Eye of the Labyrinth (39 page)

Chapter 74

Tia reached Tolace some ten days after she escaped the High Priestess’s convoy. They were ten days of hiding and living off the land, of dodging other travelers and trying to look inconspicuous whenever she could not avoid them. Fortunately, Kirshov Latanya had kept his word, and provided her with enough food that she was able to go for days without having to hunt. He had also, she discovered with delight, returned her bow and quiver of arrows, which she found hidden in the bedroll.

She was still at a loss to explain the Senetian prince’s behavior, even after days of doing little else but think about it. It was suspiciously out of character, from what she knew of him, and she was certain the Lion of Senet would be furious to learn that Tia Veran had once again slipped through his fingers. All she could conclude in the end was that he really meant it when he said he thought Dirk’s actions were repellent, and with some sort of honor-twisted logic, had decided to let her go, in an attempt to redress the injustice.

It was raining when she finally reached the outskirts of Tolace, with its long Hospice wall and its tall granite cliffs. The rain was warm, however, and it didn’t really slow her down much. She had decided it was safe enough to use the road, this far south of Avacas, and had covered the last ten miles in half the time it had taken her to cover the previous five.

The market was winding down for the evening when she trotted into town. It was past first sunrise and the heavy rain clouds were bloody and oppressive in the light of the red sun. Most of the stallholders beneath the wall had closed up for the evening, the rain driving away the few customers who ventured out this late in the day.

Boris Farlo, the Brotherhood man she knew in Tolace, had a small shop opposite the Hospice wall, which sold a large variety of woven baskets that his wife and five daughters made in a small workshop out the back of his shop. The wares were expertly crafted, ranging from small wicker baskets useful for little more than storing trinkets to the huge trunks favored by the nobility for traveling.
And the odd dead body,
Tia speculated, thinking of the cheerful little man’s other occupation. His goods were renowned for their craftsmanship, and were shipped all over Senet and Dhevyn, which made the harmless-looking little Senetian basketmaker very valuable to an organization whose prime function was smuggling.

It was almost closing time when she dismounted outside a shop selling flowers some way down the street. She walked past the basket shop twice, as casually as she could manage, waiting until the last customer had left before she stepped inside. It was cluttered with all manner of wickerwork, and she had to duck under some of the baskets hanging from the ceiling as she neared the counter. Boris looked up, with his best new-customer smile, which changed to a much more genuine smile when he recognized her.

“Tasha!”

Tia rarely used her own name in Senet, and certainly not since there had been a price on her head. Boris probably knew it was not her real name; he might even know her true identity, but they kept up the fiction that he did not. He was a short man, with a well-rounded belly, the result, no doubt, of his wife trying to teach five daughters how to cook.

“Hello, Boris.”

“This is a surprise! I wasn’t expecting to see you!”

What he really meant was there were no Baenlander ships in port at the moment. Tia had thought that would be too much to hope for. Life rarely worked out so neatly.

“I’m just passing through,” she explained. “I need somewhere to stay until I can get a message to my brother.” The “brother” she referred to was Reithan. Had she said “father,” Boris would have known she meant Porl Isingrin. Her “uncle” was Dal Falstov, the captain of the
Orlando
.

Boris nodded. “Somewhere discreet?” he asked knowingly.

“The discreeter the better,” she agreed, wondering if there was such a word.

“Why don’t you go out back and say hello to Gilda and the girls? As soon as I close up the shop, we can have a nice long chat and you can tell me what you need.”

Boris’s wife Gilda was like a female version of her husband: short, round and jolly, although Tia knew that she was just as highly placed as her husband in the Brotherhood, and far more dangerous when crossed. There was a story that Tia had heard once, claiming Gilda Farlo had castrated an amorous sailor with her trimming knife when he tried to get fresh with one of her daughters. Tia didn’t know if the story was true, and decided it probably wasn’t prudent to ask.

