The Queen's Blade V - Master of the Dance

by T C Southwell

  "I don't need to listen to your lies!" He lunged at her, his hands reaching for her throat.

  Rayan ducked under his arms and ran to the far side of the room, where she turned to face him, glancing at the assassin again. He watched her husband with hard eyes, his brow furrowed.

  "He's not my lover!" Rayan cried. "He's the man who slew Endor. He's injured, and sought sanctuary here."

  Blade sighed and shook his head. Jarron glanced at the assassin, and his eyes widened when he noticed the bandage around Blade's biceps. To her surprise, his rage drained away at this startling bit of information, and his expression became calculating.

  "Indeed? He told you this?"

  She nodded. "The soldiers have searched the house already, on the night Endor was killed. That's when Blade came here."

  "How interesting. Blade, eh? The Queen's Blade. I've heard it mentioned. Injured, you say? How badly?"

  Rayan relax a little. "He was shot with a war arrow and mauled by dogs. I've said we'll hide him until he's able to leave."

  "Did you now?" Jarron's tone dropped to a dangerous croon, and a delighted smile stretched his fat, coarse features. "But I think Endor's lords would pay a handsome reward for his capture, don't you?"

  "You can't betray him. He's saved all of us from Endor."

  "You, my dear, are a fool. Handing him over won't change the fact that Endor's dead, but it will definitely have a financial reward."

  Rayan's eyes widened, and she shot Blade a frightened, apologetic look. "You can't! We must help him."

  "We must do nothing of the sort. He's nothing to us, just a dirty assassin. But worth a great deal of money, I would venture to say."

  Blade said, "Your wife has sheltered me. She lied to the soldiers who came here. They'll execute her if you hand me over."

  Jarron chuckled. "Excellent. I have long wished to be rid of her."

  Rayan gasped, raising a hand to her mouth as she stared at her husband in horror. Blade snorted and glanced away, his brows knotted. Jarron chortled and headed for the door.

  Blade raised his head. "Jarron."

  The fat merchant paused in the doorway and turned to face the assassin with a smug smile. "If you're going to try to dissuade me, don't waste your breath, assassin. This will be like killing two birds with one stone."

  "Not quite. If you think I'll let you betray me, you're mistaken."

  Jarron sniggered. "If you're as badly wounded as she says, you can't stop me."

  "Wrong again." Blade drew his hand from under the sheets, and Jarron's eyes widened at the sight of the dagger in it.

  He raised his hands and bellowed, "No!"

  Blade flicked the dagger, which struck Jarron in the throat with a meaty thud, severed the jugular on one side and blocked his windpipe. Blood pumped out in little fountains and flowed down his chest as he pawed at the hilt, opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water. Blade glanced at the ashen-faced Rayan, who stared at her husband with wide, horrified eyes.

  Jarron swayed, reeled into the wall with a crash and fell to his knees, still trying to pull the dagger out. Rayan whimpered and swung away, covering her face. Blade drew another dagger from under the sheets and threw it. The weapon impaled Jarron's eye and ended the ghastly noises he made in his struggle to stay alive. Blade flopped back and stared at the ceiling, listening to Rayan's soft sobbing.

  "He would have let them kill you, Rayan," he murmured.

  She gulped and wiped her face, then turned to face him, averting her eyes from her husband's corpse. "I know. I'm not weeping for him. It was just... terrible, that's all."

  "You were going to ask me to kill him, weren't you? That was the favour you wanted."

  Rayan nodded. "When you were well enough. I hated him. He... beat me."

  "Then why did you wed him?"

  "I had no choice. My father arranged it."

  "I see. Too many Cotti traditions have been adopted in Contara, it seems."

  She moved closer to him. "Are you all right?"

  "Well enough."

  "You kill so easily. Have you no compunction?"

  "Jashimari assassins are allowed to kill for two reasons. When they are paid to do it, and in self-defence. He falls into the second category."

  Rayan stopped beside the bed and sank down on it, pulling back the blankets with shaking hands to inspect the bandages around his waist. "Then you won't kill me to cover your tracks?"

