Fifth Quarter (24 page)

"He looks like he's seen a ghost."

"Or heard one."

Surrounded by a jeering crowd, the guard lurched up onto her feet, eyes narrowed and jaw thrust out. "I'm tellin' you, there ain't no one robbing them tombs! Them bodies are walkin' out on their own!"

Hands flat on the table, she leaned forward until her nose nearly touched the nose of the last man to speak. "I don't like you," she growled.

He stood. She straightened with him until she stared up into his face a good six inches above her own. "The dead don't walk," he told her, daring her to argue.

She thought about it for a moment, then self-preservation overruled the beer. Scooping her helm up off the bench, she staggered for the door, muttering, "I know what I seen."

Hot fingers closed around her wrist. Vree stared from Gyhard's hand to his face. His eyes were so completely expressionless that if not for his heated grip she would've thought he'd abandoned Bannon's body and left it empty.

They caught up to her before she got very far.

"Why should I tell you anythin'?" she asked, spitting into the gutter. "Yer just like them. Like all of them. Got busted down a rank 'cause I told what I saw. Got laughed at. You heard 'em, laughing. Well, no more. The two of you can just take yerselves outa my way."

Her eyes wide shadows in the pale oval of her face, the guard stared at the woman kneeling over her. "I
ain't never seen anyone move so fast," she panted, terror chasing the alcohol from her voice. "Yer hurtin' me."

Vree moved the blade a fraction of an inch. "I know. Remember it."

He'd been uncertain of what would happen when he'd given the silent order, uncertain whether she'd even follow it, but years of army training had apparently made some responses instinctive. He stepped over the sprawl of legs and squatted by the guard's right shoulder where he could see her face. Vree shifted her own position slightly to give him room, and it suddenly occurred to him that perhaps it had nothing to do with army training. An argument could be raised that they were working as a team.

"Yeah, but not with words." For the first time she dared to turn her head enough to look at him. "Slaughter it. You
do
believe me."

Vree stood as Gyhard did, daggers disappearing as she moved. "Are you sure?" she asked again. "Because I'm not." She could feel Gyhard trembling even though she couldn't see it. "What now?"

"I think we'd best go talk to that foreign singer."

"We don't know where she is."

"If she was knocked unconscious late last night, she's still at the Healers' Hall." He started out of the alley. "You may have to get us past a guard."

"Oh no! One whole guard! Can we possibly do it?"

"Shut up, Bannon." She fell into step at Gyhard's side. "We'll manage."

Lying where she'd been thrown, one finger lightly resting on the bead of blood marking her throat, the guard thanked any gods who might be listening that she'd been forgotten and watched, without moving, until the two strangers disappeared into the night.

Chapter Nine

The two dead men who stood at the foot of her bed implored her with their eyes and pleaded with writhing arms and hands that clutched at nothing she could see. Their need engulfed her and Karlene fought for breath under its desperate weight.

"I don't know what you want," she gasped.

She could hear them screaming although their mouths were closed. The screams became a Song and just for an instant she thought she understood. Then the instant passed.

Flesh began to decay and fall from the ivory bone beneath. Bits of fingers dropped onto the blanket covering her legs. Even while they rotted, both men continued to beg for her aid. Bone followed flesh, crumbling to dust as she watched until only the eyes remained, burning in a pair of shadows.

Terror closing her throat, she struggled to answer them. "I don't know what you want…"

"We want to talk."

Not the voice of nightmare but the voice of a living man. Sleep fled and the shadows at the foot of the bed gained substance. Head throbbing, Karlene lifted herself up onto her elbows, squinting in the mix of moon and starlight that poured through the small, arched window high above her. "Who… ?"

The shadow on the left stepped forward into definition, becoming a young woman; sleekly muscled, not very tall. Her delicate, almost waiflike features were at odds with both her expression and the deadly, liquid way she moved. She was beautiful the way poisonous snakes were beautiful—the certain knowledge that they could kill without a second thought, without regret, adding to their glamour. As she came around the corner of the bed, Karlene realized that something was very, very wrong.

