In the few seconds it took us to run back to the cell we’d already lost the fight. Sir Istan was dying just outside the iron gate, blood gushing from his throat even as he struggled to rise one last time. Parrick was on the ground outside, wrestling with one of the other Knights we’d found lying beside Tommer. The Knight he was fighting hammered a fist against the pommel of the dagger I could see sticking out between Parrick’s ribs—he must have found the tiny gap between the bone plates of Parrick’s greatcoat—and a heart-rending scream echoed around the cell. Then the Knight climbed on top of Parrick, pulled out his dagger and began to force it down into Parrick’s face. Ugh was close enough now to grab the Knight by his long brown hair and he hauled him off and sent him sprawling toward me. I drove the point of my rapier deep into his right shoulder and then again into his left: I needed him to live long enough to find out who had ordered this attack, but that didn’t mean he shouldn’t hurt.
There was a great clanging and I turned to see Sir Toujean pulling the door to the cell shut. He locked himself inside with Valiana, Jillard, and Tommer, and through the vertical slits in the door I could see he had wrapped a cloth around his face that left only his eyes exposed. The boy was still on the ground, but he wasn’t moving. Valiana and Jillard were huddled in opposite corners of the room, and both were moaning in terror.
Parrick grabbed at my leg, trying to attract my attention. “The dust,” he whispered. “When you left, Toujean threw the dust at us. It’s . . . Saints, Falcio, it’s worse than I remembered . . .”
I knew what he meant. I would never forget the Dashini dust and what it did to my mind . . .
I went over to search for a way to get in, but just like the black-iron door the only way to see inside was through the three vertical slits, each one barely the width of two fingers. Even as I pulled a knife from a pocket I knew there was practically no chance of throwing it through the narrow slit, let alone hitting someone I wanted to hit. And Toujean wasn’t taking any chances; he raced back to his captives and hauling Tommer up, held the boy in front of him like a shield.
“I’d advise against anything too daring, Trattari,” the Knight said, reaching an arm around Tommer’s neck. “Little boys are surprisingly fragile. Snap, snap, snap.”
I stared at Sir Toujean and tried to work out a way to stop him. He was still covered in blood—and now it was obvious it wasn’t his own. Such a simple ruse. And all the little things that had never quite added up were making sense: he and the other two Knights had stolen the Duke’s key and then dragged Tommer down to the dungeon with them. Once safe within the Duke’s stony maze they’d been free to kill as many prisoners as they needed to, then they’d sent Toujean up the stairs with a rope tied to his neck pretending to be the terrified victim relaying his kidnappers’ demands. The Dashini dust would have kept Tommer docile . . .
But why did they kill the third Knight? I wondered. Had he resisted once he’d realized how far the others were going to go? Was there an ounce of conscience in any of the remaining men?
“What’s the matter, Trattari?” Toujean taunted. “Nothing to say? Don’t want to know how I’m going to get out of here after I kill Jillard? And the boy, of course.”
I ignored him; I was pretty sure once the Duke and his son were dead—and all the rest of us, of course—Toujean would kill the Dashini and play the grieving hero who had managed to avenge his deceased Duke. That would no doubt appeal to his fellow Knights, most of whom likely despised Jillard anyway. He would talk about Knightly honor and the will of the Gods, and the chance for a new, glorious dynasty, and they would lap it all up. I didn’t care about any of that; the only one thing that mattered to me at that moment was figuring out how to save the boy and push the tip of my sword right through Toujean’s black heart.
Valiana was crouching in the corner. Her eyes were full of terror induced by the Dashini dust but they found mine and for a brief moment she steeled herself and tried to get up—but she immediately fell back down, tears streaming down her face, a horrified moan escaping from her lips. Damn the Dashini and their damned powders. There’s something obscene about people who can fight so well and yet still use poison to first weaken their opponents.
“Come now, Trattari—surely you’re dying to know why Sir Odiard and I decided to kill our own Duke and his only son? Why thrice-honored Knights would—”
“Not really,” I said, my mind racing. “I’m just assuming you’re an asshole and a coward; I’m perfectly happy to leave it at that.”
I couldn’t throw my knife—even if I did manage to squeeze my hand and the blade into the slit, the throw wouldn’t have enough force to do any damage. He, on the other hand, had only to give one sharp twist and Tommer’s neck would break. If Brasti were here he could have put an arrow straight into Toujean’s eye—or any other part of his anatomy—but I wasn’t anywhere near as good.
Damn you, Brasti, for leaving us when we needed you.
“We are men of honor!” Toujean growled, apparently offended that I wasn’t paying sufficient attention to his plan to murder a child in cold blood. “The Dukes have failed the Knights of Tristia. They have failed this country. They—”
“Shut up,” I said. “I’m trying to think.”
Ugh pushed me out of the way and began throwing himself at the door, over and over again. He was stronger than almost any man I’d ever met and the whole iron wall reverberated with the impact of his body. Perhaps in a hundred years he might just break it open.
