Torsten grabbed Oleander and yanked her free of Lucas. “We have to get you back to the castle.”
He didn’t wait for a response to move. He found the steps down and nearly tripped on the lip before his boot met the street. South Corner rioters continued to cause a mess under Murray’s lead while hysterical citizens fled for their lives.
“Oleander, you need to lead me,” Torsten said.
“If you didn’t weigh so much I could,” she snapped, tugging on his arm.
Glass shattered. Someone dropped onto their feet behind them, and Torsten knew by how soft the landing was that it had to be the assassin. Lucas screamed and pushed himself off the porch to tackle the assassin. A throwing knife shredded the side of Oleander’s dress.
“Oleander!” Torsten exclaimed. He patted at her legs but found only ripped cloth and smooth flesh.
“Assassin!” Lucas yelled, this time enough outside of the chaos that others heard him. Lucas released a primal scream as he, presumably, tackled the assassin because the next moment, Torsten heard them wrestling on the ground. He also thought he heard teeth rend flesh, followed by another scream and then a fist crashed across one of their faces. Torsten hoped it wasn’t Lucas’s.
“Feel me up another time, Shieldsman,” Oleander said to Torsten. She pushed off him and said, “Seize that man!” to a soldier who could see.
“Halt, Breklian!” a Shieldsman who’d heard Lucas’s cry demanded. “Drop your knife!”
The man answered in Breklian, accent thick as soup. Torsten didn’t understand a word of it, but the assassin did as requested. More Shieldsmen approached, having dispelled many of the rioters by then who weren’t scared off by news of an assassin.
“Now discard all of your weapons,” the Shieldsman ordered. “That’s right.”
Torsten positioned himself in front of Oleander and turned his head to listen for the man. He also heard Lucas’s breathing. It rattled in his chest, but the boy was alive.
I can’t believe even Valin would stoop low enough to send Codar. He knew of only one Breklian in Yarrington who could fight like this.
“Codar, do as they ask, and we won’t blame you for your master’s bidding,” Torsten said.
Metal struck stone as the assassin dropped more weaponry. Then the man’s knees hit the street.
“Take him!” Oleander hissed. “This one deserves to hang.”
Torsten kept his arms spread wide in her defense as the Shieldsman marched toward the killer. “Get off the recruit,” one said. “Hands where we can see them.”
“The blood pact is written,” the Breklian said. The moment Torsten heard him speak common, his heart skipped a beat. He knew what Codar sounded like, and this man had an accent so thick it was like he’d never stepped foot in the West before.
Torsten recalled his time back in Winde Port when Whitney was on the run from a blood pact Bartholomew Darkings made with the Dom Nohzi. That was the only time he’d heard that phrase before.
The mysterious assassin’s guild in the northeast reaches, which the Breklian Oligarchs refused to condemn, rarely targeted kings and royalty. But stories of ancient times, before Liam united so much of the land, spoke of times when their order was forgotten and no longer haunted the dreams of children… that they returned in unforgettable ways. Liam’s own Great Grandfather Tarvin the Terrible was said to have died at their hands, though there wasn’t a soul in Pantego who didn’t want him dead. His cruelty made Oleander’s spell of hangings seem tame.
“Kill him,” Torsten said. “Kill him now!”
As soon as the words left his lips, Oleander screamed in horror. Torsten heard no sounds of metal clashing, just grunts of surprise, followed by flesh tearing and blood and entrails gushing out onto the stone. Before a soul knew what happened, three bodies collapsed.
“Blood must be spilled,” the assassin said.
Torsten stuck out a hand, and a throwing knife cut a long gash across the top of it. The change in direction probably saved her life.
“Where did he go?” she asked, terrified.
“Oleander, I want you to run,” Torsten said, squeezing his teeth to hold back the roar the sharp pain in his hand made him want to unleash.
“What about you?”
“I’ll be right behind you. Go!”
He gave her a shove, and she took off. One step and she tripped over her one remaining heel but tore it off. With Torsten’s help, she scrambled back to her feet and started running out in front of him.
“Move aside for your Queen!” Torsten screamed as they approached the remaining protestors, guards, and curious citizens who’d left the Royal Avenue a mess. “Move, or you’ll be held in treason!”
