““O, fuck no.”
When Mia pushed open the door to the New Imperial Taverna in the town of Last Hope, she hadn’t been expecting open arms or a triumphal parade. But when Fat Daniio, owner and proprietor, looked up from his shiny new countertop and saw the bedraggled and sea-soaked Blade and her Hearthless companion standing on his doorstep, Mia had actually been impressed by the sheer horror in his eyes.
“O, fuck no,” the publican repeated.
Fat Daniio’s trepidation at Mia’s return was understandable: last time she was in his pub, she’d poisoned a cadre of Luminatii in his common room and burned the Old Imperial to the ground. By way of compensation, the Red Church had sponsored a rebuild, and the New Imperial was a rather more well-to-do affair than its predecessor. Not exactly a marrowborn villa, but at least there were no bloodstains on the floors or rats holding court in the rafters.
Still, it seemed Mia wasn’t among Daniio’s list of favorite people.
“Nonono,” the tubby publican begged, raising his hands in surrender. “Merciful Aa, you can’t come in here, I’ve just had the walls repainted.”
“I promise to behave,” Mia said, stepping over the threshold.
“Mia!”
She heard running footsteps, smelled jasmine perfume, and then Ashlinn was catching her up in a breathless embrace. Ash’s lips found hers and Mia kissed her back, forgetting herself for a moment and just enjoying the simple feel of her girl in her arms again. She was soaked to the skin, freezing cold, exhausted past sleeping. But just for a heartbeat, none of it mattered.
Sidonius strode across the room and joined in on the hug, Bladesinger was quick to follow. Looking around the pub’s common room, Mia saw it was full of salts from the Bloody Maid, talking soft and drinking hard. Cloud Corleone sat in a booth with BigJon, Butcher, and Jonnen—the trio were apparently teaching her brother how to play Kingslayer.* But all four looked up as Mia and Tric entered, amazement etched on Corleone’s face.
“Fuck me very gently,” he breathed.
“Then fuck you very hard?” Mia asked.
Cloud tipped his tricorn and grinned. “Good to see you, my queen.”
Mia gave a slow curtsey that a marrowborn dona would envy, then looked to Jonnen and winked. Her brother climbed off his chair and, keeping his manner as lordly as he could manage, walked across the common room and wrapped his little arms around her waist in a fierce hug. She was soaked to the skin but couldn’t bring herself to care, lifting him up and squeezing him tight and planting a kiss on his cheek. The boy protested, making a face as her lips touched his skin.
“You’re cold.”
“So they tell me,” she replied.
“Unhand me, wench,” he demanded.
Mia kissed him again, grinning as he wriggled in her embrace. Finally, she set him on the taverna floor and sent him on his way with a soft smack to his backside. The Falcons looked at Mia with a kind of awe. Sidonius turned to Tric, shook his ink-black hand.
“We feared you’d not make it,” the Itreyan said. “That storm was a monster.”
“Aye,” Bladesinger said, giving a grudging nod. “Well done, lad.”
“THE WORK WASN’T MINE,” Tric replied. “WE’D BOTH BE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE OCEAN IF NOT FOR MIA.”
“Where’s the Black Banshee?” Butcher asked.
Mia shrugged. “Bottom of the ocean.”
Tric looked at Mia with lingering wonder. “SHE TRULY IS CHOSEN OF THE GODDESS.”
“Always there seemed more to her than the eye beheld,” said a familiar voice.
Mia turned and saw a thin woman with her face veiled in black silk. Strawberry-blond curls. Dark, kohled eyes. Soundless as whispers and standing right behind her.
“Naev!”
Mia caught the woman up in her arms, kissed her cheeks, one after another. Naev returned the hug with fondness, a smile shining in her eyes.
“Friend Mia,” the Hand said. “It is good to see her again. Speaker Adonai gave word of her coming. Old Mercurio sends his love.”
“You’ve spoken to him?” Mia whispered, her heart swelling with joy.
Naev cast a pointed glance about the Imperial’s common room, nodded to a table in a far-flung corner. Making their way past groups of Corleone’s crew, the group secreted themselves at the back of the pub, squeezing into a booth around Naev. Daniio shuffled over with a round of cheap ales, his nervous stare still locked on Mia.
The girl blew him a kiss.
Once the publican had retreated, Naev spoke with a hushed voice, eyes on the door.
“Adonai sent word to Naev through the blood,” the woman said, tapping the silver phial about her neck. “The speaker and weaver have aligned themselves with Mercurio against the Ministry. Chronicler Aelius stands with the company also.” Naev looked at Mia. “Between them, they have pondered a way she might enter the Mountain and strike.”
“But we have to move now, Mia,” Ashlinn said.
“Aye,” Naev nodded. “Matters are moving swift. Time is sh—”
“Hold, hold,” Mia said, shaking her head. “I just fought my way across six hundred miles of storm and ocean. You’re telling me the speaker and weaver have joined with the chronicler in a conspiracy to help me take down the entire Red Church Ministry. Can I at least have a fucking smoke and come to grips with this first?”
“Scaeva is headed to the Quiet Mountain,” Ash whispered.
