“As I said, I deserved it. Come, it’s freezing out here.”
They walked together towards the harbor. The air smelled of brine and rotting fish. The narrow, cobbled streets were deserted, most taverns had already closed their doors, and the icy rain chased away the drunken revelers. Streetlamps were few and far between. Alley cats ruled this dark kingdom, stalking their prey, watching them pass with curious, glowing eyes.
The Boatswain’s Sweetheart was a filthy little tavern in a ramshackle two-story house on a street inhabited by fishermen and netmakers. Rickety wooden stairs were stuck to the side of the house, leading to the second floor. Telani unlocked the door and Liana climbed up, following him into the dark interior. He lit an oil lamp and the flickering light revealed that the roomwas tiny, with uneven floorboards and bare, whitewashed walls. A narrow bed was crammed into one corner, while a makeshift desk—two crates stacked on top of each other—occupied another. No fire was lit in the fireplace, but the warmth from the downstairs tavern seeped through the floorboards, together with the muffled noise of the last desperate drunks who had no home to return to. There was just one chair; Telani motioned for her to sit down while he settled on the bed.
“I’ve seen battlefield corpses who looked better than you,” she said.
They had a tolerant, casual relationship most of the time, like two cats in the same kitchen, clever enough to realize their feelings about each other were irrelevant because they were both tied to the same man for good. A southern soldier turned secretary and a northern huntswoman turned a reluctant companion, they were like two moons orbiting a planet, always on the opposite sides of Amron.
“I had two hours of sleep in a ditch last night.” He rubbed his face, which looked ten years older than she remembered it, and a good deal thinner. “What happened at the palace?”
“The king sent five men to throw me out immediately and make sure I don’t steal anything,” she said. “What did Amron do to irritate him so?”
The corners of Telani’s lips curled into a wan smile. “What’s the last you’ve heard from him?”
“I got a letter from some hunting lodge in Leven. About the task the king had given him, and a ward he had to escort to Abia.”
“That brat.” Telani rummaged through his pockets and offered Liana a flask. “You’ll need this. Don’t worry, it’s the good stuff.”
She uncorked it and took a sip. The brandy burned her throat and lit a flame in her stomach. It might have restored a spark of her bravado, because she said, “I want to know what happened.”
Telani cocked his head and measured her up, as if he were trying to decide how much pressure she could take before she broke. Liana held his gaze without a blink. Ever since she’d heard the news, she felt a part of her was detached. Grief, sharp like a glass shard, was wrapped carefully in cloth and set aside for the day when she could allow herself to mourn her husband. Not today, though. Today she had to find who was responsible for his death.
“A blizzard hit us on a deserted road and our ward ran into a forest. We followed and stumbled upon a forsaken castle.” Telani shifted his weight, and the straw bed beneath him rustled. “The gods stepped in. I can tell you what I saw, but don’t expect me to explain any of it.”
Telani possessed no trace of divine blood, no talent for divination. All he could see was the surface of the world, not its background.
“A cursed castle?” Liana asked.
“A trap, set byher. Preying upon unfortunate travelers.”
He knew enough about invocation to not carelessly say Morana’s name aloud, but Liana knew he meant the Goddess of Death. The dread she had felt seeing the black bathwater crept back through her veins. “Amron must have seen it.”
“He did. But there were other people trapped there, so he refused to run away from it and abandon them.” He hesitated, creasing the rough woolen blanket. “Many things happened that night. I don’t pretend to understand all of them. I promise you, though, if there’d been any other way out, if I could’ve done it instead of him—”
“I understand,” she cut him off. He’d never given her any reason to question his loyalty. “Tell me what happened.”
“His ward, the boy we were supposed to escort to Abia, was manipulated by the gods to duel my lord. And my lord deliberately lost, to spare him.”
Liana shivered, imagining the glint of steel, the cloying odor of blood. “And the gods came?”
“They came, and they took him away.”
She breathed in sharply, fighting the spasm in her chest. “So there’s no body? You didn’t bury him?”
“No, but I saw him die.”
“That’s not the same,” she said. “That’s not the same at all.”
She got up and paced around the tiny room, her head almost touching the beams. Amron wasn’t rotting in some hastily dug grave, then. He was dead, but Liana knew that, when the gods were involved, dead didn’t always mean gone. There had to be a way to bring him back.
“I have a letter for you, he wrote it a few hours before death. Read it before you decide what to do,” he said, eyeing her, reading her thoughts. He pulled a small bundle of letters tied with a blue ribbon out of his doublet, three or four folded sheets, no more. “These are the letters he wrote on our way home. The last one is on top.” He delivered them into her shaking hands.
“Thank you.” She removed the ribbon, unfolded the last letter, a crumpled sheet of paper. Unlike his usual tidy lines in black ink, these were written in broad charcoal strokes.I’m sorry I’m leaving you like this. Take care of yourself and don’t fight the gods. I love you. A.
Her heart sank. It wasn’t enough, it wasn’t what she wanted to hear. She handed the letter to Telani without a word.
Telani’s dark eyes flew over the lines and then fixed on her. He must have registered the frustration on her face. “I saw your mother on my way here, too. She chose to appear before me, the white stag and silver bow and all. She wants you to join her.”
