Weapon of Fear (3 page)

“We
don’t know, milord.  The only person who saw the fight has…vanished.”

Arbuckle
stared at Ithross.  “
Vanished
?  What do you mean?  Who saw this happen?”

“Master
Hoseph was apparently here when the attack started.  He escaped to summon help,
though he bore injuries of his own.  I was about to question him further, with
Archmage Duveau’s aid, when he…”— Ithross looked uncomfortable—“vanished.”

“Vanished. 
You mean he actually,
magically
vanished?  I thought the palace was
warded to prevent that.”

“According
to Archmage Duveau, the dungeons are not included in the wards.”

“Why
not?”

“We
don’t know, Milord Prince.”

Arbuckle
shook his head in stunned silence. 
Mysterious assassins, dead blademasters,
vanishing priests…what next
?  “What else is peculiar, Master Corvecosi?”

The
dark man gestured to the blood pooled beneath the hanging cage.  “I at first
assumed that this blood was from the emperor, being so close to his body.  Upon
closer examination, however, it appears that someone was recently restrained in
this device.”  He touched one of the gruesome screws. “This blood is fresh, yet
there is no corpse here bearing wounds so inflicted.”

“A
rescue?”  Arbuckle’s mind whirled.  “What prisoner would precipitate such a
rescue?”

The
healer shrugged.  “That is an interesting theory.”  He strode to one of the
corpses, apparently unfazed by all the blood.  “And here, this man, unlike all
the others, has barely a mark on him.”  Kneeling, he pressed a plump hand to
the blademaster’s brow and muttered under his breath.  “Yes, as I suspected, he
was killed with a lethal toxin.”

“Toxin?” 
Arbuckle knew from his reading that poisoned weapons were commonly used in some
cultures.  “You’re sure?”

“I’m
quite sure, milord.”  He rose and nodded his head absently.  “Quite sure.”

Arbuckle
had no reason to doubt him.  He had always liked Corvecosi, one of the few
imperial attendants not stifled by formality or unduly cowed by the late
emperor’s imperious attitude.  As a boy, the prince had appreciated the man’s
quiet bedside manner, his cool hand on a fevered forehead, gentle words, and
the sense of peace that followed his visits.  Evidently, there was more to the
healer’s art than mere knowledge of illness.

“Continue
your examinations, Master Corvecosi.  I want to know how everyone here died. 
Use whatever resources you—”  Turning, ready to be away from all this death, he
spied one more victim, and choked on his words.

What
lay on the stone slab didn’t look human—at least, not anymore.  Arbuckle stared
at the corpse, willing himself to believe that the person had been dead when the
skin had been peeled away in strips, the joints twisted, the bones exposed, the
pearly nerves bared by careful dissection.  But deep in his soul, he knew that
she had been alive.  This was his father’s depravity flayed and displayed for
all to see.

“Good
Gods of Light…”  Arbuckle strode to the side of the table, heedless for the
first time of the blood.  There however, with the scent of death in his
nostrils, staring down at her tortured body, bile burned the back of his throat. 
“Oh…”  Arbuckle turned away and fell to his knees, heaving painfully, as if
expelling any hope that his father had been a decent man.  A hand touched his
shoulder.

“Milord
Prince, you must go.”  Ithross waved, and blademasters came forward.

“No!” 
Arbuckle wished with all his might that he could retreat to his room and his
books—his sanctuary—but he had already disgraced himself enough.  This was the
emperor’s doing.  Only a son could atone for a father’s sins.

Wiping
his chin with his sleeve, Arbuckle lurched up to stand over the slab where the
poor woman lay. 
Had she been beautiful
? 
Had someone loved her
? 
Were they waiting for her to come home
?  He welcomed the rage that
burned away the last thread of feeling that he had for his father.  It straightened
his back and stiffened his resolve.

“Your
cloak, Sir Fineal.”  Arbuckle held out a hand, and the knight immediately
unclasped his cloak and handed it over.  The crown prince carefully draped the
deep-blue cloth over the woman’s mutilated corpse.  Bowing his head, he mumbled
a prayer that the gods would ease her tortured soul.  “Master Corvecosi, take
care of her.”

