Shadow Of The Winter King (Book 1) (8 page)

Of them all, Fersi understood. From across the deck, the captain gazed at her, his face cool but his eyes hot. It set her insides to squirming, with desire as much as fear. As long as she could remember, Ovelia had always wanted those she should not, because of her curse.

“Good,” she said to Regel, who was still staring up at her, dumbfounded. “Good, I—”

With the blood flowing from her shoulder, she could say nothing else, so she rose and staggered away, toward the aftcastle. Regel did not call after her, or if he did, she did not hear.

* * *

Davargorn watched the increasingly vicious duel from the crow’s nest above.

They fought well. The woman’s prowess, he had expected, as she had once championed the Winter King. But Regel... The years withered away as the Lord of Tears fought. With each hammering blow upon his opponent’s shield, he moved faster. Anger gave him strength.

Then something truly surprising came to pass: the bout ended in a fearsome kiss. Davargorn had expected hatred between them—not passion, and certainly not
fire
. He did not understand it, but still he longed for it and feared it in equal measure. When Davargorn recovered, he realized that Ovelia had run back to the guest cabin. Soon enough, Regel followed Ovelia, murderous purpose written on his face.

Davargorn drew a caster from his cloak and took aim at Regel. The sight on the caster, crafted by the finest mage-smiths in Luether, let him see across that distance as though he stood just behind the Lord of Tears. With that sight, he could not miss.

At the forecastle, Regel paused, hand raised to knock on Ovelia’s door. Even from behind, through the magic of the sight, Davargorn could see the hesitation in the set of his jaw.

One black-wrapped finger caressed the weapon’s trigger.

The old man pushed the door open and paused—a dark silhouette upon the threshold.

“Crack.” Davargorn imitated the caster’s recoil.

The door closed behind Regel. Davargorn reclined in the crow’s nest and smiled.

Potent or not, accomplished swordsman or not, Regel had met his match in Davargorn. He would learn in time—when all was in readiness.

“You seek Mask, Oathbreaker,” Davargorn said. “And you will find him—to your peril.”

* * *

When she was safely behind the cabin door, Ovelia slumped to the floor and loosed a moan of pain. Her heart thudded fit to burst her chest, and its every beat felt like clenching agony in her wounded shoulder. Regel had dealt so very harshly with her, and she wanted him to be harsher still.

Wetness flowed down her arm from the gash, staining her sleeve a deep red-black. On the deck, she hadn’t thought the wound so bad. A washbasin and towels sat on the table. She climbed to her feet, reeled dizzily, and caught the bulkhead to keep from falling. Her legs bumped painfully against the bed. Her strength and grace was gone. Her body wanted her to collapse and her vision grew blurry—

Forcing her mind into line against the haze of pain and blood loss, Ovelia disrobed to her breeches and tossed her blood-slick shirt and vest in the corner. She wet a cloth in the basin and raised it to her sweaty forehead. Her hands shook as she pressed the cloth to her shoulder.

The door thrust open and Ovelia whirled, barely catching herself on the table. In her delirium, Ovelia thought Regel stood like a conquering god in the doorway.

“R-Regel...” Ovelia grasped the hilt of her practice sword. There was no way she could fight, of course, but she longed to do it anyway. “I don’t… I don’t need you.”

He strode mutely forward and caught her up in his arms. The sudden pain in her shoulder choked off her words, and she stood, letting him hold her. Her heart pounded and she feared—
hoped
—he would hurt her, but instead he inspected her wound. “This is not so bad,” he said, guiding her to the bed. “Sit.”

As they sat together, Ovelia grew acutely and warmly aware of her bare skin from the waist up. It embarrassed her, but Regel hardly seemed to notice. He cleaned her wound with stinging rum, then put a cloth on her bleeding shoulder and pressed her hand over it. She nodded and pressed hard. Regel rooted through the pockets of his pack, then drew forth a package rolled in leather. He unwrapped it as he returned to her side and leaned over her shoulder. He withdrew what looked like a bundle of black hair.

“Whur—” Ovelia said, meaning to ask what he was doing.

Regel drew out a thread and strung it through a hooked needle of silver. He bent over Ovelia and slid it into her flesh with a tiny sting. “Sorry,” he said.

Despite the pain, Ovelia chuckled. “You nearly cut my arm off in a bout, then... apologize for stabbing me with a needle?”

Regel’s hands worked quickly. He stitched back and forth and drew the skin tightly closed with each turn. His cold fingers soothed her angry, inflamed flesh.

