The Crown of Stones: Magic-Price (3 page)

“Another way?” My anger flared. The expectance in his voice—it was like I owed him an explanation. Like he wanted me to swear that I tried everything else first. That I did everything I could to find a peaceful solution. It was what they all wanted.

But I didn’t. And I had to live with that truth every single day.

I said again, “Do we have a problem?”

Tilting his head, he held my gaze pretty steady for his age. “Stories say Ian Troy could fell a man in less than a minute. Course, you were younger then. Probably take you at least two, now, eh?” Grinning slightly, he shrugged. “Nah, you best be on your way. I’m too old for problems.”

“Good.” I put a boot in the stirrup and climbed up into the saddle.

“And you got some chasing ahead of you, anyway” he said. “Chasing…” he gave me a measured, weighty glance, “and I’m thinking maybe some running too.”

TWO

I
landed flat on my back in the marsh. Cushioning my fall, the soggy ground swallowed me on impact then spit me back out. Thick, wet chunks of mud flew up and the assassin was on me before they ever came back down.

“Now, let’s have a little chat.” Straddling me, pressing a long, thin knife against my throat, Taren Roe leaned in close and her weight pushed me down. Silt gurgled into my ears. It sloshed up over my arms and legs, flowed, thick and cold, over my stomach and shoulders.

“We can talk all you want,” I told her. “But do you mind if I get up first?”

“Actually, I do.” Her short, leather tunic creaked as she wriggled a bit to make herself comfortable. “I like it here.”

“Glad you’re happy,” I said sourly, mourning the loss of my dignity and my sword. “But you’re not the one sinking.”

Tossing a chunk of muddy yellow hair out of her lean face, Taren’s lips curved into a suggestive smile. “Don’t you like me on top?”

“You’re only up there because you didn’t play fair. You distracted me,” I said, eyeing the cord dangling in my face. It was holding the front of her shirt together and I could almost catch it in my teeth.
One, little tug,
I thought. That’s all it would take to release the generous amount of pale flesh bursting out.
I don’t even need my hands.

“Well. Look at that.” Snickering, Taren raised her body up slightly off mine and looked down between her legs, to where our breeches met. “I would have never thought that, Ian Troy,” pausing, she threw a measure of
drama into her words, “notorious sword for hire and ruthless hunter of bandits and brigands, would ever sink so low as to be aroused by one of his own prey. But…there it is.” She glanced back up at me. “Like it rough, do you? Or maybe it’s just been a while.”

“Maybe,” I said, edging my fingers through the muck, searching for my sword, “you’re just the most attractive, bloodthirsty criminal that’s sat on me in a long time.”

“Is that why I’m still alive? You were hoping I might do you the favor of a tumble before you kill me?”

“You’re alive, Taren, because in the last three months you haven’t slowed down long enough for me to catch you. Now that you have, I’d really like to know why.”

“Isn’t it obvious?” She pushed the very tip of the knife into my skin. “I’m surrendering.”

I grunted a laugh. “You killed six guards in your escape from the city prison. You’ve ridden horses to death, one after another, barely stopping to eat or rest. You’ve lead me all through the mountains of Kael, clear across Rella to the very edge of Langorian territory and back. And now you stop
here
.” Mindful of the knife, I glanced around. “I could have gone my whole life without stepping foot in this fetid hole and you’ve got us in so deep it’s going to take weeks to get back out.”

“Sorry,” she shrugged.

“What are you doing here, Taren? Why did you stop?”

“That poor excuse for a horse I was riding got stuck in a bog. I tried to get him out, but the lazy bastard just stood there.”

“That’s because he was stuck.” I risked a slight, annoyed shake of my head. When she didn’t object, I shifted my shoulders some, fidgeting to camouflage my continued hunt for a weapon. “I’m not buying your bullshit, Taren. You’re an assassin. You hide in the shadows. Slit the throats of defenseless people for money. Put off a kill for days to avoid confrontation. Apparently, you steal horses from defenseless old men as well. But you don’t sit and wait for me to show up so we can fight head on. And you don’t surrender.” Purposefully, I held her cold dark eyes with my pale ones. “You’re up to something.”

Taren leaned down. She put her grimy face in mine and pressed her leather-clad breasts against my chest. “Have you ever thought that I let you catch me?”

