The Chaos Crystal (8 page)

Assuming he could find a way to get word to them from this isolated palace.

'I doubt it,' Maralyce said, in fact, when he was reporting it, your Cabal fellow seemed to think it quite secondary in importance to his other news.'

'What other news?' Declan asked.

it was about your friend,' Maralyce informed him, with no inkling, Declan decided later, of the blow she was about to deliver. 'The one Cayal brought to my claim after he escaped the Glaebans. Arkady
...
whatever her name was
...
You know, Stellan's wife? The pretty duchess?'

It was a good thing he
couldn't
die at that moment, Declan thought, because he suspected his heart had stopped beating. 'Yes, I know who you mean.'

'She was captured in Senestra, it seems, a couple of months ago. I'm not sure what you said to him after I left, but Stellan Desean has been very busy since he left my claim. He's turned traitor to Glaeba and is now aiding the Caelish, last I heard, which means he's allied himself with Syrolee and her clan. The consensus seems to be that King Mathu — and by that, I suppose I really mean Jaxyn and Diala — will try to use Stellan's wife as leverage to make her husband back down.'

Declan stared at her in shock. 'Jaxyn has Arkady?'

'So I believe.'

'Where is she?'

'Residing in Lebec Prison awaiting trial, as I understand it.'

Declan felt the bottom dropping out of his world.
Tides. This is my fault. I should never have left her. I
should have insisted we stay in Port Traeker until we'd tracked her down. I should never have left the Outpost with Arkady still angry with me
...

'Declan?' Lukys called. 'Come here. I want to show you something.'

'I
have to leave,' he said with a shake of his head. 'Leave? And go where?'

Declan glanced at Maralyce who seemed to understand his haste, before he turned to Lukys and called,
'I
have to go back to Glaeba.' And then he added in a voice meant for nobody but himself,
'I
have to go to Arkady.'

CHAPTER 7

Arkady wasn't surprised when Jaxyn came to visit, only that he'd taken as long as he did to get around to her. It seemed the pressures of stealing a crown were more important than tormenting an old adversary. That, or he was hoping to sharpen her fear by making her chew her insides out with anticipation before he got there.

She spent nearly two weeks doing just that, although it wasn't herself for whom Arkady feared. Jaxyn was far too sophisticated to gain pleasure from simple torments, so she doubted he would arrive with a branding iron or a handful of wood-slivers to insert under her fingernails.

Physically torturing Arkady would be much too easy for a world-weary Tide Lord. Her pain would offer no challenge to him at all. And when all was said and done, Arkady wasn't even sure torturing her was Jaxyn's ultimate goal any longer. With Stellan raising an army against him, Arkady knew she had other uses now. She had value beyond that of a means for slaking Jaxyn's jaded palate.

The leverage he had over her, Arkady was loath to admit, was her father. It was for that reason he had been moved here, into the cell beside her. Perhaps even the reason they had been given so long alone to make up for lost time. Arkady had grieved for her father and believed him dead. For his torment to affect her now, Arkady had to accept that he was alive. She had to fear his loss, and his humiliation, all over again.

Only then would she truly suffer.

The prospect left Arkady wondering if there was anything she could offer Jaxyn that might encourage him to leave her father alone. She could offer him her body, she supposed, but he may no longer be content with that. And if he was planning to use her against Stellan, he may not even want it.

Besides, how many times could she wriggle out of a sticky situation by letting a man have his way with her? She'd done it to save her father from Fillion Rybank — for all the good it did. She'd have laid down for Stellan in a heartbeat, had he ever asked it of her, to save her father from prison. In fact, the very nature of their arrangement had been that she was meant to provide him with an heir. And in Senestra, Arkady had offered herself to Cydne Medura with barely a moment's hesitation to save herself from being passed around the crew of a slave ship.

