The Price of Valor (10 page)

He led Marcus back to the first floor and into the kitchen, where a low-ceilinged doorway led farther down. Two guards stood beside it, rifles at the ready, and saluted at the two officers' approach. The stairway beyond had been cut into the bedrock, lit by candles resting in wall nooks crusted over with wax. It went down at least fifteen feet before straightening out into a short tunnel.

“This was originally a wine cellar,” Giforte said. “Whoever lived here must have had quite a collection.”

The tunnel ended in a wooden door, caked with dirt and grime. Giforte knocked twice.

“Yes?” The voice from within was a young woman's, oddly slurred.

“It's Captain Giforte,” Giforte said. “I've brought Colonel d'Ivoire.”

Something opened with a
snick
, and the door swung inward. The woman beyond was barely out of her teens, wearing a dark robe that pooled around her ankles and hung loose at her wrists. It had a hood, but this was pulled back, and her face in the candlelight was alarming. It was round and pleasant, even beautiful, but the right half hung drooping and slack, like the skin of a corpse. Her right eye was milky and sightless, and even her hair on the right side was coming in stark white at the roots, displacing her natural brown.

“Captain,” she said, with a slight bow. “Colonel. Welcome. I am Auriana Daatifica.” When she spoke, the right half of her mouth didn't move, giving all her words a slight lisp.

Marcus nodded nervously, trying not to stare. “I was told you had a message for me.”

“We've been expecting you.” Auriana stepped out of the doorway and gestured. “Come in. Captain, I must ask that you remain behind.”

“Of course,” Giforte said, looking relieved. “I'll see you upstairs, sir.”

Marcus stepped through the doorway, and Auriana shut and bolted the door behind him. They were in a small chamber with bare rock walls, lit by more candles. Auriana led Marcus through another arched stone doorway, walking with a slow, gliding gait that could not quite conceal a limp.

“You were in Khandar with the mistress, weren't you?” Auriana said.

“I was with the Colonials there, yes,” Marcus said carefully.

“She has told us about you. You fought to bring us our sacred texts.”

“I'm not sure I understand.”

“Here,” Auriana said.

They were walking down a long gallery, with more archways on both sides. Auriana indicated one of the left, and Marcus peered inside. There was a closet-sized space beyond, empty except for a pair of candles and a massive steel tablet propped against the far wall.

Marcus' breath caught in his throat. The last time he'd seen one of those tablets, they were hidden in a nightmare temple under a mountain in the Great Desol, two thousand miles away and a lifetime ago. The light playing over the deeply incised runes on their surfaces brought back memories of smoke and fire, of corpses with glowing green eyes lurching through the darkness to rend and tear,
of magic that screeched like knives on glass and blasted solid stone to fragments. Of looking down the sights of musket at Jen, beautiful and terrible, wreathed in sorcerous power, and pulling the trigger.

Not that it was worth a damn.
Musket balls had been no more effective than mosquito bites. They'd survived thanks to Ihernglass, who'd somehow acquired a power from these very tablets. They were the treasure Janus had gone to Khandar to find, his
other
secret weapon.
The Thousand Names.

He'd known they were somewhere in the city, but he'd done his best to put them out of his mind. Demons and sorcery, he'd decided, were above his pay grade, no matter how high that pay grade ended up rising.
Leave that sort of thing to Janus.

But Janus was in the League, and the Names were here in Vordan.

“I was there,” Marcus said. “But I'd rather not talk about it.”

“As you will,” Auriana said. “Come with me. The mistress is waiting.”

At the far end of the gallery was another archway, blocked off with a curtain. Auriana pushed through, and Marcus followed her into a somewhat larger room. Here someone had made an effort to make the raw stone chamber more comfortable—lamps shed a bright, warm light, and overlapping carpets underfoot cut the chill. A half dozen sleeping pallets clustered against one wall, and a pair of portable writing desks of the sort Marcus had used in his army tent sat against the other. Small cushions were scattered everywhere, mounding up in the corners. In the center of the room a young woman sat, eyes closed, hands folded in front of her, breathing slowly and deliberately.

