by Stacey Filak
Elam entered the alcove, his expression serene. “Thank you, Lamwin,” he said, nodding to the gray-haired prayer keeper.
“Follow me, please.” Elam offered a hand to Gemma, then smiled at Tollan and Wince. “Good sirs.”
Gemma stood, her skin burning with nervous energy, and took his hand. It had been far too long since she’d been to church.
They made their way down a narrow passage, dark save the red-covered sconces that lit the hall in a warm wash of color. At the end of the hallway, Elam produced a key from a chain around his neck and unlocked a stone door. He opened it with a small grunt of effort, ushered the three of them inside and then turned and relocked the door.
He had barely finished with the door when Gemma threw her arms around his neck and kissed his cheek. The serene demeanor of prayer keeper vanished, and the boy she’d known as little more than a street rat suddenly appeared. “Goddess, Gem,” he said, reaching up to brush at the bloody streak on her forehead, “Are you all right? What do you need? How can I help?”
“Gentleman, this is Brother Elam of the Dalinn. Elam, may I introduce Tollan Daghan, King of Yigris Above, and his associate, Wincel Quintella.”
“Prickling Void, Gemma. It’s even worse than streetword has it, then?” Elam asked, his brow furrowing behind his spectacles.
She nodded, chewing her lip. “We need a place to lay low for a few hours. Can we …”
“You don’t even need to ask … Regency.”
She saw then, that he knew about Melnora. “What news have you had?” she asked, wishing she’d made time to come visit him before she’d needed to cash in a favor.
“I was at the assembly,” he said, squeezing her hand gently. “Since then, we’ve had word of a fire at the Six-Mast. A few of those displaced from the docks have made their way to the temple. They’re saying that giant bramble bushes have grown up around Dockside. Some urchins came in saying that Guildhouse is surrounded by fire and thorns. People are saying that the Guild has disbanded—that there is no head—they’re saying that the Queen of Under is dead.”
“Prick that,” Tollan growled behind her. “Gemma, you’ve got to—”
“Elam, give us as much time as you can,” she said, talking over the King of Above. She didn’t have time for his naivety. “But don’t risk yourself or the rest of the Center. Keep your ears open for me. I’d like to think that the church will be safe no matter what, but I don’t know who is behind this yet, and we cannot be dealing with anyone from Above just now.” He nodded, dark eyes shadowed.
“And don’t tell anyone we’re here. Unless …” she paused, unsure if she was tearing open old scars. “Unless Devery comes, or Fin.”
Elam, always stoic, nodded. “Of course, Gemma.” If she hadn’t known him as well as she did—if she hadn’t grown up with him, stolen, fought and bled with him—she’d never have known that he was still in love with Devery. But she knew, and that knowledge clawed at her heart.
Wince watched the blood drain from Tollan’s face as Elam left and Gemma locked the door behind the sex priest.
“Gemma,” Tollan said, “can you explain to me why everyone in the most highly guarded place in Yigris is willing to do your bidding? Ten minutes ago, I didn’t even know this place existed, but you seem to be old friends with everyone here. I want to know what’s going on here!”
Wince hadn’t thought to wonder this, but as soon as Tollan asked, he realized it was true. He turned to Gemma. “He’s got a point,” he said.
She sighed, sliding into one of the two chairs that sat across from an enormous, lavishly draped bed. The rug in hues of red and gold on the polished floor was probably from Ladia, where the best textiles were made.
“All right,” she said, the toe of her left boot kicking aimlessly in the air. “You have to understand that this is top-level information.” She grinned, eyebrows bobbing. “And yes, the irony of saying that to you, Tollan, does not escape me.”
Tollan nodded, still stick-straight and tense. It had been a long while since Wince had seen Tollan this anxious. Of course, it had been a long time since Wince had seen Tollan in the same room as his father, and that had pretty much always made Tollan look that way.
Gemma went on. “A hundred and some-odd years ago, just before the Mage War was first called off, Jenn Daghan and his sister, Olyn, signed the secret pact that created Above and Under, making him king and her queen.”
