by Anna Holmes
The greasy man's eyes widen, and he leaves off his attacks, fumbling for something in the pocket of his long brown coat. I snatch up my sword and hold Cole at its point. He throws his hands skyward. "Peace, peace!"
"After having given us none?" I say. He’s not looking at the sword. I cast a glance to Gavroth. Blue lines start to creep up his wide neck. I turn to Cole. "A poisoned blade is a terrible weapon to throw."
"I was out of options." He grips a little bottle full of silvery liquid in his shaking hands.
If Cole had been struck, I can’t say he wouldn’t deserve the poison. But Gavroth fought fairly. I step aside to let Cole rush to his aid.
He plucks the stopper from the bottle and smears its contents over Gavroth's wounds. The huge man gasps as the blue lines recede. I hold the dagger to his neck, even though I have to stand on my toes to do it. "Unless you want to revisit that, I would end this game."
Gavroth looks at me from the corner of his eye. "Very well."
"Not just yet, though. I have some questions first."
Tressa emerges from the bedroom, a bandit in each hand. One is the woman who tried to take my horse. I smile at her. Tressa’s brow furrows. "I only count four."
"Where is the other woman?" I ask Gavroth. Cole tries to step forward, but I can still threaten with the sword. "You have a few seconds to answer."
"She isn’t with us," he says around a swallow. "We ran into her traveling."
I don't detect any dishonestly, but I catch Tressa's eye anyway. She nods subtly. "What's your designation?" I ask. Might as well get this out of the way now.
"I don't think so, Rebel," he snaps back.
"I am no Rebel." Alain must be getting to me. I don’t think a lie has ever come so easily. "I took this armor from one I killed in the siege. Pulled it from her pretty, cold neck." Tressa's head whips around. I frown at her, and she tightens her grip on the other two. I press the dagger point closer to Gavroth's neck. "Any other questions? Designation. Now."
His eyes linger on my face, tracking up and down. "Yours first."
"Lieutenant. To a prince. Alain Northshore." I pray and pray that Alain was not well known. Maybe just his name. The woman who Alain recognized isn’t here to call my bluff, for better or worse. Something flares in Gavroth’s eye. I can’t waste time. "I answered your question. What is your designation?"
The long, stifling pause seems to pull all sound from the room. I watch him carefully, my fingers toying with the wrapping on the hilt of the dagger. Not too carefully; if he hasn’t detected the lie, I don’t want to give him reason to doubt. With a deep breath in, he lets his large shoulders drop. "Alchemical Engineer First Class."
"You?" I gesture to Cole.
"Alchemical Second," he replies dutifully, but he's not happy about it.
"You two?"
"Archer, Cavalry, First," the woman says, as though daring me to say something about it.
"Swordsman, private," the man at her side answers, and I look at him more closely. He's really a boy younger than Alain and I, his sheaf of rust colored hair overgrown and falling in his eyes. If Alain was a new recruit, this one is fresh, likely hastily trained for the siege.
"My brother," Gavroth says perfunctorily, protectively.
I lower the knife but keep it close to his neck. "Nice to meet you all. Please don't bother us or anyone at this tavern again. I’ll be making a note of this with the prince." I look to Cole. "I'll hang onto this."
"You won't last long if you do," he says. "Not without the antidote."
"Good idea. Hand it over. And the sheath."
Gavroth looks to him. "Cole, do as she says."
I watch him pull out the bottle again, and he gives it to me. Not that I'm going to ever try to use this; I don't trust it as far as I can throw it. As soon as it's safe, I'll destroy them both.
"Tressa, let's go." I release Gavroth and start toward the street. On the other side, the proprietor waits, wringing his hands. Loudly enough for the bandits to hear, I call, "Mr. Harrison, show them the door. Feel free to let me know if there’s any more trouble."
I try not to giggle as I go.
Outside, Tressa says, "That was too dangerous. I'm sorry I volunteered us."
