Chapter Two

The Revolution

"A word?"

I wasn't sure what Wylder would want from me, but the last time we'd met, it had been in battle and it had ended with Nicolo taking Wylder's family hostage.

"Just a word," Wylder nodded. "And I think it would be as well for both of us if that word took place somewhere less public. You and I are both wanted men."

"I'm not a man."

"It's a figure of speech."

I frowned. "Would you be happy if I referred to you as a wanted woman?"

"Fair point, but, however you phrase it, there are guards about and the interior of a private house would be preferable to a dungeon."

He was right on that account. I might not trust him, but he was preferable to the guards, and we were technically on the same side now, though how he could have heard as much so swiftly I didn't know.

"This way."

Pulling a hood over his head, Wylder led me down a network of alleyways so complex that I guessed he was deliberately disguising the route. He didn't hold me at knifepoint, nor did he make any effort to stop me from running away, but I was well-trained enough to know that it wasn't just the two of us out here; there were others behind us, keeping out of sight while keeping an eye on me.

Finally, we passed through a small wooden door and into a modest home.

"Take a seat," offered Wylder.

I looked around myself. "And what of your friends?"

"Friends?"

"The ones following us."

Wylder examined my face quietly before speaking. "Well, that answers my first question. You are an assassin, aren't you?"

"Was," I replied with a frown. "I was an assassin."

"How unfortunate."

I wanted to follow up on that bizarre comment, but I had other questions first. I needed to know where I stood and where Wylder stood. "You were waiting for me."

"Yes," nodded Wylder.

"Then you know what happened in the castle this evening."

"Yes."

"How?"

"I think," Wylder chose his words with care, "given the early stage that our relationship—dare I say our ‘friendship'—is at, it would be prudent for me to keep details of my organization to myself. Suffice it to say that I received information about who and what you are and I learned of your falling out with your master ," he spat the word. "The news suggested to me that our interests might now align, and an assassin—forgive me; former assassin —would be a useful addition to an organization like ours. As for meeting you outside, I did get a little lucky on that account. Once I heard you had escaped, I guessed you would head for the wall. Thus, I stationed people around the walls of the Great Castle to watch out for you. The fire seemed like the sort of diversion a clever assassin might invent and so I headed for it. No great mystery."

That did clear up the question of how he'd found me, and it impressed me that Wylder had such a network of informants that information was able to reach him so quickly, but I was still a little fuzzy on why he wanted my help. I had a hunch the answer tied to his comment about it being ‘unfortunate' that I was no longer an assassin.

"When you say ‘ my organization' , I assume you mean the revolution."

Wylder pulled a face. "I suppose that's what I'm obligated to call it, but I never liked the word, it seems… anarchic, anti-authoritarian."

"Revolutions are anti-authoritarian," I pointed out.

"Which is why I don't like the word." Wylder seated himself and, with a slight grunt, put his feet up on the table. "I am not anti-authority, my dear. I'm all in favor of it. The Gath needs to be ruled with a strong hand. I am not anti-royalist, I and my family have served the Gath's ruling family (whichever family that happened to be at the time) for centuries. I have a smattering of royal blood myself."

"You're just anti-Balduin?" I suggested.

"And everything he stands for," confirmed Wylder. "The fact that he has forced a faithful old warhorse like me into the role of revolutionary is one more thing I count against him."

"So, what are your goals?" I asked.

"Traditional ones," replied Wylder without hesitation. "Goals that have long and well-documented historical precedent in the Gath. We plan to depose the king through armed uprising and replace him with someone more worthy of the title. If you're an assassin, then I'm sure you know your history (I understand Guild education to be first rate) so I don't have to tell you how many times the throne has changed hands in similar circumstances."

"Who decides who is ‘worthy'?" I asked as it seemed like the most logical question.

"Me," replied Wylder with a quick nod. "I know that might seem self-serving, but someone's got to do it and there's no one else I trust better than myself. No one else who combines that blend of unimpeachable honesty, knowledge of what makes a monarch, and sympathy with the common man."

I couldn't help smiling. "What if the common man doesn't like your choice?"

"Then they can stage their own damn revolution," said Wylder with a shrug. "This one's mine so I get to pick. That too, of course, has historical precedent. Most revolutions are followed by a period of uncertainty in which the crown bounces from head to head. After the Nine-Day revolution that deposed Carric the Hated, there were fourteen kings in less than a year."

"And that's the sort of thing you have in mind?"

Wylder sighed and shook his head. "I like to hope that my revolution will go more smoothly. I do have some ideas on how things might work differently—‘differently' as in ‘better'. But I daresay every previous revolutionary leader thought the same thing." He removed his feet from the table and stood. "I take comfort in the fact that, however bad that period of instability might be, it will be better than King Balduin's reign."

Hard to argue with that while the dreaded Purgers were visiting every corner of the Gath, burning buildings and people alike in their quest to root out dissent.

Wylder's words about new ideas, something ‘better', reminded me of what Nicolo had said when we'd left Simnel. He'd been brimming with optimism for the future and with ideas of how the court could work differently to benefit all citizens. I'd noted at our first meeting how much Wylder struck me as the same type of man Nicolo might be in thirty years, and I thought that same thing again now.

"Do you know who you remind me of?"

Wylder frowned sharply. "Who?"

"Master Nicolo."

The frown deepened. Perhaps I should have known better. To me Nicolo was still a quixotic figure; the man I loved yet also the one who had had me thrown in the dungeons (almost). But to Wylder, he was simply the man who had taken his wife and children hostage.

"I'll thank you not to make that comparison again or you and it may come to blows."

"And how do you think that would go?"

"I have no wish to find out." Wylder was smart enough to know that I might have the edge on him.

"Your family was treated well. That was because of Nicolo."

