Innkeeper Chronicles 3.5: Sweep of the Blade

by Ilona Andrews

Talking about it hurt, like ripping off a scab before new skin had a chance

  to form underneath. “No. A part of me wanted to, very much. I loved

  him. He was my husband and the father of my child. But even then I had

  realized that we were all in service to his ambition. I warned him then it

  would be the end of everything.”

  “Was it?”

  Maud nodded. “Yes. His brother survived. One of the assailants had

  lived as well. He was interrogated. They came for us that night. We were

  exiled to Karhari. All three of us.”

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  Karat’s expression turned sharp. “Who would exile a child? Especially to

  Karhari. It’s a wasteland. An anus of the Galaxy.”

  “Someone who is desperate to defend their family name.” Maud set her

  glass on the table. “House Ervan is young. They are desperate for

  respectability that comes with age and history.”

  “You can’t falsify that currency. It must be bought with generations.”

  “Well, they tried. They would kill you for this castle, if they

  could. Everything had to be just so. Every tradition followed. Propriety

  of

  every

  detail

  examined.

  Appearances

  kept.

  They

  overcompensated. Do you know who doesn’t fit into traditions? A

  human and her daughter.”

  “She is a child of House Ervan,” Karat said. “They had a responsibility to

  her no matter what her father did.”

  “They didn’t see it that way. We have a saying on Earth: three strikes

  and you’re out. I was strike one, Helen was strike two, and the

  attempted assassination of my brother-in-law was strike three. I realized

  this as I begged for my daughter’s life on my knees.”

  Karat winced.

  “They wanted to be rid of us, all of us. They struck us out from the roster

  and dumped us on Karhari. It was if we never existed.”

  “What happened at Karhari?” Karat asked.

  “The planet devoured my husband’s soul. It drove him mad. Eventually

  he betrayed the wrong people and they killed him.”

  Karat stared at her.

  Maud finished her wine. “I know why you came here. You wanted to

  know what kind of baggage we bring to your House. We have no ties to

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  House Ervan. We are strangers to them. We have settled the blood debt

  on Karhari. My husband’s killers are dead. No one alive has a claim on

  my life or the life of my daughter. No one is owed. We bring no debts

  and no allies. We are what we appear to be.”

  “Oh, I doubt that,” Karat said. “You are much more than you appear to

  be.”

  You have no idea. “Have I answered your questions, my lady?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then it’s my turn. How angry is Lady Illemina?”

  “How angry is a rabid krahr?” Karat slumped against the back of her chair

  with a sigh. “Arland is brilliant, when he is here. He’s almost never

  here. First, he developed a fascination with Earth and Earth women. Did

  he tell you we have a cousin who is married to one?”

  “My sister mentioned it.”

  “They live on the other side of the planet. She is some sort of scientist

  that studies insects.”

  “An entomologist?”

  “Yes. The other day she was late to her own daughter’s birthday because

  she’d found some new beetle nobody had ever seen before. What good

  are beetles? They are neither food nor pets. I would’ve squashed it. You

  never know when one of them turns out to be poisonous.”

  Vampire worldview, condensed into three sentences: if it’s not food or

  pet, kill it, because it might be poisonous.

  “She doesn’t get involved in politics, she isn’t interested in combat, and

  if you talk to her for five minutes, your eyes will glaze over, but she is a

  pretty woman and he loves her, Hierophant bless him.”

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  Maud hid a smile.

  “Then Arland starts disappearing. Where is Arland? He is off on some

  adventure at some inn on Earth. Everything is Earth. Broker a peace

  treaty? Earth. Go shopping for a unique present for his favorite

  cousin? Earth.”

  “What did he get you?” I asked.

  “Coffee. It’s of an excellent quality, but when would I ever need ten

  pounds of it? It’s enough to get the entire knighthood roaring drunk. The

  next thing we know, he skips out on the wedding preparations, because

  someone on Earth needs his help. Because the needs of his House are

  clearly fisur’s kidneys. He goes to Karhari and then there is this footage

  of him tearing out of some armored hovel with vampires in crappy armor

  clinging to him and him roaring like he is some hero in a period drama.”

  Maud lost it and laughed.

  “You don’t understand.” Karat waved her hands. “The damn thing was

  everywhere. He brained seven vampires singlehandedly. So Karhari

  Houses are screaming bloody murder, our relatives twelve generations

  removed are forwarding the recording to us, our allies are asking why

  our marshal is involved in a brawl on some backwater planet and if we

  sent him there as a plan for some sort of secret offensive and if so, why

  haven’t we told them about it, and we keep getting marriage proposals

  because half the Galaxy decided he is good breeding stock. I saw my

  father’s and aunt’s faces when they watched it. They turned a color not

  found in nature. It’s not funny!”

  Maud tried to stop, but it was like trying to hold back a flood. It’s nerves,

  she told herself.