"It's no matter." I hold up the dagger in the fading light. There's nothing on it to indicate it's different from any other blade. Standard Legion fare. I wonder if the poison is theirs, too, or if Cole is just talented and bored. "I get the feeling that was exactly what I—what they needed."
She grasps herself about the elbows, looking uncertainly back at the tavern. "Shouldn’t we hand them off, or…"
I see her point. I’m also not crazy about leaving them to run about and bully other individuals, but I can’t see myself marching them up to the guard right now. I’m not even sure how far to trust the guard. "I don’t know. I’m hoping that the fear of Alain’s wrath is enough."
She sighs. "Far be it from me to disagree…"
"Please feel free." We wander back to the post out in front of the tavern. I give Maribelle a pat and check that I closed the saddlebag properly. It's about time to meet Alain, and I frown. I realize much too slowly what’s amiss. "Maribelle, what are you still doing here?"
He should be riding her. I look up the street, hoping to see him exiting a shop. I don’t.
I turn to tell Tressa to run, try to find him, when a footstep behind me makes me turn. Gavroth again. I roll my eyes and move for my sword, but he holds up a hand. "I'm not going to fight you again."
"I don't have time right now," I tell him.
He doesn't speak much louder than a whisper, glancing around the street and watching some people pass before beginning. "I just need to know this. Please. Is Rosalia coming?"
"What?" I stare.
"They say in the underground that Rosalia is sending us a prince. Is Northshore that prince?"
"Yes," I say slowly.
He kneels, and my stomach lurches. I am staring at the beginning of a revolution. I know. I was there for the last two. Tressa gapes at me, and I try to assure her that I'm lying without speaking. She just sort of squints, confused, and at last, I announce to Gavroth, "So you're who I was supposed to meet."
"I didn't know we were being assigned," he says clumsily.
"It's classified. You wouldn't." I nod back to the tavern. "Gather your companions and wait here. I'll return with the prince. Tressa, with me." I stalk down the street, trying not to show my unease in a sea of smiling faces, now including Gavroth's. He lurches to his feet and heads back to fetch the others. We walk a ways, and I say to Tressa, "I need to keep track of them for now. Find out what they know. You want to get out of bounty hunting? Now's your chance. You're now the head of the counterrevolution prevention force. Congratulations. We can worry about the ceremony later."
"What do you want me to do?" she asks, voice low.
"Keep an eye on them. Make sure they don't get anywhere without me. There might be some combing through your contacts later, but first I need to find Alain, find the camp, and get back as fast as I can."
"Your highness—" I stop and frown at her, and she amends, "Um, are you sure that this isn't all just rumor? I've heard nothing of any Rosalian prince."
"I can't afford to treat it as such. My cabinet tells me nothing, so I have to hear everything." Thank gods Mountainside is one long, narrow street. There aren't many corners in which to lose Alain. "Watch them. Don't let them get away."
I run.
Chapter Eighteen
Alain
My body does not feel like mine anymore. Like some unseen force controls it, holds it still. It isn’t any mystical power, though—just her gaze locked onto me.
Jori stares up at me, those pale green eyes piercing every part of me. No faceshift forgery is this good. I know, I know, I know.
But still, it can't possibly…
"You're dead," I say at last. "I watched you…"
She shoves a bit of her hair from her face. "You thought you watche
d me."
My leg threatens to give out, and I lower myself next to her before I can fall. I knew every freckle on that face, and I can find no evidence that the constellations have been altered. She sighs. "You always knew how to make a scene, Alain."
"Apparently I'm not the only one!"
I've run through it so many times, both in the sort of wishful thinking that follows any tragedy and since seeing her just now, wondering how she possibly could have avoided that arrow. Wondering how I could have held her cold hand and not felt her heartbeat. Wondering what it would be like to see her again, and wondering how on earth I'm going to live now that I have.
She watches me with only the mildest exasperation making its way into her features. I know this look well. I vexed her often. I'd often thought that if I saw her in this life or the next, I'd apologize for it, but right now, vexing is a bit mild for what I feel like doing. "Alain, people are staring."
