Lord of the Shadows (14 page)

irk forgot about the basket maker's daughter until he returned to the
Tsarina
with Kirsh just after first sunrise. One of the sailors informed him that his “lady friend” was installed in his cabin, awaiting his return.

“Your
lady
friend?” Kirsh asked, looking at him oddly.

Dirk swore under his breath before he answered. “I took the basket maker's daughter hostage as a condition of his and his wife's release.”

“I see,” Kirsh replied thoughtfully. “Is she pretty?”

Dirk rolled his eyes with exasperation. “That's not why I brought her here, Kirsh. I thought it would be easier to get the father to admit he had something to do with Misha's escape if he thought his family was threatened.”

“And did he confess?”

“Not yet.”

“You mean he called your bluff,” Kirsh shrugged, coldly indifferent. “Well, just don't let your…off-duty activities…interfere with your other duties.”

The prince was angry with him, Dirk knew. And still blaming him for Misha's disappearance. If any harm came to Misha in the Baenlands, Kirsh might never get over it. There was nothing to be gained by telling Kirsh why he had taken Caterina Farlo as his hostage, though, so he didn't bother. He was in no mood to explain himself to a man who had summarily executed nearly a dozen innocent people for no good reason, anyway.

“I'd better go see to her.”

“I want to meet with the fleet captains after dinner,” Kirsh announced. “I'll expect you to be there.”

“Of course, your highness,” Dirk agreed, and then made his way below, wondering what he was supposed to do with Caterina Farlo.

When he opened the cabin door, the girl backed up against the bunk, holding a fruit knife out in front of her with a snarl.

“Take one step toward me and I'll cut off your balls,” she declared savagely.

Like mother, like daughter
, Dirk thought with a sigh. He closed the door and approached her. She waved the knife at him threateningly.

“I mean it!”

“I'm quite sure you do,” he agreed, snatching the knife from her grasp. She stumbled backward and landed on the bunk.

“I'll scream!”

“In your position, I probably would, too,” Dirk agreed.
“But as I have no intention of raping you, it'd be a bit of wasted effort, wouldn't it?”

Caterina Farlo glared at him suspiciously. She was quite plump, and not very tall, but she was endowed with a flawless complexion and thick, wavy blond hair.

“What do you want with me then?”

“Actually, I don't really want you at all,” he answered. “Your father was supposed to agree to my offer without any other sort of persuasion. But your mother put paid to that idea. What
am
I going to do with you?”

“You're not going to give me to the sailors, are you?” she asked. Something in her voice made him look at her askance.

“
No
. Did you want me to?”

“Of course not!”

“I was just asking,” he said with a faint smile. “I suppose I could find you something useful to do. Can you cook?”

“Can I
cook
?” she snapped, insulted by the question. “What sort of well-bred woman can't cook?”

“I could name one,” Dirk replied, thinking of Tia. He also thought Caterina was repeating her mother's words, rather than expressing her own opinion. Gilda Farlo obviously left a considerable influence on her daughters.

He considered the problem for a time as he pocketed the fruit knife.

“I suppose if I'm not to send you belowdecks to be ravished, you might be able to help the cook. You're not going to do anything stupid like jumping overboard, are you? We're really in a bit of a hurry, and we'll be too far from the coast for you to swim back to Tolace by tomorrow.” He glanced around the cabin with a frown. “We'll have to find you somewhere to sleep, too, I suppose.”

Caterina watched him closely, her expression confused. “You're not anything like I was expecting,” she said.

“And just what were you expecting?”

“I've heard all sorts of horrible things about you. I thought you'd be older, though. And nastier.”

“I'm sorry if I disappoint you,” he said, wondering what
else the rumors said about him. “Perhaps before this voyage is over I can do something brutal enough to restore your opinion of me.”

For the first time, Caterina smiled. “My sisters are going to be
so
jealous.”

“Why would they be jealous?”

“Because I was the one who got taken hostage. I've been kidnapped! And not just by anybody, but by the Butcher of Elcast, no less. I'm on the Lion of Senet's flagship. I'll get to meet a real prince. And I get to go on a sea voyage without Mama around. I've never been out of Tolace before.” Caterina sounded as if she was rather warming to the idea of being carried off by an evil nobleman bent on ravaging her. “Where are we going, anyway? Somewhere exotic? Kalarada? Or maybe the islands of Galina? I hear the woman there don't wear any clothes at all.” Although she acted scandalized, Caterina had obviously decided to treat this interesting change in her circumstances as if it were a grand adventure.

