“Yes.”
“You don’t need to tell me twice.” Ula raced after Ferdinand, Koldo, and Osana. “We’re coming, Amarande!”
Taillefer hissed out something of a laugh. “Iknewthat library had a hidden passageway—Amarande denied it. But I knew. Go on; I can certainly entertain myself while you settle this family feud.” His voice was weak—Luca’s dagger had speared his fine aubergine collar against the door from which he’d appeared. Taillefer didn’t reach for the latch, but he would the moment they disappeared; that much was guaranteed. “I’ll wait.”
“You had to tempt me.” Ula wheeled on him, sword out and Urtziat her back. “I have much to say to you after your treatment of Luca, Taillefer.”
Luca waved her off. “I will say it. Go, Ula. Your sword is meant for Geneva if Amarande doesn’t get her first. Go, for Ama and for Lygia.”
“I’m not leaving you,” Ula replied, firmly.
Taillefer sighed. “I have what I want. I have no quarrel with you, wolf cub.”
“We have all the quarrel. You don’t get the quarrel,” Urtzi spit. Apparently, he wasn’t leaving either.
Luca needed to be quick. Amarande could not wait, even with the others’ help. She needed him. And them. But they also could not let this evil boy out of their sight and near the ships still lingering in the harbor.
“If you think we will let you leave with your word and a handshake, you’re wrong.” Luca lunged for Taillefer’s weapons, drawing his sword and dagger from their sheaths. Taillefer did not fight, hands limp at his sides—Luca did not trust that. A bluff. “How are we to know you won’t leave here and order your mother’s troops to attack Ardenia?”
“You don’t.” That same wheeze they’d heard through the fabric of the Warlord’s tent chased the words out of his mouth, along with a cough that racked his entire body. If it had happened during his earlier performance, Luca’d missed it. “But it won’t be a problem.”
Taillefer grinned, but it was not a healthy thing. Blood framed each of his teeth in stark red, as if he’d sunk them into a still-beating heart.
It was then that Luca realized that he hadn’t just caught the fabric of Taillefer’s collar while pinning him; he’d caught his neck.
A weak slice to the jugular.
Not an assassin’s smile, but also not easily fixed. Blood bloomed around the blade, thickly seeping into the fabric. The cold blue of Taillefer’s eyes sought Luca’s. “You’ve killed me. Fitting, after what I did to you.”
Ula placed a hand on Luca’s forearm. “Come, Luca, we don’t need to watch this. You didn’t mean to do it.”
“Wait. Please.” Taillefer’s voice was weaker here, and Luca did not have it in him to leave. “I need you to tell Amarande something.”
As much as he hated this boy, Luca had to give him this. Taillefer was one to have the last word. He already may have been at death’sdoor, but Luca had slammed it in his face. Taillefer’s trip to the stars was on him.
“The poison at the watering hole. That was me. It’s the worst thing I ever did.”
Luca swallowed, breathing hard though the action was over. “Don’t say that. Don’t lie with your last breath. You killed Sendoa with poison in his water, the same way. I know it. Don’t deny it.”
Air wasn’t filling Taillefer’s lungs. No inhale. No exhale. Nothing. Luca could not look away as Taillefer’s face paled.
“I didn’t kill Sendoa. My poison did—Renard did.” Taillefer’s voice was failing now, but he kept talking. Kept explaining. “I cataloged every vial. Knew what I’d sent to Domingu as a sample. One additional vial of hemlock was missing and so was my brother the day King Sendoa died.”
Taillefer coughed again, so hard his body slumped afterward, the knife blade all that was keeping him upright. With his final breath, the brief King of Pyrenee showed remorse for his part in the act that started it all.
“Tell Amarande I’m sorry I didn’t stop him.”
CHAPTER63
HERmother had the single sword.
A head start.
The advantage of knowing where she was going.
Amarande was sprawled face-first on the floor—the same rough sandstones as the walls, not the smooth, showy parquet marble. Painfully, she pulled herself out from beneath the ornate tapestry, its weight falling upon them as they spun into this space.
A hallway.
