Allies & Assassins

by Justin Somper

  She felt she was dancing on a knife-edge with these words and was grateful when Silva gave a nod.

  “Of course, I knew. My mother and my older sister spelled it out for me. I was under no illusions. I had a duty to perform.”

  It was Asta’s turn to nod. She indicated the chaise and was pleased when Silva took up on her cue and sat down. Asta took her own seat, close beside Silva, and waited for the Prince’s Consort to resume.

  “Duty is important to me. the notion was drummed into me from an early age.” Silva paused to straighten the folds of her skirt. “I take my own duties very seriously. Which makes it hard when others fail to do theirs.”

  She sighed, her shoulders dropping a little, her small hands unclenching. It seemed to be doing her some good to talk. Asta remembered at a previous meeting Silva saying that Asta was akin to her confessor. This thought sent a new frisson through her. What exactly might Silva Lindeberg Wynyard now be about to confess to?

  “So you entered into this marriage knowing just what to expect. Your eyes were wide open.” Silva nodded as Asta continued. “But somewhere along the way, Anders cast a spell on you. I remember you telling me, when we first met, how kind he was toward you.”

  Another nod, then the flicker of a smile. “We were always good friends,” Silva said. “Right from the beginning. We joked about being soldiers of fortune, thrown together for the good of our nations. We made a pact to see one another through this unusual, but not unprecedented, situation by virtue of our friendship.”

  She broke off, her eyes falling to the floor. Asta had the sense that Silva had traveled back into her past, to the beginnings of her marriage. She knew she needed to pull her back, but gently.

  “But you grew to have greater expectations of him,” she said. “Perhaps it came from his own actions or simply from his charisma. But I’ve no doubt the fairy tale the court wove around you seduced you as much as anyone else.” Seeing Silva’s eyes fix on her again, Asta paused. “I’d have been exactly the same. I would have begun to lose the ability to distinguish between what was real and what was artfully constructed fantasy,”

  “I have no doubt that Anders loved me,” Silva said. “But it wasn’t a deep enough love.” She paused to correct herself. “No, that’s not it. It wasn’t the right kind of love. How could it be? You can’t be in love with two people at the same time, can you?”

  Asta shook her head, in part because she knew that was the response Silva needed. She was desperate to ask, “So, who was the Prince in love with?” but she knew that so overt a question might break the fragile bridge of trust between them. She saw Silva looking at her now. She could not remember seeing such sadness in a face before. It was not simply the face of someone feeling grief, but of someone who had given up on all hope.

  “You must have felt so frustrated,” Asta said, desperately seeking for words to fill the silence. “And lonely. You were asked to give up so much more than him. You did everything that was asked of you—from maintaining the image of the perfect marriage at all times to carrying Prince Anders’s child.”

  Silva nodded once more. Then her eyes moved to the low table between them and the note that Asta had carefully placed there before. As Silva’s hand reached forward, Asta read the note again.

  You call me your mystery, but I will share all my secrets with you, my love.

  Following Asta’s gaze, Silva reached down and snatched up the note. She read it again, wrinkling her nose as if it were assailed by a horrible odor, then she screwed up the note and tossed it across the floor. “Amoral bitch!” she declared sharply.

  Silva’s tone was as shocking as dipping a hand into the cold waters of the fjord. Asta felt that the Prince’s Consort had somehow crossed a line—was it due to grief or something more? She was behaving more and more erratically. Asta tried to keep track of everything she had told her.

  Nothing that Asta had seen or heard in the bathing house gave credence to the thought that Silva Lindeberg Wynyard might be a cold-blooded assassin. But a murderer, propelled by deep, unexpressed hurt into a crime of passion? That now felt possible.

  “Did you kill Prince Anders?”

  Asta was almost as surprised by the question as Silva. Their eyes locked together, then Asta turned away, ashamed at her words.

  The next thing Asta knew, Silva’s hand had made contact with her face and sent her reeling out of the chair. She fell to the floor, her face was burning with pain and her vision was momentarily blurred. Numbly, she lifted her hand to her cheek, checking to see if Silva had drawn blood. It appeared she had not.

