by Tanya Huff
He swallowed and winced, his throat painfully bruised. He’d tried to believe in her. He’d given her the benefit of every doubt. All he wanted was for her to be a part of his life again. Was that so terrible?
“It isn’t you who left me, it’s him.”
“I chose.”
This was the second time she’d chosen Gyhard.
The Emperor wanted Gyhard back in the Empire to pay for his treason. The Emperor had bards who could rip the parasite right out of Vree’s head.
Then she’d know what it was like to be alone.
Make the most of the night, Vree. When they let me out, I will be after you and the next time, you’ll get no warning.
* * * *
“Magda? Are you awake?” When there was no answer, Celestin sighed deeply and unbolted the spare room door. The child had sulked her way through both festival services and that, as far as the priest was concerned, was quite enough of that. Dark and disturbing dreams had interrupted what little sleep she’d had, and she was in no mood to continue excusing teenage extremes. “Magda, we have to talk. I brought you some festival ca … Oh, my.”
She stared from the crude rope braided out of torn bedsheets to the dormer window she could’ve sworn was too small for even someone Magda’s size to climb out. Except, she realized, if she went out the window, there wouldn’t still be a pile of ruined sheets lying in the middle of the room.
“Oh, my.” She said it again because there didn’t seem to be much else to say.
Vree’s weapons were missing from their place in the kitchen.
A pack and journey food had been taken from the storeroom.
Gerek had not slept on the pallet she’d had made up for him. His kit was gone, but Bannon’s was still in the stable where he’d left it.
All four horses were still in the corral.
“I don’t believe this is happening,” she muttered as a black gelding lipped at her hair.
“Then don’t stand so close to the fence,” Marija advised, coming around the corner of the building, a half-eaten apple in one hand, her instrument case in the other.
Celestin stared at the bard in complete confusion. “What are you talking about?”
“The horse eating your hair. Why, what were you talking about?”
All things being enclosed, Celestin figured there was one more thing she had to know before she jumped to any conclusions. “I think you should send a kigh to find out who’s locked in that shed.”
A few moments later, an urgent message sped toward Elbasan.
* * * *
The kigh found Liene resting on a bench set into the curved stone wall of the Center. She hadn’t slept well. Dragging old bones out of bed for the sunrise service had left her feeling her age, and all she wanted to do for the next few moments was sit and listen to the cheerful babble of voices as those of the Bardic Hall, the Healers’ Hall, and the palace who’d remained in the Citadel for the Third Quarter Festival milled about in the courtyard, chatting happily.
His Majesty stood joking with his treasurer about how the realm would soon have to strike new gold coins whether he dropped dead or not. “After twenty-seven years,” he laughed, “the old ones are wearing out.” It was obvious that both Her Majesty on his right and Healer Jonakus on his left, thought the humor in bad taste. Liene frowned and tried to remember the treasurer’s name. She could remember his mother—Denyse i’Janina a’Albinek; a great body, a brilliant grasp of economics, and a tendency to giggle in bed—but the son, even though he was standing right in front of her, she couldn’t recall.
I hate getting old, she grumbled to herself, tucking her hands into the wide sleeves of her quartered robe.
Her Highness, Princess Jelena, and her cousin, His Imperial Highness Prince Otavas were having what appeared to be a spirited argument off to one side of the semicircular yard. Watching with a critical eye, Liene wondered how the boy had gotten past Jelena’s shyness. She seemed unusually animated. Well, he’s a good-looking lad. I suppose there’s always the obvious reason.
Its pointed features twisted in pique, the kigh stuck a long finger in Liene’s ear to get her attention.
“Not my problem …” she grumbled when she finally worked out just what it was trying to tell her. Weight on her cane, she rose and Sang a gratitude before calling for Kovar.
* * * *
“To be honest, I’m not surprised that His Grace went over to the other side, as it were. Magda’s always been able to wrap her brother around her little finger, and he’s infatuated with Vree.”
