“My lord specified that she is not to be damaged.” A second voice. Much calmer and deeper than the first.
“Not being damaged doesn’t—OW!—mean you can’t secure her—OW!—legs—OW! Seft take you, bitch! But not before I’m—OW!”
Kiron clutched the side of the cupboard, overcome by mingled elation and rage. Elation, because Aket-ten was clearly very much herself, and doing her best to inflict as much damage on her captor as she could. And rage—he wanted to fly down those stairs and slaughter both the men he could hear on the spot. Or the Magus, at least.
“If my Lord would just permit me to knock the girl unconscious—” Perfectly calm, and matter-of-fact. Which only made Kiron’s blood heat as he clenched his fists. Not just the Magus, then. He’d kill both of them.
“No! I need her awake and aware and undamaged in any—OW!—way!”
The first speaker was obviously the Magus. The other—probably a guard or a servant. From the sound of things, Aket-ten was concentrating on taking out her anger on the Magus.
“The stair is too steep to risk carrying a struggling girl up it, and carry her is what I shall be forced to do. So my lord will have to permit her the freedom of her legs, and bear with the consequences. Unless my lord is going to insist on my carrying her and is willing to take the chance of both of us falling and breaking our respective necks?”
The long pause that followed the statement, and the sense that the Magus was actually considering the option, made Kiron wince in spite of the fact that he wanted to pound both of them into the floor. Whoever this Magus was, he hadn’t won himself any friends with that pause. “No, no of course not,” said the Magus, a little too late. “But—OW!”
“If my lord would at least walk a few paces ahead, so that the girl cannot reach him—” Now the voice sounded wary as well as impatient, and Kiron wasn’t at all surprised. The Magi were not known for their forbearance toward their servants. And if anything went wrong, it would be the servant who was blamed for it.
He wished he could see them. What kind of servant was this? A guard? Or someone less able to put up a fight if—when—Kiron attacked? It didn’t take being a guard or a soldier to talk about hitting a bound and gagged girl on the head.
He’d like to think that no real soldier would think of such a thing—but he knew better. From the Tian Jousters who had hauled helpless Altan peasants (including women and children) into the air and dropped them, to the Altan soldiers who had put the Temple of the Twins under siege, there was rot in both armies, and the only way to stop it was to stop the war that had made atrocity acceptable and rewarded the officers who ordered it or looked the other way while it happened.
“Seft take you! Just get her up these stairs, and I don’t care how you do it!” the voice snarled.
He’s not gaining any goodwill from the servants today, that’s for sure.
“My lord is surely aware that even if I do not carry her, the girl could succeed in pushing me down the stairs or tripping me if her feet are left free. Is this truly what my lord wishes?”
The Magus paused, for too long, leaving the impression that he was considering the option of risking his servant’s life and limb.
You’re not going higher in his estimation, you bastard.
“Just get that halter on her neck and get her up here!” There was the sound of one set of footsteps moving a bit faster up the stairs, while the other two plodded along behind. “Walk in front of her and drag her if you have to! Come on! Get her moving, you lack-wit!”
After that, there was only the sound of footsteps; evidently, Aket-ten wisely elected not to resist anymore. Kiron held his breath as they made their way up the staircase. The big question was what the nature of the man helping the Magus would be. And how big he was.
Stay hidden, he warned himself. If you rush out without thinking, they can take you. If you wait until you can catch them both by surprise, you can take them. At some point fairly soon, the others will begin their attack, and it will attract a lot of attention. If you haven’t found an opening before then, that will be the time.
But he didn’t want to wait, not at all. His stomach was in a knot, every muscle was alive with the need to fight, and he practically vibrated with tension. He wanted to get out there and hurt them, the moment they appeared—
But he wasn’t exactly trained or armed for a real fight, not the kind that was going to happen here. He didn’t have a sword, because he didn’t know how to use one. He had a club, and a knife, and his wits. Not so bad against a Magus, but suicide against a trained soldier.
From his vantage point behind the crack in the door, Kiron saw the gleam of a light in the opening in the floor through which the staircase rose. Moments later, the Magus himself, carrying a lantern, emerged through the opening.
He wasn’t one of the Magi that Kiron knew, but his clothing, a fine long robe of purple linen and short cloak of the same material, a belt of gold plates, and a matching collar, marked him as someone important. Otherwise, he looked perfectly ordinary, not the sort of man that Kiron would look twice at, if they passed each other in the street. Middle-aged, thinning hair cropped at chin-level, clean-shaven, with the kind of visage that Orest called a “face-shaped face” with nothing to distinguish it from a thousand like it.
It struck him, as he looked at the perfectly average, beardless face, neither young nor old-looking, perhaps a little plumper than he should be, but nothing that could be called “fat,” that it was wrong that evil should look so banal. For evil this man was; he might or might not be personally responsible for the murder of dozens, the deaths of thousands, but he was involved, he knew about it, and he had willingly agreed to it, had probably participated in some fashion.
He had definitely participated in draining the Winged Ones, and their inability to see into the future as a consequence had killed and hurt people all over Alta during the earthshakes they could no longer predict.
So how was it that someone who had done all of this looked like a prosperous merchant about to make a great deal? There was a smug, self-satisfied smirk on the man’s face that made Kiron want to punch it.
But the next man rising out of the stair prevented him from doing any such thing.
Definitely a professional soldier, or at least, a professional bodyguard. The man was big, well-muscled, and Kiron was nowhere near a match for him.
But he was also angry. Kiron read that in his posture and his lack of expression. He might feign a servile nature, but he hated this Magus, and given half a chance and the certain knowledge that he could not be blamed for what followed, he would desert his “lord” in a heartbeat.
Trailing behind him, with a kind of collar and leash around her neck, gagged, with her hands tied in front of her, was Aket-ten.
Once again, he had to restrain himself to keep from rushing out.
If the bodyguard was angry, she was furious. Her eyes above the gag flashed with rage. Her posture was rigid, her whole manner proclaiming that, the moment she got a chance, she was going to do something to the man that he would regret for the rest of his days.
And that if she had anything to say about it, those days would be very short indeed,
That made him weak-kneed with relief. If she had been cowed, intimidated, beaten down, he would not have been able to keep himself from running in to rescue her immediately. And if she had been sunk deep in depression and mourning for Re-eth-ke, it would be a lot harder to get her motivated to get her out. She was ready to fight for her life and her freedom and that meant she was an ally and a potential accomplice, not a potential burden.