Petrodor: A Trial of Blood and Steel, Book 2 (36 page)

“You doubt my resolve,” said the archbishop icily. “We have already disposed of one Nasi-Keth girl this morning. My guards found her hiding near your meeting place on the Cliff of the Dead. I'm told she put up a stubborn resistance and would have escaped had it not been for an excellent crossbowman. If you wish to join her at the bottom of the harbour, please just say so, and we shall dispense with these tiresome games and insults…”

Sasha lifted the table with an explosive heave. The archbishop toppled backward and Sasha rushed forward, but a guard threw her to the ground. She fell awkwardly, struggling to rise with tied hands, but a shield crashed into her side, throwing her further from the archbishop. She rolled fast, but an armoured boot in the side stopped her, and then one crashed into her head and stunned her. It was several kicks later before her head cleared. A kick in the back was agony and one in the stomach drove the breath from her lungs. She curled up and braced as hard as she could, arms over her head to protect what mattered most. Then the kicks stopped.

She lay still, breathing hard, trying to listen past the pain. She heard the archbishop's voice, disappointingly calm and reassuring, talking to the guards. The squeal and crash of the table being returned to its place. Candleholders resettled. Then a hand grabbed her under each armpit and hauled her up. Her feet barely touched the floor until the guards dumped her in the chair once more.

Sasha tried licking her lips, but it hurt to move her jaw. Her ear stung and her mouth was tender. When she dared to move her tongue past her lips, she tasted blood. She couldn't quite manage to sit straight on the chair, her back and ribs hurt and the world kept trying to tip sideways.

“That was ill advised,” said the archbishop. A servant came scurrying to put a new cup of wine in his hand. He sipped it, trying hard to look unperturbed. Smug shit, Sasha thought. She nearly rushed him again, just to prove her contempt. Only the thought of injury stopped her. If she were injured further, she'd never escape. “You seem a little dense, although given your reputation, that is hardly surprising. Let me explain to you how this arrangement will work.

“You will tell me things about the Nasi-Keth. Or not me, not precisely—my interrogators. Where they live, how many they are, what the current political situation is like—and I understand it is quite fragmented—all of this. Should you not, I shall change my more polite interrogator for a less gentlemanly variety with ingenious inventions to make even the stubbornest Lenay princess talk. And then, you shall be very sorry.”

“You hurt me,” Sasha half mumbled with uncooperative lips, “and Kessligh will kill you. No…he'll gut you and make sure you live long enough to see what colour your insides are.”

“Kessligh's followers are Verenthanes, even if he himself has lapsed,” the archbishop said confidently. “If he wishes to retain any of his fast-fading support on the dockfront, he'll not dare touch a hair on my head.”

It didn't make sense, Sasha reflected, back on her bed in the cell. Her hands had been untied and she lay on her back with arms above her head to stop her bruises from stiffening.

The archbishop only wanted her for information? Not likely. He seemed very concerned about Kessligh, that was certain. It was more likely blackmail, she reckoned. Blackmail to keep Kessligh from interfering in whatever came next. Probably they would not risk harming her, as long as she
remained useful—which would be for as long as Kessligh remained powerful. Kessligh would not remain powerful for very long if blackmail prevented him from acting…or, if in acting, he lost his best guarantee of prestige within the Nasi-Keth—his uma. However she figured it, she had to get out of here.

So what came next? Priests were being murdered. Something was afoot within the brotherhood. Something concerning Family Steiner. Something for which those involved wished Kessligh neutralised in advance. She knew she could not begin to guess. Possibly Kessligh would…but she doubted the plotters would leave much advance warning. Just long enough to let Kessligh know they had her. No fingers—probably Marya had made them swear they would not harm her. Marya was important enough that even the archbishop didn't dare break faith with her. Perhaps Marya herself would tell Kessligh. Kessligh would believe her with no severed fingers necessary.

Soon. Whatever was coming, it would come soon.

They'd killed Yulia was her next thought. Grief and horror threatened to surge and overwhelm her. No, she thought desperately. No. Perhaps it was a lie to upset her. But how would they know where Yulia was if Yulia had remained hidden? And how would the archbishop have known Sasha's accomplice was a girl? There weren't many female Nasi-Keth. Yulia alone would not have been able to outmanoeuvre them. In all Sasha's plans, she'd assumed she would be there herself to help Yulia out of trouble. It had never occurred to her that she would be the first to fall and Yulia would be left all alone.

She'd led Lenay men into battles in which hundreds had died. More recently, she'd come to know Rodery of the Nasi-Keth quite well, and he had been killed before her eyes. All was different to this, though. Those men had volunteered. They'd known exactly what they were getting into. But she'd gone to Yulia's
home
, and asked her to come, knowing that the girl half worshipped her, telling her she was not a bad warrior and assuring her that it would not be particularly dangerous, certainly far less dangerous than Riverside…

Less dangerous for Sasha, perhaps. Priests and powerful families could ransom Sashandra Lenayin. She was worth something. But what use would such powerful people have for a raggedy Dockside girl with dreams of becoming a warrior? For those people the likes of Yulia were barely worth the cost of the crossbow bolt that killed her.

Sasha knew that she was sometimes arrogant. She knew that she could be self-centred, and could at times fail to consider things from the perspectives of others. She'd thought she was getting better. More worldly and more mature. Wiser. She'd thought she was on her way to becoming the kind of uma that would raise Kessligh's prestige throughout Petrodor. The kind of
uma who would make him proud. But now she'd got a nice Dockside girl killed for no better reason than she'd been too damn impressed with herself to consider how it wasn't all as easy for some people as it was for her. She'd been too damn certain that Marya would never betray her.

