Dragon Slayer (Sons of Rome Book 3)

by Lauren Gilley

  “Only a slave,” Val chided gently. “The slaves are the source of all the best gossip. Come. What do you know?”

  Arslan pressed his lips together until they paled at the edges, holding his breath. Finally he let it out in a rush, with a defeated little groan. “I’m not supposed to tell you. The sultan forbade it.” But his loyalty did not lie with the sultan. “But your brother is returned.”

  “What?” Val leaped up from the low bench he was seated upon, whirling to face his slave. “Vlad’s here? When? Last night? Why? He was–”

  “Please,” Arslan said, ducking his head, clutching the hairbrush to his chest. Anxiety coursed through him, made him shake. “Please, your grace–”

  “Hush.” Val moved around the bench and knelt down before him, took his small, smooth hands into his own, setting the brush aside. “I won’t betray you, not to anyone, I promise. You know this.”

  Arslan looked up through his lashes, dark eyes slick with tears.

  “I need to know,” Val said. “Why is my brother back here again?”

  “It’s – it’s only rumors, but, some of the other boys were saying, they overheard last night, that he – that he couldn’t hold Wallachia. He had to flee.”

  “Flee?” Val felt his brows scale his forehead. “Vlad? Flee?” Nothing had ever sounded so preposterous.

  He gripped Arslan’s shoulders. “What of the others? Were there survivors from the palace there? Our family?”

  “I don’t know, your grace. I don’t know anything else, only that he’s here, and he brought a retinue.”

  “A retinue? Maybe…” His pulse fluttered, fast and too-light, making him dizzy.

  “Your grace, I don’t know.”

  “I know, I know, it’s alright.” He rubbed the boy’s arms soothingly a moment and then stood. The room swayed as if he’d been drinking. “I have to go see him.” His belly clenched and nausea rolled within him, but he had to. He took a deep breath and imagined he could smell his brother in the palace, rooms and rooms away.

  “But, your grace, you have archery practice.”

  “You’re right. Damn it.” He put his hands on his hips and breathed through his mouth. He really thought he might pass out. “Alright then, braid my hair, let’s hurry.” He dropped back onto the bench and presented his back, and Arslan’s nimble fingers went right to work.

  He braided Val’s long hair into a simple plait that hung straight down his back, and then laid out his clothes: finely-crafted, but muted kaftan and şalvar, all of it in shades of blue, boots, belt, leather bracers, gloves. He was starting to have calluses on his hands again, signs of training. The fancy sword had been taken away, but a practice blade awaited him in the training yard, along with a bow, a quiver bristling with arrows, and an array of targets. An arms master that gave him private lessons in proper form and battle tactics.

  A proper prince, Val had said, when he and Mehmet had bargained, and so far, the sultan had upheld his end of the agreement.

  As had Val. His thighs still felt weak from this morning’s activities.

  When he was ready, he paused, and looked to the mirror, trying to see himself through a stranger’s eyes – no, through a brother’s. A brother who knew his shame, and who hated him for it.

  He’d grown taller; his legs longer, his face a little narrower; bone structure sharp like the facets of a cut gemstone. He looked like his mother. He looked, despite the plain colors of his clothes, like a kept thing, with soft skin, and long lashes, and a collar that looked more like jewelry than a restraint.

  He sighed, and went out, Arslan trailing dutifully along behind him.

  The whole long walk to the practice yard, Val tested the air, straining to catch a whiff. He thought he did, once, but it was a cold day, and the wind was blowing, and the smell was swept away from him.

  His training yard was a private one, used by Mehmet himself. Once he became sultan, he refused to spar with the hostages at court, preferring instead to work with private archers and sword-masters, pitting himself against trusted janissary opponents when he needed to work with another.

  The archery master waited for Val, seated on a bench, restringing a bow. He glanced up without much interest – but Val detected the man’s usual flare of tension. His shoulders rose and locked up; his fingers fumbled over their familiar task. No one on the grounds was frightened of Val – but they were frightened of what might happen to them if they mishandled him.

  The first day, the man had said, “You’re late.” And he had been; Mehmet had been feeling…amorous that morning.

