Legends of Ahn (King's Dark Tidings Book 3) Read online

  “Maybe I should just wait here,” she said.

  “You will come with me,” he said, dashing that hope. “Neither of these men is Brendish, and we cannot know for sure that these are the only two he had with him. By now they may be aware of your presence. You are safer with me.”

  At least that made sense, she thought. Ilanet supposed she should be glad he had offered an explanation at all. Although at times the stranger seemed high-handed, his explanations for his actions always provided good reasons for being so. The man strapped his swords across his back but left his hood hanging. After situating his belongings in his pack, he picked it up and motioned for her to follow. The curtains swayed in the window as they approached the house, and the stranger did not wait for permission to enter. Urmel and Rella were in the kitchen. Both stepped back with fearful expressions, and Ilanet could understand their distress. The ragged traveler they knew as Roy was no longer the bumbling, self-conscious boy. This man dominated the room with a stern bearing and sharp gaze.

  “Gather everyone in the parlor,” he said.

  Rella seemed eager to leave his presence as she pushed Urmel toward the doorway. Ilanet stepped quietly as she followed the stranger through the house. Somehow, he did not make a sound, an oddity that she now remembered from their castle escape but had forgotten. When they arrived in the parlor, Urmel and Rella were standing pensively behind the settee, a woman Ilanet had not met stood by the hearth gripping the fire poker with attempted subtlety, and a second unknown woman sat on the bench by the front window holding an empty candelabra. Tiani was on the settee embracing a shaken Grebella. The madam’s hands trembled as she dabbed at the mixture of tears and blood trailing down her face. Grebella glanced up when they entered, and Ilanet slipped into the room to one side at the stranger’s direction.

  Fresh tears bathed the madam’s cheeks upon seeing them. “Oh, Roy, I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t’ve …”

  Her voice broke off, and she blinked up at the stranger several times. For a moment, he was still as a gravestone, and then he began stalking back and forth in front of the doorway. Ilanet thought he looked like one of the giant cats sizing up his prey, searching for the ideal position from which to pounce. He stopped in front of Grebella, his icy blue eyes seeming to swallow the woman’s soul.

  “What happened?” he asked, his voice deep and harsh.

  Grebella was silent as she stared, and then she abruptly sucked in a breath as though just remembering to breathe. “I, um, Brendish was angry,” she said with a glance toward the floor.

  For the first time, Ilanet noticed the bloodied body of a man that was mostly hidden from her view by the coffee table.

  “More than that. He was furious. He was yellin’ at me to get him more money, but I already done paid him twice this month. I didn’t ’ave the money he wanted. He started hittin’ me, and I jus’ … I don’t know what happened … I jus’ stabbed him with the knife! I don’t even know how it got in my hand.” She shook her head and wiped at her bloodied mouth and nose. “Then, Tiani came in and screamed.”

  Tiani looked up with tearful eyes. “It was my fault. I shouldn’ta screamed. Just, I saw all the blood.”

  Grebella squeezed Tiani’s knee and shook her head. “Those two idiots came poundin’ down the stairs, and when they saw, they started comin’ at me. I thought they’d kill me an’ the girls. I don’t know why I did it. You gotta believe me, Roy. It jus’ slipped out. I-I told ’em you did it. I told ’em you killed Brendish and ran out the back.”

  The stranger was silent for several moments as he stared at the woman. Finally, he said, “Perhaps some of the fault is mine. I wanted you to feel comfortable and safe in my presence. When you felt threatened, your thoughts were instinctually drawn to me.”

  The women’s concerned glances toward each other spoke to their confusion. While it was obvious that Roy was not who he had led them to believe, no one yet dared the question.

  Grebella looked to the floor shamefully. “No, it ain’t none of yer fault. Truth is, I didn’t expect ya to live.” Doubt and remorse filled her gaze when she sought the stranger once again. “Where they gone? How’d ya escape?”

