Nightborn

Page 27

 

  “Surely someone must have missed him. ”

  “No one had seen my father since he was a boy,” she admitted. “That made it simple to arrange for his steward to assume his identity. My father gave him most of his wealth and sent him away. The man pretending to be my father had instructions to contact me if his impersonation was ever discovered by anyone. I received that message the morning of the attack on the château. I was supposed to retrieve the scroll and take it with me out of the country. I promised my father that I would. ”

  Korvel sensed she was once more giving him a tailored version of the truth. “Your father is the reason you gave up your life at the château to become a housemaid in a convent. ”

  “I could not be what he wanted. ” She glanced at him. “Did your father expect you to become a warrior-priest?”

  “I never knew my father. ” That was the most Korvel had ever said about him, and then he heard himself telling her the rest. “My mother was the only daughter of an important Saxon baron. One night raiders from the north attacked the keep and abducted my mother, holding her hostage in their country for many months. After my grandfather paid the ransom, she was brought back. The raiders had used her as a slave, and she was pregnant with me. ”

  “Oh, no,” she murmured.

  “In my time bearing a bastard, even one conceived by rape, ruined a woman forever. My mother knew no man of her rank would marry her after that, but my grandfather still needed an heir to keep his lands from being escheated to the crown after his death. That is the only reason she didn’t strangle me at birth. ”

  “Was it your mother who left that mark on your neck?”

  “No. That came much later, at the hands of mortals who wished me dead. ” He rubbed the scar on his throat. “Sometimes, when I was a boy, I did wish that she would put an end to me. My mortal life was not a happy one. ”

  She slipped her hand into his. “Korvel, you were not to blame for what was done to her. ”

  “I served as the daily reminder of it. ” Idly he rubbed his thumb across her knuckles. “She saw to it that I was fed and clothed and schooled, but she never spoke a gentle word to me; nor was I ever permitted to forget that I was a raider’s bastard. If I did anything to anger her or my grandfather, she had me beaten. There were days when just looking upon my countenance could send her into a rage. ”

  “So you became a Templar to escape them. ”

  “My family was all I knew; given a choice I would never have left them,” he admitted. “But my status changed in an unexpected fashion. My grandmother died of lung fever when I was fifteen, which left my grandfather free to remarry. He took a much younger woman to wife. I didn’t understand why until he got her with child. ”

  She caught her breath. “He had his legitimate heir. ”

  He nodded. “As soon as my uncle was born, they no longer had any use for me. My grandfather allowed me to live at the keep until the night my mother died. Then he threw me out in the snow, with only the clothes on my back. When I would not leave, he had the servants drive me away. ”

  “How could he do such a thing?” She sounded angry. “You were only a boy. ”

  “Mortals did not live so long in my time,” he reminded her. “Most could not expect more than thirty years. In the eyes of that world, I was a man, responsible for myself. I walked for three days to beg an audience with the king. Although my grandfather was his vassal, Richard could do nothing to restore me as heir. Just as I imagined myself joining the beggars at his gates, he offered me a place among his garrison. He had no reason to do so, but it was the first kindness I had ever known. For that, I swore to serve him until the end of my days. ”

  Simone drew her hand from his. “You are a good man, Captain. ”

  Her compliment pleased him, but at the same time he sensed her withdrawing from him. He also realized she had once again changed the subject to avoid talking about her own father. “Was your father an invalid?”

  She made a small, choked sound. “No, Captain. Until he fell ill, he was in excellent health. ”

  “You said that no one had seen him since he was a boy,” he pointed out. “How did he manage that? Did he suffer from some phobia?”

  Her mouth grew tight. “My father considered fear a weakness. He wasn’t afraid of anything. ”

  “Not even death?”

  Her throat burned, and she pulled off to the side of the road, stopping the car and climbing out to run down to the brush, where she dropped to her knees.

  “Simone. ” Korvel reached her in time to support her with his arms as she emptied her belly into the grass. “That idiot doctor promised me that the drugs would have worn off by now. ”

  Once the spasms had passed, Simone straightened and accepted his handkerchief to wipe her mouth and blow her nose. “It’s not the drugs. ”

  He frowned. “Then this is my doing. I should not have reminded you of the loss of your father. I had not realized you were so close to him. ”

  “I hated my father. ” She staggered to her feet. “The day I buried him in the garden was the happiest of my life. ”

  The hatred in her voice matched the truth burning in her scent. “So he was your abuser. ”

  “He never touched me. If he had, I would be the one in the ground. ” She started back toward the car.

