My hands itched.
I halted, staring at them a moment before sinking down into a seat on the bed.
Then I looked up at Erick.
“What is it?” he asked.
“I don’t know.”
Except I did.
Erick nodded as if he understood, then moved to a second table I hadn’t noticed before. A platter of fruit had been set out, and a pitcher of some type of dark red drink.
He picked up a few grapes.
I glowered at his back, then said, “It’s not simple anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
I sighed, looked back down at my hands. “On the Dredge, it was only about survival. I hunted—for food, for the easiest target, and then later for marks you sent me after. Whatever it took to survive. Then, for Borund, I hunted again—for those targeting Borund.”
Erick turned. “And now you don’t know what to hunt for?”
“Yes. No.” I shook my head in annoyance. “It’s more than that.”
Erick hesitated, then came forward. “No, it’s not. You’re still hunting, just as you hunted for Borund. Except this time you’re hunting those that are targeting the city.”
My hand still itched and with a casual move I drew my dagger, held it before me. The blade was worn, the handle nicked. A guardsman’s dagger. I could still feel the blade slashing across the ex-guardsman’s throat, the motion awkward and fumbling, inexperienced, but it had been enough. He’d been the first man I’d killed. My first mark. After that, the process had been easy: identify the mark and kill.
Identify and kill.
Simple.
“Except now the marks are winter and starvation,” I said, and looked at Erick. “I can’t hunt starvation. I can’t kill winter.”
A troubled look crossed his face, but at the same time the sound of bells came through the window to the balcony, followed by the low bellow of a horn, sounding close, as if originating from the palace itself.
Erick moved to the balcony. I trailed behind, putting away my dagger.
The balcony was long and narrow, with a few flowering vines on trellises in the corners and a black wrought-iron railing encircling all three sides. As I moved up to its edge, I let the Fire relax and felt the pulse of the city course through me.
In the harbor, the Mistress’ ships were pulling back from the entrance, moving swiftly and silently. On the docks, there was a sudden frenzy of activity as men began to load cargo that had rested idle on the wharf for days. A few of the merchant ships that had remained loaded even after the blockade were already tossing their lines and pushing away from the docks.
Erick grunted. “The tide is good. They should be able to leave quickly.” Then he turned to me, motioning to the ships below. “You are hunting, Varis,” he said. “But you’re using ships instead of a dagger.”
I glanced toward him, uncertain what to say. But the tension in my shoulders had completely faded. And there was no prickling sensation along my shoulders, no itching in my hands.
I leaned my weight forward onto the railing and watched the ships, felt them as they glided through the water. Fixing my attention on the lead merchant ship, I followed it, feeling a sense of elation as it surged forward under the wind. Sails whuffled, snapping taut as they belled out, men scrambling on the deck and through the rigging. I felt the tension of the men’s muscles, felt their sweat. Then I noticed the flag flying on its highest mast: gold on a red field. Borund’s flag.
Of course. He would have known the blockade would be lifted soon after he’d learned I’d seized the throne. He’d been waiting for it. It must have been his ships loading up at the docks before dawn.
Borund’s ship neared the entrance to the harbor, then slid through the ends of the two juts of land and the watchtowers, passing out into the darker blue ocean. As it passed the towers, my connection to the ship began to fade. I felt a painful sense of loss as the sensation of wood and rope and water, of the men’s sweat and blood, slipped away, then ended.
Apparently, the power of the throne and its connection to the city ended at the entrance to the harbor.
I sighed, watched the remaining ships for a long moment, then felt a familiar tug on the currents of the city.
I turned, straightened where I stood.
The Dredge.
My eyes narrowed.
“I have a mark for you,” I said, then turned toward Erick.
He stood, back rigid, eyes dark and serious, as deadly as he’d appeared to me at first on the Dredge. “I live to serve, my Mistress.”
I shivered, uneasy at the words, but nodded in response. “His name is Corum.”
