The Ruin of Kings Read online

  Rook stared at Butterbelly. “What?”

  “Ah, come on, boy. I’ve known you since you were a downy-haired fellow, nothing more than a bit of golden fluff that Raven would parade around like chum for the sharks. You think I wouldn’t notice a little babe like you wearing a vané tsali stone around your throat? I offered to buy it from your Raven. She told me it wasn’t hers to sell. Can you imagine that? Raven passing up the chance to make metal? Well, you’re old enough to make your own decisions now, aincha?”

  Rook’s jaw tightened. “I didn’t . . . it’s not for sale.”

  “I see what you’re trying to do for your old man. I’ll give you five thousand for the green diamond, and another five thousand for that blue one wrapped in gold that you’re wearing. That’s enough money to get your father out of here, and be rich besides.”

  Rook put his hand to his neck, fingering something under the cloth of his shirt. “Why so much?”

  “Them vané stones is rare, and if I’m reading the signs right, that one you’re wearing is old. Fifteen thousand. You won’t get a better offer than that from anyone, anywhere. Come on, some trinket from a momma who ditched you can’t be worth more than getting out of this hellhole, can it?”

  The teenager stared at him. Something in that stare made Butterbelly uncomfortable. Something in that stare wasn’t natural, wasn’t healthy. It made him feel small and petty.

  He wondered if maybe those rumors were true.

  “My necklace isn’t for sale,” Rook repeated. “Five thousand thrones for the rest. I’ll take payment the usual way.” Without another word, he left.

  Butterbelly cursed and stared after Rook, irritated with himself for letting the boy take advantage of him like that. Eventually he sighed and started to cover his work before closing shop. Soon he was singing to himself.

  He had a vané tsali stone, and he had a buyer. Oh, did he ever have a buyer. He knew a man who’d burned a path through the Capital looking for vané jewelry-craft of all sorts, and money was no object. He would be interested in what Butterbelly offered.

  Very interested indeed.

  5: LEAVING KISHNA-FARRIGA

  (Kihrin’s story)

  Outside the auction house, a carriage squatted in the middle of the street like a rotted gourd. The theme continued with black lacquered enamel and matching metalwork. A long black fringe hung from the black undercarriage like a skirt. A black-robed figure (possibly Kalindra) sat up front, holding the reins of four impressive large horses.

  They were black too.

  “Don’t you ever grow tired of that color?” I asked.

  “Get in,” Teraeth ordered.

  There was no resisting. I pulled myself up into the carriage. Teraeth helped his mother follow me before entering the carriage himself.

  “I thought that other woman was going to—”

  “No one cares what you think,” Teraeth said.

  The blood flowed to my face.

  Six months prior, I would have done something, said something. I’d have cut him a little, verbally or otherwise, but six months ago—hell, two weeks ago—bah. I saw the silver hawk and chain wrapped around his wrist. He could say whatever he wanted, give me whatever order he wanted, as long as he held my gaesh.

  He surprised me then by pulling up the flooring in the middle of the carriage and unfolding a rope ladder.

  “Climb down,” he ordered.

  I didn’t argue. The trapdoor didn’t exit to the street as I expected. Rather, the coach had been positioned over an open grating, which led to an ancient but still serviceable sewer system. The small tunnel led straight down with a ladder built into the side. With the grating open, we enjoyed free access to an escape route.

  Only the sound of hands and feet on rungs above me let me know Teraeth followed. Someone closed the grate above us, and then I heard the staccato clap of hooves as the black-clad driver drove the carriage away.

  I couldn’t tell how long I climbed or which way we went once we reached the bottom. My eyes adjusted to the inky blackness of the sewer tunnels, but for a long, long time my only operating sense was olfactory. I gagged on the stench. Seeing past the First Veil wouldn’t have helped either: the blurry auras of second sight wouldn’t have stopped me from tripping over a sodden branch and slamming face-first into rotting waste, as it drifted sluggishly past.

  Teraeth tapped my side to signal when I should turn.

  The sewer tunnel widened until I found myself able to stand. Here lichen glowed with phosphorescence, casting subtle shimmers over the otherwise disgusting walls. I couldn’t read by that light but it was bright enough to navigate.

