Warlord

by Jennifer Fallon

  The women didn’t notice him when he first opened the door so he stood there a moment, listening to all his fears solidify into hideous reality.

  “ … you must come with me, Bylinda,” Luciena was urging. “This might be your only chance to get away from here.”

  “I have to stay,” his wife replied in that damn irritatingly vague tone she’d adopted since his daughter died. “I have to stay near Leila.”

  “But we’re not going very far,” Luciena promised, taking Bylinda’s hands in hers and squeezing them reassuringly. “Just as far as the Walsark Crossroads. Travin will be there. And the children. Damin will be there soon, too, I’m certain of it, and … Lord Damaran!” She jumped to her feet looking as guilty as a Karien sinner. “How long have you been there?”

  “Long enough,” he said in his rasping whisper.

  She looked at him questioningly. “Sorry?”

  Mahkas snarled with frustration when he realised she couldn’t hear what he was saying. He stepped into the room and repeated himself, but the effect was lost with the second telling.

  “Oh! … Well … then you’ll probably want to come along, too,” Luciena suggested with forced cheerfulness. “I was just asking Aunt Bylinda if she wanted to go … on a picnic.” Luciena cringed a little as she spoke, knowing how foolish such a suggestion was, given it was after midnight.

  “Liar!” he accused, his throat aching from the effort as he stalked across the rug to confront her. “I knew it! You’re in league with Damin Wolfblade!”

  “Don’t be silly!” she said. “He’s not even here. He’s in Cabradell fighting the Fardohnyans.”

  “You’re plotting against me!” he charged. “You’re trying to turn my wife against me!”

  “I’m tying to burn your life against a tree?” Luciena repeated with a puzzled look.

  Mahkas wanted to scream with frustration, certain she was deliberately misunderstanding him, but he had no more hope of doing that than he did of making himself clearly understood. “Don’t play games with me, woman!”

  “Mahkas, I’m trying to understand you,” she assured him soothingly, “if you could just speak a little more … loudly …”

  “You heard what I said!” he declared, his shredded voice making him sound ridiculous. “And I heard what you said! You want to take Bylinda to meet Damin. Is that where everyone else has gone? To join my enemies? I knew it! I knew all along this ruse about a war with Fardohnya was just an elaborate lie! That ungrateful whelp! Leila would never have killed herself if he’d had even a modicum of compassion. It wasn’t her fault! The Bastard Fosterling raped her.”

  Luciena took a step back from him as he ranted. That made him feel better. It was good when people feared him.

  “Mahkas, are you sure you should be out of bed, yet? You’ve been very ill …”

  “I’m well enough to see what’s going on here!” he snarled, every harshly whispered word scouring his ravaged throat. “You’re both as bad as each other! Common-born whores, the both of you, out to ruin our daughters.”

  “Daughters?” Luciena asked, a little confused. “You had one daughter, Mahkas. Remember? The one you whipped like a dog and then drove to suicide?”

  Mahkas’s right arm was still in a sling, but there was nothing wrong with his left arm. With all the strength he could muster, he backhanded Luciena without warning, throwing her back against the fireplace. Her head cracked against the polished granite with a sickening thud. She collapsed against it like a rag doll and lay there, unmoving.

  Good, Mahkas thought with satisfaction. That takes care of that problem.

  Then he glanced at his wife. She had risen to her feet and was staring at him with an odd expression.

  “Why are you looking at me like that? You’re the traitor here!”

  “You didn’t keep your oath.”

  “What oath?”

  “You promised to protect us.”

  “Us? Who is us?”

  “Leila and me.”

  “Protect you? I killed to protect you!” he croaked painfully. “I killed to protect Leila! You have no idea of the things I’ve done to make this world a place fit for my daughter! Don’t you dare tell me I didn’t keep my oath!”

  “But you failed, Mahkas. Leila is dead.”

  “That’s Damin’s fault! Not mine.”

  She smiled distantly. “A month ago it was Starros’s fault. Whose fault will it be next month? Mine?”

