No Quarter (18 page)

*So no one sees us. We're going to need as large a lead as we can get.*

*But…* He refused to look as she pushed off the narrow ledge, dropped, and caught herself on fingers and toes. The pack pulled at her shoulders and she compensated for its extra weight. *But we're heading down into an enclosed courtyard. We're going to have to go back into the Hall or over the…*

*Wall?* she finished for him, dropping onto the worn flagstones. They were still damp from the day's rain, but the sky was clear overhead, the bowl of night filled with stars. After an unhappy glance up at the unfamiliar constellations, she followed the shadow path along the foundations of the building.

*Vree.*

*Look, since you're new at this, I'll explain.* The windows overlooking the courtyard held no signs of life. Based on their evidence, the Bardic Hall might well have been empty. *We can't go out the gate— there's always a bard on it and we can't exactly pretend to be someone else. Nothing overlooks this piece of wall except the Bardic Hall. The bards are at the center, Singing for Jazep. If we go over the wall here, no one will see us.*

It very nearly made sense. *The kigh can see us.*

*So slaughtering what? By the time the bards ask them where we've gone, we'll be a good six or seven hours closer to Kars.* Splaying both hands out against the huge, squared stones used to build the wall around the Citadel, she smiled.

Although the outside rose perpendicular from the street, the inside, in the interests of strength and stability, angled gently in from the base to the crown. *We're not hiding, this is a race,* she continued as she started to climb. *We have to get to Kars first.*

*And when they use the kigh to send messages ahead?*

*To stop us?* Lying flat, she rolled across the top of the wall and started down the other side. *I don't think so.*

About to protest further, Gyhard remembered that Vree had been a military assassin for five years. Two years longer than assassins usually managed to outwit the odds. She'd never gone after a target that hadn't known she was coming, and they'd never been able to stop her. What chance would the bards of Shkoder, who really had no idea of her capabilities, have against her? He only hoped that would occur to the bards of Shkoder.

He briefly noted how fast Vree was moving and how tiny the edges of stone she gripped were, then quickly turned his attention elsewhere. It wouldn't take much of a twitch to send them plummeting to the ground. The trouble was, elsewhere almost immediately became thoughts of Kars.

Gyhard had wondered once if new love had called back the old, if the gods or the fates or the Circle or whatever anyone of a dozen different religions wanted to call it had set Kars in his path in order for him to close the door on the past and open it on the future. He didn't believe in coincidence, especially not when he'd had his nose rubbed in the past with a thoroughness that had made it impossible to ignore.

That he'd failed Kars a second time had been no fault of his. He'd done everything he could.

Apparently, it wasn't enough.

The knowledge that Kars continued to live, somewhere, could be ignored. He'd had lifetimes of practice ignoring it. But something had propelled Kars across the border into Shkoder. And something had seen to it that he got the news.

He was being given another chance.

Vree was right. He had to take it.

Staying in Elbasan and letting the bards deal with the situation would release Kars from the trap but leave him in it. If he and Vree were to ever have a life together—even as strange a life as they were living now—he had to be the one who finally laid Kars to rest.

As Vree dropped to the street and checked to make sure they'd been unobserved, Gyhard gave himself a mental shake and decided it was probably a good thing they were leaving the bards behind. Melodrama appeared to be catching.

They taken maybe six steps on level ground when they heard horses approaching from behind, shod hooves chiming against the cobblestones.

*Vree?*

The wide road encircling the Citadel wall provided no cover and the night was too bright to hide them.

Vree refused to turn although she could feel how much Gyhard wanted to.

*Ignore it. It has nothing to do with us. Even if someone saw us going over the wall, they wouldn't have sent out the cavalry.*

The horses drew closer. Close enough to hear the creak of harness, to catch a whiff of the stable, to feel the warm bulk of the animals looming up behind them.

"We'll get there a lot faster if we ride."

"We?" Vree demanded before she finished turning.

Magda let the hooded cloak fall back. An afternoon of crying had left her face blotchy, but her eyes were dry and she carried her chin at a determined angle. "I knew you were going as soon as I worked past Jazep being dead and actually thought about how he… how he died. Gyhard has responsibilities to Kars he
has
to honor or they'll eat at him, at both of you, all the rest of your lives. I have responsibilities to you. I
can't
let you go alone."

