The Born Queen (27 page)

“That’s true. I pointed that out to him.”

“Well?”

“He said things had changed.”

“What things?”

“It’s just another of his tricks,” Aspar said. “I’m not sure what he’s up to, but it’s nothing good.”

“Well, he wants you alive for something, or you wouldn’t be, right?”

“Werlic.”

She shook her head. “Why would the Blood Knight want you alive?”

“He didn’t really say.”

“Curious.”

How long was she there?
he suddenly wondered.
Did she hear the whole conversation? Is she testing me?

Or was she, after all, with Fend?

Either way, he should probably kill her. He reached for the feyknife casually, as if he were just going to take the reins.

CHAPTER FIVE

A
USTRA

“T
HAT’S LIKELY IT,”
Cazio breathed, gesturing with his nose toward the long coil of the Old King’s Road they could see from the cobbled-together treehouse z’Acatto referred to as their “mansion.” There, a carriage with an armed escort was making its way along the ruts. The driver, Cazio could make out, wore the gold, black, and green livery of the duchess of Rovy, which was Anne’s household title.

“So it’ll be a fight,” z’Acatto sighed.

Cazio was starting to ask what the old man meant when the scene suddenly shifted into finer focus.

The escort wore the orange and dark blue of the knights of Lord Gravio, one of the Church’s military orders.

“She’s already been captured,” he murmured.

“There’s no proof she’s even in there,” z’Acatto said. “It may be some fat sacritor or a half dozen soldiers.”

“It might be,” Cazio agreed, “but I only
see
five. I’ll worry about any in the carriage later.”

“Five men in full armor mounted on war steeds,” z’Acatto pointed out. “One or two would be plenty.”

“Yes, I’ve learned my lesson there,” Cazio said.

“I doubt that.”

“No, I have. One doesn’t fence such men; one hits them with something heavy, yes? So what do we have that’s heavy?”

He searched for an answer to that. The mansion was nothing more than a sort of blind they had constructed where the branches of two large trees came together. It was about ten pareci off the ground. They had some empty wine carafes and a few sticks. That was about it. Given the distance, they still had a little time, but not more than a quarter of a bell.

Z’Acatto took another drink of their last bottle of Matir Mensir, and for a moment Cazio thought he was going to sleep. Instead, he sighed and wiped the back of his hand across his stubbled mouth.

“I have an idea,” he said.

As Cazio stepped into the road in front of the small cavalcade, he was still not certain that z’Acatto’s idea was a good one, but it was the only one they had.

“Halt there,” he shouted.

The knights lifted their visors, and he could see their astonishment.

“What’s the matter with you?” one of them, a fellow with a reddish mustache, asked.

“I heard knights of Lord Gravio were on this road,” he said. “I said to myself, ‘Has the knight of Gravio ever been born that I couldn’t beat wearing nothing more than my skin and a sword?’ And the answer, of course, was no. But then I wondered, ‘What if there were two or three of them? I might break a sweat.’ But I’m thinking four of you might have a chance.”

“Get out of the road, you naked idiot,” another of the knights said. “By that popinjay’s sword you wield, you’re no knight.”

“Let me get this perfectly clear,” Cazio said, leaning on Acredo. “You’re afraid to fight a naked man. You understand I was saying you can all come at me at once, right?”

“Knights of Gravio only battle knights, you slack-jawed pig sodomizer,” the mustached man said. “All others have two simple choices: stand aside or be cut down like honorless dogs.”

“I heard that about you brave, brave fellows,” Cazio said. “Heard you mostly kill women because headless lovers can’t complain of your impotence.”

“Leave him be,” one of the fellows in the back said. “He’s clearly mad.”

“There’s only so much I can hear before I must act,” Mustache gritted. “But I make allowances. Stand aside.”

Cazio stepped a little closer. “If it’s my words that are the problem, let me use a language more apt to you fellows.”

He sent an arc of urine in their direction.

That did it. Mustache howled, and two of his fellows broke after him, all drawing broadswords.

Cazio turned and ran as fast as he could. That wasn’t as fast as a horse could run, of course, but he could reach his top pace first.

As he dashed around the bend that took the road into the forest, he glanced back and saw they were gathering speed, their swords held low and cocked, ready to decapitate him.

He ran another three pareci, hurtling around another curve, and then turned to get on his guard.