Liene watched Kovar pace the length of the office and back again before she said mildly. “Why Gerek suddenly decided to join forces with Magda and Vree isn’t the immediate problem. Marija needs to know what to do with Bannon. Should she keep him in Bartek Springs? Should she stop him from following?”
“Could she stop him from following?” Then he answered his own question. “Of course she could, he’s only got one kigh.” Still pacing, he dragged at the ends of his mustache, realized what he was doing, and held out waxy fingers to Liene. “You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
“You bet. You became Bardic Captain at midnight and this is your problem. I’m retired.”
“So you’re not going to get involved?”
The old bard grinned at him. “Don’t be ridiculous.” The grin faded when she saw Kovar’s expression suddenly change. “Look, you’re conducting, I just thought I’d …”
He raised a hand and cut her off. “What if Gerek didn’t decide to join forces with Magda and Vree? What if Gyhard jumped to Gerek’s body?”
“No. Vree would have had to push him.”
“We only have Gyhard’s word for that.” His lip curled. “We only have Gyhard’s word for a lot of things.”
“True,” Liene acknowledged, “but then you’re forgetting Magda. She’d never allow it!”
“Could she stop it? Would she even know it was happening before it was over?” Kovar sat on the edge of the desk, brows drawn in as he worked out possibilities. “Or maybe that’s why they’re going to meet up with Kars. We’ve been assuming Magda can Sing Gyhard into another body—how much do you want to bet Kars can? And he won’t have her scruples.”
“Now, you’re forgetting Vree.”
“Vree is afraid of Gyhard.” Kovar remembered that first evening in the Bardic Hall—the rage that had belonged to a second intelligence flashing for a heartbeat in Vree’s eyes, the fear he’d felt rolling off her like smoke. “I’ve seen it.”
“I haven’t,” Liene snapped, then her face fell as she remembered her trouble with the treasurer’s name. “I suppose I might not have noticed. No.” She reconsidered. “You’re wrong about that. She’s not afraid of him although I’ll grant you she may be afraid of what she feels for him.”
“We don’t have enough information.”
“We could believe the story Magda told Marija; that Gyhard needs to put his past to rest before he can build a future.”
Kovar snorted. “Magda is a romantic child.”
“Magda is a healer of the fifth kigh.”
“That doesn’t matter. None of this matters.” The new Bardic Captain began pacing again. “We have to allow Bannon to go after them. People are dying out there at the hands of a crazed Cemandian bard and it’s our responsibility …” He thumped both fists against his chest. “… to put a stop to it. Vree and Gyhard can’t be allowed to interfere with Karlene stopping this maniac.”
“And if Magda’s right?”
“If Magda’s right,” Kovar repeated sharply, then he stopped and sighed. “It doesn’t matter if Magda’s right. As much as I dislike Gyhard, I like Vree, and I wish we could give her a happy ending. However, a happy ending for one person cannot outweigh the deaths of countless others. In the final chorus, we can’t trust Gyhard. By his own admission, he is responsible for what Kars has become. We can’t allow them to get together again. As long as Gyhard remains in Vree’s body, Bannon is still the only chan
ce we have of stopping her.”
“You don’t trust Bannon either,” Liene reminded him. Both hands folded over the top of her cane, she leaned forward. “So your answer to Marija?”
“My answer to Marija …” The new Bardic Captain stood in the open window and watched a pair of kigh chase each other around a snapping pennant on the gatehouse tower. He frowned. “We’re just whistling into the wind, you know. Kars is a bardic problem; stretching a point, Vree and Gyhard may be a bardic problem as well, but the other three are not. We have no right to stop Bannon from following anyone he chooses. He’s broken no laws. We’re not at war with the Empire.”
“Her Royal Highness did make it clear that she wanted Magda back in Elbasan and she didn’t want an unstable assassin roaming about the country.”
Chin up and eyes flashing, Kovar spun around to face Liene. “The bards have not become the royal police force!” When he saw her expression, his brows drew in. “That was where you wanted me to arrive, wasn’t it? Why didn’t you just come right out and say so?”
