The Queen of the Tearling (28 page)

Her sapphire had begun to burn against her chest. She lifted it, dripping, and found that it was glowing again, a bright blue gleam that reflected off the sides of the bathtub. The jewel was magical, all right, but what purpose did it really serve? Kelsea made a face at it, dropped it back against her chest, and sank deeper into the vanilla-scented water, her mind skipping onward to bigger issues.

After medicine, education was another problem. More than two decades had passed since children were last required to attend school in the Tearling. Even before the entire literate population had been conscripted into the Census, the state's interest in education had been steadily diminishing. And who had finally repealed mandatory schooling? The illustrious Queen Elyssa, of course. Even Mace had looked ashamed when he admitted this fact. It was an excellent system to increase productivity: allow children to stay home so they could learn to work in the fields for nobles. Every day Kelsea seemed to learn something new about her mother's government, and each revelation was worse than the last.

The heat from the sapphire flared suddenly, searing her chest. Kelsea's body jerked and her eyes flew open.

A man stood over her, less than a foot away.

He was dressed all in black, masked but for his eyes. He wore thick leather gloves and held a long, tapered knife. Perhaps he was Caden, perhaps not, but the figure he cut was unmistakable: an executioner. Before Kelsea could draw breath, he placed the knife against her throat. “Not a sound, or you die.”

Kelsea looked around the room, but there was no help. The door, which she never locked behind her, was locked now. If she screamed, they would come, but not in time.

“Out of the tub.”

Grasping the sides, Kelsea hauled herself up, splattering water to the floor. The assassin backed up slightly, allowing her to climb out, but the knife never left her throat. She stood shivering beside the tub, dripping water on the cold stone. She flushed at her own nakedness, and then stuffed that impulse. A voice spoke up in her head; she didn't know if it was Barty or Mace.

Think.

The assassin took the knife from her throat and placed the tip of it against her left breast.

“Move very slowly.” The cloth of the mask muffled his voice, but Kelsea thought he must be fairly young. She shivered more violently now, and the tip of the knife pricked her, hard.

“Reach up with your right hand, take off your necklace, and hand it to me.”

Kelsea stared at him, bewildered, though she could see nothing but a shadowed pair of eyes behind the black mask. Why not just kill her and take the necklace himself? He meant to kill her anyway, no doubt of that.

He can't take the necklace off himself
.
Or at least he thinks he can't.

“It takes both hands to remove it,” Kelsea replied carefully. “There's a clasp.”

Three hard knocks sounded on the door, making Kelsea jump. Even the assassin was startled; the knife dug deeper into Kelsea's breast, and she hissed with pain, feeling a trickle of blood work its slow way toward her nipple.

“Answer very carefully,” the assassin whispered. His eyes were cold pinpoints of light.

“Yes?”

“Lady?” It was Andalie. “Are you all right?”

“I'm fine,” Kelsea replied easily, steeling herself to feel the knife go in. “I'll ring when it's time to wash my hair.”

The assassin's eyes glinted behind the mask, and Kelsea worked to keep her face expressionless. The pause outside the door seemed very long.

“Yes, Lady,” Andalie replied. Then there was silence.

The assassin listened for perhaps a minute, but there was no sound from outside. Finally he relaxed, easing the pressure of the knife. “The necklace. You can use both hands, but slow. Take it off and hand it to me.”

Kelsea reached up, so slowly that she felt as though she were engaged in some sort of performance. She grabbed the clasp of the necklace and pretended to work at it, knowing that if she took it off, she was dead. Looking past the man in front of her, she saw that one of the flagstones had been lifted up and out of its groove so that a square of darkness broke the smooth pattern of the floor. Time, she needed time.

“Please don't kill me.”

“The necklace. Now.”

“Why?” From the corner of her eye, Kelsea saw movement at the door, the lock, but kept her gaze on his mask. “Why can't you simply take it?”

“Who knows? But I get less money for the necklace than I do for cutting your throat, so don't play with me. Take it off.”

The lock clicked.

At the sound, the assassin whirled, a graceful movement of feet and limbs. He materialized behind her, pressing an arm to her waist and his knife hand against her throat, so quickly that Kelsea was helpless in front of him before the door even opened.

