Master of the Dance (35 page)

Chiana leant closer and laid a hand on his chest. "Then at least let me. Do not push me away."

He glanced down at her hand. "I dislike such attentions."

"You fear them. You are afraid that the ice around your heart will melt, and I may actually touch it. Although you have admitted your feelings, your love is as frozen as your passions. Locked away from public view, for fear of finding scorn, or worse still, pity from others."

"I care nothing for what other people think."

"Do you care what I think?"

His mouth curved in a slight, grim smile. "I know what you want. You long to tame me. To touch that which has never been touched. To be held by hands that have only ever killed. To be the only one who is safe in my embrace. That is what draws you to me, like others before you. Be content with the words you forced me to speak yesterday. There, you have succeeded where all others have failed. I am not a man to be trifled with, and to ask for more will only end in disappointment."

"Because you are the legendary Queen's Blade, a man of ice. A cold-hearted killer, immune to gentleness and affection. Not so, Blade? You pride yourself on your aloofness, your invulnerability. You admit to loving me, yet you will not show it. There is no shame in it."

"You know nothing." He pushed her away and tried to rise, but she shoved him back, holding him to the tree.

"I know what it is to love you. I know the pain of your rejection and the joy of your love. I care nothing for what you are, or how many you have killed. It is who you are that draws me, not your prowess or your fame. I felt it the first time I set eyes upon you, and I did not know who or what you were then."

"It must have been a great disappointment to find that I am less than you had hoped."

She nodded. "It was, but it changed nothing. You are afraid I will ask for more than you can give, but that, I will never do."

"You do not know just how little I have to give."

"Then show me. It will be better than nothing."

A slight, cold smile quirked his lips, but it did not reach his eyes. Chiana held her breath as he raised his hands and cupped her face. She closed her eyes, savouring the caress. His hands dropped to her wrists and gripped them, making her gasp and open her eyes. Pushing her away, he rose to his feet in a fluid motion and pulled her up. His brutal grip on her bruised wrists brought fresh tears to her eyes, and she bit her lip as she met his impassive gaze.

"You have had all that I have to offer," he said. "Be content."

"You do not rescind your words?"

"No."

Blade released her and strode away, leaving her gazing after him through her tears.

Chiana did not seek him out again. The hurt of his continued rejection mixed oddly with the happiness his admission of love had brought, and it echoed constantly in her mind. At night, she dreamt of him speaking the words again, but this time with warmth and affection in his eyes instead of resentment.

Blade left the palace on the third day, without visiting her, and she only knew that he had gone when the servants called her Regent once more. She returned to her duties with a heavy heart and a distant, sorrowful expression. At her first audience, the lords treated her gently, forgoing their usual rivalry and rancour, and agreeing with most of her suggestions without debate. The news of Blade's timely rescue brought praise for him from those who sought her favour, and none dared to voice a dislike for the assassin's regency; not even Fothal.

In truth, he had done little to earn their displeasure, since his brief rule had been marked by his lack of interest in it. She got through the days in a haze of ill-concealed grief and worry. Blade's reluctant words were the only bastion of joy to which she could cling. Verdan fed her tonics to build her strength, and gradually the colour returned to her cheeks and the dark rings under her eyes faded. Blade's absence ate at her as it had never done before, and the prospect that he may not return filled her sleep with unpleasant dreams.

Chapter Twenty Three

"The Queen's Blade is in Ashmarad."

Endor turned away from his senior general to hide the triumphant, nervous smile that twisted his lips. "Good. Where is he staying?"

"The spies are unable to discover that. His presence is learnt of only after he has left the place where he was seen."

"They are certain it is him?"

"Yes, My Prince."

Endor swung to face the officer. "I want you to find me the four best assassins in Ashmarad. Offer them a vast payment and tell them to go to Jondar and kill the Jashimari Regent."

"May I ask why, My Prince?"

"Why I want that whore dead? I would have thought that fairly obvious, Ballel. She wants me dead, so I am reciprocating in kind. Jashimari should have been thrown into turmoil when she fell into a coma, but it was not, because he became the damned Regent.

