The Tenets in the Tattoos (The King's Swordsman Book 1)

by Becky James

“Are you here for your family?” His voice was hoarse, as if he hadn’t spoken in a sennight.

  Or he’d screamed himself dry.

  Kneeling by his cot, I looked into his exhausted, lightless eyes. “I’m here for you and for word of them. Do they fare well, do you know?”

  Aleric struggled to speak, and my heart broke for him. He said, “Torgund has been sending messages through lodestones all throughout the country saying if you don’t give yourself up, they’ll be executed. He’s tired of waiting. They are scheduled to die tomorrow, and myself along with them.”

  “Where are they being held?” I asked, clasping his forearm to help my friend to his feet.

  “In the cells along from mine.” Aleric drew in a sharp breath when I began to pull him to his feet. “Not so hard! Torgund, he… he had me hoisted up by my wrists with my arms behind my back.”

  Ice centred in my stomach. “Gavain did the same to me. Gadamere healed me, and he can do the same for you—”

  “Gadamere? The queen’s soul? He’s alive?” Aleric stood stooped over, holding in the agony I knew he must be feeling.

  I held my hand out for him, and when he took it and leant into it, my stomach churned. He was severely injured.

  “They are all alive, Gough and Rose included,” I told him, smiling at the shock in his face. “We have Queen Ellesmere and Lord Gadamere safe, and Gough’s body as well, though his spirit remains in the dreamlands… We can talk more later. First, I need to get you and my family out of here.”

  Aleric’s hand brushed my shoulder. I realised he meant that as an embrace. “What wonderful news, and I’m glad to see you hale and whole. I… Thank you.”

  “Of course.” I held him briefly.

  “How are we going to do this?” Evyn asked, her whispers ringing too loud against the dark walls of the cell.

  Waving to the door with my unoccupied hand, I said, “Make a portal back out to the corridor. We’ll get my family out, get downstairs, and go.”

  She hesitated. “And if we run into someone?”

  “I’ll deal with them. Please make a portal out, Evyn. We’re wasting time here.”

  She lifted her hand to do so, then turned back to us. “We should get Aleric to safety first.”

  “Agreed, yes. Make a portal and we’ll figure it out—”

  “No, Thorrn, we have to decide on a plan now.” She raised her chin.

  With my shoulders now healed, it was no effort to carry Aleric, but he did not have the strength left to dally here. Impatience raced under my skin like an ague. “You really want to stand in a cell and argue with me?”

  She scowled. “I’m not letting you go crashing about! We have to think about this.”

  “Evyn, no plan survives contact with the real situation. I have no idea when the guards will be back—”

  “Soon,” Aleric’s soft voice cut through. “We are being measured for gibbets or the wheel, I know not which. They took me down earlier, and they have been escorting your family one by one. I could hear them – Lady Yston, Lord Roasche, Istadella. Bran is down there now. They’ll be back soon.”

  “See?” Evyn said, more than a hint of Aubin’s ire in her tone. “Some intelligence on the situation changes everything.”

  My chest rocked. “It doesn’t change the fact that I need to get up the corridor to get my family out!”

  “And we will, just in a sensible order!”

  “Shh,” Aleric said, just as we heard a clank further on up the corridor. We all froze.

  When nothing further transpired, he whispered, “Leave me here for now. Rescue me last, on the way out, and only if you have the time.”

  “Of course we’ll have time for you,” Evyn promised. “Thank you.” With that she turned and made a portal. She lifted her hand as if measuring before she made another.

  “Those need to be one after the other, pop, pop,” I told her, silently clapping my hands together with each “pop”, “in order for us to ping in and out of the worlds.”

  “I’m not doing that. Not after last time.” Her lips pressed tightly together.

  “You did under Spiritshere!”

  “That was at ground level! Much easier to do, Thorrn.”

  “It’s the same thing!” I hissed. I was ready to tear my hair out.

  “No, it isn’t, have you seen the drop?” She gestured at the gap, her eyes wide and irate. It wasn’t that bad, really. “If I get it wrong, no one’s getting rescued.”

  “Gods’ luck,” Aleric said after us. I turned to raise my arm to him in a salute as we left.

