Fifth Quarter (37 page)

Karlene wiped at the tears streaming down her cheeks. She couldn't remember crying. "I'm fine. In fact, I feel terrific."

But behind the flippant remarks, Vree could feel the effect the Song had had on Bannon and, somehow, they seemed better defined than they had for a while. She knew where he ended. He knew where she began.

They passed Shaebridge just before dusk, their pace having been drastically slowed by the traffic approaching the city. Walk turned to trot turned to canter turned to full gallop as they tried to make up the time they'd lost. The sound of their horses' hooves softened as they moved from dressed stone to the packed clay of the road that followed the crest of the river valley, but it remained loud enough to cover the sound of the single horse galloping behind.

"What's the matter?"

Vree turned from the gable window, pulled around by the bard's whisper, to find the older woman merely an arm's length behind her. Her muscles tensed, began to move, but she managed to prevent the response training and experience dictated.

It had been the smallest of possible sounds, snapping her up out of a fitful sleep. Bannon hadn't heard it. She was beginning to doubt that she had.

Karlene misunderstood the barely visible tremor. "Are you cold?"

It would be the easy answer. "I'm not used to this." A wave of her hand indicated the night outside the loft. "The nights in the south of the Empire are as heavy and warm as the days."

"You're confused, sister-mine, but I'm not doing it." Bannon's mental voice picked up the intonation of command. "Ask her."

"Why, Vree? Are you afraid I'll win? That I'll take over? That I'll keep you imprisoned the way you've kept me?" She could feel the accusation stretching back beyond the time they'd shared a single body.

"No! I'm afraid I won't stop. That I'll push until you're gone!" She slammed herself at him with every phrase. "And then
he'll
have won! Is that what you want? For me to push you right out of here?"

His consciousness retreated so completely, so quickly, that she had to throw out a hand to steady herself against the age-polished wood of the window frame.

"I want my body back." He sounded like he was five; hurt, frightened, betrayed. She wanted to hold him, to tell him everything would be all right, be the anchor and the shield she'd always been for him. But she couldn't.

Who would hear her if she cried that she wanted her body back? Who had heard her when she was five?

Gyhard stirred. Even asleep, her brother's face now bore the patina of the man who wore it. Could the bard Sing him out of Bannon's body? If she did, where would he go?

Vree closed her eyes and collapsed for a heartbeat into the comforting circle of Karlene's arms. She trembled as she felt warm lips touch her hair, then she set her jaw and pushed away. "No…"

He could hear the two women talking, their voices rising and falling in murmured cadences too soft to carry the actual words to his position on the roof. Cloaked in the night, Neegan weighed his options. Until this point, he'd concentrated solely on tracking his targets; now he could begin to plan the kill. When sleep claimed them once again, it would be easy enough to slip through the window, slit their throats, and put their betrayal to rest. The foreign singer would awake beside a pair of bloody corpses and the structure of the Empire would be restored. Assassins who deserted from the seven armies died.

But these targets were a special case, and Marshal Chela wanted to know
why
. Although he considered their reasons of less than no importance held up against the enormity of their faithlessness, it wasn't the first command he'd been given that went against his personal preference. One of the two would have to be taken alive.

No. Both. Threatening Bannon would drag the truth from Vree. He doubted he'd get it any other way. The brother was the sister's only weakness. Bannon was his own weakness as well, but he'd pile lie upon lie to save himself the way she never would to save him. And to save her? Neegan wouldn't want to put it to the test.

Perhaps they
should
have been separated. But so few children became available for training with a sibling so close in age and ability. It had been an opportunity impossible to resist.

And I was right. They both survived, finding strength together where they might not have had it alone. They were two of the best.

Which made it worse when they betrayed his judgment, his decision to keep them together. The army was supposed to be the only family an assassin had…

It was the only family he'd ever had.

These two had spat in its face. His face.

Neegan didn't want to kill the foreign singer if he could help it—he could leave her in good conscience for the First Army—but neither would he hesitate if she interfered with his mission.

He wasn't surprised to find they were no longer in a private room. The way they'd spent their stolen coin, he was surprised that it had lasted as long as it had. Right hand working around the leather-wrapped grip of his favorite dagger, he weighed the possibility of success while all three slept grouped together in the loft. On one side of the scale, it would be over. Finished. He could let go of the anger devouring his heart. On the other side, he would have two of the best assassins the seven armies had ever trained to subdue as well as an opponent of unknown skills to deal with.

I will wait the short time necessary in order to face them one at a time
. He had survived longer than almost any other Imperial assassin. Long enough to become an officer. Long enough to know that to strike in anger dulled the blade.

"
Soon
," his dagger whispered as he slid it into the sheath.

Far enough north for snow in the winter, the roof of the small inn sloped gently from ridge to eaves. Over the years, Neegan had slept on worse beds. Though the night was cool, the threat of rain had passed and up above, the stars, the same stars that blazed out over the Sixth Army, divided the sky into a thousand portents.

He saluted the Archer, and, warmed by the heat of his anger, closed his eyes.

He opened them again just before dawn when the sound of the inn door jerked him awake. Rolling up into a crouch, he worked the night out of his muscles and peered over the eaves, waiting to see who the early riser would be.

Bannon.

Neegan frowned, his own action arrested, as he stared at the slight figure crossing the innyard to the privy. It
was
Bannon. And yet…

No. The patterns of shadow between the day and night could be deceptive. The angle of observation, looking down from above, elongated some movements while it masked others entirely. And Bannon
had
changed. He had cast aside everything he'd been taught to believe in—surely such corruption would leave a physical sign.

Wrapping his betrayal around him, Neegan waited until the rough plank door to the privy closed, then moved silently off the roof. He would take Bannon as he emerged and it would all be over by the time the sun cleared the horizon.

"Vree!"

"I feel it, too." She lay still on the pallet, senses extended; the sounds, the smells, the feel of the air currents against her skin sifted for threat.

"Whatever it is, it's not in here," Bannon declared after a moment.

"Outside?"

"Yes…" A weapon clasped loosely in each hand, she rolled up onto her feet in a single, fluid motion. "Gyhard's missing."

Tucked into a fetid corner between the stable and the privy, Neegan set his anger aside and narrowed his focus to Bannon's capture. The anger would be easy enough to take up again when it would no longer be in the way. He listened to the sounds from within the small building—the splash of liquid, the rustle of cloth, the creak of wood as a man's weight settled on it—and timed a likely exit.

A blade held across the throat wouldn't be enough, but a sharp pommel blow behind the ear would significantly slow a counterattack. Perhaps even prevent one entirely.

Wood creaked again. Cloth rustled.

Gyhard stared in astonishment as Vree flung herself out of the loft's small gable window, hit the ground, rolled, and ended up facing him, crouched with a dagger in each hand.

"If you're trying to make me piss myself, you're too late," he muttered, wondering when she'd cease to amaze him. "
What
are you doing?"