  He stared at her, suddenly confronted with a stranger. “What are you babbling about?”

  “You didn’t keep your oath.”

  “For pity’s sake, woman,” he snapped, turning his back on her. “Shut up about that!” His throat was on fire. He needed to take something to ease it. Some honey, perhaps, in warm milk. That usually helped when he overdid things …

  And he needed to raise his army. If he was under attack he intended to face it head on. So Damin is at the Walsark Crossroads, is he? Well, we’ll see how that murderous little ingrate reacts when I launch a surprise attack on …

  Mahkas cried out and fell to his knees as a sharp pain shot through his lower back. He grabbed at the site of the pain and discovered his hand sticky with blood when it came away. He barely had time to register that remarkable fact when the sharp sting struck again, a little higher, and he realised he was being stabbed a second time.

  He turned to fight off his attacker, thinking, This is what I get for not checking that Luciena was actually dead.

  But when he turned he discovered Luciena still lay unmoving by the hearth.

  “Bylinda?”

  As pale as a wraith, she was standing behind him, dressed in her mourning white, a small and bloody table knife held before her. If he hadn’t seen the blood on her hands, he’d never have believed the blade dangerous enough to do any damage. Or that Bylinda would try to harm him.

  His wife stared at him with eyes that seemed to be looking somewhere far away. “You didn’t keep your oath,” she said. Her voice was toneless, flat. Devoid of all emotion.

  “For the gods’ sake, woman!” he gasped. “Put that blade down before you hurt someone!” The pain in his back where she’d stabbed him was intense, but given what he’d suffered lately, not enough to incapacitate him. He held out his left hand, expecting her to hand over the weapon. “Give it to me.”

  “You didn’t keep your oath,” she repeated.

  “I’ll give you an oath now, you stupid bitch,” he threatened hoarsely. “Give me that knife this minute or you’ll rue the day you ever met me!”

  “I’m long past that day, Mahkas.” She glanced down at the blade, staring at it as if it was something she’d never seen before, as if the blood on it was some novel substance needing close investigation.

  Wincing with the pain, Mahkas stepped closer, expecting to snatch the blade from her grasp. Instead, quick as a snake, she slashed the knife across his hand. He stared at the blood welling on his palm in shock, before fixing his furious gaze on his wife.

  “Give it to me!”

  “You didn’t keep your oath.”

  “Stop saying that!”

  “You didn’t keep your oath.”

  “I swear by every god I can name, Bylinda, if you don’t shut your fool mouth and give me that blade this instant …”

  “Take it, then,” she dared, thrusting it forward sharply.

  He wasn’t quick enough to get out of its way. The blade sliced into his right shoulder, sending a jarring bolt of pain along his infected arm. With the pain came the first metallic taste of fear as it occurred to Mahkas that not only could Bylinda do him serious harm with that ridiculous little table knife, she intended to.

  “Guards!” he bellowed as loud as he could manage. The cry came out in a strangled whisper. It was a wasted effort. Bylinda could barely make out his words; even if they’d been there, a guard in the hall would have no idea his master was calling him, let alone realise he was in imminent danger. The only other person in the room, the o
nly one who might have been able to talk some sense into his wife, lay unmoving by the fireplace, blood seeping from her cracked skull.

  Bylinda smiled humourlessly when she realised he was helpless. “Nobody can hear you.”

  Mahkas glanced over his shoulder at the door, wondering if he could make it out of the room before his wife caught him. He was in pain and bleeding from several small wounds, his arm was pounding and his throat felt as if it had been sanded with a rasp. Warily, he turned his attention back to Bylinda, thinking he might still be able to talk his way out of this. Bylinda didn’t usually defy him. This was Luciena’s fault. She’d poisoned his wife against him.

  Changing his tack, Mahkas smiled at her. “If you give me the knife now, I won’t punish you too harshly,” he promised, reaching out to her again.

  She shook her head. “You punish everyone harshly, Mahkas. Even your own daughter.”

  “Leila had to be taught a lesson, Bylinda.”

  “What about Darilyn?”

