Chapter 36
Isana awoke to pain and a sense of smothering confinement. Dull fire burned in her side. She struggled, pushing against something soft that held her close, and only after several seconds of flailing was she able to escape it. It took long seconds after that for her to come to her senses and realize that she was in a bed, upon a lumpy mattress, in a darkened room.
"Lights," murmured a male voice, and a pink-tinted furylamp on a battered card table against one wall came up to low, sullen life.
Isana began to sit up, but the pain flashed into a blaze of agony and she subsided, settling for twisting her neck until her eyes fell upon the form of the assassin sitting in a chair in front of the door. She stared at the middle-aged man for a silent moment, and he returned her look with veiled eyes that somehow made her feel off-balance. It took her a moment to realize that it was because she had no emotional sense of him whatsoever. Her skills as a watercrafter cursed her with the constant empathy that came with them-but from him she felt an utter void of emotions. It took her a moment to realize that he was concealing his emotions from her, and doing it better than even Tavi had ever managed.
Isana stared at the man, at his expression, his eyes, searching for some clue about his emotions, his intentions. But there was nothing. He might have been made from cold, featureless stone.
"Well," she spat. "Why don't you go ahead and finish the job?"
"Which job is that?" he responded. His voice was mild, and matched his unremarkable appearance admirably.
"You killed them," she said quietly. "The coachmen. Nedus. You killed Serai."
His eyes flickered with something, and there was a very brief sense of regret from him. "No," he said quietly. "But I did kill the archer who shot Serai. And you, for that matter."
Isana looked down to find herself clothed only in the silk shift she'd worn beneath her gown. It was stained with blood where she had been wounded and had been sliced open along the side to make room for someone, presumably the assassin, to clean and bind her wounds. Isana closed her eyes, touching upon Rill to feel her way through her body to the injury. It could have been a great deal worse. The arrow had ruptured flesh and fat and injured muscles, but it hadn't broken through into her vitals. The man had done a competent job of removing the arrow, cleaning the wound, and stopping the bleeding.
Isana opened her eyes, and asked, "Why should I believe you?"
"Because it's the truth," he said. "By the time I found the archer it was too late to help Serai. I regret that."
"Do you," Isana said, her voice flat.
Fidelias arched an eyebrow. "Yes, actually. She was someone I respected, and her death served no purpose. I hit him just as he loosed at you, Steadholder."
"Which saved my life?" Isana asked. "I suppose now I should feel grateful to you for rescuing me from my would-be killer."
"I think you'd rather send me to join him," Fidelias said. "Especially given what happened in Calderon two years ago."
"You mean when you tried to murder my family, my holders, and my neighbors."
"I was doing a job," Fidelias said. "I did what I had to do to complete it. I took no joy in that."
Isana could sense the man's apparent sincerity, but it only made her anger sharper, more clear. "You got more joy of it than the folk of Aldoholt. More than Warner and his sons. More than all the men and women who died at Garrison."
"True enough," Fidelias agreed.
"Why?" Isana demanded. "Why did you do it?"
He folded his arms over his chest and mused for a moment. "Because I believe that Gaius's policies and decisions over the past decade or so are leading our Realm to disaster. If he remains as First Lord or dies without a strong heir, it will only be a matter of time before the strongest High Lords attempt to seize power. That kind of civil war would destroy us."
"Ah," Isana said. "To save the people of Alera, you must kill them."
He gave her a wintry smile. "You could put it that way. I support the High Lord I regard as the most likely to provide leadership for the Realm. I don't always agree with his plans and methods. But yet I deem them less damaging to the Realm in the long term."
"It must be nice to have so much wisdom and confidence."
Fidelias shrugged. "Each of us can only do as he sees best. Which brings us to you, Steadholder."
Isana lifted her chin, and waited.
"My employer would like you to pledge your public support to his house."
Isana let out a pained laugh. "You can't be serious."
"On the contrary," Fidelias said. "You should consider the advantages such an alliance would bring you."
"Never," Isana said. "I would never betray the Realm as you have."
