Kings and Assassins (39 page)

“That's not true!” Poole's nephew sputtered. “He's an antimachinist who's been punished for speaking the truth—”

“He's an Itarusine prince,” Janus said, “albeit a negligible one.”

Harm licked his lips and set down his mug. “I remember you as well. Ivor's trained pet.”

“I've outgrown that role,” Janus said. “While you… you'll die in yours, a one-note performer to the last. Bull, hand me a pistol.”

Harm stood upright so quickly the chair went sprawling behind him, his fist closing around the saber at his hip. “I am a prince of the blood. You can't execute me.” Remarkable, really, that anyone ever believed Harm anything but an aristocrat. It only exposed how willing people were to believe someone who told them what they wanted to hear.

Poole's nephew made a tiny, betrayed sound that Janus ignored. Life dealt betrayal and disillusionment far more often than it dealt anything else. Better the boy learn it now, while he was still alive to change his ways.

“You're a prince descendant,” Janus said, “a dead man only allowed to live so long as you're useful. You killed Fanshawe Gost, you killed Chryses DeGuerre, two noblemen of Antyre. I think Grigor would consider it fair trade.”

Bull cautiously handed Janus a primed pistol, seemingly uncertain of Janus's intent. Poor Bull likely thought it a bluff. Bull didn't understand the ways of the Itarusine court. Unfortunately for Harm, Janus did.

He aimed the pistol with care, the scent of gunpowder acrid even before firing, the weight of it uncomfortable in his right hand. He
preferred to shoot left-handed; it tended to throw off a duelist, but the wound on his left arm was hot and tight, and his fingers trembled.

Harm said, “You'll shoot me for two meaningless lives, lives that I was set to remove by Ivor Sofia Grigorian? Ivor has far worse to his name. Or did you think it coincidence that he was here barely a fortnight before your king died?”

“Causal relations are easily made, and as easily disproved,” Janus said, though inwardly he was exulting. This once, Ivor might have outfoxed himself. To use Casmir, his own despised kin, as his stalking horse was clever. To see Casmir killed for playing the role was twice as clever, pleasing Grigor and granting Janus a convenient scapegoat for any lingering deaths. But Casmir was Winter Court enough to try to take Ivor with him.

“And you're a liar by trade, spilling stories among my people, claiming a name and history not your own. Still, your words are … intriguing. What think you, Bull? If you heard a man accuse another of murder on the street, would your Particulars count it as evidence or hearsay?”

“It would warrant investigation,” Bull said. “I'd imagine Captain Rue would think the same.”

Harm relaxed, content that he had a value, and Janus pulled the trigger. The explosion jarred his body and rang in his ears, enormously loud inside the tavern. Poole's nephew shrieked and collapsed as if Janus had shot him instead of Harm.

Bull twitched, taken by surprise. The sullen bartender and the early morning sailors drinking were unsurprised.

“Bring his body,” Janus said. “I want to send him back to King Grigor and if we leave it here, it'll be disfigured or stolen.”

The burly Particular, lacking a task now that Harm was dead, seized Poole's nephew instead. “Will you shoot him, too, my lord?” he asked. His jaw tightened.

“There's no need,” Janus said. “The Explorations is the place for foolish dreamers. Set him on a ship.”

“It won't change anything,” the young man said. “Matters have gone too far for that!”

“And a good part of that is your doing,” Janus said. “Remember, I'm showing you mercy Do try not to make me regret it.”

“You should regret it,” the young man said. “You should regret every moment the palace has spent punishing people for their poverty.”

Bull growled and the guards dragged the editor outside.

The burly Particular lingered. “Begging your pardon, my lord,” he said, “but there's some truth to what he says. The people feel trapped. There's no jobs in the city, and what there is pays nothing. If they don't make money, whole families are ending in jail, and if they turn to thieving, well it's jail again, only with a whipping first.”

He darted a glance at Janus, expectation of understanding in his eyes. “
You
remember, my lord, what it's like on the streets.”

Bull shifted uneasily, the sailors at the bar slid away like water before a troubling wind. Janus raised a hand, silencing any protest from Bull.

