The Axe and the Throne (64 page)

He was too late. Otis was no patient man, and his bald, sweaty crown was already on its way to smash out Tallos's teeth. Tallos began to scream in rage, hopeful that he would be heard before being knocked asleep, or at least that he may awake to the sight of some of his teeth embedded in his attacker's forehead.

A torrent of flame shot from Tallos's mouth, the force of which sent Otis flying backward. Tallos did not wait to see the hulking body hit the ground before first turning to the guard on his left and then to his right, howling flame at them as they each were ripped from his grasp. He dropped the scraps of their tabards from his hands and marched to his next victim, not scrutinizing the absurdity of these events he must be dreaming, only eager to exact his vengeance.

Gepner was a coward of a man. Tallos already knew as much. The hefty provisioner pushed Erik to the ground as he turned to run from Tallos, but in doing so tripped over himself and tumbled.

“Mountain's mercy,” he cried. “Please, spare me.”

Tallos grabbed Gepner by the loose mail on his shoulders and pulled him to his feet. “I will show you the same mercy the Mountain showed my village.”

Smoke began to rise from under Gepner's mail, and he shrieked with horror. Fire burst from his chest, setting his beard alight. Tallos released him, allowing him to run and fan the flames. Tallos then slammed his foot on Erik as he wriggled on the ground beside him, reaching for a blade. The thin bones of the man's wrist snapped, and he whimpered. Tallos put him out of his misery with expedience, willing his head to combust. Erik's eyes first reddened, then blackened, then burst.

Tallos turned to where the horsemen had been, but they were nowhere to be seen. He focused his attention instead to the armed men of the village, the beast of retribution still hungering inside him.
They deserve to die for their cowardice.

Pandemonium had spread. Men and women scattered in all directions, but mostly away from Tallos. A man in plain clothes and with a sword in hand ran past him—one of the cravens. Curious, Tallos allowed him to continue on his course and was not surprised when he saw his destination was a fair-looking woman. She was dressed much the same as most women of the Fourpaw villages, much the same as Leona had dressed. Her long hair must have been knocked loose during the commotion, as she would have no doubt worn it in the more modest and customary folded tail when in the presence of strange men. It flowed in the soft breeze as had Leona's, and when the man embraced her, Tallos felt the pang of anger. He had not forsaken his gods to save cowards from the very fate he had suffered himself.

Tallos blew hellfire from his lungs, engulfing the couple from many paces away. He did not pity this man who had allowed his village to be despoiled and then refused to answer Tallos's call for insurrection. And he did not pity this woman, a weakling creature, her path never decided by her own actions but by others, namely the one she called husband—a man likely to have been chosen for her by her parents.

I am Nekasr, and around me the world burns.

As the woman was consumed by flame, Tallos's thoughts betrayed him. The face that disappeared into the red death became Leona's.

I will not be deterred by illusion
, he told himself, and continued his assault.

His storm of fury hid her from sight, but it did nothing to stifle her soft yet audible lament—anguish that sounded no different than those times he'd been unable to ease Leona's suffering, when she'd lost her younger sister and when Lia had run off.

As the woman's cries persisted, Tallos's will to commit this first of many atrocities persisted in kind. The gods he loathed would have no choice but to notice an act so vile as this. When he allowed his flames to cease, all that would remain would be their two bodies, charred to black, together in their final embrace.

The thought suddenly repulsed him. This man had at least made it to his wife in time to shield her.
Where was I when Leona needed me? On a fool's errand, one she'd warned me not to take.
This man may have been too timid to fight, but at least he had run to be with her in death.
He is a hero compared to me.

Tallos hardened his resolve, refusing to stop what he had begun. It was too late to, in any case. But his creeping doubt made him finally question what it was he was becoming. Seemingly boundless power rushed through him, making him feel invincible—godlike. The realization stifled him.

Tallos inhaled, trying to suck the hellfire back within himself, back where it belonged. He could almost hear the gods laughing at him, mocking him. This act of killing a defenseless couple had not made him feel as though he had provoked the gods—he felt more as though he had become their instrument.