The kitchen was full of the smell of boiling cabbages and beets, as Gilda ordered her small army of daughters around the kitchen like a little general. She offered to help, but Gilda would have none of it, insisting that Tia get out of her wet clothes and sit by the fire to dry off, even though it was quite warm and the fire did little more than make her sweat.

Boris came through from the shop about a half an hour later, as Tia was sitting in front of the stove, wearing a borrowed skirt and blouse that belonged to Caterina Farlo, who was at least three sizes bigger and a head shorter than Tia.

“Now we can talk,” he announced, taking a seat at the scrubbed wooden table with a sigh of relief. He lifted his feet up and without being asked, the youngest girl—a chubby blonde about fourteen—hurried over with a footstool and placed it under his feet.

“Tea, Mother!” he ordered cheerfully.

“On the way,” Gilda assured him, a few moments before placing a steaming cup in front of him. “Would you like some tea, Tasha?”

“No thanks, Gilda. I’m fine.” Given the opportunity, Tia knew from her past visits to this house, Gilda would pour tea down her throat endlessly, until she was all but drowning in it.

“So when did you slip into Senet?” Boris asked, taking an appreciative sip from his cup.

“Just after Landfall,” she explained, seeing no point in lying to him. He would have known the
Makuan
was in Senetian waters then, anyway, and rather ironically, for a bunch of criminals with no discernable morals, the Brotherhood had a very dim view of liars.

“And now you need to get
out
of Senet?” he guessed.

“The sooner the better,” she agreed. “Do you know where any of our ships are at the moment?”

“The
Orlando
’s tied up in Paislee, so that would be the closest. I’ve not seen the
Wanderer
for a while, and the last I heard the
Makuan
was in Derex.”

“Then I should head for Paislee,” she suggested.

Boris shook his head. “It’s a long way to Paislee, lass, and she could easily sail before you get there. It’ll be quicker if I send a message to our people by bird, and they can let Dal Falstov know you’re here. He can then decide whether he wants to pick you up here or have you meet him somewhere safer.”

“Somewhere safer?”

“Tolace is crawling with the Lion of Senet’s Guard at the moment,” Gilda informed her.

“Why?” Tia asked cautiously.
Surely they’re not here looking
for me already?

“Misha Latanya has been brought to the Hospice,” Boris explained. “There’s talk that he’s dying.”

“Dying?” she asked in surprise.
How could he be dying?
Tia wondered. He was just another poppy-dust addict, and they were either lost in the dust or dead from it. There was no middle ground.

“Aye,” Gilda agreed. “It’s a sad state of affairs. I hear he’s quite an amiable young man.”

“He is,” Tia confirmed absently.

Gilda and Boris both looked at her in surprise. “You know him?”

“I met him once,” she told them, silently cursing her loose tongue. “I’m surprised to hear he’s dying, though. Did you hear what was wrong with him?”

“Not really,” Gilda shrugged. “It’s just one of those unfortunate things, I suppose. Some people are just born with weak blood.”

Weak blood, my arse,
Tia thought skeptically.
Weak-willed is
more like it
.

“Why don’t you visit with him while you’re here?” Gilda suggested brightly.

“Pardon?”
Tia gasped.

Boris chuckled. “Don’t listen to Mother, Tasha, she’s teasing. What she means is that we have a safe house in the grounds of the Hospice. You can stay there until we hear from the
Orlando
.”

“In the
grounds
of the Hospice?” she repeated doubtfully. “I thought you said it was crawling with Antonov’s guard.”

“Which is what makes it so safe,” Gilda explained. “The last place they look for people hiding from them is right under their noses.”

“Never fear, Tasha,” Boris assured her. “We’ll not see you come to any harm. Unless, of course, you don’t like Mother’s cooking, in which case she’ll probably whack you over the head with her spoon, tie you up and hand you over to the guard herself.”

They all laughed. The five Farlo daughters pushed and jostled each other good-naturedly as they took their places at the table. Gilda hefted the heavy cauldron of borscht onto the table and began to dole it out into large, glazed pottery bowls.