“Mistress,” Auriana said diffidently. “Colonel d'Ivoire is here.”

The young woman opened her eyes. She was dressed in a robe like Auriana's, gray instead of black, and had the dark hair and gray skin of a Khandarai. Marcus recognized her, vaguely, from a hurried introduction before they'd all taken ship. He gave an awkward nod and dredged up his rusty Khandarai.

“It's Feor, right?”

She got smoothly to her feet, speaking in good, if accented Vordanai. “It is. It's good to see you, Colonel d'Ivoire.” Feor gestured to Auriana. “I will speak to the colonel alone, Auri.”

“Yes, Mistress.” Auriana sat where Feor had been, with some difficulty from her stiff leg. Feor took Marcus' arm and led him back through the curtain.

“Your Vordanai has gotten a lot better,” Marcus said. She'd been able to manage only a few halting words the last time they spoke.

“Out of necessity,” Feor said. “I have had a great deal of practice.”

“Who are those two?” Marcus indicated the curtain. “If I'm allowed to be in on the secret.”

“Janus told me I could tell you whatever you asked,” Feor said. “Though I am not to bother you unnecessarily. Auri and Justin are my students. There are three others as well, though they are not here at the moment.”

“Ah.” Marcus shifted awkwardly. “You're teaching them . . . magic?”

Feor gave a wan smile. “I am teaching them what I can. Mother knew a hundred times what I know, but she is not here, and our need is great. We must unlock the power of the Thousand Names if we are to defeat the
abh-naathem
.”

Marcus could parse that, after a fashion.
Naathem
was the Khandarai name for someone who could use magic, a sorcerer; it literally meant “one who has read.”
Abh
was false, deviant, deformed, disgusting.

“People like Jen, you mean. The woman we fought in the temple.” An agent of the Priests of the Black. She'd called herself one of the Penitent Damned.

Feor nodded. “They know that we have the Names. They will try to destroy us. I believe that the gods have set us against them, as a trial of strength.”

“So you're training them to be wizards?” The idea seemed ridiculous, something out of a fairy story.

“I am training them to read a
naath
from the Names. They must learn the characters, but more important, they must prepare their spirits. Reading a
naath
is a trial that few escape unscathed.”

“Is that what happened to Auriana? She seems . . .”

“Yes. She was fortunate. Others have . . . not been so lucky.”

There was something deep and haunted in Feor's eyes. Marcus coughed, nervously, feeling as though he were standing at the edge of a vast abyss.

“I got a message,” he said after a moment. “There was something you needed to tell me.”

Feor nodded again. “Every
naathem
can feel others of our kind, if they are close enough, depending on the strength of the
naath
on both sides. There are a few small powers in the city, but in the past few days I have felt something . . . larger. An
abh-naathem
of great strength. Janus wanted you to be warned.”

“One of these Penitent Damned?”

“I have no way of knowing, but Janus thought it likely. That a wild
naathem
could be so strong is vanishingly unlikely.”

“Wonderful,” Marcus muttered. He had met two of the Penitent Damned, the demon-bearing agents of the Priests of the Black. The first, Jen Alhundt, he had fallen in love with, right up until she'd tried to kill him in the underground
Desoltai temple. The second, Adam Ionkovo, had tried to get him to betray Janus, dangling the truth about what had happened to Marcus' family as bait. After Orlanko's fall, the Penitent had slipped out of a locked and guarded prison cell without leaving a trace. “Can you tell me
where
this
abh-naathem
is?”

“Not unless he comes very close to here.”

“So what am I supposed to do?”

“Be careful,” Feor said. “And keep your eyes open. If you catch a hint of anything amiss, tell me at once.” She hesitated. “I lack the power to confront an
abh-naathem
directly, but it's possible I will have information that can help.”

Marcus nodded slowly.
That's not exactly reassuring.
“All right. Thanks for the warning. Anything else?”

“No.” Feor hesitated. “May I ask you something?”

“Certainly.”

“Do you have any word of Lieutenant Ihernglass and Corporal Forester?”