  I would have given anything for a smoky, badly made torch.

  Eventually, I rounded a corner and saw sunlight. A sewer opening lay ahead at the end of the tunnel. The odor of saltwater and decaying fish—the charming perfume of the harbor—mingled with the stink of the sewer.

  Teraeth brushed past me and grabbed the large metal grating. He yanked the bars without releasing them, preventing a clumsy, loud clank of metal. At this point, I realized his mother Khaemezra was still with us. Teraeth motioned for us to follow.

  We exited into an alley by the harbor. No one noticed us. Any eyes that strayed in our direction didn’t seem to find our strange little group unusual at all.

  Khaemezra had also tossed aside her robe. I’d already seen Teraeth, but this was my first chance to examine the frail “Mother” of the Black Brotherhood.

  She was a surprise, as I had always thought the vané were ageless.

  Khaemezra was so bent and shrunken from age she stood no taller than a Quuros woman. If her son Teraeth was the color of ink, she was the parchment upon which it had been spilled. Bone-white skin stretched thin and translucent over her face. Her fine hair, pale and powdery, showed the old woman’s spotted scalp. Her quicksilver eyes—with no irises and no visible whites—reminded me of the eyes of a demon. I couldn’t tell if she’d been ugly or beautiful in her youth: she was so wrinkled that any such speculation was impossible.

  I fought the urge to ask if she kept a cottage in the darkest woods, and if she preferred rib or thigh meat on her roasted children. If she’d told me she was Cherthog’s hag wife, Suless, goddess of treachery and winter, I’d have believed her without question.

  Khaemezra noticed my stare and smiled a ridiculous toothless grin. She winked, and that quickly she was no longer vané, but an old harridan fishwife. She wasn’t the only one who changed: Teraeth wasn’t vané either, but a swarthy Quuros, scarred of face and possessing a worn, whipped body.

  I wondered what I looked like, since I was sure the illusion covered me as well.

  Teraeth and the old woman stared at each other as though speaking without words. Teraeth sighed and grabbed my arm. “Let’s go.” His voice revealed the flaw in the illusion, and I hoped no one would notice that his voice originated from somewhere above the illusion’s “head.”

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  Teraeth scowled at me. “We’re not out of danger yet.” The vané walked out into the main throng of the crowd. After a few steps, I realized the old woman, Khaemezra, hadn’t followed. I lost sight of her and wanted to ask if she would be coming along too, but I would have to ask Teraeth.

  I hadn’t had a lot of luck with that so far.

  Teraeth pulled me through the crowd at a dizzying speed. My sense of direction became fuddled, until I only knew we were heading to one of the ships. Teraeth shuttled me up a gangplank, past sailors and a row of chained slaves. I fought back the desire to kill the slave master leading them onboard—and I didn’t have a weapon, anyway.

  Then I heard a familiar voice say, “What can I do for you?”

  I turned toward it in angry surprise.

  It was Captain Juval. I was back on board The Misery, the slave ship that had brought me from Quur to Kishna-Farriga. Captain Juval was the man who had ordered me soul-chained in the first place. Quuros might be made slaves, usually to
repay debts or as punishment for crimes, but those slaves were not supposed to be sold outside the Empire’s borders. Quuros were definitely never taken south and sold in Kishna-Farriga. Quuros didn’t go south at all.*

  I’d been unconscious for my sale to Juval and my departure from Quur. I’d never known the details of why Juval had broken Quuros laws to buy me, or how much he’d paid. I suspected Juval had paid nothing, that he’d been the one given metal in exchange for putting me in the rowing galleys and working me near to death. A feat he had gleefully tried to accomplish.

  Captain Juval wasn’t on my favorite-people list.

  But the Captain’s eyes slid over me without recognition.

  Teraeth bowed to the man and said, “Thank you, Captain. I was told you’re the person to see about a quick passage to Zherias.”

  Preoccupied loading the newest cargo, Captain Juval spared the briefest glance at the disguised vané. “How many?”

  “Three,” Teraeth said. “My family. My mother is frail. I’ve been told the springs of Saolo’oa in Kolaque might have a chance of—”

  “I charge two hundred ords for a cabin.” Juval was still paying more attention to his cargo than to their conversation. “You fit in however many you want. Food is twenty more ords a person for the trip.”