  A father whom she hated, who had never been seen, who could kill with a touch, and who had left her to guard the scroll. Korvel knew of only one man who could fit that description.

  He got into the car, but when Simone reached for the key he put his hand over hers. “I must tell you something. I believe your father’s pretense went far beyond concealing his death. The identity he used is very well-known among the Kyn. I cannot say why he deceived you, but in doing so he has made you believe certain things about him that could not possibly be true. ”

  She turned to face him. “My father did many terrible things while he was alive, but he never lied to me. ”

  “He convinced you that he was the guardian of the scroll,” he reminded her. “As well as a killer who had never been seen. He told you that he was Helada, didn’t he?”

  She nodded.

  “Simone, it couldn’t be. Helada has been the scroll’s guardian since the time it was made,” Korvel continued. “One of the Kyn, called Cristophe, was a master smith before he was changed. After the Crusades he retreated to a Spanish monastery to live as a monk. When the Kyn broke with the Templars, the high lord called upon him to forge the scroll. It was Cristophe who chose the immortal master assassin Helada to be the scroll’s guardian. That was more than seven hundred years ago. ” When she didn’t react, he added, “The Kyn cannot sire or bear children. If your father were Helada, as he led you to believe, you would not exist. ”

  “My father was Helada. ” She stared through the windshield at nothing. “Just as his uncle was Helada before him, as was his grandfather, and his grandfather’s eldest brother, and their father before them. That is how Helada became an immortal, Captain. The legendary Helada is reborn in every generation of my family. ”

  Chapter 12

  I

  n all the centuries Korvel had existed he had deceived many mortals, but never had he known any who had done the same to the Kyn. Humans were too simple in their motives, and constantly were made transparent by their actions; they never lived long enough to sustain their deceptions. That Simone and her family could perpetuate such a myth for so many generations staggered him. He wanted to believe she was lying to him now, but her scent hadn’t changed. “How could the men in your family do this without ever being discovered? The changes in age and appearance—”

  “—were never noticed,” Simone finished for him. “Why do you think my family spread the rumor that anyone who saw Helada would die?”

  “So that no one would ever attempt to see him. ” He glanced at her. “Is that why your father allowed you to join the convent? Because the
women there were all blind?”

  “That is the reason he had me educated there,” she said. “But I chose to go to the convent. ”

  Korvel thought of how Richard Tremayne would react to learning the legendary Helada was a complete fabrication. “Do you know what the high lord would do if he knew only mortals were guarding the scroll?”

  She nodded. “He would take it from my family. But my ancestor was determined that no immortal should possess the scroll, so they would not be tempted to use it to create immortal armies, or wipe out humanity altogether. That is why we never told the high lord. ”

  He didn’t know whether to laugh or groan. “If he knew, he would do much more than take it from you. ” The thought of his master punishing Simone for her part in the deception sobered him. “You can never tell anyone about this, Simone. ”

  “I’ve told you. ”

  So she had, and realizing how much trust that must have required made him feel a strange satisfaction. “I will keep your secret. ” He dragged a hand through his short hair. “You’ve lived among nuns, and yet you’re the daughter of one of the most feared assassins of all time. Christ, I can hardly believe it. ”

  “We believe what we want,” was all she said.

  Once they reached Marseilles, Simone left the car in a reserved lot a block away from the town house.

  “You have been living at the convent for the last ten years,” Korvel said as he took the case for her. “So how is it that you have a flat—and parking—in the city?”

  “I am also a sentinel, and the council maintains a number of properties here. ” She reached into a side pocket of the case to retrieve the key to the door. “This one is used now primarily for storage purposes. ”

  As they walked in and she turned on the lights, Korvel inspected the front room. “What do they store here? Air?”

  “The illusion of vacancy is for the benefit of the neighbors. ” She nodded toward the staircase. “Everything is kept on the second floor. ”