The three horsemen thundered around the bend. Mustache had on a fierce smirk and started to shout something, but at about that time, he and his brothers hit the rope Cazio had strung between two trees. It caught Mustache right across the face and one of his companions at the gorget. The third had seen the trap and tried to bring his sword up to cut it, so he was caught by the forearm. All three went flipping backward off their mounts.

Only one of them got back up, and that was the man who had brought his arm up. Cazio didn’t wait for him to find his feet but walked up to him quickly, opened the visor that had snapped shut when he fell, and smashed Acredo into his nose. As the man screeched, Cazio lifted the helm off completely and hit him again. He went sprawling back.

“I gave you cowards a chance to fight with honor,” Cazio said. “It was more than you deserved, more than you offered me, and so here we are, with you forcing me to this.”

Then he turned and sped back toward the carriage, where he found z’Acatto standing over the fourth knight, who was prone on the ground.

“Are they dead?” z’Acatto asked.

“One of them, maybe. I didn’t stay to find out.”

“We should finish them,” the old man said.

Cazio shook his head. “I don’t murder men who can’t fight back. You know that. You taught me that.”

“That’s in a duel. In war there are times you do what you have to.”

“I’m not at war,” Cazio said. “I’m only trying to save my friends.”

“You have to be practical.”

“I’ve been plenty practical enough for today,” Cazio said. “Let’s just get on with it.”

“Have it your way, then,” z’Acatto said. “I’ll just walk over and see if they have anything useful on them.”

“Oh, let’s do that together,” Cazio replied.

“You don’t trust me?”

“On the contrary, I trust you to be you. Anyway, what if there
are
fifteen soldiers in the carriage? I’ll need your help.”

Z’Acatto shrugged and wiped his sword on the dead knight’s tabard. Then the two of them approached the carriage. The driver was gone, apparently having run off.

Each door had a little barred window, but Cazio didn’t see anyone peering through it, and his heart sank. What if they already had done away with her?

He grasped the handle and pulled, but the door remained fast.

“There’s no lock out here,” z’Acatto observed. “But there
is
someone in there.”

“Austra?” Cazio asked, rapping on the door. “It’s me, Cazio.”

There wasn’t any answer. He rapped again, harder. Cursing now, he started to pound on the door.

“Step back,” z’Acatto said.

Cazio did so and saw that the swordmaster had the dead knight’s heavy blade.

“Careful,” Cazio cautioned.

The first swing shattered the glossy varnish, the second sent splinters flying, and the next caved in the panel. Using the tip of the weapon, z’Acatto pushed the cracked wood aside so that they could see in.

Austra was there, pale, unmoving, and gagged. A fiftyish man with faded blond hair slumped next to her, eyes open but unfocused. His nose and mouth had drooled blood onto his chin.

“Austra!” Cazio shouted, reaching through the hole to locate the bolt on the inside. He found it, drew it, and yanked the door open.

He touched her face and found it warm. An angry red mark on her cheek and left eye told of a bruise to come in the next day or so. Her dark saffron gown was slashed and bloody, revealing red-smeared thighs.

“Austra!”

He put his ear to her heart and to his relief felt it beat.

“We need to go,” z’Acatto said. “The Church is all over these roads. We’ll take the carriage and hide someplace.”

“Right,” Cazio muttered, still trying to get some sort of response from Austra.

“Help me get the man out.”

Reluctantly, Cazio reached over and opened the bolt on the other door. When z’Acatto started pulling, he began to shove.

The fellow coughed, and blood spewed from his nose.

“Diuvo!” Cazio swore. “He’s alive.”

“So he is,” z’Acatto said.

Snarling, Cazio reached for Acredo.

“No,” z’Acatto said, holding up his hand. “I’ll drag him over in the woods, see if he has anything useful on him. Yes?”

Cazio balanced on his rage for a moment. He looked back at Austra. The blood on her was coming mostly from a series of shallow cuts on her thighs.

“Why don’t you do that,” he said softly.

Cazio dressed quickly and found several skins of white wine liberally mixed with water. As they bumped along in the carriage, their own horses on trotters behind them, he washed Austra’s cuts as best he could. None were particularly deep, but it looked as if the fellow had been cutting a methodical diamond pattern on her. He made another search for any deeper wounds but couldn’t find any.

He was starting on her second leg when she suddenly sucked in a huge breath, then screamed, her eyes wide open and brimming with terror.

