Blood Solace (Blood Grace Book 2)

by Vela Roth

  “Your Majesty.” Lord Titus lowered his voice. “I know in your wisdom and perception, you heed the words spoken among the free lords. Fearful words.”

  “What my lords speak of are lies. If I knew who had planted such doubts among my liegemen, I would cut the tongue from his head myself.”

  Cassia smiled to herself again.

  Lord Hadrian crossed his arms over his barrel chest. “Close the gate after the lambs have scattered if you wish, My King.”

  “But bring the sheep back into the fold,” Lord Titus urged. “Your liegemen need their king’s strong hand to protect their women, their children, their vassals. Only you can provide the security they seek, and if you do not, My King…you know what fear does to a man’s mind. Loyal men may be driven to desperate acts.”

  “I have no use for men too cowardly to swallow their fears and do their duty.”

  “My King,” Lord Titus pleaded, “men do not know their duty against things of the night we cannot see, much less kill. They wave their swords at phantoms.”

  “Warriors with no enemy to fight are dangerous,” Lord Hadrian warned. “Especially frightened ones. They become restless and turn against each other—or their king.”

  “Twice in one day, Hadrian. Praise Anthros for your good fortune, for you will never again hear me say this. He speaks the truth, My King.”

  “I’ll speak some more of it then, Titus, and see if you are equal to it. The new pack of liegehounds Free Lord Tyran has bred from the heart hunters’ stock are not the only weapons he has readied these past months. The blades he’s forged to wield against Hesperines will serve much better against his fellow men.”

  “Lord Tyran is loyal to my son,” Lord Titus cut in, “which means he is loyal to Your Majesty. You know you can rely on any man under Segetia’s banner. But there are those who rally around no one’s banners—or seek to attract followers to their own. These lone wolves might well lure Your Majesty’s flock into unsafe territory.”

  “Discontent is an opportunity,” Lord Hadrian said. “Men are too glad to exchange an effective leader for any upstart who promises them petty gains.”

  “That would make them traitors,” Lucis said.

  “We do not speak of traitors,” Lord Titus soothed. “Merely of fearful, dutiful men with many lives under their protection.”

  Lord Hadrian looked the king in the eye. “They are only traitors if the man they betray is still on the throne.”

  Silence fell.

  The king gazed back at Lord Hadrian. “You recall what befell the last men who took that view.”

  Cassia clenched her hands into fists. She heard again in her mind the sound of the catapults that had heralded the last open rebellion any lords had ever mounted against the king. Lucis had slaughtered them and wiped their names from every free bloodline in Tenebra, reduced their keeps to rubble and sown their fields with salt. But not until he had let them murder Solia.

  “I have gone to the effort and expense of hosting Cordian mages,” the king went on, “the most effective defense against Hesperines. I have rewarded the two of you with the highest protection by placing masters from the Order of Anthros in your own houses. If such efforts are not enough for my people, they are craven and ungrateful.”

  “Those meddling bastards from the Orders are no reassurance to anyone.” Lord Hadrian’s answer was anything but craven. “They’re more likely to incite war than prevent it.”

  Lord Titus cleared his throat. “We in Tenebra hold the Cordian masters in reverence, for the gods themselves appointed the blessed Orders as the rightful authority over all mages in the world. However, our people feel the need for spiritual leadership from their fellow countrymen who serve the gods as Tenebran mages, the Tenebran way.”

  “The Orders rule magic, but they ought to do it from Cordium,” Lord Hadrian translated. “Our folk won’t stand for them turning Tenebra into Cordium—or into the Orders’ cow to be milked for temple tribute. The principalities and city-states of Cordium were powerful domains once, ruled by mighty men, before the mages broke the very lands that raised their temples. Take heed, My King. The lords of Tenebra won’t kneel and be the mages’ next victims.”

  “With all due respect, My King, Honored Master Dalos did not present a reassuring example for our people,” Lord Titus reminded him.

