Ernesto Tivala was a walking corpse; he just didn’t know it yet.
‘You like being pretty, don’t you?’ he said, coming closer when the torturer finished. ‘What? You thought I’d start by cutting off your arms or legs?’ he said, mistaking my silence for defeat. ‘We have time for that, Nightshade. Plenty of time. I took your magic, your dignity, now your beauty. Before I’m finished with you, death will be the only thing you crave.’
He stroked my face in an almost tender gesture, and I snapped, teeth barely missing his palm. The humiliation was complete when he kicked my shaved hair into a puddle of filth on the floor, frowning when I didn’t respond.
I didn’t cry, but whatever he saw in my eyes made him take a step back with a frown, and something else flickered through his expression. Fear. I was naked, beaten, shaved, holding on to life by a thread, and yet, he was afraid of me.
There you are, little man. See me, Roksana Regnav, daughter of the Lady of the Forest and the Dark Master. I promise your final breath will be mine to take.
Laughter bubbled up, a madness that ripped through my tattered sanity. My promise defied reason, eclipsing everything else, but I would make those thoughts real. I would end Tivala’s entire world.
‘Is that all you have?’ I asked between bouts of manic giggling. ‘You pathetic sons of bitches. I curse you. I curse you all. May your insides burn, your tongues choke you while you gasp for breath, but never die… Dark Lord Veles, listen to your daughter. If I die in this dungeon, let me be your sacrifice… Take my blood as payment for this curse.’ I looked at my tormentors as they fell back, hiding their faces and spitting on the ground to ward off evil.
‘Shut your mouth! Do you think the Dark God cares about you?’ Tivala backhanded me so hard my head bounced off the wall. ‘Do you think you can curse me?’
I watched, still laughing, enjoying the terror in his eyes as he glanced at the corner where the darkness congealed. Few dared to say Veles’ name out loud, even fewer to utter a curse in his name, but none offered themselves as a soul sacrifice.
Tivala’s hands locked on my throat with a strength I felt even through the augurec collar. ‘You have much faith in your god. Or have you lost faith in your king?’ He searched my face for an answer, his hands tightening until my laughter choked off.
I gasped for breath, clawing the wall I was chained against. ‘Reynard will destroy it all.’
‘Will he? Tell me, assassin, what can he do if the srebrec tears the power from his mages? How will he take revenge for you when Tangra’s soldiers swarm through the Wey Gates?’ He threw his head back and laughed. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll send him your rotten carcass as a gift.’
Wey gates – I need to know more about them.I focused the shreds of my mind even as my thoughts pranced, imagining the maimed body of my tormentor. ‘You hate me so much. I canunderstand that, but Ernesto…’ I held back my laughter, pausing to gain his attention.
‘What?’
‘Tangra?’ I said, rolling the name like a curse, and he grimaced as if my words burned him. ‘They’ll eat you whole and spit you out broken. You really think they’ll let you rule… or live? Gods, you’re stupid.’
He looked at me and gestured for the torturers to clear the room. The men left in haste, all unable to look me in the eye. When we were alone, Tivala reached for his collar, his pupils dilated and black as night.
‘How little you know, poisoner. Tangra will need someone on the throne. Someone Dagome’s nobles can accept,’ he said, opening his shirt, and my breath caught when a cruel smile spread across his thin lips.
‘And you think they’ll accept you?’ I asked, wondering what he was doing.
‘I wanted it to be my son, but you killed him before Reynard won his fucking war.’ He licked his lips, but I couldn’t stop staring at the purple mark that marred his torso, and the silver necromancer sigils tattooed over it. ‘All those years, manipulating the old king, ensuring his chancellor could act unchecked… experimenting with forbidden magic, all for nothing because of you.’
‘Gods, are you even alive?’ I asked, and he grinned, his hand tapping on the symbol above his heart.
‘More or less. Tangra… They know techniques our mages can’t even fathom.’ He grinned. ‘I’ll eclipse Cahyon Abrasa. I’ll rule as the forever king. Even Tangra will bow before me.’
‘So you want to be the next Lich King? Is that what those towers are doing, fuelling this corruption?’ It was a wild guess, but his expression shifted, telling me I’d guessed right. ‘Don’t you remember what happened to the last Lich King?’
‘Oh, but I’m no Lich. Not even the Tangra delegation knows what I’m doing. So superior, thinking all that magic will power their gates. Idiots.’
So many things became obvious.
‘So Dagome is the price for your perverted dream.’ I shook my head, barely comprehending the depth of his betrayal. ‘You fool. Even with a life-sustaining spell, you won’t live forever.’
‘Fool? I am a visionary. If you hadn’t interfered, none of this would be possible. If you hadn’t killed Ignac, my legacy would have lived on through him. Now, the srebrec, Tangra – they all exist because Roksana Regnav killed my only child, at the request of a lowly whore,’ he said with such disdain it took me a moment to register his words.
‘Only child? What about Inga?’ I looked at the madman as he burst into bitter laughter.
‘Inga had one job. She was to bear my child, then pass it off as Reynard’s, but she failed even this. Daughters are worth nothing unless they sacrifice their lives for their family.’ His face, twisted in a cruel grimace, was so different from Boyan’s. My father was an assassin, but an honest one, and one who loved me.
Ernesto Tivala was a monster.
‘So that was your grand plan? To make her dowager queen and raise your inbred bastard? Let me guess, you planned for her to bring a weapon to the nuptial bed? A dagger, or would it have been poison?’ I said quietly, more to myself, and he smirked, shaking his head.