The old Bardic Captain smiled up at the new. “Because now, you’ll remember it.”
“You’re an obnoxious old woman; you know that?”
Her smile broadened. “I revel in it.”
* * * *
Watching Bannon quickly and efficiently stow supplies into a borrowed pack, Celestin debated with herself about offering to help. Not with his packing, he’d obviously done that countless times before, but with the other burden he carried. She didn’t need to be able to read his kigh in order to feel the anger coming off him in waves, anger that went back beyond a night spent locked in a shed. This was a young man used to getting his own way and, in spite of evidence to the contrary, he seemed determined to continue.
Well aware that the young were often both angry and self-indulgent, the priest was equally aware that time was the only sure solution. Sooner or later, most discovered that they weren’t the center of the Circle. On the other hand, most young people weren’t angry, self-indulgent assassins.
On yet another hand, she’d seen his face when Marija—apologizing for the delay as profusely as possible with her limited Imperial vocabulary—had let him out of the shed. She could have sworn that, just for an instant, he’d hoped to see someone else and when he hadn’t, he’d first looked hurt and then derisive and then there had only been a superficially charming young man, apparently more than willing to forgive.
Finally, she could stand it no longer. “Bannon?”
He turned and smiled. In a foreign land where he barely spoke the language, pleasantry was a crucial tool.
Now that she had his attention, she wasn’t sure of how to begin. “Where do you go from here?”
A little surprised by a question with such an obvious answer, Bannon shrugged. “I get my sister.”
“Why?”
His expression hardened. “Told to.”
Celestin shook her head and laid a hand gently on his chest. “Why in here?”
Bannon met her gaze and was totally astonished to see that she seemed to really care. All at once, he was reminded of how Vree had held his face in both hands after his first target and asked him if he was all right. About to crow that the target had never touched him, he’d realized that she didn’t want to know if his body had been wounded, she wanted to know how he felt. He’d turned in time to see them drag the body from the practice yard and discovered he felt nothing at all. When he’d told her, she’d nodded, like it was the answer he was supposed to give, but he’d thought, just for a moment, he saw sadness behind the patina of her training. He’d been twelve; Vree was thirteen.
But that Vree, his Vree, was gone.
For an instant, Celestin was reminded of how Dymek had looked when they’d told him Filip was dead. Confused and lost and unable to believe how such a horrible thing could have happened.
Then the instant passed. Bannon picked up a small sack of dried apples and stared down at it, as though searching it for answers. Finally, he looked up. He wasn’t sure why it was important he make this woman understand; maybe because he thought she could understand. “Without Vree, like lost arm or leg.”
“Without her you feel crippled?” When he nodded, Celestin spread her arms, her posture as nonthreatening as thirty years in the priesthood could make it. “But is it like losing an arm or leg or like losing a crutch?”
“Crutch?”
She mimed walking with a crutch then straightened as the assassin jerked toward her.
“It isn’t like that!” Both hands curled into fists, Bannon shouted his protest in Imperial, using volume to replace the Shkoden words he didn’t have. “She doesn’t hold me up! She never held me up! We were partners, a team! The best slaughtering blades Jiir ever had! All I wanted was my body back and she betrayed me! First she saved the life of the man who tried to kill me and then she walked away. I’d leave her to rot in this slaughtering country if the Emperor didn’t want her! I don’t want her! He does! I don’t care!” As the last word slapped against the walls of the small room, Bannon was horrified to find his eyes were wet. No one had ever looked at him with such sympathy before. He swallowed three or four times in quick succession and used the pain to find himself again.
Although she hadn’t understood the words, the priest recognized the reaction. “It’s frightening being alone, isn’t it?”
“Alone?” The bark of laughter tore at the bruising on his throat. “His Imperial Highness Prince Otavas need me!”
“Good. I’m glad.”