“She ain’t no queen of mine!” Murray the Docksider spat back.
“It’s the ‘Whore Queen,’” said another who was busy trying to fend off a guard who had him pinned.
“Let me through, you worthless runt!” Oleander snapped.
“Whatcha gonna hang me over the wall?” Murray asked.
A guard released a mouthful of air as something hit him, then Oleander screamed, “Let go of me!”
Torsten rushed toward the voice, seized Murray who’d grabbed her and punched him. His fist hit the man’s face like an anvil, but as Murray twisted onto the ground, he tore Oleander’s dress up the seams.
The sight of it and the ensuing gasp silenced everyone nearby. Torsten had touched the burns which coated half her chest and arms, but now they were bare for all to see. He imagined her like the moons, beautiful on one side, shriveled and haggard on the other.
“Unhand the Queen Mother!” one of the Shieldsmen barked. What sounded like a small army of them climbed the hill, one pair disappearing at a time followed by massive bodies tumbling. Torsten had fought against armies beside fewer than one hundred Shieldsmen, and this Dom Nohzi assassin cut through them like they were mere children.
“Behold, the witch in her true form!” Murray shouted from his place in the dirt.
All the rioting and crazed chanting stopped, replaced by solemn mumbling about the “grotesque queen.”
“Stay back, demon!” a Shieldsman ordered before a gurgling tipped off Torsten to his condition. Soon, there’d be no one to hold back the assassin.
“I’ve got you, Oleander,” Torsten said. He wrapped her with his arms and pushed through the crowd. “Out of our way!” Now, nobody dared stop them. He could only imagine the people staring, thinking they knew anything about the woman Oleander dared to be.
“Torsten…” Oleander wept, barely able to speak.
He hushed her. “They’ll hold them, Oleander. You don’t have to worry any longer. I’ll prot—”
“Sir Unger?” spoke a woman up ahead. As thick as the assassin’s Breklian accent was, this woman sounded like a proper, Dockside lowborn. Sometimes, those who never left the area of the docks may as well not have been speaking common.
“Whoever you are, move aside in the name of the Crown,” Torsten said.
“Already forgot me, eh?” the woman said.
Torsten stopped. He’d rarely visited the darkest corners of Dockside after he’d become a Shieldsman—rarely went back home. Her brogue was distinct enough to recognize, and he couldn’t believe it.
“Sigrid?” he said, incredulous.
“Ah, so ye din’t forget bout us?” she replied.
“Forget? I looked everywhere for you and your brother after the madness. Why are you here? Is he alive?”
“Who knows?” she said with casual dismissal.
“She is armed with a bow and has the bodies of guards at her feet,” Oleander whispered into Torsten’s ear. The fear in her tone was palpable now.
“Let ’er go, Sir Unger,” Sigrid said. “I ain’t here for ye.”
Torsten swallowed, his throat suddenly dry as the Black Sands. He slowly positioned himself fully in front of Oleander. “What do you want? Where’s Rand?”
“He was gunna live happily ever after with that han
dmaiden, Tessa,” Sigrid said. “Til yer Queen destroyed ’em that is. She took ’em from me. She dun’t deserve no castle.”
“She was deceived by her brother,” Torsten said. “Driven mad. We all were.”
“She let him in.”
“Sigrid, think about—”
“I won’t ask again!” Sigrid screamed. Her bow snapped, and an arrow soared over Torsten’s ear. The string continued to thrum. He’d heard that same sound earlier, and knew now that the Breklian wasn’t the only one after Oleander.
“I know you’re in pain, but your brother is alive,” Torsten said. He slowly released Oleander and stepped toward the girl, making his body as big as possible like a lion protecting its cubs. “He’s traveling to Brekliodad. Weren’t you with him?”
She cackled, and Torsten noted how unhinged she sounded. Nothing like the overbearing but loving barmaiden Torsten knew before. “That what they told ye?” she said. “The Rand I knew disappeared long ago. Left me with monsters to die, he did!”
“Let us pass, and together we can find out where he is,” Torsten said.
