Knight's Shadow (38 page)

The Duke looked around and spotted a side passage to our right. ‘There!’ he said, pointing. ‘Look! We have to go that way.’

‘Stop,’ I said. ‘Think. Look at the ground: those are
our
tracks. We’re just going around in circles.’

‘Saints . . . we’re . . .’ He twisted his head left and right. ‘This passage – we were here before, just a few minutes ago . . . But I—’ He stopped abruptly and his face turned into a mummer’s mask, so full of despair it looked as if it had been shaped that way by a mad sculptor.

‘Come on,’ I said gently. ‘I know how to find him now.’

I pulled the Duke along the passageway and this time I followed a new one: the virtue of having gone in circles so many times was that I now knew which ways
not
to go. More importantly, I was also getting a sense of how sound travelled in the dungeon and now I stopped concentrating on the
loudest
echo and instead followed the one that was repeating less than the others. I hoped against hope that Kest or one of the others had figured it out before I had.

As we approached the next intersection a shadow flickered on one of the walls and I held my hand up for the Duke to stop.

‘Why are—?’

I put a hand over his mouth again. ‘Quiet,’ I whispered. ‘Look.’ I pointed down the passageway. There was light there, more than we’d seen before. We had found them.

Now I just need the assassins to suffer from sudden blindness so they don’t see me coming—

But before I could even begin to formulate a decent plan, Tommer started screaming again, Jillard broke free of my grip and barrelled down the passage where we’d seen the light shouting his son’s name at the top of his lungs, and any possibility of a sneak attack vanished into thin air.

Damn your foolishness, Jillard, and damn my own for not knocking you out when I had the chance
.

I ran behind him, both rapiers out, trying my best not to let them catch against the walls of the narrow passageway. We turned a final corner and entered a larger open area, with new passages running left and right off it. At the other end was another cell, larger than the others, but instead of vertical bars it was separated from the corridor by a solid iron wall. The large door in the middle was open and inside on the floor I saw three men – Tommer’s Knights, I assumed – all covered with blood. I recognised Sir Toujean, who was awkwardly trying to get to his feet; I didn’t know the Knight next to him; the third was lying dead in a pool of blood near the door. In the centre of the cell, lying on his back and looking almost as if he were asleep, was Tommer, Jillard’s son.

‘Tommer!’ the Duke screamed as he ran down the passage and into the cell.

‘Your Grace,’ Sir Toujean moaned, ‘Sir Odiard and I heard footsteps and we prayed to Guereste, God of War that it was you.’

‘The assassins,’ I said urgently, ‘where are they?’

The Knight pointed down one of the smaller passageways. ‘When the Dashini heard the Duke coming they ran down that way.’

‘How many?’

‘Five?’

‘
Five
Dashini?’

Now Toujean looked uncertain. ‘Not . . . I’m not sure exactly, maybe . . . But no, they were wearing masks – they must have been Dashini.’

Hells. Even if the assassins weren’t Dashini – and I was becoming more and more certain that they weren’t – I wouldn’t be able to stop five of them by myself, especially when they’d had days to learn these passageways.

The problem solved itself as Kest and Sir Istan arrived. ‘We followed the Duke’s shouts,’ Kest said in answer to my unspoken question. ‘How is the boy?’

‘I don’t know yet. Kest, Toujean says there are five of them.’

Kest looked at the dust on the floor. ‘Too many sets of tracks, going in all directions. How long ago did they leave?’

‘Just moments ago,’ Toujean said, his voice weak and fearful. ‘They fled as soon as they heard the Duke coming.’

‘Why would that send them running?’ Kest asked, but before Toujean could answer, more heavy footsteps thudded towards us from another passage and Ugh emerged from the passageway with Valiana, Parrick, Dariana and Shiballe in tow. ‘Fucking stupid people. Get lost easy,’ Ugh said. ‘Fat man so smart, eh?’ Ugh pointed his finger towards the ground and circled it around and around.

‘Shiballe had us going around in circles,’ Dariana explained.

Valiana rushed past the others, asking, ‘Where is Tommer?’ and when I pointed, she ran in and knelt down by him. She reached out a hand, but Jillard slapped it away. ‘Don’t touch him!’ he said. ‘No one touches him but me!’