As the blinding light went dark, so did the world. Tallos was thankful he could not yet see, but he would not run from what he had done; he would stay and look upon it. In his mind, he could still hear the woman's lamentation. It sounded of grief and emotional despair, not physical suffering, and it confirmed for him, albeit far too late, that killing the meek did not suit his cause. Forsaking the laws espoused in the names of the gods would not draw their ire—those laws were spurious decrees that the gods themselves broke with their every breath.
I must find a more deserving recipient of my wrath.

It was worse than he had expected. As his vision returned he saw movement—he had not killed them. Lia's sad eyes assailed him from his memories. Knowing that he would have to end their suffering just as he had ended hers struck him with weight, but he would not neglect his duty, nor would he delay it.

He turned from them and walked toward where he knew a weapon sharp enough to see the task done quickly would rest. He saw only dark shapes, his eyes still fearful of allowing in more light, but he made out the mound that was his aim. As Tallos neared Otis's corpse, he saw another figure knelt beside him. Tallos willed his eyes to adjust, but the kneeling man jumped back before he could be identified.

“Stand back, mage.”

The man had the gleaming weapon raised, threatening to swing down. The voice was strong, so much so that Tallos might have mistaken him for a brave man, had he not recognized it.

“The sword, Kelgun.” Tallos extended his open hand. As his sight returned, he saw the fear on Kelgun's broken face, one eye swollen shut and his cheek scabbed over. The knight reluctantly surrendered his blade, presenting it to Tallos hilt first. Under other circumstances it may have amused Tallos, but there was no humor to be had in the task to come.

With downcast eyes, Tallos walked back to his scene of foul carnage. He suppressed emotion as the snow gave way to the bare earth exposed by his flames, knowing their bodies, blackened and writhing, would soon follow.

Their death will not have been for nothing
, decided Tallos.
This will serve as my lesson and eternal reminder.
Tallos still felt the power surge within himself, its source unknown but seeming somehow external. He would ponder that later. He owed these two victims something: to name for them who would receive his retribution in their stead.

That the woman remained able to weep so elegantly confused him. She did not sound as though she were near death, and when Tallos's eyes found her, nor did she look it. Though her husband still hid her with his body, Tallos saw her face. Nowhere near as beautiful as Leona, she still had a presence. Or perhaps it was merely that they were both unscathed that was so exalting. The oval of melted snow, dirt steaming from the heat but not dry enough to have scorched, encircled them, yet not a strand of hair nor bit of their cloth had been charred.

“We watched the Northmen slaughter them both.” It was Mile's voice, Tallos's uncle, that entered his thoughts unexpectedly. The way this man sheltered his woman—frightened and trembling himself—brought to mind a story Mile had told Tallos to frighten him from ever entering the northern woods. He described how he had witnessed his own father, the one whom he'd always looked to as a man of courage, turn into a quivering fool once dragged from his home, just clinging to his wife rather than fighting to protect her. “Your mother and I were lucky to have escaped with our lives,” he'd said. “You don't ever want to see a Northman.”

How exactly these two had survived his inferno was less puzzling than his own confusion as to whom he should destroy. Perhaps it was because the possibility of revenge against his true enemy had seemed so hopeless before, but that was no longer the case.

He stood, naked and empowered, before the two innocents he'd somehow saved from fiery death at his own hand, before a town he'd liberated from conscription, before the unseen minions of the gods—those monsters to the north who had stolen from him everything, and he bellowed in his agony and hatred.

“Northmen! It is your turn to cower in fear. I am Tallos, and I will see your world burn before me.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A porcelain vase, probably worth a small kingdom, exploded against the wall near where she dressed. Annora tried to pay it no mind and continued changing. The dress she had grabbed was the least gaudy that could be quickly found, and yet the green bodice was sewn with gold thread and covered in gems, the skirts plumed out in a ridiculous manner, and the lacings were a series of short individual ties, impossible for her to do up on her own. Another crash came from just outside her closet followed by the holler of a man gone mad.