  “Go ahead.” Karat rolled her eyes. “Get it all out. Not only did he make

  us the focal point of the entire Anocracy for two solid weeks, he then

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  refused to return because he needed a sojourn. He threw this bomb into

  our house and went on vacation! Then he sent a message: I’m coming

  home with a human bride. Oh wait, she said no, but I’m bringing her

  anyway. Prepare the castle!”

  Maud made a heroic effort to stop laughing.

  “I thought my aunt’s head would explode. I honestly did. So no, you

  won’t get a warm reception.”

  “That’s okay,” Maud managed. “I didn’t expect one.”

  “I realize it’s through no fault of your own, but my aunt will test you at

  every turn. She made it bloody obvious she is displeased, and we are

  pack animals.”

  “When the leader snarls, everyone will jump in to help.”

  “In essence, yes.” Karat gave her a sour smile. “I was going to jump in

  too, but my father convinced me to keep an open mind. I actually like

  you now, so my position is complicated. It will be an uphill battle.” The

  vampire woman leaned forward. “Do you want to do this? I mean, do

  you really?”

  “Yes. I’m here. I showed up.”

  Karat sighed. “That’s what I was afraid of. Well, the first step is

  dinner. It will be held tonight, in about three hours.”

  “Armor on?”

  “Armor on,” Karat confirmed. “You have that time to make yourself

  presentable, although in your case there not really enough hair to do

  anything with. Why short hair?�
��

  She’d cut her hair off the first day she got to the planet. She was done

  being a vampire marshal’s wife. It was her offering to Karhari. The

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  period at the end of one stage of life and her bribe to the universe to

  keep Helen alive. But explaining that would be complicated so she said

  the same thing she’d told her sister. “Very little water on Karhari. It was

  too hard to keep clean.”

  “Too bad,” Karat said. “Do you need anything?”

  “What happens to the children?” Maud asked.

  “Helen can stay with other children or she can remain here in the

  quarters.”

  “Helen?” Maud called. “I have to go to a grown-up dinner and you can’t

  come, my flower. Do you want to play with other children or stay here

  by yourself?”

  “I want to play,” Helen said.

  Maud swallowed a sigh. Helen would have to integrate into vampire

  society sooner or later. Maud had hoped to be there. She wanted with

  every ounce of her to smooth the way, to make sure nothing bad

  happened, to help, but she couldn’t. She had to let her daughter go.

  Some lessons Helen had to learn on her own.

  “Very well,” she said.

  “I will either come myself or send someone by half an hour before the

  dinner,” Karat said. “I would guess Arland will want to escort you, but

  knowing my aunt, she will make sure he’s busy with something vital

  instead.”

  And that was exactly what she’d expected. “I will make do,” Maud said.

  Karat narrowed her eyes. “I think you will. If I don’t see you until the

  meal, best of luck.”

  55

  Chapter 4 Part 1 and 2

  February 19, 2018 by Ilona

  The door chimed at fifteen minutes till seven.

  Maud opened it. A retainer stood in the doorway. She was young, about

  twenty or so, with long brown hair tamed into a sleek waterfall and

  secured with an elaborate hair net of thin knotted chains. A ceremonial

  garment the color of blood hugged her figure, close cut in the bodice,

  with relaxed sleeves caught at the wrist and a long skirt, split on the sides

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  up each thigh. The slits betrayed a glimpse of black, skin tight pants.

  Vampires rarely showed skin.

  The front and back of the skirt fell in graceful folds almost to the floor,

  like an artist’s rendition of a medieval tabard. The outfit was purely

  ceremonial, Maud reflected. No sane knight, human or vampire, would

  run into battle with a long piece of cloth tangling between their legs, but

  it was in line with vampire fashion, or at least what Maud remembered

  of it.

  The retainer gave her a quick once over, her gaze snagging on Maud’s

  jet-black armor with its blank crest. “We will leave now.”

  That bordered on rudeness. Clearly the news had spread through House

  Krahr. The human was out of favor. Vampires were a predictable

  lot. There was a time when she found comfort in that predictability.

  “Come, Helen,” Maud called.

  Helen came over. She wore a blue tunic, caught with a silver sash over

  white leggings and undertunic. Little brown boots caught her

  feet. Maud had brushed her hair and worked it into the customary

  vampire mane. She looked so adorable, Maud snapped a couple of

  pictures for Dina.

  The retainer saw Helen and fought a smile. “Come this way.”

  They followed the retainer through a long hallway into a round chamber,

  then into another hallway, and to a door. The door slid open as they

  approached, revealing a narrow stone walkway stretching to another

  tower. The weather had turned, the dark, furious sky flinging rain at the

  castle and the plateau beyond, and a transparent roof shielded the

  walkway from the weather’s rage. It was like walking into a storm,

  suspended hundred of feet above the ground. Helen’s grip on her fingers

  tightened. Maud smiled at her and kept walking.

