Deliver (The Blades of Acktar Book 4)

by Tricia Mingerink

  Shadrach’s hand twitched as if he wanted to reach over his shoulder to the arrows and his bow slung across his back and finish Martyn off as he’d threatened. “Leith risked both his and Renna’s lives for you. Honestly, I don’t think it was worth it.” Shadrach kicked his horse forward. The mule hauling the cart strained to keep up.

  For a few moments, Martyn couldn’t bring himself to nudge his horse. Leith had gone into that Tower trusting Martyn would come around.

  He’d come very close to being wrong.

  Martyn dug his hands into the wispy end of his horse’s mane. All it would’ve taken was a hardening of his heart, a clearing of his mind, and he would’ve killed Leith. If not for Leith’s murmured I don’t blame you, Martyn would’ve done it.

  Worst of all, Leith would’ve felt the tightening of Martyn’s muscles, the pressure of the knife on his throat. So far, Leith hadn’t said anything about it, but he had to know that up until that moment, Martyn had planned to kill him.

  Friendships didn’t recover from something like that. Not even Leith could pretend to be that forgiving.

  They reached Blathe by late afternoon. After hiding King Respen’s coffin in a dry gully, they clopped into the town. Sullen, dirty faces peeked from broken windows and between the cracks of gray boards. The main road—once one of the few cobbled streets in Acktar and the pride of Blathe—wallowed in a layer of mud. Martyn steered his horse around the holes created by missing cobblestones. This place was even more decrepit than last time he’d been here.

  On the left side of the street, Blathe’s church remained nothing but blackened stones and rubble. Good riddance.

  Shadrach halted his horse and the cart in the center of town next to the well. The neglected remains of Blathe Manor loomed in front of them. If Martyn were to slip inside, would he find the rooms where he and the other Blades had lived and trained before King Respen took the throne? Where he and Leith had once promised to be brothers?

  Wraith-like figures drifted from the buildings and formed a mass of gray along the rotten boardwalks and mud-covered street. Gaunt bodies. Ragged clothing. As neglected as their town.

  “In the name of Prince Keevan Eirdon, I’ve come to return the bodies of your soldiers that fell in the recent battle.” Shadrach cast about at the faces, as if looking for someone in charge.

  The staring people remained silent. Perhaps they distrusted any offering made by Prince Keevan, even an offering of their dead. The prince had little reason to show mercy to Blathe, the town that had spawned King Respen.

  A thin man dressed in a stained tunic stepped from the crowd. “I’ll speak for the town.”

  Shadrach tipped his chin at the man, and Martyn couldn’t help but be reminded that Shadrach was the heir of Walden. He certainly knew how to look the part. “Please organize a party of grave diggers.”

  The man nodded and shouted orders at some of the men and women surrounding them. Shadrach swung down from his horse, and Martyn followed. A shovel was thrust into his hand, and next thing he knew, he’d joined the party digging graves in the forlorn plot of land at the backside of Blathe Manor.

  If only Shadrach would give Martyn more reason to hate him than simply being perfect. Perhaps if Shadrach acted like every other stuffed up hypocrite Martyn had met—if he treated the people of Blathe like scum, the way the self-righteous in this same town had treated Martyn when he’d been a part of this rejected, starving crowd—then Martyn could justify hating him.

  But, no. Shadrach wandered through the crowd, lending a hand, issuing an order, listening to a woman ramble on about her husband or son whose body she had identified and now buried. Shadrach’s infernal goodness made him take the time to see the people of Blathe with compassion instead of disgust.

  Of course Martyn didn’t get a scrap of that compassion. He apparently deserved less than a town of traitors.

  As the evening waned, Shadrach paced the graveyard. Martyn rested his shovel on his shoulder and joined him as they meandered toward the section where wooden markers gave way to headstones.

  Shadrach halted so quickly his boots scraped dust from the pebbles. Martyn peered around his shoulder at the wooden marker leaning to one side, the name still plainly legible: Lena Torren.

  “Leith’s mother is buried here.” Shadrach blinked at the marker as if it hadn’t occurred to him that he would see the gravesite of Leith’s parents in Leith’s former hometown. “Has Leith been here?”