Tommer’s eyes blinked open and closed very quickly, like a butterfly’s wings flapping against a strong wind. He looked up at his father, and then at Valiana. ‘Sister?’ he asked. ‘You’re wearing a Greatcoat . . . did you come to save me?’

It struck me as odd that Tommer still called Valiana his sister. Apparently Jillard also found the idea discomforting.

‘Tommer!’ the Duke said, tears streaming down his face, ‘I’m here – your father’s here. I’ve got you. I’ve got you.’

Tommer looked to his father. ‘Yes . . . Father,’ he murmured, I’m very sorry, Father . . .’

Jillard cradled Tommer’s head. ‘You stole my key, you silly, silly boy.’

‘I . . . I didn’t—’

‘Your Grace,’ Sir Toujean said weakly, ‘the assassins . . . they said they had another way into and out of the dungeons – that they could escape and come back to kill you and your son whenever they wanted.’ He pushed himself awkwardly to his knees, and then clambered to his feet and stood there swaying. ‘Give me a sword, your Grace, and I will hunt them to the ends of the earth.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Jillard said, still trying to rouse Tommer. ‘You and Sir Odiard can barely stand.’ He turned to me. ‘You said you wanted to put a stop to this conspiracy, to end these killings, so go: take these others and find those men and kill them.’

A small cloth bag of the darkest blue, barely larger than a baby’s fist, caught my eyes. I pulled a knife from my coat and very carefully opened the top of the bag with it. The bag was about a quarter full of blue-black dust. Saints – how much was in there when they started? How much did they use on the boy?

‘The boy needs a healer,’ I said.

‘Shiballe!’ the Duke shouted. ‘Get my healer! Get Firensi –
now
!’

As he turned and shuffled off down the passageway, Ugh shouted after him, ‘Try not to get lost, eh?’

Duke Jillard turned to the rest of us. ‘Sir Istan, Sir Jairn – I mean, Parrick, whatever the hells your damned name is – you stay here and protect my son with me. You others, go and find the assassins before they escape.’

‘Come on,’ I said to Valiana.

She started to get up, but Tommer grabbed her arm and cried, ‘Sister? Stay—? Please . . .? I’m scared . . .’ And again his eyes fluttered open and closed.

‘She’s not your sister,’ Jillard said, his voice soft, yet I could clearly hear the tinge of anger. ‘She’s not my daughter, just some—’

The sheer arrogance with which he was dismissing the girl he had believed his daughter for eighteen years made me want to knock him senseless right then and there, but to her credit, Valiana’s focus was on Tommer. ‘He’s seen nothing but angry and dangerous men for days, your Grace,’ she said gently, ‘so if he finds my face comforting, then—’

‘Very well, damn you. But go, now, and get those damned Dashini!’

The rest of us turned and ran back into the open space. ‘Three hallways,’ I pointed out, and without another word Kest ran down one, Dariana the next. I took the third, but before I’d gone more than twenty feet I heard Ugh following me.

‘I come,’ he panted, ‘I come. Fucking mad horse not better than me. Faster though.’

We reached the end of the passages and I stared down at the ground, looking for fresh tracks, but I found nothing other than what I’d seen before. ‘Which way do you think they went?’ I asked Ugh.

He pointed to a passageway ahead and to the right of us. ‘Back up stairs. Back to first level, then to palace. Only way.’

‘It can’t be the only way,’ I said. ‘Jillard’s got two dozen men waiting at the top of those stairs. No assassin would ever get through, not that way. There must be another exit.’

Ugh shook his head. ‘No other way. One door: black door.’

‘Listen: Sir Toujean just told us the assassins were talking about another way in and out of these dungeons—’

Ugh said crossly, ‘You know nothing, fucking Greatcoat tough guy. I come here sometimes, eh? Never know when maybe Duke get angry or bitch Patriana send me here, eh? I look
everywhere
. I go in
every
passage. I look
every
cell. Fucking Knights don’t know shit.
I
know. One way out. Black door.’

The erstwhile torturer stared at me, daring me to contradict him, his dark little eyes full of such absolute certainty – and yet how could that be possible? How could the assassins hope to get away? For the hundredth time I cursed Jillard and his hideous dungeon, and I cursed Sir Toujean and the other two Knights even more for having stood back as an eleven-year-old boy stole his father’s key, for allowing him to drag them down into a dungeon with a Dashini assassin. Were they
trying
to get him killed? Were they—?

