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“And, no doubt, they’ve been slowed in their escape attempt by defending themselves against us.” Nicolo nodded and turned to the guards. “Keep going this way, fight them for every inch. If you can take them, do.” Then he turned back to me. “Charlotte and I will try to cut them off.”
The guards nodded and pressed on. Nicolo looked back to me.
“Lead the way. Fast as you can.”
I nodded and led him back a few rooms, before cutting into a corridor and down a flight of stairs. As we ran, I couldn’t stop the thoughts rearing up in my mind:we’re alone, just him and me. It would be the perfect time to enact my plan. And it would be an easily sold lie.
I could say we’d been ambushed by more of the traitorous assassins and Nicolo had died defending me. No one would question it. Or he could have suffered an accident, tripping down a flight of stairs and breaking his neck—it wasn’t unfathomable.
Regardless, if I attacked now, I would catch him unawares. So… now the question became: how to attack him? Of course, it was never easy with Nicolo. I could push him down the stairs, but he was sure-footed and athletic, which meant he’d probably land on his feet like a cat, and then he’d have some questions I’d have a hell of a time trying to answer. Unless he killed me first
If I attacked him, yes I would catch him off-guard, but would that be enough? He was a formidable swordsman. So was I, but, though I imagined us to be pretty evenly matched in skill, he’d always have the edge in strength because he was bigger than me. That wasn’t always an advantage in a sword fight, but the point was that my own victory was no foregone conclusion. The fight could go either way, and I had no reason to take unnecessary chances. It was important to me to successfully complete my first assignment, yes, but was it as important as my life?
For perhaps the first time I realized that, though I was loyal to the Guild, I didn’t consider that loyalty to be worth my life. I wouldn’t die for the Guild—I viewed them as my employer and that was all. Besides, I hoped one day there might be more to my life than assassinating people for money.
“Charlotte, stop slowing.”
“Apologies, Master.”
I picked up the pace and put all those self-analytical doubts behind me. But, at the back of my mind, there remained a little voice that pointed out the fact that all I had to do was find an excuse for Nicolo to take the lead, then I could simply run him through with my sword from behind. It might not beeasy, but it would be simple.
But I didn’t do it.
Do it!I urged myself, yet I stalled.
For all my elegant and reasonable excuses as to why this wasn’t the right time, it was getting harder and harder to ignore the fact that there might be another reason I wasn’t killing him, a reason that had nothing to do with my personal safety.
I can’t think about that now,I told myself.Just focus… focus on apprehending the assassins.
I’d only been down to the sub-basement once, to clean off the metal grid over the culvert that stopped the drain from getting blocked. It wasn’t a nice job and I’d been glad to only have to do it once, but I still remembered the way.
The culvert room was deep and we were entering from an upper story—a precarious circle of slippery steps set into the wall, leading down to the floor and the drain itself. As we entered, the last assassin was darting into the drain, the metal grill held back by a tall man with a noble bearing.
“Wylder!” shouted Nicolo.
Duke Wylder looked up. I’d expected a smile as he’d managed to get away, but his face was stern. This was serious business, and I got the impression he wasn’t proud to be stooping to assassination.
He ducked into the culvert and pulled the metal grill behind him.
“Damn it!” Nicolo raced down the steps, passing me, and I followed as fast as I dared. As we reached the bottom, the guards we’d left earlier entered from the ground level door.
“We just missed them,” I explained.
But Nicolo wasn’t finished. “Come on! They can’t have gotten far.”
He grabbed the metal grill and tossed it to one side with a wet clang, stooping to follow Wylder into the drain.
“Master!” I ran forward and grabbed his shoulder, holding him back. “You can’t go—” I started.
Nicolo spun around, slapping me hard across the face, as his anger got the better of him and he unloaded it on me. “How dare you question me!”
It took all my self-control not to slap him back. And though my face stung terribly, my ego stung all the more. He hit me! He really laid a hand on me. I was equally shocked as I was humiliated because I didn’t believe he would ever lay a hand on me, much though he warned about it on and on.
It was a timely reminder that, however much I mentally tried to romanticize ‘the Terrible’, he’d earned his nickname. I suddenly wanted to browbeat myself for not taking my chance to kill him earlier.
I held my stinging cheek in one hand as I spoke. “It’s narrow and dark and they’ll be expecting you. You wouldn’t have a chance…Master.” I spat that last word as I narrowed my eyes at him.
Nicolo stared at me for a moment, the fury still blazing in his gaze, then he looked back to the drain. He knew I was correct and that he hadn’t been thinking when he was about to enter the drain, but the desire to give chase was still boiling inside him.
