Dallan saw again the broken body of his friend in Weishi House. Driven to suicide. Not much older than Dallan’s son. Guilt surged and tears pricked his eyes. He clenched his jaw to hold in a groan of despair.
He’d honestly thought people would rally to his call for help. More people than two teenage girls. He was a shazi. Maybe Teya was right: people were selfish and untrustworthy. A weight settled on his shoulders and he sagged against the bars of his prison.
‘There is no way of doing this with just us, Teya. I’m sorry. I was a shazi to think I could. We’d need an army to go against someone like Han. No-one’s going to risk themselves on such a slim chance.’
Teya gave a little gasp. She was staring into middle distance.
Dallan frowned. ‘What—’
She shot to her feet and grasped at his arm, coughing again. When she could speak, she glared at him. ‘What if I could make him think we have an army?’
‘How will that help?’ He slapped the bars and they rang, musical. ‘Even if we could get out of this, you can only show illusions to one person.’
Her jaw hardened. ‘I lied. I used to be able to fool five, but after learning from Ying, I can do more.’
‘How many more?’ Hope floated in his chest.
She shrugged one shoulder. ‘Not sure, yet. Ten. Twenty, maybe.’
Dallan sighed. ‘Not the whole hall full of Juns, and House Masters and Mistresses out there, then?’
‘No. But I won’t let Han have my brother.’ Her lip curled. ‘Don’t worry. I don’t expect your help to kill Han.’ She shook the bronze bars, and inspected where they drove into the sulcrete floor and timber ceiling. They held solid. ‘Just help me get out of here.’
Dallan scowled. The weishi had taken his jacket and weapons as well as his boots, which held his lockpicks.
Teya gave a frustrated cry and thumped the bars. She sagged against them with her arms around her stomach and eyes closed. Water puddled at her feet and dripped from her sodden clothes. She must be freezing and there were no blankets here.
He straightened, excitement tingling in his gut. ‘I have an idea.’ He inspected her soaked tunic and trous. ‘Take off your clothes.’
‘What?’
He pointed. ‘Give me your trous. I think I can get us out of here.’ Scanning the other prisoners, he caught the attention of a girl about Teya’s age. ‘You. Can you keep an eye on the door and let me know if the guards are coming?’
The girl swallowed, and nodded. She hurried to the nearby corner and craned to see through the grill set into the door.
Teya stripped her pants and handed him her dripping trous, glaring. Around them, a muttering and low growling washed through the younger men in the cell. She turned the glare on them.
Dallan did the same. ‘Touch her and she’ll scream for the weishi. If you want to get home to your families, shut the gouri up. Got it?’
Several men and boys exchanged dubious glances, but they settled.
Conscious of dozens of hungry eyes, Dallan wound the wet trous around two bronze bars at about waist height and began to twist the cloth together in a knot. Water poured from the bamboo cloth, soaking his bare feet. For a long time, nothing happened. Each turn became more difficult. More water dripped out. Then, slowly, the bronze bars bent toward each other, creaking.
A gasp susurrated around the cell, followed by hopeful whispers. Dallan shushed them and they subsided.
At last, the bars touched and the trous were dry. He unwound and passed them to Teya. She pulled them on and stripped off her tunic, standing bare-breasted and shivering in the cold cell. Blood dribbled down her shoulder. She half-turned from the crowd and he saw, for the first time, the horrifying burn scars disfiguring her back. Dallan passed her his tunic and she tugged it on with a grateful nod.
He used her tunic to bend the second pair of bars, leaving a gap large enough for an average man to squeeze through sideways.
When it was done, and they were both dressed again, he eyed the crowd. They edged closer, full of hope for the first time. In the other two cells, the occupants pressed against the bars, eyes huge with envy and despair.
‘There’s your army,’ Teya murmured.
‘Closest thing we’re likely to get, anyway,’ Dallan agreed. He raised his voice slightly. ‘There are three cells and only one that has a way out. But I want everyone to get out. Agreed?’
A few exchanged looks and more nodded.
‘How?’ the girl who’d played lookout asked. ‘We have no weapons and no keys.’
