Death Comes To All (Book 1) (50 page)

“
I
told you Loretta, I can’t stay. I wish I could. If I stayed
here Bloodheart would find this place eventually. I know how much you
want me to stay with you, but I can’t put you in danger like
that. It was the reason that I left.”

The
blond woman stood up and walked over to him, closing the distance
between them with one quick step. So quickly even Raiste couldn’t
follow, she raised her hand and slapped him hard across the face. The
dragonling raised its head immediately, glaring at her angrily.

She
raised her hand a second time, as if to hit him again, and the small
creature hissed in warning, the fiery crest on his back coming up in
a clear, undisguised threat display. She seemed to think better of it
then, instead sitting down on the arm of the chair he was sitting on.
Raiste doubted that it had been Trick that had dissuaded her. After a
moment the small animal decided that his friend wasn’t in
danger after all, and settled back down to the curled position he had
taken before.

“
That’s
not what this is about,” she said, choking back on her anger.
“I am my father’s daughter Raiste, and a master assassin
in my own right. I’m not some inexperienced little girl, pining
over a lost love. When you left I was barely eighteen, little more
than a child. Now I’m a woman, and I know exactly who I am. You
would do well to remember that.”

“
I’m
sorry,” he said quickly. “You’re absolutely right.
Whatever reasons you have for wanting me to stay don’t change
things though. I won’t be able to stay. Staying here would
bring Bloodheart right to your door. I won’t risk that. I have
too much respect for your father, and care too much about you, to
ever do that. I only came now because I needed information. I’ll
have to be getting back soon. I have the battle mage hidden away
right now, but he won’t stay hidden for long. I have to get
back to him soon.”

“
Father
didn’t die of a heart attack,” she said suddenly, her
voice choked with emotion.

“
What
do you mean? It was an assassin from your guild that told me he had
died. He told me it was a heart attack. Why would he have lied to me?
If it wasn’t a heart attack, how did your father die?”

“
He
was murdered,” she answered, her tiny voice wavering.

She
was normally a strong woman, powerful both in mind and in body. Even
when he had left, when she was only just coming into adulthood, she
had held the commanding presence and bearing of her father. Now,
however, Raiste was reminded just how small she really was. Only once
before had she ever seemed so tiny to him as she did now. The day he
left.

Even
after fifteen years, little changes.

“
It
was reported as a heart attack because it was made to look like one,”
she continued. “Even when I first heard it, I couldn’t
believe it. You remember how he was. He was strong as an ox. There
was nothing at all wrong with his heart.”

“
Sometimes
it seems that way, but we both know that’s not always the case.
He could have been sick for years without us knowing. He wouldn’t
have told us. That was just his way.”

“
I
know. However I also know that sometimes things get overlooked,
especially if the doctor doing the report is tired and overworked. So
I decided to look into it myself. Everything seemed normal, until I
looked in his mouth. His tongue was completely black.”

Raiste immediately understood what she meant. There was
a poison that induced all the symptoms of a heart attack, including
death, that most examiners wouldn’t find. He had used it on a
few occasions himself.

It wasn’t the examiners fault, he knew. Generally
they would check the body on the same day the person died. It
wouldn’t be until three or four days after death that the
telltale signs would appear. First the tongue would turn black, soon
followed by the skin underneath the fingernails and toenails. Most
bodies were either buried or burned before then, but Martin would
have been entombed in his family’s vault. Loretta could still
have examined him there.

“
How
could he have been poisoned? He was always so careful. When I left
here he rarely left the guild halls. What could have changed that
would have taken him into danger?”

“
That’s
just it, nothing had changed. Nothing at all. He was more cautious
after you left then he was while you were here. He almost never left.
He had to have been killed here, in the guild!”

“
Why
would anyone have done that?” No one had anything to gain by
killing him. He was surrounded by friends while he was in this hall.
Everyone loved him.”

“
I
have no idea. I’ve been trying to answer that very same
question since I first discovered that he hadn’t died of
natural causes. He had enemies, certainly; you can’t become the
leader of an assassin's guild without acquiring at least a few of
them. But inside these halls there shouldn’t have been anyone
who would dare to do him harm.”

“
So
that would be why you have those bodyguards, just in case whoever
killed your father tries to go after you too.”

“
They
are mostly for show, actually. You know me well enough to know that
those men wouldn’t be able to do anything against someone that
I couldn’t handle myself. I’m hoping that whoever killed
my father sees them as a sign of weakness in me. So far no one has
tried to take the bait, unfortunately. It’s far more likely
that whoever it was wasn’t here to kill my father, but was
simply a spy, and that he was afraid that my father found out about
him. Keep in mind, he wasn’t killed by an assassin's dagger, he
was killed by poison. That’s something that would have been
much more difficult to accomplish with someone as cautious as my
father was.”

Raiste couldn’t disagree with any part of that.
She was good, better than he was actually. As skilled as they both
were though, neither of them could hold a candle to Martin. Raiste
had always wondered why someone as skilled as his former teacher was
always so careful, as if everyone was likely to try to kill him at
any moment.

“
Could
he really have suspected someone in the guild?”

“
I’m
sure of it. It had to have been someone close to him too, someone who
could have slipped the poison into his cup without anyone, including
my father, ever knowing about it.”