  Martyn shrugged. “Once. We didn’t stay long. He had little reason to mourn.” He pointed at a marker lying facedown on the ground a few yards away. “Leith’s father is buried there.”

  Shadrach didn’t ask what had knocked the marker over. Perhaps he could guess what had happened when thirteen-year-old Leith had seen his father given the honor of a marker and a grave so near his mother. Or maybe Shadrach didn’t think to ask because he didn’t know the rage that Leith had been capable of back then, especially toward his father.

  Shadrach might know the new Leith, but Martyn knew the old one.

  With dusk falling around them, they located the stones marking the graves of Clarisse Felix and the stillborn baby boy King Respen hadn’t even bothered to name before burying. Ignoring the blisters forming on his fingers, Martyn leaned his weight on his shovel and levered a hunk of sod from the ground. Beside him, Shadrach did the same.

  By the time darkness fully cloaked the graveyard, they’d dug the grave to the necessary depth and length. They fetched King Respen’s coffin from its hiding spot and lugged it around the town to the graveyard.

  After they had lowered it into the hole, Martyn couldn’t bring himself to reach for his shovel. It didn’t seem right to just pile the dirt back in like they were burying a dead dog they’d found on the side of the road. But what sort of words could he say over King Respen’s grave? Murderer of women and children. Destroyer of Acktar. King of his Blades. Few besides Martyn even mourned his death.

  Shadrach grabbed his shovel and poured dirt onto the coffin. A steady thunk-thunk-thunk. “Let’s get this done.”

  Martyn picked up his shovel. Was it possible he could bury the past with King Respen? Go on and start over the way Leith seemed so determined to do?

  Probably not. The Blades were too much a part of him. Whoever he might have been had been abandoned long ago.

  Before the moon had risen, Shadrach and Martyn had filled in the grave and replaced the layer of sod on top. In a few weeks, no one would even be able to tell a grave had been dug there.

  King Respen was truly gone.

  2

  Being summoned to King Keevan’s study the morning they were supposed to leave probably wasn’t a good thing.

  Martyn trudged through the dark passageway to the king’s apartments behind a slip of a girl who’d flashed a smile, tossed her hair, and claimed she was the king’s clerk. But at least he wasn’t being escorted under guard. That boded somewhat well.

  The early morning air pressed cool against his face, not even a breeze stirring the stillness yet. They passed no one, probably due to the earliness of the hour. After the late-night feasting following the coronation the night before, not many of the fancy pants nobles would roll out of bed before the sun rose. Except King Keevan, apparently.

  At the base of the stairs, a broad-shouldered, brown-haired man halted them. He glared at Martyn. “You’ll have to be searched for weapons.”

  Martyn sighed and held out his arms. If he’d wanted to assassinate King Keevan, he would’ve slipped in during the night when he wouldn’t be caught, not march in with everyone and their sister watching.

  Once the guard patted him down enough to make sure Martyn didn’t have a knife stuffed in his boots or hidden under his shirt, the guard waved a hand for the stairs. “You may proceed.”

  Yes, because Martyn needed this guard’s permission to walk up a set of stairs.

  When they reached the top of the stairs, the clerk flung the door open and flounced inside. “Martyn Hamish is
here. Or should that be ‘Martyn Hamish is here to see you’? That sounds more official.”

  King Keevan leaned back in his chair behind the desk placed in the far corner. Neat stacks of papers rose on either side of him while a candle burned off to one side to brighten the early dawn gray. “Either way is fine, Penelope. Could you take this stack of papers to the office wing?”

  Martyn stepped off to the side as Penelope hurried across the room. Near the window overlooking the cobblestone courtyard, another guard eyed Martyn, his fingers drumming on his sword’s hilt. Martyn crossed his arms and glared back. King Keevan had summoned him. The guards didn’t have to act like he was a dangerous intruder.

  Penelope hefted the stack of papers. “It’ll be so nice when this is renovated to have the clerk’s offices here. It’ll save me so much walking.”

  Someone like Shadrach probably would’ve opened the door for her, but Martyn didn’t bother. Penelope balanced the stack of papers in one hand and lifted the latch with the other. It wasn’t like she needed help.

