Of Kings and Killers Read online

  Bliss’ pale eyes were hard, and she glared at him over the weapon. “You were gone longer than I think is safe. I tried to free you. If you are still Calder, say something that only Calder would say.”

  “The Guild War doesn’t matter,” Calder gasped. “None of it matters. We have to seal up the Great Elder tombs.” He struggled against the bars. “Help me out, we need to get a message to Jorin.”

  She looked down her spear suspiciously. “I don’t know if Calder Marten would say that…”

  “Bliss!”

  She spent a long moment searching his eyes, then she gave a sigh and tucked away her weapon.

  A moment later, Calder burst out of the Emperor’s chambers with Bliss trailing him. The Imperial Guard and servants stationed outside of the room were startled to attention; one Guard even raised his spear.

  They had been uncomfortable leaving him with the Optasia in the first place, though they were likely unclear on what it was or the risks it posed. Now that they saw him apparently unharmed, he could read relief on their faces.

  He wished he shared that relief.

  “I need paper!” he called. “Bring me paper, pen, and the Imperial seal. I’ll be sending messages to all the regional governors, so bring me their delegates. And have each Guild provide a messenger that can get into Rainworth.”

  The Imperial seal was one of the most famous relics; the Emperor had used it to imprint his seal on messages since the beginning of the Empire. It wasn’t Awakened, but it had such heavy significance of Intent that it might as well have been. Messages sent with the seal could not be opened or read by anyone other than the intended recipient.

  It was the only way to deliver this message. If the Great Elders realized what Calder had learned, they would expend all their powers to destroy him. They certainly wouldn’t let him cooperate with the Regents.

  All the servants and Guards bowed, but there was a moment of hesitation as they looked from one to the other, unclear on whose job this was.

  They weren’t used to him yet, and the entire Palace had been sent into an uproar after the battle. Order had not yet been restored.

  But he didn’t have time for this.

  He pulled out the Emperor’s crown and added to his commands. “Run!”

  Everyone but Bliss dashed out of the room.

  Jakson had just joined the Imperial Guard. He hadn’t earned his augmentations yet, but he had daydreamed about having the claws of a Bonereaver.

  He was afraid of getting something like an elephant’s ears, but even that would be all right. It was the Imperial Guard’s uniform that really impressed people.

  When the senior Guards came with a message straight from the Steward, he had leaped at the responsibility. He was the perfect man for the job, too; he was born and raised in Rainworth.

  He knew every way in and out of the town, and more importantly, he knew the people who lived there. He knew who would be working outside Independent security. His uncle was a fisherman who stopped by the Capital sometimes, and he lived just outside Rainworth’s borders.

  Jakson could make contact with him, and his uncle could get him into the town. If that didn’t work out, he had a dozen other ways in.

  Working for the Steward could make his career. General Teach would hear about this, whenever she woke up.

  The Guard lent him the fastest horse he could handle, and even it was in disguise; Jakson and his mount both had to leave their colors behind. He left at a trot on one of the least-used roads in the city.

  He would have to walk the horse once the sun set, but he would arrive no more than a couple of hours after full dark. It wouldn’t be unusual for a message to arrive that late.

  Jakson kept his message—bearing the Imperial seal—sealed inside a fake envelope with a false seal. No one would suspect him of being part of the Guard, and if any Independents did stop him, he could tell them exactly who he was without raising any suspicion.

  He was just going home.

  The sun had vanished over the horizon when Jakson slid off his horse. She had worked hard, and he patted her side to let her know he appreciated it. He could still ride in this light, but it was best not to risk the shadows.

  Each rise of grass by the side of the road had dark shadows that could conceal a rock or a pothole, and the paving-stones in the road itself were worse.

  Come to think of it…

  He squinted at the road. Some of those shadows were stretching toward the sunset. Had someone spilled something on the road? Ink? It could even be blood.