Her smile offered comfort. Terrified he might take it, Bannon grabbed up the pack and ran out the door.
* * * *
“Ger, I’m fine. Honest.” Pushing her hair back off her face with one hand, Magda shoved her brother away with the other. “I’m a healer, remember? If there was anything wrong with me, I’d know.”
“You’re shaking.”
“I’m cold.”
“It’s a beautiful day.”
She narrowed her eyes. “I didn’t say it wasn’t. If you want to do something useful, give me your sweater and stop fussing.”
Gerek recognized her expression; she’d borrowed it from her mother and years of experience had taught him not to bother arguing. Yanking the sweater up over his head, he silently handed it to her.
“Thank you.” Pulling it on, she spent a moment rolling up the cuffs, then sighed deeply and stood. Her calves ached from all the climbing, she had scratches all over both hands from pushing through prickly ash, and a low-hanging branch had left a painful welt across one cheek. “All right, let’s get going.”
Because he knew what Magda would say, Gerek looked to Vree.
Vree shook her head. “Karlene was closer than we were when she started, and Bannon won’t have rested.”
“Maggi …”
“Is a healer. She knows when she’s ready to go on.”
“She’s leaving,” Magda called as she reached the edge of the clearing. “And she wants to know if you two are coming?”
Gerek glared at Vree and jerked his head in the direction of his sister.
Vree moved to take up position just behind the younger woman’s left shoulder. She didn’t much like being between Magda and her brother, but as a marching order it made sense. Gerek could see over and around her; with their positions reversed, he was just too slaughtering big.
*I don’t think he loves you anymore.*
*Don’t be an ass, Gyhard, he never did. He’s a romantic. Probably falls in love every time he wants to get laid.*
*How exhausting for him.*
Rolling her eyes, Vree reached ahead and lifted a low-hanging branch out of Magda’s way. “Can you still feel the way we have to go?” she asked rubbing at the sticky sap smeared over the scar on the back of her hand.
Magda turned enough to show Vree a melancholy smile. “I think I’ll always be able to feel it. It’s like when someone’s sick—not injured, but sick—and a healer can feel the wrongness. I can feel the
wrongness in the world.” She stumbled and would have fallen if Vree hadn’t grabbed her elbow. “Sorry. I guess I have to pay more attention to where I put my feet.”
“That’s it, Maggi.” Gerek’s tone suggested he not be argued with. “Back to the clearing. You need a longer rest.”
The two women exchanged a speaking glance.
“Don’t get your bowstring in a knot, Ger,” Magda advised, starting up the tumbled end of a rocky ridge. “I need to find this wrong and heal it. I don’t need to rest.”
* * * *
Bannon dropped to one knee and studied the pattern in the clearing. He’d found where they’d slept and now he’d found where they’d rested. Shaking his head, he straightened and moved cautiously after them. This pace must be driving Vree crazy.
He caught up on the top of the ridge and froze as Vree motioned for her companions to be quiet. They weren’t very good at it, he noted smugly; neither of them seemed to have any idea of how to stand absolutely still. While Vree might have heard something—he hadn’t been moving as noiselessly as he could because he hadn’t realized he was so slaughtering close—he’d make sure that she wouldn’t hear anything else.
Predator patient, he waited. Once, his sister might have been able to outwait him, but that was no longer her decision to make.
“It was probably just a pinecone falling. Let’s get moving.”
His Grace was not a patient man. Bannon appreciated that. He let them gain some distance, then followed, watching for his chance. In the Empire, an assassin on target could kill anyone who got in the way. Two things kept him from sending a dagger into Vree’s companions. The first; he was not, at present, in the Empire. The second; a good assassin seldom admitted that anyone was in the way. A good assassin took out the target regardless and Bannon had been the best.
One of the best, he corrected. The third reason, was that he had no intention of warning Vree he was coming. She’d beaten him once; he wouldn’t let that happen again. They were going to pay for their treason—Gyhard for his against the Empire, Vree for hers against him.