‘Leave that to Teya and me,’ he said. ‘We’ll get you out. But in return we need help.’
The girl glanced over her shoulder at the other inmates and they exchanged shrugs and nods.
‘Right,’ Dallan said. ‘I need to try one more thing before we leave. We need a distraction. Hang on.’ He lowered his outer wards. Hopefully Ying was listening out for him, as she’d promised. He hated to drag the young xintou into this, but he was running out of time and options.
Ying? He waited, his palms slick with sweat and as he anticipated a fight. Ying?
Yes! She sounded excited. I’m here. Is Perrin there? Is Teya alright? The hunli ceremony was all very beautiful. Everything’s decorated in Han’s colours, though. But Jenna’s looking at him like she can’t think of anything else. There’s a woman in the front row who must be Teya’s mother. She looks like her, but dark haired. And her little baby boy is adorable. And I keep having to duck to hide from Mistress Shana. I’m afraid she’ll try and Read me or ask me to let my wards down and make me tell her what’s going on. But she does seem very focussed on Jenna and Han, so she’s probably not thinking about me, is she? I wonder if she—
Ying! There are four weishi here. We were caught and we’re in the cells. Perrin’s not here. I need the weishi distracted so we can get out. Can you help?
Oh! Of course. Wait a minute.
There was a sense of absence. Dallan gestured to Teya and squeezed through the gap in the bars. He turned to the girl prisoner.
‘Wait here. I’ll get the keys.’
‘But we could help!’
‘I don’t want anyone to get hurt.’ He shot her the same look he gave his teenage son and she glared in the same, rebellious fashion.
Teya followed him to the cellblock door and they both peeked through the bronze-barred grille inset into the timber.
Where was Ying? The door to the front of house creaked open, letting in light and noise. A small, gold-clad figure skipped down the stairs. The translucent gold veil hid her eyes, but Ying’s pouty mouth curved into the most innocent smile he’d ever seen.
Dallan grinned. Beside him, Teya’s slim form tensed. He leaned close.
‘Wait. Don’t waste your strength casting illusions. Wait and see what Ying does, first.’
‘I’m fine,’ she snapped.
He studied her blue-tinged lips, and the dark stain on her shirt. ‘You’re not and you need to save your strength for Han.’ She hesitated, then nodded.
‘Hello!’ Ying’s cheerful greeting lilted.
Two weishi snapped to attention. The other two rose from the table and hurried over, bowing low. Dallan tested the door. Unlocked. But one weishi faced the cellblock door, so any movement would alert him.
‘Oh, dear,’ Ying trilled. ‘I think I’m very lost. Will someone help me find the bathrooms? Oooh! Is this the prison? I’ve never seen a prison before. You all must be terribly brave, guarding all these awful people.’ She wandered away from the stairs, inspecting a rack of weapons on the wall. All four weishi turned with her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
DALLAN
Dallan and Teya slipped from the cellblock and behind a supporting wall that protruded into the room. Ying rattled on. It was almost amusing listening to the confused weishi trying to answer the questions tumbling artlessly from her tongue.
Dallan’s steel sword and boots lay on a table nearby, along with the boning knife and Teya’s bronze da
gger. No keys to the cells, though. He edged over, retrieved their things and retreated. Teya shoved the bronze knife into her belt and watched the weishi while Dallan dragged the boots on and hung his scabbards about his hips. Dallan dug into a pocket in his bootheel and produced a pair of lockpicks.
‘C’mon,’ he whispered, returning to the cells.
He held out the lockpicks. ‘Anyone know how to use these?’
A young man about eighteen or nineteen rose from the floor of the first locked cell, nodding. The rest in his cell stirred, hunger for freedom awakening hope again.
‘You need to wait ten minutes after we leave, got it?’ Dallan gauged the boy’s mettle. He seemed to have the determination needed. ‘Then break out everyone here and storm upstairs. The great hall is full of people—and weishi. But if you all work together, most of you will get out. Since you’re all being held for ransom, I suspect many of those people could be your families.’
The lad checked with his cellmates. They urged him to take the picks.
Dallan passed them through. ‘Make as much noise as you can.’
‘Why?’ The boy’s voice was husky and broken.