  King Keevan tapped the papers in front of him to straighten them, glanced at Martyn, and gestured to the chair set in front of his desk. The candlelight traced the length of the long scar across his cheek and down his neck. “Sit down.”

  Martyn slid into the seat, all too aware of the guard moving into position a few feet behind him. Preventing him from escape?

  King Keevan studied Martyn as if he expected Martyn to squirm if he stared long enough.

  He was going to have to stare a whole lot longer if he wanted to get a squirm out of Martyn. Martyn slouched in his chair. “You wanted something?”

  The lines around King Keevan’s mouth deepened, but he didn’t flinch from Martyn’s gaze. “You and I both know you won’t stay at Stetterly long. If you even make it there. Leith Torren may be ready to settle down in obscurity, but it’s plain to see you aren’t.”

  Blunt and to the point. Martyn could work with that. “What’s it to you?”

  King Keevan’s blue eyes didn’t waver. “I granted you clemency, but I don’t trust you. Then again, you don’t trust me.”

  Martyn straightened and forced himself to relax his crossed arms. King Keevan’s honesty deserved the same back. “I promised Leith I’d try to stick around. I haven’t thought much beyond that.”

  But King Keevan was right. Already, Martyn itched to leave. If not for his promise to Leith, he would’ve ridden off the moment he had King Keevan’s clemency in his pocket.

  King Keevan traced the ridged scar on his cheek with his thumb. “I have a proposition I would like you to consider.”

  Martyn didn’t give in to the temptation to lean forward. That would be too eager. Like he was just waiting for the chance to toss his leash to the next master that came along. Which, of course, he wasn’t. He just needed a mission that didn’t involve farming or pretending he belonged where he didn’t. “What would that be?”

  “A week ago, my men escorted the rest of the Blades beyond Acktar’s borders.” King Keevan’s thumb swiped back and forth on his scar. “While I have ordered patrols to watch the borders, I don’t have the resources to keep up such a patrol indefinitely nor do I believe it’ll hinder any of the Blades who might seek to return.”

  “Why didn’t you just have them executed?” Martyn had to ask, even though the thought of watching his fellow Blades die as King Respen had done turned his stomach.

  “Perhaps it would’ve been wiser. But once I start executing traitors, where would I stop? No, one execution was enough. I don’t want Acktar to linger in the past but to move into the present.” King Keevan hung his head and traced his scar again. “But the scars will remain. Healing doesn’t happen overnight.”

  Martyn had only one friendship to heal. King Keevan had to heal an entire nation all while trying to forgive the Blade who had given him his scar and damaged his voice five years ago. A Blade who’d eventually be his family.

  Martyn wouldn’t want to take on that pair of boots for anything.

  “I couldn’t bring those Blades to a public trial or execution without risking Torren’s or your name being brought up. For Renna’s and Brandi’s sakes, I had to do what I could to protect Torren from that.”

  What would that protection cost? The Blades would return. It was the Blades’ way. The code drilled into them with every whipcrack of King Respen’s voice.

  A Blade never failed, and a failed Blade must die.

  Leith had failed. He’d betrayed King Respen and his fellow Blades, and in those final moments in the Tower, Ranson, Jamie, and Martyn had joined him in that failure. By the law of the Blades, they all must be hunted and killed.

  The remaining five Blades wouldn’t believe they had another choice. They would hunt, and they would kill. Leith. Ranson. Jamie. Martyn. Anyone that tried to stop them.

  Would they look for another master? A Blade didn’t know how to live without one. Martyn saw again Lord Norton standing straight, head high, moments after King Respen’s death. If Martyn was one of those Blades, Lord Norton would be the first person he’d turn to.

  Martyn forced himself to remain relaxed in his chair. What was King’s Keevan’s angle in all this? “What do you want from me?”

  King Keevan leaned his elbows on the desktop, his voice lowering. “I’d like you to be my tracker. You know the Blades better than all but Torren. I’m not asking you to kill them. Merely help me hunt them should they return.”

