The King's Blood (31 page)

“Tell me that this wasn’t your plan,” Marcus said. “Tell me you weren’t trying to get her to go out there so that she’d find something else to do. Leave you with the bank.”

“I don’t make her decisions. And I don’t know that she’ll stay away. Only I can see that she might.”

“All right,” Marcus said. “That could happen.” “If it does, do you still work here?”

Marcus smiled. The hollowness had a touch of anger now. He didn’t want Cithrin to leave the bank and Porte Oliva, and he didn’t like thinking what it meant that he didn’t.

“Why do I get the feeling there’s a particular answer you’re looking for?”

“There is,” Pyk said. “I want you to say you will. Having Marcus Wester collecting the debts gives the bank a certain weight. And you’re good at it. But if you’re only here for the girl, then you’re only here for the girl.”

“Well, I’m here until the girl comes back,” he said. “If she doesn’t, we can talk about it then.”

Pyk’s wide, yellowed eyes took him in and she sucked at her teeth.

“That’s good enough,” she said. “And you can hire back the men I had you take down and put the other back at full rates.”

“Now that she’s gone, you mean?” Marcus said, pushing himself off the wall. “Cithrin’s here, you’ll make it hard and mean and small, but when everyone knows it’s your hand on the purse, it’s all open? That how this is?”

Pyk’s smile was so wide, he saw the holes where her tusks had been gaping dark in her gums. Her laughter wasn’t a sound but a motion in her shoulders and her belly. She shook her head.

“The girl’s letter didn’t come alone,” she said. “The holding company saw the reports. It approved my request to budget more for the guards. So now I put in more money for guards. It’s not a mystery. I’m not the villain here. You can stop treating me like one.”

Marcus stood, anger and confusion and embarrassment growing in him.

“Sorry,” he said. “Didn’t know you had to have your budget approved.”

“Don’t, strictly speaking,” Pyk said. “But the Porte Oliva branch has a reputation as unpredictable. I’m tacking into that wind. Can’t think where it came from.”

“Anything else?” Marcus said.

“Is. Keep an ear to the ground for anything about a captain name of Uus rol Osterhaal. He’ll have been coming up from Lyoneia, but he might not be announcing the fact.”

“Anything I’m trying to find out?”

“Whatever you can. Bring me what you find, and I’ll know whether it’s useful or not. You can go now. I’m going to sit here and sweat a while more.”

Marcus walked back out. He felt like he’d been in the gymnasium, down in the fighting pits getting a fist sunk just under his ribs. The world was unchanged, but it was also different. Porte Oliva seemed smaller. Thin. As if the only thing that had given the city any sense of reality was that Cithrin lived here. And if this wasn’t her city, then it was an encrustation of buildings stuck on a rock overlooking the sea. Wasn’t much charm in that.

He walked slowly, retracing his steps. The rain was still falling, though if anything less now than it had been. The streets were wet and slick, and they stank. In an hour, maybe two, the heat would loosen its grasp a little. He’d still be sweating through his shirts until morning. It would be like that until the days got short again. But he would be here when it happened. He’d be working for Pyk Usterhall and the Medean bank and waiting for Cithrin to come home until it was clear that she wouldn’t.

He held the thought in his mind like pressing his tongue to a sore tooth.

“She’s not my daughter,” he said to himself. A small voice in the far, dark reaches of his mind answered,
She’s Cithrin
.

He wasn’t sure what he’d thought. What he’d expected. That they would stay there, he supposed. That he and Yardem would keep her and her bank safe, if not forever, then for years at the least. It wasn’t something Cithrin had promised him or that he’d asked from her. If she found a better path, a better plan, taking it wasn’t any betrayal of him.

A beggar came up to him with her hand out, then met his eyes, started, and backed away. He was almost back at the taproom before he knew he was going there. The sound of the voices in the courtyard was just as loud. Maybe louder. He made his way in. He saw Yardem see him. The Tralgu’s ears went up and forward, straining at him, but Marcus only lifted a hand, more acknowledgment than greeting.