She answered by letting another arrow fly. This one didn’t miss. It slashed across Torsten’s shoulder, just above the pauldron.
“Torsten!” Oleander called out.
“You dun’t get to pretend ye care, witch!” Sigrid screamed.
Torsten wasn’t sure if it was the pain, but he only heard two footsteps before Sigrid had somehow closed the distance to them. She slammed into Oleander, knocking her through the gateway of the South Corner church’s front courtyard. The Queen Mother bayed in agony.
“She’s biting her!” a frightened woman yelled.
“She’s possessed!” shouted another.
“Get off her!” Torsten growled. He lunged at Sigrid, but before his mighty fist met her face, Sigrid lashed out with a single hand and grabbed his wrist. His bracer wilted under her strength even though it was made of glaruium, and she tossed him like he weighed nothing at all. He crashed through the church’s wooden doors, splinters snapping off as the bulk of them crashed down to pin Torsten. He struggled, pushing with all his might to break free, but he couldn’t figure out the size and shape of the doors atop him, and bright lines of pain raced down his arms. All the while, Oleander’s shriek intensified. She sounded like a hog who’d survived a butcher’s first attempt at slaughter.
“What are you doing to her?” a man shouted from the street.
Sigrid pulled her mouth free and hissed.
“Get off her!” someone else yelled. Whoever it was charged them, but Sigrid broke free and Torsten perceived the cracking of the man’s neck and cringed. He knew the amount of pressure required to snap the spine and couldn’t imagine the lithe barmaid possessing the strength to produce it.
“Are you done toying with your food, apprentice?” That same Breklian assassin asked. Now that he wasn’t fighting, he sounded more refined. The accent remained thick, but it reeked of Breklian nobility.
“Not until she suffers,” Sigrid said.
“She already has. Now get up.”
Sigrid grunted as she was torn free of the Queen. Oleander no longer screamed; she couldn’t. All that was left were her tears. Torsten pushed through the pain and finally removed the broken door with the help of a brave citizen inside the church. His mind raced in confusion. A Breklian assassin from the Dom Nohzi order and Sigrid knowing each other—none of it made any sense. But they were both after Oleander.
Torsten slid Salvation from his back-sheathe and charged. “Unhand her, you filth!” he bellowed.
The Breklian sighed, then before Torsten knew it, the man was across the courtyard, and Torsten felt a blow to his stomach. Even wearing his armor, all the air fled his lungs as he doubled over, the sword of Liam Nothhelm slipping from his grasp. He’d never been struck so hard in his life. It reminded him of when the rebel Afhem Muskigo had punched him in Winde Port. But this…
“Help me,” Oleander wept. “Torsten, help me!”
“How’s it feel, nobody answerin yer cries?” Sigrid said.
“Enough, girl,” the Breklian said.
“Enough? This is what she deserves, ain’t it!” she shouted for all to hear. Torsten could still barely breathe, let alone answer. “There ain’t one of ye who wouldn’t do the same. And now, her reign ends.”
As Torsten clutched his chest, he listened to Sigrid’s grip tighten around the shaft of an arrow, then the blade driving downward. He wished he hadn’t spent time honing his hearing so he wouldn’t know, but he did. The tip plunged toward Oleander’s chest, only, right before it struck, the Breklian grabbed her wrist, the sound of flesh on flesh.
“What’re ye doing?” Sigrid said, struggling. “Ye said the blood pact is made!”
“The Sanguine Lords will have what is theirs,” the Breklian said.
“Then let me finish it.”
“Focus, young one. It can’t be personal for us, and it can’t be about hunger. I learned that the hard way. Clearly, you aren’t yet ready for what Dom Nohzi means.”
Torsten listened to the argument with rapt attention, still unable to move or breathe.
“I am ready!” Sigrid protested. “I opened my eyes from Elsewhere faster than any before me, you said so yerself.”
“I don’t blame you, Sigrid. It took me centuries here and years in exile with that feckless thief to truly understand. We are the hand that guides this world from the shadows. The sculptors of life and death.”
“Ye promised me she was mine,” Sigrid said, softly.