Fidelias arched an eyebrow. "Exactly which part of the Realm is it you feel deserves such loyalty?" he asked. "Is it Gaius? The man who made you and your brother into symbols of his own power and made you targets of all of his enemies? The man who holds your nephew virtually hostage in the capital as a guarantee of your loyalty?"
She stared at him, and said nothing.
"I know you've come here to seek his help in something. And I know that you have had no luck in making contact with him-and that he has clearly made no effort at all to protect you from harm, despite the danger he placed you in by inviting you here. If not for the intervention of my employer, you would now be dead beside Nedus and Serai."
"That changes nothing," she said quietly.
"Doesn't it?" Fidelias said. "What has he done, Steadholder? What action has Gaius ever taken to command your loyalty and respect?"
She did not answer him.
After another silent moment, he said, "My employer would like you to meet with his second-in-command."
"Do I have a choice?" Isana spat.
"Of course," Fidelias said. "You are not a prisoner here, Steadholder. You are free to leave at any time you wish." He shrugged. "You need not meet with my employer, either. The room is paid for until sunrise, at which point you will need to either leave or make your own arrangements with the mistress of the house."
Isana stared at him for a moment, eyebrows lifted. "I... see."
"I assumed you would wish to care for your injury, so I've taken the liberty of having the house prepare a bath for you." He nodded toward a broad copper tub on the floor beside the fireplace. A heavy kettle bubbled on a hook over the fire. "Steadholder, you're free to do as you wish. But I would ask you to give serious consideration to the meeting. It might present you with some options you don't currently have."
Isana frowned at the tub, then at Fidelias.
"Do you need help getting to the tub, Steadholder?" he asked.
"Not from you, sir."
He smiled faintly, rose, and gave her a small bow of his head. "There is a change of clothes for you in the trunk beside the bed. I will be in the hall. You should be safe here, but if you become at all suspicious of an intruder, call me at once."
Isana arched a brow. "Be assured, sir," she said, "that if I feel myself in danger, you will certainly weigh heavily in my thoughts."
The faint smile warmed to something almost genuine for a moment. Then he bowed and left the room.
Isana grimaced down at her wounded flank and pushed herself heavily upright on the bed. She closed her eyes against a wave of pain and waited for it to recede. Then she rose, slowly and carefully, and walked deliberately across the room, one step at a time. She pushed the bolt on the door to, and only then did she make her way to the copper tub. The kettle on the fire was mercifully mounted on a swinging arm, and Isana swung it slowly out over the tub and poured from the kettle until the bathwater was comfortably warm. Then she slid the stained slip from her shoulder, loosened the bandages about her waist, and made her way painfully into the tub.
She felt Rill's presence at once, closing about her in a gentle cloud of concern and affection. Isana cleared the injury of bandages and directed Rill to her flank, carefully willing the fury through the process of repairing the injury. There was burning pain at first, then a tingling numbness as the fury went to work, and after several moments of concentration Isana sank back into the tub with a languid weariness. The pain was all but gone, though she still felt stiff and brittle. The water had been stained with blood, but the skin that now covered the wound was pink and new as a baby's. She added a little more hot water from the kettle and sank into the tub.
Nedus was dead.
Serai was dead.
They had died trying to protect her.
And she was now alone, far from any friends, any family, anyone she could trust.
No, not far from any family. Tavi was in the city, somewhere. But he was, it would seem, beyond her reach, as had been everyone else since she arrived. Even if her letters had found him, they would only have directed him to Nedus's house.
Oh furies. If he had been at Nedus's house, if he had come in response to her letter, if he had been there waiting when the assassins had taken position...
And Bernard. She had a horrible intuition that he was facing danger enough to kill him and his entire command, and yet she still had not reached the First Lord with word of the danger. For all the good she had done her brother and her nephew, she might as well have died in the barn when the first assassin had attacked her.
Isana closed her eyes and pressed the heels of her hands against them. The fear, the worry, the wrenching hopelessness of her futile efforts overwhelmed her, and she found herself curling up in the tub, arms around her knees as she wept.
When Isana lifted her head again, the water in the tub had become tepid. Her eyes felt heavy and sore from weeping.
