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The warning sound came as she expected, the soft hiss of steel sliding against leather, the shift of dirt under a boot with a step forward. She twisted fast to the side, caught the twinkle of a blade as it flew past her and flung her own weapon in an underhanded throw that took Ogran in the belly hard enough to knock him off his feet. He lay on his back, hand gripped around the knife's pommel, the blade sunk to the hilt. Blood trickled out of his mouth as he stared first at the knife and then at her in disbelief.
Anhuset felt no pity for him. No doubt he'd dispatched his trusting companions in just this way. She crouched beside him and stared into his rattish face, his once-ruddy complexion turning pale. “It takes a long time to die from a gut wound,” she told him. His eyes widened. “And I want my knife back.” She wrapped her hand around the pommel and yanked hard. The blade slid free with a jerk and a gout of blood. Ogran tried to scream, but Anhuset cut off the attempt with a quick swipe of the bloodied knife across his throat. He was dead before his head hit the dirt.
She dragged his body off the road and out of sight, wedging it against a pair of young saplings so it wouldn't roll. The forest scavengers would pick his bones clean in no time. In her opinion, he didn't deserve a burial any more than the men he'd killed deserved their deaths. She stripped him of the money he carried. If any of the three he'd murdered had families, they could use the coin, and if fate were kind, she'd have a chance to return it to Serovek to give to them. She also recovered the knife Ogran had thrown where it lay in the road and returned to Magas waiting patiently where she'd tied him.
A more peaceful person might say her killing Ogran wouldn't bring back the men he killed or save Serovek from an execution, but in her mind, it was justice, and if circumstance had seen fit to let her deal that justice, so be it. She hoped the same might happen with Serovek's steward Bryzant.
She reached Saggara a day and a half later, tired, filthy, and ready to switch an equally tired Magas for a fresh mount so she could ride to the Beladine capital after relaying her news to Brishen. She galloped through the gates of the redoubt and had barely reined the big stallion to a halt before she was out of the saddle and striding toward the doors of the expansive manor house that had once been the long-ago summer palace of Kai royalty. She spotted Brishen's steward, Mesumenes, as he emerged into the main bailey from the manor. His eyes rounded when he spotted her. “Where's theherceges, steward?”
She handed Magas's reins to a nearby soldier. “Take him to the stables. Have the stablemaster give him the best care.” She patted the stallion's neck before he was led away. “Good horse,” she said. The horse rolled an eye at her as if to say he was indifferent to her good opinion then followed the soldier to the stables.
Mesumenes had disappeared back into the manor. Anhuset strode after him, only to be greeted at the threshold by Brishen who burst through the doors and swooped her into his arms.
“Lover of thorns,” he said into her hair, squeezing her until she gasped. “I was about to send all of Saggara out looking for you.”
She briefly returned his embrace, noting the pinched worry lines around his mouth. “I'm fine. There's much to tell and messages to give, but I have to make it fast. Serovek needs my help. As soon as I give you my news, I'll ride from here with rations and a fresh horse to Timsiora and...”
“Sha-Anhuset.” Brishen's voice was calm but implacable, addressing her as hisshainstantly focusing her attention back to him. His features softened. “Enough.” He squeezed her arm. “Enough. Come with me.” He nudged her toward the door, inviting her inside.
She exhaled a frustrated sigh, entering the house at his side. “Herceges, I mean no disrespect, but I don't have time for friendly chatting.”
“But you will make time to plan instead of racing off with no idea in mind as to how you'll break Serovek out of a Beladine prison for treason and sedition.”
She halted, caught by surprise. “You know.”
Brishen nodded. “A messenger from High Salure managed to sneak out of the fortress and ride to Saggara. Rodan sent troops to arrest Serovek at the monastery. High Salure is currently under the command of one of King Rodan's military advisers. The messenger told me it was seized by royal troops and will be held until Rodan decides what to do with Serovek.”
Her anger at the injustice of Serovek's predicament had simmered in her blood from the moment the troop captain had announced the charges. It heated to a boil now. “He's innocent of both charges. His fucking steward tried to have him killed by a warlord and now by his own king. The warlord himself admitted it as did the steward's henchman before I cut his throat and left his corpse to the crows.”
Brishen's eyebrows rose. He gestured for her to keep up with him as they made their way through the busy great hall to one of the more private chambers he used for meetings and set in a short wing of the house. “When we aren't trying to figure out how to help our friend, you'll tell me that story.”
He ushered her inside one of the rooms—familiar to her and one she disliked. It was in this room they and the Elsod had hatched a plan to defeat thegallaand change the Kai nation forever. Brishen was closing the door when a bright-haired figure darted inside.
Ildiko blew a strand of hair from her face and tucked it behind her ear. “You found her! Thank the gods.”
Anhuset bowed. “Hercegesé.” It was an odd thing to hear the relief in Ildiko's voice. She and Anhuset got along well enough, and Anhuset's admiration for Brishen's ugly human wife grew a little more each day. She was a worthy consort to the regent and devoted mother to a child not her own.
Ildiko didn't try to embrace her as Brishen had, but she smiled a wide, square-toothed smile. “I think the worry took a decade off Brishen's life.”
“I assure you that was never my intention,” Anhuset said.
Brishen leaned against the closed door and crossed his arms. “Since we're obviously pressed for time, tell me what happened, and we'll go from there.”
She didn't waste a moment recounting their journey to the monastery, starting first with what she knew would displease him—their side trip to Haradis. Brishen's expression, usually mild, turned harsh, every angle sharpening with his growing scowl, especially when she told him of thegallastill lurking behind the walls and how she believed it had been a manifestation of Megiddo that had saved them. Anhuset glanced at Ildiko. Thehercegesédidn't scowl as her husband did, but her face was even paler than when she first rushed into the room.
“Serovek should have never brought you there,” Brishen said, voice flat. Angry. “And neither one of you should have gone into that cursed place.”
“The decision was mine, Brishen. I would have gone alone if he refused to accompany me.” Anhuset lifted her palms in a supplicating gesture. “I know why you refuse to revisit Haradis or allow others to do so. I understand. Truly. But had I not done so, we wouldn't have known about the canals dug or the fact there was agallatrapped in there. Maybe more.” Saying that sent a shiver through her, and Ildiko hugged herself as if warding off the cold.
Brishen's expression only hardened even more. “Be that as it may, I am ordering you as your regent and your commander to stay away from Haradis. You will not go back there without my express permission. Is that understood?”
Mild-mannered and jovial most of the time, though less so since thegalla's ravages, Brishen angered was a formidable sight to behold. The few times Anhuset had seen him like this, he'd reminded her of both his parents. Ruthless, implacable, dangerous to cross. She bowed. “Yes,herceges.”
“Continue,” he said, and his voice was no longer as chilly as before.
She told him of the bridge that shouldn't be there and the haunted city with its phantasmal queen and her entourage of ghosts, of Bryzant's and Ogran's betrayal of Serovek, of Chamtivos and their ordeal in the camp as well as the fight on the island and the monks' arrival there.
Brishen raised a hand to halt her narrative. The yellow of his eye flickered from dark to light with the change of his emotions. Swirling ribbons of fear laced with shock and worse, guilt. “Are you all right?” That one-eyed gaze passed over her slowly, looking for signs of injury.