Mia’s belly thrilled, her jaw tightening. “What?”
“Ashlinn speaks truth,” Naev nodded. “The imperator needs Marielle to craft another duplicate to stand in his stead during public appearances. And he must be present for the weaver to craft a convincing likeness. He will be in the Mountain in a matter of turns.”
“All the vipers in one nest,” Ashlinn said, squeezing her hand. “This is our chance, Mia. Kill Scaeva. End the Ministry. Rescue Mercurio and be done with all of it.”
Mia’s skin prickled, a surge of adrenaline banishing the exhaustion, the chill. Scaeva surely wouldn’t travel to the Mountain unattended. And even with their numbers culled, the Red Church was still a cult of the deadliest assassins in the Republic. But the belly of the Quiet Mountain dwelled in perpetual night—no sunslight had ever touched it. She’d be as strong within the Black Mother’s halls as she’d been out there in that storm. Probably more so. And with all her enemies in the one place at the one time, just a few turns’ ride across the Ashkahi Whisperwastes …
She looked at Naev, her voice as sharp as the gravebone at her waist.
“Tell me everything you know.”
The whispers were louder than Mia remembered.
They were three turns into their trek, the heat rippling off the Ashkahi wastelands in shimmering waves. The Lady of Storms had abandoned the skies for now, the dark cloud cover peeling back to reveal a sullen purple glare above. Saan was half-hidden by the horizon, and Saai falling farther toward its rest. But out here in the desert, the temperature was still stifling.
Mia and her comrades rode inside a Red Church wagon train. The Hands who usually accompanied Naev on her supply runs couldn’t be trusted to join their conspiracy, so Naev had put them down with a dose of Swoon in their evemeals before Mia had even reached Ashkah. They were now resting in a rented room in the New Imperial, bound hand and face and foot.
Mia had told Cloud Corleone he was under no obligation to wait for her return. With the Black Banshee at the bottom of the Sea of Sorrows and his friendship with Mia well-known, the pirate had decided he’d sail back to Godsgrave and lie low until the succession war over the Throne of Scoundrels was settled.
As they’d made ready to trek out into the Whisperwastes, the captain had bowed low, flashed Mia his four-bastard smile, and doffed his tricorn.
“If I were the praying sort, I’d say one for you,” Corleone had said. “But I’m not sure you’d welcome it anyway. And so I’ll gift you this instead.”
The scoundrel gently took Mia’s hand, kissed her bruised and battered knuckles.
“Fortune go with you, my queen.”
“You don’t have to call me your queen anymore, Captain,” Mia had said.
“I know it,” Cloud replied. “Which is exactly why I do.”
BigJon had given Mia a low bow and his silver grin. “That marriage offer still stands, Queen Mia. I’d rather fancy being a king and telling this bastard what to do for a change.”
Cloud flipped his first mate the knuckles, then nodded at Mia.
“Blue above and below.”
“Thank you, my friend,” Mia had smiled. “Benito? Belarrio?”
Cloud had only grinned. “My loyalty only extends so far, Majesty.”
The scoundrel had bowed low again and turned back to the sea.
Mia wondered if they’d ever meet again.
They’d set off soon afterward, eight camels leading a four-wagon train out into the Ashkahi wastes. Not needing to sleep, Tric sat up front in the driver’s chair—they had only a few turns to reach the Mountain before Scaeva was gone, and the boy’s unearthly presence served to drive their animals a little harder. Hating camels almost as much as she hated horses, Mia had given all their beasts names in her head—Ugly, Stupid, Smelly, Cockeye, Dunghead, Tosser, Bucktooth, and, for the smelliest and ugliest of the lot, Julius.
Bladesinger rode in the front wagon with Naev, watchful eyes on the horizon. Butcher stuck close by Jonnen when he could—the man still trained the boy with his wooden swords whenever they stopped for a meal—but for now he was riding with Sidonius in the rear, the pair of them taking turns at beating on a large iron contraption to keep the sand kraken away.
Mia, Ashlinn, and Jonnen rode in the middle wagon, the canvas cover shielding them from the worst of the suns. Ash sat beside Mia, hand in hers. Jonnen sat opposite, dark eyes on his sister’s. Eclipse had returned to the lad’s shadow, and Mia could see he was a little more at ease. But despite his tender age, Jonnen was no fool—he’d overheard enough of their talk to realize his father awaited them in the Quiet Mountain. And he knew Mia’s intentions toward the imperator were less than gentle.
The boy had kept his own counsel for the first couple of turns. Practicing his bladework with Butcher and sitting quietly with Eclipse. But Mia could see it building inside him like floodwaters against a crumbling dam, until on the third turn after evemeal, he finally spoke.
“You’re going to kill him.”
Mia looked up into her brother’s eyes. Ashlinn was dozing, head in Mia’s lap. Mia had been gently reweaving the girl’s warbraids, long golden locks entwined between her fingers.
“I’m going to try,” Mia replied.
“Why?” Jonnen asked.
“Because he deserves it.”
“Because he hurts people.”
“Yes.”
“Mia,” the boy said softly. “You hurt people, too.”