  He hesitated, wondering what his long-dead sister had to do with this. “She’s been dead for twenty-five years.”

  “You killed her, too, didn’t you?” Bylinda accused. “In fact, I’m not sure which is worse—that you strangled your own sister with a harp wire or that you took those poor little innocent boys in to find her body and let them grow up thinking their mother had killed herself in disgrace.”

  Mahkas stared at her in horror. How could she know that?

  “Luciena didn’t know why you killed Darilyn,” Bylinda continued, “but I can guess the reason. It was something to do with Riika, wasn’t it? Were you involved with her kidnapping, Mahkas? I remember Laran and you talking about it. I remember watching you, thinking how terrible it must have been for you to lose both your sisters like that. You sat there with a perfectly straight face and swore to your brother it was Darilyn who’d betrayed Riika, when all the time it was you, wasn’t it?” She didn’t raise her voice. She didn’t even seem angry. If anything, she seemed contemptuous of him. “Did you kill poor Laran, too, or was it just a little bit of serendipity that he got himself killed before he discovered the truth?”

  “You have no idea what you’re talking about, woman.”

  “How could you even look at those poor children after you murdered their mother, let alone bring them into our home and expect me to raise them?”

  Mahkas was rapidly losing patience with this. “Give me that damned knife, woman, before I—”

  “Before you what, husband? Beat me? I don’t care. You’ve taken the only thing I loved from me. There’s no greater pain I fear now. And you know the worst of it? You’ve made me guilty by association. Your crimes are my crimes, Mahkas, because I never tried to stop you.”

  Threatening her wasn’t working, so he tried changing his approach again.

  “I’m sorry, my love,” he crooned softly, moving a little closer. She had that faraway look in her eye again. He edged his way forward, thinking he could snatch the knife from her before she could attack him again. Once she was disarmed, he intended to beat her to within an inch of her life for this treachery. “Bylinda … darling …”

  She stabbed him in the forearm this time, the knife in and out almost before he had time to register the pain. He cried out—a hoarse, useless, whispered cry nobody but Bylinda could hear.

  “It hurts, doesn’t it?” she said. “Being killed, a little bit at a time.”

  “I swear, Bylinda,” he threatened, advancing on her angrily. “If you don’t stop this nonsense …”

  The knife took him in the shoulder this time. Before he could stop her, she changed her grip on the knife and plunged it downward past his collarbone and into the jugular. Blood spurting over them both, Mahkas collapsed to his knees with the shock and stared up at her, truly afraid of her now.

  “Bylinda …”

  “You didn’t keep your oath,” she said, looking down at him unsympathetically as she pulled the knife out and almost casually changed the bloody knife to her other hand and plunged it into his right shoulder.

  “You lied to Laran.” Stab.

  “You lied to Travin and Xanda.” She stabbed him again. “You lied to Marla.”

  And again she struck him, punctuating each accusation with her blade.

  “You lied to me.”

  Again the blade sliced into him, the pain searing through his body as she attacked his wounded arm.

  “And you lied to Leila when you didn’t keep your oath.”

  “Stop it!” he rasped, not sure if it was the stings of her little blade, the loss of blood, or the torment of her accusations that was driving him mad.

  “You didn’t keep your oath.”

  She struck him again and he collapsed even further, on his hands and knees now, his back exposed to her. He felt the blade bite yet again, this time close to his spine. He could taste salty blood in his mouth and fear on his breath.

  “Why … why are you doing this?” he cried, still not able to fully comprehend her cold, unrelenting rage.

  “For Leila,” Bylinda told him calmly, raising her arm to strike again. “I’m doing this for Leila.”

  CHAPTER 77

  The palace was asleep when Damin and his small band of invaders entered the reception room through the slaveways. Damin chose the upstairs exit from the slaveways because at this hour of the night, it was certain to be empty. The last thing they needed was to stumble over a squad of early rising slaves taking care of the ashes in the hearth of one of the more commonly used rooms downstairs.