  The stranger’s voice was soft, almost consoling. “You and I both know that would not have been possible—not for Roy. The result of your actions is that Royance is dead, and now you are left with me.”

  Grebella swallowed, and still her voice was but a whisper. “W-who are you?”

  “You do not wish to know me, Madam Grebella. Those men you sent after Roy and this young lady”—he tipped his head toward Ilanet, and Grebella glanced at her guiltily—“are dead. You have three corpses on your property, and no one left to protect you. The investigators may be slow to pick up on the disappearance of a few deplorables, but they are tenacious and will not disregard any murder. The other businessmen in the area will become aware of Brendish’s absence much more quickly, and you will be at their mercy. You may find your own protection, or you may serve me. The choice is yours.”

  “Serve you? You’re not goin’ to kill us?” Tiani asked.

  The stranger tilted his head and fingered the hilt of the dagger at his waist. “Until recent events, you were kind to me, and you have been kind to the girl.”

  Tiani huffed an anxious laugh. “Recent events? You mean sendin’ people to kill you.”

  “Yes, a minor infraction,” he replied with a shrug. Ilanet was just as dumbfounded as the others judging by their expressions.

  Tiani asked, “How’s tryin’ to kill you a minor infraction?”

  “You sent men to kill Roy. I expect you will not make the same mistake with me. Previous events are no longer relevant. You survived. I survived. Brendish and two of his men are dead. Shall we move on?”

  Grebella stood to face the stranger. Her face was swollen, but most of the bleeding had stopped. Ilanet remembered how it felt to bear such injuries. Although she was angry that the woman’s actions might have meant her death under different circumstances, she could not completely fault the women. There were times when the beatings her father had given her had been so painful that she would likely have thrown someone else to the wolf had it been an option. She also knew the shame of even thinking of committing that horrible deed. No, she did not blame Grebella. Oddly, she thought that neither did the assassin.

  “What would ya ’ave us do, and how are ya gonna protect us?” the madam asked.

  Instead of answering, the stranger said, “How many entities did Brendish oversee?”

  Grebella glanced around at the other women, “Oh, um, I think there was three brothels includin’ this one, two gamblin’ houses …”

  “Don’t forget the fights,” interjected the woman by the hearth.

  Grebella nodded. “Right, they call it the Burrow. It’s where they fight for sport, if ya can call it that.”

  “Very well,” the stranger said. “I will secure Brendish’s holdings. It will be up to you to maintain them.”

  Grebella balked. “Me?”

  The stranger spread his hands and glanced around the room. “Who else?”

  “No, I couldn’t …”

  “Then I suggest you find someone who can,” he said, “and hope he does not stab you in the back. Really, Madam Grebella, you are better off attempting the management on your own. You will have all of Brendish’s resources at your disposal.”

  “How’s that? What makes ya think they’ll listen to me?” Grebella asked.

  “Because they will fear me,” the stranger said.

  “But you won’t be here, will ya?”

  He smiled fiendishly and said, “No, but I have a certain reputation.”

  With a nod toward the dead man, she said, “What about him an’ the other two?”

  “I will take credit for their deaths. When the investigators come around, you tell them that I killed these men and forced you to submit. With my mark upon the bodies and those that are to come, the investigators will not doubt your story.”

>   Tiani rose from her seat. “You’re gonna kill more people?”

  The stranger shrugged and said, “Not so many. These people are like wild animals. I must show my teeth to assert dominance.”

  Ilanet’s voice erupted of its own volition. “But the investigators will come after you!”

  The stranger turned to regard her with his eerie blue eyes. “Perhaps, but I doubt it. The investigators’ job is to discover the culprit. In this, they will have no doubt. Ionius knows he would need a much greater force to take me. I was going to have to do something to punish his insolence anyway.”

  The way he spoke of her father was disconcerting, and yet she found herself mentally applauding him. Ilanet had never heard anyone mention her father without a hint of fear. Still, this man was an assassin, and these were her people.

  She said, “You told me you had no desire to make a claim here.”