She looked into those big dark eyes, searching the heart beyond. It wasn’t an accusation. Nor a rebuke. No matter what she was, the boy didn’t judge her for it. Her brother was a pragmatist, and Mia liked that about him. And though he’d been slowly warming to her over the past few weeks on the road, she wondered what they truly might’ve been if the world hadn’t ripped them apart before they could become much of anything at all.
“I know it,” she finally said. “I hurt people all the time. And that’s the riddle, little brother. How do you kill a monster without becoming one yourself?”
“I don’t know,” he replied.
Mia shook her head, staring out at the wastes around them.
“You can’t,” she sighed. “I’m not some hero in a storybook. I’m not someone you should aspire to be. I’m a ruthless cunt, Jonnen. I’m a selfish bitch. You hurt me, I’ll hurt you back. You hurt the ones I love, I’ll kill you instead. That’s just the way I am. Julius Scaeva killed our mother. The man I called Father. And I don’t care what they did to deserve it. I don’t care that they weren’t perfect. I don’t even care that they were probably just as bad as him. Because truth told, perhaps I’m worse than all of them. So fuck what’s right. And fuck redemption. Because Julius Scaeva still deserves to die.”
“Then so do you,” he replied.
“You thinking of trying, little brother?”
Jonnen simply stared. The slow trundle of the wagon rocking them back and forth, the clang of the ironsong breaking the still.
“I…”
Jonnen frowned. His lips pressed together. She could see the intelligence in him, just as fierce as her own. But in the end, he was still a child. Lost and stolen from all he knew. And she could see he was having trouble finding the words.
“I wish I had known you better,” he finally said.
“So do I.” Mia reached out, took his little hand in hers. “And I know I’m a shitty big sister, Jonnen. I know I’m awful at all this. But you’re my familia. The most important thing in my world. And I hope one turn you might find it in yourself to love me just half as much as I love you. Because I do.”
“But you’re still going to kill him,” Jonnen said.
“Yes,” she replied. “I am.”
“Please don’t.”
“I must.”
“He’s my father, Mia.”
“Mine, too.”
“But I love him.”
Mia met her brother’s eyes. Seeing the years lost between them, the love he felt for the man who’d taken him away from her. The wrong, rotting at the heart of that. And slowly, she shook her head.
“O, Jonnen,” she sighed. “That’s just one more reason he deserves to die.”
They traveled on, through the Whisperwastes in what little silence Sid’s ironsong spared them. And though the boy’s eyes swam with questions, he gave voice to none of them after that.
Though there was always a risk of sand kraken, the Red Church had been running supplies from Last Hope for years, and Naev guided them along paths of submerged stone, broken foothills, and finally into the mountains at the wastes’ northern reaches. Mia could see a black stone spire rising before them—just one of dozens in the range. It was plain. Unassuming. Capped with pale and gleaming snow. But Mia’s heart beat quicker to see it. The heart of the Ministry, the temple of the Mother, the cradle of the Red Church’s power in the Republic.
The Quiet Mountain.
Mia knew an ancient magik called the Discord had been placed on the peak years past—a werking to confuse unwelcome visitors. But Naev knew the words that would keep the magik at bay. Slowly, surely, their wagon train made its way through twisted gullies and broken foothills, closer to the towering granite peak. The Whisperwastes had been long left behind them—Sid and Butcher had ceased their ironsong, crawling into the middle wagon to consult with Mia and Ash about the upcoming assault. Tric had left the reins to Naev, and he and Bladesinger joined the group, gathering in a small circle around a large oaken barrel.
“Right,” Mia said. “Once we get inside, we stay quiet as long as we’re able. If the alarm is raised, we’ll have every Blade and Hand in the place on us like flies on shite. But if we walk it right, these bastards won’t even know we’re there ’til it’s half over.”
She took a piece of charcoal, began drawing a complex map on the wagon floor.
“Tric, Ashlinn, and Naev all know their way around the Mountain, so the rest of you will follow their lead. The inside of this place is like a damned maze, so watch your step. It’s easy to get turned around in the dark. Tric, you, Sid, and Bladesinger head to the speaker’s chambers. Protect Adonai and cut off the blood pool. Scaeva cannot be allowed to escape the Mountain. Ash, you and Naev head to the Athenaeum and secure Mercurio. If you can’t find him there, he’ll likely be in his chambers. Guard him with your life and get him to the speaker. Butcher, you and Eclipse stay in the stables and protect Jonnen. If all goes well, I’ll fetch you when it’s done. If all goes to shit, you ride back to Last Hope hard as you can, get out by sea.”
A stupider man might’ve grumbled at being left behind to babysit, but Butcher was obviously aware of the import of his task of protecting her kin, and how deeply Mia was trusting him by giving it to him.
“Aye, Crow.” He thumped a fist on his chest. “I’ll guard him with my life.”
“And what about you?” Sidonius asked, clearly concerned.
“I’m going after the Ministry,” Mia said.
“Alone?” Ashlinn asked.
