The Gypsy King (26 page)

For anything
, she thought wildly. “Yes,” she said primly.

It turned out that being tossed into a saddle was not as easy as Fayla had made it look, and when Azriel tossed Persephone up, in addition to smacking her tailbone on the hard edge of the saddle, she lost her balance and very nearly toppled over backward. Azriel smiled and made some comment about her still having the grace and poise of a natural dancer, but Persephone was too focused on remaining mounted to reply.

Fortunately, it didn't take her long to get used to the rhythm of Fleet's movements and begin to feel comfortable in the saddle, though she was surprised to discover that in many ways, riding in the guise of a noblewoman was actually
less
comfortable and
more
tiring than walking. Regardless, she kept her back straight, her chin up and uttered not a single word of complaint. Indeed, she uttered not a single word at all until shortly before sunset, when they crested a hill and the great black walls of Parthania loomed in the distance. Silhouetted against a sky streaked orange and red with the last light of the dying day, the walls seemed to stretch from one horizon to the other and all the way up to the heavens.

It was the most awesome sight Persephone had ever seen in her
life
.

“Oh
my
!” she exclaimed, gaping like—well, like an ignorant slave girl on her first trip to the imperial capital.

“Parthania,” offered Azriel unnecessarily.

Persephone nodded and closed her mouth. Her weariness had vanished at the sight of those great walls, but now nervousness rushed in to take its place. Over the course of the day she'd deigned to nod at a few fellow travellers who looked to be about “her” station but she'd not been challenged or even had to speak. Now, suddenly, she was going to have to pass through the gates of the imperial capital under the scrutiny of soldiers who had the authority to execute her on the spot for a traitor if they discovered her deception. Rachel would be lost and the child, too. And if they discovered that Azriel was a
Gypsy
! They would force him to his knees right in front of her … they would grab his hair … they would … they would—

“Steady, m'lady,” urged Azriel, gently but firmly.

With a start, Persephone looked down to see him gazing up at her with a calm, expectant expression on his handsome face.

As though it had never for a single instant occurred to him that she wasn't brave and strong and clever enough to do what had to be done; as if he was just waiting for her to get on with it.

For a long, quiet moment, Persephone concentrated on slowing her breathing and letting Azriel's unshakable confidence in her wash over her soul, lifting her up and restoring her own faith in herself.

And when the moment was over, a remarkable change came over her. Eyeing Azriel coldly, she said, “The next time you address me without permission, you filthy mongrel, I will have you flogged to within an inch of your life.”

Giving Persephone the same slow, considered smile that had made her stomach do a funny kind of flip-flop in the owner's barn on that night that now seemed so impossibly long ago, Azriel dutifully bowed his head, turned on one heel and led them all onward to the gates of Parthania.

As it turned out, passing through the city gates was no trouble at all.

The trouble started shortly after they got inside.

“Something is wrong,” said Azriel softly as Fleet clip-clopped through the nearly deserted street with Cur at his heels. The door of every narrow dwelling on the street was closed and the windows were shuttered tight. “It is not yet so late—there should still be people about,” he continued. “They should be returning from their daily business, tending to the evening chores, visiting with their neighbours. Children should be playing—there should be noise and bustle and instead there is nothing. I do not like it.”

Persephone nodded but said nothing as Azriel warily continued to lead Fleet onward in the direction of the imperial palace. With each passing moment, the stout turrets and glittering spires loomed larger. Even as they
did so, the streets grew narrower, the dwellings smaller and the air less sweet. At length, Persephone realized that she'd broken into a cold sweat. Fervently, she hoped that it was not a sign of fever but rather the result of the increasingly uncomfortable feeling she had that behind these shabbier closed doors and shuttered windows, many eyes were watching her—and waiting. Waiting for what, Persephone did not know, but she had a strong sense that she didn't want to find out.

“We must find a place to temporarily stable the horse,” Azriel murmured.

“Why?” whispered Persephone, leaning forward so that she could hear him.

“We shall shortly reach the slum that encroaches upon the north wall of the castle, where the child is being hidden,” he explained in a hushed voice. “You need to change back into your smock and we need to find an alley in which you can do so. Even if we were able to convince your beast to voluntarily join us there and stand quietly while you go for the child—which I highly doubt, given his unnatural attachment to you and unwavering determination to make life difficult for me—if a passerby was to notice a horse standing in an alley, he would almost certainly come to investigate. And I would be forced to kill a man for nothing more than ill-timed curiosity.”

Looking about the deserted, rapidly darkening streets, it did not seem likely to Persephone that anyone would happen by. Nevertheless, she did not want to risk the slaughter of an innocent man, so she nodded and attempted to climb out of the saddle. As she did so, she
became hopelessly tangled in her skirts, lost her balance and would have tumbled to the cobblestone street if Azriel had not been there to catch her.

“You and Rachel stay here,” he whispered in her ear as he ever so slowly set her down. “I'll be back in a moment.”

