I made no mention to anyone, especially Haven and Vex, of Shira’s failed venture into assassination attempts. While as wights they would feel no anger, both could be protective in their way. I could easily see either of them rectifying my more merciful disposition in their own manners. Besides, there were more pressing matters for me to concern myself with: an agent of the god of righteous retribution still prowled Sanctum and would be looking for an opportunity. If I left that matter alone too long, it would fester like a wound. Fortunately and unfortunately, I was no longer the only one looking into it.
Melody set her cup of tea down with a thoughtful sigh, a few strands of dark hair escaping from her perfect bun. “We have had reports of cult activity in the Streets of Broken Sky, Aleyr,” she said. Her tone was not accusatory, friendly to a fault, but I knew her presence in an official capacity at the Winter Palace was not going to go unremarked upon.
Varys’s little leech nose was already probably quivering in anticipation of revenge.
I fought the urge to pinch the bridge of my nose between thumb and forefinger. The problem with Melody serving as the King in Black’s left hand was that she could read me like a book. “You know as well as I that devotees of Erelim were responsible for Luka’s death. This is the only district of the city where human servants of the idiot god could pass without being consumed. It is the natural hiding place. What of it?”
Melody circled the lip of her cup with her index finger, as transparent as a bloody block of granite. “You needn’t be so defensive. I’m on your side. It doesn’t matter where the cult sits in the city, only that it is excised like the cancer it is.”
“You know that’s not true,” I said pointedly. “I am not deaf to Varys and Teth spreading rumors of my corruption.”
“You did snipe Hallen’s men from under her.” Melody’s habit of sounding maddeningly reasonable hadn’t changed. “And Varys is still sour that you stole Shira quite literally from under him, even if he doesn’t know what became of her. You might as well have touched a lit candle wick and cursed it for burning you.”
“What do you want me to do, Melody?” I demanded. “Break down every door in the district? Drag every suspect to Heca for torturous examination? I am not responsible for maintaining His Majesty’s peace, only prosecuting His wars. If you want to take the Eibonguard through my district and shake it until the enemy falls out, you are more than welcome to.”
“I fully intend to,” Melody said softly. “But when the rats go to run, I want them to have a place to go. A place we’ve prepared for them. A trap, baited and set.”
A sourness settled into my stomach. “What did you have in mind?” I wished for something stronger than tea even as I swirled the contents of my cup.
“I want La’an and a few other human members of the Red Sashes to drop as friendly names in a more subtle fashion. Let them think there’s a crack they can wriggle into.”
While scheming wasn’t secondary to my nature, I had lived a long life. “I have a counter offer,” I said bluntly. “Hallen needs to prove his loyalty and he is currently teetering on the edge of disgrace. Use him as your crack.”
“I need someone I can trust not to actually crack.” Melody’s riposte was flawlessly diplomatic in tone. Still, I could tell she was weighing the idea carefully and favorably.
“He will not dare while I hold his men. They are more valuable to him than some assassin of Erelim.”
“You think he can play the role convincingly?” Melody asked, arching a delicate brow. “Hallen is a man accustomed to war more than the niceties of politics and the intricacies of spycraft.”
“He has survived the court long enough to have gray hair. Give him some credit. Besides, who would you prefer to risk?”
Melody smiled faintly. “Point taken. Hallen it is. Though, if Teth and Varys catch wind, they will use it to destroy him utterly before the King in Black.”
“Not if you and I tell His Majesty of his cunning and bold action to trap an assassin at our behest, marking himself a worthy enough servant to be rewarded. Perhaps even with command of his own elite troops again.” I set aside my cup and lifted a stylus, dipping it in ink even as I pulled over a sheet of paper. “I trust that you will not abuse a writ from me?”
“Only if absolutely necessary for your own good,” Melody teased. “You know, Aleyr, I’m beginning to think I’ve rubbed off on you.”