Mace moved slowly into the room. Kelsea glimpsed some ten guards behind him, peering in, then the assassin dug the knife against her throat and her vision blurred.

“No closer, or she dies.”

Mace paused. His face and eyes were wide, disingenuous, almost blank.

“Close and lock the door.”

Mace reached behind him, never taking his eyes from the assassin, and closed the door gently, leaving the rest of the guards outside. He flipped the lock.

“You may reach me, Queen's Guard,” the assassin continued in a low, almost conversational tone, “but not before she dies. Remain where you are, answer my questions, and you prolong her life. Understand?”

Mace nodded. He didn't even look at Kelsea, who gritted her teeth. The assassin took a step backward, pulling her with him, the knife digging deeper into her throat.

“Where's the companion necklace?”

“Only Carroll knew.”

“You lie.” Another step backward. “Both necklaces went with the girl. We know that.”

“Then you know more than me.” Mace splayed his hands. “I delivered the baby with only one necklace on her.”

“Where's the crown?”

“Same answer. Only Carroll knew.”

Another step backward.

The hole in the floor
, Kelsea thought. Did he mean to take her with him? Of course not; they couldn't both fit in there. He meant to cut her throat and then escape. Mace had clearly arrived at the same conclusion, for his eyes flickered between the assassin and the hole in the floor with increasing speed. “You can't hope to escape.”

“Why?”

“I know every hidden passage through this wing.”

“Apparently not.”

Beyond the wall, Kelsea heard the rumble of many voices, the ring of weapons. But they might as well have been a world away. In here, there was only the cool whistling of the man's breath in her ear, shallow and even, without even a hint of anxiety.

“This is your last chance to take off the necklace,” he murmured, digging the knife farther into her throat, forcing her to back up against him. “I might let you live.”

“Piss off,” Kelsea snarled. But beneath her anger she felt a deep throb of despair; had she really gone through everything only to be taken naked and defenseless like this? Was this how history would say she'd died?

The assassin tugged at the sapphire pendant between her breasts, but the chain refused to give. He pulled harder and the chain bit into the back of Kelsea's neck. Kelsea stiffened, fury blooming from nowhere. It was a gift; her fear melted quickly and silently away. She could feel the sapphire now, a throbbing pressure that burned like a pulse inside her mind. With every jerk on the chain, Kelsea became angrier. The sapphire didn't want to be removed.

Why not?
she asked. And although she had not expected an answer, one came smoothly, bubbling up from some dark place inside her mind.
Because I have so much to show you, child.

The voice was alien, incredibly far away. It seemed to be coming to her from a place beyond distance. Kelsea blinked in surprise. The chain wasn't cooperating, and the assassin began to exert more force. His attention was divided now, and Mace knew it; he'd begun circling to the left, his flat gaze moving swiftly between Kelsea, her captor, and the hole in the floor. Kelsea's midriff was smeared with blood, and the arms around her felt like they might have some give. But the knife at her throat remained steady, and Mace was still ten feet away. She didn't dare try to break free.

The assassin gave a tremendous yank at the sapphire now, so hard that the clasp bit cleanly through the flesh at the nape of Kelsea's neck. Her temper snapped and something seemed to break open inside her; heat welled up in her chest, a small explosion of force that pushed her backward. Mace drew his sword with a dry rasp, but he seemed miles away, not a part of this at all. The assassin gave a grunt and the arm around her loosened; a moment later, she heard his body crash to the floor.

“Lady!”

Mace grabbed her, kept her from falling. She opened her eyes and found his face inches away.

“I'm fine, Lazarus. Only a few pinpricks.”

The assassin lay motionless on his back, his limbs sprawled out wildly. Mace let her go and dropped to a crouch over the assassin's body, moving carefully in case of a trick. When he pulled the knife from the man's clenched hand, the fingers didn't even twitch. Kelsea couldn't see a wound, but she knew he was dead. She'd killed him . . . the jewel had killed him. Or was it both? “What happened?”

“Blue light, Lady, from your jewel. I'd never have believed it unless I saw it myself.”