Chapter 2
I woke to bright sunlight, the sound of midmorning bells from the city below, and a hollow sense of fear.
I couldn’t do this. I was a hunter, an assassin, a thief. I didn’t know the first thing about ruling a city.
Something clattered and I turned my head sharply, the fear quashed, my hand sliding up under my pillow to the hilt of my dagger. Three servants dressed in white, all young girls around fifteen years old, moved about the room, setting down trays of cheese, opening the curtains and balcony doors, and laying out clothes for the day. I watched them cautiously, but none of them approached and finally the tension bled away.
I dragged myself into a seated position on the edge of the bed, moving slowly, one hand raised to my head. I’d slept later than I’d wanted, but the lack of sleep over the last few nights had finally caught up to me. I moaned, yawned, then scrubbed at my gritty eyes. I felt as if someone had beat me senseless and left me for dead in a back alley.
Someone coughed and I glanced up to see one of the servants—a girl close to my age, with blonde hair, a roundish face, and soft gray eyes—standing before me holding out a cup of something brown and steaming. It smelled of dead, dried leaves.
The girl ducked her head and muttered, “Mistress.” She watched me closely behind lowered lashes. A quick touch on the river revealed she was gray. All three servants were gray.
I frowned but took the warm cup. Bringing it close, I breathed in the steam, wrinkled my nose at the smell. This close it smelled more like muddy water. But I could actually see small pieces of crumbled leaves floating in it.
“What is it?”
The girl seemed surprised. “It’s tea, Mistress. From Marland.”
I took a tentative sip, expecting it to taste as if I’d licked a mud-brick on the Dredge. Instead, its warmth seeped into my chest, the bitterness making my tongue tingle. It did taste like dirt, but not like the stagnant rot on the Dredge. More like the gardens surrounding Borund’s manse. Earthy, like loam.
I unconsciously straightened as I took another sip, no longer feeling so exhausted.
After I’d drunk half the cup, the gray-eyed girl nodded to one of the other servants, who brought forward a stack of clothes. “Some of the merchants have already arrived and are waiting to see you, Mistress.”
Borund.
I stood, setting the cup aside on the bed. “Where are my clothes?”
The gray-eyed girl frowned and picked up the cup before it could spill. “Right here,” she said, motioning to the second servant, who unfolded a white-and-gold dress.
I grimaced. “No, where are my clothes? The breeches and shirt I wore yesterday?”
“Oh! The Matron said we should remove them.”
My eyes narrowed, and the gray-eyed girl took a tentative step back. “The Matron?”
“I-Ireen,” she stammered.
I recalled Ireen’s elation yesterday and suddenly regretted telling her she could do whatever she wanted.
“Find them.”
The gray-eyed girl cast a terrified glance toward the girl holding the clothing. “We—we can’t.”
My eyes narrowed further. “Why not?”
&n
bsp; The girl swallowed and seemed on the verge of bolting from the room. “Matron Ireen—” she began, voice tight, eyes wide, then finished in a low rush, head bowed, “Matron Ireen had them burned.”
I drew in a breath to respond, then halted, too stunned to know what to say. “Burned?”
The girl nodded.
Anger flooded me. My hands itched for my dagger, but I managed to keep myself in check.
“Find me some breeches and a shirt,” I said with suppressed rage. “And get rid of all these . . . dresses. Breeches and tunics, that’s all I want to wear. Go to Master Borund’s manse and get all my clothes from there if you have to.”
“Yes, Mistress. Right away.”
The girl backed off, dragging the servant holding the offending dress with her. They held a hissed conversation, punctuated by hand gestures, and then both girls nodded formally in my direction and fled the room.
I wondered how many of them were true Servants—girls who could sense and use the river like me, girls that could one day be the Mistress if they could learn to control the throne well enough. They were here because someone had noticed they had the talent and had brought them here to learn to use it. But because of that, they were as dangerous to me as Avrell and Baill.
