As it turned out, the most difficult part of Starros’s grand plan to honour Dacendaran by robbing Krakandar of its entire population was finding a way to speak to Xanda Taranger without bringing the wrath of Mahkas Damaran down on all of them. Damin’s commission to his cousin had been to keep an eye on Mahkas, which meant even with uninhibited access to the slaveways, there weren’t many opportunities to find Xanda alone in the palace.
Krakandar Palace probably wasn’t the safest place for such a potentially dangerous meeting to take place, in any case. After days of mulling over the problem, Starros decided to take a more direct approach. With Luc North’s assistance, he arranged for Wrayan’s Thieves’ Guild henchmen to kidnap Xanda Taranger off the streets of the city in broad daylight.
Their mission was made easier by Xanda himself. He made a point of inspecting the city two or three times a week to see how things were going, to talk to the people, reassure them, gauge their mood, and generally try to put a good face on things. Because he was here as a guest and actually held no formal position in Krakandar’s court, he was able to do this without fanfare and usually accomplished his inspection with no more than a single guard accompanying him.
Wrayan’s men ambushed Xanda and his guard as he entered the narrow streets of the Beggars’ Quarter, a few
blocks from the Pickpocket’s Retreat. They overwhelmed them and bundled the two men away, trussed up like chickens on their way to market, not removing the ropes or the sacks thrown over their heads until they were behind closed doors in the safe house.
“What the hell …” Xanda began, struggling as his kidnappers freed him. His voice faltered as the sack was pulled from his head and he found himself face to face with Starros.
“Hello, Xanda.”
“Starros? For pity’s sake, man!” he complained, shaking free of the ropes that had bound him, while he glared at the men who’d taken him prisoner. “Couldn’t you have found a less dramatic way of getting me to your …” he glanced around and then shrugged, “ … your lair?”
“Believe me, Xanda, if there’d been an easier way to do this, I would have used it.” He glanced at the men still holding Xanda’s accompanying guard, tied and blindfolded. “Let him go.”
Luc’s men did as Starros ordered. As soon as the man’s hands were free he pulled the sack from his head and stared at Starros in shock.
“I thought you’d be dead by now, lad.”
Starros smiled gratefully. “Thanks to you, Sergeant Clayne, I survived.”
His thanks were heartfelt and genuine. Clayne was the man in charge of the palace cells the night Damin returned to Krakandar. This was the man who’d stood aside to allow Damin to come to his aid.
The big man was clearly disturbed by Starros’s miraculous recovery. He eyed him up and down, his expression grim. “You shouldn’t have survived, lad. You surely shouldn’t have walked away from it without a mark on you.”
“I had help of a sort you couldn’t imagine, Sergeant.”
The man looked around the room with a frown. “And now you’ve fallen in with criminals, I see.”
“I don’t know if he’s fallen, so much as been given an almighty shove,” Xanda remarked, rubbing his chafed
wrists. “Is there anything to drink around here, or are you lot planning to torture me, as well as tromp all over my dignity?”
“Get him something to drink,” Starros ordered the man standing closest to the door. “And take Sergeant Clayne into the next room. I’m sure he’d appreciate an ale or two.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Clayne announced belligerently. “My job is to watch over Lord Taranger.”
“And I swear no harm will come to him. I’m asking you to leave for your own protection, Sergeant,” Starros explained. “You did me a favour once, and now I’m returning it. What I have to say to Xanda could be considered treason. You’ve risked a charge of treason once before on my behalf. I’m not going to implicate you, even by association, a second time.”
Clayne thought about it and then held up his hands to indicate he would offer no further resistance. “Very well.”
Starros waited until the others had escorted Clayne from the dingy room and then turned to look at Xanda once they were alone.
“Noble of you to care so much about Clayne’s neck, while you’re endangering mine without a second thought.”
“Oh, we’d thought of that,” Starros assured him. “We’re going to beat you senseless after we finish our meeting and leave you for dead in an alley somewhere. Just to make it look good.”
“There’s the mark of a true friend.”
Starros smiled. “I like to help where I can. How have you been, Xanda? You look tired.”
“I’m all right, I suppose.” He sank down on the bench beside the fireplace. “As right as any man can be, living in an insane asylum, at any rate.” Xanda jerked his head in the direction the others had disappeared. “You seem to be fitting in with your new friends rather nicely.”
“I’ve been touched by Dacendaran,” Starros reminded him, taking the seat opposite. “That makes me something of a celebrity in the Thieves’ Guild. Didn’t you notice? I even
have my very own henchmen now, ready to do my criminal bidding.”
“Yes, I noticed that.”