Kelsea suddenly realized that she was stark naked, and Mace seemed to notice only a moment later, tossing her the large white towel that hung beside the bathtub. Kelsea wrapped it around her, ignoring the blood that began to soak through from her left breast, and studied her sapphire. The heat that had flared so suddenly was gone and now the jewel merely hung there, sparkling, a low, deep blue.

Contented with itself
, Kelsea thought.

Mace had bent to the assassin again. He seemed to have no natural revulsion for the corpse, his hands moving over the body, testing, checking for a pulse. “Dead, Lady. Not a mark on him, either.”

Fumbling at the man's neck, he pulled off the black mask to reveal a dark-haired young man with an aristocratic profile and deep red lips. With an inarticulate mutter, Mace rolled the body over, produced a knife from his belt, and cut through the corpse's clothing, ripping the fabric off to reveal a mark branded into the shoulder blade: a hound, its legs outstretched as though running. With a shudder, Kelsea realized that the mark was in the exact same location as her own wound.

“Caden,” Mace muttered.

The din outside had grown louder, and they both seemed to notice it at once; Mace popped up from his crouch and went to the door, knocking softly. “It's Mace. Hold your weapons.”

Opening the door slowly, he beckoned Elston into the room. More guards followed, swords drawn, staring first at Kelsea and then at the man on the floor. Coryn came running in with his kit, but Mace held up his hands. “The Queen's only scratched.”

Kelsea made a face. She
was
only scratched, but her wounds were starting to hurt badly now that the adrenaline was leaving her body. The skin above her nipple felt rubbed raw by the rough material of the towel. She touched an exploratory hand to her throat and it came away smeared with crimson. Resigned, she watched Coryn pull out a thin white strip of cloth and soak it with disinfectant. She wished he would let her get dressed first. She didn't want all of these men to see her bare arms and legs. Then she felt even worse. Vanity. Her mother's hallmark, and Kelsea wanted nothing of her mother. For one wild moment, she thought of simply dropping the towel, just to make the point. But she didn't have the courage.

Mace was staring down at the hole in the floor. Kelsea couldn't see his face, but the set of his shoulders spoke volumes. Before she could say a word, he drew his sword, leaped into the hole, and disappeared from sight. No one seemed to find this odd. Several of her guards surrounded the assassin's corpse, staring at it like doctors preparing to diagnose.

“Traitors all, God help us,” Galen muttered, and the men around him nodded.

“The Regent?” Cae asked.

“Not a chance. This is Thorne.”

“We'll never prove it,” Mhurn said, shaking his head.

“Who is this man?” Kelsea asked, clutching the towel tightly around her. Coryn pressed the cloth to her neck, and she hissed and bit down on her lip. Whatever his disinfectant was, it stung like a bastard.

“A lord of the Graham house, Lady,” a new guard told her. “We thought them loyal to your mother.”

Kelsea didn't recognize the guard, but she knew his voice. After a moment she realized, bemused, that it was Dyer. He'd shaved his red beard. “Dyer, is that your face under there?”

Dyer flushed bright red. Pen snorted gleefully, and Kibb clapped Dyer on the back. “I told him, Lady . . . now we can see every time he blushes.”

“Where have you been, Dyer?”

The door to the chamber slammed back against the wall. All of them whirled around, Kelsea with a small shriek, as Mace stormed in. His cheeks were stained wine-red and his dark eyes burned so fiercely that Kelsea almost expected them to throw sparks. Mace's voice was the bellow of a wrathful God. “PEN!”

Pen darted forward. “Sir.”

“From now on, you'll be the Queen's close guard. You won't leave her side for a moment, do you understand? Not for a moment, not ever.”

“Lazarus,” Kelsea interrupted, as gently as she could, “this isn't your fault.”

Mace's teeth clenched, his eyes darting desperately, like caged things. Kelsea was suddenly afraid that he might strike her.

“Not for a moment, sir,” Pen replied, and went to stand in front of Kelsea, pointedly shielding her from the rest of the guard.

Mace turned back to the room at large, pointing at the hole in the floor. “That's a tunnel, lads. I knew about it, but I wasn't concerned. You know why? Because it runs beneath three chambers and comes out in one of the empty ones down the hall.”