"You can't go with us."

The younger woman held out the extra set of reins. "You can't stop me. I won't go back willingly and if you take me back, you know you won't get out again. This is your only chance to get to Kars first, and I'm afraid I'm a part of it."

Vree's eyes narrowed. "I could knock you out and leave you here. Take both horses. It might be a couple of hours until you're found."

"You won't."

"You're very sure of yourself."

"No." Magda shook her head and half-smiled. "I'm very sure of you."

The generous curves of her mouth pressed into a thin, irritated line, Vree secured her pack behind the saddle and mounted. "The king, your uncle, is not going to allow this."

"The king, my uncle, will have to catch us." Magda flicked a wet curl out of the corner of her mouth. "These are the same horses our couriers ride—the same horses Imperial couriers have been riding since His majesty got the idea and the stock from the Empire, so you
know
how fast they move. By tomorrow morning when they notice we're gone, we'll be three or four stations down the Coast Road and even if the bards get a message ahead of us, we'll have a huge lead."

"If the bards get a message ahead of us," Vree pointed out acerbically, "they'll try to stop us."

The pale oval of Magda's face tilted to one side. "Stop
you
?" she asked.

As Vree had said almost the same thing to Gyhard, she had little room left for argument. "This is going to get you into a lot of trouble."

"Why? I'm not a prisoner here." Her chin rose in a motion Gyhard recognized from days and nights of watching Vree. "I can leave if I like."

"What about studying to be a healer?" Vree leaned forward and stroked a silken neck. "What about stealing these horses?"

"I'm not
stealing
anything," Magda protested indignantly. "Healers are
allowed
to use the couriers' stables so they can get to emergencies as fast as possible. Now I may only be an apprentice healer, but I think that the dead walking in Shkoder qualifies as an
emergency
. As for the rest, you're my patient. I can't abandon you.

That's covered under Healers' Oaths. Besides…" She sighed and her tone gentled. "I heal the fifth kigh, and healing Kars is part of healing you."

*She has a slaughtering answer for everything.*

*Vree, she can't come. It's going to be hard enough dealing with Kars. If she's there…* Gyhard's voice got lost in the painful prospect of once more seeing the ruin the years and his interference had made of Kars.
Dying has to be easier than
having your heart ripped out over and over
. The ancient image grew younger; the chin pointed; the hair grew thick and brown and curly; the skin darkened; the brows lifted to a sardonic angle. Not Kars. Bannon. Which was when he realized that neither the pain nor the thought accompanying it was his alone.

The second realization seeped around the edges of the first. Bannon would be arriving shortly with Prince Otavas. If they went after Kars, Vree wouldn't have to face him. His rush of anger at having his personal demons used as an excuse to avoid hers smashed apart the barriers between them, crashed into her fear, and ground to a halt, its momentum destroyed.

Vree stiffened. The horse, who'd been standing quietly while she'd been adjusting the stirrups, began to move forward. *Bannon can wait. Kars can't.* She yanked back on the reins. *If the bards get to him first, you'll have lost your chance.*

*You were hoping I wouldn't notice. You didn't want me to know how afraid you were.*

Her teeth were clenched so tightly together both temples throbbed. *Assassins are trained to face their fears. I…* The barriers were down. She had no self-image left to save. *I can't face him. Not yet.*

*Then it's a good thing you're not an assassin any more, isn't it?*

*I'm sorry.* She didn't know what exactly she was sorry for, so she hoped he did.

"It would be a healthy thing, a distinct step forward if you two managed to resolve
something
in your lives. At least you both know what has to be done in order to deal with Kars."

Breathing heavily, Vree looked down at Magda's fingers lying across her wrist.

Until the young healer had spoken, she hadn't even felt the touch. If she needed proof she was no longer an assassin, there it was.

*This was a private conversation, child,* Gyhard told her shortly.

Magda snatched her hand back as though the fingers had been burned. Her lower lip started to tremble. "I only wanted to help. Vree was looking so… I mean, I'm a healer, and I have to do
something
!"