  Val had kicked his chin up, looked the man in the face, and said, “I am not. Which one of us is the prince anyway?”

  That hadn’t been a kind thing to say. Kindness grew more and more difficult.

  Today, the man said nothing, just stood and passed Val the freshly-strung bow. “Whenever you’re ready, your grace.”

  “Thank you. I’m ready now.”

  The lesson began.

  He’d improved immensely in the last few weeks. Just three or four years ago, he’d finally gained the ability to properly draw and fire; his arrows even made it all the way to the targets. But the shots were always wide; a good many landed in the dirt beside the target. Anger, hatred, and resolve had steadied his hand in a way that love and careful instruction never had. He felt determined now; this was a way to reclaim his status as a prince, his masculinity. Becoming a warrior was the only way to ensure that, one day, when the time eventually came, he would possess the means to escape…and keep escaping.

  When the target was bristling with arrows, his instructor said, grudgingly, “Well done.”

  “Thank you.” Val lowered the bow, arms shaking from the effort of drawing it again and again.

  The man got a speculative look, eyes cutting at him sideways. “I’ve noticed.” Oh no. “That you always shoot better when the sultan isn’t here.”

  Val swallowed. That was true, and it was intentional. He didn’t want Mehmet knowing how skilled he’d become.

  “He asks for reports after every lesson, you know.”

  Damn.

  Val nodded and handed the bow back. “Yes, well–”

  A scent reached him; it moved through his senses with the force of a lightning strike. He turned in a circle, searching wildly, heart hammering.

  There. In an upper window overlooking this courtyard, bright hair covered by a scarf, but her face unmistakable.

  His mother.

  “Your grace–” the instructor began, but Val was already sprinting away.

  He knew the palace now, better than he remembered the palace of home, and he knew which door to go through, startling a pair of guards who knew better than to reprimand him. Up a set of cut stone stairs that spiraled around twice, and into a hallway set with wide, arched windows that let in white winter sunlight.

  Eira waited there, hands clasped together in front of her, shaking, tears bright on her cheeks. She opened her arms and he barreled into them.

  She wrapped him up tight, too tight to let him breathe properly, one hand on his back and one cupping his head. “Oh,” she murmured, voice full of cracks. “Oh, my precious boy. My Valerian. Darling.”

  “Mama.” He pressed his face into her neck, sniffling, tears clouding his own eyes, seeking out her scent and warmth. “Mama, is it really you? You’re really here?”

  “I’m here. I’m here, I’m here, I’m here.”

  Her scent – or maybe the sprint up all those stairs – turned him dizzy and languid, the muscles in his legs weak. He swayed, and she swayed with him, turned it into a back-and-forth shift, like when he was small enough for her to hold, and she’d rock him in her lap after a nightmare.

  “How are you here?” he asked. “Father…”

  She sighed. “It’s a very long story.”

  “Yes,” said a too-loud male voice behind her, “and she hasn’t even told you the best part yet.”

  When Val pulled back, Mama was smiling. He p
eeked over her shoulder and there was–

  “Fen!”

  The big Viking wolf laughed. “My little prince, all grown up!”

  Val disentangled from his mother so he could throw himself at her Familiar, and Fenrir caught him with his same old effortless strength, swinging him up and around, so he felt like he was flying.

  ~*~

  Val found them a secluded bench tucked away in a hedge-lined corner of the garden, beneath a trellis loaded with winter grapes. Eira sat near to him, hip-to-hip, one of his hands held between both of hers, fingertips tracing the soft skin on his knuckles.

  She didn’t bring up the obvious: the fact that he must smell like another man’s pleasure.

  Fen stood guard, arms folded, his back to them, but Val knew he was listening intently. The idea of Fen hearing any of his shame, big, hulking, hyper-masculine man that he was, put a knot in his belly. So, when Eira looked up at him, eyes full of questions, he spoke first.

  “Mama, tell me what happened.”

  Somehow, it was worse than he’d expected.