  “Two hundred ords? That’s robbery! . . .”

  I walked away as they haggled over the price, and found a quiet corner of the ship, far out of the way of the sailors. No one recognized or even looked at me. I guess that was fortunate.

  I couldn’t believe I was back on board The Misery. Of all the dumb luck . . .

  No, not dumb luck.

  I didn’t for a moment think that this was an accident. It was deliberate luck. Directed luck. This reeked of Taja’s meddling hands.

  My goddess. Taja. I could have worshipped Tya, or Thaena, or any of a thousand gods or goddesses for which the Empire of Quur was famous. But no, I had to worship the goddess of random, fickle, cruel chance. I always thought she pushed the odds in my favor, but that assumption now seemed the height of naïvety.

  I was overcome with a paralyzing sense of foreboding.

  Closing my eyes, I breathed in the stinking sea air of the harbor, gathering my strength. If anyone recognized me, if Teraeth or the old woman asked me any questions about The Misery or its crew, I was dead. Juval hadn’t wanted me talking about how I’d ended up a slave: it was the whole reason he’d had me gaeshed. The specter of the chains lashed around my soul, the gaesh that allowed my owners to control my every moment, hovered over me, waiting to strike.

  I clenched the tsali stone at my neck. I’d been allowed to keep it only because the slavers hadn’t been aware I possessed it. I knew just enough magic to hide my most valuable possession (okay, fine, second-most valuable) in plain sight. Maybe Relos Var had seen through what was (I suspected) a simple, basic illusion.* Maybe that’s why he’d been so eager to buy me. I knew the damn thing was valuable—more valuable than the star tears I’d just stolen. I knew all too well the lengths men had been willing to go to possess the Stone of Shackles (a name, by the way, that I found less and less amusing now that my soul was itself shackled).

  And as I had suspected, no one checked me when I left with the Brotherhood—I had been naked, after all.

  I sighed and fished under my hair, freeing the necklace of diamonds I’d snagged on the back of my tsali stone’s chain. Star tears weren’t magical, something I could now confirm. No, not magical, just rare and valuable, worthy of crown jewels.

  If I was right about this necklace’s provenance, that’s exactly what these were too. Crown jewels from the treasury of the mightiest Empire in the whole world, stolen from the hoard of a dragon, gifted to a goddess, and lastly, used as a payment to a whore in what must surely have been the most expensive night of earthly pleasure ever purchased.

  The same whore turned madam who’d raised me.

  Maybe, once I returned to the Capital, I’d give her the necklace a second time. Ola would think it hysterical. With a fortune in star tears she’d be able to free all the slaves at the Shattered Veil Club and . . . I don’t know. Maybe Ola could actually afford to pay them, if that’s what they wanted to do for a living.

  I refused to think about the fact that Ola was probably dead—along with many others I loved. Even the idea that Thurvishar D’Lorus was probably dead filled me with grief, though he was responsible for my present predicament.*

  I tried not to think about it. Tried, and failed.

  I bounced the necklace in my palm, thinking of other necklaces, the one wrapped around Teraeth’s wrist in particular. Funny how he hadn’t worn my gaesh around his neck. My grandfather Therin hadn’t either, wearing Lady Miya’s gaesh on his wrist too. It was as if both men wanted to distance themselves from the reality of their atrocities by treating the control charm as a temporary accessory.

  I wondered when Dethic would look inside that velvet bag and realize he’d sold me for a few jangling copper bracelets—ones that he already owned. He probably already had, but with all the precautions Teraeth had taken to prevent being followed, the auction house’s chances of tracking us down were slim.

  Maybe Dethic’s life would be forfeited for his mistake. I smiled at the idea. I knew I was being a hypocrite; I’d known people associated with slavers back in Quur, but they hadn’t owned me. Dethic had: I hoped he rotted.

  Teraeth’s black robe served as my only clothing, so I fastened the star tear necklace over my own and hoped the high collar and Khaemezra’s illusions would prevent discovery. I would spend the journey studying the star tears until I could add them to the list of materials I knew how to conceal—and keep myself out of sight in the meantime.

