Blood and Betrayal ee-5

by Lindsay Buroker

  Between one eye blink and the next, Amaranthe was looking at the world both through her own eyes and through Retta’s. She could see Retta hovering above her, but she could also see herself, pinned on the table, naked and bruised, eyes sunken, lips cracked and swollen, flesh peeled bare of her body in multiple spots, hair a knotted tangle. If she looked that bad after the salve, she would have hated to have seen herself before.

  Your minds are one, came a whisper in her head.

  The brooch? That was creepy. How sentient was this-

  A flood of memories slammed into her with the force of a tidal wave. Her body stiffened, almost as if she were receiving physical blows. Amaranthe braced herself to block whatever invasive tendrils snaked into her head, trying to tease Sicarius’s secrets out of her. Oddly, it wasn’t her own memories that assailed her but Retta’s.

  She was the quiet, pudgy girl in school, walking the halls of Mildawn with her chin down as she avoided eye contact and tried not to bump into anyone. Someone’s elbow caught her. She tripped and landed face-first on the waxed wooden floors. Her books sprawled before her. Nobody picked them up or offered her a hand. When she gathered her belongings and hustled away, cruel comments nipped at her heels. “What a klutz.” “She’s so homely.” “She thinks she’s so important because of her sister.” “Can you imagine her trying to start a business?” The voices dissolved into laughter, and the school halls disappeared, replaced by a rambling mansion on the Ridge. A lecturing woman in spectacles frowned down at her. “Your grades are abysmal. Why can’t you be more like your sister?” The mention of a sister came with thoughts of a beautiful woman with auburn hair, sparkling intelligent eyes, and skin bronzed by the sun. She appeared on a ship, then on a camel in the desert, then bartering in some exotic marketplace, and finally in a tent, sending messages back to other Forge founders, details of investments and banking institutions started up overseas. Worgavic. Ravencrest. Omich. Bertvikar. Myll. Founders? Yes, these people were the originals and included the sister, Suan, who corresponded through mail alone and who’d been overseas for more than a decade. She seemed to be a woman that few in the organization had actually met and that nobody had seen in years.

  As abruptly as it had started, the sharing of memories ended. Amaranthe could almost hear her separation from Retta, like a piece of paper torn in half, leaving jagged, rough edges. She felt jagged and rough as well. What had happened? Amaranthe had expected to relive her own memories, especially those memories of Sicarius, not go for a trek in someone else’s head. Had the device backfired somehow? How much time had passed? Had Retta seen the same thing?

  The younger woman pulled the brooch away and stared down at Amaranthe, lips parted in stunned silence. She seemed to realize she was gaping for she drew back and rearranged her face into a neutral expression.

  “There.” Retta adjusted her clothing and straightened her shoulders. “That’s invasive, I’ll admit, but surely less deplorable than what Pike’s been doing.”

  “Uhm, all right.” Amaranthe was starting to get the impression that Retta hadn’t been sharing the same memories as she had. Had she even sensed Amaranthe in there, skimming through her past, learning about the Forge founders? Ravencrest. Omich. Bertvikar. Suan. She repeated the names in her mind, willing them to stick. Other than Worgavic and Myll-that had to be Larocka Myll-they weren’t familiar and hadn’t been on Books’s list. If those were truly original founders, knowing them could be important. If only, she thought grimly, to hand them over to Sicarius. A week ago, she never would have considered it, but after spending time with Pike, she found herself wishing he’d simply succeeded in cutting off all the heads of the hydra.

  “And more useful than I would have imagined.” Retta turned the brooch over in her hand, gazing at it with a touch of wonder. “I’d only read about it and wasn’t sure it’d work. I thought I’d have to fight you all the way, but I simply thought about what I wanted to learn, and it took me straight to your memories on the subject.”

  Amaranthe grew aware of the icy cold of the table against her back. Or maybe that was her own blood running cold. “Did it?” she whispered.

  “Marvelous invention. There’s much we could learn from the Kyattese.”

  Amaranthe kept her mouth shut. Maybe Retta had learned nothing. Maybe she was simply hoping to trick Amaranthe into revealing what she hadn’t been able to find.