  The thought chilled him, but as he looked closer, he saw that these were nothing more than shadows.

  Shadows stretching toward the sun.

  A chill rose up his spine as sixteen years of Elder stories rose up in him at once. He leaped back on the horse, turning the other direction, heading back toward the Capital…

  A great black mouth opened beneath him and he fell.

  When the mouth snapped shut, Jakson was no more.

  Emeralda had worked for the Blackwatch for almost three decades. She knew when she was being followed.

  Many Watchmen liked to joke that they developed a kind of Reader’s sense after years in service, a sort of tingling developed by thousands of close calls with men and Elders alike. She was feeling that tingling sensation now as a man that looked like a down-on-his-luck farmer took up the whole dirt road with his ox-cart on the way toward her.

  There was nothing to him alone. He could just be an unfriendly man, not acknowledging the woman he was pushing off the road.

  It was the way he seemed determined not to look at her…combined with the boys behind her, who leaned too casually against the low stone wall that kept one side of the road from collapsing. And the “blind” beggar with an empty alms-bowl who tapped his cane randomly against the ground as though to illustrate his blindness.

  This is an awfully popular dirt road all of a sudden, Emeralda thought.

  She had worn no uniform and no one had followed her this far, so there were only two reasons for a group of men to be encircling her here. One, they were simple bandits doing bandit things, and wouldn’t that be a stroke of luck? She’d pull out her pistol and they’d go on their way.

  Two, they knew what she carried.

  The sealed letter in her pocket, disguised as a deck of cards, was intended for Jorin Curse-breaker’s eyes alone. If she couldn’t put it in his hands, then it would go to no one.

  Just to see what would happen, she pulled her pistol.

  The farmer jumped down from his cart, his oxen pulling to a halt. The boys behind her cried something, and she turned to keep them in view. The blind man pulled down his blindfold to peek at her.

  She pointed the gun at him, and he smiled, showing rows of rotten teeth. He showed her what he carried in one hand: a compass. Rather than north, its needle pointed to her. “Don’t haunt us, miss. Made a bargain, we did.”

  Kelarac.

  Emeralda knew how the Soul Collector worked. He would have granted this beggar a paltry wish in exchange for following that compass, which no doubt pointed toward the Intent of the Imperial seal.

  No Elderspawn would know what this message contained. Only some powerful Elders, or the Great Elders themselves, could unravel the Emperor’s Intent without destroying the message.

  They must have been ordered to stop any message bearing the Imperial seal.

  Though she knew it was hopeless, Emeralda switched her pistol to her left hand and drew her saber in her right. Another pair of men emerged from the forest, in clothes just as shabby as the others.

  She would kill two or three, and then—if the rest didn’t break and run—she would die as she’d lived.

  Fighting Elders.

  Most people didn’t know that the Alchemist’s Guild was dealing secretly with the Magisters, but Rina did. She had been working with Nathanael Bareius, and he trusted her with these secrets, including negotiating secret meetings.

  So when a Magister met h
er at one of their rendezvous points outside of Rainworth, bearing a message for Jorin Curse-breaker, Rina promised she would deliver it. The Magister trusted her with it. The Intent of the Imperial seal couldn’t be broken anyway, so no one could read it, not even Guild Head Bareius.

  As soon as the Magister left, Rina lit a match and set it to the corner of the envelope.

  Bareius’ orders. It wasn’t time for peace yet.

  Rina was honored by his trust.

  Chapter Eleven

  three years ago

  Calder had led the others to barricade the far wall as best they could now that the hallway ended in a smoking hole.

  As far as he could piece it together from Goss and Lakiri’s mangled stories, Tommison had been packing up the alchemical munitions and had made some kind of a mistake.

  It was impossible to know exactly what that mistake was, but it had resulted in him joining a cloud of smoke that drifted down the hall.