  “I do not. I am perfectly willing to walk away and leave these women to their fate. However, it was only minutes ago that you implored me to help this woman, did you not?”

  Ilanet glanced at Grebella. “Well, yes.”

  “Then let this serve both our purposes. I will take only the smallest piece”—he tilted his head toward the women—“as a warning to Ionius.” He must have read the horror on her face, for he smiled most disturbingly and said, “Of course, I will only do so if they agree.”

  Grebella glanced between them and then said, “You speak of the king as if ya know him, and it don’t sound like yer on his good side. Mayhap I don’t wanna know who ya are, but I think I’m needin’ to—’specially if we’re gonna be dependin’ on this reputation of yers.”

  The stranger tilted his head and then bowed a most courtly bow. “Madam Grebella, allow me to introduce myself. I am called the Raven.”

  “It’s not so bad, you know,” said Reaylin.

  Frisha huffed but refused to rise to the bait.

  “No, really. How many people can say they know the king? And he’s never said so, but I think he considers me a friend.”

  Frisha looked over at the woman who was thumbing through a book that one of the healers had assigned her to read. “Friends? You’ve finally given up on trying to claim him?”

  Reaylin shrugged. “I thought he was just a warrior like me. Two warriors are a good match. We’d understand each other, you know? But a king needs a queen, and we both know I ain’t no queen.”

  Frisha could not help but notice the small smile that crept across Jimson’s face as he peered through the porthole at the gulls swooping down to catch their dinner from the bay. She was surprised by the other woman’s sensible response. It all seemed so clear and uncomplicated the way Reaylin said it. She wondered why it was such a mess in her own mind.

  “You’re not a queen either.”

  Frisha abruptly pulled herself back to the conversation. “What?”

  Reaylin rolled her eyes and closed the book. “Don’t be daft, Frisha. There’s nothing about you that says queen. You don’t walk like a queen, you don’t talk like a queen, you don’t dress like a queen.”

  Frisha scowled as her face heated. “What do you know of being queen?”

  “That’s the point. I don’t know what they do. Do you?”

  “I could learn …”

  “Oh, please. Kings marry duchesses or princesses. A king’s bed is big, though, and there’s always room for a mistress,” Reaylin said with wicked grin.

  Frisha felt the fury radiating from her face, and Reaylin’s smirk fell.

  The woman shrugged and said, “Where there’s room for one mistress, there’s bound to be room for two.”

  Jimson turned and, for once, his feelings were plain on his face. He shouted, “You would settle for being a king’s mistress when you could be an officer’s wife?” He snapped his mouth shut and glanced away. He then bowed to no one in particular and said, “Pardon my outburst. Please excuse me.”

  Reaylin watched in apparent shock as Jimson stormed out of the cramped quarters and down the narrow corridor, and then she skittered out in the opposite direction. Frisha hated Reaylin at that moment more than ever. It was not that Reaylin was wrong—just the opposite. Reaylin was voicing the doubts that had been plaguing Frisha ever since she discovered that Rezkin was the True King.

  Before she met Rezkin, she had been tormented every night by nightmares of her future husband. She would travel to Kaibain and there be auctioned off like a prized sow—or perhaps not so prized by noble standards. Every nightmare was different. In one, her husband was a slovenly old man, grown fat by the toils of his servants, who raged at the least offense. In another, he was stern and sanctimonious, prized piousness and propriety in equal measure, and believed laughter and joy to be sin. Other times, he was wonderfully handsome and yet a terrible philanderer, locking her away while he laughed and lounged amongst the frills of other women’s petticoats.

  Rezkin had been different. He had been a gentleman and a savior. Even when she thought he was merely a young traveler of little consequence she had felt insecure and a bit inferior. She had lived a sheltered life. She had never traveled, and she had no special talents. She had always known that one day she would marry and raise children. What else was there for her?

