Eighty One: Two Evils

"I can't piss, Whisperer, and you fluttering about behind me like an anxious hen is not making it any more likely." Harkenn's voice was hoarse and low, but still conveyed his annoyance very well. Nova remained perfectly still so as not to draw attention to her presence by rattling her chain. She wasn't convinced that Harkenn remembered he hadn't sent her out. As Nika took the empty chamber pot from him, the lord sighed and eased himself back into the bed. "I'm concerned that we haven't heard anything from the boy. Or Yddris."

"I am too, my lord," Nika said softly. Yddris had gone out hours before to try and track down Ethred, protecting the search party from any plague victims or demons they might encounter. Thorne had gone too, but to search the Orthanian temple instead. Nika's aura was sickly with worry and frustration. The Unspoken adjusted the pillows behind his charge and then returned to his worktable; Harkenn had given over the writing desk in his bedchamber to Nika's desperate research into what else he might have been dosed with. Nova thought that the task might have been the only thing keeping the man from climbing the walls with agitation.

For herself, she was drained, emotionally and physically. Cael's barrage had been a constant all day and her head throbbed with the effort of holding up her defences. A shimmering blind spot had begun in one eye, and the only thing in the world she would have asked for was to be in bed with Grace instead of stuck up here. Imagining the girl's face, the smell and feel of her, was only further torture – not only because she couldn't have it, but because the slightest slip might reveal that desire to Cael.

For a while, the only sound was the soft slip of turning pages as Nika flipped through one of the many books he had brought up from the library. Harkenn lay as if dead in the bed, grey against the white pillows. She didn't think he slept.

"I'm going to have those bastard Angels arrested the minute you figure out what's wrong with me," the lord muttered after a while. Nika glanced up, and his aura was not promising.

"Yes, my lord. I think that would be best."

"And the next thing I'm going to do is get myself a dark-damned heir."

Surprise registered in Nika's aura. Nova was just as shocked, though she supposed she shouldn't have been.

"You're going to nominate someone?" Nika asked. "No one's done that since..."

"No, Whisperer, I'm going to father one. I'm sure there's a woman out there who would carry a child for me at the right price."

No matter how much Faellian had hated his father, Nova thought wryly, tradition always won out with Harkenns. She had read enough of the history. Harkenns only ever fathered sons, and never once had the mothers been acknowledged. No Harkenn who had ever sat the Reach throne had married. At some point in each generation's rein, an heir always appeared, marked by the orange eyes and pale skin of their line, and whichever poor woman had begotten them vanished into the annals of history unremarked. At least this Harkenn was going to pay the poor girl for the dubious privilege – and if he intended to pay her, then at least he didn't have Nova in mind as a candidate.

"Do you have plans to marry?" Nika asked, without any expectation of an affirmative, and Harkenn scoffed weakly.

"No. I'll pay the woman, see she's looked after until she births him, and then preferably never hear from her again. You'd be surprised, Whisperer, how many offers the right amount of money would get me."

"I'm sure I would, my lord." Though his voice concealed his distaste, Nika's aura showed it very clearly. Nova was inclined to agree with him.

"But first, figure this out," Harkenn waved a bony hand at the pile of books.

Nova settled down, resigned to another few hours perched uncomfortably on the stool at Harkenn's dresser. She missed her chair in the study; at least it was padded. But Harkenn couldn't withstand the constant visitors to his study anymore, so he had had the bed moved back upstairs and allowed up only a very select number of people.

A soft knock on the door brought another torturous silence to an end. Nika sat upright so abruptly that it was quite obvious he had been nodding off over his book, and she wouldn't have blamed him for falling asleep after the events of the previous weeks. She wondered if he regretted staying to teach Thorne, as everyone in Yddris's orbit inevitably got dragged into Harkenn's business at some stage. Nova took pity on him – and took the opportunity to stretch her legs – and crossed to the door herself, staggering as feeling ran back into her feet. She found Devon's severe face on the other side of it and stepped aside to let him in as Harkenn struggled back up into a sitting position from his slump.