Mia nodded. “Best way to do it. It’ll be early morn by the time we arrive. Drusilla will probably be with Scaeva and Marielle, so I’ll save them for once we’re all ready. But as far as Solis and the Ministry go, I can have the head off the snake before it knows I’m there.”
“… SOLIS ALMOST KILLED YOU THE LAST TIME YOU FOUGHT, MIA…,” Eclipse murmured.
“Aye,” Mia nodded, smiling at Naev. “But there’s not much that goes on in the Mountain that Chronicler Aelius doesn’t know about. And he’s given me a gift to even the scales.”
She looked about the group, met each stare in turn.
“Any questions?”
Though she had no doubt every one of them was burning with them, Mia’s companions kept their silence. She nodded to each, acutely aware of how much they risked for her, how deeply grateful she was to all of them. She squeezed Sidonius’s hand, gave Bladesinger a fierce hug, kissed Butcher’s cheek. Each donned a Hand’s stolen garb as the train trundled nearer to the Mountain, hunkering down in their wagons with blades beneath their robes. The train drew closer to a blank cliff face in the Quiet Mountain’s flank, and Naev rose up in the front wagon, arms spread. She spoke ancient words, humming with power.
Mia heard the sound of stone, cracking and rumbling. Felt the greasy tang of arkemical magik in the air. Bladesinger muttered beneath her breath, Jonnen gasping in wonder as a great flat stretch of stone cracked open. A faint rush of wind kissed Mia’s face, a shower of fine dust and pebbles fell from above as the Mountain’s flank gaped wide.
The familiar sight of the Red Church stables awaited them—a broad straw-lined oblong, set on all sides with pens for sleek horses and spitting camels, wagons and farrier’s tools and bales of feed and great stacks of supply crates. The song of a ghostly choir hung in the air like smoke as Ugly, Stupid, Smelly, Cockeye, Dunghead, Tosser, Bucktooth, and Julius pulled the wagon inside. Hands in black robes walked out to guide the beasts farther in. The illumination spilling through the open door was the only sunslight the belly of the Mountain ever saw.
Mia felt her shadow surge toward the dark beyond.
She squeezed Jonnen’s hand, saw the boy felt the same thrill at the dark as she did. Sidonius was tense as steel in the wagon ahead. Bladesinger still as stone. Mia could hear Ashlinn’s quickened breath at her side. And finally, as a cadre of Hands stepped out of the gloom to help unload the wagon’s wares, Mia and her comrades broke into savage motion.
The crisp ring of blades. The glint of arkemical light on polished steel. Mia heard several soft pops as globes of wyrdglass flew from Naev’s fingertips, catching a knot of Hands in a cloud of Swoon and sending them all to the floor, senseless. The Falcons moved swift, lashing out with pommels or the flats of their blades. Hands and stable staff were sent sprawling, bleeding. Mia
Stepped
from the wagon’s belly
to the stairs above,
cutting off a fleeing Hand
and catching him up in his own shadow before knocking him witless. Brief struggles. A splash of bright red. Within moments, the stables were under their control.
All was in readiness. Each of them knew their task. Eyes hard. Blades sharp. Mia nodded to each in turn. Kissed Ashlinn swift on the lips.
“Be careful, love,” she whispered.
“You too,” Ash replied.
She felt a dark stare on her back. Turned and met Tric’s gaze.
“MOTHER GO WITH YOU, MIA,” he said.
“And you,” she replied.
She looked into her brother’s glittering eyes. Saw the pain and uncertainty in him.
“I’ll give our father your regards,” she said.
And with that, Mia was gone.
Spiderkiller stalked into her Hall, wrapped in emerald green. The gold about her throat glittered in the stained-glass light, reflected in the bottles and phials and jars lining the walls. Her eyes were black, lips and fingers blacker still—stained from a lifetime of the poisoncraft she so adored. There were none in all Itreya who could match her in it. She’d forgotten more about the art of Truth than most would ever know.
The Shahiid sat at her oaken desk at the head of the Hall, pestle in hand, grinding a compound of bluespider venom and driftroot into a stone bowl. She’d been concocting a number of new poisons of late, dreaming of her vengeance against Mia Corvere. Solis’s words in the last Ministry meeting had stung her more than she’d admit. It had been her who granted Mia her favor, allowed the girl to become a Blade. Spiderkiller would never forgive her former pupil for that. And though it couldn’t be said the woman had honor to besmirch, she did have patience. And she knew, sooner or later, Mia would give her the chance to …
The Shahiid blinked. There upon the desk, she saw a shadow, leaking across the polished oak, like ink spilled from a bottle. It puddled beneath a ream of parchment, moving like black smoke and forming itself into letters. Two words that sent Spiderkiller’s heart racing.
Behind you.
A gravebone longblade flashed out of the dark at her back. Spiderkiller’s throat opened, ear to ear. Gasping, blood gushing from severed jugular and carotid, the woman pushed back her chair, staggered to her feet. Whirling on the spot, clutching the awful wound, she saw a girl where none had stood a moment before.
“M-muh,” she gargled.