Gyhard used Vree's lungs to sigh. *You know, her wanting to go along probably has as much to do with a response to Jazep's death as with us.*

*No shit.* As Magda sniffed, Vree reached between the horses and gently grabbed her shoulder. "He's…" *How do you say pissed off in Shkoden?*

*I don't need you to explain me to her, Vree.*

"He's upset because we have so little privacy and so every bit we lose seems too large." She tightened her grip for a moment then let go. "But it's a good thing you're going with us."

"Really?"

"Yeah."

*Vree!*

*Maybe healing Kars
is
a part of healing you. Us. Besides, she's right. We don't have a choice. We have a saying in the army; don't waste your strength trying to push a dagger through armor. It only dulls the blade and irritates the enemy.*

*Very profound.*

*Thank you.*

The moist sound of horseshit hitting cobblestones echoed against the Citadel wall. Magda giggled, just a little hysterically. "We'd better get moving before we're caught by a garden-wagon and escorted home at pitchfork point."

As Vree settled into the rhythm of her horse's gait, she revised travel plans. If they managed to avoid bardic entanglements, Magda's presence had cut their time on the road at least in half. Which had to be weighed against Magda's presence complicating things rather significantly.

*Then let's look at the bright side,* Gyhard put in wearily. *If the king's niece, the only healer they've got who can heal the fifth kigh,
has
to go tearing around the country, at least there's no one she's safer doing it with than you.*

Vree grinned, thinking of the omnipresent trio of guards, and of Gerek who shadowed every moment she and Magda spent together. *You really think His Majesty and her brother are going to believe that?*

*About as much as I think His Majesty and her brother are likely to sprout wings and fly.*

"I assure you, Your Majesty, that Magda is completely safe."

"You also assured me," Theron growled, both hands pressed white-knuckled against his desk, "that the assassin would remain under bardic control. Now you tell me she's galloping down the South Coast Road with my niece." He held the Bardic Captain in a basilisk glare. "Which am I to believe?"

Projecting a calm she wasn't entirely feeling, Liene spread her hands. "The kigh are watching them, Majesty. They're not trying to hide."

"That's very helpful." The words squeezed out from between clenched teeth.

"But I don't care about the kigh. What are
you
going to do?"

Liene blinked. "Do, Majesty?" They hadn't realized until they'd sent a fledgling to her room after breakfast that Vree was gone—they'd thought she'd merely missed the meal and had been concerned that she might be ill. When she wasn't in her room, they'd assumed she was with Magda and sent the fledgling to the Healers' Hall only to find Magda missing as well and an irritated Captain of Couriers demanding to know why an apprentice had signed for two horses.

Kovar had immediately Called a kigh—his summons so peremptory four of them appeared and nearly blew him over—and sent them searching for the missing assassin. The two senior bards then began to put the pieces together and by the time the kigh reappeared, their answer came as no surprise. Liene had headed immediately for the palace. She hadn't actually thought of much beyond getting to the king before he heard his niece was missing from a non-bardic source.

"Do," she repeated. "Majesty, as I said, Magda is in no danger. She was, according to Cecilie, the bard on the gate, under no compulsion when she left the Citadel. We believe that the three of them—Vree, Gyhard, and Magda—are heading into Somes in order to deal with Kars."

"Who is—if I remember Karlene's recall correctly, which I assure you, Captain, I do—an insane Cemandian who Sings the dead to life and has recently killed a bard." Theron's face began to darken. "Not to mention, he was once Gyhard's lover and was not killed by this same assassin although she had every opportunity to do so and had apparently been trained never to miss. You'll have to explain to me, Captain, how you can possibly stand there and say that Magda is in no danger!"

Considerably more worried about the vein throbbing on Theron's temple than she was about Magda, Liene stepped toward the desk. "Majesty, please believe me when I say that both Vree and Gyhard view Magda as the only person who might possibly be able to help them. They would never, ever hurt her and will, in fact, do everything they can to protect her. There is no one in Shkoder, Majesty," she continued soothingly, "who would be able to get past Vree to Magda."