Master
Corvecosi bowed.  “As you wish, Milord Prince.  I’ll also see that your
father’s body is properly attend—”

“No!” 
Arbuckle glared one last time at the heap of dead flesh that had been his
father, then looked deliberately away.  “Divest him of any accoutrements of his
former office, then burn his corpse and cast the ashes down the nearest
cesspit!”

The
crowd shifted and Corvecosi seemed struck dumb, standing with his mouth
gaping.  Only Ithross summoned the courage to speak.

“Milord
Prince!” the commander stammered.  “To disrespect His Majesty’s body would
be…tantamount to treason.”

“No,
Commander Ithross,
that
is treason!”  Arbuckle pointed to the shrouded
form on the slab, his hand shaking with rage.  “That is an
abomination
!”

“But,
Milord Prince!  The nobles…  They will expect a royal funeral.”

“Then
we’ll bury an empty casket!  I’ll not have the House of Tsing or the soil of
this empire further contaminated by his corpse.”

“Milord
Prince, your father was—”

“My
father was a living piece of
shit
, Sir Fineal!” Arbuckle rounded on the
knight, biting back his rage, though he could not suppress his disgust.  “It’s
only fitting that he spend eternity amongst his peers.”

Ignoring
the shocked murmurs, Prince Arbuckle headed for the door.  A last thought
stopped him in his tracks, and he turned back.

“After
Master Corvecosi’s investigation is complete and the bodies have been removed
with all due reverence, send for me.  I’ll see every vile machine in this room
destroyed and the door sealed forever.  Is that clear, Commander Ithross?  Sir
Fineal?”

“Crystal
clear, Milord Prince.” Fineal bowed low, then rose with a grim smile on his
chiseled features.  “It will be my pleasure.”

Ithross
glanced about the room in disgust and nodded. “It will be done as you command,
Milord Prince.”

“Good.” 
Arbuckle turned and strode from the room.  Blademasters took position around
him, forming a five-pointed cordon as they matched his stride. 
Five
blademasters—the emperor’s contingent
.

I’m
going to be emperor
. 
The thought was nothing new, but had always been suffixed by “someday.”  Now
the inevitability of his future came rushing in, and with it, one more dreadful
realization. 
I’m not ready for this
!

Ready
or not, he had no choice in the matter.  As he mounted the stairs, Arbuckle
swore to all the Gods of Light that he would be a better emperor than Tsing’s
last.

Mya
toweled her hair dry, barely able to keep her arms aloft, so weak was she from
the evening’s trials.  She cast the towel aside in frustration, and sat on the
bed.

“Quit
bitching, Mya.  You’re alive.”  Few people could survive being stabbed in the
gut—
Twice
!—nearly eviscerated, and hacked from shoulder to chest.  Blood
loss had left her weak, but her runic tattoos had healed her wounds.  Only an
injury to the heart or decapitation could truly end her life.  Her heart ached,
but not from a sword thrust.  “Alive…and alone.”

Forcing
herself up, she grabbed her wrappings, the long strip of enchanted black cloth
that she wore under her clothes.  She used them to hide her tattoos, her secret,
but the magically self-repairing cloth had saved her life only hours ago,
holding her chest together long enough for her to heal before she bled to
death.  She submerged them in the murky water filling the tub, and began to
scrub.

It
had cost her a silver half-crown to convince the proprietor of the
Prickly
Pair
to send up a tub and a meal at this late hour.  The water and the food
had been tepid, but plentiful.  She was still a little light-headed; it would
take time to recover from the blood loss.  The memories of the fight, she was
sure, would take much longer to banish.

Sitting
back on her heels, she focused on a pleasanter memory…kissing Lad in the
carriage.  Mya closed her eyes as she remembered the warmth of his lips, the
scent of him.  A little smile twitched her lips, then fell.  He had kissed her
back, just a little, but it was a kiss goodbye.  Lad was out of Tsing by now,
and out of the guild, headed back to Twailin and his family.  She doubted that
she would ever see him again.  Her heart ached anew.