I laughed. “Who’s looking for a tumble, now?”

“I admit I was curious, to see if you were as pretty up close as you are from far away. After all, with the amount of dust I was kicking up in your face it was hard to get a good look at those fabled, Shinree features of yours. Now that I have,” Taren ran a slow finger down the sharp slope of my nose, “it was so worth it.” Her caress meandered over the well-defined bones in my face, then across my mouth and jawline. “I find most of your kind uninteresting to look at. They all seem so watered down.”

“That’s what happens after five hundred years of crossbreeding.”

“But not you. You’re different,” she said thoughtfully, continuing to scrutinize me. “They really should make more like you.”

“No, they shouldn’t.”

Fingers still wandering, Taren bit her lip and shivered in approval. “Gods, but you are a tasty one.”

“You can stop now.”

“Why? Did I embarrass you? Don’t you like standing out?” She read the answer on me and laughed. “Gods, Troy, get over it. You’re a throwback. A relic. You don’t blend with anyone, not even your own kind.”

I didn’t bother replying. Taren’s amusement evolved into a peal of taunting laughter and I knew, not only would she dismiss anything I said, she was right. Having been deliberately bred from two, full-blooded Shinree, I was one of the few of my race alive to descend directly from an untainted line. That made my appearance literally straight out of history.

The old records describe my ancestors as tall with a build that’s naturally strong and lean. The sketches show their keenly sharp features and tanned skin, their distinctive pure white, colorless hair and matching eyes. And I wear their stamp, blatantly. Not just physically, either. I could draw the energy out of any stone pulled from the Shinree mines, shape it and bend it to my will, quicker and better than most.

From the perspective of any breeder, I was the perfect Shinree specimen. From the perspective of the common man, I was an oddity, a curiosity. A danger.
And they weren’t far off the mark. If you combine my conspicuous appearance with the brutal history of the Shinree, as well as my own, grave, personal transgressions, the air tends to get real uncomfortable when I walk in a room.

Taren, however, looked a little too comfortable.

“What do you want?” I asked her, shifting in the mud.

“This.” She lowered the knife down inside the collar of my shirt and slid it under the thin strip of leather tied around my neck. Lifting the cord with the blade, she exposed the slender, black shard of obsidian fastened at the end. “I want this.”

“The stone?” I hesitated. “Why?”

“It’s pretty.”

“It’s a rock. A poorly cut one at that.”

“You’re just being modest.” Almost lovingly, she stared down at the shard. “We both know the energy it holds. The dark, wonderful power.”

“There’s no power, Taren. I picked it up on the road a while back.”

“And you kept it, why? Because it matched your coat?” She laughed at me, but the sound cut out abruptly. “It’s been trapped for so long. Waiting,” she said, in a dreamy, tender tone. “Waiting for you to feel it, to wake it up…to embrace it.” Taren’s eyes snapped from the shard, to mine. “It calls to you.”

“You’re wrong.”

“And you lie. I know what the stone is. Where it’s from. What it can do.”

“Drop the act, Taren,” I said, faking disinterest even as my unease grew. “Whatever con you’re playing, it won’t work. You’re Kaelish, not Shinree. Your kind can’t use magic, or sense it, which makes this stone nothing more than a chunk of black rock to you. So what do you want with it?”

“I could ask you the same thing. You gave up channeling magic a long time ago. Yet, you keep a piece of temptation on a string around your neck. So, what do
you
want with it?”

“I want you to get your filthy hands off it.”

Smirking, Taren lowered the knife to my chest and the obsidian went with it. “What’s it been, Troy? Ten years since you last cast a spell?”

“Something like that.” Groping in the sludge, I stretched my arm out further and finally felt steel at the end of my reach. Gradually, I tugged it closer.

“Are we pretending to forget? Or wasn’t your reason for quitting memorable enough?” Taren’s eyes tightened and she grinned slightly. It was a cruel, devious expression that went well with her next words. “Slaughtering all those men. Killing your own commander. What was her name again, Rella’s whore of a Queen?” Taren tilted her head pensively. “Oh, yes…Aylagar.”

My temper spiked. “That’s enough.”