“Austra, Austra
mia errentera.
”

She beat at him with her hands, still screaming, probably unable to hear him over her panic. He let her flail away until she had to pause for breath.

“Austra, it’s Cazio!” he said urgently.

The look in her eyes shifted to dazed puzzlement.

“Cazio?”

“It’s me,
errentera, min loof.
Porcupine.”

“Cazio!” she gasped. Then she looked down at her bare legs, and a huge sob heaved out of her, and then another. She kept gesturing at her wounds and trying to talk, but she half strangled on whatever she meant to say.

Cazio wrapped his arms around her and pulled her face onto his shoulder.

“It’s not bad,” he whispered in her ear. ‘It’s not bad. Just a few little cuts, that’s all. You’re going to be fine.”

He held her like that for a long time before she could talk.

He got the story out of her in drabs. Her carriage and guard had been set upon by knights, many more of them than Cazio and z’Acatto had dealt with. They had slain her guard to a man.

“There were two leaders,” she said. “The…the man you found in the carriage and a younger fellow with a little beard. They seemed to know who I was, or—I think they thought I was Anne.”

“Why do you say that?” Cazio asked gently.

“I don’t know. Something one of them said. Cazio, it’s hard to remember. But they had some sort of fight, and the younger man said something about the Fratrex Prismo, and that’s—” She shuddered and closed her eyes.

“What?”

“The man you found me with stabbed him in the side of the throat and laughed while he died. The other knights laughed, too. Then he got in the carriage with me, closed the door, and tied my hands behind my back. The way he looked at me. I’ve thought I was going to be raped before, and I’ve seen the look in the eyes of men when they’re thinking about it, but this was more than that.”

“How? What do you mean?”

“
More.
He wanted more than just to rape me; he wanted something worse. He pulled up my dress, and I didn’t do anything. I thought that if I was quiet, he wouldn’t hurt me. But then he said something about the ‘blood telling,’ and he started to cut me, and then I—” She coughed off into crying again, and he waited, stroking her hair.

“We can talk about it later.”

She shook her head. “If I wait, I won’t be able to. I know I won’t.”

“Go on, then. When you’re ready.”

“I fainted, and when I woke up, he was still cutting me. Blood was all over. I was so scared, Cazio. Everything we’ve been through, everything we’ve seen. I couldn’t take it. I couldn’t take it.”

“What happened?”

“I wanted to hurt him,” she said. “I wanted to reach inside of him and tear him up. I wanted it so bad, and then he screamed, and there was blood, and I don’t remember anything until you were here.”

“It’s over,” he soothed. “The cuts will heal, and everything will be fine.”

“It doesn’t feel that way.”

“I know,” he said, although he reckoned he probably didn’t.

“Now I know how Anne felt,” she said softly. “I should have understood.”

“You mean when she was nearly raped?”

“No.”

Something about the timbre of the word sent a little witch shot through his chest. It was as if an infant in its crib had just looked straight at him and said something no child that age could possibly say.

But quietly, almost in passing. Not showing off, not even trying to be noticed.

She looked up at him and tried to smile. “What are you doing here, anyway?”

“Looking for you, of course.”

“Why?”

“I got to Dunmrogh and found it full up with churchmen who wanted to skin me. I knew Anne was sending you to me, and I figured you were in danger, so z’Acatto and I hid along the road, planning to waylay every carriage until we found yours.”

“How many did you waylay?”

“Only the one, really. There aren’t many casual travelers on the road these days.”

“I’m glad,” Austra said. “I was afraid I wouldn’t see you again. I knew I wouldn’t. But I should have known. You always manage to save me somehow, even if it’s just because you saved Anne.”

“It’s all for you this time,” he said.

The carriage bumped along without any talking for a little while.

“Why did she do it, Cazio?” Austra asked finally. “Why did she send you out here?”

“I don’t know. She asked me to do something I didn’t want to do, and I don’t think it sat well with her.”

Austra attempted a chuckle. “Everyone thinks she’s so different now. It’s funny.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I mean she used to be frivolous, and now she’s taken responsibility. She never even thought about being queen, and now she is.”

“It does sound like she’s changed.”

“Sort of. I love her, you have to understand, more than anyone. But I know her, too. She’s always been impossibly selfish, so selfish she didn’t even have a clue she was selfish. You know what I mean?”