“
Any
idea who it could have been?”

“
I
don’t know of anyone who he trusted enough to get that close to
him. Besides the two of us, the number of people he trusted that much
could be counted on one hand, and I was the only one anywhere near
this city at the time. Perhaps the killer slipped it into a bottle of
wine or a bit of food. I’ve never found anything, but it’s
the only possible way I could think of. Even that would have been
difficult. My father never left anything to chance.

“
Listen
Raiste, at least stay for a little while. Surely you’ll be safe
for a month or two, long enough for you to be able to travel with
more safety than you can now. While you’re here maybe you can
keep an extra eye open for me. You’re the one person that I
know I can trust Raiste, and trust is in short supply right now.”

“
Perhaps
I can stay for a little while,” he ventured. “It won’t
be for very long though. I still have friends waiting for me.”

“
Ah
yes, I remember. You said the battle mage was waiting for your return
somewhere. I could have word sent to him....”

“
No,”
he said at once. “No offense, but I wouldn’t trust anyone
with that secret. Besides, right now we don’t know who in the
guild we can really trust. I can’t risk the wrong person
finding out where I have him hidden.”

“
You’re
right, of course. I should have thought of that.”

“
You
would have thought of it before you sent anyone,” he answered
confidently, certain that she would have. Her father chose well when
he made her the leader. She wasn’t the type of person to do
anything without thinking it through first.

“
So,
since you’re going to stay for at least a little while longer,
we might as well enjoy ourselves.” She edged herself a little
closer to him from the edge of the chair where she sat. This close,
her tiny form gave off a heady smell.

Whatever
perfume she’s using is strong,
he
thought.
I think I like it.

“
I
remember how I threw myself at you the last time you were here,
before you left. You turned me down then.”

“
Yes,
but I knew I was going to be leaving soon. You were still a young
girl. I didn’t want you to do something then that you were
going to regret later on. I cared too much for you to risk that.”

“
Well,
I’m not a little girl anymore. I’m a grown woman.”

That said, Loretta bent down over him, pushing her lips
strongly into his. It took him by surprise. There was so much power
in that little form of hers. He recovered quickly, however, and
returned her kiss with a passion that, he hoped, came close to
matching hers. Trick, not wanting anything to do with what was going
on, flew over to land on the chair behind the desk, as far from the
two as the little room would allow.

She pulled him off of the chair, practically dragging
him across the room before throwing down onto the longer couch. She
landed on top of him, pinning him there. For a split second he
considered what he was doing. He was going to have to leave again
soon, he knew.

Yes,
but she’s certainly not a little girl anymore. She’s a
grown woman. Unlike before, she knows exactly what she’s doing.

Chapter Seventeen

The
next two months passed in a complete state of absolute bliss for
Drom. They had agreed that what had happened had been nothing more
than two friends enjoying each others company, he remembered that
clearly, and yet it quickly became obvious to him that what was going
on between him and Raine was something much more than that.

For
one thing, they no longer slept in separate rooms, nor had they since
that first night. They still kept their things in their own rooms,
granted, but each night, without fail, Raine either joined Drom in
his bed, or asked him to join her in hers.

For
his part, Drom had never slept more comfortably in his life. He had
worried at first, when it became obvious that Raine planned on
spending more nights in his bed, that he might find it difficult to
sleep with her next to him. He had slept alone all his life, and
would not be used to such presence.

Much
to his surprise, the exact opposite seemed to be true. The warmth of
her body next to him, usually curled up tightly in his arms, felt
more natural than sleeping alone ever had. Even the little noises she
made while she slept, more of a purring sound than a snore, helped to
relax him into slumber each night.

Little
changed, however, during their days. Each day they would spend a
small amount of time practicing, more time together fishing, and then
relax in the living room in front of the fireplace each night. It was
an easy, carefree time.

Raine
did add one additional piece to their daily routine, one which Drom
agreed to quickly. Every day after they finished their workout, they
spent a small amount of time slowly cleaning the massive building
they had made their home. One day they would dust the walls, another
the floors, methodically cleaning each room, one at a time.

Drom
was surprised at the true scale of the Hut. After they had finished
the first fifteen rooms, he stopped counting. It wasn’t as if
most of the work was difficult. It was more dust than anything else
really, just as it had been in his room the first night he had
arrived.

When
they came across the room where the roof had caved in, crushed under
a thick tree, Raine bypassed it, explaining that for the moment it
would be a better use of their time to finish the other rooms first
before returning to that one. As long as they kept the thick door
closed, it shouldn’t make the rest of the building too cold,
she assured him. He hadn’t been worried, the rooms and halls
were warm enough on the coldest of days, but he refrained from
telling her so.

He
wondered at her sudden desire to clean the huge home, especially
considering that it was obvious to him early on that no one had done
so in generations. Raiste and Raine had only cleaned out the few
rooms that they had used, but that had left dozens of rooms
untouched. Now, she seemed intent on cleaning every room in the
entire place. It was strange, Drom thought, considering it was still
only the two of them.

What
would Raiste think about it when he got back,
he wondered?

The
unknown fate of their friend was, in fact, the only real worry that
he had felt during all that time. They had expected Raiste to return
after only a month, perhaps a month and a half at most. Now nearly
three months had passed, and still he had yet to arrive.