“In truth, they’re not really mine, they’re only on loan from Wrayan while he’s away, but they do the job and they look at me like I know what I’m doing, so I suppose that means something.”
The conversation halted when the man Starros had sent for ale returned with a jug and poured one for Xanda, and then let himself into the other room where they were holding Clayne. Xanda took a long swallow before fixing his gaze on Starros. “So, what is this treasonous plot you wish to implicate me in, old friend?”
“I want to evacuate Krakandar.”
“Wouldn’t we all,” Xanda agreed sourly.
“I’m serious. Mahkas Damaran stole the thing I loved most in this world, Xanda. I want vengeance. Real vengeance, not some token of it. So I plan to take away the thing he loves most.”
“I’m not sure he actually loves the people of Krakandar, Starros. Come to think of it, I’m not sure he actually loves anybody.”
“He loves the power the people of this city represent.”
“True enough.”
“Then you’ll help me?”
Xanda rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I’d love to. But what exactly do you expect me to do? If you want me to unseal the city, you’re wasting your time. Luciena would have nagged me into it weeks ago, if it was even remotely possible. Every time I suggest it, Mahkas gets more obstinate about it.”
“We don’t need to unseal the city,” Starros assured him. “The Thieves’ Guild has other ways to get past the walls.”
“They do?”
“Don’t ask me for details, Xanda, you’re better off not knowing.”
He took another swallow of ale. “I don’t doubt that. Are you going to tell me how you plan to get the people out?”
“That’s something else you’d be better off not knowing.”
Xanda looked at him curiously. “Then why exactly did you bring me here? To brag about it?”
“I need to make certain we’re not interfered with; that the soldiers in the city don’t start looking into anything out of the ordinary. I don’t want them tipping off Mahkas to our plans.”
Xanda raised a brow at him. “You want me to quietly put it about that the Krakandar Raiders should turn a blind eye to your criminal activities?”
“Exactly.”
“You don’t want much, do you?”
“Only vengeance,” Starros replied.
Xanda barely hesitated before agreeing to grant the favour Starros asked for. “I can probably do what you ask, but I have a condition of my own.”
“Name it.”
“Among the first people you smuggle out of the city will be my wife, my children, and the Lionsclaw boys. Promise you’ll get them to my brother in Walsark and I’ll burn down the damned palace myself as a diversion, if need be.”
“I’m not sure we need anything quite so drastic. I do appreciate the offer though. But you have my word that Luciena and the children will be among the first to leave the city. Do you think Travin will mind twenty thousand-odd refugees in his borough?”
Xanda smiled thinly. “Not if you promise to make them all buy at least one piece of his wretched porcelain.”
The young thief was mightily relieved. “I’ll make it a condition of every citizen’s exit from the city. And thank you. I thought it would take hours to convince you of the cleverness of my diabolical scheme.”
“Nothing’s too much trouble for an old friend,” Xanda said, draining the last of his ale. “You really are taking this whole Thieves’ Guild engagement rather seriously, aren’t you?”
“Not really my choice, Xanda. Damin traded my soul to
the God of Thieves when he should have let me die. I’m stuck with this.”
“And you’re too well brought up to do a sloppy job on anything,” Xanda noted wryly. “I wonder what Almodavar will make of the new Starros when he gets back.”
“I dread to think,” he said. “Can’t imagine he’ll be too impressed by my change of circumstances. On the other hand, it’s hard to tell with Almodavar, and there’s no proof he’s actually my father, you know.”
“No proof he isn’t, either.” Xanda put his tankard on the seat beside him and looked across at Starros. “I’ll need to be getting back soon or they’ll come looking for me. There’s really no need for the whole beating-me-senseless charade, you know. I can fake it.”
“If Mahkas suspected for a minute …”
“I can deal with Mahkas,” Xanda assured him. “You take care of your end of things and let me deal with the maniac.”
Starros was surprised at the sudden feeling of melancholy that washed over him. “I remember a time when we all thought Mahkas Damaran was the most wonderful man we knew.”
“That’s the worst thing about childhood illusions,” Xanda agreed. “They really hurt when you discover how wrong they are.”
The pain in Xanda’s voice surprised Starros. He’d thought he was the only one suffering intolerable grief. “Just how bad is it up there?”
“You can’t begin to imagine,” Xanda sighed. “Mahkas can only speak in a hoarse whisper, even when he’s yelling. It drives him crazy. He thinks everyone is secretly plotting to bring Damin back to unseat him. It’s most of the reason he won’t open the city gates. Nothing anybody says will convince him Damin rode off to war against Fardohnya. Mahkas is convinced Damin merely stopped out of sight at the Walsark Crossroads and is waiting for his opportunity to come back and take the city by force.”