“Only the Sanguine Lords make promises. You will make your mark. For now, sate your thirst on one of them. Your eyes, I can see it. You hunger. It’s okay, my child. The early days are hardest.”
“No, she’s mine!”
“I will not warn again!” the Breklian’s voice thundered. A thud sounded, and Sigrid’s body slid across the courtyard, bashing through a fountain-statue of Iam’s eye in the center before stopping somewhere near Torsten.
“Now, fair, Queen Oleander,” the Breklian said, his tone immediately calming. “It has been ages since the Sanguine Lords have accepted the demand for royal blood. Be honored. In your death, we rise again.”
“Torsten…” Oleander wheezed.
He could feel her staring at him, heartbroken. It helped him muster the strength to crawl toward her and make one final attempt at thwarting the assassin. His hand landed, wrapping a loose stone from the church’s doorway, but before he could pry it free, Sigrid’s tiny hand fell atop it, her flesh felt as cold as the flattened peak of Mount Lister.
“He left me alone with them, for ye,” Sigrid said, seething.
“Sigrid, you have to stop this,” Torsten said. “We can stop this.”
“No one can.”
A pair of fangs sank into Torsten’s neck. Cold surged down to his chest like icicles. He knew what was happening. Parents told stories about the upyr, blood-sucking fiends living simultaneously in both Iam’s domain and Elsewhere. In some legends, they served amongst the Order of the Dom Nohzi. In others, they were a sickness born from the Culling of ages passed when evil allowed the dead to roam the world. Now he knew the truth.
Sigrid’s tongue lapped at the wound. She groaned in ecstasy.
“Let Sir Unger go, girl,” a man shouted. His voice was Breklian as well, only Torsten remembered it from a few days before in Valin’s Vineyard. Codar, truly arriving this time.
Sigrid dropped Torsten against the cold stone. Blood oozed from the fang marks, but he couldn’t move to stem the flow. It felt like a tree made of ice, spreading its roots throughout his body, making him numb everywhere.
“Grandson,” the Breklian assassin said. Oleander released a bloodcurdling cry as he stopped doing whatever he was doing to her to address Codar. Torsten hoped not drinking her as Sigrid had been him. “I wondered if you’d show.”
“I had to get you back here, Kazimir,” Codar said.
“Hundreds every day wish for the death o
f their kings and queens. Never content. Few come to us, yet the Sanguine Lords have rejected altering the fate of men in such a way… until now.”
“You…” Sigrid snarled. “I’ll kill you!”
“Sit down!” the man called Kazimir bellowed. Again, Sigrid flew back and landed beside Torsten. She groaned as she struggled to return to her feet.
“Somehow, I always knew you’d serve a purpose for us,” Kazimir said.
“My purpose is here,” Codar replied.
“You could have served at my side for millennia. Instead, you reject immortality, like your father, to what, play house here with crime lords?”
“With Valin, I was no longer a shadow,” Codar said.
“No, just a coward.”
Metal rasped from Codar’s direction.
“Put those silly knives away before you hurt yourself,” Kazimir said. “You made your decision, Codar. Now, have you come here to watch us work?”
“I’ve come to stop you,” Codar said.
“It’s too late for that.”
“You are a perversion of our people’s dark past, Kazimir. A monster leftover from the Culling, nothing more. I knew you’d come, and now I will end you, and our once great family which you destroyed will be remembered again.”
Kazimir laughed. “History is for those who didn’t live it. You think books tell anything about what I did? Go along and play with your master.”
“No,” Codar replied. “Your time is finally up.”
He charged, and all Torsten could do was listen.
Sigrid shouted, “No!” grabbed her bow, and let an arrow fly. Kazimir said the same right before Codar collapsed at his feet.
“What have you done!” Kazimir roared. “Codar, Codar.” Torsten couldn’t see where he’d been hit, but judging by the way he struggled for air, his lung was most likely punctured.
“Now… you… serve our purposes, grandfather,” Codar forced out.
“You knew she…” Kazimir caught his breath.
“Still struggling… to raise your children… I see.”
“Impressive, boy,” Kazimir said.
“Don’t make me one…” Codar begged. “Please.”
“Never,” Kazimir said. “When you find your father in Elsewhere, tell him—”
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