9. Serak

SERAK

I t was Solstice Eve, and the castle was in an uproar, as it had been all day. A holiday feast would always mean a more frantic air, but the furor wasn’t due to that alone.

That morning, the king’s guards had rounded up everyone in the castle, all the servants and every visitor, and escorted us to the Great Hall, where we were asked to wait. Then, one by one, we’d been taken to a smaller room for questioning, like common criminals.

I’d been intrigued. The others in my group were incensed. Not only had one of their countrymen been murdered days before—though no one would truly miss Duke Lukenza, who I thought had been sent out of Mirren in hopes of him meeting a sudden end, as it was rumored he’d attacked more than one young woman in his own country. But now—from what I’d gathered from the guards who spoke in their Rimholtian sign language, erroneously believing none of our group understood it—we were all to be questioned about a theft from the royal treasury. The talks between our nations, even with Lady Cilla being the favorite daughter-in-law of the southern province’s fierce queen, would never bear fruit.

At first, I’d been slightly worried that the deaths of the four men I’d killed had been traced back to me somehow. But I was armed with blades, poisons, and a solid alibi, and soon enough, rumors made their way through the crowd that the theft was rumored to be of gemstones. A significant number of them, but nothing irreplaceable.

The uproar might afford me the opportunity I needed to get more information about the whereabouts of the obsidian dagger. In a city as small as Turino, there were only so many people who might be able to afford to purchase such an item, or have the desire to. In fact, almost all of those with the funds to buy it were in the castle with me now. I moved from group to group, commiserating with the other guests, and keeping a sharp eye out for anyone bearing the blade. But no one had it, though a few had visited the jeweler in the past weeks.

I had to stay vigilant. Perhaps someone would gift it to someone else on the Solstice. Then I would steal it back, and return to my home.

If not… If everyone returned to their home countries, and I failed to find it…

A high-pitched “Oh no!” came from the corner of the room, where the children of the castle stood around a table that held a marble checkered board covered with small, round wooden game pieces, etched with symbols.

The Rimholtian children had only just learned a new variation of the Mirrenese game of strategy, and the young prince, Dashiell, stared with concern down at his pieces. His opponent was a younger girl, the daughter of a Verdanian diplomat, whose lower lip trembled. She was one move away from losing entirely, and I could tell Dashiell was torn between winning the game, or skipping the move and allowing her to keep trying.

“How are you so good at this?” she asked, pouting. “I thought boys were supposed to let girls win.”

“My girlfriend made me swear never to give less than my best at any game. Or battle.”

“Battle?”

“Yes. She’s the most talented, bloodthirsty, magical woman on this earth. She could kill half the people in this room, and none of the others would even suspect she’d done it.”

The girl’s nose wrinkled. “She sounds horrible!”

Dashiell bristled, and made another move, sweeping four of the girl’s tokens off the board, leaving only her unprotected king piece and a few vassals. “She’s perfect. She’s a queen.”

“She can’t be,” the girl snapped. “There’s only one queen in Rimholt.”

“Will be once I’m king,” Dashiell muttered. “Do you forfeit?”

I closed my eyes for a moment, understanding dawning. This was the boyfriend. This was… Wait. This child had purchased the dagger? How? I took in his clothing. His boots weren’t tall enough to hide it, and he didn’t have a cloak. He must not have it on him.

“Fine, I forfeit!” the girl burst out, and Dashiell sighed, reaching across the board to turn over the king.

That’s when I saw it. The dagger that I was looking for, the hilt of it revealed at the base of the prince’s spine when he leaned across the board. Before I could move closer, a shout came from the opposite end of the hall, one of the noblemen complaining about the questioning, and trying to exit the room.

The guards assigned to watch the children were distracted, one of them leaving his post to stand between the children and the shouting, and taking his eyes off his charges.

That was when another nobleman made his move. He’d been standing next to the wall, but darted forward, aiming a sword at one of the children. I wasn’t certain who was the target, but Dashiell had stood and was turning, and the sword slicing through the air was suddenly far too close to his neck.

My hand shot out before I could think, and I grabbed the man’s wrist, twisting hard.

Everything happened at once. The sword fell to the floor, followed by the attacker. I twisted my hips so I was on top of him, then pulled his arms behind his back, hearing a satisfying crunch as a bone broke. One of his shoulders looked dislocated when I was done, and he screamed so loud my ears rang, but he was immobile.

Within seconds, the king’s guards were there, grabbing the man as I released him, but a flash of dark fabric from one of the walls caught my eye. A dark-haired girl—one of the princesses, I thought—had the man’s sword in her hand in a flash, holding it away from her body.

“Careful. It could be poisoned,” I warned.

“I hope so,” the girl said with an eerie smile before she unwrapped the shawl from her neck, wrapping the blade inside it. “I’ll take care of it.” I must have blinked, because she was gone in the next instant.

“Traitor!” the nobleman—who I recognized now as a merchant who’d been a drinking companion of Duke Lukenza—hissed at me as the guards dragged him away.

“Th-thank you, sir.” I glanced down at Dashiell, who was on his feet as well now, holding the marble board between us and the rest of the frightened children, his wide eyes on mine. But before I could answer, I was being dragged away as well, in the same direction as the attacker.

Shit.

In less than five minutes, I was in a dungeon, in the cell next to a now-unconscious merchant who could probably count the hours remaining in his life on one hand, if he was fortunate.For all I knew, my fate might be the same. I paced, wondering whether the king was going to punish all of the Mirrenese retinue for the assassination attempt. At the very least, they would torture a few of us, to get more information.