Dirk shook his head. “I'm sorry to disappoint you, but we're going to the Baenlands.”

“Why? There's nothing there but pirates and poppies.”

“How do you know that?” Dirk asked, rather bemused by her attitude.

“I know someone from the Baenlands,” she announced smugly. “She told me all about it.”

“Really?”

“She did!” Caterina boasted. “She was staying at our house before… well, before all that trouble started at the Hospice.” Caterina shut her mouth abruptly, realizing she had said too much.

Dirk stared at her in surprise. “You spoke to
Tia
?”

“Who?”

“I mean Tasha,” he corrected, guessing Tia had not used her real name.

“Will I be in trouble if I say yes?” she asked doubtfully.

“You've already been taken hostage, Caterina,” he pointed out. “I've released your parents and I've promised you won't be harmed. What more can I do to you?”

She thought it over for a moment, then nodded. “She borrowed some of my clothes. They didn't fit her very well.”

“How did she seem?”
Was she angry? Hurt? Was she the one who told you about the vicious reputation of the Butcher of Elcast?
There were so many questions Dirk wanted to ask. So many things he could
never
ask, for Tia's protection as much as his own.

“She seemed all right, I suppose, why?”

“No reason.” Dirk shrugged. “Although you might want to forget you saw her. I had a lot of explaining to do when I let your parents go free. It rather negates all my hard work if you start bragging you and Tasha were swapping clothes.”

“We weren't
swapping
clothes,” she objected. “It was raining, that's all, and her clothes were wet.”

“Whatever the reason, do us both a favor and just pretend you never heard of her. I can only protect you up to a point, Caterina. If Prince Kirshov learned you'd been consorting with Tia Veran, there'd be nothing I could do to stop him doing whatever he chose with you.”

Caterina appeared to take the warning seriously. She nodded and looked around the small stateroom. “I could sleep on the floor in here.”

“Wouldn't you rather somewhere more comfortable?”

She shook her head. “I don't know anybody else on the ship.”

“You don't know me, either.”

“Maybe.” Caterina shrugged. “But you've said you won't hurt me.”

“I might be lying,” he suggested, wondering what he'd done to engender such trust. Then it occurred to Dirk her willingness to remain probably had little to do with trust. Caterina's adventure would not be nearly so exciting if she couldn't tell her sisters how she had been held prisoner in the cabin of the wicked Butcher of Elcast.
Why couldn't Boris Farlo have had five sons?
Dirk thought wistfully. Then he could have sent the young man to work belowdecks and not spared him another thought for the rest of the voyage.

Why do I keep complicating my life by doing these stupid, stupid things?

Caterina shrugged. “I'm your prisoner now, my lord. It's not like you'd have to seduce me, or anything, if you wanted to …you know… take advantage of me …”

A little alarmed, Dirk studied her for a moment. Apparently, Caterina's adventure was not going to be complete without a little romance. She had shifted slightly on the bunk so her more than ample cleavage was all he could see when he looked down at her. And she was smiling at him. Dirk had a bad feeling she was trying to be alluring.

“I have to go,” he said brusquely.

“When will you be back?”

“I don't know.”

“Did you want me to wait up for you?”

Dirk stared at her, shaking his head in despair. “
No.
”

Caterina settled herself back onto the bunk. She looked far too comfortable for his liking. “I'll probably wait up anyway. Then you can tell me all about your day when you get back.”

Dirk fled the cabin, still cursing under his breath as he slammed the door behind him and went to meet with Kirsh and the fleet captains to discuss the invasion of Mil.

irsh still suspected that Dirk had tricked him into letting Tia Veran go free so she could kidnap Misha and draw them into an ambush. The notion refused to go away. Dirk denied it, of course, and Kirsh couldn't bring the matter to his father's attention without implicating himself in the affair, so he had no choice but to live with the uncertainty that went with his guilt, hoping against hope that he was wrong.

