Prince's Fire (13 page)

Knife or arrow in his back, he could not tell.

Townsfolk were fleeing the scene in every direction. He had to find cover. He was a dead man if he stayed where he was.

He stumbled toward the chocolate shop door.

Someone charged toward him through the scattering civilians. He reached for the hilt of his sword, but his arm wasn't working. The attacker crashed into him, knocking him to the ground. A crossbow bolt slammed into the wall where he'd been.

“Stay where you are.”

The person who'd knocked him down was a woman—he could tell by her voice. She was enormous, easily as tall as he was, and she held a longbow. Quick as lightning, she drew back the bowstring and released an arrow. It dropped a man standing on a rooftop across the street.

Two more men came running. The woman nocked another arrow. She swung around as if to select another target, but did not loose the arrow.

“We're friends,” called one of the men as they approached. He dropped to Rayn's side. “I'm a Healer, and Tomas is a war mage. Are you wounded anywhere besides your back?”

“No,” Rayn gasped.

Tomas spoke to the archer. “You see any others?”

“One,” said the archer. “I think he's running.”

“Should I give chase?”

She shook her head. “Stay.”

The Healer pulled out a knife and cut off Rayn's tunic around the bolt wound. “I'm going to get this out. Stay calm.”

“Won't I bleed to death if you take it out?” He'd heard it could be more dangerous, sometimes, to remove an arrow or bolt than to leave it where it was.

“I know what I'm doing,” said the man. “You won't bleed to death.”

The streets had cleared after the attack, but a few civilians were returning now to stare at the scene.

“Get out of here,” growled the archer, threatening them with her bow.

She and Tomas began to speak about the dead man on the rooftop, but Rayn soon lost the ability to focus on their words. The Healer was tugging at the bolt in his back, and the pain flared so badly he went blind with it, clenching his fists and grinding his teeth.

“Hold still,” said the Healer.

He lost consciousness.

When he came to, the archer still stood above him with an arrow nocked in her longbow, but Tomas was gone. The rooftop assassin lay at the archer's feet; apparently someone had fetched him. Rayn saw that he wasn't dead after all. The assassin was breathing, though he had an arrow in his side and was bleeding copiously.

Rayn gave an experimental twitch and discovered his back didn't hurt nearly as much as before.

“Take it easy.” The Healer rose to his feet at Rayn's side and gently helped him up. “I'll need to work on that wound some more later, but you can stand. No sudden movements.”

Rayn reeled, dizzy, as his body came upright. He'd lost blood, all right—there was a pool of it where he'd been. Not as much as the other man had.

The Healer handed him a bloody crossbow bolt. “Souvenir?”

Rayn shuddered and pushed it away. “Who are you?”

“We're friends,” said the Healer.

That didn't answer his question. Where had they come from?

The Healer nudged the wounded assassin with his boot. “You want me to fix him up? What are we going to do with him?”

“Interrogate him, I'm sure,” said the archer. “You might need to take the arrow out so we can move him.”

Were they Riorcan city guards? He doubted it. They weren't uniformed. Maybe he'd been assigned a protection detail without being aware of it. He might be inclined to complain about that if they hadn't just saved his life.

Civilians were gathering again, this time watching from a distance. He heard footsteps—a group of people running toward them. He shivered, still jumpy from the attack. The archer aimed her bow in the direction of the newcomers. A group of six people rounded the corner, and she lowered the weapon. Rayn recognized three of them immediately: Tomas, Princess Celeste, and her new bodyguard.

“Oh, thank the gods,” panted Celeste as her eyes fell on him.

“My cousin's ship has arrived,” he said. “I know I can't go to the docks in this condition, but can someone fetch my cousin and bring him back here?”

“Your cousin's ship?” asked Celeste. “Is that the one bringing your message from home?”

“No ship arrived at the harbor today,” said the huge bodyguard.

“Are you certain?”

“Quite certain,” said the bodyguard.

Soldier's Hell.
The whole thing had been a ruse. He turned to Celeste. “Who are these people?”

