Heirs of the Blade_ Shadows of the Apt_ Book Seven - Adiran Tchaikovsky [206]
Gaved’s face had screwed up in disbelief, but the other two Wasps silenced his protest. It was not that Thalric and Varmen were nodding along with what had been said, exactly, but they were not exactly jumping in with objections, either.
‘Nonsense,’ snapped Gaved at last. ‘Come on, there’s nothing like that in the world.’
‘Don’t look at me. Nothing to do with me,’ said Varmen, shrugging easily. ‘The girl thinks it means something. None of my business.’ He gave a smile at Maure, who returned it.
‘Thalric,’ Gaved prompted, ‘you’re piss-damned Rekef, or you were. You must know this is nonsense.’
Che met Thalric’s gaze, wondering if he was revisiting their shared adventure beneath Khanaphes, or perhaps thinking about the Wasp Empress’s secret practices. He did not believe, she knew, but even so . . .
‘I cannot say for sure that these things are fictions,’ he pronounced at last. ‘I cannot explain so many of the things I myself have seen. I don’t say there’s no natural explanation, only that I cannot explain them. I think I’m better off not knowing the truth. I leave that for those better qualified.’ He nodded at Che. ‘But to suggest that Tynisa Maker is a dangerous lunatic, well, no great change there. I have few fond memories of her, even from before this supposed change overtook her. To bring her here is to invite disaster.’
‘Maure and I will ensure that she does no harm.’
‘Absolutely not. Not under my roof. You’re not risking me and mine,’ Gaved snapped. ‘You can go back to the cursed Lowlands and get on with your bloody business there . . .’ He tailed off, because Sef had put a hand on his arm.
‘There are ghosts,’ she said. ‘I have seen them in the deep water, and I have seen them here.’
Gaved bared his teeth at her, but that simple laying of a hand on his arm had drained the anger out of him.
‘Tell me this,’ Che put in, ‘when you saw her last, did she not remind you of Tisamon?’
The Wasp looked at her blankly for a moment, as if reluctant to admit it, but then he nodded. ‘Perhaps, a little. But there are reasons . . .’
‘Of course, there always are,’ Che confirmed.
‘We will go to Prince Lowre Cean,’ Sef declared confidently. ‘He cares about the Maker girl enough, so he will understand. He will believe.’
‘Abandon our own house?’ Gaved demanded.
‘It is a house. It will still be here after they are all gone,’ Sef explained reasonably. ‘And you must all come, all of you.’ Her gesture took in the three Wasps.
‘Now hold on—’ started Thalric, but Che cut him off.
‘She’s right, best that you’re not here. As you said, you and Tynisa have a good deal of history, and besides, Wasp-kinden are not what we need to confront her with. It would be too good an excuse for her to give in to temptation and draw her sword.’
‘Not that she ever needed much of an excuse,’ Thalric recalled sourly.
‘Quite,’ Che agreed. ‘Thalric, please.’
Thalric nodded tiredly. ‘When she saw the two of us off in Collegium, setting off for Tharn during the war, she was ready to swear all manner of oaths that she would come and kill me if anything happened to you, Che.’
She eyed him wordlessly, but with a single nod.
‘Then I swear this: if she harms you – whether in her madness or her sanity – then I will hunt her down, you understand? If she so much as draws a bead of your blood, then I will see her die in flames.’ He was abruptly once more the merciless spymaster, the killer of children, the fatal hand of the Empire, and it was for her, for Che alone, that he would become such a thing again. The feeling of power, having him on her side, shocked her.
‘She won’t hurt me,’ Che did her best to assure him.
His expression held no confidence in that, and his threat, his promise, still hung in the air as Varmen said, ‘Well, then, who’s this fellow we’re to impose ourselves on? Prince Lousy, was it, you said?’
‘Lowre Cean,’ Gaved said quietly.