Mia stepped back swiftly as Spiderkiller drew one of the curved blades at her belt. The steel was discolored, damp with venom. But the Shahiid’s face was already bleeding pale, her footsteps tottering. She sagged back against the desk, eyes wide with fear. Blood pumped rhythmically from Spiderkiller’s sundered throat, covered her hands, her dress, the gold wrapped around her fingers and neck. So much.
Too much.
“I thought long and hard about how to end you, Spiderkiller,” Mia said. “I thought it might be poetic to finish each Shahiid with their own mastery. Steel for Solis. Poison for you. In the end I decided you’re just too dangerous to fuck about with. But I wanted you to know I killed you first because I respected you most. I thought you might draw some solace from that, neh?”
Spiderkiller toppled forward onto the stone, her eyes cold and lifeless.
“No,” Mia sighed. “On second thought, I don’t suppose you would.”
Mouser heard a door slam somewhere out in his Hall.
He looked up from the needletrap he was loading, a frown on his handsome brow. His workshop was hidden behind one of the many doors in the Hall of Pockets, a quiet place where he puzzled with locks or played at dress-up. He was wearing women’s underthings beneath his robes now, as it happened—he’d always found them more comfortable, truth be told.
Mouser rose from his desk, took up his walking stick, and limped out into his Hall. The walls were lined with dozens of other doors, leading off into his wardrobes or storerooms, or sometimes nowhere at all. Long tables ran the room’s length, littered with curios and oddities, padlocks and picks. Blue stained-glass light puddled upon the granite floor, reflected in the dark eyes of the girl waiting for him.
“Mia…,” he said, belly running cold.
“You helped take my familia away from me, Mouser,” she said. “And years later, you actually had the stomach to look me in the eye. To offer me counsel. To pretend like you were my friend. Where do stones like that come from, I wonder?”
Mouser’s hand drifted to the Ashkahi blacksteel blade he always wore at his waist.
“Blacksteel can cut through gravebone, you realize.”
“It’s a fine sword, Shahiid,” the girl agreed. “Did you win or steal it?”
As ever, Mouser’s smile loitered on his lips like it was planning on pinching the silverware. “A little bit of both.”
Mia smiled too. “Best not to risk it, then.”
He wasn’t sure where the crossbow came from—one moment the girl’s hands were empty, the next, she was drawing a bead on his chest. But even with his crippled legs, the Mouser could still move quick as cats, and as Mia fired, he let go his walking stick, grasped his sword, and drew it forth with a crisp ring, sidestepping the bolt speeding toward his chest.
Or at least, that’s how it played out in his head.
But as Mouser made to step aside, he found his boots affixed firmly to the floor. Too late, he brought up the blade to ward off the blow, but the bolt struck home, punching through his gray robes, the corset beneath, and into the chest beyond.
A bubble of blood popped on his lips as he stared stupidly at the fourteen inches of wood and steel now lodged in his left lung. He looked up as Mia reloaded, grunted as a second bolt thudded into his chest, wobbling him on his trapped feet and finally toppling him backward onto the stone. He hurled a fistful of throwing knives as he fell, but the girl was gone, Stepping into the shadows and reappearing a few feet to his left.
She brought her boot down on his hand as he reached for another blade, leveling the reloaded crossbow at his crotch.
“Say farewell to your stones, little mouse.”
Solis opened his eyes to the sound of the choir.
Rising from his bed, the Revered Father washed his face, blinked his blinded eyes. And just as he did every morn, he picked up a wooden sword and ran himself through his practice drills. After thirty minutes, his body was dripping with sweat and he was breathing hard. Smiling at the song of his blade in the air.
Satisfied, he slipped on his robe, his scabbard. Pale eyes open and seeing nothing at all. And yet, seeing everything and more.
Imperator Scaeva and the Lady of Blades would be arriving shortly, and he knew he’d best get himself presentable. Stalking down long, dark hallways, he nodded to the Hand outside the bathhouse door, stepped silently into the empty room. Unbuckling his belt, he took a deep breath as he always did. Reaching down to run his fingers over his precious scabbard. The leather embossed with concentric circles, much like a pattern of eyes.
Slowly, he removed it from his waist, feeling all the world around him fall away into darkness. Once again blind as he’d been the turn he was born. He folded his robe neatly and placed it by the edge of the broad, sunken bath, coiling his belt and scabbard carefully on top. There were only a few in the entire Church who knew its true purpose, the magiks that coursed through it. Old Ashkahi sorcery engraved into the leather, lifting the veil on a world that would otherwise be utterly hidden to him.
Stepping down into the warm bath, Solis closed his eyes and tilted his head back beneath the water, allowing himself to float for a handful of minutes.
Deaf, dumb, and blind.
It was a habit, and the Revered Father didn’t like habits—they made a man easier to ambush. But he always allowed himself this tiny moment of peace and quiet. This was the Red Church, after all. The bastion of Niah’s might upon this earth.
Who could touch him here?
Solis rose to the surface, blinked the water from milk-white eyes. He smelled soap’s perfume, maple burning low in the braziers, candle scent. His ears were keener than his beak, but all he heard were crackling flames, the ghostly choir out in the Church’s dark. And though his own eyes were almost sightless, sensing only the absence of light, he noticed nothing odd as he sat up in the bath, save perhaps the chamber was a touch darker than usual.
