Weapon of Flesh (31 page)

See that the boy eats!
she thought venomously. 
See that his clothes are cleaned!  See that he continues his exercises!  See that he understands the instructions!
  She turned a corner to the cellar stair and almost bowled over the guard who was posted there.  He moved out of her way without a word and she wrenched the door open and started down.  “Next it’ll be ‘See that the boy wipes his
ass
properly!’” she growled under her breath as the door slammed.

She strode through the sparring room, studiously ignoring the two swordmasters from the Mercenary’s Guild waiting patiently for their morning bout with the Grandfather.  He sparred every morning, she’d come to learn, usually with the best-trained professionals the martial guilds could offer.  He paid handsomely for the service, and even more handsomely for services from other guilds.

Mya shuddered with that thought, slamming the next door behind her and descending the stairs into the Grandfather’s interrogation chamber.

“More like torture chamber,” she said to herself, slowing her pace and unlocking the door.  She pushed it open carefully, though she knew not why she was showing such trepidation.  Lad sat upon the same stone slab where she’d seen him bound and unconscious less than two days before.  The restraints had been removed; it was now his bed.  He sat placidly, legs folded, hands on his knees, his palms up and open.  His eyes were closed.

Meditation
, she thought, descending the few steps to the floor and wondering why anyone would teach a weapon to meditate. 
Might as well teach a sword to play three-card mango
!

“I’ve got your instructions for tonight, Lad,” she stated flatly, stopping a stride in front of him.  She noticed that the silk pants and shirt she’d sent down were sitting folded next to him, clean and ready to be put on.  He wore only a short breechcloth, and she noticed that his skin shone with the sheen of sweat.

He didn’t respond to her at all, even to the extent of opening his eyes.  She tried a more direct approach.  “You’ve been exercising?”

He didn’t even twitch.

Mya’s temper, left over from her less-than-satisfying breakfast with her master, suddenly burst into a rage.  How
dare
this slave boy ignore her.  She was a professional, a Journeyman in the Guild!

“Wake up!” she shouted, but there was no more response than before.  This was intolerable!  “Wake UP!”  Her open palm lashed across his face with a report like the crack of a coachman’s whip.

Lad sat perfectly still as her handprint flushed red on his cheek and slowly faded.

Mya’s anger smoldered like a bed of coals.  He had been ordered to follow her commands, and now he was ignoring her.  He was supposedly controlled by magic—she had seen the effect the Grandfather’s words had on him—but if he’d been ordered to obey her, why would he not?

“You have been ordered to obey me, Lad,” she said dangerously, her hand on her dagger.  “Now, open your eyes and get off that table.”

She jumped back as his eyes suddenly snapped open and he vaulted off the table to stand perfectly still before her.  His face still bore that same placid expression, as if he were half-asleep.

“You were awake the whole time,” she snapped accusatively.  “You heard every word I said!”

He remained perfectly still, his eyes not even tracking her.  She was beginning to wonder if his mind had fled, or if she were being goaded. 
Yes, that must be it!
she realized, letting her anger ebb. 
He’s trying to goad me into killing him!  He doesn’t want to be a slave, and he knows the only way he’ll ever be free is to die.
  She stood there, amazed at his stoicism.

“Why didn’t you respond to me earlier?  Answer me.”

“You did not say or do anything that required my response,” he stated flatly, his eyes remaining fixed to a point just over her left shoulder.

“You didn’t wake up when I ordered you to.  How do you figure that didn’t ‘require your response?’”

“I did not respond because your order could not be followed.”

“What?  What do you mean?”

“I was not asleep.  I could not wake up.”

“Hmph!”  She glared at him, disgusted with his childish taunt.  “But you knew I wanted you to answer me.  You were just being insolent.”  He remained silent, a statue hewn from flesh.  “You were baiting me, admit it.”

“I do not know what you mean by ‘baiting’.”  His eyes shifted slightly toward her, and then back.  “I cannot answer your question.”

“You’re still doing it.  You’re trying to make me angry.  I know you have enough free will to do as you wish within the bounds of your orders, Lad.”  She smiled, knowing she was right in her surmise.  “You hope to make me angry enough to kill you.  Isn’t that right?”

“Yes.”

“Well, it’s not going to work.  Now sit down.  We’ve got a lot to cover before tonight, so pay attention.  You have two targets to eliminate before morning.”

“You mean two people to kill, don’t you?”  He sat on the slab, legs folded, staring at her with those strange eyes of his.

“Yes, that’s exactly what I mean.  Now pay attention.”  She unrolled the scroll from her belt.  “The first is the nephew of Duke Mir himself.  He is of middle age and is not in line for the Duke’s title, which is probably why he and the Duke are so close.  His estate is well guarded and he is a capable fighter.  He has a wife and two children, and a mistress he keeps in a flat in Westmarket.  That’s where he’ll be tonight.”

“What’s his name?

“What?  Why would you want to know that?”

“I want to know the people I kill.”

“Why?”

“Because not knowing them, not caring about them, would be evil.  I am not evil.”

He said the last with such calm assurance that it took Mya off guard.  She had never really thought of herself as evil, but she supposed that her profession could not really be called good or honorable.  But she’d also grown up fighting everything and everyone around her just to survive; she had seen real evil, and snuffing out the lives of a few fat nobles in their sleep didn’t hold a candle in comparison.