“Merely a temporary confluence. Your mind for intrigue is greater than my own.” I scribbled a simple message and then closed it once the ink had dried, dripping a candle onto the meeting of the fold and sealing it with my signet. The withered emblem of a rose pressed well into the soft red wax. “Give this to Hallen and find the assassin.”
“The bearer of this note comes to you with a request in my name, for my favor,” Melody said, reciting the contents from memory with an impish grin. She had a knack for reading even my scribbles upside down and backwards at a frightening speed. “He will be hard pressed to refuse.”
“I am not accustomed to being refused, least of all by men who owe their lives and men to me.” I held out the writ to her. When she went to take it from my hand, I drew it back for a moment. “There is one more little wrinkle you should be informed of, Melody, but it has to stay between us and only us.”
“Oh?” She held out her hand for the writ.
I placed it on her open palm. “Shira was the second target after Luka.”
Melody’s brow furrowed. “I assumed it was you. Surely followers of Erelim would seek to rescue a captive priestess of Ishal? They are allied gods, and closely so.”
“Anstydir and I interrogated the two assassins that died by poison.” I mentally patted Anstydir on the back for not betraying that information to anyone, even Melody, who would have most certainly asked. Then again, she had been simply my handmaiden at that point. “They believe she is too dangerous as a captive to be left alive.”
“Do you know why?”
I shook my head. If Shira and I were really to someday come to blows, surely they would want her alive. Perhaps their pet prophecy had something about a hero’s fall in it this time.
“An important question to answer.” Melody turned her teacup thoughtfully, dark eyes focused on my face as if I contained the solution to this riddle. “Heca and I will inquire, discreetly. If we turn up anything, I will inform you.”
I smiled, though the expression twisted with pain. “In the King in Black’s service, Melody, you can only have one master.”
“Aleyr, for me not to inform you of a threat to your interests would be against our understanding.”
A sigh slipped from my lips, smile fading. “You will inform me only if the King in Black permits, Melody. Whatever friendship we have cultivated over these past thirty years, it is inconsequential to Him. Just as He took you from me, He will turn you away from me.” It ached deep in my soul. “There is only one god, only one master, in the service of the King in Black. You are my peer now, Melody, not my handmaiden.”
Melody hesitated a moment, then reached out and wrapped delicate fingers around mine. “I am still your friend, Aleyr.”
I regarded her sorrowfully. “There are no permanent alliances in the Undying Court, only permanent interests. His Majesty will demand nothing short of your absolute loyalty, even if that means you incur my displeasure or slight me. I have seen it over and over again, played across centuries. Naltheme was the little girl I pulled from the pyre, and now she is His apprentice and my rival. Teth, a bosom-friend turned into a blood-drinking leech with no thought except how she can replace me. Maric, once my squire in life, now holds no nostalgia for those days, consumed by earning the approval of the King in Black in undeath.”
A brief flicker of hurt flashed across Melody’s face. “Can I not convince you that this will be different?”
“I know Him better than anyone. He will warp any tool to His purpose, trusting that I will follow blindly along in lock-step, the same dutiful Beloved I have ever been.” My expression stayed blank, almost mask-like, but I felt my stomach sour at the thought. “My apologies, Melody. You know how little I can protect anything, even you.”
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She sighed and gave my hand a squeeze. “I know.” She had seen me try to gainsay the King in Black with Naltheme, albeit a confrontation that had occurred behind closed doors: here in the Winter Palace, in my bedchamber.
You cannot do this! She is a child! Let me have one thing of my own, love. Let me keep her, protect her, teach her. Let me be a mother to one who has no one in the world!
The ring on my hand burned with cold at the memory of his withering indifference to my pleas. I wondered some nights if he knew what he had stripped from me. And yet, no matter how I fought, it made no difference in the end. Even encased in agonizing cold on the floor, tears freezing to my face, I had eventually ceased the struggle. Strange, how craven and resigned a supposedly fearless champion could be. That was the pain that had motivated both Melody and I to send her son far, far from the Eternal Kingdom for an apprenticeship, somewhere where no one knew his name or nature.