Qahuar Em and his client were sitting at a small table in the shade of a wide white wall. Seagulls were screeching and wheeling out beyond them, grey against the white sky. Marcus hesitated. He’d taken enough lovers in the years after Ellis that he knew what sex would ease and what it wouldn’t. Right now, his body wasn’t hungry. He didn’t need release for its own sake. The thing that would soothe him now, he wasn’t going to find in a woman’s bed.

Or anywhere else.

We have steady work for fair pay. We have shelter and we have food. Interesting if that’s not what we were looking for.

And more than that? What did he want that was more than that? What had Cithrin taken with her that left him angry with no one to be angry at?

The woman with Qahuar Em looked over, saw him, smiled. Marcus smiled back. This was a mistake, but it was his to make. He found the serving boy, made his order, and gave him a silver coin that would have paid twice over. When he approached the table, Qahuar Em smiled and lifted his eyebrows.

“Evening,” Marcus said. “I hoped I could return your kindness. Stand you to a round?”

“Of course,” Qahuar Em said. “This is Arinn Costallin, a dear friend of mine from Herez.”

“Marcus Wester,” he said, taking her hand. “So I’ve heard,” she said.

Y

ardem found him by the seawall just before dawn. Marcus wasn’t drunk anymore. The rain had stopped sometime after midnight, and the clouds had scattered. Yardem had a sack of roasted nuts in his hand. When he squatted down next to Marcus, he held its open mouth toward him. Marcus took a handful. They tasted sweet and meaty.

“Didn’t see you at the barracks,” Yardem said.

“I am an ass.”

Yardem nodded and bit down on a nut. They chewed together quietly for a time. A seagull called, lofting up into the darkness, then, as if confused, swung back and landed on the cliff face below them.

“Moved too fast with her, sir?”

“Did.”

“Should we be expecting children?”

“No. I was careful about that, at least. But then after, I started talking about…”

Marcus leaned forward, his head in his hands.

“Might have been a little early to talk about them, sir.”

“Might have.”

“Scared her off of you.”

“Did,” Marcus said. Below them, fishing boats had put out to sea for the day. Tiny black dots on a nearly black sea.

“Was this about Alys and Merian?” Yardem asked. “Or was it about the magistra?”

“Cithrin.”

“You think she isn’t coming back, then.”

“I think she may not. I wouldn’t blame her if she didn’t. And someday I’ll need to find what it’s going to take to get a family I can keep.”

Yardem nodded and flicked one jingling ear. They were silent for a moment.

“I have an answer for that,” Yardem said.

“Is it theological?”

“Is.”

“Best we save it, then,” Marcus said, clapping his hands on his thighs and standing up. His back was a single long ache, and his mouth felt as dry as cotton. When he stretched his arms, something between his shoulders cracked like a dry stick. “I take it Pyk has a list of work for us?”

“Does, sir. But if you’d like to sleep, I can take a group through it all. It’s not so much we can’t manage without.”

“No. There’s a job needs doing,” Marcus said. “Show me what we’ve got.”

Dawson

C

amnipol opened its gates to Dawson and his men as if to a hero from legends. The sober black and gold of the city was covered over in bright, celebratory array. Pennants as long as five men standing fluttered from the windows of the Kingspire, and the great bridges were hung with flowers produced by both nature and artifice. As he marched through the great streets, honor guard surrounding him, choirs of children sang the ancient songs of heroes and wars with Dawson’s name included among the great generals of the past. He was hailed as a great man and a patriot. The irony was rich. All of it was true, and not a word of it had been earned.

Not yet.

His army, of course, waited in camp outside the walls. No armed force was allowed within Camnipol. That had always been true, and after the showfighters’ riot, the old tradition had been reinforced. And even if Dawson had ordered the attack, it would have done no good. He was praised and honored today only as far as he was the tool of Geder Palliako and his cult. To turn against the man too soon was to invite failure. Dawson raised his chin, smiled, waved, accepted the garlands of white and red flowers offered to him, and reminded himself that all of it was not earned by what he had done, but borrowed against what he was about to achieve.

Behind him, King Lechan walked with as much dignity as the old man could muster. The chains around his neck and wrists were made of silver and thin enough that they might almost have passed for adornments, but they were still chains.

