Son of the Black Sword - eARC

  Once inside the restricted collection, she fully opened her lantern. There were shelves filled with books, so it looked pretty much like the rest of the place, only dustier. She was a bit surprised how small the room was. After years of not being allowed inside, she’d built it up in her head that the restricted collection would be far more impressive. Like most forbidden things she’d sampled over the years, reality was a bit of a letdown. She locked the door so her search wouldn’t be interrupted.

  It was believed that books had been common long ago, but when the demons had arrived, they’d ruined most of them. During the Age of Kings they’d started binding books again, but many of those had been lost when that age had descended into evil. Most of the works from the tumultuous time between the ages were scrolls or unbound stacks of paper. It wasn’t until reason returned and the Age of Law began that proper books had as well. Now her Order even had marvelous pressing machines that allowed them to make multiple copies of a page at a time. If Rada had her way, the world would be flooded with books and everyone would know how to read—but that was just her being silly, and she knew it.

  There were shelves filled with wooden boxes and piles of paper, and unlike most of the regularly accessed parts of the library, it had been quite some time since this place had been properly inventoried and organized. This could take a while.

  One nice thing about the Capitol was that the air was very dry in the desert, and since this part of the library was deep underground, the temperature never fluctuated. It was the perfect environment for preserving paper. Rada put on her soft gloves. Many of these works dated back to the first centuries of the Age of Law, and some from even before that, back when mad kings reigned, or even before, when demons rained from the sky and lived on the land, so these works would be very delicate. They would need to be handled with the utmost caution. She pulled her scarf over her mouth, because even moist breath could damage an old book. Then she put on her glasses so she could actually see.

  Rada began her search.

  * * *

  It was easy for a voracious reader to lose track of time when given access to new books. But then her lantern ran out of oil.

  “Saltwater.”

  Rada had been sitting on a stool, reading Melati’s Testimony of the Prior Age when she’d been plunged into total darkness.

  No need to panic. She’d spent her entire life inside the library, so ending up in the dark in a windowless room wasn’t particularly remarkable for her. The worst part was that she’d been interrupted. The book was fascinating, and the casteless question was far more complicated than she’d ever imagined, certainly more complicated that the modern judges suspected, and in fact, it was astounding that so much had been forgotten about this particular topic over the centuries. She held the delicate page between her gloved finger tips so as to not lose her place.

  Then Rada realized that there was no way that she could have run out of oil already. Sure, Melati’s words were difficult to decipher because their language had evolved so much, and it was hard to sort out the truths from the myths, but she’d only skimmed about a hundred pages, so she’d not been down here that long. Why had her lantern gone out?

  Blind, she slowly reached toward where she’d hung the lantern on the wall with her free hand. She was hesitant, waiting for her fingers to bump hot glass, but instead they hit something soft. Cloth? It was hard to tell through the gloves, but that hadn’t been there before. Then as she lifted her hand, she touched a face.

  Surprised, Rada screamed and nearly fell off the stool, but a hand clamped onto her throat and choked off the sound. The ancient book was torn from her grasp. The fingers around her neck were like iron. She was lifted off of the floor by the neck. As she thrashed about, the man didn’t seem to care as he carried her effortlessly across the room and slammed her hard against one of the shelves. Several books fell on the floor, and she inadvertently kicked the priceless artifacts as she thrashed about, but he didn’t let go of her neck. Desperate, Rada remembered her ceremonial knife and pulled it from her sash, but her assailant swatted it out of her hand with bone-jarring force, and then he squeezed her neck, just a bit more.

  She couldn’t breathe.

  “Quiet, Archivist, or I’ll snap your neck,” the man said. He pulled her over, so close that she could feel his hot breath on her ear. Terrified, she began to black out. “I know anatomy like you know books. You’d be amazed how little pressure it takes to snap a neck, especially a scrawny one like yours. Scream again and I’ll kill you.”

  The grip relaxed just a bit, and Rada gasped for breath. “Please don’t hurt me.”

