Shadow's Edge - Brent Weeks [126]
Garoth’s pulse pounded loud in his ears. He didn’t even care who might be watching. Whatever kind of madness this was, it was intoxicating.
She shimmied her hips and said something again.
“What?” he asked.
“Let go,” she said.
She seemed to have a tight grip with her legs, so he let go, ready to catch her with the vir if need be. He wasn’t going to let this end without taking his pleasure. Not now.
Magdalyn tugged her nightgown free from where it was trapped between their bodies and stripped it off. She dropped it over the edge, laughing again as the flimsy cloth spun toward the flagstones below.
Then she sat up and kissed Garoth again, pressing her young body against him. She stripped his robe back roughly. Then she burrowed into him, moaning as her skin touched his, warm against warm in the cold night air.
She nuzzled his neck. “I heard you talking about the Night Angel,” she said. “Kylar Stern.”
“Mmm.”
“I want you to know something,” she whispered into his ear, making him shiver. What the hell was she saying? “Kylar’s my brother. He’s coming for me, you dirty fucker, and if I don’t kill you, he will.”
She bit his carotid artery as hard as she could and tried to throw them both off the edge.
The vir reacted before Garoth could, exploding at his neck. The vir lashed from his limbs, flinging him inside even as Magdalyn Drake spun out into space.
He stood shakily and summoned Neph.
The Vürdmeister found him standing on the balcony, looking at the ruin of the young woman crushed in the courtyard below.
“Take care of her, Neph. Tell Trudana I expect the best,” the Godking said, greatly moved. “Hers was a great spirit.”
“Shall I…” The Lodricari coughed his fake cough and Garoth hated him anew. “Shall I send in another concubine?” He pointedly didn’t look toward the evidence of Garoth’s continued arousal.
“Yes,” Garoth said tersely. Curse you, Khali, yes.
“If you’ll excuse us, Count Drake,” Terah Graesin said. “I have need of your quarters.”
Count Drake limped out on his cane as several guards took up position outside the tent.
Kylar was still reeling. Terah Graesin knew Durzo. That meant he was supposed to know her, and he didn’t. If she knew Durzo, that meant she knew Durzo through his work. That meant she had hired him.
“So,” she said. “Logan’s alive. That’s… terrific.” Terah Graesin had a silky, low voice. It was reputed to be sexy, but then, everything about Terah Graesin was supposed to be sexy. Kylar didn’t see it. Oh, she was pretty. She had a wide mouth, full lips, and the kind of figure that was unattainable for the majority of noblewomen who spent their days doing nothing more strenuous than issuing orders to the servants. Maybe it was that she was a little too self-consciously good-looking. She wore lots of makeup—expertly applied and subtle, but lots—and had tweezed her eyebrows down to tiny lines. The truth was, she held herself like he ought to admire her, and it pissed him off.
What pissed him off more was that to look her in the eye with his disguise, he had to stare straight at her admittedly perky breasts. Dammit, why were breasts so intriguing?
“So who’s paying you to save Logan Gyre?” she asked.
“You don’t really expect me to answer that,” Kylar said. The only card he had to play was that Blint tended to be blunt and secretive. If she knew him, she’d know that much.
“Master Blint,” she said, seeming to come to a decision, but still speaking in that same consciously sexy voice, “you’re the only man I know who’s killed two kings. How much can I pay you to kill a third?”
“What?! You want me to kill the Godking?”
“No. Simply don’t save Logan Gyre. I’ll double whatever your employer is paying.”
“What?” Kylar asked. “Why? You need all the allies you can get right now. Logan would bring thousands to your banners.”
“The problem is… well, can you keep a secret, Durzo?” She smiled.
“Would you trust a murderer