Arkady was quite appalled at the tally, when she thought about it. For a woman who prided herself on her intelligence, who resented any implication that she'd achieved success simply because she was a beautiful woman, or married to a rich and powerful man, she'd acquired a terrible history.

It was time to break the cycle. Arkady was smart, she was a cool head in a crisis and if she couldn't outsmart a wretched immortal, then she didn't deserve to survive.

And she had something Jaxyn might want.

'Could you stop that infernal pacing, Arkady? It's driving me to distraction.'

She glanced through the bars at her father, considering him with the cold eye of a woman planning to take down a Tide Lord, 'I'm sorry,' she said, but she didn't stop pacing. It helped keep her warm, if nothing else. She wore only the shift she'd travelled here from Senestra in, and it was icy in the tower cell where they were incarcerated. This

unnaturally cold winter bothered her, but Arkady didn't know if it was normal, the result of the Tide coming in, or something a Tide Lord had caused. She pulled the thin woollen blanket around her shoulders more tightly. 'I keep worrying about what will happen when Jaxyn Aranville turns up. The thought doesn't exactly lend itself to peaceful contemplation.'

'Perhaps this new Duke of Lebec will be more accommodating than
...
your husband?'

Arkady looked at her father and shook her head in amazement. 'I hope you're not trying to be funny, Papa.'

Bary climbed slowly to his feet and walked to the bars dividing their cells. Her father walked stiffly these days. He also had the thin blanket from his bed wrapped around his shoulders to ward off the bitter cold. 'Stellan Desean has proved himself a liar and a traitor, Arkady.
To
you
and
to his country. Perhaps the new king has awarded Lebec to a man with some moral fibre. A man we can reason with. Maybe we can even appeal to his better nature.'

'Jaxyn doesn't have a better nature, Papa,' she told him, a little more harshly than she meant to.

'You don't know that
...'

'Yes,' Arkady said emphatically, 'I do.' She stopped pacing and turned to look at him. 'And before you get too enchanted with the notion of appealing to Jaxyn Aranville for clemency, just remember he was Stellan's lover for over a year before we left for Torlenia. The moment our backs were turned, he lied about every day he spent in Lebec, arranged the death of the King and Queen of Glaeba and had my husband blamed for it.'

Her father shook his head in denial. He'd had years to incubate his woes. He blamed Stellan for his predicament, and was unwilling to contemplate any point of view that cast the former Duke of Lebec's actions in a favourable light. 'Are you so certain Stellan is innocent?'

Arkady laughed humourlessly and stopped in front of the bars, innocent? I've come to the conclusion there is no such thing. But I can promise you he is not a traitor. And if, as the guards are claiming, he's gathering an army to invade Glaeba, you can be sure it's because he believes such an act would be in Glaeba's best interests.'

Bary Morel shook his head in puzzlement, 'I cannot comprehend your continuing faith in that man, Arkady. After what he did to you, to me
...'

'You did it to yourself, Papa.'

Her father's eyes seemed haunted. 'How can you say that?'

'You could have walked away from here seven years ago, a free man. All you had to do was keep your mouth shut and smile approvingly as I married the richest duke in Glaeba. What was so hard about that?'

He stared at her as if she was a stranger, 'I cannot believe how cold and hard you have become, Arkady. What happened to you?'

A
great many things I have no intention
of
sharing
with my father,
Arkady replied silently. It was doubtful he would have heard her reply, even if she had responded aloud. His mind was already made up, the blame placed, and it wasn't anywhere near his own shoulders.

'Desean has done this to you, hasn't he? For that alone, I despise the man.'

She was tempted to point out that it wasn't Stellan, but her own father who had driven her to such a pass. Right up until Arkady met the Immortal Prince, every man she'd ever slept with, every move she'd ever made, had been designed to protect her father or his memory. And now, here he was, trying to make her feel guilty for wanting to help him.

Arkady never got a chance to berate him further, however, because at that moment the outer door to

their tower cell chamber opened and Jaxyn Aranville walked in.