  “If and how much you will be hurt is entirely dependent upon the honesty of the answers you provide.” His voice was neither old nor young, but it was frighteningly calm. “Do you understand?”

  “Yes.” She couldn’t understand how someone had gotten in. There was only one door, it was locked, and she would’ve heard it open. A wizard?

  “I have magic,” he said, almost as if he’d read her mind. “So if you lie, I’ll know. What have you read so far tonight?”

  “Ancient history, nothing more.”

  “A history of the untouchables, yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “The War in Heaven? The Sons of Ramrowan? The fall of the kings and their priesthood?”

  “Yes,” Rada wheezed.

  “Too bad. You should have listened when your father warned you not to come here…Yes, child, the walls have ears.”

  The walls have ears? That was a common saying about the Inquisition. Rada hadn’t thought she could be any more afraid, but she’d been wrong. “You’re an Inquisitor?”

  “I don’t know.” His voice was a menacing growl. “Are you a witch?”

  “No! I was only trying to research an assignment from the judges!” Hot tears had leapt from her eyes and were streaming down her face. “Please…”

  The shadow gave her throat a bit more of a squeeze, fingertips on her artery, and it was enough to make her almost pass out. “I’m familiar with your task. That’s why I’m here, to ensure the integrity of your investigation. Now it’s too late and you know things you aren’t supposed to know, which makes me wonder if you can keep a secret. Can you keep a secret, Rada?”

  Rada tried to nod, but couldn’t move her chin up and down with his iron hard fist there. “I won’t tell.”

  “Good answer. My inclination is to kill you, but I have friends who hold a great deal of respect for the Lord Archivist, and they wouldn’t want the embarrassment of a daughter of the first caste hanging from the Inquisitor’s Dome. So due to that respect, you will be given one chance. One. You will never speak of this. You will finish your report, but there’d better not be any mention of these old histories. There’s no need to confuse the judges with superstition or the ravings of religious fools. Use what you have been allowed, nothing more. We’ll see what you write long before the judges will, and if my friends don’t like it, I’ll come back. Do you doubt me, Radamantha?”

  “No.” She flinched as he stroked her face with his other hand.

  “Good job,” he said as he removed her glasses. There was a crunch as he ground them to bits in his fist. “We’ll be watching.”

  He let go of her throat and Rada sank down to the floor. The room slowly filled with light. Her lantern was glowing again.

  Ancient books and little bits of sparkling glass littered the floor. She was alone and her throat was bruised and aching. The book she’d been reading was missing. The door was still closed and locked.

  What have I done?

  Chapter 17

  Grand Inquisitor Omand was stuffed. Say what you would about his not-so-gracious host, but among his household servants was one of the best chefs in the Capitol. “Thank you the wonderful dinner, Durmad, but I’m afraid I really must be going. I’ve got a long journey ahead of me tomorrow.”

  The Lord Archivist was terrified but trying not to show it. Having the leader of the Inquisition sh
ow up unannounced at your estate for dinner tended to have that effect on people. “Where are you going?”

  “I have business in the north. Vadal lands.” Omand waved his hand dismissively. “As you know, an order’s work is never done.”

  His host sat on the cushions, staring at the nervously picked at plate of food in front of him. The food was excellent, so Omand was sad it was going to waste. It would be rude to ask to finish Durmad’s plate, and besides, Omand was getting a little soft around the waist as he reached middle age. The lady of the house had already made some excuses and fled at the earliest opportunity. Even the servants were scared to come into the room to clean their plates.

  “Well, it has been a pleasure to see you again, Omand…” the Lord Archivist said, hopeful that the Inquisitor was actually leaving now.

  “Always. My only regret is that your eldest daughter was unable to join us.”

  The Lord Archivist looked up and swallowed hard. “My daughter?”

  “Yes, Radamantha, I believe is her name. I’ve been told she’s quite the lovely girl, takes after her mother. You truly have a beautiful family, Durmad. Don’t worry. I’m sure she’s just working late and she’ll be home soon.”

