Shadow's Edge - Brent Weeks [59]
Suddenly, among all the big questions about Durzo, about Kylar’s powers, about the Godking and what he knew or thought he knew, Kylar just saw a man sweating on a table, a man who’d lost his teeth and his good looks for Kylar, a man who’d been tortured and made an addict, who’d been compelled to try to kill Kylar and had fought against it with everything he had. He’d done all that for a man he didn’t even know.
So Kylar didn’t ask about the Society, or magic, or what Aristarchos could do for him. That could come later, if they both lived until later. “Aristarchos,” he said, “what is a shalakroi?”
The man was taken off guard. “I—it’s a little below a Midcyri duke, but it’s not an inherited position. I scored better than ten thousand other students on the Civil Service examinations. Only a hundred scored higher in all Ladesh. I ruled an area roughly the size of Cenaria.”
“The city?”
Aristarchos smiled through his sweat and clenched muscles. “The country.”
“It’s an honor to meet you, Aristarchos ban Ebron, shalakroi of Benyurien.”
“The honor is mine, Kylar ban Durzo. Please, will you kill me?”
Kylar turned his back on the man.
Pride and hope whooshed out of Aristarchos with his breath. He slumped in the bed, suddenly small. “This is no kindness, my lord.” He convulsed again, and strained against the leather bonds. His veins bulged on his forehead and his emaciated arms. “Please!” he said as the convulsion passed. “Please, if you won’t kill me, will you give me my box? Just one seed? Please?”
Kylar left. He took the box and burned it. Aside from a poisoned-needle trap, it was empty.
20
Your Holiness, our assassin is dead,” Neph Dada said as he stepped onto the Godking’s balcony. “I apologize to report this failure, though I do wish to point out that I recommended—”
“He didn’t fail,” Garoth Ursuul said, not turning from his view of the city.
Neph opened his mouth, remembered to whom he was speaking, and closed it. He hunched a little lower.
“I gave him a task he could thwart so that he might accomplish the one I desired,” the Godking said. Still staring over the city, he massaged his temples. “He found Kylar Stern. Our ka’karifer is in Caernarvon.”
He picked a note from his pocket. “Transmit this message to our agent there to give to Vi Sovari. She should be arriving any day.”
Neph blinked convulsively. He’d thought he knew everything the Godking was doing. He’d thought that his own mastery of the vir was within a hairsbreadth of the Godking’s, and now, blithely, the man had given him this. It set Neph’s ambitions back months. Months! How he hated the man. Garoth could track exact locations magically? Neph had never heard of such a thing. What did it mean? Did Garoth know about the camp at Black Barrow? Neph’s meisters had been abducting villagers for his experiments, but it was so far away, Neph had been so careful. No, it couldn’t be that.
But the Godking was giving him notice. He was telling Neph that he had his eye on him, that he had his eye on everything, that he would always know more than he told even Neph, that his powers would always be beyond what Neph expected. As the Godking’s warnings went, it was gentle.
“Is there something else?” the Godking asked.
“No, Your Holiness,” Neph said. He managed to keep his voice perfectly calm.
“Then begone.”
Despite all the reasons he had to be grumpy, when Elene was in a good mood, it was hard not to be happy. After a quick breakfast and a cup of ootai to stave off weariness, Kylar found himself wandering the streets with her, hand in hand. She was wearing a cream-colored