CHAPTER 14

The first drops of rain spattered, leaving wet stains on the rocks. Wind whistled through the canyon, tugging at Amaranthe’s clothing and battering the tents surrounding her. The moist air smelled of burning coal and a coming storm. The approaching clouds were almost as dark as the black plumes wafting from a pair of steam shovels working on either side of the camp.

Amaranthe sat on her knees before an unlit fire pit. Ropes bound her ankles to her wrists, which were pulled behind her back, making her shoulders ache. The shaman had marched her past piles of limestone on the way in, but she still had no idea what the men sought. Surely not the rock itself.

The shaman strode out of a tent with a slight wiry man at his heels. The attendant clutched scissors in one hand, tweezers in the other, and a bloody rag dangled over his arm.

“Please, wait, sir. I’m not finished.”

The shaman snarled a chain of words in his tongue. The attendant, who had the darker skin and hair of a Turgonian, lifted his arms in bewilderment. “If you would just sit down for a moment…”

The shaman stopped before Amaranthe. From her knees, she had to crane her neck back to find his eyes.

His bone-blade knife came out, and he rested it at her throat. “Before you die, you will speak to me all you know of Sicarius. All weaknesses, all everything.”

She sat straighter. “Does that mean you didn’t find his body? That he’s still alive?”

The shaman had dispatched a team of men to check, but they had not returned yet.

He scowled. “Much rubble. Probably he dead and buried. You tell me his weaknesses anyway.”

“If he has any, I don’t know them.” She shrugged, deciding on a casual response rather than open defiance. She would tell him nothing, but it would be foolish to declare that and imply there was no point in keeping her alive. “Though he is a poor conversationalist. I don’t know, can you use that?”

The shaman glowered. “You are no funny.”

“No, I suppose not.”

“Sir,” the attendant said. “You’re bleeding all over camp. Shall I get that pistol ball out first?”

The shaman returned his knife to his sheath. “Yes. Mundane weapons no always best way to get answers, and I must have concentration for other ways. No pain.”

They strode into a nearby tent together, leaving Amaranthe wondering what non-mundane interrogation methods he might subject her to. Best to escape and not find out.

The camp lay deep within the canyon. To escape she would have to run past several pickaxe-wielding workers as well as the ambulatory machinery. One step at a time, she told herself. Hands first.

The bowman sat on a boulder, oiling the limbs of his weapon, glancing at her from time to time. She shifted slightly to keep her hands hidden behind her back while she worked at the ropes, trying to dig a thumbnail into a knot. Inside the tent, the shaman spoke to someone in a language she could not understand. He wasn’t conversing with the Turgonian surgeon. So, who was he talking to?

She had encountered a communication device before, in Larocka’s basement, and wondered if the shaman had one inside. Though he had not asked Amaranthe her name, someone, maybe a lot of someones, would soon know Sicarius was up here. If he wasn’t dead.

Amaranthe did not want to consider that possibility. He was too aware; he would have seen or sensed the attack coming. Even if it was magical. He would have run off the ledge before it collapsed. But, if he was alive, wouldn’t he be doing something to help her escape the camp? And to get rid of the shaman before he could report Sicarius’s whereabouts?

Maybe he was injured and needed her help.

Amaranthe doubled her efforts on her bonds, scraping skin raw, but loosening them infinitesimally. She eyed the camp as she worked. If she managed to free her hands, she would need a distraction, a big one considering the shaman could immobilize her from a distance.

Wind battered the tents framing the fire pit, though not enough to blow open flaps so she could see inside. A crate sitting beside one caught her eye. A faded stamp read, Blasting sticks. That, not magic, must be what someone had thrown at Sicarius. She grimaced. It made little difference.

Pained curses came from the shaman’s tent. His assistant must be pulling the pistol ball out. Little time left.

A young man Akstyr’s age jogged into the camp. He paused to eye her curiously before angling toward a tent. Dirt smudged his cheeks, and stubble fuzzed his chin, but neither hid the handsomeness of his face.

“Afternoon,” Amaranthe said as the youth passed her.

He twitched in surprise and glanced behind him, as if checking to be sure she was addressing him.

“I’m Amaranthe,” she told him. “What’s your name?”

“Er, Dobb.”

Her guard kept sliding a rag along his bow, but his eyes lifted, tracking the exchange.