  He didn’t know if Lakiri had exaggerated the power of the munitions, because if they had really been capable of burning the island bare, he would have expected them to take the tower down. Maybe they were more incendiary than explosive, but he would be the first to admit that he knew almost nothing about alchemy and even less about demolition.

  They had certainly been sufficient to destroy the back room and take any hint of Captain Tommison with them.

  Calder wished Tommison had survived so that he could beat the man with his own hands.

  Now The Reliable was no longer an option. Most Navigator ships could be launched without the captain, but not sailed far. He might be tempted to risk it if not for the giant fanged Elderspawn in the surf.

  No, without the captain, the ship was no longer an option. And the munitions were gone, which he had planned to use to clear the way to the beach.

  Now he was reliant on Foster and Urzaia to make a path for the rest of them.

  Goss and Lakiri were all but dead weight now; they had been closer to the explosion than anyone else, and their hearing had still not returned. Goss was covered in burns, though they were all shallow. He would be fine, but he wouldn’t be much help in their escape.

  Which meant that Urzaia, Andel, and Calder—with Foster’s support on the long guns—had to carry three passengers incapable of combat through a jungle filled with Elderspawn.

  On the bright side, if there was a bright side, the sun was almost up and none of them had been torn to pieces by Slithers yet.

  All six of the survivors were gathered in the main room as Calder addressed them. “This will be a dash for our very lives. Our only hope is to have Foster bring The Testament close enough to shore that I can make contact.”

  He wasn’t sure how far away he had to be to contact the Lyathatan. He would prefer to be standing on deck, but that obviously wasn’t an option.

  If he couldn’t wake the Elder from the beach, or if Foster and Petal couldn’t manage to get the ship close enough, they would have to do battle with the fanged worms using only what they had on them.

  Which was possible, given Urzaia’s presence, assuming they weren’t attacked from behind by an army of Slithers.

  “I’ve already signaled Foster.” The alchemical flares burned brightly from the top of the tower, and the responding flags had been flown from The Testament’s mast almost immediately. “He’ll be trying to bring the ship closer, but we have to meet him on the beach. That means running behind Urzaia and sticking close. I want us to be tripping over each others’ heels, do you understand?”

  He waited until everyone nodded except Urzaia, whose gaze was drawn and fixed on the view outside.

  That was as it should be; he needed the Champion focused on their goal, not on Calder’s words.

  “No need to carry anything but weapons. We have provisions on the ship, and even if we didn’t, it’s better to lack food than to be food.”

  He had expected a tense laugh, or maybe a look of agreement, but he got one only from Andel. At least he and the quartermaster had been singing the same tune recently.

  The first pink rays of dawn were already sneaking through the barricade. Calder took a deep breath and readied the sword in his hand.

  “Well, that’s enough talking from me. Does anyone have anything they’d like to contribute at this late hour?”

  He still wasn’t certain Goss and Lakiri had their hearing back. They nodded again, but they’d nodded to almost everything he said.

  Andel looked grim and resolved, Urzaia like a hound straining at his leash, and Jerri like she was eager to begin a race.

  “All right, then. Urzaia?”

  The cook tucked the heavy safe containing the crown under one arm. Calder would prefer to have someone else carry it, but it would have taken anyone else two hands, and they couldn’t afford that. Taking their Champion down one arm was better than burdening someone who could barely run.

  Besides, Urzaia had insisted.

  The cook lowered his other shoulder, the one wrapped in the golden hide of the Sandborn Hydra, and bulled straight through the barricade.

  The crunch of wood snapping was deafening, and Calder and the others had to flinch back as they were pelted by flying splinters. But Urzaia tore through the wood in seconds, slowing himself only enough to allow them to catch up.

  Like one of Othaghor’s many-legged beasts, the Navigators scurried after him.

  From the base of the tower, Calder glimpsed the green-tinged sails of The Testament drifting closer. Foster would be cutting it close with the sand, but it would be better to run aground if that gave them access to the Lyathatan.