  “She’ll be home soon?”

  “Yes, that is what I said, isn’t it?”

  The Lord Archivist, wide-eyed, nodded. Omand noted that there were crumbs in Durmad’s beard.

  “Important work, preparing all those reports for the judges. I look forward to reading her findings on the casteless question. It will be good to have such an important topic presented by someone so respected for her thoroughness. See to it she finishes them in a timely manner. Take care of that girl of yours, Durmad, for I foresee a bright future ahead of her.” Omand stood up, adjusted his mask, and then gave his host a polite bow. “I’ll see myself out.”

  Omand took his time strolling down the hall, admiring the artwork and the excellent wood carvings. The Lord Archivist stayed planted there, staring and sweating until Omand was out the door. Omand had no doubt that the instant he was out of sight the old man would send a runner to the library to make sure his precious daughter was still in one piece.

  I love my job.

  His driver, Inquisitor Taraba, was waiting outside the estate, standing next to the carriage, holding the door open for his superior. “How was your evening, sir?”

  “Excellent. Finest spiced duck I’ve had in years, steamed in some sort of chewy leaf I’m not familiar with. Absolutely delightful. Find out who their chef is and steal him,” Omand ordered as he climbed into the carriage. Taraba closed the door behind him, and sure enough, waiting within the shadows was Sikasso.

  He was sprawled across the carriage’s opposite seat as if taking a nap. Sikasso wasn’t a member of the Inquisition. Quite the contrary, he was a leader of an organization that wasn’t supposed to exist anymore, but if it did, would surely be an enemy of the Inquisition. The assassin was an average-sized, unassuming man, somewhere between the age of twenty and forty, with a completely forgettable face. Tonight he was dressed like a junior librarian, tomorrow he’d appear to be something else. Neither of them spoke until Taraba had whipped the horses and the carriage was rolling through the Capitol.

  “It is done,” the magically enhanced killer said, revealing that he’d not been napping after all. “The girl at the library won’t be a problem.”

  “Not a problem dead, or not a problem compliant?” He had, after all, insinuated she was still alive to the girl’s father, and he’d hate to have gotten it wrong. Omand had a reputation to keep up.

  “Alive as requested. I’m not one of your masked thugs, out there carelessly breaking knees and thumbs. My people are artists. Besides, intimidating the firsters is easy. Most of them are so insulated from violence that even the suggestion of it makes them fold. She’d probably never been threatened before in her whole life. I’d have your men keep an eye on her, but I don’t think she’ll talk to anyone. All that easy living makes firsters soft.”

  “I’ve found that to be true myself.” Over the years Omand had tortured confessions out of members of every social strata, from the lowest casteless scum to chief judges. Everyone cracked eventually, but the ones who were the least used to sweating and bleeding usually cracked first. “A fantastic evening all around then. Better her respected name on the report than some drunken fool who the judges will mock.” Omand reached into his robe and pulled out Sikasso’s payment. He tossed over the pouch. “Are you ready for our journey to Vadal?”

  “I look forward to it,” the assassin said as he opened the pouch and studied the contents. If his Inquisitors had a smile as unnerving as Sikasso’s then there would be no need for them to wear masks. Satisfied that the black steel fragment was of the agreed upon weight, the pouch vanished from Sikasso’s hands. “When the Protector’s sword shatters, then we get the pieces.”

  “If…”

  “When,” Sikasso stated. “The road you’re sending him down can only end in dishonor, and we’ll be there when it does. The fragments are mine.”

  “That is fair.” An entire ancestor blade worth of magical black steel shards was worth a fortune, but so were the services of Sikasso’s organization. “You know my expected timeline.”

  “I think your schedule is optimistic at best. I’ve killed more than my fair share of Protectors over the years, but I’ve always wanted to fight a bearer.”

  Omand chuckled. “If everything goes according to my plan, you won’t need to.”

  “You assume he’ll still do as he’s told. No man is that devoted to the Law, Inquisitor.”