  Retta slipped the brooch into a pocket and withdrew a folded piece of paper. She laid it on the table beside the pincer pinning Amaranthe’s thigh. “It’s a map to help you get off the ship. I… hope you’re able to walk. I don’t dare go with you or give you a weapon, not with Pike and his soldiers preparing to search the swamp. If you let him catch you, I won’t have any sway over him, not with Ms. Worgavic away. I may not be able to stop… ” Retta swallowed. “Just don’t get caught. I’ll make sure the ship’s defenses are shut down so you can escape. Once outside, you’ll be in swamp and marshlands. The nearest town is a two-day walk to the north. If you can make it, I’m sure you can talk someone into helping you.” She managed a quick smile. “You got me to. I’m sure you don’t appreciate it right now, but one day maybe it’ll mean something to you that I saved your life.”

  All Amaranthe could think about during the monologue was whether or not Retta had truly found out about Sespian’s parentage. Retta wasn’t trying to tease out information or ask for verification. She seemed certain about what she’d discovered.

  Retta moved to the foot of the table and fiddled with the controls there. She waved to the claw. “I’m going to delay the release until I’m safely out of the area. I don’t think you’d attack me, but your loyalty seems to be such that you might kill to keep that man’s secrets. After being in your head, I understand your reasons for doing things, mostly, but Amaranthe, you must see that the son of some common-born assassin doesn’t have the right to rule. He never did.”

  Amaranthe groaned. Retta knew. Cursed ancestors, the last however many days of resisting Pike-all that suffering beneath his knife-had been for nothing. Retta knew, and soon all of Forge would know.

  Amaranthe’s vision blurred as tears formed. A click sounded, and Retta stepped back from the table. She started toward the door, but paused, then turned back. She grabbed the map, unfolded it, and held it above Amaranthe’s eyes.

  “I better not leave any evidence that I helped you,” Retta said. “Can you memorize this quickly? I seem to remember you were bright and got good grades.”

  Amaranthe barely heard her. She had the presence of mind to stare at the map, but her thoughts were a jumble, and she wasn’t sure how much she would remember. She’d failed. All she could think about was how Sicarius would react when he found out.

  Maldynado and Yara crouched in the darkness on one of the two long, cylindrical boilers filling the space. From their perch, they could see two doors, one leading to engineering and the other out to the deck. They could also jump on anyone who came inside. The black knife lay on the engine room floor, with Basilard, Books, and Sespian hiding in the shadows provided by the towering machinery. The plan was for Maldynado and Yara to wait for Mari’s bodyguards-or whomever she sent-to pass, then drop down behind them. Basilard and the others would spring the trap first. Akstyr remained by the furnace, grumbling softly about being stuck shoveling coal. If something went wrong, and muscle and fists weren’t enough, he and his Science skills were on backup duty.

  Maldynado shifted his weight, careful not to crack his head on the metal ceiling beam between him and Yara. They only had a few feet of clearance above the boiler. Laughter floated down from the dining hall on the deck above. He wondered how many crew and passengers the Glacial Empress claimed.

  “If they don’t come tonight, we’re going to be in trouble,” Yara said. “An officer will be down in the morning to relieve the night-shift engineer, the night-shift engineer you thumped and dumped into the river.”

  “I know,” Maldynado said. He hadn’t wanted to thump and du
mp anyone else, but with the engine room adjacent to the boiler room, it hadn’t been particularly surprising that the officer in charge had stumbled across the team making plans for their ambush.

  “Covering one of your people in soot isn’t going to make him pass as an officer,” Yara said.

  “I know that too.”

  They ought to have until morning to figure that aspect out. With Akstyr shoveling and Books keeping an eye on the engines, nobody from navigation should find anything amiss until that shift change.

  Maldynado adjusted his crouch again. “I hope Mari sends her people soon. My thighs are burning.” As soon as the admission slipped out, he wished it hadn’t. Yara would accuse him of whining.

  All she said was, “I’d laugh if we’d set this all up and they were up there sleeping.”

  “You do that?” Maldynado asked.

  “What?”