  When I returned, Teraeth and Juval were finishing their negotiations. Teraeth’s mother Khaemezra now stood by Teraeth’s side. Money changed hands, and one of the sailors showed us a tiny cabin filled with four bunk beds where we could sleep (in theory)* for the voyage.

  Within a half hour of our arrival, the slave ship called The Misery weighed anchor and set out to sea.

  6: THE ROOK’S FATHER

  (Talon’s story)

  Thirty-five paces from the fountain at the center of the flowering courtyard to the steps in the back. Two steps, then a hallway. The door on the left was Ola’s, and the door on the right led to another set of stairs. Ten more steps, a small turn, another ten steps, then a door.

  Surdyeh knew the route by heart, which was convenient, as he had never seen it.

  The blind musician opened the door, frowned, and sighed. His son snored—

  Is this bothering you, Kihrin?

  Oh, such a shame. You must have realized Surdyeh is part of my memory collection. You are too, to a lesser extent.

  You didn’t know? Oh.

  I guess you know now, ducky. Surdyeh’s an active part of me. He wants so badly to protect you. A father’s love is so powerful.

  You’re adorable when you’re angry.

  As I was saying—

  His adopted son snored, still asleep on one of the cots crammed into the storeroom turned living space. The situation hadn’t been so bad when Kihrin was a pup, but as the lad had grown older he’d grown larger. Now there was barely room for the two of them.

  Better than nothing though, Surdyeh thought. Better than being tossed out into the street.

  If only he could make his ungrateful wretch of a son understand.

  Sadly, he suspected his son understood too well. As much as Surdyeh pretended they walked the razor’s edge with the whorehouse madam’s good grace, the threat was idle. Madam Ola would never evict them. He would have preferred, though, if Ola didn’t sabotage his efforts at every turn. The boy needed to have a little respect shaken into him from time to time.

  Surdyeh pulled himself out of his reverie for long enough to smack the end of his cane against his son’s backside.

  “Kihrin, get up! You’ve overslept.”

  His son groaned and turned over.
“It’s not time yet!”

  Surdyeh banged the stick against Kihrin’s bamboo cot this time. “Up, up! Have you forgotten already? We have a commission with Landril Attuleema tonight. And Madam Ola wants us to break in her new dancer. We’ve work to do and you’ve been up all night, haven’t you. Useless damn boy, what have I told you about stealing?”

  His son sat up in bed. “Pappa.”

  “If I wasn’t blind, I’d beat you until you couldn’t sit. My father never put up with such foolishness. You’re a musician, not a street thief.”

  The cot creaked as Kihrin jumped out. “You’re the musician. I’m just a singing voice.” He sounded bitter.

  Kihrin had been bitter about a lot of things lately, but he’d been such a sweet boy. What had Surdyeh done wrong?

  “If you practiced your lessons . . .”

  “I do practice. I’m just no good.”

  Surdyeh scowled. “You call that practice? You spend more time helping yourself to Ola’s velvet girls and prowling rooftops than you do learning your chords. You could be good. You could be one of the best if you wanted it enough. When I was fifteen, I spent all night in the dark learning my fingerings. Practiced every day.”

  Kihrin muttered under his breath, “When you were fifteen, you were already blind.”

  “What did you just say?” Surdyeh’s hand tightened on his cane. “Damn it, boy. One of these days, you’re going to run afoul of the Watchmen, and that will be it, won’t it? They’ll take one of your hands if you’re lucky, sell you into slavery if you’re not. I won’t always be here to protect you.”

  “Protect me?” Kihrin made a snorting sound. “Pappa, you know I love you, but you don’t protect me. You can’t.” More swishes of cloth: Kihrin grabbing loincloth, agolé, sallí cloak, and sandals to dress.

  “I protect you more than you know, boy. More than you can imagine.” Surdyeh shook his head.

  His son headed for the door. “Don’t we need to be somewhere?”

  He wanted to say so much to the boy, but the words were either already spoken or could never be spoken. He knew better than to think his son would listen too. Ola was the only one Kihrin paid attention to anymore, and only because she told the boy what he wanted to hear. Surdyeh was tired of being the only one saying what the boy needed to hear. He was tired of arguing, tired of being the only whisper of conscience in this sea of sin.