Then again, she would never have expected it from Elix, either, and yet here they were. She stared up at him, at the once familiar and even cherished face that now looked as alien to her as that of any of the denizens of Xoriat.
“Why, Elix? Why would you do this to me?” she whispered at last, not even caring how broken and lost her words sounded.
“How else was I going to get you to come home?” he asked, looking pained.
When she didn’t respond, he sighed and dropped to one knee in front of her.
“If there were anyone else, don’t you think I would have gotten them? You’re the only one who can do this. Aggar needs you, and we need the Tordannons. And you’ve been gone so long, and you never answered any of my letters. I just needed to see y—”
But she’d stopped listening, having heard all she needed to.
So. He’d betrayed her trust to keep the Tordannons happy, to make sure their weapons kept pouring into Deneith’s armories.
She should have known. After all, building that relationship had been the main reason she and Leoned had originally been sent to the Holds to guard the Tordannon heir. And her killing of Aggar’s would-be assassin—along with Ned’s death—had cemented the partnership with mortar made of equal parts guilt and gratitude.
By rights, that ought to have been enough.
For seven years, it had been.
But now, the alliance built on Ned’s coffin was in danger, and so the House was calling her back, whether she would —whether she could—or no. Because the needs of the House always outweighed the needs of any of its individual members.
And Elix was, first and foremost, a Deneith, and he’d protect the House’s interests at all costs. He’d said it himself.
“I don’t know why I’m surprised. I mean, you gave me fair warning. ‘I’m a Marshal. It’s my job,’ ” she spat, viciously parroting his words back to him. “I didn’t know that job included lying to your friends and stabbing them in the back, but maybe they’ve changed the requirements since I earned my brooch.
“So I guess it’s a good thing that I don’t have it anymore.”
She cut off Elix’s protest before he could give it voice.
“Don’t. Just … don’t.”
She made her way to the library door and reached out to open it.
“Saba. Please. I’m sorry, but—”
Her hand stilled on the handle, but she didn’t turn.
“I don’t care. Find someone else to save the House’s trading partnership with the Tordannons. As of tomorrow, I’m gone. And you needn’t bother sending any letters after me this time, real or forged. I won’t be coming back to Karrnath. Ever.”
Then she stepped from the room without so much as a backward glance, slamming the door on Elix and on her life as a Marshal.
Mountainheart jumped up from his seat when she returned to the sitting room.
“Finally! I was beginning to think you’d completely forgotten the Tordannon hand signals.”
She’d just been going back to retrieve her cloak and had had no intention of even speaking to the dwarf. But his words brought her up short.
The hand signals. The chin scratching and bead twisting. Of course.
He’d been trying to tell her they needed to speak privately … either that, or that her beard needed trimming, which hardly seemed likely.
Not that it mattered.
“You’re too late. I’ve resigned my commission; I’m no longer a Marshal. I did it before you even got here—Elix probably forgot to mention that little detail, didn’t he? Seems he’s gotten pretty good at keeping secrets since I left,” she said as she reached down and retrieved her still-damp cloak from the hearth. “So whatever it is you wanted to say, save it. I’m not going back to the Holds with you, and neither Breven nor Elix can compel me to, now.”
She turned away from him and took two steps toward the door before his next words stopped her where she stood.
“I don’t need them. I have Sollego.”
Sabira turned back slowly to face the dwarf, who was regarding her with an unpleasant smirk.
“I’m actually a bit surprised,” he continued in a conversational tone, casually buffing his rings on his tunic. “My uncle told me you were a smart player; that you played like a dwarf. I guess that changed after you left the Holds, because no dwarf worth the name would be stupid enough to bet money they didn’t have.”
Sabira’s eyes narrowed.
“So I owe the gang a few galifars. So what?”
“Actually, you no longer owe Sollego anything. I purchased your debt from him—at a considerable markup, I might add.” The smirk became a full-fledged grin, the movement making the beads in his black beard clatter together. “Now, you owe me.”
Sabira swallowed. Owing a dwarf money was a deadly serious matter, even more so than owing a gang leader like Sollego. Sollego might rough her up, even maim her, but that’s as far as he would go, because his ultimate concern was getting his money back, and his ability to do so would be severely hampered if she were a corpse. A dwarf, on the other hand, had more at stake than mere money—his honor and very clan status were on the line. A dwarf who could not collect his debts was no dwarf at all.
You could tell a lot about what was important to a race by the words they used and the words they didn’t. Dwarves, for instance, had more than two hundred words for “family” and nearly as many for “wealth.” But the only word they had for someone who defaulted on a loan was “dead.”
Mountainheart watched her closely, gauging her reaction.
“So, unless you’re able to pay off your debt in full—all ten dragons of it, plus another two to cover my expenses in purchasing the note—then you are going to the Holds, where you will defend my uncle once again, only this time it will be in front of the Iron Council instead of in the depths of Korran’s Maw.”
Before she could respond, Elix entered the room, a small pouch clutched in one hand.
“Ah, Captain!” Mountainheart exclaimed, his smile expansive and more than a bit smug. “You’re just in time. Sabira has just agreed to return to Krona Peak with me. My uncle and the whole Tordannon clan will be very pleased.”
Elix’s brow creased and he looked from the dwarf’s satisfied expression to Sabira, taking in her set jaw and angry glower. For a moment, bewilderment warred with relief on his face as he tried to divine what Mountainheart could have possibly said or done to make her change her mind so quickly. But then, like any good politician, he shook it off with a slight shrug and crossed over to her.
“In that case, you’ll be needing this.” He pulled her brooch out of the silk bag and draped the leather cord around her neck so that the chimera brooch lay just above her heart, while she stood there, stiff and unyielding. As he moved her hair aside to knot the cord, his fingers brushed the nape of her neck. She could swear his hand was trembling; he was probably furious at her.
The feeling was definitely mutual.
Damn you, Elix, she thought. And Mountainheart and Aggar, too. Damn all your manipulating hides to the darkest depths of Khyber.
While she was at it, she might as well curse that gnome at the Wayward Lobster who’d beaten her Royal Family with a full complement of lowly Spears. Or the dealer who’d given him the hand, or Olladra, who’d turned a blind eye toward her in favor of that sniveling little tinkerer.