Her purpose, she realized, had not changed since coming to the capital. She had to secure help for those she loved.
By whatever means necessary.
As soon as she was dressed, she unbolted the door and opened it. Fidelias-assassin, traitor, murderer, and servant to a ruthless lord-waited politely in the hallway. He turned to her with an inquiring expression.
She faced him, chin lifted, and said, "Take me to the meeting. At once."
Chapter 37
Ambassador Varg fled through the tunnels of the Deeps, and Tavi followed.
For the first hundred steps, Tavi had been frantic with fear. Without weapons, position, something he could use to his advantage, Varg would tear him to pieces, and so actually catching up to the Cane would be suicide. And yet, Varg still carried Kitai. How could Tavi do anything else?
But then another thought occurred to him. Even carrying his prisoner, Varg could have outpaced Tavi on foot without more than moderate effort. Canim battlepacks could often outmarch even the Legions in the field, unless the Alerans countered their natural speed by using the roads to lend speed and endurance to their troops. And yet, while Varg fled at great speed, it never quite pulled away from Tavi. The young man actually slowed his steps for a time, but Varg's lead did not lengthen.
Suspicion came over him, and his brain started chewing furiously over the facts. As Tavi pelted along the tunnels, he used his knife to strike the stone walls at each intersection, drawing small bursts of sparks and leaving the stone of the tunnels clearly marked. He knew the tunnels near the Citadel well, but Varg swiftly descended through a gallery Tavi had never explored and began working his way deeper into the mountain, to the tunnels that connected to the city below, the walls growing slick with moisture the lower they went.
Tavi rounded a final corner, to find the tunnel opening up into a long and slender chamber. He slid to a halt, lantern in hand, only to feel a sudden impact on the lantern that tore it from his hands and extinguished the candle in it.
Tavi got his back to the nearest wall and gripped his knife tightly, while struggling to keep his labored breathing quiet enough to allow him to hear. There was a quiet, steady trickling of water, where runoff from above the mountain escaped cisterns and flowed into the subterranean channels beneath the mountain's skin. After a long moment, he made out a dim red glow, the same as from one of the barely visible Canim lamps in Varg's chambers. Over another moment or two, his eyes adjusted, until he could make out the silent, enormous form of Ambassador Varg, crouched a dozen yards in front of Tavi, one hand holding Kitai's back to its front by the waist, the other pressing black claws against her throat.
The Marat girl looked more angry than frightened, a fierce glitter in her green eyes, and her expression was proud and cold. But she did not struggle against the vastly more powerful Cane.
Varg stared at Tavi, its eyes hidden in the shadows of its muzzle and fur. Varg lifted black lips from his fangs.
"I'm here," Tavi said, very quietly. "What do you want me to see?"
Varg's tongue lolled over its fangs for a moment in what looked like a pleased grin. "Why do you think that, pup?"
"You don't need something this complicated to kill me. You could have done it already, without bothering to lead me somewhere first. So I figure you wanted to show me something. That's why you took Kitai."
"And if it is?" Varg growled.
"You wasted your time. You didn't have to do this to get me here."
"No?" Varg asked. "Sooth, pup, would you have followed me deep into these tunnels simply because I asked it of you?" The Cane's white teeth showed. "Would you have walked this far from any help with me, given any choice?"
"Good point," Tavi said. "But I'm here now. Release her."
A bone-rattling deep growl rolled up from Varg's chest.
"Release her, Ambassador," Tavi said, and kept his tone even and uninflected. "Please."
Varg stared for a moment more, then nodded and released Kitai with a little shove. She stumbled away from the Cane and to Tavi's side.
"You all right?" Tavi asked her.
She seized her knife from where he had thrust it through his belt and turned around to face the Cane with murder in her eyes.
"Wait," Tavi told her, and clasped his hand down over her shoulder. "Not yet."
Varg let out a coughing, snarling laugh. "Ferocious, your mate."
Tavi blinked, then said, "She is not my mate."
At the same time, Kitai said, "He is not my mate."