“What’re you doing working up here?” she asked the youth.

Dobb shrugged. “Need the money.”

“Looks like hard work. Hope it pays well.”

“Not really.”

The rain grew heavier, pattering on the tent roofs. Amaranthe hoped it kept the shaman from hearing her chitchat. She continued to pry at her bonds as she talked.

“Then why work way out here?” she asked.

“I don’t know. It seemed like a smart thing to do when they offered the job. I didn’t have any work in Stumps.”

“Dobb, quit your yammering and get back to work,” the bowman said.

The knot Amaranthe was working on loosened. Careful to keep her shoulders from moving too much, she untied it.

“Gonna be a big storm,” Dobb said. “Pit boss said to get the lanterns lit and bring tarps to cover the machinery.”

“Then you best do that,” the bowman said.

Amaranthe sat up straighter at the words “lanterns lit.” Dobb slipped into the tent, revealing crates and food sacks before the flap fell shut. When he came out, he carried a large folded tarp. A box of matches stuck out of his pocket.

“With your looks, you could be working as a female companion,” Amaranthe told him.

The tarp slipped from Dobb’s arms. “A what?”

“An escort for well-to-do women seeking handsome men to attend social events with them.” Amaranthe unwound the rope from her wrists.

Dobb stared at her. “You can get paid for that?”

The bowman stood. “Get back to work, Dobb.”

“Paid well,” Amaranthe said, eyes locked with the youth’s. “One of my comrades used to be in that business. Maybe I could have him arrange an introduction for you.”

“An introduction? Like to vouch for me?”

The bowman stalked over and grabbed Dobb’s arm. “I said, get to work.”

Dobb yanked his arm free. “You’re not the boss here.”

The bowman took him by the collar. “I’m in charge of the prisoner, stupid. Don’t let her talk you into—”

With her hands free, Amaranthe lunged to her feet. She yanked the match box from Dobb’s pocket, then sprinted around the bowman, kicking him in the back of the knee as she passed. He crumpled, grasping his leg. Dobb jumped backward to avoid him and fell through a tent wall.

Amaranthe threw open the lid to the crate and grabbed two blasting sticks.

“Get her!” the bowman yelled.

She tore open the box of matches, spilling them everywhere. She snatched one, swiped it against the crate, and lit the fuse.

“Idiot, don’t let her—”

Amaranthe tossed the stick into the center of camp as the shaman stepped out of his tent.

“What—” he started.

“Run!” The bowman crashed into him in his race to escape the camp.

Amaranthe snatched a handful of spilled matches and ran toward the mouth of the canyon. Ahead of her, dozens of men chiseled at the stone walls with pickaxes, and two ambulatory steam shovels belched smoke.

The explosion rocked the earth, its thunderous boom echoing from the walls.

The workers dropped their pickaxes and gaped in her direction. She veered toward one of the rock walls, hoping she could follow it to the mouth of the canyon before someone shot her.

“Get woman, or nobody get paid!” the shaman roared, voice muffled.

Amaranthe hoped a tent had fallen on him.

Despite his ultimatum, most of the workers scurried out of her way when she waved the remaining blasting stick. The closest steam shovel operator did not. He rotated his machine toward her, and it rolled forward on its huge treads.

She kept going, hoping she could outrun the steam shovel. She lifted the blasting stick in one hand and a match in the other so the operator could not miss her threat. Amaranthe did not want to blow anyone up, but she was not going to let him crush her beneath those treads either.

As she ran, rain blew sideways, stinging her eyes. More orders to stop her came from the remains of the camp.

The operator continued toward her, narrowing the gap between the machine and the wall. He must think the metal cab enclosing him would make him invincible to the blasting stick. Not likely, she thought grimly.

Amaranthe slowed down to swipe the match. She tried to light the fuse without stopping completely, but running made it difficult.

An arrow clattered on the rocks a half foot from her. No, she dared not stop. The match flame brushed the fuse. It smoldered but did not light. Too wet.

The steam shovel bore down on her. Another arrow skimmed past, stirring her hair. Her match went out.

“Cursed ancestors.” She gave up on lighting the fuse and pumped her legs faster.