  The king leaned forward. “The late Honored Master Amachos, also known as Dalos, was a respected expert on the destruction of Hesperines, whom the Order of Anthros generously sent from Cordium to watch over us during the creatures’ visit to Tenebra. The honored master kept his identity secret for our safety, for knowledge of his presence was sure to inflame tensions with the heretics. When the Hesperines’ so-called ambassadors attempted, without provocation, to cast a malign spell over the entire Council of Free Lords and the royal family, the honored master sacrificed his own life to save us all.”

  Silence reigned again. Cassia gritted her teeth.

  “There are plenty who don’t believe that,” Lord Hadrian informed the king. “He was a war mage. We know their kind. A great many folk say he wanted a crack at the Hesperines and didn’t care who stood in the crossfire.”

  “Or they say…” Lord Titus hesitated. “…there is some talk that Honored Master Dalos and his order would have found it convenient if our nobility was no longer an obstacle to Cordium’s influence in Tenebra. These rumors persist. They have taken on far too much life to die now.”

  “I have given my people the truth. Those who deny it are not only traitors to the crown, but heretics in the eyes of the Orders.”

  “Then most of your subjects are traitors and heretics. What will you do?” Lord Hadrian asked. “Hang the greater part of the population and let the mages immolate the rest?”

  “Enough,” the king said.

  The two lords said no more. But they had indeed said enough.

  Cassia’s words, her rumors, her truth—the real truth—had made it to the king’s ears, and he had no choice but to react.

  Tenebra was on the verge of rebellion. Precisely where Cassia must hold it.

  “I have already decided upon a course of action,” Lucis said, “which I was just about to discuss with Titus when you joined us, Hadrian.” The king rose to his full height behind the desk. “Titus, you are the most persuasive man in the kingdom. You will lead the charge against these lies and ensure my people believe the truth. Begin tomorrow. You will have plenty of opportunities to speak with the kingdom’s most influential figures at the Autumn Greeting, while you watch your son dance with my daughter.”

  No. Don’t do this. Cassia wanted to shout at Lord Titus. Don’t do this to your people, your son, or me.

  But she already knew what he would say.

  “As you wish, My King,” Lord Titus answered.

  “Excellent. What a fine picture our children will make at the Greeting on the morrow.”

  And so the king named his price, and Cassia knew what game was to commence.

  “It’s not enough,” Lord Hadrian said. “Our people will find no reassurance in words, only in a renewal of our ancient truce with the Hesperines. Without the Oath, there will be war.”

  “Our Cordian allies will keep us safe from the Hesperines,” Lucis stated. “There will be no Summit.”

  Cassia had heard that tone all her life, ordering her to all she feared, denying her everything she dared love. She knew what it meant. The king’s decision was final.

  Once she had felt pain each time he laid waste to her hopes. Then she had learned to feel nothing. That time was over. Gone were the days when she rendered herself numb for self-protection and in so doing rendered herself helpless.

  She had remembered how to feel. She embraced all her dread and anger and fed it to her resolve.

  She knew Lucis better than anyone. When one pushed him, he pushed back harder. When one pushed him too far, he lashed out with unparalleled ferocity.

  The pressure from the free lords, together with the wedge bet
ween the king and the Cordian mages, was powerful enough to immobilize him. But not to make him give way.

  Cassia had never had any illusions she could do more than stall him. Even as she had fought with everything she had these long months, she had considered what would eventually be necessary. She had, night by night, maneuver by maneuver, come to acknowledge it would take more to break any possibility of an alliance with Cordium once and for all and secure a lasting peace with Orthros.

  She had known it would come to this. But oh, how she had hoped it would not.

  There was not room for her sweeter hopes now. She must focus on what she must do for Tenebra. For Orthros.

  His name, his face flashed in her mind. Her greatest grief. Yet still her greatest comfort.

  You understand, Lio. You are the one who will understand better than anyone.

  Cassia must take matters well and truly into her own hands. It was time for the last resort.