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  The other tower loomed ahead, a much wider and larger structure.

  “How old is the fortress?” Maud asked.

  The retainer paused. Maud hid a smile. As a mongrel human, she clearly

  wasn’t worth an answer, but rules of hospitality prescribed courtesy

  when interacting with guests.

  Politeness won. “The core of the castle is twenty-three centuries. We

  have expanded it over the generations.”

  An understatement of the year.

  They reached the second tower. The dark door swung open, and they

  entered another hallway. The stone of the walls here was smoother,

  newer, cut with greater precision. Lights, soft golden spheres, hung from

  the twenty-foot ceiling in artful bunches, bathing the hallway in a golden

  radiance. The blood-red banners of House Krahr spanned the height of

  the walls. At the far end of it, double doors stood wide open, offering a

  glimpse of the feast hall. Sounds of conversation floated over.

  The retainer turned left and stopped before an open door. A pair of

  knights in full armor waited at the entrance, one male and the other

  female, both middle-aged and thick through the shoulders. A single slice

  of red marked their House Crests like a rip of a single claw. Sentinels, the

  knights trained specifically to guard against an intrusion. Both were

  armed. Child’s laughter rang behind them.

  “The child stays here,” the retainer said.

  Maud crouched by Helen. “I’ll be back soon, okay?”

  “Okay,” Helen said quietly.

  “You will get to play with other kids. Practice rules only.”

  “Okay,” Helen said.

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  “Repeat it back to me please.”

  “Practice rules only, mama.”

  “Good girl,” Maud kissed her daughter’s forehead and straightened.

  The male knight stepped aside, and Helen walked into the room. Maud

  watched her go.

  “Your daughter will be safe,” the female knight told her. “The keepers

  of the children watch them closely. They won’t permit other children to

  harm her.”

  It’s not her I’m worried about. She had no choice. At some point Helen

  would have to interact with outer kids to see if she could fit in. Maud

  nodded and followed the retainer to the feast hall.

  #

  The feast hall occupied a huge square chamber. Large rectangular

  tables, carved from sturdy wood ages ago, filled the room, each sitting

  ten guests. In the center of the hall, the Host table stood, marked by a

  metal pole supporting the standard of House Krahr. The guests were

  seated in order of receding importance, the higher the rank, the closer

  to the host table. Servers glided back and forth.

  “You sit there,” retainer pointed to the table closest to the wall. A group

  of tachi had arranged themselves there. “With the insects.”

  It was customary to walk a guest to her table, no matter how far from

  the host table she was seated. That was just about enough.

  “They are not insects,” Maud said. “They are tachionals. They are warm-

  blooded, with a centralized brain. They give live birth, nurse their young,

  and the sharp edges of their arms can slice a vampire’s head o
ff her

  shoulders with a single swipe. You would do well to remember that.”

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  The retainer stared at her, open-mouthed. Maud strode to the

  table. The tachi appeared to ignore her approach, but their exoskeletons

  remained a nebulous, bluish grey. Tachi at rest turned darker, revealing

  their speckled patterns. It was a sign of trust and often a promise of

  intimacy.

  If they stood, they would be slightly taller than her, right around six

  feet. They had two main legs with shins that curved too far backward for

  human comfort, and two short vestigial appendages, pointing backward

  from their pelvises, false legs, a reminder of evolution. The vestigial legs

  had two joints and a very limited range of movement, but when a tachi

  sat, they gripped the seat, anchoring them in place, which greatly helped

  them in spaceflight and aerial combat. A tachi was just as comfortable

  upright as upside down.

  Their bodies narrowed at the waist, developing into an elegant thorax

  that could almost pass for a very thin human clad in segmented

  armor. Their backs curved backward, the thick exoskeletal plates hiding

  their wings. Two arms, joined to the body not at the sides, like in humans

  and vampires, but slightly forward, a neck, and a round head shielded by

  three chitin segments, each with slits for a pair of glowing eyes. Nine

  tachi in all. The female in the center wore a crystal bracelet filled with

  gently glowing fluid. Pale green flecks floated within it, shifting every

  time the tachi moved. A royal. The rest were bodyguards, likely elite.

  They should’ve never been seated that far from the host table. She

  couldn’t even see it from here. It was an insult and the tachi were

  sensitive to such slights. Vampires were somewhat xenophobic,

  especially toward aliens who didn’t look like mammals, so the fact that

  the tachi were permitted here at all meant something significant was on

  the line. An alliance, a trade agreement. Something of value. This was

  a tactical blunder. She would have to mention it to Arland.

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  Where was Arland? She didn’t expect him to sit with her – that would

  be pushing against all Holy Anocracy customs – but he could’ve at the

  very least strolled by. Just to see that she was actually present.