Amaranthe hurled the unlit stick toward the smoke stack, thinking she might get lucky and it would drop inside and ignite. It bounced off the roof of the cab. The driver swung the long, extendable shovel at her. It scraped along the wall, sheering off rock as it veered toward her head.

She ducked low but did not slow down. Shards of rock thudded onto her shoulders and head, and warm blood trickled down the back of her neck, but she pressed on. The shovel was not agile enough to outmaneuver her. She escaped its reach and sprinted for the end of the canyon. Ten meters and she could run around a corner and disappear in the forest. She hoped.

A dark figure stepped from around that corner, rifle raised.

At first, she saw only that weapon trained her direction. It fired, billowing smoke into the soggy air. Sicarius.

A cry sounded behind her. The driver tumbled from the cab, a pistol flying from his fingers. It fired when it hit the ground.

Relief washed over Amaranthe, both at seeing Sicarius alive and at his action. That weapon had surely been aimed at her back.

The driverless steam shovel crashed into the wall.

Amaranthe sprinted around the corner, slapping Sicarius on the shoulder. She wanted to wrap him in a great hug, but there was no time. They needed to put distance between themselves and the shaman.

She ran several steps before realizing Sicarius was not following. Thinking he had paused to reload, she whirled to tell him to do it later. He was not there.

One of the rifles, the one he had fired already, leaned against the rock face where he had been standing. Amaranthe backtracked and peeked around the corner.

Sicarius stood, the second rifle raised, using the crashed vehicle for cover.

Before she could decide whether to join him or yell at him to get out of there, he fired. The steam shovel blocked her view, and she did not see what—who—he hit, but she could guess.

“The shaman?”

“Yes.” Sicarius jogged past her without slowing. “They’re gathering weapons.”

Amaranthe grabbed her rifle and chased after him.

“He knew you were out here,” she said when they reached the trees.

He slowed so she could run beside him.

“He knew your name and your history with Mangdoria,” Amaranthe went on. “I think he told someone. Someone who speaks Mangdorian. If it’s Ellaya, well, she’s already irked with me for destroying her gizmo-making machine. She’ll want us extra dead now. Me anyway.”

“I’ll kill her when we get back.”

Amaranthe missed a step. His cold, blunt efficiency should not surprise her by now, but sometimes, when he was acting more…human than others, she could forget about it. “She didn’t actually seem to loathe you, not the way this man did. Maybe I can talk with her, convince her she doesn’t want to be our enemy.”

“Doubtful.”

“You’re in a dour mood. Is it because I almost got you blown up?” She eyed him as they jogged between the trees, mud splattering with each footfall. With his black attire, it was hard to spot blood, but he appeared unharmed. “I am sorry about that, but…” She started to make an excuse, to explain that it was the shaman sensing him that had caused trouble, but it had been her scheme to go down and talk to him in the first place. “I’m sorry. How did you escape?”

“They weren’t as stealthy as they thought. I’d moved before they threw the blasting stick.”

“Good. I’d feel—” utterly and irrevocably devastated, she thought, “—a little upset if I got you killed.”

He slanted her a flat look. “You should.”

Thunder boomed through the valley, and the rain picked up.

“I found out some new information at least.” More about him than the mystery, but her mind did not want to process that yet. Safer to think about the land and the water plot. The pieces of that puzzle floated on the periphery of her mind, and she felt close to drawing them together into a cohesive picture.

Her comment only made Sicarius’s expression harder, and she wished she had said nothing about his history with Mangdoria.

•  •  •  •  •

Books fought back a yawn. He shifted in his hard chair and turned his gaze from the crackling fireplace toward the log bed—and its soft, inviting quilts. He had the room to himself and the opportunity to enjoy a serene night of sleep. Too bad that was not the plan.

A thump occasionally sounded downstairs, audible over the rain pelting the roof. Someone in the household remained awake. In another hour, he might be able to leave his room to investigate. Amaranthe would call it snooping.

He wanted to accept Vonsha’s explanations as truth, but Maldynado was right: she had shown them no evidence to justify a trek through the pass.

His chin drooped. He dozed until his own snores woke him.

The fire burned lower. Books listened but heard no footsteps, no bumping about, only wind buffeting the walls.

He stood and removed his boots, not trusting his ability to walk stealthily in the clunky footwear. He padded to the door in his socks. A floorboard creaked like a howling coyote.

“Oh, yes, this will work,” he grumbled.