Darker …
“… GOOD EVE, SHAHIID…”
To his credit, Solis didn’t flinch. Didn’t even deign to look in the shadowwolf’s direction. He heard a featherlight scuff of a boot on stone, caught the faint smell of sweat above the smell of maple, and … Spiderkiller’s perfume? He knew who stood there, off to one side of the pool. Watching him with her dark, shaded eyes.
“You.”
“Me,” Mia replied.
A cold trickle of dread cooled Solis’s belly. His hand flashed toward his robe at the bath’s edge. But though his fingers found the cloth, he realized his scabbard was …
Gone.
“I was actually disappointed when I found out,” Mia said, now speaking from farther away. “There’s something quite romantic in the notion of the blind swordmaster, isn’t there? But it was all lies, wasn’t it, Solis? All bullshit. Just like the rest of this fucking place.”
Fear turned his insides greasy cold. He reached into his robe for the dagger he kept hidden there. Not really surprised to find that gone, too. Solis rose from the bath in a cloud of steam, crouched naked at the edge. He was drawing breath to shout when—
“Your Hand is sleeping, by the by,” came the girl’s voice from across the room. “If you were thinking of screaming for help, that is.”
“Scream?” Solis sneered. “You always did think too much of yourself, girl.”
“And you too little,” she replied. “Is that why you let me train here? Knowing how badly it could bite you in the arse? Did you really think I’d never find out what you all did?”
He tilted his head to better hear, straining for the sound of her footfalls. Retreating along the edge of the bath, he tried putting his back to the wall. But he heard a soft whisper of cloth over the crackling wood in the braziers, realized she was
Behind me.
He struck, hands outstretched, finding nothing but air.
“A fine lunge, Revered Father,” the girl said. “But your aim. Tsk, tsk, tsk.”
She was to his right, drifting away. He could feel her. Years in the dark before he’d found his Belt of Eyes, the years he’d spent locked in the Philosopher’s Stone, all came rushing back in a flood now. He’d murdered a hundred men to win his freedom from that pit, all while blind as a newborn pup. He didn’t need eyes to kill then. He’d not need them now.
But she’s good. Quiet as death when she moves.
“It’s all lies,” she whispered. “The murders. The offerings. Hear me, Mother. Hear me now. All that bollocks. This place wasn’t a church, Solis. It was a brothel. You were never a holy Blade in service to the Mother of Night. You were a whore.”
Keep her talking.
“And you expected something greater, is that it?” he asked. “Did you swallow the nonsense Drusilla and your Mercurio told you? ‘Chosen of the Mother,’ is that it?”
A soft scuff of her boot.
Left…?
“I told them when you arrived we should have just ended you,” he said. “I warned them this turn would come. When you learned the truth of it, and the spoiled, squalling brat you truly are showed herself. Always you thought yourself better than this place. Always.”
“So why didn’t you kill me?” she asked.
Behind again now …
“Cassius wouldn’t hear of it,” Solis replied. “‘Little sister,’ he called you. Supposing some kinship in the dark between you, though he knew nothing of what he was. ‘The Black Prince,’ he called himself.” The Shahiid scoffed. “Prince of what?”
“Why did you hate me, Solis?” she asked. “It wasn’t just that scar I gifted you.”
And then he saw it. The way to make her stumble. To hold her still long enough to get his fingers around her throat.
“I never hated you,” he said. “I just knew it would always end this way. I knew you’d eventually discover it was the Red Church who captured Darius Corvere and handed him over to his killers. I knew Scaeva’s shit would end up on our boots.”
He tilted his head and smiled.
“But did you never wonder, Mia?”
“Wonder?”
Moving right. Back and forth with no pattern.
Clever.
“Wonder who it was who stole into Darius Corvere’s encampment?” Solis asked. “Wonder who snatched up him and his lover and handed them over for execution?”
Solis held up his left hand. Running his fingers over the scars notched in his forearm.
“Thirty-six marks,” he said. “Thirty-six bodies. In truth, I’ve ended hundreds. But I only branded myself with those kills I was paid for, in blood and silver. Even the ones where I never actually wielded the blade.”
He ran his finger over a notch near his wrist.
“This one is General Gaius Maxinius Antonius.”
He heard a scuff on the stone as she stopped moving.
“And this is Justicus Darius Corvere.”
Solis turned milk-white eyes toward her soft gasp.
“You…”
And then he lunged.
Mia moved, slipping away quick as shadows. But not quite quick enough. His fingers closed on a lock of her hair and he seized tight, heard her yelp as he wrapped it up in his fist and dragged her in. Fingers closing around her neck. His face was twisted, rage boiling in his chest at the thought this fucking slip had blinded him, mocked him, caught him unawares.
He slammed a fist into her jaw, sent her reeling. Dragging her back in to punch her again. Slamming her like a rag doll into the wall, fingers sinking deep into the flesh of her throat. He’d gotten too soft. Too predictable. When this little bitch was dead he’d—
A blow to his chest.
Another and another.