“Your hands,” she murmured. “You always had... a healer’s hands.” Her head lolled against his arm. “Ironic... for a slayer.”

He rubbed ointment from the leather pouch over her wound. It stung but she let him bind her shoulder in silence.

As Regel started to draw away, Ovelia reached up, caught his hand, and pressed his palm tight to her cheek. She turned her face into his fingers and kissed them. She felt his body tremble against hers—or maybe it was she that trembled.

“I am sorry,” she said. “I am so sorry...”

Regel pushed her gently to the bed. “Rest. I’ll stay right here.”

Ovelia relaxed. She saw a half-molded hunk of wood sitting on the near table. Regel’s carving stood over her like a warding charm.

As sleep took her, she tried not to think about Regel’s fingers on her naked skin or his eyes that threatened to swallow her whole. She had no right to want him, after what she had done.

Instead, darker dreams awaited—dreams of searing heat and of falling winter.

Five

Tar Vangr

A
resonant moan rose
from Serris as she lay on her stomach in her bed. Snow flurried outside the steamed window, but the sizzling brazier kept the room warm. It was just the two of them, and only thoughts of pleasure. “By the Fire, Vidia,” she said. “That’s exactly right. Just there. Just—
unhh
.”

Her fellow Tear smiled. “Here?”

Vidia dug her fingers deeper into Serris’s bare foot, prompting a deeper moan.

By the Old Gods, Serris needed this. With the council in a frenzy, the Ravalis locked down tight in the palace, and Dusters patrolling in force, Serris had plenty to worry about. She’d hardly stopped moving in the two days since Regel had departed for Luether, and her feet ached fiercely. One of Vidia’s massages was just what she craved.

Self-named and recruited into the Circle of Tears not long after Serris herself, Vidia had been a baker in her nameless life. Once accustomed to kneading the infamously dense and rich bread of Tar Vangr’s bakeries, her fingers held both strength and grace. Sometimes—like tonight—her Nar-blessed touch seemed to be all that kept the Circle together.

Even the massage couldn’t ease Serris’s mind entirely. Regel was gone again, after such a short time in the city, and she couldn’t help but fear he wouldn’t return this time. She’d almost given him up for dead before, and this time he had left in the company of the horrid Bloodbreaker of Denerre herself. Ordinarily, she’d have trusted Regel, but the attack weighed on her mind as well. And the threat…

Serris felt again the masked slayer’s hands on her, smelled the foul breath hot on her face. He’d barely touched her—he’d used words more than steel—and yet she’d felt helpless under his knife as she’d not felt since Paeter Ravalis had scarred her. Even now, just
thinking
about that awful feeling—about his threat—she wanted to weep. But weakness did not befit the center of the Circle of Tears.

Vidia had moved up to her backside. “Are you well, Serris?”

“Well enough,” she said. “Sorry I can’t return the favor. I’ve matters to attend this eve.”

“Matters more pressing than your own pleasure?” Vidia pressed the palm of her hand hard into Serris’s lower back, releasing waves of delight through her tight muscles. “I pity you.”

That made Serris smile despite her misgivings. “You always seem to know the right thing to say.”

The door to Serris’s chamber opened suddenly, and a diminutive figure came in. The child stopped short and looked upon the two women with wide eyes.

“Child!” Clutching the coverlets to her chest, Serris sat up and pulled free of Vidia. “What have I told you about knocking?”

The child looked chastened but said nothing. She had a mess of blonde hair, a pert face, and almost black eyes that had gone big and watery. She would not cry, though—Serris had taught her better than that. She had no name, of course—she was only a child, and as such only bore the name “Child” until she came of age or earned her own name. She might not even remain a girl: if she took a man’s name, then to all Vangryur she would be a man, as she chose. The child tightened her grip on the towels she bore in her arms, as though fearful of dropping them and provoking another scolding.

“Tsch, do not sling your discomfort at the child.” Vidia stood up and patted the spot she had been sitting. “Come, Child. Set those down. Would you like to look at the cards?”

The child brightened at Vidia’s softer tone. She hurried over to lay the towels carefully on the bed, then joined Vidia at the room’s lone table. The former baker took from Serris’s shelf a stack of bone playing cards bound up with string, which she unwound with such delicate grace Sarelle was transfixed. Amazing. Those hands could choke the life from a man or handle an axe with the best of warriors, and yet Vidia had such a gentle touch with this child or any other. It was the same with her massages: Vidia could dispense life or death with equal ease, a talent Serris wished she possessed. Death was her forte, and she’d grown quite good at dealing it over the years.