Shira was not wrong in her estimation of Sanctum. It was a prison where no one walked freely, whatever their rank or privileges, so long as they stood in His shadow. Perhaps the windows of the Winter Palace were not barred, the gates were not sealed, but I was most certainly collared and leashed. I had envied Luka’s freedom in life, his many jaunts in beast form beyond our borders. Now I envied his freedom in death.
Melody squeezed my hand again, the one without His ring. “He will find me harder to warp than they were,” she said firmly. “I am here for you, Aleyr.”
I looked at her, those dark eyes so earnest that they cut my heart. I knew she was wrong, but I couldn’t bring myself to continue saying it. “I hope so,” I said quietly, even though the place where hope sat in my heart was as vacant as an unlit hearth. “I must bid you a fond farewell now that our business is concluded. Shira is waiting for me in the training room, Melody. I promised I would drill with her instead of letting Vex run her in circles today.” I squeezed her hand back. “I consider you my closest friend. The Winter Palace will always, always be open to you.”
“I know.” Melody smiled at me, tinged with melancholy. “The Withered Rose does not revoke her love.”
“Much to her misfortune,” I said, letting go of her hand. I drained my tea and then stood up. “Happy hunting, Melody. Be careful and stay well.”
She bowed her head and waited until I had risen to rise herself. She walked out with Haven as an escort and I took a moment to compose myself once I was alone. All of this was not what I wanted, but what could I do? He always had His way, one way or another. Deep down, a swell of terror whirled like a maelstrom when I thought not just of Melody’s loss, but of Shira’s. If He ever learned of that vision, He would snuff her like a candle flame whatever my feelings on the matter. There was no feeling in Him, let alone a sense of mercy or tolerance.
I had protected Melody for thirty years, kept her from His sight, and still surrendered her when she needed my protection most. Perhaps it would have been worth the torture to try refusing, but wouldn’t it have been worth it?
No. It would have been a performance. Perhaps Melody would have appreciated it, but it would have ended the same. You can defy Him as easily as a vampire can challenge the sun.
I took a long route to the training room, taking my time to put my composure together like armored plates. Shira waited kneeling on the mats in the center of the room, her training sword laid out in front of her. Her eyes were closed, hands folded over her heart in prayer.
The urge to lash out boiled up for an instant, but I curbed my tongue before she could feel its cut. If she wanted to place her faith in Ishal still, foolish as that was, how could I take that from her and stand to look at myself in the mirror without thinking of my own sacrifices to my own god? I announced my presence by closing the door behind me. Her eyes snapped open as the hinges creaked closed, immediately dropping her hands.
She still regarded me like a kicked hound, but I refused to play the villain for the moment. “How was conditioning with La’an?”
He was gentler than Vex, but I still ache, Shira admitted with flicking fingers.
“The majority of the aching will fade.” I’d made the executive decision that the rest of body hardening would be La’an’s duty, not Vex’s. The wight would accidentally break Shira, not understanding pain as a creature incapable of feeling it. “Even I get the occasional sting from it. Did you stretch afterwards?”
Shira nodded. Haven also made sure willow’s bark tea was waiting for me.
“Good. Today we are talking about laerthalu’ur: the mystery of steel.” I set Woe aside in its place and picked up a light training blade. Shira was wearing a gambeson with a training helm next to her, and I was similarly attired, though my helm hung from my belt since I’d been pulled away half-prepared to meet with Melody.
What does that mean? Shira signed, confused. She had never trained as a warrior, so the principle likely was an alien one.
I laughed despite everything and held out my training blade, taking a guard stance with the point of the blade angled out towards her. “Meet me in a bind.”
She furrowed her brow, but caught her blade against mine, true edge against true edge. The blade tapped against mine, a sign she was still so nervous that her hands were shaking.