  Until the part of the story when Vlad showed up. Excitement fluttered in his chest like a bird as he listened to her describe Vlad’s assault on the palace guards, how he’d cut down Vladislav’s men. How he’d ridden into the city to the cheers of the people of Tîrgovişte.

  But as was always the case, good things couldn’t last.

  “We were too few,” she lamented. “Our enemies too powerful.” She shook her head. “And he is still just a boy, after all.”

  “Like me.”

  She squeezed his hand, and he lifted his head to see her small, sad smile. “No. Not like you.”

  “But–”

  “Vlad is exceedingly intelligent. A natural born leader. But he doesn’t know how to bend – and in that way, he is still very much a boy. You, though, know how to give ground.”

  “To bend,” he said, self-mocking. “Yes, I’m very flexible.”

  She reached with one hand to touch his face, gentle fingertips along his cheek. “Oh, darling. I’m so–”

  “Please don’t say you’re sorry. It isn’t your fault. There’s nothing you could have done.” He tried to smile; it wobbled.

  Her touched firmed, palm cupped around his jaw. “I’m your mother, which means I can apologize for whatever I want to whenever I want to. And…gods, I can’t – it breaks my heart, Val.”

  “I’m sorry.” He tried to turn away.

  “Don’t you apologize. It isn’t your fault either,” she said fiercely. “The world should be a better place.”

  “But it isn’t.”

  “Parts of it are.” She smoothed a wisp of hair behind his ear. “We’re going to take you with us.” This she said like a declaration, firmly.

  He turned back to her. “What?”

  “We can’t stay. We’re not welcome here, not really. Now that Vlad has failed to hold Wallachia, and given the way he and the sultan hate one another, it simply isn’t possible. Not that we’d want to anyway,” she tacked on, expression souring. “We can’t stay in this place. And neither can you.”

  How long had he dreamed of leaving? Dream-walking was made nearly impossible by the silver on his wrists and throat, but he still dreamed regularly, as mortals did. Dreams in which he managed to scale the smooth palace walls and drop down, undetected, into the fragrant pine forests around it. Dreams in which he stole a horse from the stables, and rode past guards too shocked to bar the gates. Dreams in which Father, and Mircea, very much alive, laid siege to Edirne, eyes blazing, swords flashing, rescuing him in a feat of valor not seen since the old days.

  But that was all fantasy.

  “Mama, I can’t leave.”

  A spark flared in her eyes, wild, beyond reason. A glimmer of the true fear and desperation she kept so well hidden. “Val, you have to. I don’t know what he’s told you, or promised you.” She clasped his shoulders, fingertips digging in hard. “But it’s all lies. He’s manipulating you, he–”

  “Mama,” he said again, gentler this time. “I know. I’m not a little boy anymore. I know exactly what’s happening, and why it’s wrong.”

  “Then–”

  “I’m leverage.”

  She blinked at him.

  He sighed. “I’m the way he keeps Vlad in check. Mehmet is…” Volatile. Vain. Spoiled. “Not stupid. He talks as if Vlad is beneath his notice, but he does fear him. He knows that Vlad is stronger than him in every way that counts. He knows that Vlad is smart, and angry, and that he can best him, man-to-man. Vlad may be here on his doorstep, begging asylum, but he knows that Vlad will someday be a threat. He can’t kill him, because they might need him. All that’s left is to manipulate him, and he needs me for that. Even if you stole me away in the middle of the night, Mehmet would send men to give chase. He has endless, endless waves of men to throw at the things that he wants.”

  She blinked again, this time in an effort to push back fresh tears. Her smile trembled. “When did you get so clever?”

  “Mama–”

  “I know, I know. You’ve always been clever. You’re just growing up.” She slipped her arm around his shoulders and pulled him in close, urged his head down onto her shoulder, where she was warm, and smelled of home. “I’m so sorry,” she murmured. “Gods, I…Valerian. Baby. I’m so sorry.”

  “I know. But it’s alright. If I’m to live forever, then I supposed I’ll have to endure some unpleasantness.”

  She breathed a hollow chuckle. “That’s one way of putting it.”

  A growl split the peace of their garden nook, low and threatening.

  Val straightened, and Eira’s hand tightened on his shoulder.