“Let's get you back to the Enclave building,” she said. “I'll explain there.”

B
ack at the Enclave building, Celeste followed Justien downstairs to the underground prison. Ahead of them strode the tall, powerful-looking woman with the longbow slung over her shoulder. She held the captured assassin, who remained conscious but weak. The Healer had already removed the arrow.

The archer carried the assassin into a cell. Guards swarmed around the pair, blocking Celeste's view.

Justien halted outside the cell, and the archer came out to meet him. “Your Imperial Highness,” she said to Celeste, dipping her head.

“This is my wife, Nalica,” said Justien.

Celeste clasped wrists with the archer. Clearly this woman was another member of the Order of the Sage. “Thank you for what you did. I'm sure you saved the Inyan prince's life.”

Rayn came up beside her. “Yes, thank you.” He clasped wrists with Nalica as well.

Celeste looked him over. He stood awkwardly, one shoulder raised a little higher than the other. “You should go and finish with the Healer.”

“In a moment. I want to see what you learn from this man, since apparently he wanted me dead.”

Celeste turned to Justien. “Are you going to question him?”

Justien nodded. “It won't be pretty, but it needs doing. We'll want a mind mage. Would you . . . ? I hate to ask, Your Imperial Highness, but I'm not sure I trust anybody else.”

Celeste swallowed. She'd never done this sort of work before, never even viewed an interrogation, though she knew they took place beneath the Imperial Palace. An interrogation was only as reliable as the mind mage who sat in and used magic to determine whether the prisoner was telling the truth. Prisoners would say anything when subjected to torture—lies, truths, half-truths, whatever made the pain stop. Without a trustworthy mind mage, one who honestly reported what her magic told her, interrogation had little to no value. “I can serve as your mind mage. We need a writ, though, or it's not legal.”

“I'm authorized to write those. Have you done interrogations before?” asked Justien.

“Not as such—”

One of the guards inside the cell cried out in a frantic voice, “Justien!”

Justien darted into the cell, followed by Nalica. Celeste trailed after them as far as the doorway. Inside the cell, the prisoner convulsed on the stone bench.

Justien turned from the prisoner and cried, “Healer! Kasellus, where are you?”

The Healer who'd helped Rayn shoved past them into the cell, followed by more guards. They surrounded the assassin. From the door, Celeste craned her neck but couldn't see what was going on. Though dying to ask questions, she held her tongue. The men were obviously trying to save the assassin's life.

The noise and frantic activity around the assassin slowed. Then it ceased, and the men who'd been standing over him stood up, their shoulders slumping.

“That's it,” said Kasellus. “He's gone.”

“He's dead?” cried Celeste from the door.

“Fucking deathstone,” snarled Justien. “That's enough. Get out.”

The men filed out of the cell, leaving only Justien and Nalica and the assassin. Celeste went in, followed by Rayn. The assassin lay pale and still on the bench.

“He had a deathstone?” asked Celeste.

Justien lifted the assassin's head and indicated a spot on the back of his neck. “Feel.”

Hesitantly, Celeste touched the place. There were two lumps, one for the riftstone and one for the deathstone. The assassin's body was still warm. Her skin crawled. It was not often she saw a dead man, let alone touched one.

“What's a deathstone?” asked Rayn, touching his own fingers to the spot.

“A bit of Riorcan magic,” said Celeste. “It's attuned to the person in whom it's implanted. That person can activate it at any time to release a death spell upon themselves.”

Rayn blinked. “Why would they do that?”

Justien ran his hands over the victim's clothes, searching him. “For exactly the reason this man did it. To avoid interrogation.”

“I know about it because the empress has one,” said Celeste. “It was implanted in her when she was a girl. Ista has one too.”

“They're not generally used anymore.” Justien fumbled in a pocket he'd found sewn into the assassin's tunic. “The Circle once used them, back in the day—ah.” He retrieved a folded piece of paper. “Here's something, maybe.”

“What is it?” asked Celeste.