  “Laugh. I haven’t heard it.”

  The shadows hid her scowl, but Maldynado knew it was there.

  “That’s because you’re not as funny as you think you are,” Yara said.

  “I haven’t seen you laugh at anyone else’s jokes either.”

  “I haven’t heard many jokes.”

  “Ah, that’s right,” Maldynado said, “you can’t understand Basilard. He’s hi- lar — i-ous.”

  Yara didn’t respond. Maldynado wondered if he’d stunned her to silence or she merely thought the notion ridiculous.

  “Really?” Yara finally asked. “He seems glum.”

  “He is, but he has his moments. He’s had a rough past. His people are pacifists, but he was captured, made into a slave, and forced to kill to survive pit-fighting bouts.” Maldynado shifted his weight again, trying to find a more comfortable spot on the boiler. He was tempted to straddle the thing, but that’d be a poor position from which to launch an attack. Also, given how much warmth seeped from the metal, he might scorch something important. “All the boys have tough pasts,” Maldynado continued, thinking Yara might be more sympathetic to everyone if she knew that misfortune, rather than a puerile urge to irk enforcers, had led them to the outlaw lifestyle. “Books watched his son get killed by Hollowcrest’s men. Akstyr grew up on the streets. Sicarius, I don’t think, knows what to do with himself now that he’s not Emperor Raumesys’s personal assassin.”

  Yara stirred, and Maldynado wondered if that last tidbit was news to her. Sicarius probably wouldn’t appreciate him chitchatting about his personal history, but he wasn’t there, so too bad.

  “I think,” Maldynado said, “everyone’s hoping that, in helping the emperor, they can rise above their pasts and make a difference in the world. Amaranthe makes a man want to do that.”

  “You, too?”

  “Nah, I just lost a bet.”

  Yara snorted. It almost sounded like a laugh.

  Yara stretched her legs out for a moment. Hah, her thighs must be burning too. “Your family sounds awful.”

  “Uhm,” Maldynado said, surprised that she’d bring it up. “I guess.”

  “My brothers always teased me growing up, and I had to learn to be tough, but I knew they cared for me. Mevlar might have gotten me in trouble after your employer and assassin showed up on my father’s doorstep, but only because he thought he was saving the family from dishonor. And because he’s being a whiny loser over the fact that I was promoted first.”

  Maldynado smiled, both because she was opening up and because he now knew why whining might not sit well with her. He grunted to let her know he was listening. Women always seemed to appreciate that.

  “But that’s how you expect siblings to be,” Yara went on. “You don’t expect them to send their wives to throw you to the mechanical alligators.”

  “To be fair to Ravido, I don’t think he was thinking of me at all when he sent, or let Mari go downstream. She saw the opportunity to turn me into alligator fodder of her own volition. Maybe she thought it’d make a nice anniversary present in case the throne-usurping gig didn’t work out.”

  “I never thought I’d feel sympathy for some warrior-caste dandy, but it must be hard knowing your family wants you dead, even your parents.”

  For a long moment, Maldynado didn’t say anything. He had to run her words through his head a few times, because he couldn’t believe Yara had implied she felt sympathy for him. Though a few teasing replies came to mind, he thought she might appreciate a serious response. Something about the shadows made it feel safer to be serious. Still, he lowered his voice to make sure the others wouldn’t hear from the next room. “They have a reason.”

  “What happened with your sister?”

  Maldynado poked at the riveting on the boiler seam. “I have seven older brothers. My parents kept trying because Mother wanted a girl. Finally, three years after I was born, she had Tia. She was forty and knew it’d be her last child. Somehow, as second youngest, I always got put on babysitting duty while my parents were at their parties and military functions. Mostly, I loved being the big brother and watching out for Tia, not that she needed a guardian. She was real sweet, and everyone loved her. She was good at charming folks, a lot like Amaranthe, and she usually got what she wanted. Like to tag along with me. She-” Maldynado’s throat had grown tight, and he paused to clear it. “She always wanted to do what I was doing and to go where I wanted to go. Mother said she could so long as I kept an eye on her. Tia was my responsibility, she’d say. By the time I was twelve… Well, I was as dumb as any kid that age and didn’t want my little sister hanging around. There was a lot of teasing from the other boys and even my older brothers. Looking back now… it’s stupid that I let that bother me, but one summer, when it was hotter than a smelter, we went to the river to swim. We had a great spot with rope swings and platforms to jump off, a whole obstacle course of stuff to play on. Anyway, that day there’d been a storm up in the mountains, and the water was rough and high. I told Tia to stay on the bank and play there. I wasn’t watching her though. I was in the water with the boys. I never saw her go in. She was just there, and then the next time I looked, she was gone.”