  The Flower of Cordium

  The king’s solar grew brighter suddenly, as if midday had come an hour before dawn. The glow faded just as quickly and gave way once more to firelight, but the flames now illuminated seven robed men who had not stood in the room an instant before.

  Fresh anger rose in Cassia with the speed and power of reflex. She didn’t know what it signified that the new arrivals wore unadorned, flame-red robes instead of the Order of Anthros’s customary red-gold. But it was clear enough these were the guests expected from Cordium.

  The young mage hovered among them, licking his fingers and tucking his thin black hair under his apprentice cap. “Basileus, allow me to present—”

  “That will be all, Eudias,” said the man in the lead.

  The apprentice shut his mouth.

  “Basileus.” The mage in charge inclined his head, then withdrew his hands from his sleeves, revealing long fingers, smooth palms and a gleaming collection of rings. “I am sure you are as weary as I of go-betweens and deliberations. Allow me to introduce myself and my brothers who have come with me from Corona to resolve your troubles with the Hesperines.”

  Corona! That was the heart of Cordium, the seat of the Order of Anthros, where their Akron lived and wielded his power as the head of the Order that ruled all other Orders.

  “By all means,” said the king.

  Cassia looked at the mage’s face for the first time and assessed the facts. By accepted standards he was the most handsome man currently under the palace roof, and Flavian was in residence. Before morning, many ladies of the court and no few men would be speculating as to how seriously the mage took his vows to give up the pleasures of the flesh in exchange for magical power.

  He appeared athletic and in the prime of life, and even through her own flametongue, Cassia could smell the oil that scented his wavy black hair. He had golden skin and a golden voice and had probably been born to a Cordian princess with a golden spoon in his mouth. The Order must have handed him a position reserved for those of high birth whose families’ wealth paid for the Akron’s jeweled slippers. Had this man qualified because he was a perfectly bred example of Anthros’s ideal of manhood, or did he have magic too?

  With the air of a salute, the mage touched a hand to the sunstone medallion he wore. “I am Chrysanthos, Dexion of the Aithourian Circle. I am here to clean up my late colleague’s mess.”

  If Cassia had been a mage, she would have feared her own power would defy her self-control and lash out at the opponent before her. As it was, her emotion was a force so strong her body shook.

  The king studied his new reinforcements in silence, while Lord Titus spouted His Majesty’s welcome and compliments. “What an honor! We have not had the privilege of welcoming the Dexion as a guest in Tenebra since…well, since the Last War, surely. How magnanimous of the Synthikos to send his right hand and future successor to us in our hour of need.”

  The Cordian Order of Anthros hadn’t sent just anyone to repair the damage Dalos had done. They had sent the man who would one day lead the war mages’ most deadly circle. Dalos’s grand delusions had been bad enough, but this Chrysanthos could honestly say he was the living heir of his circle’s founder, the legendary Aithouros, who in ancient times had personally burned every Temple of Hespera to the ground.

  There was no question of whether Dexion Chrysanthos had Hesperine blood on his hands. Cassia could only wonder how many lives he had cost Orthros. Had any of the mage’s victims been close to Lio?

  If there had been any shred of doubt or hesitation in Cassia’s mind, Chrysanthos’s arrival was proof enough. The king and Cordium would not retreat. It was time for her to bring all she had cultivated for the last six months to fruition and make her long-term plan a reality.

  There was no other way. She must go through with the last resort.

  “You are correct, Lord Titus,” Chrysanthos was saying. “The question of whom the Synthikos would select as his Dexion has gone unanswered for many years, at least publicly. However, he recently finalized my appointment as a mere formality. He has groomed me for this position since my youth, when I was his apprentice.”

  “Honored Master Dalos was once the Synthikos’s apprentice,” the king pointed out.

  “There were two of us.” Chrysanthos smiled. “Competition for promotions can be quite brutal.”

  Cassia added ruthless and opportunistic to her assessment of Chrysanthos. Facts. She must focus on facts. Dwelling on the full scope of the effort ahead of her…the consequences…was no strategy at all. The way to proceed was one task at a time, and the imperative at hand was to get to know her new enemy.