If the guard thought himself brave enough to throw Janus's upbringing in his face, he would hear it all before he acted. The man did have the sense to wait until the tavern emptied before continuing. “I've been a Particular for near fifteen years. I remember chasing the boy they called the rat king over Relict stone falls until he and his rabble darted into holes too small for a man like me. I remember there were times I chose to stop chasing. When you raided the markets for food instead of coin. It was a hard time. It's only gotten worse.”

“What would you have me do?” Janus said. “Until we cast off Itarus's shackles, all our profits disappear into their coffers. Or would you employ the poor as unpaid soldiers, send them off to fight a war?”

“The solution's your problem, not mine, but I'd think twice about letting the nobles skive out of their debts when other families are ruined by theirs. Fathers, mothers locked away while their children starve.”

“Peter,” Bull said, “remember your audience.”

“Is it the families torn apart that worry you? Or the inequality of
debt between nobles and commoners?” Janus asked. “Would it please the public if I declared amnesty for those in Stones whose debts are less than fifty sols? Would it please you?”

Peter hesitated, all his bravado washed away by Janus's response, as if he had braced himself for anything but actual interest in what a Particular thought. The man looked to Bull and Bull shrugged, clearly communicating that if Peter was fool enough to question Janus, he would have to be fool enough to answer questions in return.

Bull said, “Last, that's nearly all of them.”

“You and Rue constantly remind me how full Stones is. Wouldn't it help if the only prisoners were those who deserved to be there? The ones who actively caused injury to the country?”

“We cannot afford to forgive the debts,” Bull argued, dropping his voice and pulling Janus aside. He waved Peter outside. Peter went with the alacrity of a condemned man escaping the gallows. “Explain yourself. Do you mean to do it? You weren't simply playing with my man to relive old times?”

Janus drew up a seat before a mostly clean table, and waved at the bartender. “Luncheon please, and whatever you have to drink that's … imported.”

Bull dithered a moment and Janus gestured to the seat opposite. “Man must eat,” he said.

“Here?”

“I think my meals are better out of the palace than in it,” he said. “The public may be outraged, but they're too poor to willfully poison food.”

“And you would send more mouths into the streets. In Stones, they are fed.”

“On the kingdom's coin,” Janus said.

The bartender brought over a plate, laden high with fried bread and a few gamy cuts of sailor's fare, some animal flesh spiced so heavily it couldn't rot.

Two goblets landed on the table, along with a bottle. Bull touched it; his eyes widened. “This is—”

“Imported is the polite term,” Janus said. “Tarrant's been using the Seadog as a drop point for some of his sundries.”

He took a warming sip of the Itarusine brandy, found it suited the dark, chewy meat well enough and took another.

“Listen Bull,” he said. “We can't afford to have the public in utter rebellion. If we release the debtors …”

Bull said, “Do you think it will matter? To have freedom when the chains of poverty still weigh them down?”

“It will delay the inevitable,” Janus said. “Ivor's fleet won't arrive to find our city softened by internal rebellion.”

“Prince Ivor's agitators are quite capable of creating a revolt on his command.”

“Given what we learned from Harm—from Prince Casmir—I think we have enough to confine him to his wing under suspicion of acting against the treaty. It'll be up to you and Rue to find evidence enough to prove Harm's words more than hearsay.”

Bull sat back in his seat. “You're confident in this path.”

Janus hid his smile with the heavy goblet. Of course he was. He'd always intended the release of the prisoners as a part of his plan to thwart Ivor, but he hadn't anticipated such a perfect chance to do so. “For the country, Bull,” he said. “Send the Particulars out to Stones and have them release those listed as debtors. Oh, and have them release Poole also. With his nephew gone, he's like to find it harder to sell his drawings. Perhaps we'll find out who's been guiding his pen.”

O
N HIS RETURN TO THE
palace, Janus left Bull to tell Rue the events of the morning and to oversee the display of Harm's body. It was necessary, but he recalled another body that was meant to have been displayed and quailed from watching it done. The rooks would feast.

Instead, he sought out Ivor, taking along a full complement of guards, and found the prince seated in one of the garden bowers, in the midst of a cozy tête-à-tête with Admiral DeGuerre. DeGuerre's face was a picture, distrust warring with pleasure, as Ivor turned his agile tongue to mixing flattery with lies.

“DeGuerre, if you fall for his platitudes, you must be a great favorite with the playhouses, always applauding an actor's turn of phrase,” Janus said, unaccountably annoyed. Hadn't he had Gost removed for worsening DeGuerre's opinion? Now Ivor did the same?