‘Because you’ll be serving as a distraction while my friends and I do our best to kill Jun Fourth Han Gray-Saud. How does that sound?’ Dallan grinned fiercely.
The boy lit up and his companions straightened. There were nods and mutterings of agreement. Dallan shushed them.
‘Remember,’ he said, ‘ten minutes. Good luck.’
The youngster held the lockpicks tight against his chest.
Dallan returned to the door, listened long enough to hear Ying still nattering away, and snuck out again. He made his way to the shadowed lee of the wall where Teya waited. She leaned against the stone, sucking shallow, quick breaths.
Ying had seen him pass behind the weishi but hadn’t faltered in her chatter. She could talk underwater, that child. He rested against the cool stone for a second while his heart settled.
Then he opened his wards. Ying?
Oh, thank goodness! I’ve run out of things to say!
Sorry. Just warning you. I’m going to have to kill them. I want the prisoners to escape and I need to get the weishi out of their way. Get to the stairs. Try not to watch.
There was a shocked silence, both inside his mind and outside. He forced himself to wait, trying not to swear or push her too hard.
He added, The prisoners are being held for ransom, remember? They’re not criminals, Ying. Most of them are teenagers and children caught out late after curfew.
Her talk started again, but her laughter sounded forced. One weishi interrupted and respectfully suggested she should be abovestairs with the rest of the guests. She agreed and begged them in honeyed tones if they would help find her entourage as it was such a press of people!
Two of them followed her up the stairs. Dallan palmed the boning knife. Not enough room to swing a sword properly and any clang of his steel against their ceramic blades would be loud.
He ghosted from his hiding place. A quick thrust drove the knife into the gap in one weishi’s alzin armour, beneath his arm. Into his heart. The man gargled, clutched at Dallan, and sagged to the floor. Blood spurted from the wound and glistened on his dark uniform.
The second weishi turned. Dallan sliced his throat with the knife. The weishi scrabbled at his neck and slumped against the wall, his eyes wide. At the top of the stairs, Ying shoved a weishi in the stomach. He overbalanced, arms wheeling. With one hand he latched onto his companion and both tumbled down the stairs in a flurry of arms and legs.
They landed in a tangle at Dallan’s feet, swearing at Ying and at each other. Ying remained at the top of the stairs, palms clamped over her mouth, eyes wide.
Dallan plunged the knife into a vein, gritting his teeth against the warm spray of blood and the weishi’s gurgling cry. The metallic smell of iron-rich blood filled the room.
The remaining man, wiry and quick, leapt to his feet. He sprinted up the stairs and snatched Ying into his arms. His dagger pricked a bead of blood from her skin. She blurted a faint scream and stiffened.
‘Drop the knife or I’ll kill her,’ he snarled.
Dallan hefted the slim knife, feeling the weight and balance. No good for throwing. Too big a risk of hurting Ying. He dropped it.
‘You do realise she’s a xintou?’ he said.
The weishi sneered. ‘A child. And I’m warded. Besides, everyone knows xintou are taught nothing but peace and diplomacy feihua. She won’t hurt me. Now—’ He choked, eyes rolling back. Releasing Ying, he clawed at his skull and slumped against the wall, uttering feeble cries. He collapsed and slid bonelessly to the foot of the stairs.
Teya’s expression was contemptuous. ‘She might not, but I will.’
Dallan used the boning knife and despatched him with a slice to the jugular. More blood seeped across the stone floor, glistening garnet-dark.
Ying hurried down the stairs, avoiding the bloodied bodies strewn across the floor. She threw her arms around Teya’s waist.
‘You’re alright!’
Teya awkwardly patted her. ‘I guess. But we have to go.’
‘Oh! Of course.’ Ying tidied her veil and smoothed her rumpled robe. ‘But we can’t go that way.’ She pointed at the stairs. ‘There are hundreds of people and all the important families have weishi. And you…’ She wrinkled her nose at Teya’s bloodied, wrinkled tunic and wet hair.
‘Kitchen’s this way.’ Dallan jerked his head toward the other entrance. ‘And there’s a servants’ entrance to the upper floors through it. Ying, you should go to Neri. I don’t want you involved.’