Tavi glanced at Kitai, cheeks flushing, while she favored him with an acidic look.
Varg barked another laugh. "Plenty of fight in both of you. I can respect that."
Tavi frowned. "I assume you are the one who broke my lantern."
Varg made a guttural, affirmative sound.
"Why?"
"The light," Varg said. "Too bright. They would see it."
Tavi frowned. "Who would?"
"We put our fangs away for now," Varg said, white teeth still gleaming. "Truce. And then I will show you."
Tavi nodded sharply and without any hesitation. He sheathed his knife, and said, "Kitai, please put it away for the moment."
Kitai glanced at him, wary, but slipped her knife back into its own sheath. Varg's stance changed to something more relaxed, and it let its lips fall over its teeth. "This way."
Varg stooped to pick up the Cane lamp, a small affair of glass that looked like a bottle full of liquid embers only moments from dying. As it did, Tavi took note of the fact that Varg now wore the armor he'd seen on the mounting dummy in the Black Hall, and wore its enormous sword on its belt. Varg set the bottle on the floor next to an irregular opening in the cavern wall, and growled, "No light past here. We crawl. Stay to the left-side wall. Look down and to your right."
Then he dropped to all fours and wriggled his long, lean frame through the opening and into whatever lay beyond.
Tavi and Kitai exchanged glances. "What is that creature?" she asked him.
"A Cane," Tavi said. "They live across the sea to the west of Alera."
"Friend or enemy?"
"Their nation is very much an enemy."
Kitai shook her head. "And this enemy lives in the heart of your headman's fortress. How stupid are you people?"
"His nation may be hostile," he murmured, "but I'm starting to wonder about Varg. Wait here. I'll feel better if someone is watching my back while I'm in there with him."
Kitai frowned at him. "Are you sure you should go?"
Varg's growl bubbled out of the opening in the wall.
"Um. Yes. I think I'm sure. Maybe," Tavi muttered. He dropped down into the opening, which led to a very low passage and started forward before he could think too much about what he was doing. Had he tried, he could have crawled forward with his knees on the floor and his back brushing the rough spots in the ceiling.
Within a few feet, the cave became completely black, and Tavi had to force himself to keep going, his left shoulder pressed against the wall on that side. Varg let out another, almost inaudible growl in front of him, and Tavi tried to hurry, until Varg's feral scent and the odor of iron filled his nose. They went on that way for a time, while Tavi counted his "steps," each time he moved and planted his right hand. The sound of falling water grew louder as they proceeded. At seventy-four steps, Tavi's eyes made out a faint shape in front of him-Varg's furry form. Ten steps beyond that, he saw pale, green-white light ahead of him.
And then the wall on his right fell away, and the low tunnel they were in became a dangerously narrow shelf at the back of a gallery of damp, living stone. The Cane rose to a low hunting crouch, glanced at Tavi, and jerked its muzzle at the cavern beneath them. Tavi drew himself up beside Varg, instinctively keeping every move silent.
The cavern was enormous. Water dripped steadily down from hundreds of stalactites above, some of them longer than the outer walls of the citadel were tall. Their floor-level counterparts rose in irregular cones, many of them even longer than those above. A stream spilled out of a wall on the far side of the gallery, fell several feet into a churning pool, and rushed on down a short channel and beneath the back wall, continuing down toward the river Gaul. Tavi stared at the scene illuminated in green-white light, and his mouth dropped open in sickened horror.
Because every surface in the cavern was covered in the croach.
It had to be. It was exactly the same as he had seen in the Wax Forest two years before. It did not look as thick as the wax that had covered that alien bowl of a valley, but it gave off the same pulsing, white-green glow. Tavi saw half a dozen wax spiders gliding with sluggish grace over the croach, pausing here and there, their luminous eyes glowing in shades of green, soft orange, and pale blue.
Tavi stared down at them for a moment, too shocked to do anything more. Then his eyes picked out an area where the croach had grown up into a kind of enormous, lumpy blister that covered several of the largest stalagmites. The surface of the blister pulsed with swirling green lights and was translucent enough to reveal shadows moving within it.