“Relax,” I said calmly. “This is much more difficult if you are tense and you will betray yourself further into the exercise.”
Shira loosened up her shoulders and relaxed as best she was able, turning the tapping into a faint quiver.
“Close your eyes and push into my blade.” The minute she obeyed, I met her with a press back, just enough to provide resistance without overpowering her. “Focus on the feeling in your hands.” I changed the pressure gradually, first increasing until she was almost forced back, then yielding progressively until she was almost losing contact with my sword. Then I started to vary further with different intensities of each, sudden and changing like a summer storm. “Do you see how much you can fathom by touch?”
Her eyes opened and she let go with one hand, pulling back. I feel the changes, but I don’t know what that has to do with anything.
“If I meet you hard in the clash and bind, what does that tell you?”
She worried at her lower lip with her teeth. You mean to overpower me?
“It could certainly mean that, and often does. Whatever the case, I have an intention for your weapon by using mine: I can push you or pull you like this.” I knocked her blade to one side, then caught it with the other and turned my sword so that the flat of the blade slid against her edge, an attack towards her face with a press that forced her blade out of the way. She stayed still, letting me demonstrate. “What about if I am soft in the bind?”
You’re weaker.
“Perhaps. Shall we find out?” I motioned for her to raise her blade and we met in a bind again. This time I let her push into me, but when she went to copy what I had done, I moved off-line and broke blade contact altogether, hitting her with a switching strike from the other side. Her blade met absent air and mine tapped gently against her cheekbone with the edge of the blade.
So it could mean anything? Shira signed, exasperated.
“My point is that it means not one thing in particular, but that it could mean very many things, which is why you should pay close attention to it. Combat is like a dance: rhythm and sensation are as important as visual acuity and living on the balls of your feet. The important thing is that you know how to capitalize on each and every sensation of steel.”
You said my shaking would betray me later.
“Whether I am pushing hard or yielding softly in the bind, the movement could be either genuine or a deception. The separation between a good swordsman and a great swordsman is quite simple, in my experience. Someone who is merely good fights by using technique and prowess, whether strength or speed, maybe even both. The greats, however, fight by getting inside the heads of their opponents.”
Shira eyed me cautiously. Is that how you are able to compete with undead?
I laughed, letting my training sword rest against my shoulder. “It’s the only way the living can compete. If it were merely a test of speed or strength or skill, even a vampire as young as Varys would stomp me into the gutter.” I touched my temple with my index finger. “But here, I can be every bit their superior still, especially if I know what drives them, what they expect, what they want. The same is true with mortal opponents. Many I fought expected me to be weak because I was a woman, so I would play to that stereotype until the moment I could punish them for their hubris. If they knew my reputation and expected a brute, I could lumber about and then use that yielding to displace and strike with speed. If they expected aggression, I could switch to defense to throw them off-balance or if they expected defense, do the opposite. The point is that if you are only what you appear, you will lose.”
A principle you’ve taken into many domains, Shira observed shrewdly through her sign-speech. A woman of many faces.
“You may find that many of the lessons of battle serve you well off the field as well. Deception is a valuable tool for survival in many avenues, especially swordplay. If your opponent can be beaten here,” I tapped my temple again, “then beating him with a sword is infinitely easier. But be warned: the converse is true as well. If he can deceive you or dominate you mentally, you face an exponentially more difficult battle.”
The stories said you won through cruelty and magic, not simple trickery.
“I assure you that trickery is seldom simple.” I grinned a little. “Shall we make a trickster out of you, Shira?”
She adjusted her grip on her sword to include both hands and nodded eagerly. For all her gentle nature and native fear of me, she was still eager to learn on every occasion and I welcomed the distraction from the real world. Besides, I wanted her well-equipped before she had to contend with any of the dangers of Sanctum, including the servants of a god of Light. Melody’s shaking would buy me time, but not forever.
Zealots would come for Shira eventually. My task was to prepare her as much as possible so that she would survive.