  “Concentrate! Don’t be wandering all over the place in between worlds!” Evyn snapped.

  “I’m recognising my brother-in-arms!”

  “Recognise him in your own time. Focus and there’ll be opportunity later.” She tossed her hair, the glowstones throwing her imperious shadow on the walls as she walked up the corridor.

  Scowling, I leant down to hiss in her ear. “He is giving up a chance at rescue! That means something, Evyn!”

  “I know. Will you stop going on at me and tell me which cells to ping through next? I can’t see up through the grates!”

  “I… oh, yes. Fine. Alright.” I slammed the grates back with more force than they warranted, keeping one ear trained back on the corridor behind us and the stairs leading up to it. Sweat trickled between my shoulder blades. Evyn kept making nervous twists of her head this way and that, as though the cell doors were going to burst open. It ratcheted my nerves up further, like a bowstring drawn to greater tension.

  Throwing back a grate at the end of the corridor, I saw huddled shapes. “Mother?”

  “Thorrn!” My mother’s grateful sobs greeted me.

  “Get me in there,” I told Evyn.

  “Of course,” she said, but muttered “sir” as we went through. Now was not the time to speak about it; I was overwhelmed, and she should know that. But my heart felt a twinge even as it lifted at the sight of my mother.

  My mother Yston, Sylvia and Ista all fell upon me when I entered. “My boy, and you are whole! My boy!” Mother struggled to catch her breath.

  Sylvia nearly shrieked. “Thorrn, you’re alive!”

  “I hope you are not here to give yourself up,” Ista said severely. “But with a power like walking through walls, you are probably not.” She gave me a hug, but I could tell the difference in her. Her fire had gone out.

  “Ista… Aunty…”

  She waved me silent. “What is the plan, Shardsson?” Her eyes shone. It cost her much to say that name.

  “We have no plan yet. We need to brainstorm one,” Evyn said, standing by the portals with one eye to the corridor.

  “Lady Evyn! It’s lovely to see you again!” Sylvia, ever the courtier, even tired and dirty as she was, said with exuberance.

  Evyn gave her a thin smile. “Let’s get you all out of here.”

  The men were in the next cell along, but only Roasche came through when Evyn opened a way between. My mother’s soul companion folded her in an embrace and kissed Aunty Ista on the cheek. He had always been stoic and quiet, but his laboured breathing told of the strain he had endured.

  Istadella held her hand up for silence, but we were all talking in hushed whispers anyway. “Bran is downstairs being measured up. Sylvia is the only one left. Once that is done, they will leave for the night with a sole guard.” Ista raised her chin. “They mean to take us in the morning. I’m sure in the dead of night we can steal away, using Lady Evyn’s ability to escape into the city.”

  “We have a much better place for you to hide,” I said.

  “And it has central heating,” Evyn murmured. “We just need to get to ground level.”

  My mother took my sister’s hands, pressing them to her heart. “It will be hard for you, but endure the measuring. You know now that it will come to nothing.”

  I could see how frightened my sister was, her face pale beyond that of fashion and her eyes brittle. Sylvia looked at Evyn’s posture and
straightened her back to match, throwing her shoulders down and steadying her gaze. “Yes.”

  I squeezed her shoulder. “Father would be proud of you.”

  Feeling a flicker of fear, I glanced at Evyn, who widened her eyes at me. “Someone’s coming,” she mouthed.

  It was the guards bringing Bran back, but they found nothing amiss; Evyn and I had pinged into an empty cell below the women’s. The guards made some harsh comments as they shoved Bran into his cell, Sylvia’s soul companion making none of his witty retorts back.

  I listened as they barged into the women’s cell. “That one,” a voice said, and Evyn shuddered. It had to be the torturer in the black mask. Putting my hand on her shoulder, I breathed in her fear for a moment before she dismissed it and took a cautious step toward the door to listen. My hand slid off in the same moment, but I had little time to wonder if that was intentional.

  Sylvia was hauled out. “Please, have mercy on her, she’s young,” my mother cried. Sylvia screamed and shrieked. Perhaps a little too much, I felt, but the guards seemed to think it amusing.

  “Yes. Young and pretty,” one of the men said.

