“Be ready,” Amaranthe mouthed to Sicarius and turned back to them.
She could have said “kill him,” she supposed, but Tollen wanted a warrior’s death, not a surprise dagger to the back. And there was one peace she could give to the family.
“Your missing brother-” Amaranthe set her sword on the table before Tollen, “-was he a corporal when he disappeared?”
Frowning, he looked up at her. “Yes…”
“You’ll find his remains in a canebrake in Deadscar Ravine to the south of Fort Erstden.” Amaranthe met Nelli’s eyes; the daughter would be the one to lead the hunt and build the funeral pyre. To Tollen, Amaranthe said, “You were right. Sicarius killed him.”
The stunned silence probably only lasted a heartbeat, but it felt much longer.
Tollen roared and grabbed the sword. He skipped the ladder and leaped out of the loft, weapon raised overhead. Nelli rushed after him. Amaranthe did not. She did not want to watch what she had orchestrated.
A very brief clash of steel echoed through the cabin. Tollen didn’t scream or cry out; it was Nelli’s weeping that told Amaranthe it was finished.
Slowly she descended the stairs, conscious of the gawking stares all around. His expression never changing, Sicarius handed Amaranthe her sword.
Nelli knelt in the blood-soaked sawdust, cradling her father’s head. Tollen, drawing his last ragged breaths, spotted Amaranthe. She took small comfort from the fact that he looked more peaceful than pained.
“Thank you,” he rasped. “Your father…wouldn’t be…disappointed.”
Dawn found Amaranthe trotting out of camp and onto the lake where Sicarius stood, a cloudless blue sky as his backdrop.
“Thanks for waiting,” she said. “I talked to Nelli and Merla. Merla is going to be promoted to Operations Manager.”
A slight eyebrow twitch implied what she already knew: he didn’t care.
She lifted a gloved hand in acknowledgement, and they started across the lake together. Before noon, they would be back in the city, the night’s events like a dream. No, she thought, too real for that. A memory.
“I apologize for using you as an executioner,” Amaranthe said.
“It doesn’t bother me.”
“I know, but it bothers me.”
“Is your friend going to mention our work to the emperor?” Sicarius asked.
“After we killed her father and served up his soul for some vile underworld creature?” Amaranthe snorted. “I didn’t ask.”
“Oh.”
She didn’t get the opportunity to tease him often, so she let Sicarius walk in stony silence for a moment before adding, “But Merla said she would.”
The look Sicarius gave her wasn’t exactly a smile, just a faint stretching of the lips, but it was enough.
THROUGH FIRE DISTILLED
A green-feathered crossbow quarrel protruded from the distillery owner’s chest. Tall and gangly, with mussed salt-and-pepper hair, the man reminded Books of himself, albeit deader. Fresh blood saturated the brandy-stained shirt, and a rivulet meandered down the sloping cement floor and into a drain near the steam engine. The chug of the pistons and flap of the flywheel drowned out any disquieting dripping, but Books shifted with unease.
This had just happened.
He rested his hand on the hilt of his short sword as his gaze probed the distillery. Wooden barrels, apple crates, copper stills, and myriad pipes cluttered the cavernous room with potential hiding places. Dusk hovered beyond the high windows, and the intermittent lanterns created more shadows than they drove back.
“That’s a problem,” his comrade said when she stepped in and noticed the body. Amaranthe adjusted the repeating crossbow on her back and tapped her sword scabbard thoughtfully.
“A dead body usually is,” Books said, surprised he no longer felt shock at such things. Two years ago, he would have, but he had been a simple professor then, a content man with a handsome son who should have been starting classes at the University this fall. Contentment was more elusive these days.
“Especially,” Amaranthe said, “when it belongs to the person hiring you to investigate his-”
Boom!
Books ducked, and a pistol ball clanged off the nearest still. He started for the door, but four men blocked the way. Two brandished cutlasses, and two more aimed pistols.
“Cover!” Even as she barked the order, Amaranthe grabbed his arm and dragged him behind the steam engine. She already had her short sword out.
Just as Books reached for his, a second shot fired. It cracked against the flywheel, ricocheted, and shattered a window. Glass flew, and he threw up an arm to protect his face.
They rounded the back of the still only to jerk to a halt before two large, muscled men. One raised a broadsword, but the other, more startled, dropped a crossbow. It struck the floor, and a green-feathered quarrel skittered under the pumping pistons.
Books lunged at the unbalanced fellow, leaving the more prepared opponent for Amaranthe. He stabbed at the man’s hand, trying to end the fight before it began. But his opponent leaped back and found time to draw a cutlass.
They retreated and advanced, fishing for each other’s blades, trading testing blows. Beside Books, Amaranthe engaged her man.
Like so many before, he hesitated at the sight of an armed woman. Without pause, she hammered his longer blade wide and darted in. He backed into the still and ran out of room. Before he could align his blade to defend, Amaranthe thrust hers into his chest.
Books’s opponent advanced and lunged, slashing at his neck. Books parried, but the power of the blow forced him to the side, and his shoulder banged against the wall. With his blood surging, he barely felt it, but he lowered his sword and pretended a true injury. He retreated several steps. His assailant charged after, apparently forgetting about Amaranthe in his eagerness for the kill.
As they reached the flywheel, she stepped in behind the man. Her blade flickered, cutting through his hamstring. His legs crumpled, and she finished him. Books started to say thanks, but movement froze his mouth.
Two men, pistols reloaded, popped around the flywheel. Amaranthe tore her crossbow from her back and dropped to a knee. Books threw himself out of the way, and her quarrel zipped into one man’s cheek.
“Cursed ancestors!” They backed out of sight.
“They’ve got crossbows!”
“You’ve got guns,” someone growled. “Get back in there.”
“It’s a repeating crossbow,” Amaranthe called, “and I’ve got a full magazine, plus a box of quarrels in my pocket. Oh, and sorry about your friend there, but the tips are laced with deadly poison.”
Mutters came from the door, but no one else poked their heads around the flywheel or tried to approach from the other direction.
Amaranthe threw a wink at Books. He sucked in a deep breath and tried to still trembling hands. How could she so obviously be enjoying herself?
“Isn’t that just a temporary paralysis poison?” he whispered.
She held a finger to her lips. “Don’t tell them that.”
Between the crossbow, the sword, and the gray military fatigues, she should have looked like a hardened warrior, but she always wore a smile and, more often than not, a warm glint of humor sparkled in her brown eyes. Any man would have proudly taken her home to meet the parents.
She peered over the churning piston rods. “More of them. At least eight by the door. They’re milling around, talking.”
Books grimaced. “Sorry I’m not more help. You should have brought one of the others.”
“I should have broughtallof the others,” she said. “This was supposed to be an investigation of a haunted distillery and apple orchard, not an ambush.”
Yes, investigation and research were much more his realm.
“Besides, you looked glum this morning,” Amaranthe continued. “I thought you could use a distraction from whatever’s plaguing you.”