Tollan sighed, and Wince knew that his friend already knew all of this, but Gemma ignored him and went on. “Yigris had traded away nearly all of its land and mines just to get the Vagans to leave. Above was strapped for gold and Jenn saw Olyn and her Under as his ticket back to prosperity. Olyn, however, saw the pact as her ticket to freedom. She’d gone from feeling like a pretty backdrop who didn’t even have the right to choose who she married in House Daghan, to the leader of a powerful criminal underworld nearly overnight. She was smart and brutal, and while Jenn believed that he’d found a way to control both the nobles and the thieves, Olyn had other plans.”
Ever since Wince had snuck a copy of the secret pact away from Tollan’s tutor, they had talked about the pact and what it meant for Above, but Wince had never really thought about the leaders of Under. The idea that Olyn had thought she’d gotten the better of the deal was foreign and strange to him, and he turned his gaze to Tollan, wondering how the king would take that information.
Gemma went on: “It didn’t take long for Olyn to realize that the church would be a problem. The pact was perfect in the way that it divided power and kept both the legitimate and the criminal elements loyal to what was left of House Daghan, but that would do little good if the church stood against them. There is only one thing people fear more than their king, and that is the goddess.
“But Olyn also knew that the greater part of the priests and prayer keepers were lecherous, money-starved miscreants. So she figured why not bring them into her fold? She infiltrated the Slit, learned of their underground dealings and used it for her own benefit.”
Wince looked around at the splendor of the Dalinn’s room. The sex priests were obviously taken very good care of, and the few glimpses around the Slit had told him that the Holy Aegosian Church had far more wealth than he had ever imagined.
“Olyn took the seedier leanings of the church and bent them to her will. Nobody outside the church—and I mean nobody living except for you, me, Wince and a couple of top members of the Guild—knows that the Yigrisian temple of the Holy Aegosian Church became a branch of the Shadow Guild four years after the pact was signed. They have their own leadership, their own bylaws and they handle all of their own conflicts internally, but they answer to the Queen of Under.” Gemma finished with a sigh as she met Tollan’s steely gaze.
Tollan bristled. “And why exactly would they answer to the Under rather than the Above?”
Gemma smiled. “Because Olyn had them by the balls, and because she was way too smart to tell her brother. Once the pact was signed, the income made by the Guild by paramours, assassination-for-hire and bloodwork was taxed by the king and overseen by the king. That was all part of the benefit of signing the pact in the first place. If the church refused Olyn, she vowed that she would report their less-than-sacred activities to her brother, thus putting them under his control. If they agreed to Olyn’s compromise, then at least they maintained the illusion of autonomy, and they were protected anonymously under the parasol of the Guild.”
Tollan’s nostrils flared, but he said nothing. Wince knew his friend well enough to know that a slow, simmering rage was boiling beneath his surface. Wince could see the telltale twitch in Tollan’s right eyelid and the twist of his mouth in distaste. He should diffuse the situation, but he was in so much shock over what Gemma was telling them that he let the moment pass.
Gemma continued. “Olyn was the true intellect behind the pact, and she manipulated her brother into wording it so she maintained control of the Under. She knew the pact wouldn’t stand a chance of s
ucceeding if the church maintained its self-government, and her newly found freedom would disappear as well. She made it work—and for five generations, it has. I know that’s a lot to take in, but …”
Tollan moved toward Gemma. He shook with rage, and for an instant Wince thought the King of Above might strike the Queen of Under. She put her hand on the hilt of her dagger. They were of equal height, but for a moment, she seemed dwarfed by him.
“A lot to take in?” Tollan growled. “All of Yigris thinks I’ve killed my father and perhaps Melnora, too. I’ve been in two whorehouses today—one of which is a prickling church. I’ve been dragged through Under, which appears to be collapsing, while Above is supposedly consumed by burning bushes. And now I find out the king doesn’t wield much power anyway. Even the church is controlled by the Under!” He balled his fists at his sides.
Wince’s heart pounded in his chest. Tollan was right, but a fight with the Queen of Under seemed like a good way to meet a blade.