‘Saint Zaghev-who-sings-for-tears—’ I turned and looked into the dim light down the passageway just in time to see two figures rising up from the floor of the cell. One of them was reaching for the blue bag of Dashini powder.

Swearing under my breath I took off at a run back down the hallway, with Ugh chasing after me asking, ‘What? What—?’

‘Tommer didn’t make the guards bring him down here,’ I said, still cursing myself for a fool. ‘Toujean and the other two Knights dragged him.’

Chapter Thirty-Three

The Captors

In the few seconds it took us to run back to the cell we’d already lost the fight. Sir Istan was dying just outside the iron gate, blood gushing from his throat even as he struggled to rise one last time. Parrick was on the ground outside, wrestling with one of the other Knights we’d found lying beside Tommer. The Knight he was fighting hammered a fist against the pommel of the dagger I could see sticking out between Parrick’s ribs – he must have found the tiny gap between the bone plates of Parrick’s greatcoat – and a heart-rending scream echoed around the cell. Then the Knight climbed on top of Parrick, pulled out his dagger and began to force it down into Parrick’s face. Ugh was close enough now to grab the Knight by his long brown hair and he hauled him off and sent him sprawling towards me. I drove the point of my rapier deep into his right shoulder and then again into his left: I needed him to live long enough to find out who had ordered this attack, but that didn’t mean he shouldn’t
hurt
.

There was a great clanging and I turned to see Sir Toujean pulling the door to the cell shut. He locked himself inside with Valiana, Jillard and Tommer, and through the vertical slits in the door I could see he had wrapped a cloth around his face that left only his eyes exposed. The boy was still on the ground, but he wasn’t moving. Valiana and Jillard were huddled in opposite corners of the room, and both were moaning in terror.

Parrick grabbed at my leg, trying to attract my attention. ‘The dust,’ he whispered. ‘When you left, Toujean threw the dust at us. It’s . . . Saints, Falcio, it’s worse than I remembered . . .’

I knew what he meant. I would never forget the Dashini dust and what it did to my mind . . .

I went over to search for a way to get in, but just like the black-iron door the only way to see inside was through the three vertical slits, each one barely the width of two fingers. Even as I pulled a knife from a pocket I knew there was practically no chance of throwing it through the narrow slit, let alone hitting someone I wanted to hit. And Toujean wasn’t taking any chances; he raced back to his captives and, hauling Tommer up, held the boy in front of him like a shield.

‘I’d advise against anything too daring, Trattari,’ the Knight said, reaching an arm around Tommer’s neck. ‘Little boys are surprisingly fragile.
Snap, snap, snap
.’

I stared at Sir Toujean and tried to work out a way to stop him. He was still covered in blood – and now it was obvious it wasn’t his own.
Such a simple ruse
. And all the little things that had never quite added up were making sense: he and the other two Knights had stolen the Duke’s key and then dragged Tommer down to the dungeon with them. Once safe within the Duke’s stony maze they’d been free to kill as many prisoners as they needed to, then they’d sent Toujean up the stairs with a rope tied to his neck pretending to be the terrified victim relaying his kidnappers’ demands. The Dashini dust would have kept Tommer docile . . .

But why did they kill the third Knight?
I wondered. Had he resisted once he’d realised how far the others were going to go? Was there an ounce of conscience in any of the remaining men?

‘What’s the matter, Trattari?’ Toujean taunted. ‘Nothing to say? Don’t want to know how I’m going to get out of here after I kill Jillard? And the boy, of course.’

I ignored him; I was pretty sure once the Duke and his son were dead – and all the rest of us, of course – Toujean would kill the Dashini and play the grieving hero who had managed to avenge his deceased Duke. That would no doubt appeal to his fellow Knights, most of whom likely despised Jillard anyway. He would talk about Knightly honour and the will of the Gods, and the chance for a new, glorious dynasty, and they would lap it all up. I didn’t care about any of that; the only one thing that mattered to me at that moment was figuring out how to save the boy and push the tip of my sword all the way through Toujean’s black heart.

Valiana was crouching in the corner. Her eyes were full of terror induced by the Dashini dust but they found mine and for a brief moment she steeled herself and tried to get up – but she immediately fell back down, tears streaming down her face, a horrified moan escaping from her lips.
Damn the Dashini and their bloody powders
. There’s something obscene about people who can fight so well and yet still use poison to first weaken their opponents.

