Ushoran frowned. He had never liked being shown up, Neferata recalled with a flush of humour. ‘That is perhaps a conversation for a later time, Thane Silverfoot,’ he said, leaning back in his seat. ‘We have other matters to attend to this day.’ He waved and Strezyk clapped his hands. Men stepped forwards, surrounding the dwarf. For a moment, it looked as if Razek wasn’t going to move. Then, with a grunt and shrug, he turned to allow his escort to remove him from the hall. He glanced at Neferata as he stomped past. His face was unreadable. Regardless, she knew that it was a warning.
Strezyk clapped his hands again and she stepped forwards, leaving her own escort stumbling after her, trying to catch up. The crowd of backwoods nobles murmured. She ignored them.
‘We bid you greetings, Lady Neferata,’ Ushoran said, holding out his arms and stepping down the dais towards her. As she had noted before, the bland, innocuous Lord of Masks she remembered was gone, replaced by a handsome creature that seemed to have stepped straight out of a hero-myth. Even so, she caught a flickering glimpse of something else, a monstrous phantom shape superimposed over Ushoran. Which was his true form, she wondered?
‘Lady,’ she repeated, stepping forwards and flinging back the edge of her furs. ‘You forget yourself, Lord of Masks.’ She could sense the faint tremors in his web. What gambit would he employ? Would it be courtesy?
‘Neferata—’ Abhorash growled, making to step forwards. Ushoran gestured for him to remain where he was. He smiled at his former queen with apparent good humour.
‘No, my lady, I do not think that I do. Much has transpired since our last meeting,’ he said.
Neferata looked around the room, taking in the gathered faces. Though she did not know them, she recognised them well enough — the great and the good who clung like parasites to any throne. ‘So I see,’ she said.
‘I am hetman here, Neferata,’ Ushoran said, striding the rest of the way towards her. ‘From Mourkain, I rule the mountains of Strigos. Here is the seat of empire…’ he said grandly. A sudden burst of applause made him stop and raise a hand.
No, not courtesy then. He wanted her angry. That was her weak point.
‘Oh, well done,’ Neferata said. ‘Delightfully stage-managed, oh Lord of Masks.’
‘I am not the Lord of Masks any longer,’ he said, looking into her eyes. ‘There are no masks in Mourkain. I am king. And it is only fitting that you should bow.’
Neferata burst out laughing. It was an obvious ploy. He had gone soft.
‘Impudent wench,’ Strezyk snarled, dragging the mace from his belt. He swung it at Neferata, intending to batter her off her feet. She whirled, ripping off her fur cloak as she did so and flinging it over his head. He roared and stumbled and then she was behind him. She sank into a crouch and her claws plunged into his legs, ripping through the leather of his boots to get to the flesh within. Strezyk screamed as he fell, hamstrung. Ushoran stepped back as his servant’s mace crashed to the floor.
Neferata rose and stepped over Strezyk’s thrashing form. The vampire was already healing, but he would be out of her hair for a few moments at least. She looked at Ushoran. Had that been planned? Was it a tug of the web? Ushoran retreated slowly up the dais, smiling insufferably at her. ‘As impressive as ever, my lady,’ he said. ‘Truly you are first among us, in power if not in status.’
‘The latter can be easily rectified, Ushoran,’ Neferata said, flicking blood from her fingers to the floor.
‘Implying what? Would you kill me?’ he said, laughing as he plopped back down into his throne. Abhorash’s men moved forwards warily. Neferata ignored them.
‘Kill you? No… You have proven yourself useful in the past, Ushoran. Perhaps you will again. But I am a queen. I do not bow.’ Two can tug on a strand, Ushoran, she thought.
‘And I am a king!’ Ushoran snapped. Ah, there it was. He had lost that mask of servility, at least. He had grown used to being master.
‘No, you are a fool and a fraud, clinging to a throne no doubt won through treachery and deceit,’ she said. His flinch told her that she had scored a point. She grinned. ‘I think it only fitting that you give me your kingdom, since you destroyed mine.’ I see your offer and raise, cunning one, she thought. A nervous titter rippled through the throne room.
Ushoran hissed. ‘Lahmia’s fall was not my fault, woman.’ His mask of civility was gone now too, to join the servility, replaced by a rage that was tinted more than a little with something that might have been madness. The armrests of his throne cracked in his grip, the stone turning to powder. ‘It was your madness! Your obsession with that puling princeling Alcadizzar! That was what damned us!’
It was Neferata’s turn to flinch. Too close to the truth not to hurt. She exposed her fangs and lunged up the steps, claws out. If he wanted her in the web, now was the time to dive in. Abhorash stepped forwards, placing himself between her and her prey as she knew he would. Predictable Abhorash, dependable Abhorash, still protecting her, even if he didn’t realise it. Her claws dug furrows in his mail and he grunted in shock as she sent him reeling. He countered by drawing his sword and forcing her to drop back down the step. Abhorash rose to his feet, the tip of the sword just beneath Neferata’s chin. She backed away slowly, arms held out. She could have pressed the matter if she had wished and he knew it.
‘Get out of my way, Abhorash,’ she said. ‘I would hate to kill you as well as him.’
‘Are you so maddened that you think you could get away with it?’ he said, looking at her with reproach. ‘Do you think that you can win a kingdom this way?’
Neferata looked around. Horrified eyes that belonged to human and vampire alike watched her much like a flock of birds might watch a snake slithering through the grass below them. Her face hardened as an icy calm replaced the only partially false fury that had filled her only moments before. Her own earlier words to Naaima filled her head — seek the advantage. ‘Maybe not hold one, but win one? Oh yes,’ she said calmly.
‘You’ve learned nothing in your years in the wilderness, I see,’ Ushoran growled.
‘Oh, I’ve learned much,’ Neferata said. ‘I’ve learned that thrones are like horses. They always throw their rider at the first sign of weakness.’ She reached up and pressed two fingers to Abhorash’s sword and pushed it aside. ‘I’ve learned that it is far better to be the one holding the reins than riding the horse.’
‘I thought you were a queen,’ Ushoran spat her words back at her.
‘I am, but not all queens sit on thrones,’ she said. She nodded to Abhorash, who stepped back. ‘You’ve given Abhorash a position within your new Lahmia, Ushoran. So why not do the same for me?’
‘You?’ Ushoran said, incredulously. Even Abhorash looked taken aback.
‘You need me, Ushoran,’ she said. ‘You know nothing of ruling a kingdom, nothing of statecraft or diplomacy. If you would be more than a petty warlord squatting in a tomb of stone, you will require someone with… finesse,’ she said.
‘I have more than enough advisors,’ Ushoran said suspiciously. She could see the wheels turning in his mind.
‘Yes, but what you do not have is a Lady of Masks,’ Neferata said, her foot on the first step of the dais. ‘Someone to shape your policy and be the dark left hand of this… paradise you have made.’