“His name is Treyland Vossek Mir.  Happy?”

“No, Mya.  I am not happy.”  He offered nothing else: no explanation, no thanks and no feeling.

“Fine, then.”  She laid the map of Westmarket flat on the slab beside him and indicated a building with her fingertip.  “This is where the mistress lives.  He usually takes her to one of the eating establishments nearby.  They eat, share a bottle of wine and go back to her place for sex.”

“What is that?”

“What is what?”

“Secks,” he said, mispronouncing the word slightly.

“You’re joking.”

He looked at her with eyes that seemed to her incapable of joking.

“I am not.  I do not know the word.”

“Well, I’m not going to explain it to you.”  She changed maps in a rush, pointing out the woman’s flat in the corner of the building.  “She lives above a clothier.  They sleep after, and that’s the best time to strike.  Just wait for the sound of their breathing to change, then kill him.”  She handed over the dagger he was to use.  It was identical to the ones he’d used the night before.

“Same technique,” she said, handing over a rolled parchment, “different message.”

He placed the dagger and the scroll on his clothing, his face impassive.

“As for the rest of it, your orders are the same as the two last night.  Don’t be seen, don’t kill anyone you don’t have to and don’t leave any clues that might implicate the Assassin’s Guild.”

“What about the woman?”

“Don’t kill her unless she sees you well enough to recognize you.”  She thought his face might have twitched slightly at that, and wondered why.

“Choose the way in that is the quietest and least likely to get you spotted.”

“What about guards?” he asked, drawing a suspicious glance from her.

“This is a woman’s flat in a working quarter of the city, Lad.  There aren’t any guards.”

“Okay.”

“Any other questions?  We’ve got one more to go over.”

“Yes.”  His eyes left the map and drew hers like a magnet.  “Will you help me kill the Grandfather?”

She felt the blood leave her face as she stumbled back a step.  Would she
what?
  She set her jaw and glared at him.  He was trying to make her angry again.

“I told you to stop trying to goad me!”

“I am not.”

“Then you’re stupid, Lad,” she scoffed, retrieving another parchment from her belt.  “You can’t
seriously
expect me to help you assassinate the Grandfather.  Now pay attention.  This is your second target.”  She pinned the parchment flat for him to see.

“I do not expect you to help me, Mya,” he said, his attention on the map, “but you have done many other things that I have not expected.  I could not know if you would help me or not, unless I asked.”

“Well, now you know.  Don’t ever ask me that again!”

He did not respond, his attention on the map as she had ordered.  The subject had been dropped—forgotten, she hoped.  If the Grandfather even caught a hint that Lad was trying to persuade her to kill her master, her life wouldn’t be worth spit.

 Chapter
XIX

“Y
ou there!”  Captain Norwood advanced on the hapless corporal, pinning him to the side of the carriage with a fist pressed to the man’s chest.  “What’s your explanation for this?  Viscount Dovek dead and not so much as a decent description of the assassin?  Were all four of you sleeping?”

“No, Sir!”  The man was sweating despite the cool night air, and with good reason.  The Captain would have him busted to private and cleaning sewer pipes in The Sprawls by morning if he found out any of the squad had been negligent in their duty.

“Then explain to me how the one man the four of you were told to protect is dead, while none of you have so much as a scratch!”

“It happened too fast, Sir!” the poor man said, obviously shaken.  “We were all on watch, three of us on the outside of the carriage and Mori inside, sittin’ right across from the Viscount.  One second we were rumblin’ along Wyvern Street, then we rounded the corner onto East Run, and out of nowhere this thin shape comes leapin’ out of the shadows and right through the carriage window without even touching the casement.  By the time Mori even got his dagger out, the deed was done and the culprit out the other side window!  Says he never seen nobody move that fast!  All he saw was a blur of black.”

“The assassin came through
that
window?” the Captain asked skeptically, inspecting the small square portal in the carriage’s door.  It was no more than twice the width of his outstretched hand. “And the carriage was moving?”

“Yes, Sir!  Not fast, but we were movin’ along at a jog, I’d say.”

“Have you been chewing lotus, Corporal?  Nobody could get through that window at a run!”

“I wouldn’t have thought so either, Sir, but that’s what happened.  Truth be told, Clem was the only one to see the culprit comin’.  Didn’t see nothin’ but a black shape, thin, maybe an elf.  The feller just took three runnin’ steps from where he was hidin’, and dove right through.  The carriage lurched when he hit the far wall inside, but by the time anyone could even so much as yell, he was out the other side and the Viscount was-- well, like you see him, Sir.”

“Blast!”  The captain released the man and wrenched open the door of the carriage.  The young Viscount sat there, his head pinned to the back of the carriage seat by a long stiletto, a tightly rolled note secured to the hilt with a black ribbon.  “I can’t believe this!  And the bastard
told
us!”

“Sir?”  The corporal’s confused shock begged for an explanation.  Norwood wasn’t usually inclined to offering information to his guardsmen, but the man had been through a lot, and deserved something.

“Three days ago the Count’s wife was murdered in their bed while he slept next to her.  Same method.  Same note.  The assassin is telling us who’s next and when.  There have been four more killings between then and now, two each night, and different notes and dates with each telling when the next person in that particular noble family will be killed.  Two barons, another count and the Duke himself have lost family members.  Now the assassin’s making good his promises, and it looks like there’s nothing we can do to stop him.”