A soft footfall sounded and I spun, eyes catching the last girl on the far side of the room. She stilled, tried a tentative smile and a small bow, then began a frantic and unnecessary rearrangement of the curtains.
I sighed and thought of Erick, suddenly wishing I hadn’t sent him after Corum after all, that I’d sent one of the other Seekers instead. I was surrounded by people I couldn’t trust; having him here would have given me someone I could rely on.
I scanned the room, the hollow feeling in my gut returning. With a small push, I let the Fire relax and felt the sensation of the city flow through me, let the voices of the throne rush forward. Not far enough to overwhelm me, but enough so I could hear distinct voices clamoring for attention.
I ignored them, focusing instead on the city. Closing my eyes, I reached out, wary of Eryn’s warning about pushing myself too far. I thought of Erick, of how he felt when I saw him beneath the river, about his scent—sweat mixed with a tang of oranges.
After a moment, I sensed him in the city, somewhere on the Dredge, lost in the darker turmoil of the emotions of the people that lived there, that survived there. I smiled, the tension in my shoulders relaxing as I felt him moving, as I drew in the tang of orange that surrounded me.
Erick was hunting.
I felt a momentary urge to take my dagger and join him, escape from this palace with all its meetings and servants and guardsmen. For a moment, I gave in, let myself drift forward, heading toward the Dredge on the flows of the river, following Erick’s scent, Eryn’s warning forgotten.
But when the sensation began to stretch, when I could no longer feel a tenuous connection to my body, before the last threads broke, I pulled back.
The feeling had been glorious . . . and frightening at the same time.
I breathed in one last calming breath, then shifted my attention to the Dredge itself, to the seething roil of desperation. I couldn’t pick out individuals, couldn’t even narrow my focus down to a street, but I sensed that it was possible. It wasn’t the same as stretching toward Erick, or even Reaching to find Corum as I’d done on the tower. I’d had a known scent to follow then, something concrete to focus on. Without that scent, the eddies and currents were a jumbled mess, too complex to separate. For now.
But I could sense the fear. The people of the Dredge were terrified. The tension on the river was palpable, a tension I recognized because I’d survived on the Dredge for so long on my own. Winter was approaching, and the Dredge would be the hardest hit. The people in the slums were worried about where their next chunk of bread or gobbet of meat would come from.
There had to be a way to help them, to feed them this winter and beyond.
I pushed the voices and the city back, let the river slide away with a sigh, and turned my attention to Borund and the merchants.
* * *
An hour later Marielle, the gray-eyed servant, led me through the palace to one of the sitting rooms, where Avrell, Borund, and two other merchants were waiting, talking animatedly. I heard their voices from two corridors away.
“—but look at what happened in the warehouse fires!” Borund spat, his voice easy to recognize.
“I realize that,” Avrell countered, voice as slick and fluid as it had been during the meeting the day before. “But in the interest of organization and control—”
“It won’t matter how well organized or controlled it is if some other disaster wipes out the remaining supplies. We cannot take the risk!”
All voices ceased as Marielle and I entered, all four men turning toward me with dissatisfied, angry frowns. With a faint twinge of surprise, I realized I’d already been in this room. Low tables and pillows were scattered among plants and a few latticework screens designed to provide small alcoves for private conversations. I’d hidden in one of those screened-off alcoves when I’d infiltrated the palace, had overheard Avrell and Nathem discussing the decision to kill the Mistress.
Once the merchants realized who had interrupted, their anger faded, replaced by cautious but curious frowns from the two merchants I didn’t know, and a genuine smile from Borund. Warmth flooded through me at the smile, and I grinned in return. Borund was dressed in his formal red-and-gold merchant’s coat and ruffled white shirt, the wire rims of his spectacles catching the light. He was mostly bald, skin shiny on the top of his head, but with gray-brown, wispy hair above his ears and circling around to the back.
“Varis,” he said, rising to give a low bow at the waist. The others rose as well. “I mean . . . Mistress. May I introduce Merchants Regin and Yvan.”