“My pet,” Ivor said. “When you and I are dining, I don't allow interruptions. Will you not allow the good admiral and myself the same?”

“Perhaps he'll visit you in the old wing,” Janus said. “We captured Harm today.”

“Did you, then?” Ivor said.

“He said the most damning things about you. Named your assassin—”

“That I doubt,” Ivor murmured.

“And claimed you are responsible for Aris's death.”

“This again. You've no proof he's Itarusine. Harm's an antimachinist and an egalitarian,” DeGuerre said, and seemed puzzled that he had moved to defend Ivor. Janus thought it was only that the admiral was so accustomed to quarreling with him. Perhaps this would teach him better.

“A prince descendant an egalitarian? Hardly likely.” Janus turned his attention to Ivor, watched the man's hands. Ivor was armed and Janus was hampered by his wound, by the weakness in his hand. “Ivor, I'm afraid I've killed your brother Casmir.”

DeGuerre rose, and without another glance, walked away.

Ivor reached out and stripped a branch of leaves, letting their torn edges fill the evening air with their green scent. “Do you want this?” he asked. “To make me your enemy?”

“You were always that,” Janus said.

“And the guards?” Ivor said. “I presume, despite the lack of evidence, you'll see me confined to the old wing? With or without my personal staff?”

“With,” Janus said. “Less the one that we're hunting.”

“Very well,” Ivor said. He rose, walked toward the waiting guards with a composure entirely unruffled. He paused in their midst and said, “One request?”

“Perhaps,” Janus said.

“As I'm about to be confined to boredom and indolence, perhaps a single bout of sparring?”

“I might be young, but I haven't been a fool for a very long time,” Janus said.

“Ah, don't fret so. We're at a deadlock, you and I, like two school fellows. That is your intention, is it not? To claim to Grigor that I disrupted the peace treaty first, with my alleged assassination of your king? That your arms display was only in reaction … Should either of us die unexpectedly, the treaty will be shattered beyond repair.”

“All that might be true,” Janus said. “It changes nothing.”

He turned to go, heard the rush of movement behind him and a guard calling, “Last!”

Janus got his own blade up in time to meet Ivor's descending one, parried the blow though the force of it ran the length of his arm. It shouldn't have been unexpected; Ivor had been remarkably well behaved, only setting others to commit his murders, when Janus knew how much the man enjoyed the work himself. Even his sanguine temper could be chafed by inaction.

The guards raised pistols and Ivor said, “If you fire, our countries will war.”

They hesitated, then began spreading out like a net, swords in hand, coming to separate the two men.

It was likely to be a futile attempt, Janus thought, shifting to block another thrust with one of his own. The blades slipped past each other with a hiss of steel. Ivor took two dancing steps back. A guard, more impulsive than most, darted forward in an attempt to disarm Ivor. He received a slap of the blade for his effort, slicing his cheek to the bone.

Janus lunged forward again, and Ivor evaded it. “Always overstepping yourself,” Ivor said. Janus had to drop to a knee, roll away from a thrust that nearly took an eye. His heart raced; his mouth tasted of metal—sour and sudden excitement.

“You try for too much,” Ivor said. “It blurs your focus. You want to be king. You want Maledicte back. You want Antyre to prosper. You
want respect and admiration, though I believe you would settle for respect and fear. I even think you want your sweet wife. How can you accomplish any of these when your focus wavers so—”

Janus lunged upward; the edge of his blade caught Ivor's cravat, ripping it, before the man's blade forced Janus away.

Their blades clashed again, not with the metallic rasp of the Antyrrian rapiers, but a heavy, grinding
screel
. Janus shifted his weight, dug his heel into the soft loam and broken shell beneath him, pushed Ivor off his blade, then danced three steps back, seeking a chance to catch his breath. His wounded arm ached and bled, and he hadn't needed it yet for anything but balance.

Ivor grinned at him, vulpine and openly content.

Janus let his blade hang loosely before him, tempting Ivor to an unconsidered strike. But Ivor had had the training of him and knew how easily that careless seeming stance could be turned against an opponent. Ivor simply waited, and frustration bit into Janus's belly. Ivor was always just that much ahead, leaving Janus to scramble to catch up.