"Now she must pay the ultimate price for sending him to try to kill me. This time he will not be there to save her, or his accursed kingdom. Before he dies, I shall inform him of her imminent demise. It will make my triumph complete."

"Yes, My Prince." The officer bowed as Endor dismissed him with a gesture. The Prince went to the table and poured himself a cup of strong spirit, slugging it back with a grimace. Now that his wish was granted, he found the prospect of being hunted by the legendary assassin far more disquieting than he had anticipated.

To comfort himself, Endor contemplated the tortures he would inflict upon Blade when he captured him, and refused to entertain the notion that the assassin might succeed. In the back of his mind, a lingering doubt plagued him, however, and he found himself glancing into the shadows often, wondering if a black-clad man might be secreted there. He doubled the palace guard and locked himself in his rooms at night, but the precautions did little to allay his fears.

Blade studied the castle from a neighbouring hilltop, using his spyglass to count the guards that patrolled it, noting their routes and the times of their changing. So far, he had found few weaknesses. Endor seemed to have devoted his entire army to guarding himself. This did not surprise Blade, and experience had taught him that there was always a weak point, either overlooked or dismissed as impossible by the defenders. Each night, he returned to the city and slept in a different inn, arriving late and eating his meals in his room.

Each day, he rode around the castle, which was situated on a hill just outside the city, studying it from different angles. He had visited the two largest and most affluent brothels to make discrete enquiries into Endor's taste in women. There he learnt that Endor sent for women regularly, even though he had a harem of wives and concubines in the castle. His preference was for buxom, bosomy young girls, however, short of stature and plump of face. This ruled out the use of Blade's female disguise, somewhat to his relief. Endor's cruelty to the girls was well known. They always returned bruised and beaten, and some did not return at all.

Ashmarad's populace had suffered under Cotti rule. Endor's taxes had beggared the city's wealthier citizens and brought the entire economy down. The areas closest the castle comprised mansions and businesses; the rest was a sprawling warren of stinking, squalid slums. Cotti culture had influenced the architecture, and the temples had domes and minarets instead of steeples and tiled roofs, while the houses were similar to those in Jashimari. Cotti had influenced the language too, and it possessed more of the shortened words that Cotti liked to use, but without their accent.

Blade had spent the past tenday studying the city and the castle, as well as learning all he could about Endor's habits. The tale of Lance's attempt was still told in taprooms, and he had heard it several times now. His apprentice's plan had not been a bad one. Its only flaw was that he had been dealing with a Prince guarded by soldiers, and not a rich merchant with a few bodyguards. Cotti princes were trained in combat, and so were dangerous in themselves, but to attack Endor while he was surrounded by dog soldiers had been a fatal mistake.

Blade had already rejected the idea of making the attempt when Endor was in the city, and turned his attention to the castle instead. Most assassins would have viewed it as impregnable, but Blade had yet to find a building that could keep him out. Each night, after studying the castle, he would make a foray closer to it, enter the grounds and creep about the gardens and courtyards to spy out the lay of the land. The place abounded with dog soldiers, which would have been enough to put off most men.

It presented a problem, but Blade had already come up with a solution. There was a stray bitch in the city that was near to her heat, and he planned to enlist her aid. Familiars were less inclined to be influenced by carnal pursuits, but they were not immune to them. He had considered various plans by now and rejected them, resolving to rely purely upon his skills of stealth and trickery, with a little help from the bitch.

On the eleventh night, a Death Moon hung in the sky like a grinning skull, and various religious cults emerged to worship it. This was unheard-of in Jashimari and Cotti, where all worship other than Tinsharon's was forbidden, and punishable by death. In Contara, however, he had discovered that morals and religions were free to do as they pleased, which led to a rather debauched society with a plethora of myths, cults and strange gods. On this, the night of a full Death Moon, bonfires were lighted in the city, and scantily clad people danced around them. Torch-bearing processions marched through the streets, and the people, dressed in robes and skull masks, chanted and sang.