Tia took her place at the table and joined in the laughter warily, not entirely certain that Boris was joking.

Chapter 75

It was almost a week after Alenor’s miscarriage before Dirk was able to see her, and when he did, he was shocked by her appearance. Always a small girl, she now seemed so thin and fragile that a stiff wind might blow her away. He stepped into the room as Dorra announced him, leaving his ever-faithful escort waiting in the hall. He looked at Alenor with concern. The room was dim, the windows covered to keep out the bright light of the second sun, and the air was heavy with the scent of rose petals that smoldered in a small dish by the bed. Alenor sat propped up on a mountain of pillows, her pale face almost as white as the silk sheets she lay on.

“Dirk!” Alenor said with a weak smile as Dorra closed the doors and stood in front of them like a sentinel.

“How are you?”

“Feeling a little better,” she assured him. She looked past him to her lady-in-waiting. “Could you arrange some tea, Dorra? And when Captain Seranov gets here, send him straight in.”

“Your majesty, it’s not appropriate for you to be alone with . . .”

“Oh, Dorra,” she sighed. “Dirk is my cousin, and we’ve already had numerous discussions about the captain of my guard.”

“Very well, your majesty,” Dorra agreed with a great deal of reluctance. She opened the doors behind her and headed into the other room, pointedly leaving them open.

Dirk walked to the bed and sat down, taking Alenor’s hand in his. It was so small, so thin, he was afraid it might crumble in his grasp if he held it too tightly.

“I spoke to Yuri. He says you’re coming along nicely.”

“Master Daranski would probably say that even if I was gasping my dying breath.”

Dirk smiled. “Well, at least you haven’t lost your sense of humor.”

“But I lost my baby.” She sounded so small and frightened.

“There’ll be others,” he lied, with an encouraging smile. “A miscarriage is just nature’s way of telling you that this child wasn’t meant to be.”

Dirk felt a little guilty for the lie. Yuri had told him the damage to Alenor’s womb was severe. It was unlikely that she would ever carry another child. That news worried Dirk a great deal, and not only for the effect such knowledge might have on Alenor. If Antonov suspected that Alenor could no longer bear him the heir to Dhevyn he so desperately wanted, then his only alternative heir was Dirk. He had begged Yuri to keep his suspicions to himself for Alenor’s sake, hoping that Yuri would not realize Dirk had another reason for being so considerate of his cousin’s delicate state of mind.

“Nature is very perceptive,” Alenor remarked in an odd voice, turning her head away to avoid meeting his eye.

Dorra bustled into the room carrying a tray with two steaming cups of tea. She offered the tray to Dirk, who lifted the cups and placed them on the side table beside the bed.

“Will there be anything else, your majesty?”

“Her majesty will call you if she needs anything,” Dirk answered for the queen.

Dorra glared at him, but Dirk’s position was too ambiguous for her to challenge him confidently. “As you wish, my lord.” She curtsied politely and left the room, but did not close the doors behind her.

“Alenor?”

When she looked back at him, her eyes were filled with tears. “I’m being punished, aren’t I?” she asked in a small voice.

“What are you talking about, silly? Punished for what?”

She glanced past Dirk into the other room to check on Dorra’s whereabouts before she answered. “It wasn’t Kirsh’s baby, Dirk,” she whispered.

He did not respond immediately. In fact, he was quite numb with the shock of her revelation. “Did Kirsh know?” he asked cautiously, in a low voice.

She nodded. “I’ve never been with him, Dirk. Not even on our wedding night. He was furious when he found out I was pregnant.”

Furious was probably an understatement,
he thought. Then something else Yuri said to him when he inquired after Alenor began to make sense. “Who else knew?”

“Nobody.”

“Are you sure about that? What about the baby’s father?”

“Well, of course he knew.”

“And do you trust him?”

“As much as I trust you.”