“You have plan, tough guy?” he said at last, his breath ragged.
I did have a plan. It just wasn’t a very good one. The first time I’d been hit with the dust I’d very nearly choked on my own fear. Quillata had done a little better, though, and so had a few of the other women—so maybe they had better resistance . . . and maybe there was a chance here.
I’m sorry, Valiana. No one should be asked to be this brave.
“You think you’re safe in there, Toujean?” I shouted through the slit. “Because I think you’ve just trapped yourself in a room with a Greatcoat.”
Toujean laughed. “Her? I tell you, Trattari, the first time I heard that the King was allowing women to become traveling Magisters my friends and I reckoned it must be some kind of joke. After all, there’s a reason women don’t become Knights, Trattari.”
“And there’s a reason Knights don’t become Greatcoats,” I said. I looked at Valiana, trying to catch her eye, but she was busy mumbling something and shaking her head, over and over. “It’s scary, isn’t it,” I called to her. “It’s like you’re standing on a cliff a hundred miles high and looking over the edge, and then realizing you’ve just lost your balance—”
“You’re wasting your time, Trattari,” Toujean interrupted me. “The first time we used it on the boy I got the slightest touch of it on my skin and nearly ran screaming for my life.”
Ugh, beside me, chuckled. “Guess you not tough guy, eh?”
“Shut up, dog,” Toujean said. “When we bring a righteous purge to Rijou you’ll find yourself hanging at the end of a gibbet right alongside the Duke.”
“Hanging next to Duke? Big promotion for me, uh?”
“Valiana,” I said, “that dust is like breathing hell right into your heart: I know that. It’s terrifying. Most people can’t take it. But most people haven’t been chased across Northern Tristia by an army determined to see them dead—like you have. Most people haven’t had to pick up a sword and fight against soldiers twice their size and with ten times the training—like you have.”
“I’ll snap the boy’s neck!” Toujean shouted.
“Then you get knife in chest, eh, smart guy?” Ugh said.
Toujean gripped Tommer tighter. The boy’s head moved a little and now I was staring at three sets of eyes. They all looked back at me.
“Valiana,” I said, struggling to make my voice as soothing as I could, “most people would just curl up and wait to die rather than fight that dust—but most people haven’t discovered that their lives were a lie. Most people haven’t found out that they were not who they believed they were. And most people have not stood up and fought back against the world the way you have.” I pressed up against the iron surface of the door, working on getting my hand through one of the slits. “Valiana, you have faced more fear than almost anyone who has ever lived. You’re not going to be stopped by some dust cooked up by a bunch of cowards so scared of the world they have to wear masks just to face it—that’s not who you are. It’s not who you were—and that’s not who you’ve become.”
Toujean twisted his head quickly, just long enough to catch a glimpse of her. When he turned back, I could see his unpleasant sneer, even through the cloth covering his mouth and nose. “It’s a nice idea, Trattari, to think you can make someone brave just by haranguing them as if you’re some pathetic roadside cleric. I must admit, I found it terribly touching when you tried it with me back at the black door: ‘When you were a boy, you dreamed of being a hero, did you not?’ Brave words, Trattari—sadly for you, they had as little effect then as they do now. I’m afraid life just doesn’t work that way.”
He reached down and picked up a sword from the ground. “My friends will be coming soon.”
I continued to ignore him. “Valiana, it’s time,” I said firmly. “You said you wanted to make your life count—so do it, now. This is your time: so get on your feet and kill this son of a bitch for me.”
She looked at me and her mouth opened wide in horror, as if what I was asking her to do was even worse than whatever the dust had shown her. But slowly—so very slowly—she pushed herself to her feet and I could see her hand was reaching for her sword in its sheath.
Toujean heard the sound of her coat creaking as she moved and twisted around—just as I threw my knife. With far more luck than I deserved, the blade struck the Knight in the shoulder, and he bellowed and dropped Tommer to the ground. I reached for another knife but before I could throw it he had grabbed Valiana by the collar and thrown her against the cell’s iron wall. She bounced off it and stumbled toward me and I felt her hand briefly touch my fingers poking through one of the slits in the door. She was shaking badly.
“You can do this,” I whispered. “There’s nothing you need fear but—”
She looked at me through the slits in the door. Her lips trembling on the words, she said, “Falcio, please shut up now.” With her hand pressed against the wall, she found her balance before she turned around and faced Toujean. “Su-surrender,” she said.
Toujean laughed. “You want to dance with me, little girl?” He flipped the point of his sword up and feinted toward Valiana’a face, and she stumbled back into the door again. But this time she straightened her back and immediately stepped into the center of the cell. Her blade was wavering, but it was out in front of her. I wanted to throw another knife, but Toujean had started skillfully maneuvering her around the cell, ensuring she was always between us.