  “They will.” It was only a matter of time. Though, King Keevan’s concern about that return probably had more to do with Renna, Brandi, and anyone else that might get in the way than actual worry about Leith or Martyn getting killed. “Why me? Why not ask Leith?”

  King Keevan’s jaw tightened as he rearranged the stacks of paper on his desk. “I trust you more than I do him. Yes, you were loyal to Respen Felix, but you were unswerving in that loyalty. Once I have your loyalty, I can depend on you to turn on your fellow Blades for it.”

  Martyn hung his head. His loyalty. His honor and his downfall. He’d pursued his loyalty so far he’d nearly killed his best friend. But King Keevan was right. Martyn had given his loyalty to Leith, and through him to King Keevan.

  “And you were the Sixth Blade at the time of my family’s murder. My family’s blood doesn’t stain your hands the way my blood stains Torren’s.”

  Martyn carried other blood. The murder of General Hannoran, Acktar’s ranking general under King Leon, the night Leith had tried to kill King Keevan. But apparently King Keevan found that blood easier to forget.

  Martyn swung to his feet and paced away from the desk, ignoring the guard who reached for his sword. Should Martyn take King Keevan’s offer? It’d give him a purpose. A mission. He could protect Leith and Renna without being confined to watching their happiness play out.

  He threaded his hand through his hair, the locks curling around his fingers. Could he go from Blade to Blade hunter? If he came across their tracks, could he turn them in to King Keevan? Wouldn’t that be a betrayal like Leith had done to him?

  He faced King Keevan. “Let me think about it.”

  This time when Martyn chose his loyalties, he wanted to do it without being forced.

  King Keevan nodded. “Of course. I wouldn’t expect you to rush into a decision.” He shot a glance toward the window. “I believe they’re gathering to depart.”

  If that wasn’t a dismissal, Martyn was going to make it one. He bowed and hurried from the room and down the stairs.

  Unlike before, the cobblestone courtyard teemed with soldiers, the flags of Sierra and Walden flying from poles and horses’ bridles. Martyn ducked his head, hunched his shoulders, and ignored them. Hopefully they’d ignore him too. He strode into the stables, but the bustle flowed into there as well.

  He shoved his way to the back where his horse munched on a mouthful of hay in a stall. A few stalls down, Shadrach eased a bit into his chestnut’s mouth. Former Ninth Blade Harding tightened the saddle’s girth on a ho
rse in the stall next to Martyn’s. Even that boy, Jamie, was there, saddling a horse.

  Nothing he could do but ignore them. Martyn threw the blanket and saddle on his horse’s back, tightened the girth, checked the other straps and buckles, and worked the bit between his horse’s teeth. As soon as he strapped his gear behind the saddle, he led his horse from the stall.

  “Where do you think you’re going?”

  Martyn sighed and faced Shadrach. “I’m riding out now. Might as well scout our route to make sure we don’t run into any trouble.”

  “We’ll be riding with a small army. No one’s going to attack us.” Shadrach crossed his arms. “You’re the only trouble I’m worried about.”

  “Tough. I’m free to leave, so that’s what I’m doing.” Martyn shoved past Shadrach. “I’ll meet up with your small army later this morning. I could hardly miss the dust cloud you’ll be raising.”

  Martyn yanked his horse down the aisle, swung on, and kicked it into a canter. His horse’s hooves clunked on the cobbles, through the main gate, and down the ramp leading to the castle.

  The morning breeze whipped by his face, cool with last night’s dew. Perhaps he should just keep riding. Maybe if he rode far and fast enough, he could outrun the ghosts of Leith’s screams and the pain of betrayal.

  3

  Renna gripped her saddlebags so tightly her arms quivered. She was finally leaving. After months of imprisonment in this castle, she was going to freely ride out of there. She stood next to the stable, trying to stay out of the way. Lady Lorraine stood in the center of the courtyard, directing the foot soldiers into a line on one side of the courtyard.

  “I wish you didn’t have to leave so soon.”

  Renna turned. Queen Adelaide—Addie as she’d insisted on being called when Renna met her a few days ago—lumbered from the passageway, leaning on Keevan’s arm to steady her eight-months pregnant frame. Her hair puffed in a mass of brown curls around her head, striking against her deep green dress.