None of it sounded right. His mind made the leap. 'You've already done it, haven't you?' His throat closed up on him suddenly. He felt a light-headedness that made him sway. 'She's dead, isn't she?' Of course they'd already killed her. It made more sense. Tidier. Smarter. And soon he'd be dead, and the whole thing neatly wound up.
'No. No, she's fine, and she will be as long as you continue to do as we say.' Willow spoke very rapidly. 'But you can't see her just now. It's my decision, really. I've seen you two together. She draws strength from you, and would become more difficult to handle. We might have to hurt her. And you'd do any stupid thing for the sake of protecting her.'
'Like killing a Duke,' he said. His voice sounded distant. He could feel his heart beating in his chest. He knew his face had gone white.
'Eat.' Her voice was expressionless, but her eyes betrayed some secret panic of her own. 'You should eat that food right away.' She crouched by the trap door, tapped on it. And practice. You'll have to take my word that Ki is alive now. If you want Ki to still be alive tomorrow night, you'd better be at your best.'
'I'm not hungry.' His words were an empty reflex. Ki was dead. He could read it in Willow's hasty effort to leave, the way she resisted any further talk with him. Ki was dead already. His heartbeat thundered in his ears. Ki was dead, and ... the last piece suddenly slipped into place. He'd been a fool. The cold emptiness that flooded his heart set off a glaring white light in his mind, mercilessly illuminating everything he had hidden from himself. The cold-blooded logic of their plan was suddenly revealed to him. Very tidy. No loose ends.
'Eat it anyway.' She sounded worried.
'I don't like the flavor.' He watched her face carefully as he added, 'Every damn thing sent up here tastes the same, same herb or spice in the bread, the tea, the stew.'
There it was, the tiny widening of her eyes. Her control of her face was good, but too late. 'It's a strengthening herb, well known in this part of the world. I'm surprised you don't know of it. We're trying to give you every advantage we can.'
He snorted, kept the suspicion from his voice. 'Herb lore. Something to bemuse old women after their children have grown up. Three-fourths of it doesn't do what they say, anyway.'
The trap door in the floor heaved upward, the closed face of the guard appearing briefly. He glared at the bared rapier in Vandien's hand, then drew back to allow Willow to descend.
'What's it called?' he asked as she reached a leg down for the ladder.
'What?'
'The strengthening herb. What's it called?'
'Oh.' She paused - overlong, it seemed to him. 'Thwartspite.' His heart sank, his belly went cold. But he kept his voice even. 'Think about what I said,' he called after her, with little hope that she would, knowing it could make no difference anyway. All things were fixed now, lashed into their courses.
'No. You think about what I said.' Her voice floated back to him. 'Festival starts tomorrow. The first matches will be just after noon.'
He waited until the trap door was shut completely, heard the bolts securing it shot home. Then he allowed himself to sink slowly to the floor, still cradling his arm against himself. Not that it hurt. It felt fine, now.
'Bloodfriend,' Ki had said, nudging the small, blueflowered plant with the toe of her boot. 'Cleans poisons from the system, some say.' She had stooped to pinch off a handful of the small flowers, shaking her head. 'Doesn't really. But it makes a sick animal feel healthy and strong, so it shows well enough to sell. Makes a good poultice for an infection is all I use it for. Thwartspite, I've heard it called, too.' He sat very still on the attic floor, remembering the angle of her jaw as she had looked up at him, the way her long hair swung forward of her shoulders, the easy way she flowed up from the ground to stand.
Gone. Everything. Ki was dead. He'd lost his honor in a fight against a fanatic with a poisoned blade. He looked down at the sword in his hand, at the blade that had betrayed him. He considered the puckered seam on his forearm. Not even Kellich had been what he believed. A poisoned blade. Vandien had even played the fool to him. And now, nothing was left. No family. No name. Only himself to think of. Only one last satisfaction to give himself.
'Fight the Duke and die,' he mused aloud. 'Hell, I might as well. I'm dead already.' He picked up the bowl of cold soup and sipped at it, tasting the antidote to the poison that already chilled his arm and moved through his body with every beat of his heart. Setting down the bowl, he lifted the mug of lukewarm tea in a mocking toast to the empty room. 'May you all go down with me!' he declared, and grinned a smile Ki would not have recognized. 'You bastards.' He drained the mug.
SIXTEEN
Festival time had come to Tekum. Sparkling shards of glass and tiny bells swung from the branches of trees that lined the main street. The sweet high ringing kept time with the light that flashed from the glass whenever the wind stirred their branches. Bright booths had mushroomed in the shade of the trees, selling everything from toys to tonics. The Human population of the town seemed to have increased fourfold, with here and there a T'cheria or a Dene to mark the contrast. The Brurjans, of course, were everywhere. They were not near as numerous as the Humans, but their hulking size and the near-visible violence that shivered around them made them the dominant element of the crowd. There was no uniformity to their battle harness or weapons, but they needed no badges to mark them as the Duke's. Vandien watched them moving effortlessly as the Human crowd parted to give them way, and wondered if the Duke knew what he was doing to give his safety into their hands. But instead he asked Lacey, 'What's the occasion for this festival?'
Lacey snorted. 'The Duke ordained it, twelve years back. It's to commemorate his coming to power.' 'Why hold it in Tekum?'
Lacey's eyes squeezed shut briefly. 'We had a militia, then. Stationed here, along the caravan route, to keep down robbers and such. Young fool in charge rallied to the Duchess's cause. Duke brought his Brurjans in. Didn't take long.' Lacey nodded to the long line of trees. 'Wasn't a tree here that wasn't swinging a body, and a hell of a lot of them had two.'
The high singing of the bells became suddenly a mocking carillon to Vandien's ears. 'So this is how he reminds you, every year, that you depend on his largesse to survive. And that even the best of you will never better him at swords.'
Lacey looked at him in bewilderment. 'I never thought of it that way before,' he muttered disgruntledly. 'It's just a thing the Duke does. Very typical of him. Doesn't matter why he does it, anyway. It's our only chance at him, that's all that counts. Come on, now. The others will already be gathering. Duke always holds it on the threshing floor in Merp's barn.'
Vandien nodded curtly and followed him through the press of folk. He walked behind Lacey, letting the heavier man forge a pathway for them. As he passed through the crowd, eyes swung to him, held an instant, then darted away. Damn fools. Was there anyone in this town who wasn't in on the plot?
A manic grin settled on his face, and he took to meeting all eyes for the fun of watching them widen and then jerk aside. He felt good. The realization of that startled him for a moment, and then he felt the full impact of it. Damn, he felt great. These bastards had plundered his soul, had taken from him all that he had ever valued. He had nothing left to save. Not even his own life. Ki had gone, and her passing had left less than nothing within him. The gentler parts of his nature had died with her, leaving him only the hard and sharp to do with. The impulsiveness that had always characterized his decisions was now in complete control. It was a heady feeling.