  “She’s down for execution anyway,” the other replied.

  Sylvia’s shrieks reached a new pitch. “I – no, get off me! Take your hands from me this instant!”

  My eyes locked onto Evyn’s wide ones.

  “That haughty attitude will get you a slower death on the wheel, my girl,” the torturer laughed. The door we hid behind shuddered as something slammed against it; Sylvia’s scream told me it was her.

  Evyn grabbed my arm and dragged me to the side. I pulled free, wildly gesticulating to her to open a portal for me now. She motioned me to follow her. I pointed at the door where Sylvia sobbed just on the other side. My family’s shouts rang down the hall but none of them called for me; none of them risked the guards realising I was here. Drawing my blade, I swung it uselessly. Why wasn’t Evyn helping?

  She motioned me again to follow her. Shaking my head angrily, I walked toward her, along the wall away from the door, when realisation hit me. “I’m sorry,” I whispered as Evyn opened a portal. She nodded as we passed through, and I ran immediately for Sylvia.

  Sword raised, I wasted no time in eliminating the guards. My code was clear, and there was no mercy in me for these men; they were not upholding the law and had abused their positions as well as their charges. I stabbed the guard, pulled my sword free and swung at the torturer’s neck as he turned, open-mouthed underneath the hood; his head toppled to the side.

  I pulled their corpses off Sylvia as she sobbed even harder. I bent to help her up but my sister struggled against me. Evyn brushed past me, and Sylvia wrapped her arms around my soul to weep into her hair.

  I was panting, the noise echoing down the corridor. I didn’t know whether the sounds of women sobbing were so common here as to be unremarkable, or whether it would draw attention. I felt sick thinking of it.

  Behaviour like this was not what I wanted to uphold, not anything near the tenets I swore to. How could the others endure it? How could Gavain live with himself?

  “We have to move. Sylvia, dear, buck up. We all have to go now.” Evyn straightened her up with a heartening smile and got everyone to back away from the doors. Bringing my heartrate under control, I listened for any sounds that we were discovered as Evyn opened two sets of doors and then closed both when everyone jumped through.

  “I’m sorry, Evyn,” I whispered to her. “It didn’t occur to me that when there are people behind the door, we can’t ping there.”

  “Let’s just collect Aleric and go,” she said, casting a careful eye around the corridor. “We have to get through whatever we come up against. Thorrn, you’re out front doing any bashing that needs doing, and we’ll follow you. Everyone, quiet as you can.”

  I led the way, Ista grabbing the guard’s halberd to wield it beside me. The others tried to move as quietly as possible, but Sylvia still let out little sobs. Bran and my mother shushed and comforted her as best they could.

  Footsteps echoed up to us from the castle proper, as measured and regular as a soldier’s. I raised my arm and motioned to a closed cell door. Evyn opened a portal, and we hustled into an empty cell, with Evyn snapping it shut behind us. Calming my breathing, I weighed our next move. Once the bodies were discovered, this place would become much livelier. We would need to move inside the cells, hoping they were all unoccupied, and we were on the wrong side to rescue Aleric…

  The steps halted in the corridor, right outside Aleric’s cell. “Al?” a voice whispered.

  My eyes widened.

  “Gav?” Aleric groaned. “I suppose it’s Sergeant Gavain now. Forgive me if I don’t salute you, sir.”

  Gavain stayed silent for a time. I moved slowly to peer out of the grate in the cell we huddled in. A jingle of keys rattled out, flashing silvrine in the light of the glowstone. Gavain threw Aleric’s cell door open. “Go.”

  “What? Is this a trick? Are you going to cut me down here?” Aleric limped forward. “I suppose I’d rather that than—”

  “Go. Leave. Now,” Gavain said harshly. “I’ve changed the guard rota to make it minimal, and I’ve an alibi, but it’s not good for turns of the glass.”

  My mouth fell open.

  “I… what about Alyssia? I need to find her. She’ll be the first the king orders to be questioned if I vanish.”

  “Where is she?”

  “I don’t know. I can Call her?”

  “You’re the Caller too?”

  “Yes, I know, it’s useless… wait, are you the Caller in your pair?”

