Maddek found no fault with the Rugusian captain’s strategy. Except that he had not looked up.
Lingering by the bedchamber entrance, as if to watch the attack, the two soldiers in the vestibule had not yet taken post by the corridor door. Nor would they ever.
As one, Maddek and Kelir sprang from their hiding places. No weapons did they draw, for they wore them. Silently Maddek landed behind the nearest soldier and with silver claws ripped out the man’s throat to the spine. Hot blood spurted over Maddek’s fingers and splashed the wall. With his opposite hand, he caught the soldier’s sword as it fell from his grip. The soldier convulsed, hands flying to his neck. If any scream he made, it emerged as a bubbling wheeze from his gaping windpipe.
Maddek eased the thrashing body to the floor. Metal armor would have clattered against marble tiles, but the leather armor muffled the soldier’s dying throes, and what little noise remained was concealed by Toric’s heavy grunts.
So too did his grunts conceal the next attack. Like raptors Maddek and Kelir bolted from the vestibule. The group of soldiers had crossed half the distance to the curtained bed, moving silently in a fanned formation that could better keep watch on the darkened corners of the large chamber. But it was from behind that death came for the two soldiers at either end of the fan.
No attempt did Maddek make at silence now. So near to the others, not even Toric’s grunts could mask the tortured wheeze or the wet thunk of throatflesh that Maddek threw to the floor. No attempt did he make to stop this soldier’s sword from clanging against marble. Instead of letting the body fall to the floor, he anchored the dying man against his chest, holding him upright with silver-clawed fingers cradling the soldier’s jaw, letting the others have a clear view of what awaited them.
And using the body as a shield against the crossbow leveled at his heart when the captain spun around. Even in the moonlight, he saw the bloodbare tension that paled the captain’s face.
“Abandon the sly-tongue,” Maddek told him. “I will let you flee by the balcony.”
As he spoke, sudden silence came from the bed, leaving the bedchamber filled with the crash of waves and the heaving of breaths. Though Maddek had not expected the Rugusian to possess any honor, he was not sorry when rage and determination chased the terror from the captain’s skin. But although flushed and shaking, neither the captain nor the remaining soldier fired his crossbow at Maddek or Kelir, wasting the bolt on the corpses the Parsatheans used as shields. Instead the captain and soldier drew closer together, providing better protection for Bazir.
In the council chambers Bazir had scrambled fearfully away from Maddek’s approach. The two guarding him would slow Maddek no more than the table had, yet no fear did he see in the sly-tongue now. Instead there was only familiar arrogance and disdain. That cur’s moonstone eyes gleamed with it—one eye partially slitted closed, swollen and bruised.
“If you are here, who then mounts Yvenne in that bed? There is your answer to why we encountered none of his guard, Holern,” Bazir said to the captain. “The barbarians have not laid a trap for us. Instead they take turns between my sister’s—”
A hoarse scream from deeper within the nest sounded, followed by savage growls as the remaining Rugusian soldiers found the sleeping quarters where Fassad and his wolves waited.
Bazir’s head cocked, listening. When silence fell again he said cheerfully, “Perhaps you had it right, Holern.”
The captain’s jaw clenched but he only told the remaining soldier to keep an eye on the bed, and his own gaze did not move away from Maddek and Kelir. Perhaps hoping for rage to overcome Maddek’s sense, too.
That would not happen. It mattered not what Bazir said.
“She killed our mother. Did she tell you that?” the sly-tongue asked, but the words were nothing, no more substantial than a breeze, because Maddek expected them. “How familiar it must have sounded to you—a queen tragically killed in a failed escape attempt. Is that what you told him, Yvenne?” Raising his voice, he called toward the bed. As he continued, true anger seemed to burn away his smirk. “Or did you give to him a false story, so he would not see through your schemes? Perhaps a tale where our father killed her, though his use for our mother was not done? Or perhaps you blamed Lazen or Cezan, because you have made certain they cannot defend themselves against your lies?”
A failed escape attempt. Harder the words blew, a gale wind battering his heart, yet Maddek stood firm against them. “What use would Zhalen still have for your mother?”
That smirk returned. “To get another daughter upon her. The sickly heir she whelped was . . . inadequate.”
Kelir’s grin flashed through the blood painting his face like a blade through flesh. “Vela does not find her inadequate.”
Neither did Maddek.
Bazir gave a dismissive laugh. “You place your trust in a goddess who abandoned us to the Destroyer? Where was Vela when he killed Queen Venys, the only warrior to ever draw his blood? And when he reanimated Syssia’s beloved queen as a demon, where was the goddess then? But it was not only Syssia that Vela had forsaken. Not only the nations of this alliance. All of the western realms, she abandoned to his destruction. Yet you truly expect her to assist us now?”
Maddek cared nothing of what the goddess did. Only what he believed Yvenne might accomplish.
Those moonstone eyes sharpened, so shrewd and yet so unlike the cleverness of his sister’s. “If you wish to survive the Destroyer’s return, do not look to Yvenne. Join with my father and Aezil, and bow to Enam—and you and your people might have a chance.”
By serving the Destroyer? By welcoming his rule and more of Enam’s corrupt magic?
“I think not,” Maddek said.
“So instead you will follow a queen who is sickly and weak? What fool would do such a thing?” Her brother laughed again, and Maddek knew the shame of having thought and said almost exactly the same. To the bed Bazir called again, “You have truly enslaved him! Perhaps you are no demon, Yvenne, but you have proved yourself more persuasive than ever I believed. First you clear a path to a husband by setting a trap for his queen and king, then you convince him to marry their murderer. Are you certain you do not wish me to take her back to Syssia?”
The last was directed to Maddek—as it all had been, he knew. Trying to stoke his rage, to fuel his doubt.
And enraged Maddek was. Impulsive, he was not. Neither were his warriors.
Danoh had fought beside him far longer than she’d been part of his guard. Maddek knew the only delay had been the moonlight, as Danoh found route to the balcony where the shadow she cast would not expose her movements. The moon was low and shone directly into the bedchamber, so she would be forced to find a wide angle of approach. So wide, she was still nowhere in his sight when he heard the thwap of her bowstring.