It felt as though she were punching him, and he sneered at the thought. She was two-thirds his size, half his weight. As if her fists could hurt him …
But then he felt pain. Warm and wet, spilling down his belly. And he realized she wasn’t simply hitting him. Her knife was just too sharp for him to feel.
Both hands were at her throat now. Blind eyes open wide as the agony started creeping in. They stumbled, falling back into the bath. As they crashed into the water, he felt her blade slip into his back half a dozen times, the pair of them sinking below the surface as he strangled for all he was worth. He’d killed a dozen men this way in his time. Close enough to hear the death rattle in their lungs, smell the stink as their bladder loosed when they died.
But the pain …
Rolling and tumbling beneath the water. Hard to keep his grip. Pulse rushing in his ears. Spilling from the dozen wounds in his chest, his back, his side. Arms like iron.
She’s killing me.
The thought made the rage flare bright. Denial and fury. Kicking and stabbing, flailing and cursing. They surfaced, bright light in his blind eyes, gasping. The pair crashed against the edge of the sunken bath, her spine cruelly bent, his face twisted. She was still flailing at him, cursing, spitting. Stabbing his forearms, slicing his cheek, lost in her own frenzy.
He couldn’t feel his hands. Was he still holding her?
It didn’t hurt so much anymore. Dull impacts. Chest. Chest. Neck. Chest.
“Bastard!” she was screaming.
Is
“You!”
this
“Rotten!”
how
“Fucking!”
it
“Bastard!”
ends?
He felt his knees give out. His grip slithered away from her neck. The water was warm, but he was so cold. Hard to breathe. Hard to think. Slipping deeper, he closed his eyes and tilted his head back beneath the surface, allowing himself to float for a handful of minutes.
Would he meet her now? Gather him to her breast and kiss his brow with black lips?
Had he ever believed? Or had he just enjoyed it too much?
Mother, I …
Solis closed his eyes to sound of the choir.
And then he sank beneath the—”
“Enough,” Scaeva said.
Drusilla looked up from the pages, one eyebrow quirked.
“Is it?” she asked.
The imperator of Itreya scowled slightly, his dark eyes on the Lady of Blades. The dozen personal guardsmen he’d brought with him were arrayed about their master, staring at the book in Drusilla’s hands like it were a viper set to strike. Scaeva himself made a better show of appearing unimpressed, resplendent in his purple toga and wreath of beaten gold. But even he regarded the chronicle she’d been reading aloud from with suspicious wonder. He steepled his fingers at his lips, scowling.
“I believe you have made your point, good lady.”
Flames crackled in the chamber’s hearth, and Mouser shifted uncomfortably in his chair. Spiderkiller’s face was blanched, even Solis looked disconcerted at the foretelling of his own murder at Mia’s hands. Drusilla leaned back in her seat, closed the third Nevernight Chronicle with a gentle thump. Her fingertips traced the cat embossed in the black leather, her voice soft as silk.
“She must be stopped, Imperator,” the Lady of Blades said. “I know she is your daughter. I know she has your son. But if all this tome says is true, once inside the Mountain, Mia Corvere will wield a power none of us can match.”
“Mia is not the only darkin in this tale,” Scaeva replied.
“O, well do I know it,” Drusilla replied, patting the tome. “The results of your clash are quite spectacular, if somewhat overwritten. But they end badly for you, I’m afraid. Would you like me to read it? I have it bookmar—”
“Thank you, no,” the imperator replied, glowering.
“I do not understand,” Mouser said. “The first page of the first chronicle told us she dies.”
“And indeed she does,” Drusilla said, drumming her fingers on the third tome’s cover. “After a long and happy life, in her bed, surrounded by her loved ones.”
“I will be damned,” Solis growled, “before I allow that bitch a happy ending.”
“This chronicle is witchery,” Aalea said, eyes on the book.
“No,” Drusilla said, meeting the eyes of her Ministry. “This chronicle is a future. But it is a future we can change. Already we change it, here and now, by speaking as we do. These pages are not carved in stone. This ink can be washed away. And we have young Mia at disadvantage.”
“O, aye?” Mouser asked.
“Aye,” Drusilla said. “We know exactly how she intends to enter the Mountain. And when. And fool that she is, we know she’s bringing the imperator’s son with her.”
All eyes turned to Scaeva.
“You should depart back for Godsgrave, Imperator,” Drusilla said. “Leave your errant daughter to us. Safer for all concerned.”
“And that concern is touching, Lady,” Scaeva replied. “So I trust you’ll forgive my honesty. But your efforts in subduing my daughter thus far have been less than impressive. And if she is bringing my son to your slaughter, I will remain to ensure that Lucius is not harmed. In any way.”
“You may trust us on that, Imperator. But as for your daughter?”
The Lady of Blades leaned forward in her chair, staring hard.
“I know you wished her captured, Julius. I know you wished to make her your weapon, to set we gold-grubbing whores of the Red Church aside.” Scaeva glanced up at that, and Drusilla met his stare, smiling. “But surely this tome demonstrates Mia is simply too dangerous to be allowed to live. The Red Church will continue to serve your imperium, just as we have always done. We will be paid for our services, just as we have always been. And Mia Corvere will die.”