As the two played their game, Serris turned instead to preparations for her liaison of the evening. She shrugged into a dress of blue-black damask pulled over her leather underthings. The Vangryur Councilor she would see tonight loved the contrast, and she could oblige such fantasies. The scar across her cheek had once made her self-conscious, but she had come to see it as a source of strength, not weakness. It reminded her of what she had overcome, and of the vengeance she had yet to exact. Besides, if she did her job well, her lover would not be looking at the scar.

As she worked, Serris watched the blonde child through the mirror. The girl stared at the colorful design on each card Vidia laid out on the bed with delight, her mind whirring despite her tender years. Ruin’s Night would see the beginning of her third year of life, and she’d been an autumn birth. Despite using words so rarely, the girl seemed an intelligent, perceptive girl. Serris often thought Vidia made an excellent mother for her, far better than the one Ruin had chosen.

All the Tears were orphans, however young or old they might be, and the Circle provided all the family they would ever need. They were servants of secrets and blades of vengeance, to be wielded as their master directed. It was not Serris’s place to make demands of Regel, even if he would in all likelihood do as she asked. He was a good man, but there were certain things she could not ask of him.

Serris couldn’t help thinking of the masked slayer again: the threat he had made, and what he had commanded her to do...

Vidia saw Serris watching and smiled sadly at her. “You didn’t tell him, did you?” she asked. “Before he left?”

Serris straightened up and steeled her expression against any sign of emotion. “Pass well, and I’ll see you on the morrow.”

* * *

They coursed together rhythmically in the roaring firelight. The lord grunted with each thrust that slapped her hindquarters against his belly. His hands cupped her breasts and squeezed urgently but not painfully. He made love to her as firmly and as well as he could. All the while, his eye lay fixed upon their naked bodies in the mirror.

Kiereth of the Blood Yaela always did like to watch himself.

For her part, Serris moaned and panted because he expected that, while in truth she felt like sighing. Her heart was far from this, even if Kiereth worked with passion and enthusiasm. To her, his well-meaning efforts were little more than sound.

Kiereth spent himself before she reached fulfillment, but that was not surprising. With all that had passed over the last days—with all her worries, fears, and rages—Serris would have got down on her knees and praised the heir of Blood Yaela as an Old God reborn if he could have pleased her. He went on for a time, caught up in a desperate need to share the gift she had given him, and she obliged him by feigning release herself.

Finally, Kiereth sagged against her and laid his cheek on her back.They knelt together on his bed for a moment, breathing in unison, before he pulled away and laid his shivering body down. His arm offered a snug place to curl up, and she took advantage of the invitation. He felt sweaty, muscular, and warm. He shut his eyes and smiled at her, drifting off into shallow dreams surrounded by her perfume.

This, she liked: the exhausted intimacy that came right after sex, one of the times a man was at his weakest. She liked Kiereth—liked dining with him, lying with him, and rutting with him—but she held no illusions. If this night’s business called for his death, she would plant a knife in his ribs and walk away with no compunction or regret.

Fortunately, it did not.

“My Winter Angel.” He traced his finger along her brow. “How I have missed you.”

“Really.” Serris gave him a wry smile. “I hadn’t noticed.”

He smiled drowsily and pressed his face into her forehead.

As one of the most powerful voices on the Tar Vangr council, Kiereth was one of the Circle’s most potent assets. That Serris held him on such a short leash should have made him biddable, but the headstrong heir of Blood Yaela all-too-often found ways to skirt the Circle’s wishes and go his own way, regardless of the consequences. It was one of the things Serris liked about him: Kiereth certainly could never be called boring or predictable.

Also, the Blood Yaela was a steadfast enemy of the Ravalis, which she liked even more.

The Yaela Bloodsword, namesake of Kiereth’s blood, hung in a place of honor before the hearth. Serris had heard it said otherwise, but she knew the Yaela sword was a mundane if richly-crafted blade that bore no ancient enchantments. Kiereth seemed uninterested in wielding it outside of ceremony and ritual. He was a nobleman, not a warrior—Serris had never seen him so much as lift a dagger—and that ultimately made him enjoyable to rut but easy to forget.

Serris wondered why she felt so judgmental toward Kiereth. She’d been in a foul mood for days, and he deserved none of her wrath. The one who did slept far away to the south, on his way to a tortured city across the Dusk Sea. If he even still breathed. She prayed Regel would finish his damned quest quickly and return safely.

Time passed, and ultimately Kiereth stirred. “Mmm.” Eyes still closed, he twined a lock of her hair between his fingers. He smiled wanly. “Have you considered my offer?”

