore when working through a problem while sitting in his favorite chair in his study back home. Lily had learned to leave him alone during these times. She knew that his best ideas often came after long sessions of quiet brooding. Faraday apparently hadn’t learned that lesson. He jabbered on, oblivious to Zane’s disengagement.

  “What was his theory?” Lily asked.

  “Zane believed the Sword and the Shadow needn’t be two separate positions at all. He believed one man could attend to both duties. He believed the king need only employ a sufficiently skilled ferox.”

  Lily turned and looked at him. “A ferox.”

  “You see, even back then—back when he fully intended to be an abditus—your mentor had an unhealthy obsession with the society to which he now belongs. That night, he told me he believed a good ferox is the match for any abditus when it comes to clandestine activities. And he felt a ferox could match the martial prowess of even the most dedicated of warriors. So having two people as the Sword and the Shadow was superfluous. That was his opinion back then, anyway. I wonder if he still feels that way?”

  Von Ridden looked toward Zane and spoke loudly. “Do you still think that, Halloway? How do you think your swordplay matches up against Faraday’s?”

  Zane scowled, a look all too common on his face lately. “I can’t remember ever having said I was Faraday’s match.”

  Von Ridden rose to his feet. “No. But you did once tell me a good ferox is the match of any warrior. You are by all accounts a very good ferox. And Faraday is most certainly a warrior. What do you two say to a little sparring?”

  Faraday wore an amused smile. “I’m game if you are, Ferox.”

  Lily slipped her hand out of the rope, and she suppressed a groan of pain as the cord rubbed against her irritated skin. If she could get them distracted with a sparring match, perhaps this hellish ordeal would be over. Besides, she had to admit she wouldn’t protest seeing a shirtless Faraday in action.

  Zane paused a long moment before answering. “I think it’s best we focus on the task at hand. There will be time to play games when it’s over.”

  Lily couldn’t help herself. “You always say sparring with skilled opponents is the best way to improve. Certainly Faraday qualifies.”

  Zane sighed and pushed himself to his feet. He looked older than he had a few days ago. The leg was bothering him, Lily knew, but it was more than that. It was as if there was a weight on him. Zane was a man who treasured his independence, his autonomy, and his freedom above all else. Now, with one request from the king, that was all being taken away from him. And he might never get it back.

  Lily was curious. Would these circumstances make him more effective, or less?

  Zane put his hands against his lower back and stretched. “All right. I assume you have practice swords handy?”

  Faraday seemed like the type of man who might have practice swords with him at all times, just in case the need arose. He trotted to a cabinet against the wall and took out two wooden swords. He tossed one to Zane.

  “Standard scoring system, I assume?” the King’s Sword asked. “First to five points takes the match?”

  Zane took a few practice swings with the wooden sword to get the weight of it. “We don’t use point systems in my line of work. How about we just try to hit each other until one of us causes a wound that would be fatal if these blades were real. Best of three, let’s say?”

  Faraday nodded. He saluted Zane with his blade, then raised it to the en garde position. Suddenly the wooden sword looked like a very noble weapon indeed. “When you’re ready.”

  Zane, in sharp contrast, saluted, then let his sword hang by his side.

  He brought it up, quick as Lily had ever seen him move. He lunged wildly. Faraday parried the blow, but he clearly hadn’t expected such an unorthodox attack and deflected it at an awkward angle.

  Zane pressed his opening and slipped his sword past Faraday’s off-balance parry, tapping the King’s Sword firmly on the side of the head with the flat of the blade.

  Zane lowered his sword. “First point to me, then?”

  Faraday’s face reddened. “So it would appear.”

  Lily elbowed Von Ridden. “Maybe Zane was right.”

  Von Ridden surprised Lily by grinning at her. “I suspect that won’t happen again.”

  The two men raised their swords and both nodded to confirm their readiness.

  This time, Faraday struck first. His blade moved so fast, Lily’s eyes could barely track it. Zane deflected the first blow—barely—and tried a counterstrike of his own. Faraday parried casually, like a man swatting at a fly, and struck again with another thrust. Zane twisted his body, and the sword missed his rib cage by an inch.

  Now Faraday feigned another thrust, and Zane bit, committing his sword to block a blow that never came. Instead, Faraday brought his blade up, turned it, and tapped Zane on the temple. Almost the exact spot Zane had scored a hit only a moment ago.

  Zane grimaced. He shifted his weight, testing his injured leg, Lily suspected, calculating how far he could push it.

  Von Ridden clapped his hands like a delighted child. “Wonderful. Next match decides the day.”

  Neither Faraday nor Zane spoke. Their eyes were locked on each others and their jaws were set. Suddenly it appeared they were taking this little game a lot more seriously.

  “When you’re ready,” Zane said. Was that a little taunt? A reminder of how the first match had gone?

  Faraday swung at Zane’s head, a sharp arching blow that reminded Lily of a whip snapping. Zane brought his blade up and deflected the blow, but before the ferox could take an offensive position, the tip of Faraday’s blade was rushing toward his chest. Again, Zane deflected it, and again Faraday attacked from another angle.