He was silent for a moment, debating how much he should tell her. He purposely did not dwell on the implications of her news. That Alenor had spurned Kirsh and taken a lover was something he was not quite ready to deal with just yet. “Alenor, do you know that Yuri suspects your miscarriage wasn’t an accident?”

“I remember him saying something like that the night it happened.” She suddenly clutched at his hand. Her grip was disturbingly weak. “Oh Goddess, Dirk! You don’t think I took something deliberately, do you? I didn’t try to get rid of it, I swear!”

“But maybe somebody else did,” he suggested.

“Who would do such a thing? Kirsh was the only one who knew the truth, and I don’t care what you say, he would never do anything so dreadful.”

He nodded in agreement. “Kirsh would go to his father and tell him everything before he killed an innocent child, even one that wasn’t born yet.”

“Then who could have done such a thing?”

“What about your faithful watchdog?”

“Dorra? I don’t think so. If she suspected anything, Antonov would know about it, and I wouldn’t be lying here having my every whim catered to. I’d be in a dungeon having a long and painful chat with Barin Welacin.”

He thought for a moment, and then it came to him. The one person in Avacas he was certain was capable of such a heinous act, and more important, had the knowledge of and access to the herbs required to induce an abortion. Someone with plenty of reason to not want Alenor to carry her child to term, regardless of who the father might be. He did not share his thoughts with Alenor, however. There were other, better ways to deal with the author of this tragedy. And, for Alenor’s sake, it would be better if she did not suspect who had been responsible. He didn’t think she was so good an actress that she would not betray herself if he told her of his suspicions.

“You must be more careful, Alenor.”

“
I
should be more careful?” she asked archly. “That’s rather ironic, coming from you.” She stopped speaking suddenly and looked over his shoulder at the door. Dorra was standing there, glaring at them suspiciously. “Yes, Dorra?”

“Captain Seranov is here, your majesty,” her lady-in-waiting announced.

“Send him in, please,” she ordered, with a hint of the old Alenor behind her frail command. “And close the doors, would you? The light is hurting my eyes.”

Dorra admitted Alexin and with a disapproving scowl, closing the doors behind him as Alenor had asked.

Dirk rose to his feet, partly out of politeness, and partly out of a strong sense of self-preservation. The captain of Alenor’s guard looked very smart in his blue-and-silver uniform, but he was also rather conspicuously armed, and Dirk could well imagine how Alexin felt about the news that Dirk Provin was now the Lord of the Shadows and the right hand of the High Priestess of the Shadowdancers.

“What’s
he
doing here?” Alexin asked coldly, stopping just inside the closed doors with his hand resting on the hilt of his sword.

“We need all the powerful friends we can get, my love,” Alenor told him. “Would you watch the door, Dirk?”

She held out her hands to Alexin, and he hurried to her bed, taking her in his arms and holding her silently.

Dirk was rendered almost speechless by the depth of their lunacy. “You’re a pair of damn fools!”

They clung to each other desperately for a moment. Dirk realized that this was probably the first chance they’d had to be alone since her miscarriage. Alexin let Alenor go and turned to face him, his hand reaching for the sword.

“No, Alexin,” Alenor commanded. “Dirk won’t betray us.”

“He’s betrayed everybody else he’s had anything to do with lately,” Alexin snarled. “Why not you or me?”

“You’re still permitted to walk freely through the Lion of Senet’s palace armed with a sword, Alexin,” Dirk pointed out. “Do you think that likely if I’d betrayed what I know about you and your family?”

“Is that a threat?”

“More a blindingly obvious fact.”

“Your very presence in this room is an insult,” Alexin spat in disgust.

“You’re a fine one to talk,” Dirk accused. “Alenor nearly died because of your carelessness. You have an interesting way of interpreting
your
oath to protect your queen, Captain.”

“Stop it, Dirk!” Alenor ordered. “This is just as much my fault as Alexin’s.”

