“A charming image. Now, walk.”
Eliana dug deep for strength and pulled free of Simon’s grip. Without him holding her up, the world turned upside down. She collapsed at once, but Simon caught her before she could hit the ground.
“What’s wrong with her?” came Navi’s worried voice.
“Eliana?” Simon’s hand cupped her cheek. “What does it feel like, what’s happening to you? If you don’t tell me, I can’t help you.”
She took three long, shallow breaths to quell the sick feeling rising in her throat, then glared up at him with watery eyes. “This is the first real lead I’ve had since leaving Orline,” she said through gritted teeth. “I’m not going to give it up. Don’t make me hurt you, Simon. I’m not keen to.”
He quirked an eyebrow. “Aren’t you?”
“God, do you ever shut up?” She tried to shove past him, but Navi was the one to stop her that time.
“Eliana, stop this,” she said quietly. “Let’s go back. It isn’t safe out here.”
“But I can find my mother,” Eliana insisted, “and all the others who have been taken.” She glanced at Simon. “Including people from Red Crown.”
“Unimportant,” Simon said. “Our priority is getting Navi to Astavar. Once that’s done, I’ll help you find your mother. As we agreed.”
“Or I could go find her right now. By the time we get to Astavar, it could be too late.”
“A risk you knew when you accepted my offer.”
“Why do you care about me staying with you, anyway? If it’s a fighter you want, Camille has dozens of sellswords to pick from.”
The words said, Eliana’s mind began to clear, cutting through her muddled senses. Why does he care indeed? When she looked back at Simon, his carefully implacable face told her the truth: she’d hit upon a nerve.
“What is it about me,” she said quietly, taking one step toward him, then another, “that makes you want to keep me close?”
Navi looked curiously back and forth between them. Simon opened his mouth, hesitated.
Then a voice rattled from the shadows underneath the nearby staircase: “Because you’re special, Eliana Ferracora. And he wants you for his own. Just as I do.”
Eliana’s mouth went dry at the sound of that voice. She knew it, though now it rasped rather than purred.
A slim figure came into the light, wearing a tattered black uniform and frayed crimson cloak made nearly unrecognizable by the caked mud and bloodstains marring the once-fine fabric.
“Rahzavel,” Eliana whispered in horror. Even Simon seemed dumbstruck. “You’re alive.”
The assassin grinned, his pale face marked with a long, swollen scar that ran down from his temple, bissected his face, and disappeared into his collar. His white hair hung in matted clumps.
“Alive,” he agreed, “and so very excited to kill you.”
Then he ripped his sword from the sheath at his waist, raised it with a horrible hungry cry, and swung hard for Eliana’s neck.
33
Rielle
“I’d hoped the recent news wouldn’t reach you for several more days. It is true, however, about Prince Audric and the Dardenne girl. I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you in person. Stay in Belbrion, guard the north. Patience, my son. All will be as it should, and soon.”
—Letter from Lord Dervin Sauvillier to his son, Merovec
May 30, Year 998 of the Second Age
The doors to King Bastien’s council hall banged open.
Rielle shot to her feet. She had been tensely waiting in a hard, uncomfortable chair for a solid hour under the equally tense eyes of her guard. During that hour she had prayed for the hasty arrival of the king, so they could get the inevitable explosion over with.
Now, however, with the king storming to his seat—the Archon, the queen, her father, every member of the Magisterial Council, and Lord Dervin Sauvillier accompanying him—Rielle passionately wished she could return to her lonely chair and sit there for the rest of the day, unbothered.
At least Audric and Ludivine had come in as well, standing at opposite ends of the table.
“Lady Rielle,” began the king, his voice tight as he stood behind the enormous Privy Council table, “I have no idea where to begin.”
“Well,” said Lord Dervin, the words bursting out of him in a razor-thin voice, “perhaps we can start by discussing Lady Rielle’s willful abuse of power during her latest trial. Or else, her flagrant disregard for the sanctity of our children’s engagement—”