His study of the castle had at last revealed a weak point, as he had hoped. One side of the building was a blank wall some fifty feet high, devoid of widows or parapets, and consequently, guards. His study of Endor's movements had narrowed the position of his rooms to an area atop the wall, the most difficult place to reach, unless one scaled it. Even reaching the base of the wall was fraught with peril, and to do so he would require the bitch, and a distraction.

When darkness fell and the celebrations in the city were in full swing, Blade made his way into the slums to find the bitch. She was surrounded by admirers, but followed him when he slipped a rope around her neck and showed her the piece of meat he had bought for her. With a pack of dogs at his heels, he made his way through the outskirts of the city towards the castle, his bag heavy with the rope and tinder he had brought.

Reaching the castle wall, he tied the bitch to a tree and located the rough patch he had found on a previous foray, where his fingers could find purchase between the stones. On top of the wall, he waited while two quartets of guards strolled past, then slid down it into the shadows at its base. Across the courtyard lay the armoury, filled with spears and bows, which would provide an excellent distraction once he had set it ablaze.

To reach it, he had to make his way along the walls, since crossing the well-lighted courtyard was out of the question. This took several minutes, and he was forced to freeze in the shadows a few times when guards appeared. He had bathed before he had left the inn, scrubbing off all odour, but even so, the dogs would smell him if he was not careful to stay downwind. Reaching the armoury door without mishap, he found it locked. It took only a few moments to pick the lock, and he slipped inside.

In the gloom, he pulled some tinder from his pack and set to work with his tinderbox, cursing as the sparks refused to land on the tinder for a couple of minutes. Eventually he coaxed a fire into being and added fuel to it until it was large enough to spread once he had fed it the butts of several spears. The old wood was dry and oiled, and the flames licked hungrily at it. When he was certain that the fire had taken a firm hold, he opened a side window to give it air, then slipped out and locked the door behind him.

Retreating to the shadows beneath the wall, Blade waited for the fire to grow and be noticed, watching the faint orange glow in the window brighten. The smoke would also help to mask his scent from the dogs in the courtyard. Flames leapt in the window when one of the dogs smelt the smoke and raised the alarm. Soldiers rushed to the armoury, some armed with buckets of water, while those who arrived first broke down the door.

Officers shouted orders, and the flames roared when the door was beaten down, filling the courtyard with smoke and garish light. In the confusion, no one noticed a black figure sprint across the courtyard and vanish through a recently abandoned gate. Blade untied the bitch and led her into the courtyard, her bevy of admirers following. Skirting the ruckus around the armoury, he trotted through two unguarded gates, their sentries gone to fight the fire. Beyond the second gate, which led into another courtyard, the atmosphere remained quiet and undisturbed, and sentries manned their posts.

Blade released the bitch and hurled the piece of meat towards the next gateway, where four dog soldiers stood, two at either end of a short corridor that led through the section of the wall. The castle was designed in such a way that the broad courtyard that ran around most of it was divided into sections. In the event of invaders scaling a portion of the outer wall, they would find themselves trapped in a courtyard, where archers could pick them off. The pack loped after the bitch, and the sentries' familiars attacked the intruders, then discovered the bitch.

The men rushed into the fray, shouting at their dogs, which were as smitten as the rest of the pack. Blade smiled as he slipped through the shadows to the gate and into the next courtyard. On the far side, another quartet of dog soldiers guarded the gateway, but now the time had come for him to take the assassin's highway. He scaled one of the little huts that abounded within the courtyards, used by the soldiers or servants and built wherever space permitted. Walking along the roof to the next hut, he jumped the narrow gap and stepped onto a wall that led to the base of the cliff-like side of the castle.

Blade paused to glance back. The fire was a distant glow, beyond four walls. So far, it had been relatively easy, but he was still in an outer courtyard, and had moved around the castle, not into it. The route through it to Endor's rooms was a gauntlet of walls, gates and doors, all guarded by alert dog soldiers and their keen-nosed familiars. That was why he had chosen the unguarded wall, a daunting climb, but he was more likely to succeed in scaling it than he was to find a way past the scores of guards. The reason he had entered the courtyard further around the castle was because of the barracks outside the wall of the courtyard where he was now.