People like Sofy told her. Oh dear spirits, Sofy. Sofy would have told her not to trust Marya, not now, not in this situation, where her own children's futures were at stake. Sofy would have told her that it wasn't fair on Yulia to pressure her to do something she didn't particularly want to. Sofy would have told her not to get the poor girl killed because Sasha was too damn selfish to stop for a moment and consider other people's problems.

The ceiling began to swim in her tears. She stifled the sobs, as they hurt her bruises, but that felt like penance, and richly deserved. Tears ran down her temples and into her hair. “Oh, Yulia, I'm so sorry,” she sobbed. “Please forgive me.”

But she didn't deserve forgiveness, and she knew it.

W
HEN
A
LYTHIA WALKED INTO THE GARDEN
that night with Tashyna on a leash, the guards on the patio stared. The wolf heaved at the leash, straining toward the open grass.

“Hey, steady!” Alythia scolded, pulling back with her entire body, hoping the wolf didn't wrench her arms off. “Steady, steady! Calm down, you crazy fool, you!”

“M'Lady?” asked a guard, approaching uncertainly. “What are you…?” Tashyna growled, backing away as fast as she'd lunged forward, tail down, ears flat, neck bristling.

“Stop!” Alythia commanded the guard, holding out a firm hand. He stopped, a wary hand on the hilt of his sword, eyes wide on the wolf. “Don't approach her, she's not used to it. Just stay back.” To her delight, the guard obeyed. At last—power! The guard looked a little scared, as did his companion further away. How wonderful. Alythia crouched, offering a hand to the wolf. “It's all right, Tashyna,” she said in Lenay. “It's all right, I'm here. I won't let him hurt you.” Tashyna let her stroke her neck and scratch her head. The ears rose and the growling stopped.

“M'Lady,” said the guard cautiously, “is this wise? That's a wolf!”

“It's a Lenay wolf,” said Alythia imperiously. “Her name's Tashyna. She listens to me.” The guard blinked at her. It had been six days since she'd given Tashyna her name. Since then she'd visited the wolf every day, sometimes twice a day, always with food. Alythia was astonished how little time it had taken for the wolf to come to trust her. Probably, she thought, Tashyna remembered a time when she'd been an adorable puppy and humans had been nice to her. Probably she'd only wanted some of that affection back again and had no idea why the exuberance that her human masters had once found so charming was now met with fearful exclamations and beatings. Alythia thought she knew how that felt.

Now, Tashyna had one human in Halmady Mansion who was nice to her, and flung herself upon that protection with desperate hope. Wolves, Alythia recalled her brothers saying, were proof of the natural order of kings. They
wanted to be commanded. They needed a dominant ruler to obey. Perhaps Tashyna now believed that dominant ruler was her. It gave Alythia a strange feeling of pride. Someone needed her. Someone enjoyed her company. That someone had four legs, smelled poorly at the best of times and had terrible eating habits, but it was better than no one at all.

Alythia pulled Tashyna onto the grass, where the wolf quickly regained her enthusiasm and began hauling desperately on the leash. Alythia struggled to keep up, her sandalled feet slipping. She tried to keep left of a row of garden bushes, then slipped and fell on her rear, losing the leash from her hand. Tashyna shot off across the grass, rounded the central fountain, half tripping on her lead, then came bounding back, a sinister, lunging shape in the evening torchlight. For a brief moment, Alythia recalled her previous fear, to see that ferocious outline coming straight toward her. But Tashyna slowed, then jumped on her playfully and tried to lick her face.

“Oh get off! You're too heavy!” Alythia struggled to her feet and tried to regain the leash, but Tashyna was off once more, with boundless energy. Alythia sighed and brushed the grass from her arms. This was most undignified, and irritating too. The guards were surely laughing at her. Her heart was thumping with exertion and half-fear, and the stupid animal would simply not do what it was told. But Tashyna had been her only friend for the past week, and deserved this brief freedom. And Tashyna was…well, really quite funny too, she thought, watching the wolf weaving between the flowerbeds, tongue lolling, a mad excitement in her eyes. She arrived at the far wall, skidded to a halt and came back the other way, nearly falling. Much to her own amazement, Alythia found herself laughing.

Tashyna came back to Alythia and dodged around her, jumping and snapping at her skirts. Guards on the patio came to stare, and some house staff too. Some looked anxious, but others were laughing. “The Lenay wolf-girl!” someone exclaimed loudly in good humour. Alythia had the grace to turn and curtsey, and gained more laughs. It was more goodwill than she'd experienced at any time since her wedding, she thought, with a surge of happiness. The next time Tashyna returned to harass her, she managed to grab the wolf and give her a big hug. Tashyna whined, struggled and licked.

And raced off once more. Alythia turned back to the onlookers and found that little Tristi Halmady had emerged from the house, escorted by a pair of maids, one of whom carried even littler Elra in her arms. The maids looked anxious, but Tristi was wide-eyed with amazement.

“Alythia's friends with the wolf!” Elra said loudly. She was a pretty girl, her black hair done up at the back, rosy-cheeked and clutching Topo, her favourite ragdoll.

“Alythia, Papa says the wolf is wild and dangerous!” exclaimed Tristi. “He told us we weren't to go near it!”

“Well I assure you,” Alythia announced primly to them all, “he demanded no such thing from me!”