“Warin, you incompetent blackguard! I will have you dragged behind the
Maiden's Thief!
” That Cassen had somehow lost his feminine inflection was frightening enough, but the man had become incensed after finding blood at the entrance of these royal chambers that were otherwise empty. He paced back and forth, alone in the room of purple and red—made redder still by his anger—destroying everything with the capacity to shatter while cursing Warin's name.

These were not the first threats of murder she'd recently heard. Annora could not recall with exactness what had occurred in the throne room—just that the blinding pain in her chest had lessened, the guards released her, and Stephon had begun promising death to Cassen with high-pitched shrieks. Then she was led up countless stairs by a man with an iron grip, more relieved that her chest no longer felt like burning death than she was to be alive.

It was Cassen who had led her up those many steps, and it must have been he who'd saved her as well. Knowing that, she chanced speaking with the belief that he had no intention of harming her.
Not tonight, at least.

“We should go.” She made her plea while still within her closet.

She heard another object smash into a wall and braved an exit.

“Please, they will be looking for us both, and we will be imprisoned or worse.”

Annora was growing tired of having to convince Adeltian nobility to flee their own kingdom. It was only then that she realized Ethel and Eaira were in equally grave danger.

“Where are Ethel and Eaira? We must not leave without them.”

“Oh, must we not?” Cassen laughed like a madman. His new voice did not match his feminine appearance. Though she always thought him to be hiding something, she had grown accustomed to him being the way that he was. “You would throw your life away for some highborn brats? Girls you just met a few weeks ago?”

She ignored his boorish questions. “Was it you who yelled and saved me?” She wanted to be sure.

Cassen merely shook his head as if it pained him to recall the event.

Why did you do it?
Annora feared the answer to that question. Cassen now a man, eunuch or not, allowed for explanations better left unsought.

She began to remember more clearly what had happened in the throne room. Stephon had struggled to free his hand while shouting orders for the guards to seize Cassen where he stood, but the guards refused to obey. “Why did you not just kill him?”

“We have wasted enough time here,” he said dismissively. “Come.”

Her chest still sent pangs of agony through her body with every motion, but it did not bleed. The crumpled servant's cloth that lay on the floor in the closet caught her eye, parts scorched through, and her desire for protection overruled her reservations about Cassen's motives.

“Help me with my lacings, and I will not slow you further.”

Cassen had found some stately men's garb in a separate closet of the room Annora now realized was the queen's royal chambers, but why he had taken her there remained a mystery. It seemed an unnecessary risk to have climbed to the top of the very castle they needed to escape. But the castle had been strangely empty when they crept out, and now outside its walls, her immediate safety remained her primary concern. Cassen's plan to take a boat to meet friends of his was better than any she could have concocted should she be left alone.

He looked a different person entirely with his new vestment. It was the typical dress of an Adeltian nobleman, something Cassen would never have been seen in as a duchess. His gaunt face made more sense now that he was stripped of his surplus of silks and showed himself to be built no different to most men. The brown cotton trousers were ill-fitting, but the long woolen coat covered the areas where it was more noticeable.

Finally afforded some time to think, Annora realized that that place at the top of the stairs, that opulent red room of anger and anxiety, was supposed to have been where Ethel's mother was kept.

Ethel and Eaira.

“Will he kill them?”

Cassen did not look at her as they scurried down the paved road, leading to where, she did not know. “We must hurry,” he said as his pace quickened.

We should go back and get them.
The thought was brave and stupid, and Annora could not help but be thankful that the responsibility of that final decision no longer fell on her.

“They need only to survive a few more days—a week at most,” said Cassen.

“How is that?”

Cassen brought them around a bend, the change in direction giving him the apparent justification to ignore yet another of her questions.
Cassen the duchess would not have been so rude.

He led her into a building with a dirt floor and the sweet scent of straw mixed with the thick pungency of horse.

“I hope you can ride.”

The idea seemed idiotic. “I have never ridden a horse in my life.”

“Then I hope you can learn quickly.”

They passed by stall after stall, most empty but some with horses inside that Cassen by some means judged as not fitting their needs. They all looked and sounded the same, blowing and snorting, the meaning of which Annora could not interpret.

“Are these even your horses?”