"My lord." The captain of the guard's expression remained carefully neutral as he sketched a bow, but Nova read the dismay in his aura clearly. She suspected he knew of the antidote, and the lord was not in an encouraging state even after having it. "Sir Cael has left the castle grounds."

"And you didn't stop him?" Harkenn snapped. "What in Kiel's name did you let him wander off for?"

"I had hoped," Devon said, a little stiffly, "that he might lead the spy I sent after him to wherever they are keeping Ethred. He went alone."

"He doesn't need anyone else," the lord growled, as Nova cautiously lowered her walls and found that yes, the barrage on them had stopped. Her knees failed and planted her back on the stool as the pressure squeezing her temples eased. "He'll sense your man from a mile off. Quite literally."

"I also sent runners to all the guard posts to keep an eye out for him." The captain drew himself up to his full height. "My lord, I'm afraid I didn't have the means available to stop him. The whole guard is on high alert and most are now in the city looking for Ethred. If Cael had gone back for Varron's troops things could have become dire very quickly."

"When did we get to this point?" Harkenn asked of no one in particular. "That I do not have enough guards to do all of these things at once? Where've they all gone?"

"My lord, if I may..." Devon hunched inside his uniform, eyes down. "I do believe some of the guard have been paid very well to absent themselves this evening."

"What."

The captain winced but continued. "Someone has been planning this for a long time, sir. One of my men came to me not too long ago and told me there had been a barracks walk-out. Not of many, but enough to make the difference. I checked the list of absentees, sir, and I had most of them down for disciplinary already. Someone has a very firm finger on the pulse in your household."

"Better than me, apparently." Harkenn's glare held some of its old fire as he stared the captain down. "You're on very shaky ground here, captain, I hope you know that."

"I do, sir. I am doing my best to mitigate these failings."

"Well, if we can't spare anyone else to follow him..." Harkenn sighed. "If only there were two of Yddris."

"I can go and relieve him," Nika suggested. "And tell him what has happened."

"Do you know which direction Cael took?" Harkenn demanded of Devon. The captain nodded. "Then do so, Whisperer. I'd rather have him where I can see him, so to speak. And leave a guard with the rest of the contingent."

"Sir." Devon clicked his heels together and bowed again. His retreat wasn't hurried, but it was prompt. Nika extracted himself from behind his towering library stack and followed, his glance at Nova half an apology for leaving her alone with the lord. She kept her feelings off her face. She didn't blame the man...per se. Her silent cursing was more for the circumstances that had convened to leave her in this position, looking after her owner while he was sick and fractious, her hands tied over ending it all because the alternative was worse. Nika's presence had eased that agony, but as the door closed behind him, it began to chafe once more. Harkenn still looked so frail, lying there, and her freedom felt as far away as it ever did.

"You must hate your uncle very much," Harkenn said, as if she had spoken the thought aloud. She realised her glare was such that she might as well have done. Mild amusement played across the lord's face. "If even the threat of him has prompted you to keep me alive."

She sat very still and said nothing. Her chain was a significant weight at her neck. It would be so easy. So easy.

But a vivid image of her uncle and her twin sister on the day she had been judged and found guilty stopped that thought in its tracks.

"I suppose I could reward you for it." The lord's eyes were closed but she knew he was aware of her. They had been together for too long and knew each other too well. If he did sleep, he would never do it in front of her. "If I live, that is." A slit of orange opened in one eye. "I'm bored and curious. What would you ask of me if it were up to you?"

She kept her face passive even as her soul howled. He knew exactly what she would ask for and just wanted to hear her say it, the bastard. "I would want the chain gone," she replied. Even as she said it she knew it was a foolish hope, but if she asked for things he might concede to if he were truly grateful... Ah, that was stupid. It wasn't even worth trying. But her silence only brought thoughts of Grace, and so her betraying mouth kept talking. "Or clothes. With shoes. Or a pallet."

The eye had closed again. For a moment she thought he might have succumbed to his weakness and fallen unconscious, but then he sighed. "Keep me alive and you can have all three. And the girl. That stands."