Tollan seemed to come to the same conclusion, because his shoulders sagged. “I’m sorry,” he said softly. “That was ungentlemanly of me.”
“You’re damned right it was,” Gemma replied, smiling brightly. “It’s about time you started thinking like a rogue. It’s the only prickling way you’re going to survive this!”
After Gemma and Wince explained their discovery of the tainted mage mark on his back and their conclusions about a potential mage uprising, Wince could see the panic growing behind Tollan’s eyes. Pacing, Gemma continued. “How could this happen? What made the mage women suddenly choose to act against you? Was it just your father’s death? Did they see this as their opportunity to start trouble? They’ve been alone in the castle for so long …”
A deep, painful sigh pushed its way out of Tollan. “But they aren’t alone, anymore. My brother married a Vagan princess, Elsha, a few months ago. I was gone when it happened,” Tollan said, his voice little more than a whisper.
And suddenly, it was Wince’s turn to panic. He didn’t want to hear this story, didn’t want to relive what couldn’t be relived. Heart pounding, he said, “No, it’s not your …”
But Tollan pushed forward, his shoulders slumped and his eyes glassy with unshed tears. “Wince and I grew up with a friend—a noble girl named Uri. A while back, Uri got into some trouble with a common-born boy who worked in the stables. She had this mare she doted on, and she spent a lot of time there. This stableboy took care of her horse—the one thing she loved most in all the world—so she loved him for it. And one thing led to another. She got pregnant.”
Wince could barely believe what he was hearing. Was it possible that Tollan really didn’t know the whole truth?
Tollan turned his back to them, his words heavy with guilt. “Uri came to me, hysterical. We were really good friends—and she was sobbing that her parents would disown her, that she’d lose everything. I thought I was helping. I told her to tell her parents that the baby was mine.”
“Oh,” Gemma said as if she’d been gut punched. She couldn’t know exactly what had happened—but she was a smart girl. Wince was sure she could imagine.
Tollan squared his shoulders and turned to face her. “My father was livid—as angry as I’ve ever seen him. He said that under no circumstances could I acknowledge the child; that Uri and her family would be sent away so that no one would notice the resemblance. He said that I ought to have known how to keep the useless girl from getting with child if I wanted to climb on top of her, and that he wouldn’t let House Daghan be saddled with my indiscretions. Then he sent me to sea on his private merchant vessel to give me time to calm down, as he put it.”
Wince felt bile rise in his throat. The weight of his own grief was as vast as the Hadriak. He didn’t want to hear about Tollan’s pain. He didn’t want to feel responsible for that, too.
“After that,” Tollan went on, despite Wince’s silent pleas for him to stop. “I couldn’t tell him the truth—it would have ruined Uri even more than the lie.” He met Gemma’s gaze. “I was at sea for four months, but three days after I set sail, Uri hanged herself in the stables. I was a prickling coward and my friend died because of me. Her family thinks I abandoned her, but I …” He trailed off.
Wince gagged on a sob, his throat squeezed tight by the tears he had refused to shed for her—for them.
Tollan crumpled onto the bed, as if his spine had all but gone out of him. “While I was away, my brother was … he got married. She was a foreign visitor—a princess. A Vagan princess. It seems my brother and Princess Elsha fell madly, deeply in love within just weeks of her arrival and refused to be separated. She’s been living in the palace, ever since.”
“Are you suggesting she’s a mage woman? Do you think he’s somehow magically compelled to be with her?” She shook her head and spat as if dispelling a foul taste. “If it’s mage work, then there isn’t a damned thing you could have done,” Gemma said soberly. She moved toward Tollan—almost as if she meant to comfort him—but she stopped short, her mouth twisted downward. “And if you hadn’t been sent away, then you’d probably be the one married to the Vagan princess.”
Tollan stared at her. As much as Wince could see he wanted to deny it, Tollan knew she spoke the truth. If he hadn’t been away, he’d have succumbed to his father’s will, or to Elsha’s. Wince barely heard Tollan as he said, “When I returned, six weeks ago, she and Iven had already married. Uri was in the ground. Everything was different, except … except my father. He was the same.”