  Maldynado blinked and forced himself to focus on the shadowy boiler room and the doors he was supposed to be watching. While he’d been speaking, he’d been back there by the river, playing with his peers. Baking his bare shoulders under the summer sun. Jumping in the cold water to cool off and avoid mosquitos. How vividly he remembered that moment, looking over to the bank by the rope swing and feeling that icy sensation of dread.

  “A couple of days later, the neighbors downriver came up to the estate. They’d found… ” Maldynado swallowed. “They’d found the body.”

  Beside him, Yara let out a long, deep exhalation. Maldynado wondered if she was still feeling sympathetic toward him, or if she saw him as more of a careless idiot than ever. The latter most likely. That was the consensus his family had reached.

  “Anyway,” Maldynado said, finding the silence awkward, or maybe fearing the judgment in it, “it’s not my favorite story to tell for obvious reasons. Amaranthe doesn’t even know it.” Few of his adult friends and acquaintances did. Only those people who had known him all those years ago. Deret Mancrest was one-he’d been among the boys playing on the river that day. Thinking of him made Maldynado wonder what was going on in the capital. Deret’s newspaper had reported the emperor missing before anyone should have known about the train incident. And the story had given a positive, non-alarming reason for Ravido’s troops to be entering the city. Maldynado wondered if Ravido or Father had spoken to him. Deret had always been an honorable fellow, not the sort to kowtow to pressure to publish certain stories, but Deret’s father owned the paper and had been friends with Maldynado’s father for years. When Amaranthe reunited with the team, they’d have to visit Deret. Assuming she did reunite with the team. Maldynado rubbed his face.

  “So, that’s why you follow her?” Yara asked.

  “Huh?” It took Maldynado a moment to remember that he’d spoken Amaranthe’s name aloud. “Oh. May
be.”

  “Because in helping her, maybe even protecting her, you’re making up for the failure with your sister?”

  “I guess. Except I’ve failed Amaranthe now too. She’s probably being tortured in that big black monstrosity. If she’s still alive at all.”

  “What happened with your sister was tragic, and I’m not sure there’s anything I, or anyone else, could say that would make you stop blaming yourself for that, but Amaranthe isn’t a child. From what I’ve seen, she’s the one who gets herself into these situations. Didn’t Books say she was using a homemade slingshot to hurl blasting sticks at the other craft when she was thrown from the dirigible? There’s not much you can do to protect someone who takes risks like that.”

  “I suppose not,” Maldynado said, surprised Yara was trying to make him feel better. None of her usual brusque gruffness colored her tone. “But I’m worried about her, and I can’t help but wish I’d figured out how to fly the dirigible better. Giant balloons aren’t as maneuverable as you’d hope.”

  A few moments passed without comment, until Yara said, “That explains one thing anyway.”

  “Oh? What’s that?”

  “You see Amaranthe as a little sister. I was wondering why you didn’t leer lecherously at her like you do at every other woman.”

  “My leers are not lecherous,” Maldynado said, relieved to have a lighter topic, one where he could shield himself with his usual flippancy. “I’m far too handsome and charming for anyone to consider my leers offensive or unwanted.”

  “Please.”

  “And I don’t leer at every woman.”

  “ Please,” Yara said with even more disbelief. “You leer at me. And I’m… not someone people leer at.”

  Something in her voice made Maldynado consider his answer before responding. “Because… you’re tall, fierce, and intimidating, so you figure that deters lecherous leerers? Or because you don’t believe you’re attractive enough to draw leers?”