  A slight, wry smile twisted his lips. "No. I have no reason to. But I can't help you to get rid of the body."

  She cast a quick glance at Jarron's slumped corpse. "What am I going to do?"

  "Go to the market, buy a horse with tack and bring it here. I'll leave tonight, and as soon as I'm gone, call the Watch and tell them your husband has been murdered. It happened while you were at the market. You returned and found him dead, understand?"

  She nodded. "But you're not well enough to ride. You'll open your wounds again, and the soldiers are searching outside the city."

  "I'll be all right, now go. And try to find a good beast that's quiet, but not half dead."

  Rayan headed for the door, then paused and turned to face him again. "If you leave now, you'll die. We could hide the body until you're stronger."

  "And how will you explain a rotting corpse to the soldiers?"

  "The undertaker is Contara. He won't betray me."

  Blade shook his head. "Trust no one. Doubtless there's a hefty reward for my capture. Even your closest friends may be tempted by it. Just do as I say."

  "I thought assassins were only concerned for themselves."

  "I am only concerned for myself. I have to return to Jashimari as soon as possible, and if the soldiers capture you they'll torture my description from you, as well as the details of my injuries. They know I'm hurt, but not how badly, and they didn't get a good look at me. My escape relies upon your silence."

  "I see." She looked away, frowning, then turned and left.

  Blade closed his eyes and relaxed, forcing himself into a light doze to make the most of the few time-glasses of rest still remaining to him. He cursed himself for not telling her to buy some wine or spirits to dull the pain, and hoped that she would have the sense to do it anyway.

  Chapter Twenty Eight

  The slight creak of the door woke Blade, and he opened his eyes. Rayan was framed in it, a lamp in one hand and a bowl of broth in the other. She approached the bed and set them down on the bedside table, glancing at her husband's corpse. Blade pushed himself up against the pillows with a groan, gritting his teeth as pain shot from the wound in his belly. When it subsided, he looked up at her.

  "Where are my clothes?"

  "I washed them. I'll fetch them."

  Rayan disappeared down the stairs to the kitchen, and Blade picked up the bowl of fish broth, forcing himself to choke it down. It was tasty, but he had no appetite, and normally would not have consumed it, except now that plans were in motion for his departure, he needed all the strength he could get. Rayan returned with his clothes, and he instructed her to bring him several lengths of stout cloth. She looked curious, but left to find some.

  When she brought two clean sheets, he told her to find the false moustache in his bag and dye it black. She returned about half a time-glass later with a wet black moustache, which she placed on the window ledge to dry. Blade sat up and swung his legs off the bed, gripping the mattress as the room spun. Rayan watched him with deep concern, but after a moment it passed, leaving him sweating.

  While he waited for the strength to return to his legs, he asked, "What sort of horse did you get?"

  "A farmer's cob. Strong, but slow and steady, like you wanted."

  "Perfect. Now I need some farmer's clothes, preferably smelly ones."

  "My husband has some he used when he tended the oxen, and the cow. But they'll be far too big."

  Blade smiled, shooting her an amused glance. "I intend to put on some weight. They'll do."

  Rayan went over to t
he wardrobe and took out a stained smock and a pair of patched trousers. "But they are clean."

  "That can be remedied."

  "Of course. You intend to disguise yourself as a farmer?"

  He nodded. "They're looking for a slim beardless man dressed in black, so I'll become a fat hairy one dressed in a smock, returning to my farm after dark, preferably drunk." He shot her a piercing look.

  "I bought some strong wine, and a bottle of port."

  "Good. I want you to wrap the sheets around my waist. It will make me look fat, and help to stop the bleeding. But first I need the wine, so I can start getting drunk."

  Rayan brought him the wine, which he found to be a good sweet red. She helped him to don his trousers, since he could not reach his feet. He directed her to wrap the sheets around him so tight that he could barely breathe, using a pillow to give himself a paunch. With the strapping in place, the pain of his injuries receded to a dull throbbing, aided by the wine. She helped him into the baggy farmer's trousers, which fitted well over his new paunch.