  Asta remained lying there for a moment, to regain her equilibrium. She was aware of Silva standing over her, watching her with cold, curious eyes. Then, without saying another word, she turned and walked out.

  A moment later, Asta’s ears were assailed by one of the most disturbing sounds she had ever heard. Silva let out a keening wailing cry. It sounded at once inhuman and saturated with pain—the kind of sound you might expect a wild animal to make.

  Asta stumbled out of the bathing house and found Silva, crouched down by the edge of the fjord. She hesitated, unsure whether to try to comfort her or if this would only further enrage her. Asta decided she simply couldn’t leave her like that and, with some trepidation, made her way to join her at the water’s edge.

  “I need you to go now,” Silva said, rocking on her heels.

  “I can’t leave you like this.”

  “You can and you must,” Silva said. “I will not be subjected to any more of your questions.”

  “I won’t ask any,” Asta assured her. “I’m sorry. I was impertinent and insensitive and—”

  “Stop!” Silva cried. “Stop the noise!” She brought her hands to her ears. “Leave me in peace!” She drew herself up to her feet, then turned to face Asta once more. She saw, with apparent shock, the redness of Asta’s cheek. “Did I do that to you?” she asked.

  “It’s all right,” Asta said. “I deserved it.”

  Silva looked at her again, and then nodded. “Yes, I rather think you did.” She continued to stare at Asta for a moment, then hung her head sadly. “Please go,” she said. “I really do need to be alone.”

  “Are you sure?” Asta asked. “Because I think that’s the last thing you need.”

  Silva folded her arms. “Please do me the respect of accepting I know my own mind.” There was a faint renewal of strength in her voice now. Perhaps the slap and the scream had both served as some form of catharsis.

  Asta remained unsure but, as she took her leave of Silva, she realized that her cheek was starting to throb and she could feel a dull headache taking hold of her skull. She knew she ought to get back to the village and either take a rest or apply some salve to her raw skin—hopefully, she would be able to slip back into the house unnoticed by Uncle Elias and thereby avoid an interrogation.

  She felt a little light-headed than ever as she made her way back along the path that edged the fjord and she realized that she was badly in need of some breakfast. The heady brew of emotions—both her own and those she seemed too easily able to absorb from others—combined with her lack of sleep had done nothing for her constitution. And the force of Silva’s slap hadn’t helped matters. A ray of morning light from across the fjord suddenly pierced her eyes so that she had to close them and she felt herself stumble on the uneven path. She took a deep breath, wondering if she might be about to faint.

  “Hey! Are you all right?”

  It took her a moment to come to her senses and open her eyes. She looked up to see Lucas Curzon at the head of a string of horses. Their manes were ruffles by a breeze coming off the water; steam spiraled from their gaping nostrils. Lucas himself was in the saddle of a large bay horse, its reddish-brown coat slick from sweat and shiny from the reflected sunlight. Despite her state, Asta couldn’t help noticing Lucas’s shoulder-length hair was only just a darker shade of brown.

  Asta had seen the handsome Chief Groom out exercising the horse
s before, though more often the task seemed to fall to lowlier members of his team. She wondered if there was a reason why he had chosen to take the horses out himself today but was soon distracted by the scrutiny of his very piercing grey eyes. She gazed up at him, still feeling giddy, shielding her eyes from the sun with her hand.

  “Asta, isn’t it? He said now. “I asked, are you all right?” When she did not answer him, he jumped down from the saddle and, keeping hold of the long reins, walked over toward her. Her eyes fell to his worn boots as they pounded over the ground.

  “Look at me!” He reached out with his free hand and gently turned her face toward his. He was so close, she could smell the shaving soap he had used that morning and see where he had missed a few stray hairs on his neck.

  “What happened out here?” She realized he was staring at her cheek. “Did you see who did this to you?” Lucas glanced around, then returned his gaze to Asta. “He can’t have gotten far.”