  Faraday’s sword-work was fast—so fast—but unless Lily was mistaken it wasn’t quite as fast as it had been in the second match. She had the sinking feeling Faraday was toying with Zane.

  It went on like that for the next thirty seconds: Faraday attacking and Zane successfully defending himself—if barely. Then a smile grew on Faraday’s lips, and he shifted his weight back on his heels.

  Zane attacked—just as Faraday must have known he would—and Faraday parried. But unlike Zane’s frantic defense, Faraday’s looked almost relaxed. Zane pressed and Faraday deflected blow after blow, his sword moving like a snake, somehow always anticipating where Zane’s blade would strike a moment before the strike happened.

  Then Lily noticed something strange. The way Zane was holding his sword, the way his wrist was turned…that was the way Lily had held her sword when she’d first come to work with Zane, and how he’d scolded her. He’d shown her again and again what could happen.

  Sure enough, a moment later Faraday struck Zane’s sword with a sharp blow near the pommel, and it went flying from Zane’s hand and careened to the floor. He tapped Zane in the chest, and the match was over.

  It was quiet for a long moment in the musty room. Only the sounds of the two swordsmen breathing heavily and the distant drip of water broke the silence.

  “Well,” Von Ridden said finally. “That answers the question.”

  Lily suddenly felt guilty for goading her mentor into the match. She’d known he wasn’t at his best, physically or mentally. There was the leg. And his distress over the job they were being forced to do.

  But the way he’d held his wrist hadn’t been because of either of those. There was something else going on here.

  Faraday held out a hand to Zane. “I’m sorry. Sometimes I get a little…carried away.”

  Zane shook the hand and flashed a forced smile. “The warrior’s blood. I would expect nothing less from the King’s Sword. It seems the stories I’ve heard about you may have understated your
ability.”

  “You exceed your reputation as well,” Faraday said, but something in his eyes made Lily think he didn’t mean it.

  Lily wanted very much to be out of this dank dungeon as quickly as possible. But if Von Ridden had more information that could help her pass the exam, she needed to hear it.

  “What happens after I escape the ropes?” Lily asked.

  Von Ridden smiled sadly. “I don’t know. My source didn’t make it that far.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Zane waited until one in the morning, an hour before the guards would change, and he snuck into the belly of the castle.

  There were two things he wanted to accomplish tonight. Time was short and things had to be put into motion. But this was also partly for him. He needed to regain his sense of control.

  He and Lily had been led only through out-of-the-way halls and hidden doors since they’d arrived. They’d never once come into contact with anyone other than the king, the Sword and the Shadow, and the King’s Guard. In other words, no one who wasn’t necessary for the plan. This worried Zane. If he wanted to be optimistic about it, he could assume they were doing it in case he was caught, so the king would have plausible deniability. But he couldn’t afford to be optimistic. Not now.

  The term that had been running through his mind all day was damage control. He and Lily had been pulled into a conflict between nations. They were pawns, and what king could possibly expect to win the day without sacrificing a pawn or two? Lily’s exam and the assassination of Charles Danum were meant to take place tomorrow. Zane’s options were limited. If he’d had weeks to scheme and put his connections to work, he might have been able to move some bigger wheels or draw some larger political targets that would make this whole job irrelevant. As it now stood, there was only one thing Zane could do: he needed to make it so it was more troublesome to kill Zane and Lily then it was to let them live. He had an idea, a scrap of an idea anyway, but he needed to flesh it out and make it reality. By tomorrow.

  Getting past the guards was disturbingly easy. They were tasked with keeping people out of this part of the castle, not with keeping people in. That was a good sign, Zane supposed. He waited for a clear path as they made their hourly rounds, then snuck up the stairs to the castle proper. He was halfway up the stairs before he stopped to consider how he’d get back into that wing of the castle. Too late for that now. Onward he went.

  He had a general idea of the layout of the castle. He’d been in audience at a few official dinners back in the days when he’d cared about such things. He wound his way through twisting back corridors until he arrived at the part of the castle he thought contained the quarters of the important people not of royal lineage. From there, he hid in the shadows, eavesdropping and watching the ebb and flow of the servants, picking up from their cues where the people they most feared lived.

  If there was one thing Zane knew about Jacob Von Ridden, it was that the servants would fear him.

  After an hour, he tried one likely candidate, only to find a gruff, old, bearded man snoring loudly in his bed. The next room he tried was a woman of some importance (from the way the servants talked). She had a man twenty years her junior sharing her bed.

  As he waited, he learned the servants loved Faraday second only to the king himself. Figured. That man was the real deal. Zane hoped he wouldn’t have to kill him.

  Finally, on the third try, Zane found Jacob’s chambers. The Shadow slept alone. A high-pitched wheezing noise escaped his throat when he exhaled. Zane quietly pulled open the curtain covering the window, and moonlight fell across the bed. Jacob looked so helpless lying there. He might be the second most powerful man in the nation, but he was as vulnerable as any other when he slept.

  Zane pulled a steel dagger from his belt and crept forward. He looked down on Von Ridden. The man’s head was tilted back and his neck was conveniently exposed.