  By the time she had put his boots on and helped him into the huge smock, he had almost finished the bottle of wine, and was light-headed. The beard was dry, and he glued it in place, then rubbed a generous amount of the skin dye he used for his Cotti disguise onto his face and arms, darkening his skin to a deep bronze. Rayan rummaged through her husband's wardrobe and found a moth-eaten wool hat and a wide leather belt, which added to his disguise. As a finishing touch, he used kohl to blacken two of his front teeth and rubbed the oily, foul-tasting skin dye onto them to make them yellow. When he finished, Rayan studied him and shook her head with a smile.

  "Even I wouldn't recognise you now."

  "Good. Do you have any lonions?"

  "Lonions?"

  "To give me bad breath. Farmers are not known for their cleanliness."

  "Nor merchants." She glance at her husband's body and shuddered, then left to find some lonions in the kitchen.

  While she was away, Blade stood up to test his strength and found himself surprisingly steady. He splashed some wine down the front of the smock to add to the medley of smells he planned to coat himself with so the Cotti's dogs would not want to sniff him too closely. He had always found strong smells to be an efficient repellent of the curious, and had rolled in manure before now.

  Blade chewed the chopped lonion Rayan brought and washed it down with wine, grimacing at the taste. She packed the rest of his belongings in his bag while he strapped on the wrist sheaths and slid the daggers into them, secreting the two that normally resided in his belt within the padding around his waist. Rayan put the last two into the boot sheaths for him, and he walked around a bit to accustom himself to his increased girth. Satisfied, he descended the stairs, Rayan following with his bag.

  Outside, a sturdy bay gelding stood where Rayan had tethered it, a nondescript animal that had seen many years of hard work, but was still sound. It had provided a pile of fresh manure, which he smeared over the smock and trousers, then rubbed himself against the animal to add some of its scent to the mix. Rayan disappeared for a few minutes, and returned with a pair of muddy over-boots, which she pulled on over his boots. When she straightened, she wrinkled her nose at his stench and stepped back.

  "You stink."

  "That's the idea."

  She smiled. "I hope you escape them, Blade."

  He glanced around for a mounting block. "I usually do."

  "You haven't asked how I'll manage without a husband."

  "I don't particularly care. You wanted him dead, and he is. What you do now is your business. I suspect that you have a prospective husband lined up, one of your own choosing."

  Rayan nodded. "I do. A good man. But even if I hadn't wanted Jarron dead, you'd have killed him anyway, wouldn't you?"

  "Yes, he was about to sell me to the Cotti."

  "And if I hadn't agreed to help you?"

  Blade walked to a chopping block, leading the horse. "Then I'd have tied you up if I'd had the strength, which I didn't, anyway."

  "But the soldiers..."

  "Would be dead, and I'd have left the same night."

  "You wouldn't have killed me?"

  He stopped at the block and turned to face her. "No."

  "Then you're not as bad as most assassins, from what I've heard."

  Blade sighed. "I'm worse than most assassins, Rayan. My code prevents me from killing for no reason. It's what makes me an assassin, not a murderer. Don't think it's because I have any qualms about it. If you'd tried to betray me, as your husband did, you'd be just as dead as him."

  "That's understandable. I don't think you're a bad person. You don't even look like an assassin."

  "Why, because I don't have a huge scar on my face or a permanent leer? Looks can be deceiving, so don't put great store in them. You don't have to be ugly to be bad. Prince Endor was considered handsome, but he wasn't when I'd finished with him."

  "You disfigured him? Why?"

  "He deserved it." Blade manoeuvred the horse up to the block.

  "Who hired you to kill him?"

  "I can't tell you that."

  Blade mounted the horse with a grimace and grunt of pain, and Rayan handed him his bag, which he tied to the saddle. He swayed, and she feared that he would fall off, but then he straightened and picked up the reins. As he turned the cob and urged it into a walk, she raised a hand in a tentative wave.

  "Goodbye. Good luck."

  The assassin glanced back and kicked the horse into a trot, vanishing into the gloom at the end of the street. Rayan stood gazing after him for several minutes, wondering why she was so bereft at his leaving. Never before had she met such a fascinating man. The handsome young farmer, for whom she felt a certain tenderness, paled into insignificance when compared to Blade.