He was not entirely unsympathetic to her plight.
How lost
and lonely must you have been to turn to Alexin for comfort?
But it did not excuse such stupidity. Even if Alenor was too naive to realize the risk, Alexin certainly should have known better.

He shook his head in disbelief. “Have the two of you
any
idea of the danger you’re courting?”

“It wasn’t like we planned anything,” Alenor said defensively. “It just . . . happened.”

“Then make it
un
happen, Alenor. Now. Send him back to Kalarada. For Alexin’s sake as much as your own. Kirsh will kill him if he finds out, and Antonov will destroy you.”

“I’m not afraid to face Kirshov Latanya,” Alexin declared with quiet determination.

“You should be, you fool!” Dirk snapped in annoyance. “Because while you’re busy defending your honor, the Lion of Senet will be back on Kalarada disbanding the Queen’s Guard for treason and replacing it with his own.”

His words silenced both of them. Neither Alenor nor Alexin had apparently given any thought to the consequences of their affair, beyond what they felt for each other.

What a mess we’ve all made of our lives,
he thought.

“Dirk, please don’t be mad at me,” she said, begging for his understanding. “You’ve no idea what it was like on Kalarada. Kirsh spent all his time doting on his mistress, and then up and disappeared on me for months. I have nobody I can trust except Alexin and Jacinta. Antonov’s spies watch every move I make . . .”

“Who’s Jacinta?”

“My cousin. I left her in Kalarada to keep on eye things while I was in Avacas.”

“Jacinta
D’Orlon
?” he asked, having heard the name mentioned in palace gossip. She was quite notorious, actually, which was how Dirk had heard of her. “Is this the same Jacinta D’Orlon who told Lord Birkoff that she’d rather marry the male of another species than share his bed?” He rolled his eyes in despair. “Now there’s someone you can
obviously
rely on for tact and good judgment.”

Alenor managed a weak smile. “She never told me she said that . . .”

“How in the name of the Goddess did you manage this without being caught?” he asked in astonishment.

“We were careful,” Alexin told him.

“Not careful enough,” Dirk retorted.

“When I discovered I was pregnant, we decided I should come to Avacas,” Alenor explained. “Jacinta thought that if I could tell Antonov before Kirsh got back, then he’d assume that it was Kirsh’s child and then Kirsh wouldn’t be able to deny it.”

“That was a pretty big gamble, Alenor. You beat us here by less than a day.”

“But it worked,” she shrugged. “Will you help us, Dirk?”

“Help you how?”

“You could use your influence to get some of the Senetians out of Kalarada,” Alexin suggested.

“Why should I? So you two can indulge your affair in ignorant bliss while the world falls to pieces around you?”

“That’s not fair, Dirk,” Alenor said, quite hurt by his lack of sympathy.

“Very little in this world is, Allie.”

“You’re wasting your time, Alenor,” Alexin advised. “He’s not going to help anybody but himself. All you’ve done by confiding in him is made the danger worse.”

“I won’t betray you,” Dirk promised. “I’ve got problems enough of my own without buying into yours. But that doesn’t mean I don’t think what you’re doing is stupid and dangerous.”

“You don’t care that
Kirsh
has a mistress.”

“Antonov won’t kill Kirsh for taking a lover, Alenor.”

“But now that you’re back and he has an alternative heir to Dhevyn, he’d destroy Alenor without hesitation if he learned she had taken one,” Alexin concluded, convincing Dirk that maybe the captain was not quite as dense as he first thought.

“Get out of Avacas,” Dirk said to Alexin. “Today, if possible.”

“I won’t send him away, Dirk.”

“You must, Alenor,” he insisted. “Besides, I need him to get a message to Reithan for me,” he added, turning to face the captain.

“What could you possibly have to say that the Baenlanders would want to hear?”

Dirk took a deep breath before he answered the question, certain beyond doubt that his next words would provoke a reaction.

“I’m going to tell Antonov how to get through the delta,” he informed Alexin calmly. “You’ll need to warn him so they can evacuate Mil.”