The young xintou studied the dead guards and swallowed. ‘I already am, shenshi. And a xintou’s job is to keep the peace in the jundom. Letting slavers take over would not be the right thing to do.’
Dallan groaned. ‘I can’t protect you.’
‘I don’t need protecting.’ Her tone was confident but her eyes darted to the bodies.
He gave up. ‘Teya? Ready?’
Her skin was waxen, breathing laboured. She nodded and straightened. ‘Let’s go.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
TEYA
Teya crept along in Dallan’s wake, trying to ignore the knives stabbing into her chest and the blood trickling along her arm. Ying held onto Teya’s tunic. When Teya hissed at her to let go, the xintou set her mouth and held tighter.
The kitchen staff did little more than gape at the oddly-assorted trio. A few sketched bows to Ying’s golden robe without knowing who she was. How could they? Whispers ran around the room until a big, redfaced woman with frizzy hair yelled at her workers to get on with it and stop gawping.
Dallan strode through like he owned the place, bestowing a regal nod on the woman and aiming for a small door in the opposite corner.
Once through, he paused in the cooler darkness of a narrow hallway and whispered, ‘I give us five minutes at most before she sends word or checks the prison. We need to move fast.’
The corridor ahead split into three choices. One kept going west, one went north and up a straight staircase. The third was a well-worn, spiral staircase set into the wall.
Dallan pointed to the spiralling risers. ‘That’s the servants’ entrance leading to the Jun First’s apartments on the third floor.’
Teya tugged on his sleeve. ‘If there are weishi at the top it’s a flat-out kill-box, you know that, don’t you?’
He nodded, grim. ‘But the only other entrance is through the great hall, the main staircase, and the front door of Jenna’s rooms. Not an option.’
Teya nodded and smothered a cough. Dallan drew his sword and held the boning knife in his left hand. The staircase spiralled anticlockwise, so he would be at a disadvantage against a right-handed swordsman coming from above, as they would have no wall to interfere with their sword-strikes.
They passed a door on the first floor. Teya struggled for air. Dallan regarded her with concern. She ignored him.
<
br /> By the time they reached the landing for the third floor, she judged close to five minutes had passed since they left the prison cells. No time to waste. If the prisoners swarmed into the great hall full of guests, chaos would erupt and the shouts and screams would interrupt even the most passionate hunli consummation.
She shuddered at the thought of Han touching the Jun First. Han was almost double Jenna’s age. How could the girl admire him that way? How couldn’t she see through his charm to the perverted blackness beneath?
‘Teya?’ Dallan stopped on the stairwell out of sight of the Jun First’s door. Drawing her close, he whispered, ‘Ready?
She nodded. Her practice with Ying last night had improved her speed in breaking through basic wards, but she still had no way of knowing how she would fare against really strong ones. And the energy that took was huge. She was already weak. What if she couldn’t get through Han’s? What if she hesitated again? What if—
No. She pushed aside the doubts.
‘Ying,’ Dallan whispered. ‘Once we’re in, you make sure the main doors are locked. I don’t want his weishi coming in. There are four rooms: the bedroom, a bath room, a bedroom for her body servant, and a sitting room. The sitting room and the maid’s room have the doors. But they’re at opposite ends of the suite. Lock the sitting room door, first. Got it?’
Ying peered around Teya. ‘Yes,’ she squeaked.
‘Teya,’ Dallan asked, ‘are you able to hold two different illusions at once on two people again?’
She shrugged. ‘Normally, yes. Right now, don’t know. I’m not…’ his image blurred for a moment ‘…feeling the best. Probably not for long.’
He swore. ‘Right. Then concentrate on Han. I’ll keep Jenna out of the way. Do whatever it takes to control him. If I know him, he’ll have my dagger in place of his own. Use it, if you can. If not, hold him with an illusion and you can use my sword. I’ll have your back.’
She nodded, not trusting herself to speak without coughing. Was he arranging it that way so he could lay the blame on her, afterward? He would be able to say honestly that he hadn’t killed Han if she did it for him. And if she did ii—if she gave him what he wanted—he would have no reason to help her find Perrin.
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