‘Come now, Trattari – surely you’re dying to know why Sir Odiard and I decided to kill our own Duke and his only son? Why thrice-honoured Knights would—’

‘Not really,’ I said, my mind racing. ‘I’m just assuming you’re an arsehole and a coward; I’m perfectly happy to leave it at that.’

I couldn’t throw my knife – even if I did manage to squeeze my hand and the blade into the slit, the throw wouldn’t have enough force to do any damage. He, on the other hand, had only to give one sharp twist and Tommer’s neck would break. If Brasti were here he could have put an arrow straight into Toujean’s eye – or any other part of his anatomy – but I wasn’t anywhere near as good.

Damn you, Brasti, for leaving us when we needed you.

‘We are men of honour!’ Toujean growled, apparently offended that I wasn’t paying sufficient attention to his plan to murder a child in cold blood. ‘The Dukes have failed the Knights of Tristia. They have failed this country. They—’

‘Shut up,’ I said. ‘I’m trying to think.’

Ugh pushed me out of the way and began throwing himself at the door, over and over again. He was stronger than almost any man I’d ever met and the whole iron wall reverberated with the impact of his body. Perhaps in a hundred years he might just break it open.

‘You have plan, tough guy?’ he said at last, his breath ragged.

I did have a plan. It just wasn’t a very good one. The first time I’d been hit with the dust I’d very nearly choked on my own fear. Quillata had done a little better, though, and so had a few of the other women – so maybe they had better resistance . . . and maybe there was a chance here.

I’m sorry, Valiana. No one should be asked to be this brave
.

‘You think you’re safe in there, Toujean?’ I shouted through the slit. ‘Because
I
think you’ve just trapped yourself in a room with a Greatcoat.’

Toujean laughed. ‘Her? I tell you, Trattari, the first time I heard that the King was allowing women to become travelling Magisters my friends and I reckoned it must be some kind of joke. After all, there’s a reason women don’t become Knights, Trattari.’

‘And there’s a reason Knights don’t become Greatcoats,’ I said. I looked at Valiana, trying to catch her eye, but she was busy mumbling something and shaking her head, over and over. ‘It’s scary, isn’t it,’ I called to her. ‘It’s like you’re standing on a cliff a hundred miles high and looking over the edge, and then realising you’ve just lost your balance—’

‘You’re wasting your time, Trattari,’ Toujean interrupted me. ‘The first time we used it on the boy I got the slightest touch of it on my skin and nearly ran screaming for my life.’

Ugh, beside me, chuckled. ‘Guess you not tough guy, eh?’

‘Shut up, dog,’ Toujean said. ‘When we bring a righteous purge to Rijou you’ll find yourself hanging at the end of a gibbet right alongside the Duke.’

‘Hanging next to Duke? Big promotion for me, uh?’

‘Valiana,’ I said, ‘that dust is like breathing all the hells right into your heart: I know that. It’s terrifying. Most people can’t take it. But most people haven’t been chased across northern Tristia by an army determined to see them dead – like you have. Most people haven’t had to pick up a sword and fight against soldiers twice their size and with ten times the training – like you have.’

‘I’ll snap the boy’s neck!’ Toujean shouted.

‘Then you get knife in chest, eh, smart guy?’ Ugh said.

Toujean gripped Tommer tighter. The boy’s head moved a little and now I was staring at three sets of eyes. They all looked back at me.

‘Valiana,’ I said, struggling to make my voice as soothing as I could, ‘most people would just curl up and wait to die rather than fight that dust – but
most
people haven’t discovered that their lives were a lie.
Most
people haven’t found out that they were not who they believed they were. And
most
people have not stood up and fought back against the world the way
you
have.’ I pressed up against the iron surface of the door, working on getting my hand through one of the slits. ‘Valiana,
you
have faced more fear than almost anyone who has ever lived. You’re not going to be stopped by some dust cooked up by a bunch of cowards so scared of the world they have to wear masks just to face it – that’s not who you are. It’s not who you
were
– and that’s not who you’ve
become
.’