Books slipped into the hallway. And stopped. Where should he go to snoop? Rambling through the sprawling house, hoping to find some sign of nefarious plots, seemed unlikely to deliver results. Would Vonsha have her notes in her room? He shied away from the idea of sneaking into her bed chamber. He remembered passing a study on the bottom floor. Maybe Lord Spearcrest kept information about the property there. That might be a place to start.

No sooner had he started down the hallway when a door ahead opened.

Books halted, not sure whether he should flee back to his room or concoct some excuse for wandering.

Vonsha stepped out, a lacy nightgown swirling about her calves. Her hair tumbled about her shoulders in brown waves, almost hiding the bandage on her neck. The thoughts spinning through Books’s head ground to a halt, and he could only stare.

“Books?” she asked. “Were you going somewhere?”

“I…wanted to talk to you.” Not exactly, but maybe he could obtain his information from her. He would have to take charge of the question-asking though. No sitting close and smelling her perfume and definitely no gazing at the bare flesh revealed by that sleeveless, low-cut nightgown.

“Talk?” Vonsha asked. “I don’t usually ‘talk’ to men in my bedroom while I’m at my parents’ house, but I guess I’m too old for them to chastise about such things now.”

“I—uhm.” Books swallowed.

She took his hand and led him into the room. The only thing he noticed inside was the bed and how its sheets were already turned down.

Vonsha stepped close, her chest brushing his torso. “Are you always shy and awkward, or do I make you nervous?”

“Oh, I’m always awkward, but yes to the latter.” Of course, some of that nervousness was due to the fact that he was supposed to be investigating. If he didn’t feel obligated to research the place, he would—

She stood on her tiptoes, and the floral scent of her perfume teased his nostrils. Her lips brushed his, warm and inviting.

He slid his arms around her waist and forgot about research, and about being shy as well.

•  •  •  •  •

Rain hammered the top of Amaranthe’s head, while wind whipped branches into her eyes. Daylight had vanished from the valley. She stumbled along behind Sicarius, stretching out a hand every few moments to make sure he still walked in front of her. Soaked clothing stuck to her body, chafing and rubbing skin raw. A tree snapped and crashed to the ground behind them.

“Where are we going?” Amaranthe yelled to be heard over the wind.

“The cabin,” Sicarius said.

“We need to get back to the lorry and over to the Spearcrests. The shaman knew about the family, so I think it might have been a mistake sending Books and Maldynado there.”

“Not tonight.”

Lightning flashed. For a moment, trees and branches stood out, stark and cold in the white brilliance. Seconds later, thunder rumbled, a great peal that rang in Amaranthe’s ears. Up here, surrounded by mountains, the storm seemed louder, rawer, and more dangerous than any she remembered from the city.

“You don’t understand,” she said. “I may have sent them into a trap. We have to warn them.”

Sicarius spun about even as lightning flashed again, highlighting his wet blond hair and the hard angles of his face. “It’s foolish to stay out in this. Going—”

Thunder drowned out the rest of his words, but she got the gist. Going down that trail in the dark would be treacherous. She knew it in her head; her heart was what objected.

Amaranthe was about to nod and wave Sicarius onward, when the hair on her arms stood on end. Her skin tingled, as if ants crawled all over her.

“Down!” Sicarius dropped, pulling her with him.

She tucked her head under her hands, burying her face in the ground. The sharp earthy scent of mud flooded her nostrils.

Lightning struck, and a boom hammered her ears.

The air stank of charred wood. A tree groaned, then cracked like rifle fire. Branches snapped. She wasn’t sure whether to look up or keep her head buried.

Something—Sicarius’s arm?—snaked around her waist, tearing her from her huddle.

Mud and trees blurred before her eyes as she was yanked several feet. She landed hard on her rump, her back thudding into Sicarius.

The trunk of a massive tree smashed to the ground where she had lain. Eyes wide, chest heaving for breath, she gaped for several long seconds. Sicarius held her, arm wrapped around her waist.

“Are you injured?” he asked.

Amaranthe waved her hand in dismissal, not trusting her voice.

He released her and helped her to her feet. She wiped rain out of her eyes with a shaking hand. Despite the downpour, flames leaped where lightning had struck the tree. Their orange glow helped her find her rifle.

“The cabin, you say?” she asked.