Both merchants gave stiff bows. They were dressed much like Borund, but with different colors: Regin wore a dark blue-and-gold coat, while Yvan’s was cream-colored, with black embroidery. Yvan was fat, with cold, hard, intelligent eyes and a shiny, completely bald head. Regin was thin, poised, and had long, wavy, dark hair.
“Forgive me,” Regin said, surveying my clothes. Marielle had found boots, breeches, and a white shirt that actually fit. My dagger was tucked into one of the soft-sided boots. “I did not recognize you, Mistress.”
My eyes narrowed, but I couldn’t decide whether he’d meant it as an insult or not. “What were you arguing about? And where are the rest of the merchants?”
“This is all that’s left,” Borund answered, then glanced angrily at Avrell. “And we’ve been arguing over where the supplies we have should be kept. I think they should be moved to various locations throughout the city, to protect them and to make it easier to distribute them once winter sets in. Avrell wants to store them in a central location.”
“We can keep better control over the supplies and their distribution if they are in one location,” Avrell countered. “The palace, for instance. It would be easier for the city and palace guards to protect them if they were not scattered throughout the city.”
Borund snorted. “But look at the fire in the warehouse district. With one mishap, we lost close to half of our winter storage. Granted, most of it was Alendor’s, but . . .”
“Alendor,” I interrupted, moving forward to take a seat on one of the pillows, legs crossed so I could rest my elbows on my knees. “What happened to him?”
The merchants shifted uncomfortably where they stood, then slowly took their seats around me, along with Avrell. Marielle was nowhere to be seen.
“No one has seen him since the night of the warehouse fires,” Avrell said. He cast me a warning glance to keep quiet, motioning slightly toward Regin and Yvan. Neither of them knew I’d followed Alendor into the warehouse district that night in order to kill him, to break the consortium of merchants he’d built up. The consortium had been buy
ing up and hoarding the resources of the city to form a monopoly, killing off any competing merchants. Instead of killing Alendor, I’d ended up killing his son, Cristoph, and in the process the warehouse district had caught fire.
“Tarrence—and the merchants in the city that we know were part of Alendor’s consortium—all scrambled to leave the day after the fire,” Avrell continued.
“How do you know?” Borund asked.
“Once I knew who was part of the consortium, I had them watched by the city guard. I also have sources scattered both inside and outside the city. Tarrence, for example, was sighted yesterday south of here, in the port city of Kent.”
Borund grunted with grudging respect.
“Is that all?” I asked.
Everyone stilled.
“What do you mean?” Regin asked, his voice tinged with condescension.
I bristled where I sat, turning my full attention on Regin. I noted his merchant’s jacket had more gold embroidery than Borund’s. Borund had told me once that the color of the jackets indicated what commodity the merchants had dealt in when they applied for membership in the guild—red for wine, blue for fish, cream for dairy—and that symbols in the embroidery indicated what they currently dealt in. More embroidery indicated a more powerful merchant.
Judging by his embroidery, Regin outranked Borund in the guild.
“Alendor tried to seize control of all trade within the city,” I said, “tried to seize control of the merchants’ guild, of all resources within Amenkor, including your own. He ordered the deaths of members of the guild itself, as well as merchants from other cities along the coast. Are you saying the guild isn’t even searching for him?”
Yvan snorted, but it was Regin who answered, his voice laced with anger.
“Of course we’re searching for him. The guild itself has condemned him and all of those that were part of the consortium. Their licenses to the guild hall have been revoked and all of their rights rescinded. In effect, they can no longer legally act as merchants, either within the city of Amenkor or any of the ports that recognize the merchants’ guild as a power. Alendor’s name means nothing. All connections to any trading houses along the Frigean coast are gone. He has been destroyed as a merchant. He’s not in the city, and he has nowhere else to run to, nowhere he can expect safe haven, at least from the merchants’ guild. What more do you expect us to do?”
The Throne of Amenkor Page 35