The Born Queen - J. Gregory Keyes [187]
Cazio stepped in front of Austra.
“About all of that, I know nothing. You might be lying, you might be telling the truth. If I had to guess, I would say the first. It doesn’t matter.”
“He isn’t lying,” Austra murmured.
“What are you talking about?”
“Anne was trying to tell me something like that, even though I don’t think she knew herself what she was getting at. And I am linked to her; we walked the same faneway.”
“Listen to her,” Hespero said. “There’s not much time.”
Cazio looked down at Austra. “Do you trust him?”
“No,” she replied. “But what choice do we have?”
“Well, I’m not letting him have you,” Cazio replied. “He might kill you both.”
She closed her eyes and took his hands. “Cazio, if that’s what it takes…”
“No.”
“I don’t know why I spent any time talking to you at all,” Hespero said. Cazio saw that he had drawn a rapier.
“You remember that your weapon can’t hurt me, I trust.”
“Oh, we’ll find a way, Acredo and I,” Cazio said, taking up his guard.
Anne called lightning into him and for a moment thought it might actually be that easy. But the Jester grinned and regained his feet, and when she hurled another bolt at him, he twirled it around himself somehow and sent it back.
He laughed, just as he had laughed in the otherwhere she first had met him in.
What was so irritating was that she’d had him right under her nose—or at least the part of him that was Stephen. She could have killed him at any time, if only she’d understood, and this would never be happening. Worse, it had been her vision that sent him off to become—this.
How many of her other visions were false?
Well, there was still time to correct that mistake. She clapped her hands together and ripped him out of the world, into the sedos realm.
“A change of scene?” he said. “Very well, my queen.”
The sky raged with her will; the land was all moors of black heather.
“This is mine,” she told him. “All of it.”
“Greedy,” he said.
Her fury kindled deeper.
“I didn’t want it. I didn’t want any of this, but you all pushed me. The Faiths, you, my mother, Fastia, Artwair, Hespero—your threats and your promises. Always wanting something from me, always trying to take it by guile or trickery. No more. No more.”
She struck out then, filling the space between them with death of sixteen kinds, and with lovely glee she watched him falter. Yet still he kept smiling, as if he knew something she didn’t.
No more. She saw a seam in him and pulled him open like a book, spreading his pages before her.
“You dare call me greedy?” she said. “Look at what is in you. Look at what you’ve done.”
“Oh, I’ve been a bad boy, I’ll admit,” he said. “But the world was still here when I went to sleep. You’re going to be the end of it.”
“I’ll end you for certain,” she said. “You and anyone else who won’t—”
“Do what you say? Leave you alone? Wear the proper hat?”
“It’s mine,” Anne screamed at him. “I made this world. I’ve let you worms live on it for two thousand years. If I give you another bell, you should all beg me from your knees, kiss my feet, and sing me hymns. Who are you to tell me what to do with my world, little man?”
“There you are,” he said. “That’s what we’ve all been waiting for.”
She felt him bend his will toward her, and it was strong, much stronger then she had thought. Her lungs suddenly seized as if filled with sand, and the more she fought, the more the weight of him crushed her.
And still he smiled.
“Ah, little queen,” he murmured. “I think I shall eat you up.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
REQUIEM
NEIL FELL and rolled, desperately clinging to consciousness. He fumbled for the little knife in his boot, but the man kicked him in the ribs hard, flipping him onto his back.
“Stand him up,” he heard Robert say.
Rough hands lifted him and slapped him up against the wall of the house.
“That wasn’t a bad performance,” Robert said. “I had heard you were in worse shape.” He laughed. “Well, now I guess you are.”
Neil tried to focus on Robert’s face. The other fellow had his head turned; he seemed to be looking for something.
Neil spit on the