The fleet slowed as they reached Daven Isle, the ships reducing their sail and tacking against the wind as they prepared
to enter the Bandera Straits. The small rocky island was home to so many roosting birds the cliffs were stained white with their droppings. It was still some distance away, but the faint screeching from its thousands of winged residents drifted clearly across the water. Here the pirates awaited their prey, catching Senetian traders as they readied themselves for the tricky currents and fickle winds of the narrow Straits. With smaller, more maneuverable craft, their intimate knowledge of the hidden rocks around Daven Isle, and their ability to flee into the Spakan River delta, the pirates were unstoppable.

But not today, Kirsh mused as Dirk came to stand beside him on the foredeck. There was no sign of any pirate ships in the Straits. He thought that meant they were still in the bay farther upriver, beyond the delta. At least he hoped they were. Once his fleet entered the delta, there would be no escape for the pirates.

“Captain Clegg was wondering if we should heave to and wait for second sunrise tomorrow before we proceed,” he remarked to Dirk.

“I'd recommend waiting,” Dirk advised. “The instructions we have refer quite specifically to the position of the second sun. I don't think we should tackle the delta with only the first sun to light our way.”

Although not happy about the need to wait, Kirsh nodded in agreement. Since hearing the instructions the Goddess had given Marqel, he had suspected they could only safely be followed during the day. As for the other implications of his beloved now being the High Priestess of the Shadowdancers and the Voice of the Goddess—he was trying very hard not to think about them at all.

“I think I'll have the
Hand of Fate
and the
Azure
take up position near the entrance to the delta anyway,” he decided. “I don't want any pirate ships slipping by us before second sunrise tomorrow.”

Dirk glanced back at the two following ships and the half-dozen more spread out behind them. “Are you planning to take all these ships through the delta? The bay of Mil isn't that big, you know. It's going to get awfully crowded in
there, and you'll have precious little room to maneuver if you need it.”

“I'm glad you brought that up,” Kirsh told him. “We need to discuss how we're going to attack their defenses.”

“What defenses?” Dirk scoffed. “It's a village smaller than Tolace, Kirsh.”

“So you keep telling me,” he said, his tone leaving no doubt about how unreliable he considered that information. “I can't believe they have no defenses at all.”

“Up until now, the delta has been all the protection they needed.”

Kirsh was still not sure he believed Dirk. He had a sneaking suspicion he was sailing into a trap. Would Mil prove to be as defenseless as Dirk promised? Or was there a whole army hiding in there, waiting to wipe out his invasion force? Was that why Dirk was advising him not to take all his ships through the delta? Was he trying to help, or was he trying to even the odds a little for his friends?

“How many fighting men do they have?”

“I couldn't really say,” Dirk shrugged.

“You can't or you won't?”

“I can't,” Dirk assured him. “There are simply too many variables, Kirsh. Their ships may not be in port, which will significantly reduce the number of men they can throw into a fight. Or they may have gotten word we were heading for the delta and fled the settlement.”

“How could they know something like that?”

Dirk shook his head. He seemed amused. “Look around you, Kirsh. You don't think you can sail out of Avacas with a fleet this large without somebody working out where it's headed, do you? Senet isn't at war. The only logical place a fleet this big
could
be heading is Mil. And, whether you like it or not, there are plenty of Dhevynian sympathizers in Senet who could have sent them word.”

“Including you?”

“Sure,” he agreed. “I sent word to the Baenlanders to warn them of the attack. That's why they hired an assassin to come after me. Out of gratitude.”

“It could have been a feint. An attack simply to convince us you really had betrayed them.”

Dirk looked at him for a moment and then shook his head in amazement. “Have
you
ever used a crossbow, Kirsh?”

“Yes.”

“And you honestly believe I arranged to have a Brotherhood assassin nick my ear, just to make it look good?”

Kirsh looked away, annoyed by Dirk's amusement. Admittedly, the chance of such a thing was remote, and it would make Dirk courageous beyond imagining if it were true. What had he heard Belagren say once?
When all other explanations had been discarded, the one left, no matter how unlikely, was probably the truth
. Which meant Dirk had betrayed the Baenlanders and joined the Shadowdancers because he really
had
seen the light, and not for a more sinister reason. But Kirsh wouldn't know for certain until they sailed through the delta. Until then, a core of distrust lay heavy in his stomach, like the remnants of a bad meal.

“Let's assume the worst, then,” he said, pushing away his irritation to concentrate on the problem at hand. “If their ships are in port, how many men do we face?”

