The Bandit King (5 page)

“D’mselle—”
He caught himself. “Vianne. My fair
cousine
. I would not leave you here, as a kit among wolves.”

Worry not, di Cinfiliet. This wolf will not let his little kit receive the slightest harm, and his teeth are sharper than yours.

“Fear not. This kit will soon grow her teeth. Go, Adrien. Please.” Velvet moved. Had she embraced him? It hurt to think of it, and hurt equally to think of her planning so quickly and thoroughly. How could she think herself in danger from
my
quarter?

Why had I said
poison
? A fool’s move. I was accustomed to lying with far more aplomb. Now I was trapped by the story.

“Should you need me, send for me.”

“Do
not
return unless I send the other half as a token. Go. Must I beg you?”

“No.
D’mselle
?”

“Oh, for the sake of the Blessed,
what
?” Irritation, wedded to sorrow and flashing witchlight-quick. I knew that tone of hers; my heart leapt to hear it. I wanted to take her in my arms, my bones aching with the need.

I could almost see the fey smile he practiced upon her. “My thanks.” The sound of the door opening, his boots retreating.

I could not help myself. I dropped my hand from my rapier-hilt and edged closer to the wall, seeking one of the small holes glowing with lamplight. I peered through, almost holding my breath.

The room was not so severe as I had imagined. There was a bed, two chairs by the fireplace, a washstand in the corner, and a door slightly ajar to the watercloset. I could see a glitter that was the jeweled statue of the Huntress, her bow lowered. The lamps hissed, and it would be cold tonight; had they not thought to lay a fire for my Vianne?

She stood straight and slim, facing the bed. As I watched, she turned in a full circle, looking about the room, her skirts making a low sweet noise. I could not see her face; the angle was wrong.

“Tristan,” she whispered, and I started guiltily, though I was well hidden. There was no way for her to know I watched. “What I would not give to be assured of…”

Twas not the words themselves. It was the tone, numb agony in her soft, cultured voice. Of all the people who should sound so hopeless, she was the last.

It fair threatened to tear my heart from my chest.
All I have done has been for you.
I longed to tell her so, put my mouth to the hole I watched through and whisper the words. Would she think it the gods speaking to her?

She took two halting steps toward the door; that removed her from my sight. Did she think to flee? No, for she immediately turned back and walked with quick, unsteady steps to the bed, flung herself down. She had not lied; she sobbed fit to break both her heart and mine.

Oh, Vianne.
I should have been at her side, to hold her while she wept. I should have told her. I should have made her somehow understand.

At least you are forewarned.
If I hewed to the tale of my innocence, would it satisfy? Why, in the name of the Blessed, had I told her Henri was
poisoned
? I had not been thinking clearly.

Now I was, and I had to move with some speed if I were to save myself.

“Captain?” Jierre’s lean, dark face greeted me as I stepped into the small room given over to our use, a pilgrim’s cell in the heart of the Temple. Adrien was apparently deep in prayer before a statue of Danshar the Warrior in the central nave; Tinan stood guard at Vianne’s door and it irked me to leave him there.

No matter. I would return soon enough.

They had dined, di Cinfiliet and the Guard; I did not. Time enough for that later. Now, as Danae the priestess prepared our
d’mselle
for her dreaming in the house of the Blessed, my expression brought Jierre to his feet. The remains of their dinner lay on the table, and there were four cots.

Adersahl did not look up. He sank into a chair by the fireplace, staring into the flames. His brow was thoughtful, but not troubled.

I led Jierre into the hall. “This goes to the Keep.” I thrust the hastily penned letter into his hands. “Do what is necessary to delay di Cinfiliet’s departure until my father reads it.”

My lieutenant nodded. No shadow of doubt marred his clear, dark eyes; none ever had. “And should our bandit take umbrage…?”

“I trust your judgment.”

He flashed me a wry smile. “A relief, I was beginning to think I had none left.”

“Precious little, Jierre. After all, you are still following me.”
Through even the gates of the underworld, you said once. You were drunk, and you thought I was, too.

“That, my Captain, is a matter of taste. Not judgment. Look after the
d’mselle
.”

“As always.”
If only you knew how I look after her.
“Make haste.”

He left with a spring in his step, a spare, sinewy man whose quick eyes and fine mind were worth far more than a King’s Guard could ever be paid. He had held the last survivors of the Guard on the slopes of Mont di Cienne, waiting with unshaken faith for me to emerge from the bowels of the donjons. Which I had… but only because Vianne had trusted me.

Because I could not stand the thought of your beheading, Captain.
Her chin lifting as she took me to task, a memory I did not have time to savor.

I stepped through the door again, bracing myself. Adersahl remained in the chair, staring into the fire. He did not stroke his mustache, and that spelled certain trouble.

I affected nonchalance, my thumbs in my belt. “
Sieur
di Parmecy et Villeroche.”

He waved a languid hand. “Captain. Standing on ceremony?”

“No more than usual.”
You defended me. Loyal as she is.
“How is she, Adersahl?”

He stared into the flames as if they held the Unanswerable Riddle’s full solution. “I would be surprised if you did not know, Captain.” It hurt, to hear him accord me the title with such brittle formality.

Are you feinting to draw me out?
“I know far more than anyone credits, and far less than I like. For example, I think I know who is loyal to me. Strange, how rare such a quality is.”

“Rare, yes. Very important in a King’s Guard.”

Ah.
“Even more important in a Queen’s.”

He nodded. “Even so.” He paused, as if he would speak. Settled for repeating himself. “Even so.”

