Blood Mercy (Blood Grace Book 1)

by Vela Roth

  The mage’s probe sputtered out. He turned his attention back to Lio. “Yes…just an animal of some sort.”

  Lio had seldom been so grateful for his superior education.

  “May I ask if you have concluded your evening meal?” the mage inquired.

  Lio showed Amachos a close-lipped smile, filling one more moment’s pause with the gesture, stalling for that much more time. “I thank you. Indeed, I too have enjoyed the plentiful gifts His Majesty has so liberally bestowed tonight. As you see, I was just returning to the comfort and welcome of my guest quarters within Solorum Fortress. I thought to go directly to bed, rather than return to the festival, for I suspect I am too late and have already missed the best of the dancing.”

  “Yes, I fear the prince’s temple day is concluding somewhat earlier than in past years. I can’t imagine why.”

  “Even so, such a celebration could not have been a disappointment to him. He is a truly fortunate young man.”

  “Indeed he is.” Amachos eyed Lio. “Well, I am relieved to hear all is well. When the royal groundskeepers found no evidence you had taken advantage of the king’s provisions, Basileus was troubled that what he set aside for you might be…insufficient.”

  “Evidence, Honored Master Amachos?”

  The mage put on a supercilious smile. “The remains of the deer, naturally.”

  “Only dead deer leave remains, Honored Master.” Lio made an effort to conceal his disgust.

  The mage subjected him to a piercing gaze. “I trust it is only venison for which you have a taste, honored guest?”

  Lio abandoned empty words. Such an insinuation called for a real response. How dare Amachos demand such gruesome proof of Lio’s honor? How dare the mage imply that the lack of a trail of deer carcasses behind Lio meant he was drinking from humans instead?

  Lio sensed Cassia’s presence disappear into the palace’s magical aura. She was safely away. He let his veil spell unravel into the night.

  He looked Amachos in the eye. “No Hesperine has a taste for flesh, much less death. Unlike my mortal hosts, I do not slaughter my dinner. I assure you, all those I have ‘taken advantage of’ on the king’s grounds walked away from the encounter.”

  “How…forbearing. The king will marvel to learn of how you contain yourself on his behalf. I shall return and reassure him.” The look in Amachos’s eyes said he would be watching Lio long after they parted company.

  Lio put a hand over his heart. “May the Goddess’s Eyes watch your path.”

  The mage’s smile twisted. Oh, so close to a sneer. A sudden flare of light broke the darkness, and when it cleared, Amachos was gone.

  Lio cringed at the intangible sparks that spat at him in the aftermath of the mage’s expense of power. He couldn’t believe Amachos had just performed a traversal. A working of that magnitude could leave a man bedridden, if he wasn’t careful. Moving from one place to another with magic might come naturally to Hesperines, but not to mortal mages. Apparently Amachos would not be outdone by an initiate heretic.

  When Lio reentered the barracks, he bowed to the guards at every turn to leave an impression on them, securing still more witnesses to his good behavior. At last he made it to the embassy’s guest quarters, where moonlight and darkness had taken over, and no guards dared tread to replenish the torches even when Aunt Lyta and Kadi’s ward did not bar them from entry. Lio was relieved to sense none of his elders in their rooms. It seemed he still had a little time before they returned from the palace. He retreated to his own chamber and sank down on the edge of the bunk.

  He looked down at his hands. Yes, they were shaking, and light pulsed around them.

  He could not remember ever feeling so angry in his life.

  Lio curled his hands into fists and shut his eyes. Behind his eyelids, the current of his own power shone bright white and blood red in his mind’s eye. He drew upon it, urging it into himself. Tonight it was like trying to herd the moons. The calm and joy he always felt in this moment, when he withdrew into himself to that place where only he and the Goddess dwelt, would not come to him.

  The Gift, his own Hesperine nature, had never felt this way to him before. As if he did not have the Gift. As if his Gift, cold and clear, heated and wild, had him.