She’d forgotten all about such a thing. “To buy me from the Circle, you mean?”

Kiereth teased his fingers along her face, which he had always seemed to find intriguing. “You are no slave to be bought and sold, my Angel Serris.”

“So you say. I doubt my master will part with me.”

“A miser,” Kiereth said. “But enough gold persuades all men, even the Lord of Tears.”

Serris had often whispered to Kiereth of her relationship with Regel—of Squire and Master—and she thought he understood. Every time she and Kiereth shared a bed, the nobleman repeated his intention to take Serris away from the Circle as soon as her duty to Regel was at an end. Not as a consort, but as a... companion, for revelry in public and private. For her part, Serris thought she would find life as the kept woman of Tar Vangr’s most powerful councilor pleasurable, but ultimately impossible.

“Keep your gold.” Serris caught his hand before he could touch her scar. “You are noble, but I know this bothers you. Would you not rather buy an unbroken tool?”

“Damaged, not broken. Mysterious.” He pulled free of her grasp and traced the scar with his fingers, which made Serris tense. “Every time we meet, I ask after the story, and every time you refuse to speak. Do you not know that you are beautiful in spite of it?”

In spite of it. There, in just four words, Kiereth answered his own question, and reminded Serris she could not accept his offer. She had never considered her face any more than passable, and the scar made it distinctive. Every time she looked in the mirror, she remembered her drive to push the damned Ravalis from Tar Vangr into the Ruin they so richly deserved. Not that Kiereth would understand.

“You’ll not tell me,” he said at length. “Will my lady tell me why she is sad, at least?”

“A lady must keep some secrets,” she said. “A whore, even more.”

“Even more.” He repeated the rhyme, seeming to savor it on his tongue. Then he rolled atop her and held her wrists down. “I can persuade you to part with these secrets. I am insatiable, and I think you are softening.”

“Again, m’lord?” His earnestness made her smile despite her mood. “Again, you would dishonor yourself with failure?”

“A sweet, sweet failure.” He kissed her.

They made love again, and this time Kiereth lasted longer. Serris was not fully satisfied, but she enjoyed it. Ultimately, she pushed him off her and went to work with her mouth and tongue as he knelt, moaning. The sex was useful: he tended to ramble on while she worked on his little blade, kissing and caressing. She used his ardor to ply him for secrets, but learned little of any real interest.

For the Council’s part, there was no news. The attack on the Burned Man had not gone unnoticed, particularly since Ravalis soldiers had died there. None could prove without a doubt that King Demetrus had sent the slayers, but the Tears had enough influence with the Council to press for an investigation. The Ravalis had so far closed their gates and denied all. Since the attack, the Burned Man had seen only more patrons, and silver and gold poured in for the repairs from generous donors.

Serris could not rid herself of the sense that the Ravalis were simply awaiting a proper time to strike. Their antipathy toward the Circle of Tears was well known, though Serris was one of the few who knew its source. She had, after all, seen Regel kill Paeter Ravalis, the heir to the throne. If the ruling blood had any concrete proof Regel had been the assassin, the Burned Man would cease to exist and the Circle of Tears would be slaughtered. Did they know, and they were simply waiting for the Circle to make a mistake and show their hand? And how did the Nar-burned
Bloodbreaker
fit into all this?

It was a dangerous game they played, but then, revenge required one to take risks.

“There is a rumor,” Kiereth said as Serris worked, “that the Ravalis have lost their spymaster.”

“Mmm.” She came up for air and met his eyes. “Indeed?”

Kiereth smiled, pleased to have pricked her interest. “No word as to who the Shroud was, though. It’s hard to know a man is missing if his existence was only speculation.”

“Mmm.”

Kiereth seemed to interpret that as encouragement, shuddered, and groaned as he spent himself for a second time. When he was done and Serris had cleaned him, he kissed her, then fell to the bed beside her and shivered with delight. Serris traced her fingers along the edge of his ear as she considered.

If the Shroud was dead or gone, that would certainly explain why the Ravalis had seemed paralyzed with inaction. A wild fantasy occurred: perhaps the Bloodbreaker had slain the Shroud personally, and that was why the Ravalis had chased her. If so, it gave Serris new respect for the woman, or at least lessened her hatred.

Serris was just wondering if Kiereth had drifted off to sleep when she heard a commotion from somewhere below them in the keep. She might have thought little of it, but she recognized one of the voices, and it made her body tense up like a drawn bowstring.