Justien unfolded the paper. He looked at it, and his triumphant smile faded. “It's in code. I can't read it.”

A frisson of excitement buzzed through Celeste. “Let me see.”

Justien handed it to her. On the paper was a series of unreadable Riorcan letters, all uppercase, with no spaces or punctuation. “Can your team break ciphers?” she asked.

Justien's brows rose in bewilderment. “Are you joking?”

“No,” said Celeste. “If your people can't break it, I might be able to.”

Rayn peered over her shoulder at the letter. “How can you decode it without the key?”

“I'm a mathematician. I can break most ciphers, given sufficient time and a long enough message.”

“But they're just random letters,” said Rayn.

“In fact, they are not,” said Celeste. “They mean something, and the fact that they do should give me a foothold in deciphering them. I can't say for certain whether I can break this particular message—it's less than a page long. But it's worth trying.”

“Gods know we've nothing else at this point,” said Justien. Snarling at the dead assassin, he aimed a kick at the prison bench.

Rayn turned to Celeste. “I'd like to talk to you.”

“About what?” She was wary of anything Rayn might have to say to her, now that she knew how he felt about her family. “Shouldn't you see Kasellus and get that wound healed?”

“It can wait,” said Rayn.

“We'll be called to assembly soon,” said Justien. “The Riorcans will want to hear about the attack. You should see Kasellus before they drag you off to the assembly room.”

“We'll talk after the assembly,” said Rayn.

•   •   •

Rayn spent an hour with Kasellus, a skilled Healer who managed to remove every last vestige of pain from his arrow wound. Then, knowing he smelled of sweat and blood, he visited the baths in the basement level of the Enclave building, and was summoned to the assembly just minutes after he'd returned. It was a smaller group than usual. They convened in a dining room and were served luncheon: a salad course followed by a chowder of seafood, root vegetables, and spinefruit. Celeste and Justien and Nalica were present, along with several members of the Riorcan leadership. One seat was empty; they were waiting for Governor Asmund, who'd been away from the building at the time of the attack and had to be fetched by a runner.

Rayn tucked into his food, happy to be alive. While it was clear someone—Celeste?—had arranged discreet protection for him against his expressly stated wishes, he could hardly complain about it. He'd been wrong, and she'd been right. He might not need bodyguards at home in Inya, a civilized country, but he certainly needed them here.

He turned to Celeste and spoke in a low voice. “Were you the one who arranged for me to be followed by Nalica and Kasellus?”

She stiffened. “Yes.”

“Thank you.”

She met his eyes briefly, looking relieved, before returning to her food.

He'd been a fool to push her away. The more he thought about it, the more embarrassed he felt. He knew so many families where the son or daughter was entirely unlike either parent. He'd spent time with Celeste. He'd talked to her, relied upon her in the Riorcan wilds, exchanged stories with her. He
knew
her. Why had he ignored the evidence before his eyes and blamed her for the crimes of an entirely different person?

And after he'd pushed her away, she'd taken steps to save his life. Possibly she'd done it for political reasons; Kjall didn't want a foreign prince assassinated on their territory. But he could not deny that she'd taken action to safeguard his life when it would have been easier for her to do nothing at all.

Governor Asmund entered the room and took the remaining seat. “Sorry I'm late.”

Greetings were exchanged, and Asmund asked Rayn to describe the events that had taken place on the street where he'd been attacked. With some help from Nalica, Rayn did so. Then the conversation turned to what had happened in the prison below.

Asmund eyed Bayard and Ista. “What do you make of the fact that the captured assassin had a deathstone?”

Ista shrugged. “It means the assassin was Riorcan. Someone from an old Circle enclave in the mountains, I imagine.”

“The Obsidian Circle?” Rayn was confused. “The organization you're a part of?”

“Yes and no,” said Bayard. “Not all of our people approved of the Circle's new role in governing Riorca as a Kjallan province. Some of the Circle members left the organization. This assassin could have been one of them.”

“A mercenary, perhaps?” asked Justien. “Paid to carry out this assault?”

Bayard shrugged. “It's possible.”