"He was also the one who took them from me."

I had to acknowledge that and did so with a nod. Then I changed the subject. "What do you want from me, your former-Grace?"

Wylder shrugged. "Exactly what you imagine. I want an assassin."

I nodded. "You want me to kill Balduin?"

But Wylder shook his head. "Would it were so simple. For starters, getting to Balduin and past his bodyguards is next to impossible. As you will have already gleaned, I do have friends in the castle but even for them, Balduin is too difficult to get near. But, even if we could kill him, I do not think we necessarily would. Tempting though it is. Simply assassinating a monarch is not how a revolution can end if it's to have any validity going forwards. Done like that, it's simply murder and the next person on the throne will have an excuse to continue with the Purges."

"One of the sisters," I nodded.

But Wylder scoffed. "Those poor bitches had little influence in court before Balduin was crowned and now they're on the outside completely. I have, I admit, used them when our interests aligned (bringing down their brother), but their day is done. No, the next king would be a quite different prospect."

I frowned, unsure who he was talking about.

Wylder shook his head. "Your affection blinds you, Charlotte. Your Master Nicolo would succeed Balduin if we assassinated the King. And his first job in such a position would be taking charge of the hunt to find his friend's killers, but then the taste for power would get its claws into him. And let's be honest, no one would dare to oppose him. Can't you just see it?"

I could. The court would be scared, but they might also be quietly grateful for the rule of The Unbreakable. He would be Balduin without the childishly cruel excesses. I hated to admit it, but Wylder was right, after the death of the Queen and my ‘betrayal', the death of Balduin would hit Nicolo like a thunderbolt. His revenge would be terrible and the whole of the Gath would feel it.

"So, it's Nicolo you want me to assassinate," I said, sure of my guess.

Wylder nodded. "At the moment, Balduin is riding high. He has the loyalty of the military and that's all he needs to get everything he wants. But the man makes friends as easily as a fish rides a horse. Pretty soon, his own people will turn against him and he will only have ‘loyalty' to protect him. Loyalty like that is only worth the gold that buys it, and if the nobility club together, they can outbid that loyalty. But Nicolo secures him. Nicolo's loyalty is not for sale, and while people are scared of Balduin's erratic behavior, they are terrified of Nicolo full stop. As long as Balduin has The Unbreakable, he has power. So, Master Nicolo must die." He shrugged. "Plus, if we kill Nicolo then Balduin will die too and will do so in a nice, natural way. No muss, no fuss."

I spoke up. "There are probably some things you should know."

Wylder listened with interest as I told him that it was Balduin himself who had hired me to kill his ‘friend'.

Wylder frowned. "That can't be. Balduin's life relies on Nicolo, everyone knows that."

It was true, and also inexplicable. As a boy, Balduin had suffered from a degenerative illness, but, for some reason, proximity to Nicolo made the symptoms vanish. But not permanently; Balduin could go a month without Nicolo around, but after that, his health again deteriorated. No one fully understood why this happened except that it was something to do with Nicolo's violet eyes, which he had inherited from his father, whom he'd never known as the man was a traveler from another land.

So, Wylder was right, Balduin killing Nicolo was insane, except that…

"He's found another boy like Nicolo," I explained on a shrug. "A boy with violet eyes who he keeps locked in a secret room off his old apartments in Heir's Tower. Or at least… that's where I last saw the boy. Balduin may have moved him by now."

It had been my intent to save the boy when I returned to the Gath after my time away with Nicolo in Simnel with his mother. I still wanted to, of course, but the goal seemed suddenly even further away than before. None of which meant I was going to give up.

"Interesting," Wylder stroked his chin. "Another reason Balduin is preferable to Nicolo is that he has no concept of his own shortcomings. He probably thinks he can manage perfectly well without the Master, which he can't."

"So, he may still have Nicolo killed?"

"If we're lucky."

That didn't sound like luck to me, it sounded more like the end of the world.

"Still attached to him?" asked Wylder, not unkindly. "He is not worthy of you, Charlotte."

"Not worthy of me?" I laughed, shaking my head. "I'm nothing more than a lapsed assassin." I swallowed hard. "I'm nothing and no one."

Wylder shrugged. "You followed your heart when it would have been easier and safer to do as you were told. That sounds worthwhile to me. That's why I'm sure you will come around to our way of thinking—to see Balduin as the threat he is."

"I already see that."

He nodded. "Of course you do. But to bring down Balduin, we need to be rid of the Master."

I nodded. "I won't argue with you on that. Balduin is nothing without Nicolo, but I don't believe we need to kill Nicolo to do it."

"You've seen what Master Nicolo is capable of," growled Wylder through gritted teeth, still thinking of his family no doubt.

"Yes, I have." I, on the other hand, was thinking of Nicolo in the village of Simnel, milking goats with his mother or risking his life to save his young half-brother. There was a Nicolo that Wylder knew nothing about, a Nicolo whom nobody knew about but me. That Nicolo had been lost in the series of shocks that had racked him over the last twenty-four hours, but I was confident he could be unearthed again. There was good in Nicolo, if only I could get to it.

The trouble was that I was the only one likely to try, and I was also the last person Nicolo wanted to see. That was going to make this difficult, but I couldn't give up on him.

"Will you let me try?"

"To talk to him?" Wylder pulled a disbelieving face.

"To appeal to his better nature."

"You'll have to find it first."

"It's there. I've seen it. If I can just get him to listen to me, if I can get him to believe the truth, then I can save him and with him, the kingdom."

Wylder pursed his lips. "So, your plan hangs on finding the good in a man whose nickname is ‘The Unbreakable', then convincing said man that the person who came here to assassinate him is the only one telling him the truth?"

I shrugged. "I'm not saying it's the best plan, but it's all I've got."