  They stepped into the cavernous hall, hurrying across the polished parquet floor with footsteps that sounded far too loud for comfort. When they reached the entrance, Damin halted everyone with a hand signal, and then he turned to face them.

  “I’m guessing Mahkas will be in his bed at this hour,” Damin told them softly. “So that’s where I’m headed. Wrayan, I need you to find Xanda and Luciena. Starros and Kraig, ladies, you’re with me. Luc, you and your people are with Wrayan.”

  The thief nodded. “What do we do if we encounter any resistance?”

  “We won’t,” Wrayan assured him, but he was looking at Damin when he answered. Damin understood immediately. Between his magical powers and his status in the Thieves’ Guild, Wrayan feared very few men. Besides, once they found Xanda, his cousin would be able to order any Raiders left in the palace to lay down their arms with a good expectation of being obeyed, even without Wrayan’s magical assistance.

  “And if we find Mahkas?” Wrayan asked.

  “You come and get me. I’ll deal with him.”

  The thief looked relieved that he and his men weren’t going to be held accountable for the death of Krakandar’s regent, regardless of how much everyone thought he deserved it.

  Nothing more was said as the intruders left the empty room and turned in opposite directions down the corridor. Damin made no further attempt to conceal his presence. He strode through the darkened halls as if he owned the place. It was bad enough that he’d had to enter the palace by skulking through the slaveways. He didn’t intend to skulk any more. Certainly not in his own home.

  “Where do you want to look first?” Starros asked softly as he caught up with Damin’s long-legged stride, looking around with concern. He would have been much more comfortable if they were skulking, Damin thought. Kraig, Barlaina and Lyrian, on the other hand were looking around with open curiosity as they followed him through the palace.

  “We’ll start with the bedrooms,” he announced, making no attempt to lower his voice. “If what you’re telling me about Mahkas being ill is correct, he may well be sound asleep in his bed.”

  Starros glanced at Damin sceptically. “Are we taking odds on that?”

  They took the stairs to the next floor without encountering a single soul. Damin had wandered the halls of Krakandar Palace any number of times as a boy, but he had never before experienced such an eerie feeling of emptiness. It was as if the life had been sucked out of the buil
ding, leaving only an empty shell, haunted by painful memories.

  The wing of the palace that housed the sleeping quarters was just as deserted as the rest of the building. Damin passed his own room, the one he’d shared with Starros as a child, Leila’s room, the bedroom the twins had always called their own, the oddness of it all tugging on his memories of this place. He’d never seen this passage devoid of guards before. Never seen it plunged into darkness like this: Not a lamp was lit, not a single soul seemed to be in residence.

  He hesitated when he reached Mahkas’s room at the end of the hall.

  “Is this where we will find your uncle?” Kraig asked.

  Damin nodded. Immediately Lyrian and Barlaina began to reach for their weapons.

  “He’s a sick man and he’s probably asleep,” Damin informed them with a frown. “Let’s not get too excited, ladies.”

  “You remain calm if you wish, your highness,” Lyrian suggested tartly. “In my experience it’s the probablys that usually require weapons. Besides, did we not come here to kill this man?”

  This bloodthirsty need to inflict violence on someone—anyone—was an alarming tendency he’d noticed both women appeared to be suffering from, ever since he’d removed the slave collars and returned their own clothes and weapons after they’d left Lasting Drift. Everything was far too black and white in Lyrian’s world, and he really didn’t have the time to explain all the various shades of grey to her. Damin looked to Kraig for a bit of support, confident the prince would understand why he couldn’t risk Lyrian and Barlaina bursting into Mahkas’s room and slicing him into little pieces just for fun.

  Kraig seemed to understand what Damin wanted of him. “You must not harm this man,” he ordered his bodyguards. “It is Prince Damin’s right alone to butcher this pretender.”

  He frowned, thinking the phrase butcher this pretender was a little extreme, but the prince’s words seemed to have the desired effect. The women looked quite disappointed they were to be denied the opportunity to shed some blood and reluctantly returned their knives to the tooled leather sheaths they were wearing.