She was too surprised to scoff. That he had mentioned the possibility at all was a first. The overwhelming likelihood was that he was teasing her to amuse himself, but never before had his jokes come anywhere close to giving her something she wanted. Not unless he was trying to get her to grovel for it, which she'd got wise to in her first year of captivity here – not without a few public humiliations first. Again it hit her that she was trying to save this man's life; this man who had used her as an amusement for his guests, in bed and at table, as if she was an object rather than a person. Her fingers ran gently across the edge of her chain.

It was a relief when he didn't try to engage her in conversation again. Every word out of his mouth was like a rock thrown at her resolve not to end him herself. Despite her best efforts to meditate, the cramping of her legs soon reclaimed her attention and she found herself wishing for something to happen anyway.

"Who is buried in that secret crypt?" she asked, and marvelled at her own audacity. When he was well, she would never have dared to ask questions he hadn't invited from her.

A furrow of annoyance creased his brow. "You do like to whitter when you get some leeway, don't you?" He took a long breath. "The Barrow Kings were buried there. They ruled before my family did and their fortress was on this site. They came from a world that was one of the first to close their portals in the Isolation, and their line became so dilute it vanished."

The Barrow Kings. She had never heard of them. The Harkenns had been on the throne for hundreds of years, and her people had arrived much later than the first of that line. She made a note to ask Nika when she had him alone; if anybody would know more, it was him. She was sure Harkenn did as well, but she had pushed her luck with just one question and didn't want to find out if the antidote had restored enough of his strength for him to throw things at her.

"What's that noise?" Harkenn's voice escaped as a near-unintelligible mumble, but sure enough when she dragged her thoughts back to the present she could hear loud voices downstairs.

"Would you like me to check, my lord?"

His only response was to wave a vague hand at her. She took it as an affirmative, crossing the room and trying to stamp some feeling back into her feet as she went. She thought she recognised Jan's voice in the commotion. The feeling that reached her sixth sense from the top of the stairs was overwhelmingly nervousness and fear. She held her chain to keep it quiet – not that anyone would hear it in the racket – and crept down the stairs until she could see into the foyer. Staff clustered at the windows, peering out at something and talking among themselves. An old maid kneeled on the carpet nearby and wailed into her hands. Several other faces had gone white and down here the anxiety was suffocating. Two soldiers had settled the drop-bar of the front doors into place.

She hurried down the rest of the way and tugged at Jan's sleeve. "What's going on?"

"Oh, Nova," the housekeeper said, turning from her station at one of the windows and wringing her hands. "Oh, Nova, it's bad."

She wriggled into the gap the housekeeper had left in the cluster. One of the potboys glanced back, saw her, and made a warding sign before hurrying off. When she made sense of what she was seeing through the window, she grasped why. Confusion flooded her, and then blank terror like she hadn't felt in years.

"Vestra save me," she whispered. The gleaming ranks of Caelumese in the front courtyard were like a scene straight out of one of her nightmares.

"How did they get here without anyone knowing?" Jan asked, still standing at her shoulder. Her voice was barely controlled, far from her usual calm assertiveness. Most here would have living memory of the first Annexe War, and if they didn't personally, then their parents had raised them on horror stories of the Caelumese. Though she had grown up in Caelum and had been trained to join the army herself, the sight of it struck terror into her. How they had got in was a secondary concern to what they wanted. Surely they hadn't brought an army just for her?

"I don't have a clue," she said faintly. She stumbled back from the sight and the ranks of staring servants closed in behind her. The gleam of their armour was burned into her eyes, so she saw it even when she closed them. They hadn't made an attempt to get in yet, but there was so little of Harkenn's army left here that they would have no trouble when they decided to do so. And then...what?

Their opponent had been two steps ahead of them...again.

Her feet felt putty-like and uncoordinated as she turned and hurried back towards the stairs. She had no idea what Harkenn could do from his current position, but he was her only narrow chance of escaping her uncle. She flew down the corridor to his bedchamber, mind and heart racing. It was impossible that an army of Caelumese could have made it into the city without someone raising an alarm – unless the entire guard had been paid off, which seemed unlikely. Even Caelum's coffers weren't that deep. But that left her without any ideas at all.