  The problem was the Elder itself. If it was annoyed by the shallow depth and towed the ship away from the island, there would be nothing Foster could do about it.

  Urzaia dove into the forest with a sound similar to an elephant trampling a pile of matchsticks. He wasn’t holding himself back now; trees fell or bent away from him as he passed, and any bushes that missed his feet were swarmed by the crew behind him.

  It was a headlong rush into green chaos, and Urzaia’s noise had woken the jungle. Birds and cats screamed at each other from across the island, insects buzzed in a great chorus, and other, stranger whispers floated on the wind.

  Calder questioned everything.

  Based on the stories of Othaghor, he was capable of making any living creature, so it wasn’t only obvious monstrosities that could be in his service. Maybe one of these flies was actually a miniature Elder abomination.

  It was their second tense twilight dash through the woods in one day, and when the beach came into view, Calder started to breathe more easily. This stretch had ended peacefully. Now they had to move on to the next problem.

  Or so he thought before the next problem leaped onto them.

  There came a roar that drowned out even Urzaia’s snapping trees, and Calder caught a glimpse of green bulk descending from the treetops. It landed on Urzaia before he could get a good look at it.

  The Elder of Othaghor was built like a gorilla with a hide of leathery olive skin and no fur. Its head resembled a bullfrog more than anything else, with a limp sac of skin falling like jowls from its jaws. Yellow eyes bulged from its head, and its mouth split open sideways, hissing at Urzaia with rows of tiny teeth and flailing its massive fists.

  But it still hadn’t made contact with the ground.

  Urzaia was holding it in the air with one hand.

  The Champion’s muscles strained, his teeth bared, blond hair blowing behind him like in a portrait of an Izyrian hero. He dropped the safe, bringing his left hand around to catch the green fist that would have crashed into his ribs.

  “Get to the beach!” Calder shouted.

  At that moment, the bushes came alive.

  The Slithers crawled out from everywhere.

  Everywhere.

  Every patch of grass and gnarled nest of roots and loose patch of bark disgorged a hideous lime-green creature with six yellow eyes and a dozen webbed amphibian feet. Scarle
t stingers flexed, and the Elderspawn lived up to their name as they slithered for Calder and his crew.

  Andel separated from the group, dashing for the safe that Urzaia had dropped. He’d probably made the best call in regard to their objective, because the crown’s return would benefit the Empire even if they all died here.

  But as far as personal safety went, Calder applauded everyone else instead. He, Jerri, Goss, and Lakiri circled with their backs to one another, their various weapons held out.

  A pistol cracked behind him, and he hoped it wasn’t Jerri, who would only have a long knife to defend herself once she’d unloaded her single shot. He skewered a Slither to a tree, cut another one along the ground, and sliced a third in half as it tried to sink its strange horizontal-split jaws into his ankle.

  A scream the sounded like Lakiri came from his left, but he was too distracted by the fourth Elderspawn biting into his left arm. It raised its stinger, ready to plunge, but he swatted it away and glanced back to Jerri.

  She seemed fine, as far as he could tell; the wave of Elderspawn must have crashed into his side of their circle because she was facing fewer than anyone else. But Goss was about to break formation, covered in at least half a dozen clambering creatures. He made a strange choking noise as he swatted at himself, dancing like he was covered in spiders.

  Calder’s blade moved as fast and carefully as it ever had. He cut a long gash in the man’s arm and took off the tip of his ear, but he caught four of the Slithers before he had to return to his own concerns.

  That was all he could do for the man.

  A missile flew through the jungle air, smashing through trees.

  Urzaia.

  The Champion flipped and landed on his feet, roaring out a challenging laugh as he dashed back to battle, but Calder spared another glance over his shoulder for Andel.

  The Luminian held the safe behind him as Othaghor’s amphibian behemoth stood over him.

  Without thinking, Calder broke formation, dashing for Andel. He shouted, trying to draw the creature’s attention.