  The ferox rested the cold steel against the skin of Von Ridden’s neck and a wheezing breath caught in the man’s throat.

  Zane waited just a moment, then said, “Just so you know that I can.”

  Von Ridden’s breathing was controlled now. “Point taken.”

  Zane returned the dagger to his belt.

  Jacob pushed himself to a sitting position and rubbed at his eyes with the back of his hand. “Is there another purpose to this visit other than causing me a case of night terrors?”

  Zane sank into a chair in the corner. “Yes. I wanted to talk in a place I knew we wouldn’t be overheard.”

  Jacob chuckled. “We are still in the castle. What makes you think this is any more private than your chambers?”

  “Please, Jacob. I know you. You would have seen to it you had your privacy.” Zane looked around for a moment. From what he could see in the dim moonlight, this room was richly appointed with fineries that outstretched any of the local nobles Zane was used to dealing with. “I’m curious how you managed to get yourself appointed King’s Shadow. I imagine there’s a story there.”

  Jacob stifled a yawn. “I’m afraid there’s not much to tell. I know you think I wormed my way into power through unsavory means, but the truth is much more boring. I worked hard as an abditus and stayed active in Abditus Society politics, but not so active as to make myself toxic to either side. I was diligent, a friend to any who had need. And then I was in the right place at the right time. I’d assisted one of the king’s favorite cousins in a matter that required some discretion. So, when the position opened, my name came up. The king met with me and asked some questions. Apparently he liked my answers.”

  Zane bit his lip. Jacob was right; he had thought it would be much more manipulative than that.

  “I know you don’t like me,” Jacob said.

  “That,” Zane said, “is accurate.”

  “And I don’t blame you for that considering what happened between us. But here’s the thing. You’re letting your entire perception of me be colored by one event that took place when I was twenty-two years old. There is so much more to me than that.”

  Zane’s leg suddenly barked in pain, sending an involuntary shudder through him. After it passed, he said, “Why did you suggest me to the king?”

  Jacob swung his legs over the side of the bed. “I guess I always felt a little sorry about what happened. I thought you deserved better than to be a local assassin in a nowhere town that barely qualifies as a city.”

  A sudden anger leapt into Zane’s chest. “You screwed me. Me and my apprentice both. There is no way this ends well for us.”

  “I think you’re selling yourself short. If you perform well here, who knows what happens? The king is a good man. He doesn’t forget a service.”

  “And if the Ferox Society requires the head of the man who killed Danum?”

  Jacob paused a moment before answering. “That is unlikely to happen. As long as the society members like the replacement, they will quickly forget what happened to the predecessor. Look at your history. How many Ferox Society heads have died by non-violent means in the last hundred years? Three?”

  “That’s different. Internal struggles are part of the Society’s marrow. But an external interference, even from the king, will not be easily forgotten. So I’ll ask again. What if they require the head of the assassin?”

  Jacob sighed. “There is a plan. One I’m not at liberty to discuss.”

  “That doesn’t exactly calm my nerves.”

  Jacob took a glass of water off the table and took a sip. “Then allow me to propose an alternate solution. Tomorrow night, after you do the job, I’ll have a ship waiting for you. A ship with a very beautiful and discreet captain. The destination is up to you. I’ll give you enough thrones to set up a nice new life for yourself wherever you land. Though I suspect you don’t need it.”

  Zane was truly surprised at the offer. Letting Zane slip away after the job would lessen their ability to use him as a scapegoat. “And how would the king feel about that?”

  Jacob shrugged. “That
’s my problem.”

  Another jolt of pain shot through Zane’s leg, but he was ready this time and braced himself. He was certain Jacob wouldn’t be able to see the shudder from all the way across the room. Almost certain. “And what does this cost me?”

  Jacob leaned forward, his hands on his knees. “Lily.”

  Zane rose from his seat, his face suddenly hot with anger. “Excuse me?”

  The King’s Shadow held up a hand. “As an apprentice.”

  Zane relaxed, but only slightly. “Your apprentice?”

  Jacob nodded. “I’ve been wanting to take one for a while. Laugh if you want, but I think I’d be a good teacher. Lily’s a quick study. She proved that today. I took the liberty of pulling the results of her Tens—which was no small feat considering the backwater she grew up in—and found she did demonstrate some aptitude for the magical arts. She’d have to spend a year or so at the Academy, but then she’d be able to join me here. An apprenticeship in the king’s court is not exactly a bad start to a career, you know. You’d be doing her a favor.”

  Zane suddenly realized his hand was resting on the hilt of his sword. “Tell me you’re not seriously bartering for my apprentice.”

  “I’m offering to do you a favor. You and her both. And, let’s be honest, she’s not going to pass that test tomorrow. It’s too soon for her. Regardless of what happens, she’ll never be a ferox.”

  “Jacob, Lily is a human being both willing and able to make her own decisions. You want her to be your apprentice? Ask her. I’ll release her from her commitment to me if that’s what she wants.” He spit out his next words slowly, so there was no mistaking them. “But I don’t barter in human life.”