  He had thought himself more reasonable than this. More altruistic. He was not prone to anger, never had been. But tonight his temper had arrived unannounced and determined to outstay its welcome.

  Lio must regain control of his emotions if he was to be any use tomorrow. It would be wrong to let the sun rise on his anger, and if only the Dawn Slumber proved enough to calm his ire, that would feel like defeat indeed.

  36

  Days Until

  SPRING EQUINOX

  Change of Plans

  It was strange how sound carried, or sometimes didn’t, within the inner walls of the Temple of Kyria. Cassia heard the hoofbeats in the outer court as clearly as she could hear her spade scraping the soil, but she couldn’t make out the voice of whoever had arrived.

  Her aches distracted her. The preceding winter months had left her gardening muscles out of practice and wrought calluses on her hands more suited to accommodate a shuttle than a spade. In a moment she might have to give in and straighten to rest her arms and rub her back. But her body had no cause to complain. It had been in its own bed for the past three nights, all night long. Never mind that she had slept poorly, thinking of what she had not done.

  Curse Deukalion for keeping her awake with thoughts of how close they had come to disaster. Curse him for inviting her out to the Font. The king’s own mage had nearly caught them together! She had felt Amachos brandishing his magic as she escaped.

  Cassia hurled aside the stone she had pried out of the soil. She was wiser than the idealistic, overconfident Hesperine. She knew when risk outweighed the answers she would never get. She would not venture into such dangerous territory again.

  “Lady Cassia.”

  At the sound of her name, Cassia finally straightened, rising up on her knees and allowing her body to stretch.

  Deutera stood at the end of the row. She wore her veil, and a line between her brows suggested worry. Or perhaps regret. “A messenger has come for you. He awaits you in the outer court.”

  The pain in Cassia’s limbs worsened from sudden tension. She got to her feet. Knight moved restlessly at the edge of the garden but did not disobey her command to stay out of the bed. As soon as she made it to the end of the row, he twined around her legs, eager to offer comfort.

  “We won’t completely clean up,” she told him. “We’ll be back after we’ve heard what the messenger has to say.” She paused only to set aside her tools. This could not be a summons.

  She and Knight followed Deutera around the inner wheel of the temple, through the walls that divided it like spokes and the gardens nestled in between. Cassia was coming to understand the purpose of the different segments and the ways of the soil in each. Most remained chill and hard in the grasp of winter, while others turned into lakes of mud as they thawed, but come spring, all would become home to the seedlings now tended so carefully indoors.

  Tendrils of Kyrian magery brushed Cassia’s arms as Deutera led her past women who nurtured the dirt with tools and spells. A group of apprentices stood laughing at a well, trying to wash mud from their dark blue robes. Splashes echoed off the walls, and sounds played tricks on Cassia’s ears again. Although the infirmary was in the outer temple, she heard a child moan.

  The cacophony faded as she and Deutera emerged from the nest of walls and fertile soil. They halted in the outer court, where the messenger in royal livery confronted Cassia. She knotted her hands in her apron and waited for the man to speak.

  He had a hard face that showed no expression. “His Majesty requires your presence.”

  That meant immediately. That meant the king was, for the first time, calling Cassia back from the temple in the middle of the day for all to see. What it meant beyond that she could not imag
ine, if she were to reach the palace on her feet.

  Trying to ignore the twisting pangs in her stomach, Cassia glanced down at herself and gestured to indicate the smears of soil on her apron. “I will take a moment to make myself fit to appear before him.”

  She must hurry. It would take too long to retrieve her tools. She must leave them and wash up at the nearest well.

  She turned to find one of the apprentices already standing near with the basket of tools in hand. Another young mage offered a damp cloth. Cassia breathed a grateful thank-you to both girls and tidied herself, then took off her soiled apron and made to fold it with the clean side facing outward. The result was a haphazard, wrinkled pile she stashed on top of her tools. She gripped the basket to her, made a courteous apology to Deutera that she forgot as soon as she said it, and turned back to the messenger.