  “On the contrary, Wizard, from what I’ve learned of this Ashok, you might be surprised.”

  Chapter 18

  “Where’s your cane?” Pakpa asked.

  “I threw it in the river,” Jagdish answered. He’d be damned if he presented himself to his new assignment looking like a cripple. Besides, his leg only really hurt in the mornings, or when it was too cold, or too hot, or when he walked, or put too much weight on it. He spread his arms so she could see his new uniform. “How do I look?” he asked his new bride.

  “Like the finest warrior in all of Vadal,” she lied, or perhaps she was so still so happy to have been assigned a higher-status husband that she actually believed that. To Jagdish, when he looked in the mirror all he saw was a warrior so pathetic that he’d managed to lose a duel even when his opponent had been unfairly outnumbered, and who’d had a Thakoor die under his watch as a result. It had taken months for his arm and leg to heal enough to return to duty, but by then, the story had spread, and no fighting paltan wanted him.

  “The finest warrior? I doubt that.”

  “You will make an excellent risaldar.”

  Pakpa meant well, but she’d grown up in the worker caste. She couldn’t grasp the nuances of rank and assignment within the warrior caste hierarchy. To her, being married off to a miserable failure of a soldier was still a huge step up in life. She didn’t understand that his new promotion was really intended as an insult. Only the worst places received names related to water, and he was being sent to Cold Stream.

  Jagdish kissed his wife. “I must go. I can’t be late.”

  He limped from their small home, through the streets of the city, south toward his new assignment, guarding the very bastard who had ruined his life.

  * * *

  The fallen Protector’s appearance had changed. He’d not shaved or cut his hair since the slaughter. His beard was long and unkempt, his hair wild and filthy, and now he truly looked like the casteless dog that he was. Like the other prisoners, he was dressed in gray rags.

  The only noticeable difference was that sword.

  “What does he do?”

  “Nothing much, Risaldar Jagdish,” the prison guard told him. “We let them out into the yard for most of the afternoon, but he keeps to himself. I think the other prisoners are scared of him. He exercises, sword forms mostly, then runs several laps around the yard, but t
hat’s it. When their time is up, we ask him to return to his cell, and he does. Then he just sits there and stares off into nothing.”

  Jagdish stood at the tower railing, looking down into the yard and the prisoners who’d segregated themselves into groups. Most of them were here because of crimes not severe enough to warrant execution, but a judge had found them to have temperaments unfit for a period of slavery. His new charges were mostly thieves, debtors, and deserters. The roster said he had a few murderers and rapists from the warrior caste, who would serve their time and then be returned to duty, where murder and rape weren’t necessarily crimes as long as they remembered to only do it to their approved enemies and not their own people. He also had some workers guilty of that level of crime who’d not been executed, which told him they came from families with enough money to bribe a judge. Then there were the hostages, warriors taken from other houses in border raids, held here until their families paid a ransom or they were traded for Vadal men being held in other lands.

  But none of those mundane prisoners interested Jagdish right now. “Has the prisoner caused any problems?” He had five hundred charges, but there was only one who could be the prisoner.

  “None, sir. He’s unfailingly polite. In fact, Nayak Suchart was surprised by one of the more violent prisoners, who started choking him with a length of chain. Before any of us could get there, Ashok appeared and beheaded the attacker. Cut his head right off like it was nothing. Then he just walked back to his cell. Saved Suchart’s life, more than likely.”

  “Yes. I’m sure they call him the Black Heart because it overflows with mercy.”

  “I wouldn’t say that, Risaldar. It wasn’t mercy so much as annoyance. He told the prisoners that were watching that he wouldn’t abide anybody breaking the Law in his presence…Scared them, that’s for sure. Assaults have been down and we’ve not had a single riot since he’s been here. We used to have fights between the different hostage gangs all the time, but now they’re all scared of getting on his bad side. Most of the prisoners seem happy, you know, having a bit of entertainment.”