Scaeva stroked his chin, eyes on the chronicle. The Lady of Blades could see the wheels at work behind his stare. The plans within plans, unraveling and restitching.
But finally, as she knew he would, the imperator nodded.
“Mia Corvere will die.”
A soft knock disturbed the silence of his bedchamber.
Mercurio’s natural scowl deepened, and he dragged on his cigarillo, looking at the offending door in annoyance. Pulling his wire-rimmed spectacles off his nose, he set his book aside with a curse. He’d have been miffed to be interrupted reading at the best of times, but he was only two chapters from the end of On Bended Knee. The chronicler had been right—the politics were silly, but the smut really was top-shelf—and with only twenty-two pages left, he was surprisingly invested in discovering whether Contessa Sofia’s evil twin really was going to marry Archduke Giorgio and—
Knock, knock.
“Fucksakes, what?” the old man growled.
He heard the key turning in the lock, and the door swung open silently. Mercurio fully expected to see one of his damned Hands poke their heads around the frame. He’d been confined to his bedchamber since the discovery of the third chronicle, and the poor sods watching him were bored shitless now. The Dweymeri lad even asked if Mercurio wanted a cup of tea yesterturn. But instead of a dispirited lackey of the Red Church, the old man found himself looking at the Lady of Blades herself.
“Since when do you knock?” he growled.
“Since I was informed about your current reading material,” the old woman replied. “I’d rather not stumble into a visit from Dona Palmer and her five daughters, if it’s all the same to you.”
“You always were a prude, ’Silla.”
“You always were a wanker, Mercurio.”
The old man smiled despite himself. “Why are you here?”
Drusilla stepped inside, closed the door behind her. He could tell from her expression that despite her opening salvo, she hadn’t come to jest. She sat down on his bed and he turned his chair to face her, elbows on his knees.
“What is it, ’Silla?”
“Mia is dead.”
The old man felt a tightness across his chest, like iron bands constricting. His left arm ached, fingertips tingling as he felt the room begin to spin.
“What?” he managed to sputter.
Drusilla looked at him with clear concern. “… Are you well?”
“Of course I’m not fucking well!” he snapped. “She’s dead?”
“Black Mother, I was speaking figuratively. The deed isn’t done yet.”
“Maw’s fucking teeth.” Mercurio massaged his chest, wincing with pain. Relief flooded over him like spring rain. “You near gave me a fucking heart attack!”
“… Do you wish to see the apothecary?”
“No, I don’t wish to see the fucking apothecary, you crusty bitch!” he snapped. “I want to know what the ’byss you’re babbling about!”
“Scaeva has given approval for Mia’s execution,” Drusilla said. “We know exactly when and how she will enter the Mountain. Her fate is sealed, the matter is certain. I know how much you care for her, and I wished you to hear it from me first.”
“You wished to fucking gloat, is what you mean,” Mercurio snarled.
“If you believe I take pleasure in this—”
“Why the ’byss else would you have come in here?” The old man blinked hard, rubbing at the pain in his arm, his body now in a cold sweat. “Of course you take pleasure in it, ’Silla! You always have! You always will!”
“Know me so well, do you?”
“O, I know you, all right,” Mercurio snarled, wincing as he curled the fingers on his left hand. “Better than any man b-before or since. I saw you at your best and I watched you at your worst. Why the fuck else do you think I ended it between us?”
The old woman scoffed, blue eyes glittering. “I didn’t care forty years ago, Mercurio. I care even less now.”
“Some of us joined this place because we believed. And some of us because it was all we had. But you?” Mercurio winced again, pawing at his shoulder. “You joined because you liked it. You l-like hurting things, ’Silla. You w-were always a heartless…”
Mercurio blinked, rising to his feet.
“… h-heartless…”
The old man gasped, clutching at his chest. He staggered back against the wall, his book tumbling to the floor, a pitcher of wine knocked loose and shattering on the stone. His face twisted, he gasped again, lips moving as if he were unable to speak.
Drusilla rose to standing, eyes widening.
“… Mercurio?”
The old man fell to his knees. A gargle of nonsense spilling over his lips, both hands pressed to his heart and twisting at the fabric of his robes. The Lady of Blades slammed her fist against the door, crying out. The Hands burst into the room as the old man fell facedown on the stone, the stink of wine and piss in his nostrils.
“Get him to the apothecarium!” Drusilla snapped.
Mercurio felt a strong grip upon his waist, the Dweymeri Hand picking him up and slinging him over one broad shoulder. He only groaned in response, eyelids fluttering. He felt the rhythmic tread of hurried footsteps, heard Drusilla barking commands above the endless dirge of the Church choir. He couldn’t feel the pain anymore, thankfully. A long string of drool spilled from his lips and he groaned more nonsense. He was being carried along dark hallways and down spiraling stairs, head thumping against the Hand’s backside. Drusilla was following, shaking her head.
“Stupid old fool.”
The old man groaned in reply as the Lady of Blades sighed.
“This is what having a heart gets you…”