“Has it occurred to Mahkas that Damin was in the city not
so long ago and could have taken over any time he pleased, if that was his intention?”
“Ah, now that sort of conclusion requires a degree of rational thought. Mahkas isn’t real big on rational, right now.”
“What about Bylinda?”
Xanda shook his head in sorrow. “She’s the hardest one to watch. Leila’s death has destroyed her.”
Starros wasn’t surprised to hear Xanda’s news. “I know what you mean. I saw her a few weeks ago. In the slaveways.”
Xanda looked at him in alarm. “In the slaveways? Do I want to know what you were doing in the slaveways, Starros?”
“Probably not. But I do understand what you mean about Bylinda being destroyed by grief. She looked like a wraith when I spoke to her.”
“That’s a pretty fair description, actually,” Xanda agreed unhappily. “Luciena’s desperately worried about her. We all are, for that matter.”
“Well, I’d offer to help, but I don’t think my presence in the palace would do anything to ease matters.”
Xanda forced a weary smile. “There’s an understatement if ever I heard one. But I’m glad you survived this, Starros. There’s been enough death in this family to last a lifetime. And you appear to be adapting remarkably well to your sudden change in circumstances, even if your life is turning in a direction you didn’t anticipate.”
“I still haven’t convinced myself this whole ‘let’s sell Starros’s soul to the God of Thieves’ plan isn’t Damin’s idea of a sick joke.”
Xanda looked around the small main room of the safe house, nodding with approval. “Well, you’re on your way to a fine career as a thief, I’d say. Your own minions. A nice lair. What more could a thief want? You’ll be giving Wrayan a run for his money soon, won’t you? How long before you’re the head of the Krakandar Thieves’ Guild?”
“Never,” Starros said and then, before he could stop himself, he burst out laughing as something else occurred to him, something so ironic it was almost painful.
Given the serious nature of their conversation only a few moments ago, Xanda wasn’t nearly so amused. “I don’t get the joke, I’m afraid.”
“It just occurred to me—I used to complain Orleon would live forever and I’d never get to be Chief Steward of Krakandar Palace.”
“Oh, yes, I can see how you’d think that was hysterically funny.”
“Don’t you see the irony?” Starros laughed, unable to help himself. “Even if I wanted Wrayan’s job, it wouldn’t make any difference. I’ve sold my soul to a god and I’m still no better off than I was in the palace.”
“I don’t get the joke.”
“Wrayan’s part Harshini, Xanda,” he reminded him. “There’s a good chance he really will live forever.”
Xanda smiled. “That is kind of funny, when you think about it.”
Starros wiped his eyes and forced his laughter under control. “I’m sorry. You’re right, it’s not that funny. I don’t know what … you know, I think that’s the first time I’ve laughed since Leila … since she died.”
“I think it’s the first genuine laugh I’ve heard since then, myself,” Xanda replied. “Don’t feel guilty for being alive, Starros.”
“I don’t …
“Yes, you do,” the older man scolded. “You think it’s not fair that you’re still here and she’s gone. And maybe you’re right, given the manner in which you were saved. But you can’t live like that, Starros. I know. After my mother died, I spent months thinking she’d hanged herself because of something I did. Absurd, I know, but I was only six at the time. I used to walk around clutching that damned ceramic horse and knight Mahkas mended for me, reliving those last few moments in my mother’s room before our uncle sent me and Travin out, wondering what I’d done to make her so upset she’d kill herself.”
“I’m not six years old, Xanda.”
“I know. But the guilt is still there, no matter how old you
are, or how hard you try to deny it. All suicides are the same, Starros. It’s the ultimate act of selfishness. Suicide offers a release to the one who dies and a lifetime of grief and pain to those who have to go on.”
“Leila wasn’t being selfish,” he objected, a little surprised to hear Xanda say such a harsh thing about his own cousin. “She was the most unselfish person I knew.”
“She killed herself to get back at her father, Starros,” Xanda reminded him. “I know you loved her, but you need to remember that. And someday you’ll get over your grief, too. And you need to accept it’ll happen and not feel guilty about that, either.”
Starros rose to his feet, uncomfortable discussing anything so intensely personal, even with an old friend, particularly with his grief still so raw. “I appreciate the advice, Xanda, but really, I can deal with this on my own.”
“Vengeance won’t make the pain go away.”
“I don’t want the pain to go away,” Starros told him. “Because when it does … then she’ll truly be gone, Xanda, and I’ll finally have to accept that no matter how hard I wish for it, Leila is never coming back.”