He bent at the waist, his hands resting on his knees and his breathing labored. For just an instant he thought he might be sick, but the nausea soon passed, leaving him weary and tearful.
He straightened and began to walk back toward the inn, struggling to keep from bawling like a babe. The singer had been right in front of him. Had he but drawn his blade and waited a moment or two, he might have been able to kill the man. Yes, the crowd would have overwhelmed him. They might even have killed him. But at least the singer would be dead, and Brienne avenged. He had sworn to her spirit that he would strike the man down for her and though he had not spoken the words aloud, he had vowed to himself that he would not allow fear for his own life to stay his hand.
Now he had done just that.
“I am a coward,” he muttered under his breath, tears stinging his eyes. “I always have been.” The only time he had truly been brave was in Kentigern’s dungeon, when he had endured the torture inflicted upon him by Brienne’s father rather than confess to her murder. And all he had to show for those brief moments of valor were the scars on his face and body.
That would end here, in the half-frozen, mud-covered lanes of this city. He began to walk faster. The assassin hadn’t seen him; the young lord felt certain of that. Which meant that the man would be as unprepared for Tavis’s assault at their next encounter as he had been at this one. He had lost an opportunity, but nothing more. He would find this Swallow’s Nest and kill the singer there. Let the Aneirans hang him. Better to be executed for the murder of a killer and reviled as a nobleman of Eibithar, than to waste away in exile with all the Forelands believing that he had butchered his queen.
By the time he reached the small lane that led to the inn at which he and the gleaner had taken a room, he was running, enlivened by his resolve. He threw open the door of the tavern, took the stairs two at a time, and rushed down the corridor to their room. Opening the door, he found that Grinsa had already gone.
He spat a curse and searched the room for a quill and a piece of parchment. Seeing none, he hurried back down the stairs to where the innkeeper sat, puffing on a pipe.
“Do you know where my friend went?” he asked, heedless of his accent.
The Qirsi man regarded him coolly. After a moment he shook his head. “I saw him leave just after you did, but he told me nothing.”
No doubt he had gone back to the castle, hoping to learn something of its design and of Shurik’s whereabouts.
“Do you have a quill, and something on which to write?”
The innkeeper gave him a sour look, but he stood and walked slowly back to his chamber, emerging a few seconds later with a quill, a stoppered vial of ink, and parchment.
Tavis grabbed them from him, tossing a “Thank you” over his shoulder as he ran up the stairs once more.
He sat on his bed and opened the ink, but then faltered with the quill poised over the vial. If he explained too much about what he intended to do, the gleaner would try to stop him. Grinsa would see only the danger. Tavis was more than willing to exchange his life for the assassin’s, but the Qirsi would balk at such a trade. In the end, however, the young lord decided it was best to tell him everything and hope that Grinsa wouldn’t have the chance to interfere. Someone should know what he had done. Someone should be able to explain to his parents that he hadn’t died a coward, that he hadn’t carried his shame to the Underrealm.
He kept his message to the gleaner brief and to the point, but he did include a final word of thanks for all Grinsa had done for him.
“Had it not been for your companionship, I would have spent these last several turns alone and friendless,” the young lord wrote. “For that, I will always be grateful. Be well, Grinsa. May the gods keep you safe.”
He placed the parchment at the foot of the gleaner’s bed, checked to make certain that his blade was strapped securely to his belt, and left the room. His stomach felt hard and empty, but he didn’t dare eat. Having made his decision to avenge Brienne here in Mertesse, he now needed to contrive a way to kill the singer without getting himself killed first, and without giving the gleaner time enough to stop him.
Their performance in the marketplace went quite well; better, Cadel had to admit, than had any of their previous ones. Not that the city folk would have noticed much difference from one day or evening to the next. Dario could have neglected to tune his lute, and Cadel could have reversed the lyrics of the Paean, and still the people of Mertesse would have cheered lustily for every note. Such was the power of the reputation they already enjoyed in this city.
Perhaps the singer should have accepted this as evidence that Dario was right: no one cared if they played perfectly. It was enough that they sounded good and pleased their listeners. But something about their performance this day left him troubled. More precisely, it was something about the marketplace itself, or perhaps the crowd that greeted them there. Cadel could hardly say which. He knew only that he felt the way he often did before a difficult kill, alert and a bit on edge. It almost seemed that his body was readying itself for a fight, though Pitch Night was still several days away. He couldn’t explain it, but he had learned long ago to trust his instincts. He couldn’t dismiss it either.
Yet there was nothing to be done about it, at least not until he had a better sense of what was coming. As they walked back toward the Swallow’s Nest, Cadel found himself scanning the city streets for signs of trouble, one hand drifting time and again to the handle of his dagger.
Dario didn’t appear to notice. “We sounded good, don’t you think?” he said, a broad grin on his boyish face. “I bet there were people in Kentigern who heard those cheers.”
“Your timing is still all wrong in the threnody, and the Caerissan folk songs are far too ragged in the refrains.”
Cadel winced at what he heard in his own voice, and the smile vanished from the lutenist’s face, leaving a hard, bitter look.
“We’re so close to having it all just right,” the singer began again a moment later. “We just need a bit more work.”
Dario nodded, but said nothing.
He couldn’t say why he treated the younger man this way. There remained much about their playing that bothered Cadel, and though they had practiced every song more times that he cared to count, Dario’s playing had changed little. Nearly every compromise had come from Cadel, either with a specific change in his singing style, or a silent acquiescence to another of Dario’s poor habits. But while Cadel found this exasperating, disagreements over their music hardly explained these outbursts of anger, which, at times, caught even him unaware. It almost seemed that he was directing at Dario all his lingering rage at having lost Jedrek.
“We won’t practice very long,” he said, trying once more to soothe the other man’s anger. “Just once through the threnody and the folk songs ought to do it.” I need this, he almost said. I need to sing in order to keep my mind off of everything else.
Dario gave no reply, and they walked the rest of the way to the inn without speaking a word.
They played the songs quickly and flawlessly, though without any of the feeling that usually marked their performances. The lutenist stared at his hands the entire time, as if refusing to look at Cadel.
If I’m not careful, I’ll destroy this partnership before our first kill.
“That sounded good,” he said when they had finished the last song. “All of them did.”