  A familiar, richly-dressed figure stood just beyond the half-drawn curtain of winter ivy. Hands linked behind his back, posture deceptively casual; his head was cocked at an angle Val knew well by this point – a dangerous one.

  A fresh kind of terror stirred in Val’s belly, one akin to the blood-chilling terror of that first night of Mehmet’s…attentions. After the feast, when he’d stabbed the sultan, and fled into the garden. Fear of the unknown. He’d grown used to Mehmet’s tempers, his slaps, his passions, his requests. He’d studied the man as he studied languages and arithmetic and politics; learned every gesture and slow blink, as he would with a difficult horse.

  But Fenrir was massive, and angry, and growling. And Mother was…she was leverage against Val.

  He swallowed the lump forming in his throat. “Fen,” he said, levering as much authority into his voice as he could muster. “Stand down.”

  The growl cut off; Fenrir stilled, poised on his toes. He was huge, yes, but he could be quick when he needed to be. Val felt that faint ripple of energy through the air, a subtle pulse, the kind that usually preceded a wolf shifting to his four-legged form.

  “Fenrir!”

  Mehmet laughed. “Oh, no. By all means – let’s see what he intends to do to me, hm?”

  Eira’s hand tightened as she stood, the movement elegant, soundless; her fingertips biting through silk into Val’s skin. He had the sense she was trying to hold him in place, keep him at her side.

  “Fenrir,” she said, quiet, authoritative. An inflection rarely heard from her, an unmistakable order as a master. “Come.”

  Slowly, with great reluctance, Fenrir backed away from the sultan. Joined the two of them at the bench; sat on it, even, head bowed, ashamed, and leashed.

  Val realized he was breathing rapidly through his mouth and pressed his lips together, forced his lungs to slow.

  Mehmet took three steps forward, so he blocked the entrance to the alcove, booted feet splayed apart on the crushed-rock path. A sultan, but he stood like an indolent heir, still.

  “Your instructor said you fled from your lesson,” he said. “I thought I might find you consorting with our guests.”

  Val started to respond, but Eira dug her nails into the join of his neck and shoulder.

  “Not consorting,” she said coolly. “
Visiting with his mother.”

  Mehmet’s brows lifted. “Mother? Pardon me, but…” His gave moved down her figure, bold and assessing, “you hardly look old enough to have sons. Tell me.” He prowled a few steps deeper, so he was only two arm lengths’ away from them. “Do the people of Wallachia know that you’re the boys’ mother? And not Vlad Dracul’s late wife?”

  She snorted. “You think to intimidate me with old truths? Do your own people know that you yourself are immortal?”

  Something passed across Mehmet’s face, a brief flash of an emotion that he quickly tamped down.

  “You have no Familiars,” Eira continued. “No immortal allies. You were turned and not born – how sure are you that, should the truth slip out, your people will support you when they know that you drink blood to stay alive?”

  Again, the sultan didn’t answer.

  “Will they accept you for what you are? Or will they call you a demon? There’s a distinct history of mobs overtaking monarchs in this world. If they turn against you, will they cut you down? They can kill you, you know, as my mate was killed.”

  A faint, insincere smile finally touched his mouth. “Or perhaps I’ll just kill you now.”

  Her hand tightened another fraction, silencing Val before he could speak. She smiled, and it was wide, and it showed her fangs, and it wasn’t only sincere, but wicked. “I know who made you. I know his strengths – and his weaknesses. And I am far, far older than you, little boy. I could snap you in half.”

  “Then it seems we’re at an impasse.”

  “So it would seem.”

  The moment stretched out, drawn tight as a bowstring wound one too many times. Ready to snap.

  Slowly, Val reached up and removed his mother’s hand from his shoulder. He stepped in front of her, and of Fen, putting himself between his family, and the man who owned him.

  “If I come with you now, will you leave her alone?” he asked, evenly. He’d learned to control his voice, to stuff all of his emotions down deep to a place where they couldn’t cut him so. “She has nothing you want. She doesn’t matter to you.”

  “Val,” Eira said, soft, but deeply pained.