“It is nothing for you to concern yourself over,” he said.
She stepped away. “If you insist. Do you have anything scheduled tomorrow?”
“No,” Tamas said. He was an unwanted soldier without a campaign. He was under suspension. What few duties he had left to him could be finished in a couple hours each week.
“Then we should leave the city tonight. We can shoot until our eyelids are heavy then camp until afternoon. Then in the evening we’ll work through the fencing forms I’ve been showing you.”
They had arrived at the door to his small, first-floor tenement. Tamas used the opportunity to turn away from her. Every instinct was telling him to say no. If he went, it could be nothing but practice, even if he wanted something more. Even if she wanted something more, which seemed beyond possible.
He tried to tell himself that her flirtatiousness was just his imagination. There was no possible way that a girl of her cleverness and station would allow herself to feel anything for a commoner.
She looked at him, eyes half-lidded, biting her bottom lip. His heart hammered in his head.
“All right,” he said breathlessly. “Let me just …”
He caught it then. It was very faint, and at first he thought it just his imagination. But a moment later the scent intensified.
Jasmine perfume.
“No,” he said.
“You just …” Erika began.
Tamas cut her off. “No. I can’t. Too much to do. This is just … just child’s play. You should go. Now.” His voice rose until the last word was nearly a shout. Erika stepped back, her face scrunched with alarm, her hand on her sword, and Tamas realized how violently the words had come out.
“I’m not a child.” Erika said. Her tone was steel.
“Yes, you are. Now leave.”
Erika whirled on her heel without another word, striding through the falling snow. Tamas couldn’t help but feel a deep regret as she left, but he knew it was for the best.
He cracked a powder charge and sprinkled half of it on his tongue. The scent of jasmine intensified, and Tamas could feel the presence of the Privileged on the other side of the door. He removed the iron key from his pocket and turned the lock, then stepped inside, closing the door behind him.
He kept a hand on the butt of his pistol and peered through the darkness with his heightened senses. His was not a large home. The living space was nothing more than a coal stove, a table, two chairs, and a cupboard. A door to his left led to his small, cramped bedroom.
Privileged Dienne sat on the other side of the table, fingers steepled in front of her face, wearing her gloves. The window behind her into the courtyard of his tenement was open, allowing the snow to blow gently onto his floor. She was flanked by two of her cabal guards, their hands resting on the pommels of their sabers. Two more guards stood to either side of the door, and when he had closed it they moved almost silently to take up positions behind him.
The attack came so quickly Tamas could hardly react. The two guards each grasped one of his arms, yanking his hand away from his pistol. He spun toward one of them, wrenching his opposite arm free, grasping for his belt knife.
His free arm was snatched again, and he was forced into a brief wrestling match. His powder trance gave him more speed and strength than both men together. He cracked one in the nose with his elbow and finally got a hold of his knife. He brought it up and around.
And found himself unable to move.
He strained at the invisible bonds that held him, eyes seeking Privileged Dienne. Her fingers twitched slightly, and he could feel the trickle of sorcery that she pulled into this world.
His arms were forcibly returned to his side, his knife and pistol taken from him. By the time the sorcery released him, the two guards held him in such a way as would force him to break his own arms if he struggled.
“Who’s the girl?” Dienne asked, finally breaking the silence.
“No one of importance,” Tamas said through clenched teeth.
“Shall I go after her, my lady?” the guard beside her asked, his voice a bass rumble.
“We’ll find out who she is soon enough,” Dienne said, waving dismissively. “Captain Tamas, you have one opportunity to tell me what the king wishes of you. If you don’t, I will begin to burst the molars in the back of your mouth, one at a time, until you have no teeth left.”
Tamas relaxed completely, letting himself sag against the two guards that held him. “I won’t be able to talk through that kind of pain.”
“You’re a powder mage. I suspect that your pain tolerance is rather high, and considering how well you saw me in the dark I imagine that you’re running a powder trance right now. Don’t try to toy with me, Captain. You’ll do fine.”
“Why do you care what the king wants with me?”
“This isn’t a conversation,” the guard holding Tamas’s left arm said. “You will not ask questions.”
Tamas turned his head and coughed, as if clearing his throat, then spit a wad of phlegm into the guard’s eye.
He was rewarded with a punch to his gut that doubled him over, the pain shooting like a bolt through his powder trance. He remained that way, stars floating before his eyes, until the guards forced him back up.
“What did that gain you?” Privileged Dienne asked.
The bastard on my left doesn’t have a proper hold on me anymore, Tamas thought. He said nothing aloud.
“You’re very stubborn,” Dienne said. “I’ll give you this; the king wants you because you’re a powder mage. But I imagine you know that already. Regardless of what he may have told you, you will gain nothing from serving him in any capacity. In a few months your rank will be stripped from you. You will be discharged from the army, and no one in all the Nine will be willing to employ you in any profession that has even the slightest scrap of dignity. You will spend the rest of your life shoveling shit or mining coal, wishing that I had killed you. Now what did the king want?”
Dienne might as well have admitted that she was behind his suspension, confirming Tamas’s suspicions. Not that the knowledge gave him any satisfaction. He could feel the pressure build in the back of his jaw. It started as a niggle, then an increased force, as if someone was drilling his molars from the inside out. He gave an involuntary whimper.
The pressure lessened. “What was that?” Dienne said, leaning forward with a smile.
“He’s playing you,” Tamas finally got out.
The smile disappeared. “Explain.”
“What does he want me for? Nothing. Nothing at all.”
“You’re trying my patience.”
“And you’re trying mine. If you’re going to torture me, get on with it. But I just told you what you wanted to know.”
Dienne stared at him as if she were looking at a particularly hideous dog. Tamas wondered if anyone had ever shown her any kind of defiance in her life as a Privileged. “Have it your way,” she finally said with a snort.
Tamas felt the pressure in his teeth increase suddenly, and he anticipated the scream that was about to tear itself from his throat.
“That’s enough of that,” a voice said.
The room grew very suddenly still. The guards all looked at the Privileged, Dienne’s posture was suddenly stiff as if there was something pressed against the small of her back.
“If you so much as twitch a finger I will splatter your heart across the front of Captain Tamas’s nice uniform.” Erika’s face appeared in the open window just over Dienne’s shoulder. “Tell your guards to step away.”
“Do it,” Dienne said.
Tamas was released, and the four guards pressed themselves into the corners of the room without protest.
“Now hold your hands in the air, fingers splayed,” Erika instructed the Privileged. Dienne’s raised her hands slowly, and Erika reached one hand around to pluck off the gloves, one finger at a time. When she had pocketed the gloves, she said, “Tamas, get out of here.”