Valiana thrust her sword at Toujean’s chest, although her hand was shaking so badly the blade was almost comically wavering in the air. He shifted his weight and half-turned, smiling victoriously as the awkward lunge missed him, but Valiana didn’t stop. She kept attacking, working her way around his guard to strike at his belly, his neck, even his legs. When Toujean counterattacked, she made little effort to parry, instead relying on the bone plates sewn inside her thick leather coat to protect her. I was glad she hadn’t seen Parrick, lying there with the sword piercing his own greatcoat. . . . And even though the plates were doing their job, for now at least, Toujean was bigger and stronger than she was, and his sword was heavier. He smashed the edge of his blade against her shoulders, then her ribs, and each time I winced.
Hells, you can’t take much more of this. Move him around, girl!
Valiana was trying her best, but every time she tried to position him so I could get a decent shot with my knife he’d do something, like swinging his sword in a wide arc, forcing her to shift her stance just to parry his blade without being pushed over.
“You’re going to die, little girl,” Toujean said, his blade slapping hers out of line yet again. “How does it feel, knowing that?”
She brought her sword back into line. “Like . . . like a relief.”
He laughed again. “This is the story of Tristia, right here: a foolish girl—nothing more than the discarded outcome of the rutting of nameless peasants—dreams herself a warrior—” He broke off, then asked, conversationally, “Do you even have your own name, little girl?” He brought his sword up high and then struck down in a vicious diagonal arc toward her neck.
She managed to get her sword up in time to parry, but Toujean brought his weapon back up and around and almost effortlessly struck her hard in the ribs. “I know,” he said gleefully, “I’ll give you a name! How about—let’s see—Bitch? Or Slut? Or maybe Whore? I think I like Whore best.” Almost lazily, he swung his blade back and forth in wide arcs, all the time forcing Valiana backward toward the iron wall. He wasn’t the least bit tired, and she was fading fast.
“You know,” the Knight said, as if he had been seriously considering the matter, “now that I think about it, ‘Whore’ is a bit too short for a proper name, isn’t it? So how about ‘Dead Whore’? That’s better, isn’t it? That has a lovely cadence to it, don’t you think?” He swung twice more, and now he was moving much faster, striking her on the leg, then again on her left side. This time I heard a rib crack.
Valiana stumbled back. She was going to die in a few moments.
“Stop,” I called out to the Knight. “Please, stop. Don’t do this.”
Toujean ignored me; he was fired up with self-righteous passion as he moved closer to Valiana.
“You’re right about one thing, Sir Knight,” Valiana said, shakily recovering her footing. “This is the story of Tristia, told right here in this cell deep in the belly of this disgusting palace in the heart of the most corrupt city in the world. It’s the story of a Knight so full of dishonor and cowardice that he would murder a young boy to achieve his filthy desire for power.”
“Shut up, Dead Whore. I’m not some farmer’s son you can bray at. I’m a Tristian Knight.”
“That you are,” she said, her sword dipping down as she struggled to stay on her feet. “And I am . . . I am Valiana val Mond, a peasant and a fool and a Greatcoat all at once.” She tightened her grip on her weapon. “And I’m the dead whore who’s about to kill you.”
She brought her sword up into line and lunged at Toujean’s belly, but he parried the sword away and thrust at her chest.
Fast, I thought. He’s too damned fast—she can’t parry him. But she didn’t try: she let his blade hit her in the left side of her chest. I heard the bone plates of her coat break, and I could have sworn I heard the leather being pierced, and then the sound of something sick and wet . . .
Toujean’s eyes were wide with surprise and delight. “She just . . . she just walked into it!” His smile widened. “You stupid whore—don’t you know any better? You never raise your weapon against a true . . . a trueb—”
The Knight looked down, and only then did he see that the tip of Valiana’s sword was resting just under his neck. “Welcome to Tristia,” she said, and with both hands on the hilt of her sword she pushed the blade up through his neck and into his head.
They stood there for a moment, eyes locked on one another, two storytellers each convinced their tale was the truest. Then Toujean began to blink furiously, and I saw blood start to seep from the corners of his eyes as the flesh inside his skull began to work its way out. The blood dripped down his face, and just for a moment he looked as if he were crying tears of great sorrow. Valiana pulled her blade out and pushed him away from her and as he fell, the tip of his sword came out of her chest. She dropped her own weapon and fell to her hands and knees next to Tommer’s unconscious form.
No, please, no! I thought, pulling uselessly at the handle of the iron door.
Very slowly her right hand slid along the dusty stone floor until her fingers reached the key. Without looking up she threw it toward me and I caught it—just barely, but it was enough. I fumbled at the lock, shaking, until Ugh took the key from me, stuck it in, and opened the cell.
I ran inside and dropped to my knees beside Valiana, lifting her head to rest against my legs and pulling a cloth from my coat to hold against her wound. Her eyes fluttered and the color in her face began to fade. “Valiana!” I screamed, “Don’t go! Please—”
She reached up and placed her hand over mine. “M’fine,” she said, her voice barely a whisper. She slowly turned her head and looked at Duke Jillard, cowering, still terrified, in the opposite corner of the room. “Bet you wish I was your daughter now.”