Cassen selected a horse with a dark coat and white stripe on its face and busied himself fumbling with the clasps of the saddle. The animal was thinner than the ones that pulled their carriages and looked to have a knack for speed that frightened Annora.

“Why of course. And I would expect you recognize your own palfrey as well, my dear daughter. Or we may need to see you to a mender and cancel our early morning sail. Now grab some straw and make yourself known.”

Annora attempted to feed Cassen's horse and the one near it that he had indicated would be her own. His horse was eager to take the hay from her hands, but the other was agitated and would not eat.

“I do not see myself learning to ride anytime before the guards are upon us.”
Especially in the dark.
It had already been an hour or more since the throne room, and the Dawnstar had retired. Annora was thankful and a bit surprised that none of the people they had seen roaming were armored. She would have expected Stephon to have put every man at his disposal to work searching for them.

“No, you may be correct. You will ride with me.”

It was not long before they made their way out of the Adeltian Throne, though not as she had pictured, and making far more noise than was comfortable. The clatter of the horses' feet on the pavers was louder than she recalled from her carriage rides.

“Someone will hear us,” she worried aloud.

“I hope they do. A pair of horses that make no sound would be sure to draw attention.”

Frowning at Cassen's back did little good, but she did it just the same. They must have made quite a sight in addition to their racket. She was seated behind him, forced to clasp her arms around his waist to avoid tumbling off the beast's rump. The skirts of her ridiculous dress hung to either side as they moved at what felt like a dangerous gait, though the bored expression of the horse that tailed them, reins tied to their saddle, led her to admit it may just be an issue of perception.

“Isn't this the way to Eastport?”

“It is.” He answered as if her question required no further explanation.

“Are you not concerned that you will be recognized?”

“Would you rec—well I suppose
you
might. But the men of the docks are not my lady daughters, and none have seen me in men's dress save when I go there in disguise. Any that know me well enough to recognize me will also know to fear me.”

“I still think Westport would be the safer option.”

Cassen snorted. “I do not think you have spent enough time in Westport to make such an appraisal. The city has lacked proper management since—”

He quieted with a quickness that was worrying. Cassen was always eager to belittle his rival city.
He must have heard something.

“Are we in danger?” she whispered after waiting in silence as long as she could bear.

“No. No more than we have ever been.” He sounded reticent.
It must have to do with having to leave his great city behind.
It made her wonder what land they would even sail to from Eastport. She certainly had no wish to return to the Spicelands and hoped instead Cassen intended to sail up the eastern shore to Midport or Strahl.

In spite of Cassen's half-hearted assurance, Annora scanned for possible threats—roadblocks or places for guards to lay ambush—but there was little to see. “Where are all the guards? And the people?”

They had only passed a handful of people on the road, empty carriages for the most part, and not a single patrolling guard.

“You might find people are reluctant to leave their homes when a king declares murder to be legal.” It was a fair point, but only answered half the question.

“And the guards?”

Cassen grunted in disgust. “It would seem our good friend Master Warin has seen fit to take his prestigious Protectors north with the armies—ahead of schedule.”

When in the queen's chambers, Cassen had cursed the man as if Warin had betrayed him, but it seemed an odd place to discover such a thing.
There is more to this story than you are revealing
, she thought.
Had you even any intention of preventing Warin from raping Ryiah, or did you merely use it to leverage the man?

She chanced pressing him further. “What business does The Guard have in the North?”

“The realm is vast and filled with humanity, all of whom require protection.” He made no effort to sound sincere.

“What was your part in it?”

Cassen turned momentarily to give her a sidelong glance. The furrow in his brow was clear to see. “I do not claim to be a better man than Warin. I am merely better at hiding my malevolence.”

Annora pondered the accuracy of his statement. How many people truly believed Cassen to be a better man than Warin? And just how heinous was Cassen if he thought himself good at masking it?

Their journey continued in silence for what felt like hours, interrupted only once to switch horses. The feisty palfrey had calmed, though, and seemed happy enough to bear their weight.

“Remember,” said Cassen, “when we get to the docks, you are my daughter. That should not be too difficult a task, considering. Just follow my lead. We will secure our own small boat with sail.”