• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 2851 0

are so fiercely loyal to the code of their password. What plans did Valère have for her younger sons? I could not say; did not know aught of the lads, who had been shielded from our presence here. Loyalty, or ambition? Ysandre was the first member of her House, insofar as I knew, to place the good of the realm above her family . . . but Ysandre, I thought, was a rare being by anyone's terms. I missed her, then; missed her terribly. Cool and calculating she might be, ruled by her intellect, but in her own way, she honored the precept of Blessed Elua to its fullest. Love as thou wilt. When it came to it, my icy and precise Queen was willing to stake her life on love. I remembered how she had ridden through the ranks of de Somerville's army, parting them like blades of grass bowing before the wind. And I remembered how she and Drustan mab Necthana had danced together at the fête where we had been honored, their eyes only for each other, smiling, evincing a love so profound it seemed a trespass to behold it.

I'd seen that look in the Mahrkagir's eyes.

I wondered if Joscelin and I would ever look at each other that way again.

And I wondered, deeply, if Valère L'Envers had acted of her own accord, or if she had orders from her father. Lord Amaury Trente had sent word from Menekhet. If Duc Barquiel had learned of it, there would have been time, during the months we spent in Drujan, for him to send orders to Valère. I'll not pretend I'd be sorry to hear of the child's demise, he had said to me. Would he contrive it? He had ambitions of

his own, and grandsons to fulfill them. He might. And if he did, Imriel was in danger, no less in the City of Elua than Nineveh.

Iwant to stay with you, Imriel had said. The memory tore at my heart. How much had it cost him to trust Joscelin and me? I wished we could stay with him. Ah, Elua! I trusted Amaury Trente to see him safe, but Imri scarce knew him. He would feel hurt and betrayed, and in truth, I would sooner see him under the protection of Joscelin's sword. Would that we could keep him forever from harm. I wished I were returning home to Terre d'Ange, and not bound for Jebe-Barkal. I could not even make him a promise that we would return. It seemed such a long way, such a very long way.

But I had other promises to keep, and there were fates worse than death.

Hyacinthe.

SIXTY-TWO

NOTHING HAPPENED that night, nor in the nights that followed, though Joscelin and I traded shifts and remained awake throughout, weary and ragged. My warning, it seemed, had been taken to heart and a one-armed Cassiline was still a sufficient deterrent.

Sinaddan, I thought, must not know. If he did, Valère would not need to rely on stealth—it would have been easy enough, in Nineveh, to kill or poison the lot of us. No, this was a private matter, and not one sanctioned by the Lugal of Khebbel-im-Akkad, who would have been displeased to find Terre d'Ange's most famous courtesan and her consort dead within his walls, along with the rescued prince.

I was glad of that, at least, and glad that Joscelin and Imriel's search had turned up no scratch-marked suspects among Lord Amaury's men. It didn't guarantee there was no danger from that quarter, but it made it less likely.

All told, we remained another week in Nineveh, and it felt like an eternity. There were private fêtes and a public ceremony, all very glorious. Prince Sinaddan heaped an embarrassment of gifts upon us—rare spices, gold jewelry worked in the elegant, flowing lines of the Akkadian style, intricate woven carpets. To Imriel, he presented a curved dagger with a gilded hilt in the shape of a ram's head. Imriel thanked him in zenyan-accented Akkadian, a ten-year-old courtier, his expression giving nothing away.

With no other skills at my disposal, I had begun teaching him the arts of covertcy such as my lord Delaunay had taught me when I was a child: how to observe, how to read expression, tone and posture, how to listen for the unspoken; how to make oneself unobtrusive, and when to watch for what people will reveal when they think themselves