Eventually, two burly guards returned and escorted me to another room. It was a smaller dungeon, the far wall decorated with most of the instruments of torture I knew about, and a few whose purposes I wasn’t sure of. I steeled myself for pain, the only thing I was certain I’d find here.

Instead, I discovered something far more terrifying. Though the room was unlit—no candles or torches at all, only narrow windows along the ceiling that allowed in faint sunlight—it was not close to empty.

A small table had been set up along one wall, with a crystal decanter of what looked like whiskey, two glasses, and a white linen cloth on top. There were also two rough, wooden chairs, one of them occupied by the very last person I wanted to be alone with. In this country, at least.

General Vilkurn held a book with a cracked leather cover, and wore a curious, malevolent smile on his lips that dropped as he motioned me forward.I’d never seen him smile. I never wanted to again.

“Well, well, Pict. I never saw this coming.” He waved a finger at the guards, who retreated quietly. My eyes never leaving him, I moved slowly to the chair opposite his, and sat.

“Never saw me in your dungeon?”

He smirked. “No. I fully assumed you’d end up here. But I never thought I’d be serving you a drink.” He put down the book and poured two glasses of whiskey, then handed me one. I drank after he did, uncertain if the precaution would make any difference. A Master Spy would have built up a tolerance for many common poisons.

His dark eyes bored into me for a long moment before he pushed the book toward me. I glanced down, reading the title, and was glad I was sitting, as the blood rushed to my head. “Where did you?—”

“Where did I get one of your order’s holy texts?” He traced a finger along the handwritten title, Servants of the Fire . It was written in Pict, but he spoke the title in his own language.

Oh, fuck. I felt the blood drain from my face. “My order? What do you?—”

“Don’t insult me, boy. You live because you saved my son, then warned my daughter of the poison on the blade. You stay alive if you can promise me that you intend no harm to any of my family.” I opened my mouth to answer, but he went on. “Or to my protégée, Rada.”

Rada. He knew her name. Of course he did. What else did he know?

“You cannot think I would allow you inside my home without learning everything I could about you?” One eyebrow crooked upward. “The first time I saw you, years ago at court, I began digging. Lost more than one of my men finding out what I needed to know, in case you ever found your way back here.

“And when I saw that you recognized the daughter of my heart all those years ago, I knew you would return.” He sipped his drink. “Of course, I’ve had eyes on your border since I first met my young apprentice, ten years ago. I knew when you returned to Mirren. I just wasn’t certain why you did, until you showed back up in my court.” He hummed darkly. “I didn’t know if I’d let you get this close. General Axe argued to be allowed to behead you a dozen times, when he learned you were returning to court.”

I shivered unconsciously. The consort he spoke of was the royal executioner, a massive, mute warrior who wore an aura of power along with his well-used ax.

Vilkurn leaned forward. “I almost had an archer loose a stray arrow in your direction as you rode through Turino three months back.”

I didn’t speak. I couldn’t. I was forbidden by my order, and knew better than to pretend in front of this man. Lying wouldn’t save me.

“There is an old saying about keeping your enemies close. But the true enemy is ignorance. I dug into your past, learned everything about you. One month ago, I planned every detail of your death and disappearance. I was only waiting for the moment when Ratter took matters into her own hands.” He almost smiled again. I shivered. “Impetuous brat.”

I swallowed, wondering where he was going with this.

“But when I learned it was you who killed the Mirrenese idiots who dared to insult her, I became intrigued.” His eyes narrowed. “What reason would one of the servants of the Lord of Fire have to protect the girl he was sent to kill?”

I tried not to react, but his attention was fixed on me, and I knew I’d betrayed myself somehow. Shit. My nostrils had flared.

He hissed. “No. Not sent to kill. To retrieve?” I allowed my muscles to release, and he nodded, thinking he’d guessed correctly. “But you did not retrieve her. In fact, you allowed her to poison you, then protected her from the shadows. You know I am sending her away.”

“You cannot hide her from her god.” I didn’t bother telling him that was exactly what I was trying to do.

“I can delay the inevitable meeting,” he said, and stood. “And I can kill you if I must. But instead, I will take your vow.” His lip twitched. “I hear your kind are keen on blood oaths.”He held out a hand that I would have sworn was empty, but now held a narrow, almost needle-thin dagger. The next words he spoke in my language, and though his accent was atrocious, his grammar was perfect. “Swear on the Lord of Fire that you will not try to take Rada back to His seat. Back to… the maw, or the island that holds it. Back to the Alldyns Vug. If you do this, I will not lift a hand to you, nor share any of my knowledge of you.”

“Not even with her.” I swayed on my feet as I stood, whispering, “You cannot tell a soul in this world.” When he began to nod, I shook my head. “Not her, not the king. Not your Omega. You cannot even speak it aloud to yourself, not by the light of even one…” I couldn’t say any more, and swallowed reflexively.

“Of even one candle,” he finished for me, and I realized that he somehow knew one of my order’s deepest secrets. “There is no flame here.” He cut the palm of his hand, the red welling up along the blade. “I understand, and do so swear.”

I held out my hand and made the oath he’d required.

I felt no guilt when he allowed me to go. None at leaving the merchant to his grisly fate, and none that the oath he’d required had not been the one he should have asked for.

And not a single speck of remorse when I snuck into the crown prince’s room later on to take the dagger back.