“Yes,” Sicarius said dryly.

She followed him back to the clearing without further suggestions of getting off the mountain that night. The wind continued to rail, flinging branches into their path, and flashes of lightning illuminated the mountains. The rain turned to hail and pounded their heads and shoulders.

The cabin came into view, and Amaranthe broke into a run. Even knowing a dead man waited on the floor inside could not dim her relief at the prospect of sanctuary—though she almost hugged Sicarius when he dragged the body outside by himself. She decided a comment about it being good of him to help with the house cleaning would be in poor taste.

While he tended to that grisly task, Amaranthe laid a fire. Water dripped from her clothing and pooled on the cold hearth stones beneath her knees. The hurried trek across the hillside had kept her from noticing the chilly air that had ridden in with the storm, but it made her shiver now. Though the long wooden matches had heads the size of coins, it took her shaking hands several tries to strike a flame. Fortunately, Hagcrest had kept the cabin well-stocked, and enough wood for the night was stacked in a bin near the hearth.

Sicarius returned as her fire started crackling. He did not say what he had done with the body, and she did not ask. She doubted any scavengers would be out in the downpour to bother it. They could build a funeral pyre in the morning.

“Venison.” He laid strips of dried meat on the table and headed for his rucksack.

She added a final log to the fire. “You purloined food from a dead man’s smokehouse?”

“He doesn’t need it.” Sicarius removed a set of neatly rolled dry clothes and tugged off his shirt, revealing the hard, lean muscles of his back.

Amaranthe caught herself staring. She grabbed the fireplace poker and turned away from him, cheeks heating. Too many hard angles, she told herself. It would be like sleeping with a rock. Who would want that?

Me, some insidious thought whispered.

That worried her. Even if there were not already enough reasons to keep the relationship purely business, the shaman’s revelations alone should have horrified her enough to keep the notion from entering her mind. What would her father think of her, daydreaming about an assassin? A man who had killed, not just soldiers in a combat situation but innocents as well.

The empire had always considered it cowardly and dishonorable to attack someone who could not fight back, so Hollowcrest and Emperor Raumesys had gone against seven hundred years of imperial mores by raising and employing an assassin. Perhaps they had sensed a future when brute force would no longer be enough to keep the conquered subjugated, or they had realized the rest of the world would catch up with the empire’s engineering and metallurgy advancements, and that their edge would eventually slip away. To understand their reasoning and condone it were different matters, and here she sat with the one who had done the dirty work for them.

“Did you do it?” Amaranthe prodded a log with the poker. “Kill the Mangdorian chief and…his family?” Including the children, she added to herself.

“Yes.”

She closed her eyes. It did not surprise her. She knew what he was by now and had heard enough from others to guess at much of what he had done. Sometimes she forgot, though, because she had never known him when he was purely Hollowcrest and Raumesys’s assassin. It was jarring to be reminded that his reputation was entirely founded.

“Was it… Do you regret it?” she asked.

No note of remorse had colored his “yes,” but he was so good at hiding his thoughts and emotions, one would never know if he actually felt something.

Sicarius set his boots by the fire and held her rucksack out to her. “Do you want me to go outside?”

“What?”

“While you change.”

“Oh.” She had forgotten the water dripping from her hair and clothing. “No need. I’ll go over there.”

Thanks to the disease Hollowcrest’s crazy dungeon scientist had infected her with, Sicarius had seen her naked before. Or maybe not. She was not sure if he had bothered looking. Despite everything he was, and knowing what she should and should not want, that disappointed her.

She grabbed her rucksack and walked to the bed, wet boots squeaking with each step. She turned her back to the fireplace and dug out dry fatigues. Alas, she did not catch him peeping while she changed.

They shared the purloined food, then Sicarius settled on the bearskin rug, one leg stretched out and the other bent, arm resting on his knee. His shirt was untucked, and he was barefoot. Amaranthe did not bother him outside of missions and training time, so she had never seen him in even that bit of undress. He almost looked…relaxed. She had never seen that either.

It did not seem right, considering the day’s revelations, but it was old news to him even if it was not to her.