Jaxyn smiled when he saw Arkady, glancing around approvingly at the rough granite walls. He wouldn't be feeling the bitter cold himself, but he'd know how bad it was for her and her father.

Arkady turned to face him, her arms crossed, clutching the scratchy grey blanket against her body. Bary stepped away from the adjoining bars and also turned to face their visitor, who was accompanied by a single feline Crasii. Arkady thought she looked like the feline Stellan had won in that bear-baiting he'd attended with Mathu and Jaxyn, a lifetime ago, back when Stellan was the Duke of Lebec, Mathu a likeable young prince and Jaxyn just annoying rather than dangerous. The feline took post by the door, her expression inscrutable.

'Your grace,' her father began, 'it's so good to see you again. If you could
—'

'Shut up, fool,' Jaxyn ordered, without even glancing in her father's direction. His eyes fixed on Arkady, searching her face for some indication she was near breaking point.

Arkady had no intention of giving him the satisfaction.

'Well,' she said as he approached. 'If it isn't the legendary Lord of Temperance. I met some of your followers in Senestra, you know. They were a universally dour lot, with no personality and absolutely nothing in the way of charm or charisma. So I guess it's true that like attracts like.'

Jaxyn seemed amused. 'Ouch! Such cutting insults.' He spared her father a look and smiled even wider. 'Do you like the gift I left for you?'

'Is that what you call locking my sick father in a bare tower cell in the middle of winter with a single blanket so he can slowly freeze to death? A gift?'

'Absolutely,' he said, stopping in front of her cell. 'Aren't you grateful? I found your most beloved possession for you, Arkady. Brought him back from the dead. You should be weak-kneed with gratitude for my kindness.'

'Words fail me,' Arkady agreed in a tone that was anything but gracious.

Jaxyn was in a rare good mood and didn't seem to mind her sarcasm. 'Who'd have thought Stellan, The Tiresomely Righteous, would lock the poor fellow up and throw away the key?'

'You'd have done the same in his place.'

'No, my precious, I wouldn't have. I would have killed your wretched father without hesitation and been done with him. Typical of Stellan, though, don't you think? Even when he's being ruthless, he lacks the balls to go all the way.'

'Your grace
...'
her father began again.

Jaxyn raised his arm and her father flew backwards across his cell, slamming into the far wall. With a grunt, he slid down the rough wall, winded and gasping.

Arkady didn't move; didn't react. More than anything, Jaxyn wanted a reaction from her. That was why he was here. She wasn't going to play his game. She squared her shoulders and spoke with all the withering scorn she could muster. 'Immortality
...
control of the Tide
...
and the best you can do, Jaxyn, is throw a feeble old man around? Perhaps that's why Cayal is so much more revered than you among the general populace. He, at least, doesn't lack for imagination.'

Mention of the Immortal Prince got a response from him. Jaxyn's eyes flashed dangerously for an instant. It wasn't much, and Arkady only noticed it because she was looking for his reaction, but it was there. 'You think I care what the unwashed masses think of Cayal?'

'I think it irks the Tide out of you that he's

considered a legendary lover and you're worshipped as the god of restraint and self-control.'

'I didn't come here to discuss Cayal with you, Arkady.' He stepped a little closer to her cell.

Arkady held her ground, resisting the urge to retreat from him. 'Really? Then why did you come, Jaxyn? To torture my father? To get at me? I can't imagine why you'd bother. Or that you have the time. Aren't you on the brink of war?' She smiled as another thought occurred to her. 'Or do you think you can use me to stall Stellan? You must know by now that he's not the pushover you thought him to be.'

Arkady glanced at her aghast father uninterestedly, hoping her apparent lack of concern was believable. 'The man who so callously incarcerated a sick old fool to hide a secret about himself, isn't going to stop his plans to take Glaeba's throne just because you're threatening to harm the woman he was pretending to love.'