At first, I’d been slightly worried that the deaths of the four men I’d killed had been traced back to me somehow. But I was armed with blades, poisons, and a solid alibi, and soon enough, rumors made their way through the crowd that the theft was rumored to be of gemstones. A significant number of them, but nothing irreplaceable.
The uproar might afford me the opportunity I needed to get more information about the whereabouts of the obsidian dagger. In a city as small as Turino, there were only so many people who might be able to afford to purchase such an item, or have the desire to. In fact, almost all of those with the funds to buy it were in the castle with me now. I moved from group to group, commiserating with the other guests, and keeping a sharp eye out for anyone bearing the blade. But no one had it, though a few had visited the jeweler in the past weeks.
I had to stay vigilant. Perhaps someone would gift it to someone else on the Solstice. Then I would steal it back, and return to my home.
If not… If everyone returned to their home countries, and I failed to find it…
A high-pitched “Oh no!” came from the corner of the room, where the children of the castle stood around a table that held a marble checkered board covered with small, round wooden game pieces, etched with symbols.
The Rimholtian children had only just learned a new variation of the Mirrenese game of strategy, and the young prince, Dashiell, stared with concern down at his pieces. His opponent was a younger girl, the daughter of a Verdanian diplomat, whose lower lip trembled. She was one move away from losing entirely, and I could tell Dashiell was torn between winning the game, or skipping the move and allowing her to keep trying.
“How are you so good at this?” she asked, pouting. “I thought boys were supposed to let girls win.”
“My girlfriend made me swear never to give less than my best at any game. Or battle.”
“Battle?”
“Yes. She’s the most talented, bloodthirsty, magical woman on this earth. She could kill half the people in this room, and none of the others would even suspect she’d done it.”
The girl’s nose wrinkled. “She sounds horrible!”
Dashiell bristled, and made another move, sweeping four of the girl’s tokens off the board, leaving only her unprotected king piece and a few vassals. “She’s perfect. She’s a queen.”
“She can’t be,” the girl snapped. “There’s only one queen in Rimholt.”
“Will be once I’m king,” Dashiell muttered. “Do you forfeit?”
I closed my eyes for a moment, understanding dawning. This was the boyfriend. This was…Wait.This child had purchased the dagger? How? I took in his clothing. His boots weren’t tall enough to hide it, and he didn’t have a cloak. He must not have it on him.
“Fine, I forfeit!” the girl burst out, and Dashiell sighed, reaching across the board to turn over the king.
That’s when I saw it. The dagger that I was looking for, the hilt of it revealed at the base of the prince’s spine when he leaned across the board. Before I could move closer, a shout came from the opposite end of the hall, one of the noblemen complaining about the questioning, and trying to exit the room.
The guards assigned to watch the children were distracted, one of them leaving his post to stand between the children and the shouting, and taking his eyes off his charges.
That was when another nobleman made his move. He’d been standing next to the wall, but darted forward, aiming a sword at one of the children. I wasn’t certain who was the target,but Dashiell had stood and was turning, and the sword slicing through the air was suddenly far too close to his neck.
My hand shot out before I could think, and I grabbed the man’s wrist, twisting hard.
Everything happened at once. The sword fell to the floor, followed by the attacker. I twisted my hips so I was on top of him, then pulled his arms behind his back, hearing a satisfying crunch as a bone broke. One of his shoulders looked dislocated when I was done, and he screamed so loud my ears rang, but he was immobile.
Within seconds, the king’s guards were there, grabbing the man as I released him, but a flash of dark fabric from one of the walls caught my eye. A dark-haired girl—one of the princesses, I thought—had the man’s sword in her hand in a flash, holding it away from her body.
“Careful. It could be poisoned,” I warned.
“I hope so,” the girl said with an eerie smile before she unwrapped the shawl from her neck, wrapping the blade inside it. “I’ll take care of it.” I must have blinked, because she was gone in the next instant.
“Traitor!” the nobleman—who I recognized now as a merchant who’d been a drinking companion of Duke Lukenza—hissed at me as the guards dragged him away.
“Th-thank you, sir.” I glanced down at Dashiell, who was on his feet as well now, holding the marble board between us and the rest of the frightened children, his wide eyes on mine. But before I could answer, I was being dragged away as well, in the same direction as the attacker.
Shit.
In less than five minutes, I was in a dungeon, in the cell next to a now-unconscious merchant who could probably count the hours remaining in his life on one hand, if he was fortunate.For all I knew, my fate might be the same. I paced, wonderingwhether the king was going to punish all of the Mirrenese retinue for the assassination attempt. At the very least, they would torture a few of us, to get more information.
Eventually, two burly guards returned and escorted me to another room. It was a smaller dungeon, the far wall decorated with most of the instruments of torture I knew about, and a few whose purposes I wasn’t sure of. I steeled myself for pain, the only thing I was certain I’d find here.
Instead, I discovered something far more terrifying. Though the room was unlit—no candles or torches at all, only narrow windows along the ceiling that allowed in faint sunlight—it was not close to empty.