Amaranthe sat on the rug, close enough to enjoy the fire’s warmth and talk to him—should he deign to converse—but she was careful not to intrude on his space. Strange that she could joke with him, however one-sidedly, while working, yet words eluded her now. Must be the bare feet. Most of the time, she felt comfortable around him. Indeed, over the last few months, when she dared not visit her old friends or enforcer comrades, he had become the person she confided in most. She trusted him to have her back in a fight—or a lightning storm. She wished she knew if his willingness to protect her represented fondness or if he was only interested in keeping her alive because she might be his best bet to one day establish a relationship with Sespian.

“Sicarius…” Amaranthe pulled her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around them, eyes toward the fire instead of him. “You were watching the camp there at the end, I assume. If I hadn’t… If that shaman had started to interrogate me…” She licked her lips, not sure she should ask a question she might not want to hear the answer to; he never prevaricated, so she expected a blunt and honest response. “I’m guessing you had your rifle in hand, ready to fire, before I threw the blasting stick and escaped. If I hadn’t done that… Given what I know about you and…Sespian…and given what happened when I originally learned what I learned… Well, I wonder sometimes if you wouldn’t feel your secrets were more secure if I weren’t around.”

Wood snapped, and sparks disappeared up the chimney. Amaranthe waited, then finally looked his way. He returned her gaze but said nothing.

“Well?” she asked.

“Well, what?”

“You’re not going to answer?”

“You didn’t ask a question.”

“I did too.”

“A question is denoted by a higher pitched tone at the end of the sentence. Your voice never did that.” Curse him, his eyes glinted with amusement.

“Sicarius! This isn’t the time for you to practice being whimsical.”

He turned his dark eyes toward the fire. “It wasn’t in my mind to shoot you.”

Not exactly a proclamation that he would never under any circumstances consider harming her, but she had not expected that. Hoped for, but not expected.

“Good,” Amaranthe said. “My ego likes to think I’m not expendable.”

Sicarius leaned back on his hands. Amaranthe added a couple more logs, relishing the heat that warmed her face. Rain hammered the roof, and wind beat at the shutters of the single window, but inside it had grown comfortable.

“Sespian was there,” Sicarius said.

“What?” Amaranthe blinked.

“When I returned from the mission to Mangdoria. With the heads. The emperor and Hollowcrest always wanted proof of a task completed. Sespian was there.”

“Oh.” She feared she did not want to hear the next part, but she gave him an encouraging nod anyway. She could not remember many times when he started a conversation or volunteered personal information. “How old was he?”

“Five. He was on the floor next to Raumesys’s desk, playing with wood blocks. Building something creative.” Sicarius continued to stare into the fire as he spoke, lost in the memory perhaps. “I asked Raumesys if the boy should leave. He said no. Sespian needed to be tough if he was to rule one day.” His jaw tightened.

“So he was sitting there when you dumped a pile of heads on the floor.” Amaranthe rubbed her face. A five-year-old boy confronted with that…

“Yes. I should have refused to do it with him in the room. I was…”

“Indoctrinated to obey the emperor,” Amaranthe said.

His gaze shifted to meet hers.

“I know. Even as an enforcer, I had a lot of that drilled into me,” she said. “Obey your chain of command without question, and the emperor’s law is immutable. If we want you to have an opinion, we’ll give it to you.” For the first time, she wondered what kind of person she would be if she had gone to a city school. Her father had sacrificed much to send her to Mildawn to study business, where she had received a far more liberal education than typical in the empire. By the time she entered the Enforcer Academy, she had been old enough to know her own mind and her obeisance had often been outward only.

“Yes,” Sicarius said.

A question she had wondered more than once trickled into the stream of her thoughts. With him more open than usual tonight, maybe he would answer it. It was on her tongue, but she hesitated. He had been the one to bring up Sespian, but he might not appreciate her prying.

Curiosity overruled wisdom.

“How did you come to be Sespian’s father?” Amaranthe asked. “Did you love his mother?”

He did not react with surprise to her questions—he never did. Just that schooled mask that revealed so little.

“Sorry,” she said. “I retract my question. It’s none of my business.”

He snorted softly. Yes, he knew she wasn’t retracting anything; she wanted to know.

Amaranthe shrugged. “At least I pitched my voice higher at the end of the question.”

She wondered if a man who could kill without remorse or self-doubt possessed the ability to love. Sespian’s fate mattered to him, but did he love his son? Or was his protectiveness born from a sense of duty? That imperative ran deep amongst Turgonian men. Duty to the emperor, duty to one’s family. That wasn’t the same as love.