“Personally, I don’t understand what you saw in the little, dark savage, but I do like the way you repaid her attentions. A Queen shares her bed with you, a lowly Shinree, and you drain the life out of her with magic…along with several thousand of her soldiers.” Taren’s grin morphed into a proud smile. “It really was a brilliant strategy. Wipe out all the fighters on both sides so there’s no one left to fight. I love it.”

“That wasn’t what I wanted. I didn’t mean for it to happen that way.”

“Well you should have. Rella and Langor had been at each other’s throats for so long the only way to bring the dogs to heel was to slaughter them.”

I shook my head at her flippancy. “Guess you’re not the sentimental sort.”

“But I can see you are. It’s kind of cute, really. But,” she bent and brushed my lips with hers, “how about I take your mind off all this unpleasantness for a while? And in return,” slowly and meaningfully, she ground her body against mine, “you overlook that little bounty King Sarin placed on my head back in Kael.”

“Which one?”

“All of them.”

“Am I supposed to forget about the family you murdered as well?”

She flashed a wicked grinned. “Which one?”

“I’m not bargaining with you, Taren.” Beneath the bog, I tightened my grip the sword. “You’re going back to Kael, one way or another.”

“Come on, Troy,” she whined. “It’s a fair deal. It’s been a long, lonely three months with nothing between my legs but the back of a filthy horse. And don’t tell me you aren’t interested,” she snaked a hand down the front of me, “because I can feel otherwise.”

“I’ll live. In fact, I’ll probably live a lot longer.” I moved my weapon toward the surface. “Now, use the knife, bitch. Or get off me.”

Taren frowned. “Here I thought you’d be charming, being a war hero and all.”

“I’m not a hero. I never was.”

I expected another crude quip, which would be her last; my sword was ready, just below the top, watery layer of the marsh. But instead of more sarcasm or another bribe, Taren’s expression went strangely blank. Her voice took on an odd, husky, almost mannish tone, and she said, “It’s good you understand that. A magic user is far too selfish a creature to ever be a hero.”

I watched her a moment. Her body was completely still. She wasn’t even blinking. “Taren?” She didn’t answer and a tingle of warning streaked across my shoulder blades. “Taren?”

Abruptly, she flinched. The knife in her hand jumped against my throat, nicking my skin, but I barely noticed. I was too startled by the creepy way her eyes were rolling back in her head and the rapt, sightless stare she was training on me.

With the same, weird voice, she said, “The stone. I’ll give you whatever you want for it.”

Unnerved, I said, “It’s not for sale.”

“You answer so quickly. Can’t we bargain?”

“Sure. Here’s my counter offer.” I hoisted my sword up out of the bog and slammed the muddy hilt into the side of her head, so hard she went flying.

THREE

T
aren hissed as I pressed a cloth against the gash on her head. “Damn it, Troy. Give me that.” Wrists bound, she yanked the rag out of my hand. She struggled to get up, but her ankles were tied too and the slippery mud was unforgiving. “I’m starting to dislike you,” Taren groaned, settling back down.

“Feeling’s mutual.” I gestured at her wound. “Tighter. You’re getting blood on my rope.”

She responded with a rude gesture. I ignored it and squatted down in front of her. Pushing a cascade of mud matted hair back from Taren’s eyes to make sure she could see mine, I said, “I need something from you.”

“Really?” Taren bit her lip. “All you had to do was ask.”

“Not that.” I sat back on my heels. Reaching into my shirt, I pulled out the shard of obsidian. “Tell me why you want this.”

That abnormal, unwavering glare she had before resurfaced. “To fix the circle.”

“What circle?”

Almost like a song, she replied, “A beautiful circle buried in the sand, seamless and whole…until you found it.” Her expression tightened. Her voice followed. “The piece wasn’t yours to take, Troy. An ancient artifact, fashioned into the shape of a King’s circlet, containing a bottomless well of magic…the Crown of Stones is the most remarkable piece of Shinree history ever recovered. It is the most important. And you broke it.”

My entire body stiffened.
How can she know?

I dropped my hand from the shard and stood up. Dozens of questions were spinning in my mind, but all I could get out was, “I didn’t break it.”

Taren gave me a bored yawn. “A little over ten years ago you brought King Raynan Arcana the Crown of Stones, along with the body of his dead wife. He buried Aylagar. You hid the crown—not very well, I might add. But before that, he broke off a part and gave it to you. You put it around your neck and haven’t taken it off since.”