It didn't change the fact that they were out there now, and that they would grab her if they got half a chance. So, to Harkenn. Think about the rest when you get out alive.

If you get out alive.

A strange noise escaped her outside of her control, something between a whimper and a cry of fear and frustration. It bubbled in her like a toxin, bubbled up like the images of her long stay in Lucifer's dungeons. She pushed them all down, straining her ears for any sound that suggested they had made a move.

Harkenn was where she left him. She could have wept when she crossed to his bedside and he made no response, his face slack and unmoving. Unconscious, at the worst possible time.

The door to the chamber, which she'd left open in her headlong flight, closed with a snap. She looked up from steeling herself to shake her owner awake, and her knees turned to jelly. Of course. There were still Caelumese inside the castle walls. The army didn't need to break in if they were waiting for the Angels already inside to do their work.

Evangeline, the Caelumese judge, stood in the shadows at the edge of the room. With her were two other Angels with their faces covered, leaving only their eyes free to survey her coldly. The nervous, subservient woman from the diplomatic meetings was gone, replaced by a flinty-eyed assassin. No wonder Nova hadn't recognised her – the garb of a judge had been a ruse.

"I expected it to be harder to get to him," she said, when Nova couldn't make her voice work.

Me too, she wanted to say, but was too busy eyeing the knives that Evangeline's companions held. She probably wasn't even called Evangeline.

"I had hoped the poison might get to him before it came to this," the Angel continued, as if she anticipated that Nova would commiserate with her woe. "It would have been so much simpler to blame it on a wasting disease. But it seems Cael got a little cocky and allowed you to figure it out." A thin smile. "I've been specifically ordered not to kill you, so step aside. Then I can be done with my chores and we can discuss where to go from here."

She wanted to move. Oh, she wanted to, to let Evangeline take Harkenn's fate out of her hands. But there were two other assassins in the room, and an army stationed outside. She would force them to kill her before she let them take her back to Caelum.

Grief flooded her. She would never see her freedom. Grace would never know what had happened here. The dream she had perilously begun constructing, the little dream of she and Grace living in their own home together somewhere far from the Reach, began to crumble and drift away from her. She had not wanted life so much in so many years, and now was the time her death chose to visit her? It all seemed so cruel. One condition she had had, just one ask of fate – to die free – and she wouldn't get it. Of course not.

"He's not going to protect you," Evangeline scoffed, when Nova didn't move. Her gorge rose as the woman switched to Caelumese. "Why wouldn't you want me to kill the man who made you a slave? Worth less than an animal?" An unimpressed little snort. "He must have knocked you about quite a bit."

A chill touch on her hand. Without turning, she raised her walls and extended them to include Harkenn's aura, and sure enough she found him awake and aware again. She hoped Evangeline was too busy preening to have noticed. She darted a glance at the two other Angels, and found one checking the corridor through a crack in the door and the other looking between her and Evangeline as if hoping for a brawl to break out.

Evangeline moved so quickly Nova barely had a chance to bring her weapon to bear. She had no idea where Harkenn had hidden it but was hardly going to complain. The assassin drew up to a halt as the sword skimmed the air in front of her throat. It was an uncomfortable weight after so many years, but familiar from countless hours in the palace training halls. They stood there for a moment, staring at each other across the length of a blade, as Nova had never had the chance to do on the battlefield. All the deaths she had brought about had been dirtier, from closer quarters.

"Stand aside, girl." Evangeline drew herself up and gestured her two grunts forward.

She made her choice. It was a decision she never thought she would have to make, and an option that a year ago she could not have dreamed she would ever choose.

She clambered up onto Harkenn's bed and stood in front of him, sword braced and ready. She forced aside her images of the past and focused instead on future she was determined to win for herself and the woman she had fallen for.

I love you, Grace.

She swung.

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Regards,

Elinor (S E Harrison)