Kip’s knuckles popped, he was clenching his fists so hard. He’d come here tonight ready to die. Because even if you think you know what’s going to happen, when death is in the offing, and Andross Guile is in the room . . . well, he’s Andross Guile.
“Of course not,” Karris interjected. Her face twisted as she added, “son.”
Zymun grinned in victory, changed his look to unconvincing sadness an instant later, and took the spear-point-bladed knife from Blackguard Commander Fisk.
There was a kneeling pillow at the front center of the podium. Zymun extended his hand to Karris. “Come, daughter,” he said. As if he were Prism already.
Kip looked at Andross and found Andross staring back at him, but his eyes were inscrutable.
He was really going to let this happen.
They all were.
Though Kip had shown up ready to die, Zymun, of course, had never once thought that he might be the Guile to die. To him, this was all a game, a show for his entertainment.
To Kip, it was a nightmare he couldn’t wake from. He could see why Andross didn’t want to depose Zymun today: he was a figurehead without any real power, but for the people of the Jaspers, losing another Prism on the very eve of a battle for their survival would be a devastating blow to morale. He was handsome, and the son of the beloved Gavin Guile—that’s all most of the people knew. Andross wanted Zymun to strut through whatever of the Sun Day events they could manage, maybe read a speech Andross had written for him, and then quietly go away right afterward. And Kip was needed for the islands’ defense.
So it had to be Karris.
She made a sign of benediction to the crowd. “My faithful ones,” she said, “I’ve run my race. I pass my light on to you, my friends. You fight like hell. Orholam be with you. And please, when we are victorious over the pagans—when we are, for I have no doubts of that—do not hold the shedding of my blood against Ironfist or the Parians. I am not without blame in this. Take no vengeance for me, but stitch Paria back into these Seven Satrapies with grace and mercy, as Orholam would will it.”
There were quiet sobs in the room. The Blackguards were all stony-faced sorrow. Karris took a few moments to make eye contact with them one last time. Many in the crowd looked on with abject horror, while others simply seemed titillated.
This is not happening.
Karris looked at Kip, and her mouth pursed with regret. She nodded to him in farewell.
Then she knelt on the pillow.
“We’re not doing anything yet,” Andross said loudly.
Usually, that would have been the end of it, but Zymun didn’t move. He’d put his hand on Karris’s forehead, ostensibly in blessing, tilting her head back to expose her throat.
“Grandfather,” Zymun said, his voice dripping contempt, “this is now a matter between the Prism and his faithful. This is sacrosanct. For the sake of the Seven Satrapies, I’m afraid I can’t allow you to—”
Kip had been with the Blackguard long enough to recognize the small move with his right hand backward, drawing the knife back to get space to apply more force to ram it home.
All the tension in Kip’s muscles exploded at once. Sweeping in from Zymun’s left side, he caught the young man’s right hand just as the knife swept forward. Kip pushed the knife wide as his own mass collided with Zymun, driving him away from Karris. Then Kip’s right elbow flashed up, cracking across Zymun’s head as Kip blocked his heel with his own foot.
Zymun went down, boneless.
The fight was finished before the gasps were.
Kip could tell suddenly that a lot of the people here hadn’t seen the telltale twitch that foretold murder. To the untrained eye, his action must have looked like an unprovoked attack.
“He was moving to kill her,” Commander Fisk announced sharply. “We train constantly to see tells of such a move, and Kip trained with us. He saw it, too. This was defense of life, not an attack. I know what I saw, and I swear this to be true.”
Twenty Blackguards gave silent affirmation. Kip hadn’t even thought of the Blackguard, but he realized why he was the first to react: they were trapped between their next Prism, a White who’d abdicated her protection by them, and a not-quite order from the promachos. Their loyalties and their oaths of obedience had tangled, slowing them.
“You dare? You dare lay your hands on me?” Zymun hissed at Kip from the floor, blinking his eyes.
“Grandfather,” Kip said loudly but without turning from the snake. “May I remind you of your earlier promise?”
Irritated, Andross announced, “Blackguards, Kip is under my full protection. Act accordingly.”
Zymun lunged at him, scrambling to draw a pistol, but the Blackguard—happily absolved of contradicting loyalties—restrained him quickly and with more force than strictly necessary.
“Take Zymun to his apartments. Our Prism-elect has much to pray about this night,” Andross said.
Zymun was dragged out, spitting and trying to bite the Blackguards, who had no trouble handling him.
“One minute to midnight,” Carver Black said.
Karris hadn’t moved from where she knelt on the pillow. “Commander Fisk?” she asked. “Will you do me the honor?”
“That is your will?” he asked.
“It is.”
Quietly Fisk added, “I wish we could lose a different Guile.”
“I know,” she said. “You’re a loyal friend, Commander. Thank you.”
Commander Fisk looked at Andross, but the old man made no gesture one way or the other. So then Fisk looked at Kip and extended his hand for his knife.
Kip hadn’t even realized he was still holding it. “Hell no,” Kip said. “This is insane. You know Ironfist! He would never do this! This isn’t his heart. We wait!”
“My lord has the luxury of disobeying orders,” Commander Fisk said. “I wish I had the same.” He took a knife from another Blackguard. “Karris, Archer, sister, High Lady Guile, forever our Iron White,” he said, “it has been my honor to serve with you, and to serve you. May Orholam reunite us in gentler lands.”
“And may He bless you with light and warmth, Commander. Now, stop delaying, old trainer of mine. It’s taking everything in me not to try my hand at fighting you one last time, to see if I could win now, as I couldn’t so very long ago.”
Taking a deep breath as he came to stand over her where she knelt, she pulled the neckline of her blouse open, looking up toward heaven and pulling the skin tight so that the gaps between the ribs were visible.
Then there was a cry outside the audience chamber in the hall. Kip couldn’t make out the words, but an instant later he saw Trainer Gill Greyling go sprinting past the open door—not into the audience chamber but past it toward the lifts—shouting, “Stop, stop, stop!” with the urgency of man who knew he was too late.
Chapter 94
Teia’d had terrible premonitions all the way here, but the last thing she was expecting when she finally made it invisibly to the Chromeria’s lifts was to be greeted by the lift gate opening to reveal a bloody, badly wounded Commander Ironfist.
“Get in, quickly. Timing is everything,” a dark, plain-dressed Parian man with him said to her. The lift was otherwise empty.