  She was confused by his questions. No one had tried to attack her, had they? He wasn’t making sense. Why was she even here? She felt so hot and giddy. She really needed to get home. Seeing the concern in Lucas’s eyes, she reached her own hand to her cheek. Her touch brought back the memory of the slap.

  “I’m fine,” she told Lucas, making a quick decision not to blame Silva. “Just a bit light-headed. I’ve been out longer than I intended and I haven’t eaten breakfast yet.” Seeing his still furrowed brow, she added. “No one attacked me. I think I might have slipped, back along the path, and grazed my cheek.”

  His brow remained furrowed and, for a moment, she was unsure if he was going to accept her explanation.

  “I don’t understand,” he said at last. “If nothing happened, why did you scream?”

  Her eyes met his. “I didn’t scream.”

  “I heard it from over the other side of the woods. I came as fast as I could.”

  What should she say? She felt tongue-tied.

  “Asta, I heard you scream.” He wasn’t going to let this drop. “What the hell happened?”

  She shook her head, slowly, aware that her options were reducing. “It wasn’t me. It was Silva.”

  Instantly, his expression changed. “Silva is here? Where is she? Did someone attack her?”

  “No!” Asta cried. “No one attacked her either.” She lowered her voice. “She’s just a little upset.”

  “A little upset?” He rested his hands on his hips. “The scream that sent me galloping here was more than just a little upset.”

  In spite of what had happened at the bathing house, Asta did not want to betray Silva’s confidences. She remembered what Prince Jared had told her the previous day. “For your own safety, you must not share these thoughts and theories with anyone else. Only with me…” But the intensity of Lucas’s gaze was disconcerting and she knew she had to give him some information. “She found out something terrible about Prince Anders this morning.” As she said it, she noticed how guarded Lucas’s expression suddenly became. She sighed. “She feels things very deeply. Perhaps because she has to put on such a public face at all times. And especially now, of course, her emotions are all over the place.”

  Lucas’s eyes scanned hers curiously. “Because she is new in grief?”

  “Well yes, and also because she is pregnant.”

  There was no more guardedness in Lucas Curzon’s soft gray eyes. Now they were as open as the door to the Prince’s bathing house had been. “Silva is pregnant!”

  “Yes,” Asta said. Waking out of her strange reverie, she suddenly realized that she had broken a major confidence. “In time, I’m sure it will be a comfort to her to bring Prince Anders’s child into this world. But, right now, I think she is feeling very overwhelmed with everything.”

  There was a strange expression in Lucas’s eyes. “In the middle of life, there is death,” he said. “And in the middle of death, there is life.”

  Asta hadn’t expected such a poetic turn of phrase from the Chief Groom. She found herself smiling and nodding.

  “I’ll go and check she is all right,” Lucas said, nodding, full of purpose. “And take her back to the palace.”

  “She said she wanted to be alone,” Asta told him. “That’s why I left her.”

  “You shouldn’t have left her,” he said. She was surprised to hear a note of anger creep into the Groom’s usually gentle voice. “I have no intention of leaving her here when she is so clearly in distress.”

  Asta wanted to protest that she hadn’t had much choice in the matter of whether to leave Silva or not—for all his talk, Lucas could have no idea what Silva was like when her passion was high.

  And then it hit her, like the sun skimming off the waters of the fjord. Maybe he did know. Maybe handsome Lucas, with those gentle gray eyes, knew the Prince’s Consort far better than the Chief Groom should.

  Maybe Silva Lindeberg Wynyard had her own secret.

  TWENTY-SIX

  The Prince’s Quarters

  “THE CAPTAIN OF THE GUARD,” LOGAN announced. the poet stepped back into the Prince’s study, closely followed by the taller, more imperious figure of Axel Blaxland. Jared had the curious sense that his quarters had been invaded, even though the invasion had happened at his own command.

  He had to make it clear to his cousin that he would not tolerate being addressed again in the manner that Axel had at their last meeting. And that he needed the Captain of the Guard to renew the search for Anders’s killer, if only to eliminate the possibility that it could have been someone other than Michael Reeves.