  She wouldn’t make the same mistake she had made with Dalos. She hadn’t been curious enough about him. She hadn’t understood what he really was until it was almost too late. Chrysanthos seemed to wear his status and his intentions as clearly as his sunstone pendant, but she knew better than to accept things as they appeared.

  Chrysanthos proceeded to introduce his seven colleagues as his war circle and listed their qualifications. Cassia collected names and masteries into her memory. The youth with the earnest face and fire in his eyes was Chrysanthos’s apprentice, Tychon. Aflame with devotion, the desire to prove himself, or a longing to best his master?

  All of the mages certainly acted as if their chief pleasure in life was basking in their Dexion’s glorious presence. All but Dalos’s former apprentice. Eudias, they called him. He appeared ready to sink into the floor.

  With apparent appreciation, Chrysanthos surveyed the arsenal that adorned the king’s walls. “Eudias has informed me that my brothers and I are to fill positions on the noble estates of Ostium and Littora. Allow me to demonstrate we would be of much greater use to you here in your own household, Basileus. I wish to begin our new association with a show of good faith. A declaration of intent, if you will.”

  “What do you have in mind?” the king asked.

  “On my way in tonight, I took the liberty of assessing the safety of Solorum. We must discuss improvements to the protections upon Tenebra’s capital sooner rather than later. As a starting point, I must bring to your attention an ungodly site that has been allowed to remain on your doorstep, unattended and uncleansed.”

  No. No, he couldn’t mean… It had stood for time out of mind. It was older than the Orders or Orthros, a memorial to a time when everyone could worship as they chose without fear. Mortals had forgotten its meaning, and no one but a Hesperine had the power to recognize it for what it was. This peacock from Cordium couldn’t possibly have discovered that secret.

  “The structure is a ruin,” said the mage, “but alas, the unnatural magic in it lives on. There are even vines of harlot’s kiss growing up through the rubble, in full bloom and armed with thorns.”

  Hespera’s roses. Cassia and Lio’s roses.

  “There is a shrine of Hespera on your grounds, Basileus,” Chrysanthos announced.

  Silent Roses

  Cassia’s stomach turned.

  Chrysanthos smiled. “Allow me to perform a p
roper purging. Dawn is imminent. My brothers and I shall channel the power of Anthros’s rising sun and give you a demonstration of how truly competent Aithourian masters deal with heresy.”

  “As I said, my lords.” The king glanced from Lord Titus to Lord Hadrian, then nodded to Chrysanthos. “Our allies from Cordium shall ensure no Hesperines blight Our lands. We shall accompany you to observe.”

  “Excellent, Basileus. I can see you and I are both men of action who do not like to waste time.”

  Cassia could plan what to do while she ran. She turned and bolted through the back of the hearth.

  She didn’t even feel the solid stone as she moved through it into the passageway beyond. She raced through the corridors within the walls of Tenebra’s most ancient royal household with only the barest glow of the flametongue on her clothes to light her way. When she came to the princess’s chambers, she crossed through the wall again. Stumbling across the cold ashes in Solia’s hearth, Cassia caught herself on a large, shaggy body. Her liegehound braced his legs and whined in concern.

  “Dockk, Knight. We have to save—” Cassia’s throat closed.

  No breath for talking. No time for discretion. She must stay ahead of the mages. Knight launched into motion at her side, ready for anything, unquestioning as always. The pendant Solia had passed down to Cassia bounced at her neck as she ran through her sister’s deserted rooms. Kicking up clouds of dust in her wake, she threw open the door to their abandoned garden.

  The trek through the weeds and ivy, down the passage under the walls of the palace, up through the hatch and out onto the grounds had never seemed so long. She took the deer paths Lio had shown her, but underbrush clutched at her skirt and mud robbed her of her footing. Cassia felt as if she were living one of her nightmares of fleeing for her life with her legs and arms bound.