“Who?” The question was out before she could stop herself.
“Cat.” He stared at the tabletop. “It wasn’t my fault, Den’s the one who lost his amulet. In gods’ names, I was sleeping when it all happened!” Jasper shook his head. “I’ve Healed Cat many times, you know. His hand was burned when I got him and then Den’s methods . . . But the pup never so much as gave me a glance of thanks. And it’s somehow all my fault anyway.” Jasper scrubbed his hand over his eyes and looked away.
Renee’s heart pounded. “What’s your fault, Jasper? What happened?”
“Cat tried to run.” He hung his head, speaking to the table top. “Mother is putting him down at the next fight.”
She stared at him, unable to find words. Not only was she without men, she was without time. “When is that?” Her voice shook despite her grip.
“A week or so.” Jasper frowned at the opening door and sank deeper into his chair. “Wonderful.”
At the tavern’s entrance, a boy of about twelve was looking around like a ferret on duty. His gaze came to rest on Jasper and the boy trotted forward. His dark eyes weighed Renee, as if deciding how her presence affected his mission. Shrugging, he turned to Jasper. “Madam says you are to attend to the weeds.” An unpleasant smile curved his lips. “Immediately.”
Jasper’s nostrils flared.
The messenger took a step back, although his smirk stayed in place. Clearly, he considered himself employed by a higher authority and thus immune to any insult he offered. “If you refuse, I’m to advise her at once.”
Jasper’s jaw tensed, the only defense to dignity he seemed able to conjure.
The boy snorted and rubbed invisible dirt from his cheek.
“Your message is understood,” Renee said, pushing herself away from the table.
The lad stopped smiling and raised his nose into the air. “Madam said—”
“You may go.” She lifted her brow. “If you have no other duties to attend to, I am certain some can be found.”
The boy swallowed, mulled over the threat for a moment, and scurried away.
Jasper shook his head. “That is twice you’ve stood up for me, blinder.”
She blushed. It was Jasper’s connections, not genuine friendship, that brought her to sit at his table. She searched for words that were both true and appropriate. “You healed my nose.”
He said nothing, but a spark of pleasure lit his face. It seemed no one said thank you to the boy very often.
And now she had to turn his goodwill against him. Renee swallowed her rising bile. “Could you get me in to see Cat tonight? I’d like to see him again before, you know . . . ”
To her relief, Jasper nodded at once.
The Madam was not one to be kept waiting and the weeds had to be seen to first. Renee agreed to come along with Jasper for the company. She had followed him for several blocks before she realized they were heading toward the arena entrance. Sure enough, the boy took her inside the same door Den once had. Apparently, the Viper weed variety flourished beneath the ground.
They entered the main corridor and Renee took her bearings. Savoy and the Predators lived toward the left, west of her position. Diam’s old cell lay toward the right—east. Her jaw tightened as they passed the entrance to a narrow tunnel that she knew led to Duke Leon’s grounds. Savoy had been captured there.
Jasper turned right into an unfamiliar corridor. In addition to lanterns, specs of blue shimmered in the occasional crevice near the ceiling, such that the space would not surrender to total darkness even if all lanterns failed at once. A professional setup to rival the palace in function if not decor. The tunnel system of Catar’s bowels was proving even more extensive than Renee imagined. It was a wonder that the topside structures had not caved in to join their darker cousins.
They took another east-bound turn and the musky scent of stone and earth gave way to stink. Renee’s groan drew a nod of agreement from Jasper.
“That’s the weeds.” He shook his head and returned to discussing the fighters. “Keeping pups is like tuning an instrument. Heal an injury too soon and its lesson is lost. Too late, and you lose training time. Diet is important. Even mood. Den understands nothing of it. Once, he strained Cat’s hurt shoulder for pure enjoyment.” Jasper frowned at an askew lantern but did not fix it. “Weeding, that’s the opposite. No skill. No finesse. Repetitive drudgery any half-trained mage could manage.”
The reek increased.