Toujean twisted his head quickly, just long enough to catch a glimpse of her. When he turned back, I could see his unpleasant sneer, even through the cloth covering his mouth and nose. ‘It’s a nice idea, Trattari, to think you can make someone brave just by haranguing them as if you’re some pathetic roadside cleric. I must admit, I found it terribly touching when you tried it with me back at the black door: “When you were a boy, you dreamed of being a hero, did you not?” Brave words, Trattari – sadly for you, they had as little effect then as they do now. I’m afraid life just doesn’t work that way.’

He reached down and picked up a sword from the ground. ‘My friends will be coming soon.’

I continued to ignore him. ‘Valiana, it’s time,’ I said firmly. ‘You said you wanted to make your life count – so do it,
now
. This is
your
time: so get on your feet and kill this son of a bitch for me.’

She looked at me and her mouth opened wide in horror, as if what I was asking her to do was even worse than whatever the dust had shown her. But slowly – so very slowly – she pushed herself to her feet and I could see her hand was reaching for her sword in its sheath.

Toujean heard the sound of her coat creaking as she moved and twisted around – just as I threw my knife. With far more luck than I deserved, the blade struck the Knight in the shoulder, and he bellowed and dropped Tommer to the ground. I reached for another knife but before I could throw it he had grabbed Valiana by the collar and thrown her against the cell’s iron wall. She bounced off it and stumbled towards me and I felt her hand briefly touch my fingers poking through one of the slits in the door. She was shaking badly.

‘You can do this,’ I whispered. ‘There’s nothing you need fear but—’

She looked at me through the slits in the door. Her lips trembling on the words, she said, ‘Falcio, please shut up now.’ With her hand pressed against the wall, she found her balance before she turned around and faced Toujean. ‘Su-surrender,’ she said.

Toujean laughed. ‘You want to dance with me, little girl?’ He flipped the point of his sword up and feinted towards Valiana’s face, and she stumbled back into the door again. But this time she straightened her back and immediately stepped into the centre of the cell. Her blade was wavering, but it was out in front of her. I wanted to throw another knife, but Toujean had started skilfully manoeuvring her around the cell, ensuring she was always between us.

Valiana thrust her sword at Toujean’s chest, although her hand was shaking so badly the blade was almost comically wavering in the air. He shifted his weight and half-turned, smiling victoriously as the awkward lunge missed him, but Valiana didn’t stop. She kept attacking, working her way around his guard to strike at his belly, his neck, even his legs. When Toujean counter-attacked, she made little effort to parry, instead relying on the bone plates sewn inside her thick leather coat to protect her. I was glad she hadn’t seen Parrick, lying there with the sword piercing his own greatcoat . . . And even though the plates were doing their job, for now at least, Toujean was bigger and stronger than she was, and his sword was heavier. He smashed the edge of his blade against her shoulders, then her ribs, and each time I winced.

Hells, you can’t take much more of this. Move him around, girl!

Valiana was trying her best, but every time she tried to position him so I could get a decent shot with my knife he’d do something, like swinging his sword in a wide arc, forcing her to shift her stance just to parry his blade without being pushed over.

‘You’re going to die, little girl,’ Toujean said, his blade slapping hers out of line yet again. ‘How does it feel, knowing that?’

She brought her sword back into line. ‘Like . . . like a relief.’

He laughed again. ‘This is the story of Tristia, right here: a foolish girl – nothing more than the discarded outcome of the rutting of nameless peasants – dreams herself a warrior—’ He broke off, then asked, conversationally, ‘Do you even have your own name, little girl?’ He brought his sword up high and then struck down in a vicious diagonal arc towards her neck.

She managed to get her sword up in time to parry, but Toujean brought his weapon back up and around and almost effortlessly struck her hard in the ribs. ‘I know,’ he said gleefully, ‘
I’ll
give you a name! How about – let’s see –
Bitch
? Or
Slut
? Or maybe
Whore
? I think I like
Whore
best.’ Almost lazily, he swung his blade back and forth in wide arcs, all the time forcing Valiana backwards towards the iron wall. He wasn’t the least bit tired, and she was fading fast.

‘You know,’ the Knight said, as if he had been seriously considering the matter, ‘now that I think about it, “Whore” is a bit too short for a proper name, isn’t it? So how about “
Dead
Whore”? That’s better, isn’t it? That has a lovely cadence to it, don’t you think?’ He swung twice more, and now he was moving much faster, striking her on the leg, then again on her left side. This time I heard a rib crack.

Valiana stumbled back. She was going to die in a few moments.