  He was holding his horse for her. Waiting to pack her onto the animal and deliver her to the king.

  She wasted an extra instant rubbing away the moisture between her palms. Then she marched to the horse, and the messenger hoisted her into the saddle. He took the reins in hand and led her out of the temple.

  Knight paced beside her the whole way, now on one side, then on the other. He could not stand still, as if he wished to attack something, but could not spot it. Cassia focused her gaze on the countryside so the motion of the horse did not worsen what was going on in her belly.

  The ride felt interminable, and she wished it had lasted forever. The messenger deposited her in the main courtyard of the palace and informed her, “His Majesty awaits you in the solar.”

  The walk through the palace seemed too fast, although she walked slowly, swallowing at every step. Suddenly she found herself in the king’s wing. The corridor was full of sunny afternoon light falling upon her from the windows far, far above her head. The double doors that led to the king’s rooms stood open.

  The antechamber was full of guards. As she passed between their ranks, they chatted with each other as if she were not there.

  The solar door was closed. Would they make her ask for admittance? Would they make her open it herself?

  The door popped open, and Cassia jumped. Red-gold robes, oiled dark hair and an unremarkable face met her in the doorway.

  Amachos smiled at Cassia and held out his arm to invite her inside.

  No, no. He couldn’t know. He hadn’t told the king.

  Let it not be true that Amachos had seen her with Deukalion.

  “Lady Cassia.” The mage’s voice seemed to resound around her. “How very interesting to see you again.”

  The sunbeams swam in her vision, and the sight of the mage blurred before her. She could only hear his clear, deep voice. She stood there as if his words tethered her to the spot.

  No reprieve. No recourse. No escape.

  “Won’t you join us inside?” he commanded.

  Cassia feared the guards might have to push her over the threshold. If they did, what passed within would be infinitely worse. She forced herself to step inside. She made herself walk past Amachos, although her every instinct screamed that she mustn’t put her back to the enemy.

  She tried to ignore everything inside that room except the legs of the desk, where she pinned her gaze as she knelt. But in her mind’s eye, she saw each stick of rich furniture that cluttered the chamber. All fourteen of the swords on the walls. The arch of the great hearth, where a fire always burned, as in the kingdom’s forges. Most of all, every line graven on the face of the man who sat behind the desk. His hair and beard that had gone white while he occupied that chair. His blue eyes, which were as keen and piercing as they had been since Cassia could remember.

  “Well,” said Amachos behind her. “Out of all our daily afternoon meetings, Basileus, few have been so revelatory. I will leave you to…settle your family matter.”

  The door swung and landed shut with a quiet, final impact that sounded like a catapult. Cassia’s whole body jerked. The startle gave way to the slow burn of humiliation. She had betrayed her feelings.

  “What do you have to say for yourself, daughter?”

  Cassia swallowed again. He expected her to speak first?

  “Forgive me.” She hated the words and how broken each syllable sounded. “The messenger did not…that is, he had yet to tell me for what purpose you summoned me.”

  “Do you not already know?”

  Cassia clenched her teeth, willing her back not to tremble.

  Did the king know?

  She supposed others might have prayed in that moment, but all she could do was try to think. He was baiting her. She knew this; that open-ended question was a classic threat, a trap. If he didn’t know, she must not condemn herself.

  She heard the king shift in his chair, a warning her silence had stretched on too long already.

  “Forgive me,” she said again, pushing the words out of her tight throat. “I do not know.”

  “Your wrongdoing does not weigh on your conscience at all? That offends me most deeply. Even your mother had a greater sense of propriety.”

  Cassia waited. The glare of the sun streaming in the windows behind the king made pain erupt in her head, which felt as if it were much too near the ceiling. The promised rain hadn’t come yet. Knight shifted his body closer to her, and right in front of the king, she leaned on her dog to steady herself.

  “Go ahead,” the king commanded. “Ask me what you have done.”