Renee coughed, interrupting him. “Why the stink?”
He shrugged. “That’s just the way weeds are.” He took a third turn toward the odor. Twenty paces more brought them to a cell similar to the one Diam had occupied. The next step took Renee’s breath.
The filth-covered forms swarming within were children.
“Where are they from?” she asked. There had to be thirty of them, all under ten, in a space not four spans square. The slop bucket lay overturned in the corner and one little boy relieved himself where he stood, having no care for whom the excrement landed on.
“This batch came from Atham, I believe.” Jasper scratched the back of his head. “The harvesters are lazy there, taking whatever the locals bring instead of doing their job. Likely as not, most of this batch will wither before anything useful can be made of them. The pleasure houses pay coppers unless the product is trained.” He sighed. “There’s always tunnel work to do, I suppose. ”
“They are but children.”
He shook his head. “They are hungry street urchins who would have frozen to death in the winter if not for us. The ribs show on half the stock and the other half is too dumb to find the slops. Not even a blind noble would buy these.”
She turned away before the horror on her face revealed itself. Noble estates, including her father’s, often bought children who worked in exchange for clothing and a roof, but those youngsters were orphaned, not kidnapped. So this was the fate of the people disappearing from the capital’s streets. “What are you to do with them, Jasper?”
“Heal the worms and whatever other corruption they brought with them. The washers will launder the ones worth keeping.” He sighed, letting blue fire spread over his fingers. “Pray we catch none of their pestilence.”
Renee forced herself to approach the bars and memorize the young faces behind them. A dark-eyed boy with a scar over his brow holding a smaller boy’s hand. A toddler girl whimpering for her mother. A five-year-old with a distended belly lying listless on the stone floor.
Getting Savoy out alive was only the beginning of her problems.
CHAPTER 38
The door of Savoy’s cell screeched behind Renee and shut with dull finality. She shook her head, pushing the children’s faces to the back of her mind. She had little time. Jasper was in the hallway, keeping watch for stray guards while she visited his pup, Cat, slated for destruction in perhaps a week’s time.
Unlike the guest room where she saw Savoy last, this chamber was dark; a stale, tiny tomb in which the eyes could never adjust. She uncovered the lantern and was relieved at its warm pool of light.
Savoy sat on the floor, his bare back pressed against the stone. His forearms rose to shield his eyes, exposing shivering muscles. Several marks, small webs of black silk, marred his skin.
She crouched beside him. “You’re cold.”
“The least of my worries.” He risked lowering his arm and blinked. “It is too much to hope you stopped toying with fire?”
“Leading by example?”
He chuckled once, then quieted and focused on cracking his knuckles. “You promised to go to Atham.”
“I never promised to stay there.” She sat on the floor. “Atham has its own problems. The kidnappings and assaults hold everyone in fear. Sentries stand outside the Academy’s barracks. Sasha Jurran . . . ” Renee lowered her head. “She’
s the second of the Crown’s family to pay the price of relation. Lysian’s youngest cousin is the other. The Crown plans to arrive in Catar in a week, but we cannot expect assistance from that front.”
Savoy snorted. “You asked Verin for the Seventh and he said no.”
She hoped the murk hid her wince. “We have means of contacting them. We need but the code word.”
He shook his head. “I will obey Verin’s orders.”
Her gut clenched. There were enough battles and walls without Savoy arguing against what shreds of solutions they had. “You don’t trust me with the code?”
“Did I miss your promotion to High Constable?” His voice was cold. “If Verin believes the Seventh’s current mission is more important than I am, then it is. Your own accounts put Atham teetering toward disaster, with the Crown and Vipers galloping at each other to see who flinches first. You want my support of a plan that undermines the entire security posture?”