Don’t,
Mya
!  Love was a
weakness, and weakness would only get her killed.

Pulling
the wrappings from the tub, she wrung them out and draped them on the back of a
chair to dry.  Better to focus on their other kiss, on Lad’s betrayal.  Her
cheeks flushed as she remembered how he’d tricked her, letting her think that
he shared her feelings, then slipping the Grandmaster’s ring on her finger.

Mya
held up her hand and examined the ring: obsidian dark against her pale skin,
filigreed gold bright in the lamplight.  It was beautiful, she had to admit. 
More distinctive than the band of unadorned obsidian that she had worn as
Master Hunter, and more ornate than the black-and-gold ring that Lad had worn
as Twailin Guildmaster.  There were six guildmaster’s rings scattered across
the empire. 
This
ring was unique.  There was only one Grandmaster of
Assassins.

And
that’s me
.  With a
scoffing laugh, she leaned wearily against the tub and closed her eyes.

“Godsdamned
Grandmaster…  Lad’s crazy if he thinks I can do this.”  She tried to be angry
with him, but knew she couldn’t lay all the blame at his door.  She’d chased
power her whole life.  To a frightened girl on her own, joining the Assassins
Guild made sense.  Strength, skill, and power meant safety.  She had been
ambitious and ruthless, prepared to sacrifice whoever got in her way.

Until
I met Lad
.

“You’re
the perfect Grandmaster”, he had told her.  Mya didn’t believe it for a
second.  “You think like an assassin, but you have a good heart.”  Lad was
naïve.  That was one reason she’d fallen in love with him. 

“He
has no idea what’s in my heart.”  Mya heaved to her feet.  Catching sight of
herself in the mirror, she stopped and stared.  Her dark tattoos writhed in the
lamplight, a tapestry of magic engraved on her flesh from neck to wrist to
ankles.  They’d kept her alive tonight.  Imbuing her with strength and speed,
sharpening her senses, and healing grievous wounds, they made her nearly
invincible.  They also made her a monster.

“No
wonder Lad sent you packing.”

Stop
it
!  If Mya
expected to survive, she had to forget about her unrequited feelings for Lad
and do what she did best.

“Think
like an assassin, Mya.”  Whirling away from the mirror, she went to her trunk
and rifled through the contents, drawing out a comfortable silk shirt, a pair
of supple trousers, and clean scanties.  She considered her situation while she
dressed.

Lad
had killed Emperor Tynean Tsing II.  She had no doubt that a massive manhunt
for the emperor’s killers would ensue, that descriptions of her and Lad were
being distributed to the city guard.  Of course, that led to her next problem.

The
emperor of Tsing had also been the Grandmaster of the Assassins Guild.  In
helping Lad to kill the Grandmaster, she had cut the head off a very large
snake.  Now
she
was the head of the snake, the master of a guild that
didn’t even know she existed.  Could she control it, or would it turn its fangs
on her?  That would most likely depend on one person.

Lady
T
…

The
Tsing guildmaster had not been overly impressed with either Lad or Mya, but the
woman had seemed frightened when she escorted them to their meeting in the
palace dungeons, giving Mya the distinct feeling that Lady T feared the
Grandmaster.  Not surprising, considering what a monster the man had been.  So,
would the lady welcome Mya as a liberator or revile her for a usurper?

Mya
began to pace, and to think.  Everything depended on how Lady T reacted.  The
assassins of the Tsing guild would follow her lead, and Mya had no doubt that
the provincial guilds would fall in line behind the Tsing guild, the strongest
of them all.

And
if she doesn’t accept me
?

Bound
by blood contracts signed when they joined the guild, no guild assassin could
even attempt to harm the wearer of the Grandmaster’s ring.  Nothing, however,
prevented them from hiring someone outside the guild to kill her.  A chill ran
up Mya’s spine as she realized that the guild wouldn’t have to hire an outsider
to kill her.