Every instinct told her two people were approaching where she could only see one.

She'd been told by the healer that under no circumstances should she use her bardic abilities, that the blow she'd taken could have easily killed her, but when the young woman lifted her head, moonlight reflecting for an instant in her eyes, Karlene caught her gaze and held it.
"Stop right there!"

"Bannon! I can't move!"

"Try harder!"

"I
am
trying harder!" Vree struggled against the compulsion, but her feet had rooted to the floor. She felt Bannon's consciousness race through her body, then surge to the front of her mind.

"Let me take it, sister-mine…"

They had learned to trust each other in a hundred, in a thousand situations where to hesitate meant death. Vree sucked in a deep breath and, as she released it, gave Bannon control.

She felt herself dive toward the bed, the familiar weight of a leather-wrapped hilt in one hand. She saw the blonde woman jerk away and discovered she could move again. But it was Bannon who held the blade to an ivory column of throat and Bannon's cry of freedom that echoed inside her skull.

The kiss of the dagger's point having successfully banished all other emotions save fear, Karlene pressed back against the pillow, oblivious to the red heat pounding at her temples.
I
hope I'm still dreaming
…

You are a fool, Gyhard i 'Stevana. A fool
! How could he not have realized that the foreign singer was a bard?
I've spent too many years in the Empire
. Since his first body had died, he'd been near only one other bard and, although untrained and emotionally crippled, Kars had known what he was, had sensed the reforged connection between his life and the physical shell he wore. He could only assume that this bard would know him as well and the thought of that recognition paralyzed him.

He'd done nothing to prevent Vree's capture by the bard's Command and, a heartbeat later when Vree shook the Command off and dove for the bed, he continued to do nothing.

He'd watched Vree closely for the last thirteen days. He watched her now and tried to understand the small changes in her bearing, in the way her fingers wrapped around the hilt of the dagger, in the curve of her spine.

"This is
my
body, Bannon! Mine!"

Facial muscles twisted, teeth snapped together, a shudder ran from neck to ankles but the hand holding the knife never moved.

Karlene, sensing the battle, rolled her eyes toward the second shadow. A male copy of the woman who had her pinned to the braided straw mattress; his features fey instead of gamine, the danger he exuded was more subtle than a sudden death. The woman held two lives. The man held his at arm's length. A day ago—or perhaps more accurately a night ago—she would have cried
abomination
and run. But she'd seen the dead up and walking and knowing they were dead, and all reactions had to be measured against that.

"You'll have to excuse my companion." His tone managed to hold both threat and amusement. "She's an assassin and has only one response to perceived obstacles."

An assassin
. Enclosed as they were within the city walls, the First Army had no assassins—they made the citizens of the Capital far too nervous. While Karlene had never met one, she'd certainly heard of them; dark songs called them Jiir's blades and insisted they were safely sheathed by the army. The assassin bending over her looked neither sheathed nor safe.

Following the bard's train of thought with little difficulty, Gyhard smiled slightly. "I wouldn't twitch so much if I were you."

"I'm not twitching." Shallow breathing kept her skin from pressing against the blade. "It's just that I've never heard they were able to overcome Command."

"Usually, they aren't." Gyhard saw no reason to tell the bard what he suspected must have happened and surrender a potentially useful advantage.
She's not one assassin, she's two
. "Give me your word you won't… Sing out, and I'll have her release you."

"My word?"

"That's right."

As she had little choice, Karlene gave it, fully aware that even if she called for help she'd be dead before it arrived. It was a strange feeling; in Shkoder bards were honored, in the Empire they were protected by an Imperial decree, but neither honor nor the Emperor would—could—save her now. She was staring death in the face—and she'd never imagined death would be beautiful.
And this is
not
the time to start writing love songs
...

Bit by bit, Vree pried up Bannon's will and thrust him to the edges of her consciousness. He was her brother, and if honor demanded she sacrifice him, she would die as well, but she would give him no more of her life than he already had. Her strength surprised them both. Regaining control, she saw Gyhard studying her, a worried frown creasing the bridge of his nose, and realized she hadn't answered his question.