It had been Ihernglass and Forester, Marcus remembered, who rescued Feor during the Khandarai campaign. Ihernglass had taken the quick passage back to Vordan with Janus and Marcus himself while Feor and Forester had stayed with the rest of the regiment on the slower transport.

“I know they're both in the east with Janus. Ihernglass raised a company of
women
to help defend the city, if you can believe that.” Marcus still wasn't sure he could, or why Janus had allowed it. “I think Forester was helping him. They all marched out with the Army of the East.”

“They were well?”

“They were the last time I saw them, after the Battle of Midvale. There's been fighting since then, and we haven't gotten much word.”

Feor nodded gravely. “Thank you.”

“Of course. If you get any more information, about this
abh-naathem
or”—Marcus wanted to say “any other weird nonsense,” but thought it might not be politic—“ask Giforte to send word.”

“I shall. I wish you the best of luck, Colonel.”

“Thanks.” Between the queen and this mysterious sorcerer, Marcus was beginning to think he'd need it.

*   *   *

The actual trick of faking the queen's exit from the city was accomplished with a minimum of fuss. The first step was the queen's announcement that, in the interest of safeguarding the Orboan line, she had reluctantly agreed to leave the city for an unnamed, more secure location. She gave quite a nice speech for the occasion,
Marcus had to admit, but the occasion was somewhat spoiled by the fact that it was only lightly attended; the commons had apparently decided it was dangerous to get too close to the queen. Those who did attend, forced to by custom or social position, came with conspicuous bodyguards. Combined with the heavy presence of Patriot Guards, Grenadier Guards, and red-coated Mierantai, the armed men probably outnumbered the civilians.

Marcus had reluctantly agreed that the performance was necessary to reassure the public that the queen had not, in fact, been killed in the blast, contrary to rumors already racing through the city. Having proven that she was still in one piece, at least to those who'd bothered to show up, Raesinia was whisked down from the platform and into a waiting coach, guarded by a phalanx of Grenadier Guards on horseback.

It headed north, toward the road that led past Ohnlei and into the country. Near the edge of the city, however, they stopped to collect the queen's luggage and supplies for the journey. A servant girl, dressed in a hooded robe, climbed into the darkened vehicle with a few personal effects. Raesinia, suitably reattired, climbed out. The double would be told the switch was for security reasons, to guard against an ambush on the road.

Marcus waited beside Raesinia, watching the convoy of coach, wagons, and guards rumble away. He had to keep reminding himself that it was the
queen
standing beside him. In plainclothes, she looked like any other pretty young girl, her slight figure making her look younger than her twenty years.

“Colonel?” she said as the convoy turned a corner and passed out of sight.

“Yes, Your Majesty?”

Raesinia winced. “For starters, you're going to have to stop calling me that, or this ruse isn't going to last very long.

“Oh.” Marcus tapped the hilt of his saber uncomfortably. “Then . . . my lady?”

“Raesinia,” said Raesinia. “I have a name. Raes, even, if you prefer. Remember, I work for you now.”

Officially, Raesinia was now a courier in Marcus' service, giving her a plausible excuse to be staying at Twin Turrets should anyone inquire. Only Lieutenant Uhlan and his Mierantai guards knew the truth.

“All right.” Marcus gritted his teeth. “Raes.”

“Is something wrong?”

There were at least a hundred things wrong that Marcus could think of, starting with the fact that Marcus had been ordered to try and protect the Queen
of Vordan while she wandered around incognito playing at being a private investigator. He forced a smile. “I'm just worried that you won't find the accommodations at Twin Turrets up to your usual standard.”

Raesinia waved a hand irritably. “Never mind about that. Are you ready to get started? I have a few ideas, but of course I welcome anything you can come up with.”

Marcus closed his eyes for a moment and blew out a long breath.
All right.
This was the assignment, the mission Janus had handed him. Marcus might not approve—the thought of being personally responsible for the safety of the queen while she wandered around the city might leave him a bit weak at the knees—but that was neither here nor there.
Trusting Janus' judgment has gotten me this far. It's too late to stop now.