  Her admirer's blunt, warm character seemed common and dull next to the assassin's steely personality and devastating charisma. Yet she wondered how comfortable it would be to spend a lot of time within the icy sphere of his influence and the biting lash of his tongue. Rayan turned and walked back to her house to begin the odious task of burning the blood-stained sheets before she called the Watch and reported her husband's murder.

  Blade slowed the gelding to a walk at the end of the street, unable to stand much of its jolting trot. Although a stout and steady animal, its gaits left much to be desired, and it was more suited to a cart than saddle. He pulled the wine bottle from the bag and sipped from it, letting the cob wander along the street at its own pace. The city slumbered under a pall of silence that only the occasional barking of a distant dog, and once the scream of a fighting tomcat, broke.

  The populace stayed indoors, either in taverns or their homes, avoiding the Cotti soldiers who roamed the streets with vengeance in their hearts. Even in his disguise, being abroad was not a good idea, and had it not been for the untimely arrival of Rayan's husband, he would have spent another day in her bed. Now that he had been forced to kill again, however, moving on was the wisest thing to do.

  Half a time-glass of steady clopping through the empty streets brought him to the city gates, where four Cotti guards watched him approach. Blade swayed in the saddle and hummed a ribald ditty he had heard in Contara taprooms, waving the bottle of wine. A soldier stepped into the horse's path, and it stopped. Two others approached, holding up freshly lighted torches.

  "Get down," the shorter of the two instructed.

  Blade eyed the long drop to the ground and swayed, clutching the horse's mane. "Do I 'ave to? Tis a long way down, laddie, an' then I'll 'ave to climb back up again." He used a thick brogue that common Contara spoke, and lowered his voice to a gruff tone.

  The soldier stepped closer. "Get down!"

  "Okay, okay," Blade muttered. "Don't get yer knickers in a knot."

  The assassin slid from the saddle, clung to the horse's neck and leant against it. The men thrust their torches closer to his face, and he held up his hands to ward off the heat, one still clutching the bottle of
wine. The nearest Cotti peered at him and recoiled with a disgusted expression.

  "He stinks!"

  "Oi, that be honest work yer smelling," Blade protested. "Tis the toil of a farmer who works wi' beasts, no shame in it."

  "It's shit and wine," the soldier stated.

  Blade leered, revealing his yellowed, blackened teeth. "Aye, there's a bit 'o wine there too. A good red ‘un; want to try some?"

  He thrust the bottle at the soldier, swaying towards him, and the man stepped back. A dog growled beside the other Cotti, then sniffed the air and retreated with a whine. Blade stumbled closer to the soldiers, swinging the bottle, and they backed away from his stench.

  "He's not the one we're looking for," the shorter man said, and his companion nodded.

  "Who're yer lookin' fer, then?" Blade enquired, taking a swig of the wine and allowing some to spill down the front of his smock.

  "Not you, fat man. Be on your way."

  Blade glanced at the horse. "Now yer want me to climb back up there? Let's 'ave a bit of a singalong first."

  "Get going, before we help you along with a boot up your arse."

  "Okay, okay." Blade reeled over to the horse and grabbed the stirrup. "Give us a leg up, then."

  The short soldier stepped towards him, his hand on the hilt of his sword. "Be off with you, and take your stink with you, before I cut some of that lard off you."

  "Okay, okay, keep yer hair on."

  Blade took the horse's reins and staggered away, humming the ditty again. The guards watched him leave, then wandered back to their post. The assassin did not come across a suitable mounting block until he reached the edge of the forest and found a tree stump, by which time his gut ached and his legs shook. He sat on it while he waited for his strength to return and pondered just how much he hated being injured, and considering that, how often he was these days.

  There had been a time when he had hardly ever been hurt, in more youthful days, the likes of which he would never see again. He wondered if he was becoming so much slower, or if it was just that his missions were that much harder. He hoped it was the latter, for his work was not yet done. Remounting the horse, he let it continue down the road at a walk, hoping he would not be forced to dismount again until he had regained a little more strength.