“He speaks the truth,” Rodian cut in with a steeliness that could have rivaled a shipbreaker in a sea of ice floes. “Many bloodlines paid for it in blood. Yours was not excluded from that betrayal to the Poison Accords. Which means your bloodline will not be exempt from paying tithes to the wardens.”
Vissarion’s hands curled into fists as he glared at Arkadi, knowing better than to lay his temper at the Isar’s feet. After a moment, he composed himself and retook his seat, but his eyes still snapped with anger. “My family had no say in the decisions made by the Isar and the Navy.”
“You still voted to go to war with Daijal.”
“I did not,” Arkadi oh so thoughtfully pointed out. “Neither did the Isar, when he was but a Minister. And yet, our bloodlines will still pay the tithes owed.”
The silence that settled between the group was fraught with tension. Arkadi focused on the four ivoryanin, senses attuned to their body language. He kept waiting for an attack, but one had yet to manifest itself. A distant whisper in the back of his mind curled doubt through him.
What if I was wrong?
It would be embarrassing if that were the case, but Arkadi’s gut told him he wasn’t. Sigurd was the kind of man to always believe he was in the right. So Arkadi watched, speaking up only occasionally, as Rodian kept the conversation moving. The four ivoryanin sought to verbally corner Rodian and get him tochange his mind, but the far north bred stubborn people. They needed to be if they wanted to survive the winter where the sun never rose.
An hour into the polite argument—no one had yet to raise their voice to Rodian, but Sigurd had come close a time or two—Kaja leaned forward to refill everyone’s tea. Arkadi watched her, half his attention on Sigurd’s impassioned but ultimately useless speech to try to change Rodian’s mind. Her hands moved from one teacup to the next with grace, but when she finally reached for Rodian’s, all of Arkadi’s instincts snapped at him in warning.
He could not say what had tipped him off, only that he knew Rodian could never touch that tea mug again, not if he wanted to live. Vissarion and Demid watched Kaja rather than Rodian, while Sigurd held the Isar’s attention. Kaja wasn’t finished pouring tea from the samovar when Arkadi reached across the space between them and wrapped his fingers around her delicate wrist. He dug his fingers into the tendons there, making her cry out and forcing her fingers open. She lost her grip on the tea mug, and it clattered to the table.
“What poison did you just use to try to harm the Isar?” Arkadi asked in a low, furious voice.
Her eyes went wide, guilt a fleeting flash before it was hidden by anger. “You dare?—”
Arkadi wrenched her forward, not letting go of her wrist. Kaja shrieked as she was slammed down onto the low table, spilling the remnants of food from the dozen or so small plates there. She knocked over her own teacup, spilling hot tea all over the table and into the skirt of her gown.
Vissarion swiftly stood, grim determination on his face. Arkadi didn’t think, merely acted, reaching up to pull one of the stilettos free of its thin metal sheath and throw it with deadly accuracy at Vissarion. The thin blade embedded itself in the ivoryan’s throat, slicing through the artery there. The cascadeof blood bubbling out from the small, deadly wound saturated Vissarion’s long-vest, staining delicate embroidery. He gurgled out a wordless sound, both hands scrabbling at his throat. He dropped what he’d been holding, and Arkadi’s eyes tracked the fall of the small opaque vial, its cap missing, spilling colorless liquid on the table.
Rodian jumped to his feet even as Vissarion fell back on the armchair behind him, clawing at his throat. Kaja tried to wrench herself free of Arkadi’s grip, but he didn’t have the time to hold her. As Rodian conjured up a flicker of starfire, that molten-gold magic making Sigurd and Demid recoil in shock, Arkadi deftly freed one of his throwing knives from its arm sheath and stabbed it neatly into Kaja’s hand, pinning her to the table.
She screamed, the sound high-pitched and agonizing, before fainting, sprawling loose-limbed over the low table. Arkadi stood, aligning himself with his Isar, another knife held in hand, ready to throw at the next threat. He met Sigurd’s gaze over the glow of starfire eating at the air between them. Even found out and staring down a future death he could not escape, Sigurd still spat his way.
“Blade,” Sigurd snarled with all the disgust he could muster.
Arkadi didn’t even bother to deny it as the palace guard finally broke down the locked salon doors, barreling inside, drawn by the sound of the confrontation. He looked at Sigurd instead of Rodian, not wanting to see the horror and disgust for what he was in his Isar’s eyes. “Traitor. The Midnight Star will never hear your prayers.”
Twelve
RODIAN
Rodian refused to leave the room where the palace guard was handling the traitors and the dead, but he did allow himself to be ushered as far away from the poison the four had sought to use against him and Arkadi.
Unbidden, Rodian’s attention latched onto Arkadi, the tall young man looking far less frazzled than any of the palace guard. One hair stick was askew, the knot of his hair coming half-undone. Rodian still didn’t know how long Arkadi’s hair was, but his fingers itched to run through the loose strands he could see.
You saved my life, he thought, briefly meeting Arkadi’s gaze over the shoulders of the palace guards that stood around him in a protective circle. Arkadi wrenched his gaze away, and Rodian wanted to reach out to catch his chin and force the younger man to look at him.
“Should we call for a healer?” a guard asked, gesturing at where Vissarion was bleeding out in the chair.
“No,” Rodian said, not needing to think about the answer.
The guard in question nodded. “And the others?”
“They’ll be tried for attempted murder of the Isar,” Arkadi spoke up.
“And you should be tried for being a Blade,” Sigurd snarled.
The dip in conversation was impossible to miss. So, too, was the faint flinch that ran through Arkadi’s body. Rodian wanted so much to hold him close and soothe the younger man, to let him know that Rodian would never hold his road against him.
Surprisingly, the lieutenant on duty said, “Minister Arkadi did his duty to save the Isar. For that, the guard sees no Blade in this room.”
Arkadi did a double take, gaze skittering from the soldier to Rodian, who never looked away. “Come here, Arkadi.”