She rose and leaned against the opposite wall, two paces away. The cold from the stone seeped into her skin. Without knowing it, Savoy was caught in a game between Verin and Palan and gods knew who else. For an instant, she considered telling him, then rejected the thought. He’d only side tighter with Verin’s thinking. “You don’t know the nuances,” she said instead. “The Vipers hold other prisoners in the tunnels. Children.” Her nostrils flared. “The Seventh will save lives. If you care little about yours, consider the . . . the weeds.”
“My point exactly. I do not know the nuances.” Savoy leaned forward. “Prisoner rescue is better organized by a man who sees the whole field of battle than one who sits in an underground hole. It is your duty to ensure Verin and the other constables have the information they need, not forge a side mission that answers your own priorities.”
“My duty.” Her fingers worked themselves into fists. “My duty is my own. I am not in the Crown’s Service any longer.”
His green eyes flashed. “I am.”
Renee’s lips opened without sound.
Savoy rose and braced his hand on the wall beside her shoulder, forcing her to meet his gaze. “Please,” Renee said. “Don’t do this.”
“I owe Verin everything that I am.” Savoy’s voice was gentle. “I will not undermine him. Your coming here gave me a choice. And I made it.” He held her eyes until she swallowed and bowed her head. “I’m not done fighting. But should I lose, there is a letter in my pack. Will you mail it to my parents?”
“Of course,” she whispered without looking up. “I’ll get it to them.”
* * *
“What now?” Renee asked Alec. She wished he would come sit by her, but he stayed across the room, on what used to be his bed at Hunter’s Inn. She told him of Atham’s problems and of Verin’s refusal, of Jasper and the weeds, of King Lysian’s imminent arrival that threatened to spark battle on Catar’s streets, of Savoy’s death sentence. She told him and he had listened. But he had asked no questions. She dipped her head to better see his face. “Alec?”
He braced his forearms against his knees and looked toward the window where gray buildings blocked the view of the horizon. “You play upon Jasper?” he said after a moment, as if that bothered him the most of everything she had shared. Renee wondered whether he even heard the rest. Before she could answer, he frowned. “It is not like you to indulge in such games. Do you realize who he is?”
She forced her clenched fingers to loosen. Upon hearing the evil brewing within arm’s reach, Alec should have rallied with support and enthusiasm. Instead he brooded as if taking action was a matter of debate. She tilted her face toward him. “A mage, a Viper, a fifteen-year-old boy. Which answer are you seeking?”
“He’s the Madam’s son.”
She blinked. The boy’s notorious mother led the Vipers? The implication of Jasper’s bruised cheek and the odd look Ivan had given Renee beside Jasper’s house took on new meaning. As did his weeding chores. “How long have you known?”
He shook off the question. “What I mean, Renee, is that he has no choice in what he does. You manipulate him into crossing her and he’ll suffer for it.”
“He has a choice. There is always a choice,” said Renee. “Mine is to save Savoy and the two dozen of Atham’s children the Vipers have trapped beneath the ground.”
“What of Savoy’s choice?”
“To die?”
“To stop risking others to save his skin.” Alec shrugged. “Verin, Savoy, the gods themselves are telling you to leave this be.”
She stared for a moment, then drew up her legs and studied him. He sat in the middle of the bed, not the corner of it like he used to. His voice had grown deeper, it seemed, and it spoke more of energy currents than swords. She drew a breath. “Once you knew you could Control, was joining the Academy really nothing more than a challenge you waged against Tildor?”
His face lifted in surprise and he spread his palms, paused. “I’m not certain,” he said at last. “My aunt refused the Crown’s will and died for it. My mother bent to it and lost all that she was. Yes, I wished to challenge Tildor and win. Was that my sole fuel? I don’t know.” He shrugged. “It little matters. Harnessing Control is a commitment, not a hobby to be toyed with whenever a free moment arises. I know that now. You can’t be a swordsman and a Healer at the same time any more than you can be a blacksmith and a farmer together. Staying at the Academy was a mistake. Becoming a Servant would have changed nothing.”
Perhaps he was right, but coming to Catar seemed to have changed everything. Her finger traced the stitching on the bedspread. “You will not help.”
