by Devin Madson
That makes no sense.
Yes, it does. You’re just a passenger there.
Are you admitting that’s my body you’ve run off with?
I felt my brow crinkle into a frown. She didn’t answer.
Why does he need your help?
Because he’s not what you think him, she said. There’s a lot the Witchdoctor didn’t tell you, which you might have discovered if you’d bothered to read the book you stole from him.
The book? Do you—?
I jerked awake as the door slid open. “Oh, I’m sorry, my lady, I did not think you would already be asleep.”
A maid stood holding a tray, and I blinked a dozen times to bring her face into focus. It didn’t help. She shuffled in. “I’ll leave the tray for when you’re ready, my lady.”
She set the tray on the floor and backed out, closing the door softly behind her. No click of a lock. No silhouette of a guard or shifting steps, but in this state, freedom was impossible.
Rich smells wafted from the tray, making my stomach turn. From the next room, a voice sounded through the thin wall.
“A man does kneel at the dawn and the dusk and thank his God for the night and the day, the sun and the moon and the stars.”
Leo, the musical roll of his voice as he read a relaxing sound.
“Though he kneels with others he is alone, one man in the eyes of God as the man beside him is one man and the man beside him is one man, all through the gathering.”
A second, deeper male voice murmured agreement. “Next to the other assassin,” the servant had said, and my curiosity was piqued. Other assassin. I’d only ever been a lone wolf.
“We are many. A congregation of ones, together even when we are apart.”
I forced myself to eat as much as I could stomach while I listened to the rising passion in Leo’s voice, culminating in a ringing silence.
“We will continue our lessons tomorrow,” Leo said, his voice moving away. “Until then, you are beloved of God.”
A door slid open and slid closed, and footsteps faded away along the passage.
Lessons. Too well could I remember my own lessons at the hospice, seeking to shape me into a useful pawn. I cleared my throat. “It’s all bullshit, you know,” I said, leaning back against the wall. “Lots of people in the world don’t worship the Chiltaen god, and the sun and the moon still go on the same. Besides, if you were beloved of God you wouldn’t be stuck here, huh?”
No one answered. Perhaps I had misjudged.
“My name is Cassandra,” I tried again, deciding it was safest to leave the empress out of this. “Cassandra Marius.”
More silence. I wondered if my neighbour had heard me, and had parted my lips to speak louder when he said, “I am Yakono. Just Yakono.”
A Kisian name, but the accent was more Chiltaen and yet somehow not quite. “Nice to meet you, Just Yakono. You must be favoured for Dom Villius to read to you himself.”
A little laugh sounded near. He must have moved closer, was perhaps right behind me, our backs pressed against each other but for the interference of the thin wooden wall.
“I hope I am not so fortunate,” I added. “Becoming a priest of the One True God involves a lot of confessions, and no one has time to listen to all my sins.”
“You would be surprised how much time I have, Cassandra.”
My name rolled off his tongue in a way that sounded more like the traders from the west, and I said, “Where are you from? You don’t sound Kisian.”
“Neither do you,” was his light reply.
“Because I’m not. I’m Chiltaen, I’m just stuck here.”
He didn’t answer for a while, and I wondered if the question had offended him. “You don’t have to tell me, we can talk about something else.”
“Why do you want to talk?”
Because you’re an assassin too, and I’m curious probably wasn’t the wisest reply, so I said, “Is there anything else to do?”
“No, but… I don’t know you.”
“I don’t know you either. You’re Just Yakono and you’re not from around here and you’re not a devotee of the One True God, or Dom Villius wouldn’t be trying to make a convert through preaching the devotional lessons.”
Fabric scuffed against the wall as he shifted his weight. “And you are Cassandra Marius from Chiltae, and you are also not a devotee of the One True God or you wouldn’t speak so.”
“My dislike of the church is baked in deep.”
“I thought myself impervious, but…”
I thought of the way Leo’s reading had lulled Kaysa’s mind, drawing her in. Waking after such dreams had been like breaking the surface of a dark lake and sucking deep breaths of air. “You find the lessons entrancing,” I said, turning my cheek to the wall and finishing his sentence for him. “Intoxicating even. Difficult to shake.”
“Yes.”
“Well, I would shake you if I could. I’ll just have to shout at you through the wall instead.”
“If you shout, they’ll hear us,” came his deep rumble. “If they hear us, they’ll move us. I don’t… I don’t want to be alone.”
They were such vulnerable words, and I swallowed a constriction in my throat. “You aren’t.”
A footfall approached along the passage, and fearing someone had heard us, I levered myself out of my sitting position and lay on the sleeping mat, heart hammering fast.
Someone tapped on my door, and I croaked permission to enter. “I have been sent to bring you to the physician, my lady.” The maid from earlier bowed. “Can you walk or do you need help?”
I wanted to tell her the physician could fuck off. I wanted to tell her I’d rather die than do anything to benefit Leo. I wanted to refuse all offers of help because it hurt my pride to admit I needed it, but I swallowed it all.
“I will need help,” I said, forcing out the hateful words. The maid entered, clucking about my messy blankets and the food I’d picked at, before offering her hands to help me up. They were rough, but strong and warm compared to my cold claws.