"Let them!"
"I'd rather not," she says, gracefully pulling herself to her knees and then to her feet. She holds out a hand to me. I don't take it, struggling upward myself. I can feel the bandage growing warmer, wetter, but I ignore it, looking down at her. She stands a few inches shorter than I do, and she seems to feel intimidated by that now, as she darts away from me. "Listen, I meant to find you after the siege, but—"
"But I'd been taken to a slave camp and subjected to hard labor for three months after being flogged nearly to death," I tell her.
She glowers, yanking me out of the middle of the street and into the shadow of a shuttered store. "Do you want to keep your voice down?"
"No," I say.
Every self-preservation instinct I have is gone. All I feel is an unholy and intoxicating combination of rage and confusion, and something tells me that nothing she says next will lessen it. She smoothes down her bodice and smiles nervously as a man walks past us. "Come with me," she says through the smile, which might convince anyone but me.
I don't know why I should. I'm still not entirely sure this isn't some sort of well-researched trap, or some machination of my terribly tired, terribly frayed mind. She moves down the alley to a side door, lithe frame bending as she pulls a key from her pocket. I am lured closer. "Inside," she says, gesturing to the abandoned store.
Inside, it is not empty. Sawhorses sit petrified, covered in dust. Tools are scattered everywhere, not touched since their owners left them. "What is this place?"
"Alchemists' shop," she says briefly, tugging a curtain over the door. "Abandoned since the retaking of the country."
"Why do you have a key?"
"I knew the owner."
I don't like this. She sets about lighting a few candles, summoning the flames between her fingertips.
Jori had been the most talented magician—even more than Marsh. I'd been certain when the prince hunters came through it was her they were after. She had the makings—respect from the soldiers, a fundamental understanding of the Legion, dangerous cunning. I'd always assumed utter loyalty part of that list, but it seems not now. She was all too happy to desert the rest of us, leave me to die in her place. When she turns to look back at me, all I can manage is, "Why?"
She settles on one of the sawhorses and looks at me with a sad smile. "I couldn't do it anymore. It was making me crazy. I already did what I could for the Legion. I brought them you."
"Fat lot of good that did them."
She shakes her head, moss green eyes troubled. "They never could have brought that siege together without you. I just…knew it would fail."
"How?" I demand.
"The Rosalians counted us lost from the second the invasion started. One of them ordered Marsh to pull back as soon as we made it into the city for transport to Rosalia. I wasn't important enough to make the list to be saved. You would have…"
"But I ignored Marsh," I realize.
She'd been calling for me, I remember, between a fog of arrow fire and dust. I instead went to Fram.
"I didn't want to die, but I was expected to," she sighs. "So I did. Just on my own terms."
She hops down and wanders to what had once been a wall of drawers. A cobwebby ladder sits leaned against it. It groans under her weight, but she reaches up to a broken drawer and pulls out what looks like a pinch of dead leaves and twigs. "Nightroot. If you'd ever paid attention in alchemy training, you'd know that it produces a stupor in which the skin grows cold and thick enough that no pulse can be felt."
"But the arrow," I say dumbly.
"I stopped it well before it actually hit me," she replies with a little laugh. "I showed you that trick myself."
She had. A month before the siege. I'd been so preoccupied with my new title that I must have given her a "that's nice, dearest." She'd been trying to tell me what was to come. "But why didn't you say something?"
"You would have gone on to Rosalia. I'd always meant to find my way home, but that was the only way you'd go, too."
I frown so low that I can't see her anymore, but I prefer it that way right now. "I told you, Jori. Even if we lost the war, I was staying in Elyssia."
"You were so stubborn!" she cries suddenly. "Why couldn't you have just listened…?"
"You're right," I find myself admitting. Stubborn as I may be, I am also exhausted. I’ll concede the point. "I should listen. But Elyssia is my home."
"Is it?" Her voice hardens. "When it enslaves you, takes what you love from you…"
"You took yourself away."
"Because of them!"