Wince couldn’t listen anymore. He couldn’t let the conversation continue to dwell in the depths of the pit he only allowed himself to fall into when he was alone and drunk. “We need to know more,” he blurted. “We don’t know shit about magery or about the Vagans. Both halves of Yigris strut around pleased as prick that they’ve got a secret pact. We closed what was left of our borders for a hundred years, pretending we could banish anyone who wields the kind of power that the mages do, and then”—he rubbed his hands together—“we forgot about the whole damned mess.”
“How did the king’s mage women seem?” Gemma asked Tollan. “Have you noticed any increase in hostilities?”
Tollan chuckled bitterly. “You’ve not actually met a mage woman, have you?”
She shook her head. “I mean, I saw the one who was with you …”
“The mage women haven’t spoken since the war, since they were signed over as part of the truce. They are silent, emotionless servants to the crown.”
“Signed over? I thought they chose to stay.” Her eyes grew hard. “Do you think they see themselves as servants to the crown, Tollan?” she asked. “Because they sound like slaves to me. You noblemen do love to keep your women prisoner, don’t you?”
Tollan opened his mouth then closed it again.
“So what do we do?” Wince asked, thankful to the goddess that the conversation had swerved far away from his grief. “Can we talk to them? Can we set them free?”
“Prick that,” Tollan growled.
Gemma’s gaze cut hard and fast at Tollan as she snapped, “Goddess-damn you, with your prickling morality and your noses turned so far up to the sky that you trip over your own feet. Aegos! Wince’s smallclothes were so twisted about who I let stick what where, in my body, that he could barely speak, but keeping people locked up against their will, using them and …” Gemma spat on the floor again. “And you bastards have the balls to call us evil.”
Wince felt color rise to his cheeks. She didn’t have to be quite so descriptive.
“The mage women might have murdered my father,” Tollan grunted.
“They might have murdered Melnora, too,” she barked, and Wince saw, without a doubt, just how dangerous Gemma could be. “I imagine that you’d also be ready to kill someone if you’d been chattel for a century.” Her hand rested on the hilt of her knife. “What the Void am I supposed to do about …”
A small bell tied to a velvet rope that ran across the ceiling and down the wall rang so
ftly and all three of them jumped.
“Aegos,” Wince said. He drew his sword and turned to Gemma. “What was that?”
“I don’t know,” she said, pulling the key from beneath her shirt and heading for the door.
Wince stood next to the door as Gemma opened it. The prayer keeper, Brother Elam, stood in the hallway, his face pale and his shirt blood spattered. His glasses were askew, and it looked like he’d been crying. “Gemma, hurry,” he said as soon as he saw her.
Gemma followed him at a dead run, leaving Wince and Tollan to hurry behind.
By the time Wince and Tollan caught up with Gemma, she was in the hospit on her knees beside a low cot. A large man, bald with smooth skin was spread out, his feet hanging off the end.
Tollan wore an expression of bewilderment, so Wince whispered to him, “Aw, Aegos. Fin the Fish.”
Understanding settled on his friend’s features.
“Oh, no … no … no.” Gemma moaned, clutching at Fin’s hand. There was blood everywhere, as if he’d been gutted like his namesake, and when he tried to speak he coughed more onto her face.
“Shhh,” she said, squeezing his hand and leaning into him. She kissed his cheek and whispered into his ear, but he kept struggling, fighting to talk.
“It’s going to be all right,” she said, smoothing hair that wasn’t there and caressing his cheek. “The priests will fix you up, and you’ll be good as new.” Her tears fell on his face, and he opened his mouth to form words but no sound came.
“Fin, I don’t know what you’re trying to say.” She sobbed.
He coughed once and thick, dark blood bubbled from between his lips. He hacked out a single word.
“Dev.”
She stopped moving for a heartbeat, then stood up. “I have to go. Fin, if he needs me, I have to go. Is he hurt? Is he … dead?” There was a tremor in her voice.
Fin shook his head—or at least Wince thought he did—it was difficult to tell because at the same moment a shudder ran through the Balklander and his breathing stilled.