  My heart burnt, a flare that warmed and hurt me at the same time. Swallowing hard, I pushed past the pain in my tight throat.

  Aleric hobbled away. Gavain looked up the corridor toward where my family had been held, bunching his fists. I gritted my teeth. If Evyn could ping me out, I could… Make a lot of noise in the corridor and alert the guards to a prison break.

  Gavain looked down at the keys in his hands, frowning, while I held my breath. If he went up the corridor, he would see the bodies.

  Locking Aleric’s cell door, Gavain paced past us, toward the remains. I held up my hand for quiet. Sylvia stuffed her hands over her mouth, her chest twitching with the effort of suppressing her sobs.

  Gavain swore, and then he backed away hurriedly down the hall.

  “Ping me out,” I hissed to Evyn. “He’s going to raise the alarm.”

  “No,” Ista whispered. “He would have shouted by now.” Gavain vanished downstairs, along with any chance I had of stopping him before he rang the alarm bell.

  Handfuls of hushed heartbeats passed. No sound rang up to us. No clang, no chase. “He can’t admit he was up here, and he changed the guard rota,” Ista mused.

  “Did he…?” Evyn whispered incredulously.

  “Yes. Gavain freed Aleric, and he might have wanted to free my family too.” Maybe he would protect Prince Rogan alongside Barlay. A sour feeling grew in the pit of my stomach, glad that Gavain had saved Aleric, but… sad that he hadn’t tried to save me.

  We waited for what felt like a score ten of heartbeats, that devastated feeling curdling my stomach, before I judged it safe to move. I led the cavalcade down, keeping tension in my stance and senses.

  Finally, Evyn nodded. “We’re out of here,” she decided. Before we knew it, we stood in the wet forest next to the canalside. My family huddled, shaking and staring wild-eyed around us. “Welcome to Earth.”

  Chapter 25

  Evyn found places for everyone somehow. My mother and Roasche were billeted in her mother’s room, while Bran and Sylvia bunked in Evyn’s room. Istadella was given a bed that came out of a bag and required me to inflate it using air from my lungs, which took an inordinate amount of will and energy. Only when we went to the kitchen did I realise that we had neglected ourselves and, moreover, the sun had begun rising.

  Evyn slumped on the kitchen table. “Let them rest as much
as they can. I doubt they’ve had a great week.”

  “Nor have we had a good sennight.” I rubbed my face, wincing at the stubble which was no doubt unsightly and unkept. “We did not act in concert in that situation.”

  “Is that your way of saying that our squabbling could have brought disaster down on us?” Evyn put her hands flat on the table.

  I stared into my mug, half empty with dirty, brown liquid. “Special Forces is trained to work alone or in a team. It occurs to me that I should teach you the common hand signals we use.”

  “It’s more than that, Thorrn.” She looked up at me, and I met her eyes. Her skin was pale, her eyes large and empty. “It’s you trusting that I wanted to help Sylvia but that I knew something you didn’t. You didn’t trust me on either.”

  Looking away, I let that sink into my bones. “You are right. I did not.”

  “And I need to practice the portals. If we are going to ping around in the MasterMage’s Palais, we need to be as fast as you wanted me to be.” She swallowed a sip. “Even if we’re up forty feet or more.”

  “There is a need for plans and fallback positions,” I said, trying hard to keep my voice even. “But we also need to be able to improvise and think on the spot. The more we work together, the more we can anticipate how the other will react in a situation.”

  Evyn let that fall into place for her. “Agreed. So, how do we go about it?”

  A few nascent ideas presented themselves to me, but nothing substantial. If I spoke now, it would be bluster and, while I had desire to show well to her, I had no craving to string her a false hope that I was in control of the situation. “I don’t know.”

  The truth hung between us. I watched her reaction, waiting for her to scoff. Instead, she nodded in agreement.

  I ventured another truth. “I’m tired. And I need you.”

  “I need you.” She sighed. “I need you to be sensible. I’m still mad, but don’t worry. I’m going to ream out Aubin when we get him back too. And it is when, not if,” she said as I opened my mouth to tell her the implications of a Thrall contract. “Tuniel is sure he outwitted Waker somehow, but I’m still going to shout at him for a good few weeks or more.”