  Cassia coaxed a breath into her nose and convinced it to form words. “What have I done? Your Majesty?”

  “You have done your brother a grave insult. He was angered to see you leave the feast in his honor so early. For his own sister to be among the first to depart…what sort of message do you think that sent to others in Our court?”

  Cassia felt the mad urge to laugh. So this was to be it. A boy’s party, her undoing at last.

  She had miscalculated. Over something so simple.

  “What do you have to say for yourself?” the king asked.

  “I saw Lady Hadrian leave, and I thought it acceptable to follow the example of one so esteemed.”

  “Lady Hadrian is not my daughter, nor is she the prince’s last surviving sister.”

  The hopeless laughter inside Cassia was gone. Something much more dire rose and raged, striving to fight its way out of her.

  She held it within herself with every ounce of will she had.

  “I. Was ill.”

  “Did you not feed a sample of every dish on your plate to the dog first, to ensure none of it would make you ill?”

  “Yes. It was not the food.” She cleared her throat. “I…I did not want to humiliate my brother by fainting before his guests. I thought it better to return to my chambers and not display my weakness before Your Majesty.”

  “It disturbs me that you always seek to hide your shame. Is there anything else you wish to confess?”

  “N—no.”

  “Is there anything else you ought to confess?”

  Her heartbeat pounded in her ears, throbbing with the pain in her head.

  Her life, as always, depended on her answer.

  What could she possibly do to make him believe her?

  She lifted her head, inch by inch. She tilted her eyes upward.

  His blue gaze burned into hers.

  “I have done nothing else that would offend Your Majesty or my beloved brother. Forgive me for my failure on his day of honor. It was…a feminine weakness.” The most convenient lie she could grasp at. She hadn’t used it yet this month. Had she? No. Time to contrive bloody rags for Perita to launder so the ruse would remain convincing.

  “So much time spent with the mages of Kyria, and yet their healing arts do nothing to assist you with womanly complaints.”

  “I shall consult with them…for a new remedy.”

  “See that you do. It is a hardship for Us for you to be unreliable.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty.”

  He tapped blunt fingertips on the surface of the des
k. “Go back to your rooms. Do not embarrass Us in that way again.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty.”

  She struggled to get her legs under her. If not for Knight, she would never have made it to her feet. She backed away, and the carpet seemed to clutch at her slippers. The knowledge that she stumbled in front of the king made her skin burn from scalp to belly. She still faced those cold blue eyes. Only when she got out the door and it shut on his gaze was she released.

  She turned and fled.

  No reprieve in her rooms. Perita sat by the fire at her mending. Cassia rushed past her without a word and shut the door of her bedchamber.

  She saw herself slamming it. Saw her hand reaching for her spade and throwing it against the wall so she could listen to it clang and echo on the stone. She heard all that in her mind only, for every real noise she made, whatever she did in this room, Perita would hear and report to the king.

  Cassia took her basket of gardening tools in both hands and hurled them with all her might onto the bed.

  Her spade rolled impotently on the soft bedclothes, scattering bits of soil. Packets of seeds landed all about and spilled their precious contents. Her apron fluttered over it all and landed with its unstained side up.

  Cassia made it to the basin on the floor by her bed just in time to avoid vomiting on herself. Knight nudged his head under her elbow until she wrapped one arm around him. She clung to him while her body heaved, pushing out and emptying everything from within her.

  When it was over, she crouched there and rested her forehead against Knight. She cleared her throat, then swallowed. Her voice was rough, but she managed a whisper for Knight’s ears to hear. “Change of plans.”

  Risks Reckoned

  Lio paused to sit on the lip of the old fountain. A shower had passed through around midnight and filled the thirsty basin. He wasn’t eager to return to the catacombs of their guest quarters or the pall of discouragement that hung over the embassy. Soon enough, he must go back to his room and make use of the time before dawn to log the depressing events of tonight’s Summit.