At the Kingspire, the Lord Regent waited in his grand audience chamber. Prince Aster sat at the man’s side, and the bull-massive priest stood behind the throne. Palliako wore the small, golden crown of the regency and his own signature black leather cloak, despite the heat of the day. The priest wore a dust-brown robe, much as the other priests did. A sparrow whispering to a crow.

The crowd around them was quiet. Not silent. Dawson could hear mutterings and complaint, but near enough that when he spoke, the callers could make out his words clearly.

“Lord Regent,” he said. “You have tasked me with the submission of Asterilhold. I have come to report that duty is done.”

And on the word
done
, the crowd erupted in cheers. Dawson kept himself from smiling and watched Palliako’s face. No one knew that he had refused the regent’s order, and no reply had come to Dawson’s report that the nobility of Asterilhold was under his personal protection. It was possible that Palliako would have him named traitor for what he’d done, but with the adulation of the crowd ringing the city like a bell, it seemed unlikely. Nearly impossible.

And, in fact, the regent was smiling. He looked about with a wide grin, as if the cheers were for him. Palliako stood, motioning for silence, but the cacophony went on, trailing off only slowly.

“Lord Marshal Kalliam. You have shown yourself again to be an invaluable friend to the Severed Throne. It is my duty and pleasure to add to your titles and holdings. From this day forward, you are Dawson Kalliam, Baron of Osterling Fells and also of the Barony of Kaltfel.”

Dawson felt a sudden tightness in his breast. The renewed cheers were wild as a windstorm. He had guessed that there would be no suit of peace, no treaty. The war now behind them had not been a conflict between civilized kingdoms. It had been raw conquest, and now as its spoils, Palliako had granted Dawson a city almost as great as Camnipol itself. He had made Dawson effectively the second most powerful man in Antea, behind only the regent himself.

Dawson gave salute, but his mind was possessed by the implications. He imagined the wealth of Kaltfel pouring into his hands, his house, and the fortunes of his sons. Even Lord Bannien would look a beggar by comparison.

All he would have to do was accept Geder’s rule and the rule of his priests. All it would cost was his honor. Dawson took a garland of flowers from around his neck and placed it on the ground before him, as if offering them up to Palliako.

I will earn these
, he thought, but even if he had shouted it, no one would have heard.

After the official audience, Dawson suffered through hours more of his official duties. The surrender of the prisoners, which took some extra time as he needed to impress on the gaolers that King Lechan especially was being surrendered only for holding, and that he remained under Dawson’s personal protection. Then he ordered the disband, freeing his men to return to their homes and families and ending his tenure as Lord Marshal.

He tried to avoid being in a room with Palliako and the priest, but form required at least a private glass of wine. The private audience was in a small garden near the dueling grounds. Prince Aster greeted him formally, and then excused himself to go play with a handful of other boys born of noble houses. Palliako and Minister Basrahip sat at a table of lacquered rosewood, servants rushing to them with cooled wine and fruit. Dawson bowed to the regent and took his seat, but his gaze was on the personal guard. Ten of them. Ten blades set to protect Palliako at all times. They would be difficult to overcome, but not by any means impossible…

“I hope your journey back wasn’t too arduous,” Geder said. “I hear you left Fallon Broot as Protector of Asterilhold?”

“I did, Lord Regent.”

“Now there’s a man whose fortunes have changed in the last years,” Geder burbled. “You know I met him on the Vanai campaign?”

Dawson drank from his glass. The wine was excellent. Simeon had always cared about his drink. Now Palliako was getting the benefit of that.

“I believe I had heard that, my lord,” Dawson said.

“Well, it’s bad fortune for him that he’ll be missing your revel. I still remember what you did for me. After Vanai. I’ve been looking forward to returning the favor. It will be amazing. Honestly, I think people will be talking about this for a generation.”

Dawson permitted himself a smile.

“I hope that you are right,” he said.

“I was sorry to hear that you didn’t have Basrahip’s priests help with the battle at Kaltfel. They were useful taking the bridge, weren’t they?”

“I didn’t believe their help was required at Kaltfel,” Dawson said. “And I thought it would be better for morale if the victory were unquestionably Antea’s.”

“Oh, that’s silly,” Geder said with a wave of his hand. “Everyone knows they’re on our side. I mean, they weren’t out driving down the enemy’s confidence over some private feud they had with them.”