“Diam is safe, that’s what we left the Academy to do. I have completed my part.” Alec sighed, the words rushing out. “Savoy is no friend of mine, Renee. And the people of Atham are the Crown’s responsibility. The same Crown who enslaves mages to do its bidding. I owe nothing to either.”
CHAPTER 39
No Alec, no Seventh, and King Lysian’s impending arrival hung over Catar like a menacing fog. Only for Diam’s sake did Renee stop herself from punching the wall. The boy sat beside the window, gazing left and right as if expecting his brother to stroll down the cobblestones below.
Instead, a fine-cloth merchant across the alleyway was boarding up his windows while his sons hauled crates of goods into an awaiting wagon. A few doors down, a crowd gathered around the armorer’s shop, purchasing new weapons or sharpening used ones. Renee had gotten a new sword there herself just a week ago.
It had been thus for days, ever since news of the Crown’s intentions to ride to Catar had reached the city. Whispers in the inn’s common room had grown into currents of unease. Guests who could, paid their fees and packed. Few wished front-seat viewing should a confrontation between King Lysian and the Madam erupt.
Khavi whined and nosed the door. Nodding, Diam climbed down from his perch and, without saying a word, left with his wolf. Renee stared at the closed door, then took down Savoy’s sword and ran a sharpening stone along its edge. He’d like his weapon cared for.
The knock startled her. Letting the blade hang at her side, she called out a challenge and frowned at the familiar voice. “Lord Palan.” She stepped aside to let him in and hoped her voice betrayed none of the sudden dread that washed over her. “To what do I owe the honor?”
“Lady Renee.” He bowed, small eyes and self-satisfied smile the same as ever. “If I may impose on your hospitality?”
You already have. “Of course.”
“You still do not trust me, I see.” Lord Palan seemed pleased. “My nephew picks his friends well.”
“I don’t believe Savoy counts you among them.”
The smile vanished. Palan glanced at a jug of water and, at Renee’s polite bow, poured himself a glass. “Korish still wore swaddle cloths when his parents fled to hide among mercenaries.” He settled into a chair. “When the boy
started at the Academy, he took a dislike to me. Telling him the truth would not have served his interests. Or mine.”
She took a chair opposite him. The man did not visit for his health. She must have something he wanted. What in the bloody hells was it? Renee crossed her legs. “How did Verin learn the truth of Savoy’s bloodlines?”
“From me.” Palan’s lips pressed together. “The boy would not accept a position with me even while locked in the dungeons. I did what I had to do to ensure his future.”
“I don’t understand.”
Palan frowned. “I agreed the Family would not interfere in Academy affairs or sell veesi leaf on the grounds. In return, Verin was to assure Savoy’s career. There is no way to say it more plainly.”
Renee paused. Verin fostered Savoy at Palan’s bidding? It helped explain the heavy hand the headmaster used in raising him, if the alternative was turning a gifted Crown-trained fighter back over to the Family. “Forgive my indiscretion,” Renee said at last, “but I fail to see your advantage in such a deal.”
Palan’s eyes flashed. “I care for my family, whether estranged or not.”
“And does Tanil share your . . . enthusiasm for relatives?” Renee held her breath. If she was right about Tanil’s involvement in Diam’s kidnapping, the fat lord had a problem on his hands. “It seems your young foster wishes you dead. You and his cousins both.”
Palan’s lips pressed together again and his dark eyes narrowed on Renee’s.
Her heart hastened under his calculating gaze. It was as if he were assessing the value of her continued existence. She would do well to remember whom she spoke to.
Palan shook himself and inclined his head, like a fighter acknowledging the other’s score. “Tanil knows nothing of the Savoys’ relation to the family. He simply fell into a combination of debt and sloth, which he sought to remedy by pitting his teacher against me.” He finished his water and interlaced his fingers over his belly. “The boy thought that if Commander Savoy and I were busy with each other, he’d be free of harsh training and financial oversight both. It worked out poorly for him.”