“Could be money is the motive,” said Ista. “Gods know the enclaves trained enough of us, and an assassin's job skills don't transfer well to other professions.”

“Might be the breakaway enclave,” said Justien.

“What's that?” asked Rayn.

“One of the groups which broke away from the Circle.”

“Why would an Obsidian Circle breakaway enclave want to murder Rayn?” asked Celeste. “He's prince of a nation that has nothing to do with them.”

“For the money,” said Ista. “Fund-raising's not so easy when you can't bully the local villages into coughing up tetrals. Or they may hope to provoke Kjall and Inya into war. If that's the case, they'll want Rayn killed
here
, on Kjallan soil or a Kjallan ship.” She turned to Rayn. “You might be safer if you returned home.”

Rayn eyed Celeste. “Our treaty negotiations are not complete.”

“I'm still trying to work out the political motives,” said Celeste. “If money was the cell's motive, someone had to hire them. Rayn, if you're assassinated, who takes your place as heir to the Inyan throne?”

Rayn hesitated. “At the moment, it would be my illegitimate daughter, Aderyn. She's an infant, so a regency council would be appointed to rule in her stead until she comes of age and marries.”

“Who would be on the regency council?”

“The Land Council appoints three people.”

Ista spoke. “So the Land Council arranges to have you assassinated overseas where the blame is likely to fall on Kjall or Riorca rather than upon them. Then your daughter becomes queen and they name three of their own people for the regency council, thus seizing control of your country.”

“That scenario is plausible,” said Rayn. “But it's only speculation.”

“Speculation is all we've got,” said Ista. “With the captured assassin dead, we've no one to interrogate.”

Rayn's eyes went to the Imperial Princess. They had no one to interrogate, but they did have an enciphered letter. Could Celeste break the code?

•   •   •

Celeste returned to her room with an inkpot, a quill, a stack of paper, and a mug of chocolate. She sat in the middle of the bed, spreading her writing tools around her, sipped her chocolate, and began analyzing the encoded letter. The preliminary work of decryption was rote and tedious, yet satisfying in its way. She began by making a list of every symbol that appeared in the ciphertext and marking down how many times it appeared. From the start, she observed something that gave her pause: there were many more distinct characters in the ciphertext than appeared in any language known to her. Frowning, she began calculating the percentages of how often each character appeared.

A knock came at her door, and Rayn was announced. After a moment's nervous hesitation, she called, “Enter. I'm in the bedroom.”

She heard his heavy steps through the anteroom. He appeared in the archway, and as always, her heart dropped at the sight of him. It was unfair. Someone should pass a law against men this gorgeous.

“Working on the cipher?” he asked.

She nodded.

“Any progress yet?”

“No, I'm just beginning frequency analysis.”

“May I see?”

She beckoned him closer, wishing that having him near didn't bring back those memories of the pool in the Riorcan wilds and how he'd worshipped her body—so it had seemed. Of course he hadn't
seen
her body. She'd been underwater until the end, and by that point he'd been too preoccupied to notice her flaws.

He looked through her lists of characters and frequency percentages. “I don't understand what any of this means. But it looks impressive.” The bed sank as he sat on the edge. “Who are Justien and Nalica? I mean,
what
are they? They don't wear uniforms like the Legaciatti.”

“I can't talk about that.”

“Well, I owe you an apology,” he said.

Her face flushed, and she turned away. “For what?”

“For not trusting you. For holding you accountable for your father's crimes, and for judging you based on Inyan ideas about bodyguards that don't apply in Kjall. After all that, you still looked after me. I believe you saved my life.”

“Well, you saved mine when you jumped out of that ship. Thank you for that.” She licked her lips and turned back to her percentages. “Anyway, you know I couldn't allow an Inyan prince to be assassinated on Kjallan soil.”

He was silent for a moment. “Is that the only reason you helped?”

“I'm not certain what you're asking.”

He sighed. “Do you suppose we might start over? Let me court you the way I ought to have done the moment Lucien proposed the match.”