  Rezkin did not talk much, though. It had been difficult to get to know him, to find out what he liked and disliked. She had tried to find common ground, even going so far as to attempt to learn the sword. She figured that if he carried two of them then they must be important to him, and she did want to be able to protect herself. The metal monstrosity had been terribly heavy, and she had been afraid that she would cut off her own leg. Anxious about disappointing him, she had given the excuse that she could not carry a sword because she was a woman. The disapproval in his eyes had her worried that she had made a mistake. When he showed up with the set of knives, she had been elated. He was at least trying to meet her half way. Truthfully, she hated the knives almost as much as the sword. She kept at it, though, because she wanted to prove to him, and to herself, that she was capable. He seemed to put value in that quality. Plus, the gift had been costly, and she did not want to appear ungrateful.

  Frisha knew she had shortcomings as far as many of the others were concerned. She had not been trained as a warrior, she had no talent, and she was not of high standing among the nobles. Frisha had always been a romantic, though, and she knew that her greatest gift to her future husband was her love and devotion. She had thought to give those to Rezkin, but that was before she had seen his emptiness. She was no longer certain she could offer those to him. Her mother had once told her that if you pour water into a well with no bottom, the well will never fill, and you will keep pouring until you too are empty.

  “Pay no attention to Reaylin, Frisha,” Malcius said.

  Frisha had almost forgotten his presence. Malcius was sitting on a short stool leaning back in the corner behind her. He, too, was reading a book, but his appeared to have something to do with military tactics. She briefly wondered if he chose it intentionally or if nothing else was available.

  “She is crass and simple minded,” he continued. “Rezkin chose you, and she has not yet accepted it—not that she was ever truly an option. I know not what the good captain sees in her, but I suppose he is used to dealing with commoners.”

  “Perhaps he was struck in the head too many times during training,” Brandt proposed as he ducked into the room and settled himself in the chair that Reaylin had vacated.

  Frisha fought back the tears and said, “I don’t know, Malcius. I think she may be right.”

  Malcius and Brandt shared a look that was too close to pity.

  Malcius said, “Look, if this is about your speech and style, we can teach you what you need to know.”

  “Shiela is the expert on modern fashion,” Brandt added, “or so she claims.”

  Malcius nodded and said, “The strikers have spent much time in the palace, and Tieran is as close as you can get to royalty. They will be able
to tell you about queen’s business.”

  Frisha nodded and said, “I’ll think about it.”

  She was both appreciative and irritated by her cousin’s show of support. When first they set out on their voyage he would barely look at her. Had they grown so much closer through their trials, or was the prospect of her becoming queen encouragement enough? She glanced out the porthole just as a gull swept past with a fish clutched in its beak. At least Reaylin was honest in her opinions and intentions, she thought. Then, she felt guilty for doubting Malcius. She buried her face in her hands and wondered, How did life get so complicated?

  Bilior padded through the human settlement. It was larger than those he had visited on the few unfortunate occasions in the past. When first he had arrived, he donned the aura of a human female. People had spoken to him, though, and he did not care for that. He wished to interact with the humans no more than he desired to be in their settlement. The humans were strange, rejecting the balanced variety of animals in the wild but permitting the small felines to enter their domain unhindered and unmonitored. If only they knew the felines’ thoughts, they would not be so careless. Still, it was a boon to Bilior, for he much preferred the aura of nature’s beast. It mattered little that these had been tainted by the meddlesome humans’ standards of selective breeding. The little felines were still wild in spirit.

  He followed the scent of the young king. It was difficult to pick out at first, amongst all the noxious smells of the settlement. The sensitive nose of the cat, enhanced by his own powers, was both a blessing and a curse. By the scent trails, he could tell that the king had been all over the settlement, but they were focused strongly in one area. The structures in this section were built of old wood that had long lost its soothing energy, and Bilior mourned the sacrifice. Like the Ahn’tep peoples before them, the life energy of the humans lacked the balance of the other animals. He supposed that was the intent of the gods, but he did not care for it all that much.