“Men? More than a hundred, maybe two hundred. Not all their ships berth in Mil, though. Quite a few simply call in every now and then, to bring supplies and news. Not every ship sailing the delta is crewed by brigands, Kirsh.”

“If they're in Mil when I get there, that's exactly what they are, Dirk.”

“Then be prepared to face every man, woman and child in the settlement who can pick up a weapon. They won't give in easily.”

“What about escape routes? Can they flee upriver?”

“Some of them might try, but it will only mean they'll take a little longer to die. There's nothing upriver but barren lava flows.”

“Where are they likely to be holding Misha?”

“Either down in the village or up at Johan's house.”

“What sort of fortifications does the house have?”

Dirk smiled. “Ah… now that's going to be a
real
challenge.

There'll probably be at least two, maybe as many as
three
women in there protecting it, and then there's that nasty, wide-open veranda that goes all the way around. Are you sure you have enough men to handle it, Kirsh?”

“If you're going to be so cynical about this, Dirk, why did you bother coming?”

Dirk leaned on the railing and studied the horizon thoughtfully. “I wasn't given a choice, remember?”

“You could at least pretend to have some enthusiasm for the task.”

“I'm brimming with enthusiasm, Kirsh,” Dirk said. “But the word
overkill
leaps to mind. You're taking a thousand men into battle to round up a couple of hundred women and children. It's not that I lack enthusiasm for your cause. I'm simply overwhelmed by your Senetian tendency toward excess.”

“Then why do I get the feeling you're always laughing at us, Dirk?”

“I don't know,” his cousin shrugged. “Maybe it's because deep down, even you think your methods are laughable sometimes, and if
you
think that, then you assume everybody else must think the same.”

Kirsh had been acquainted with Dirk long enough to know better than to get into an argument with him about…
anything
. He could twist things around worse than a Tribunal Advocate, but somehow, Kirsh never seemed to learn.

“When we land tomorrow, you're not to go ashore until I tell you it's safe.”

“I'm touched by your concern.”

“I'm
concerned
you'll have a change of heart when the killing begins.”

“It won't be a change of heart, Kirsh. You know quite well how I feel about needless killing.”

“I abhor needless bloodshed as much as you do, Dirk,” Kirsh reminded him. “It's in the definition of
needless
that we differ.”

“A few hundred corpses aren't going to bring Misha back if he's already dead,” Dirk pointed out.

“If Misha is dead, Dirk, you won't need to count the corpses. I'll reduce Mil, and everyone in it, to ashes.”

When Dirk didn't reply, he turned to look out over the blood-red sea.

“You should go below and get some rest. And get rid of that girl for the night. I don't want you running us aground tomorrow when we enter the delta because you're too tired to concentrate on the route.”

Dirk smiled ruefully. “I'll send Caterina to
your
cabin then, shall I? She'd probably get a bigger thrill out of being your prisoner than mine, anyway.”

“What are you talking about?”

“She's become quite enchanted with the whole hostage thing,” Dirk explained, turning his back on the horizon and crossing his arms, as if he were suddenly chilled. “And I think she's more than a little disappointed I'm not living up to my reputation as the Butcher of Elcast. Caterina has four sisters at home who are—she assures me—going to be green with envy she got to have such a grand adventure and they missed out. But I'm afraid that other than helping the cook cut up a few onions, her adventure's not turning out to be quite as thrilling as she'd hoped.” He shook his head with despair. “She's driving me insane, actually.”

Dirk's obvious discomfort gave Kirsh a degree of malicious satisfaction. “You brought her on board, Dirk. Don't look to me for sympathy.”

“I don't expect sympathy from you, Kirsh,” Dirk said, looking at him with those inscrutable metal-gray eyes. “What I look to you for is that sense of nobility you like to think you're so famous for.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“The Baenlands, Kirsh. Tomorrow, when we reach Mil, before you order scores of innocent women and children put to the sword just because you're pissed off about your brother being kidnapped, remember
you're
the one who likes to think he has honor.”

Dirk didn't wait for his reply. He pushed off the rail and headed back toward the stern, leaving Kirsh staring after him,
wondering how, with a few well-chosen words and not a drop of blood spilled yet, Dirk Provin could make
him
feel like the butcher.