“That’s the way,” she said as though encouraging a child. “I am sure Master Ao will soon have you better. He’s the best physician for miles around.”
I could not walk without leaning heavily upon her arm, but she was a sturdy young woman and didn’t shrink away, let alone buckle. Leaving the door open, she helped me into a long passage. I’d not been awake enough when we’d arrived to pay attention to our surroundings, but I looked around now, noting the decoration carved along the upper walls and the well-polished floor. A nobleman’s country estate?
As we slowly staggered past Yakono’s door, I stared at the paper panes and wondered why he was here. Had he been sent to kill Leo as I once had and failed? But if so, why risk keeping him alive? I stared longer than I ought at the door, hoping for a sight of his silhouette through the paper.
“I don’t want to be alone,” he had said.
We ought not to trust him so quickly, Empress Hana said. We are in a bad position here, and we don’t know who he is.
I never said I was trusting him.
She spoke no more as we reached the end of the passage and turned into a larger hall. Double doors led out into what would be the public rooms, while another, shorter passage led on into a large sitting room. A breath caught in my throat. There I was, kneeling at a central table with an open book before me. Kaysa, I reminded myself, the sight of me from outside my own skin a strange one.
“Ah, Cassandra. Empress Hana.” Leo strode forward to stand beside… Leo. Two of them. They looked exactly the same, down to the colour and sit of their robes and the way they wore their masks loose around their throats. And just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, I saw Septum. Not in his box, but lying upon a divan below a broad window like he was resting.
Three Leos.
“How shocked you look,” one said. “Surely this should not be a surprise by now. The dear captain was… not very good at keeping secrets, after al
l. How disappointed my father would have been in his poor service.”
“Poor service?” I repeated, anger vibrating in the words. “Whatever my thoughts about your father, at least he put his faith in the right people.”
“Fine words from the woman who slit his throat.”
Kaysa had not looked up from her book, but nor had she turned a page since I entered. She had the stilled look of one who is carefully listening while pretending not to. Poorly.
The maid remained in the doorway, no shock at the sight of three of the same man in the one room, only a glassy stare that wasn’t entirely present. A dead look, but her pulse throbbed in her neck. The spot from which Captain Aeneas had bled out. As had the hieromonk before him.
“Come and sit,” Leo said, indicating the divan opposite Septum’s. “The physician will be here soon. I have somewhere else I need to be, but I will leave you in the care of…” He turned to look at the other Leo now standing by the window. “Myself.”
He grinned at his own joke while the maid helped me to the divan and, without a word, strode back out. Leo followed, drawing up his mask as he went. I lay down, hoping the other Leo would leave me alone if I pretended to be asleep.
“Really, Cassandra, I am hurt,” the Leo at the window said, not turning from the gardens blearily visible through wavy glass doors. “One would think you haven’t missed me. That you didn’t regret having killed me. That you never liked me at all.”
I had liked the Leo I had travelled to Kisia with. The one I had killed. He had seemed to come back to life, but it had been a lie. He had died as surely as anyone I’d ever stuck a blade into. Which brother had he been? A less important one?
“His name was Sextus, and I’m sorry, but you did me a favour when you killed him.”
He turned from the window as Kaysa leapt up from the table, the way she wore my body so different to how I had imagined myself. “You’re back,” she said. “I wasn’t sure.”
“I couldn’t let him know,” Leo said, glancing at the door. “He wouldn’t have left.”
They shared an understanding look, and feeling like I had just walked into a mad world, I stared at them both. “Did he just apologise to me?” I said, trying to prop myself up on an elbow and failing. “What the fuck is going on?”
“I told you there was a lot you didn’t know,” Kaysa said. “This is Unus, Cass. He’s not what you think he is.”
He looked the same as the others, owning the same boyish good looks, the same sharp nose and fair hair, the same quirk of a smile, though there was something mesmerising about this one’s eyes. “Captain Aeneas told me about him. Unus, the firstborn, the most powerful. Blah blah blah.”
“That’s both very right and very wrong,” Leo Unus said, coming no closer. “We are… rather more like you than it appears. Just… a bit different.”
“Like us but different?” I repeated. “Well, that clears that up.”
Leo looked away, reddening with embarrassment or annoyance, I hardly cared. Yet in the same way Kaysa wore my skin differently, so too did this Leo wear his differently. All awkward stance and arms folded tightly across his chest.
What did the captain say he was? Hana asked. A single soul in multiple bodies?
Yes. And the others have all acted the same. Except for Septum.
“I told you she wouldn’t help me, Kaysa,” he said. “Let it go. I can do this myself.”
Kaysa turned back, but as she went to him, he staggered, pressing a hand to his head, the other held out to halt her. And she did stop, freezing in place with a pitiful little groan. He retreated from her, shaking his head until he hit the closed doors of the balcony with a harsh rattle. It seemed to shake through him, and like an uncurling snake he straightened, dropping his hands and rolling his shoulders.
“Well, that was fun,” he said, his tone bright and brittle and hard. “Shall we try this again? How nice it is to see you here, Cassandra.”