Nodding wordlessly, Persephone watched as Azriel pulled a handful of something edible out of his pocket, held it under Fleet's nose and started walking. With a soft whicker, Fleet eagerly began trotting after him and whatever was in his hand. A moment later, the night swallowed them both. Cur let out a soft whine. Suddenly feeling very alone, Persephone reached for Rachel's hand just as Rachel reached for hers. Together, the two girls and the dog waited in tense silence for Azriel to return.

A moment later, he was back with Persephone's lowborn smock tucked under one arm.

“Best luck,” he panted. “I found an untended stable with a bin full of turnips in one corner. There were sufficient to keep all the horses in the king's own cavalry well fed for several long winters, so there just might be enough to keep your beast distracted for the next half hour or—”

He stopped speaking abruptly and cocked his head to one side as though listening hard. Alarmed, Persephone did the same thing and that's when she heard it: the distant but unmistakable murmur of a large crowd gathering.

“Come!” ordered Azriel tersely. “There is no time to waste!”

Reaching for Persephone's free hand, he nearly wrenched her arm out of the socket in his haste to lead her and Rachel onward. The farther they ran, the louder the
murmuring became. Soon, they were able to distinguish voices—hard male voices intermingled with pleading female ones.

Then, just as they reached the entrance of a dark, unpaved and altogether unpleasant-looking alley, they heard the first scream.

“What was that?” exclaimed Persephone, as the first scream was joined by another and then another.

“
What is going on?
” cried Rachel softly.

Instead of answering either of them, Azriel turned and plunged into the alley. Cur bounded after him. Persephone and Rachel stumbled blindly after
him
—slipping in unseen puddles of muck, tripping over repulsively soft things that stank of rot and trying not to hear the squeaks of vermin scuttling ahead of them—until Azriel stopped so abruptly that Persephone bounced off his back and had to throw her arms around him to keep from falling. Without thinking what she was doing, she held on tighter and leaned into the warm, solid strength of him.

“Wait here,” he said, pulling away from her.

Shocked by how empty her arms felt without him in them, Persephone shivered and watched as he silently and swiftly navigated around the precariously stacked crates, barrels and piles of old hay that cluttered the alley. He paused only briefly at the edge of the alley before turning and hurrying back with an urgency that set Persephone's heart pounding.

“The square is swarming with soldiers,” he whispered harshly. “They are driving people from the slum—it looks as though they mean to torch it!”

“Torch it!” gasped Persephone, even as she caught a whiff of smoke. “But the child—”

Before she could finish her terrible thought, there was a clatter of hooves at the far end of the alley. Jerking her gaze toward it, Persephone saw the silhouettes of a half-dozen men on horseback, several of whom were carrying torches.

“You in the alley!” called a commanding voice. “Show yourself!”

Instinctively, Persephone, Azriel and Rachel shrank back into the shadows and stood as still as death. Raising her hand to Cur, Persephone gave him a silent order to stay.

“You would play with
me
?” continued the voice, which was now tinged with barely suppressed rage. “Even though I have
personally
gone to such heroic efforts to rid our fine city of that verminous eyesore you called a home? Even after I
explicitly
warned you and your kind against attempting to run amuck through the city offending the sensibilities of your betters? I warn you, whoever you are, come out upon the instant or I shall order my men in there to cut you down without mercy!”

When there was no sign of surrender from the alley, the voice shouted an order. At once, several of the men slid out of their saddles, swords glinting in the torchlight.

As they did so, without even realizing what she was doing—and before Azriel or Rachel could stop her— Persephone took three deliberate steps forward into the flickering light cast by the pitch torches. Looking up, she fixed her eyes upon the man to whom the voice belonged. He was clad entirely in black so that his body seemed to
melt into the night, but his ageless face was clearly visible. So handsome that it seemed almost otherworldly, it radiated power and magnetism and … something else.

Something terrible.

For a long moment, his fathomless eyes bored into her.

“Who are you?” he finally asked, his tone inscrutable.

To Persephone's horror, she found herself unable to move, unable to speak! Unable to do anything more than stand there gaping like an ignorant, ill-bred servant in disguise waiting for the accusation that would see her facade crumble and her trembling legs give way beneath her.

Then she remembered the way Azriel had looked at her—as though it had never occurred to him that she wasn't brave and strong and clever enough to do what had to be done—and her courage returned.

“Who am I?” she echoed in a voice as haughty and cold and noble as could be. Desperately, she tried to remember the noble name that Fayla had used—the one belonging to the living noblewoman who was from such a distant branch of such a minor family as to be unlikely to be recognized—but it eluded her completely, so she latched on to the only other noble name that came to mind, the one Azriel had used with the owner.

“Who am I?” she said again. “I am Lady Bothwell of the Ragorian Prefecture. Who, pray tell, are
you
?”

Head bobbing slightly, the man awkwardly leaned forward in his saddle and hissed, “I am the Regent Mordecai.”

NINETEEN