I drew my breath in softly; my hand curled around my rapier-hilt. All the Guard are trained in swordplay as well as Court sorcery; I had insisted upon as much when I took the reins of command. It had done little good for those taken by treachery. But those who had survived were the best of comrades—and the worst of enemies.

Let us see how well I cast my dice.
I found my throat full of something, could not speak for a moment. My gaze dropped to his boot-toes.

My voice surprised me, rough as if I had been at ale or
acquavit
. “If I suspect di Cinfiliet of treachery, Adersahl di Parmecy, I will show no mercy.”

A long pause, filled only with the snap and rush of flame. Would I have to be more explicit? I did not think so. What did he believe, if anything? There was a time when I would have been certain he would take my word as a writ from the Blessed themselves.

Adersahl sighed. It was a long, heavy exhale, full of weariness. “I know nothing of treachery from his quarter. What would you have of me, Captain?”

“You will remain with her when I cannot, and you will kill Adrien di Cinfiliet if he threatens her. And you will breathe no word of my orders.” Even as I said it, I flinched inwardly. It was the first lesson a Left Hand learns: The only way to keep a secret is to consign the bearer of it to Death.

Including, sometimes, the Hand himself. That is the oath we take:
As one already dead, I swear myself to service.
I had often thought long and deep on the meaning of such a vow. If I was a dead man, did it matter who I killed or how I debased myself?

The problem was, I was still alive.
She
had resurrected me.

He still did not look at me. “You truly think di Cinfiliet so much of a danger?”

“His aunt raised him to hate the King.” A world of meaning lived under those words.

“The King is dead,” Adersahl murmured. “Long live the Queen.”

Absolutely.
“If I have aught to say of it, she will live to a ripe old age. No matter
what
I must do to ensure it. Do we understand each other, di Parmecy?”

That caused his gaze to swing through the darkness, but not to me. He looked up at the ceiling, closed his eyes. Was he even now expecting a knife to the throat? The garrote? “I thought I understood you, Captain.”

“And do you?”

The weary old veteran examined the roof beams. “I am no fool.” He settled himself further in the chair’s embrace. “Loyal to a fault, but no fool.”

“I am gladdened to hear it.” I turned on my heel, gave him my back. “Go to your rest,
sieur
. Tomorrow may well bring surprises.”

“Of what sort?”

“Of whatever sort Vianne will dream up next.” The skin of my back tightened and tingled, expecting… what, a blade? No, twas not in Adersahl’s nature. He had
defended
me to my
d’mselle
. My unease was the sort that had followed me since I arrived at Court, the expectation of danger such a constant refrain I could hear no other music.

He said nothing else, and I left the room dissatisfied. The conversation had gone as well as could be expected… but still, there was something amiss.

What bothered me—now that I had time to turn my attention to less pressing problems, as I closed the door and set off down a stone hall in the house of the Blessed—was what further use d’Orlaans and di Narborre had thought to gain from such a paper as the one my
d’mselle
now held.

For I could have sworn I burned the only copy of that distressing oath, on paper as fine as any the King’s brother had access to, the night before the conspiracy broke loose.

A priestess in green-and-white robes swayed gently out of sight down the hall as I relieved Tinan di Rocham of his vigil at my
d’mselle
’s door. The boy was pale, but he returned my salute and hurried away in the opposite direction, wincing as if pained. To be sent away from the lady’s door was probably mortifying. And he had recently come close to death, gut-stabbed by a Pruzian assassin and healed by sorcery. Wounds closed in such a manner sometimes pain one more in the aftermath than in the receiving. The body knows it has been violated, and not even the grace of the Aryx can dissuade it from remembering.
Ghost-pain
, the healers call it, the same term for a limb lopped off and yet still felt.

Which led me to the Aryx, the Great Seal of Arquitaine, its triple serpents twined in an endless knot and its power singing through my
d’mselle
. The Seal had been asleep since King Fairlaine’s time, true, but it was still a mark of the Blessed’s favor for Arquitaine. And now it was awake. Plenty of the old accounts of its power were… thought-provoking. Did Vianne know what other Left Hands had written of the Seal’s capabilities in the secret archives, she would no doubt seek to claw it from her flesh.

One more danger to guard her from.

I touched the door’s surface, smooth wood-grain under my fingertips. No line of candle or witchlight showed under its edge. She must be in her bed, prepared for dreaming with a soporific draught and left to embark on the sea of sleep. Danae would have prayed over her, and I pondered what wonder, if any, the priestess would have witnessed. Would the Aryx respond to this ceremony as it had responded to the marriage-vows?

A chill walked up my back. The door smelled of hedgewitchery. A thread-thin tracery of green, visible to passive, sorcerous Sight, twined through the wood. Was it a defense, a hedgewitch charm meant to bar passage? Did she fear to sleep here, knowing I would be at her door?

Not that. Please do not let her think that.

I took up my position to one side, and listened. The temptation to enter the closet of Kimyan’s elect and peer through the darkened eyeholes, to perhaps hear her breathing, ran through my body like fever, like ague.

Instead, I played the same game I have played through countless nights of watching and waiting. A Left Hand spends many nights in silence, like a viper under a rock, waiting in darkness for a victim to blunder past or an assignation to take place. Moreover, many a man has been proved unfit for the Guard, no matter how noble his blood, by the simple inability to
wait
.

To wait successfully, a man fills the time as best he may. My game runs thus: I think of Vianne. I consider her in different lights—under a flood of sunlight in her garden, on her knees and digging, sometimes cursing under her breath before she worked hedgewitchery, a green flame on her fingers threading through whatever herb or flower she sought to save or replant. I envision her under torch- and witchlight during the Court dances, in the slow stately measures of a pavane or during the wild whirl of the maying, her feet unseen under her skirts and her dark curls flying.