He strode forward and Kaysa fell back, all but scurrying out of the way of a man she had stood close to only a moment before. Leo glared at her, full of disdain, and came toward me. He lowered himself onto the edge of the divan, his weight depressing the cushion and making me slide toward him. It took far too many strained muscles to stop us touching, a fact he seemed to understand and appreciate with another of his smiles. “Wasted energy, Cassandra,” he said, slowly lowering his hand to my cheek. “Wasted energy. When there is nothing you can do in this state to stop me doing anything I like.”
I expected his touch to be like static, yet it was just the warm, soft touch of fingers that had never seen a day’s hard work in their life. Everything about him was smooth and unweathered and gently mocking.
“What do you want?”
“I am too kind a man to answer you. Isn’t that nice?” Someone cleared their throat at the doorway. “Ah, Master Ao. I’m so glad you could come. My friend is ill and in great need of your care.”
“Holiness,” the man said stiffly, making it clear he had little respect even for so highly ranked a priest. “I shall do all in my power to help.”
“Good. I have been informed you are the very best physician in these parts.”
“The Manshins certainly thought so.”
Shit, Cass, I’ve just figured out where we are. This is the country estate of Minister Manshin, commander of the imperial army. Does that mean he—? The empress broke off, unable to finish her own thought. But she didn’t need to; they were loud enough. If Minister Manshin had formed an alliance with Leo, what would that mean for Miko? Hana had been comforted that Manshin was her daughter’s minister of the left, but that comfort was fast turning to a deep, intense fear. And there was nothing I could do.
The physician asked a hundred questions, prodded and poked and listened to the sound of my breathing and my heart. Torvash’s examination had been far more comprehensive, had involved temperatures and looking inside my mouth and my ears and checking the consistency of my saliva, and I doubted any human physician would ever come close to figuring this out if the immortal Witchdoctor could not. But I let myself be checked over and swallowed a foul mixture while the man explained to Leo that I had an imbalance of the spirits and would do well for more rest and warm broth and exercise in the coolest part of the day.
Eventually we were taken back to our room to rest, but though our body was exhausted our mind was not, too busy flitting from anxiety to dread and back.
What could Leo possibly have offered Manshin to get his support? Hana said, voicing her biggest worry.
Is it possible Leo is here without permission? I said.
It is, but there’s no sign of a fight. And I’d rather consider the worst than hope for the best when it could have such disastrous consequences.
Do you worry he would harm your daughter?
She didn’t answer, which was answer enough. After a time, she said, It’s no comfort that Leo wants us alive either.
No, I agreed. But did you notice how different he was at first? That’s not the Leo we know.
I did, but I don’t know what to make of it. And I don’t trust him not to be playing a deep game to get Kaysa on his side.
But why? What can he possibly need her for?
If it comes to that, she said. What can he possibly need us for? Is it something to do with Manshin? Or am I to be ransomed back to my daughter?
Whatever it is, it’s bad.
Her agreement was a warm, silent thing. He wants us alive for something, she said. We can’t just lie here and let him get what he wants, so what are our options? Escape is not one of them. Neither is killing him, though if we had, perhaps Captain Aeneas would still be alive. Or we would all be dead.
It would be impossible anyway, I said. Between his mind reading and our weak state, the chances of getting a blade in our hand, let alone anywhere near him, are slim.
She sighed. All right. We can’t escape and we can’t kill him, but we can’t do nothing. I begin to get the feeling we aren’t getting o
ut of here for a long time. Unless he plans to ransom us, I don’t think I’ll be seeing my daughter again after all.
Will we get better? Now we can rest consistently and aren’t travelling.
She didn’t answer.
You said it came in bouts and you would be well between them.
Still she didn’t answer, but our minds were close enough that she didn’t have to. Determination was all that kept this body going now.
There had been a time I’d hoped to make a difference in the world, to change Chiltae for the better with my blade as I couldn’t with my voice, but here I was trapped and fading, the circular helplessness of my existence coming to a slow and pathetic end. It wasn’t what I’d wanted. Wasn’t how I’d hoped to die. It had all gone wrong the day I’d accepted Secretary Aurus’s contract for Leo’s life.
I turned my head, cheek to the wall. “Yakono?”
“Cassandra?” came the rumble of my name.
“You’re an assassin,” I said, more statement than question.
There was a moment of hesitation before he answered, but no shame nor a single drop of embarrassment or pride when he said, “I am.”
“Were you contracted to kill Dom Villius?”
The same brief hesitation, perhaps weighing up his options. “That isn’t something I would usually discuss, but I get the feeling you have a good reason for asking. I was contracted to kill him but, as you see, was far from successful.”
“Was it Secretary Aurus?”
“How do you know?”
“Because he contracted me too.”
I could well imagine the silence was shock, and when Yakono next spoke his voice was tight and high with tension. “When?”
“I don’t know what the date is anymore, but before the rains. Before Prince Tanaka was executed. I was to kill Leo in time to give the Nine a reason for war.”
“Ah, you were before me. I… had the feeling I wasn’t the first. I was warned it was not an easy job, but then we’ve often had difficult jobs in the past, especially political ones, so I didn’t think much of it.”