"They forced you?"
"They would have sent me to a colony. I wouldn't have survived that."
Somehow I find that hard to believe. The smart ones always managed, and Jori is smart. "But you let me go." She doesn't say anything, and now my jaw tightens, and I lean forward, stiff. "Jori."
"Don't act such the victim," she snaps. "You replaced me quickly enough."
"Replaced—" Oh. "She's not—"
"Oh, please," Jori hisses, jumping down from the ladder. Even without the Legion's carefully apportioned meals, she's stayed strong, never wanting for food like so many of her fellow soldiers now do. "I saw you."
"Saw me what? Jori, there's been nothing to even suggest—"
"I saw you change her face."
My body has fallen away, leaving only my stomach behind. My stomach and my stupid, stupid leg. Still, I notice, the slightest bit of creeping dread filling back in and pooling at my core, she's said nothing about my ultimate betrayal—trading her for an enemy. I don't think she's recognized Caelin. "I only meant to protect her."
"You know as well as I do what it takes for a successful faceshift."
Common theory states there must be a connection between the magician and his subject to change another's body around. I’m not sure I accept theory—never mind that what I did for Caelin is just unorthodox illusion—but I can’t tell her that. I can’t tell her that there’s no way I could have done a faceshift, because the princess is protected from people like us. Instead, I splutter, "Jori, that's ridiculous. I just—it's different for me. Like making the wells. Remember?"
Marsh had gone on and on about how much finesse it took to create a well magically. While she blathered on, I had made six. I see her face waver, but it hardens. "Oh, yes, I forgot. You're special."
"I’m…strange. Something's different, but I'm not anything special." I pause. Why is it so important that she believe me? "Jori, you were dead almost four months. You can't know how I…"
"You couldn't have waited six?"
"And you couldn't have told me you were alive?" I shout.
"You were in a slave colony," she answers warily, uncertain of the advantage now.
I fold my arms. "You could have leveled that colony if you wanted. You could have found me. Why did you leave me there if you knew? Why did you wander with those brigands? Why did you attack me?"
Again, she says nothing, and I am flushed. She settles on her sawhorse again, and folds and refolds her hands. This was an old hab
it, one Marsh wasn't too shy to correct. It was an unspoken rule that once an officer was made of you, it was bad form to critique you in front of the troops, but Marsh was ruthless in her discipline.
"Does any of this matter anymore?" Jori asks, voice quivering. "We've found each other, Alain. It's going to be all right now."
I halt the beginnings of a smile, snatch it from coming into existence on my face. My leg reminds me. "No—no, it isn't, Jori. You let me think you were dead. Do you know how that killed me?"
"Apparently not too much."
"I was about to—" I can't tell her what I'd attempted to do. I can't begin to tell her how indifferent to my fate I'd been. Until Caelin. Maybe she's right. Maybe there is a connection after all.
She jumps off the sawhorse. "I was an idiot to think you would have me back. You know—" She waves one of her small, perfect, white hands. "Every other sad sack and drunkard in this town pays handsomely to see their lost loves again. But you won’t take the real thing for free."
I have to reach for the sawhorse for support. I might be sick, between the sharp pain darting from the wound to my calf and what she just confessed. "Jori."
She stares at me, icicles in her eyes, icicles in her heart.
"You know more spells than—"
"And what good will that do? No one wants a useless Legion officer for anything. Not even the Legion wants me no matter how many tricks I can do. But everyone misses someone here. I was stupid enough to think you missed me."
I blink hard, my nose stinging, all the strength gone out of me. It's a good thing indeed that this sawhorse is here. The rough, unfinished wood chafes the skin of my palms, but it holds me up just fine. "Oh, how I did," I breathe. "But I don't think I can anymore."
Her pixie-like face brightens. "That's right. I'm here." She reaches for my hand, but there's nothing familiar in her touch, the strange, smooth, overly warm caress sliding over the top of my hand. I jerk back and place her hand back against her skirt. It's Jori, but not my Jori.