“No,” Sicarius said.

It took a moment for her to realize which question he was answering. The love one.

“Oh.” She was not sure what answer she had hoped for. “No” could mean he had never loved anyone, and he never would. If he had said “yes,” it would have warmed her to know he had the capacity to love someone, but then she might be jealous of some long-dead woman.

“All right, no love,” Amaranthe said. “Then how… I mean, I know how, but why did she want you?” Oops, that sounded insulting. “I mean, of course I know why she’d want you because you’re smart and athletic, and I’m sure you’d make wonderful children, and, uhm…” She cleared her throat and avoided his eyes. “What I mean is how did things come to happen?”

Fortunately, her stumbling tongue did not seem to offend him.

“You know Princess Marathi was Raumesys’s second wife,” Sicarius said.

Amaranthe nodded. “His first wife, Alta, died of influenza.” She had been a toddler then, but it was well-known history.

“The first was killed because she didn’t produce an heir.”

“Ah? That’s not what the record books say.” An uneasy thought occurred to her. “Did you do it?”

“Raumesys did it himself. He married Marathi a week later. A year passed and she had not conceived either.”

“I’m guessing it was Old Raumesys’s rifle that wasn’t fully loaded. Poor Alta. Murdered because her husband was impotent. So, Marathi made some assumptions and figured Raumesys was the problem. To avoid Alta’s fate, she decided to get herself impregnated by someone else and let Raumesys think it was his doing.”

“Yes.”

“And she picked you.” Amaranthe nodded. While his training no doubt accounted for much of his martial prowess, a great deal of that skill had to be natural aptitude, something that ought to be passed along to children. Thinking of the way he had flawlessly drawn copies of ranmyas for her counterfeiting scheme, she had little doubt he would be good at any endeavor that relied on speed, dexterity, or coordination, all traits admired in the empire. Strange that Sespian’s interests did not lie along martial lines. Or perhaps not. Maybe Marathi had worked hard to make sure she did not raise a killer. “She had iron guts. Risking death if Raumesys found out. And approaching you. I can’t imagine…” Amaranthe couldn’t even tell Sicarius she had feelings for him. She certainly could not see herself brave enough to show up at his door to seduce him. “Or were you more cuddly and approachable as a teenager?”

His eyebrow twitched at the word cuddly. “No.”

“That was gutsy of you too. Sleeping with the emperor’s wife—that had to be a death sentence if you were caught. And you admitted you were inculcated to obey Raumesys. You certainly seem to have killed everyone he and Hollowcrest asked you to.” She winced. That had come out more accusing than she intended.

“Fifteen-year-old boys don’t do much thinking when pretty women show up at their doors.”

Fifteen? He had been young.

Sicarius stood and retrieved a canteen. “Also, I was recovering from punishment that nearly killed me. I wasn’t kindly inclined toward Raumesys at the time.” He took a swig of water, and she wondered if the conversation was making him wish he had something stronger. Not that she had ever seen him drink anything alcoholic.

“Punishment for what?” she asked.

“Failure.” His clipped tone did not invite further inquiry.

“At least it was an opportunity for you to…know something you might not have otherwise. Did you get to spend any time with him as a boy?”

“That would have been suspicious.” He screwed the cap back on the canteen.

“Surely, with your ability to be stealthy, you could have sneaked in for a moment here or there.”

Sicarius turned his back to her and set the canteen on the table. “Marathi did not want me around. And my presence scared Sespian.”

Of course. After seeing Sicarius deliver a pile of severed heads, Sespian must have been terrified of him. A son, yes, but one he could only watch from afar. And one who grew up fearing and hating him.

“Go to sleep,” Sicarius said. “I’ll take first watch tonight.”

The wind still howled outside, and thunder rumbled from time to time. She doubted anyone would intrude on them that night, but he was a stickler for running a watch, and she did not want to argue with him. She padded over to the bed.

“Sicarius?”

“Yes?” His eyes were hooded, wary.

Amaranthe wanted to tell him she was sorry his life had been chosen for him from his first day and that he never seemed to have known happiness. She wanted to tell him she never would have told him to stay away from his son. And she wanted to tell him she loved him.

“Good night,” she said.

Coward.