  “Cousin Axel,” he said, rising from his seat. “Thank you for responding so swiftly to my message.” He gestured to the chair on the other side of the desk from him, then continued with well-rehearsed formality. “Please take a seat. There are matters we must urgently discuss.”

  Axel remained standing. And now his face moved through a strange series of contortions, light suddenly retreating in much the same way it did from the peaks of the hills when the weather changed. “Prince Jared, there has been a confusion. I did not receive any message from you. I sought you out of my own accord. I have grave news to impart.”

  “What are you talking about?” Jared asked Axel.

  “You might want to sit down for this.”

  Jared remained standing—if his cousin wouldn’t sit at his bidding, why should he do so now at Axel’s behest? “Tell me your news, cousin,” he said gruffly.

  Axel glanced over his shoulder, checking that the doors to the Prince’s quarters were shut. Reassuring himself that they were, he turned back to Jared. The Prince was aware of Logan, who remained close by, watching them both closely.

  “Believe me when I say that I’m deeply sorry to bring such news to you,” Axel told them now. “Silva is dead.”

  “Silva!” Logan exclaimed. “No!” His eyes closed momentarily.

  Jared felt as if the ground was about to give way beneath his feet. He slumped down into his chair.

  “She was discovered an hour ago in the river,” Axel continued. “She was not long dead, by all accounts, but quite beyond anything the Physician could do.”

  “Was she murdered too?” Jared asked.

  “It’s too early to say for sure,” Axel answered. “Elias has her body now. It was Jonas Drummond who found her, tangled up in weeds, in a tranquil pool, at the point where the river opens out into the rapids. She had sustained some wounds to her head. It seems as if she might have been dragged along the by river current for some distance and acquired these injuries on the way.”

  “Surely it was an accident, then?” Logan said, then paused. “Or, do you think, suicide?”

  “Suicide seems the most compelling explanation,” Axel said. “I’m sure we can all imagine the intense upset she experienced in the wake of Prince Anders’s death. And this scenario is certainly supported by the physical evidence.” He approached the desk and unrolled a large square of parchment on it. “This, as I’m sure you can see, is a rudimentary
map of the fjord and the stretch of river that connects to it.”

  Jared reached out his hands to keep the paper from curling up again. “I know this stretch of water very well.”

  “Of course,” Axel said, his tone becoming darker. “We all do.” His finger tapped a point on the map. “This is where the wooden bridge crosses the river, at its narrowest point. We found this key here.” He reached into his pocket again and produced a medium-sized key, setting it down on the edge of the map.

  The key, of course, was immediately familiar to Jared. He picked it up and turned it between his fingers. “The key to Anders’s bathing house,” he said, setting it back down again. “Why would Silva go there?” He suspected he already knew the answer to that question. The combination of the key and love note on Anders’s chain would have surely have been motivation enough.

  Axel shrugged. “Perhaps in an effort to be close to Anders spiritually?” The contours of his face shifted—light suddenly retreating, in much the same way it did from the peaks of the hills when the weather shifted. “Or perhaps she was in a more heightened state of emotion.”

  “What makes you say that?” Logan inquired.

  Axel turned to acknowledge the Poet’s question. “The bathing house has been burned down to the ground. It was the smoke that first attracted Jonas’s attention. It’s too early to be sure about these things but it looks very much like Silva set the bathing house alight—for whatever reason—and then jumped from the bridge, upstream, propelling her body into the strong current there. Whether she dropped the key accidentally or left it there as some kind of message for us, we don’t know. There was no suicide note.”

  Logan nodded. “Perhaps the key was a convenient substitute.”

  Jared rose to his feet once more. “We cannot just assume this was suicide. I know that Silva was deeply distressed about Anders’s murder. How could she not be? And, though I’m no expert in these matters, I’m sure that, being pregnant, her emotions were heightened still further. The sad truth is that I really didn’t know my sister-in-law—perhaps in truth none of us did—but still I find it very hard to believe that a pregnant woman would condemn her unborn child to death, however strongly she might desire to end her own life.”