Kushiel's Avatar

for six months. If we were not back by then, they would reckon us dead or lost.
    Renée de Rives fell on my neck, weeping hard and kissing me as she bid me farewell, leaving no doubt that she’d no hope of seeing me alive again. Despite the language barrier, the delegates had managed to get their fill of tales of Drujan; enough to render them certain that we rode toward our doom.
    There had been a death in Nineveh, whilst we made our arrangements-a commoner, a potter, had been crushed by his own wares when a shelf had given way in his workshop, after he’d cursed a Skotophagotis who crossed his doorstep.
    It was enough to fuel the fear.
    Joscelin said little and sharpened his blades, working them endlessly with a whetstone, oiling his scabbard and sheaths and removing the last traces of rust from our rain-sodden journey to Nineveh. We had worked out a plan, such as it was. The Lugal’s man, one Tizrav, would guide us to the palace of Daršanga. If we reached it safely, Joscelin would pay him half the agreed-upon price from his own purse. Our story was that Joscelin was a renegade D’Angeline lordling who had abducted a peer’s wife-that was me-against her will. Having found the price of his escapade too steep, pursued by my husband’s kin across several lands, he would be willing to trade my favors for sanctuary in Drujan, where no one would dare seek him.
    A simple plan, and a good one. As a surety, Lord Amaury himself would hold the second half of Tizrav’s payment, to be rendered only when the Persian returned from Drujan with the appropriate code-word. Joscelin and Amaury had agreed upon the word, and Joscelin would not give it unto the Persian until he was certain Tizrav had not betrayed us.
    “What word shall we choose?” Amaury had asked, frowning.
    Joscelin had looked at me. “Hyacinthe,” he said.
    It was only fitting.
    There is a point where fear becomes so large it ceases to matter, and exists only in the abstract. I reached it, during those preparations. It was too vast to comprehend, so I went about my business. I met Tizrav, son of Tizmaht; he was not a figure to inspire confidence, a wiry, dirty man with one eye put out by a poacher’s arrow, so he said. I considered it a good deal more likely he had been poaching. Nonetheless, the Lugal of Khebbel-im-Akkad vouched for him.
    “Tizrav knows the mountains,” he said. “He is a coward, but a cunning one, and he will not betray you, not where there is gold at stake.”
    I’d no choice but to believe him. “Are you willing to lesson me in Old Persian along the way?” I asked. “It is a long road to Daršanga.”
    “Of course!” he said, bobbing his head agreeably, grinning and fingering beneath his eyepatch. “Whatever my lady wishes. It is my milk-tongue; I speak it like a native! It is why no Drujani will trouble us, no, not when Tizrav is guiding.”
    I had my doubts; I had a thousand doubts. I kept my mouth silent on them. Joscelin looked at me without speaking and continued to sharpen his blades.
    Ironically, Valère L’Envers forgave me for abusing her House’s password and came to like me better once she thought I was marked for death. Having nowhere else to turn for it, I begged a favor and asked her to hold in safekeeping the Jebean scroll with the story of Shalomon’s son, and Audine Davul’s translation. Not only did she accede, but did me another favor unasked. “Here,” she said, thrusting a coat upon me, a deep crimson silk lined with marten-skin. “It was a gift from Sinaddan, who had it in tribute, but the sleeves are too short and I’ve never bothered to have it sized. It ought to fit you well, Comtesse, and it will be cold in the mountains.”
    I tried it on, and it fit perfectly. “Thank you,” I said softly, the silken brown fur of the collar nestled against my cheek. “My lady is kind.”
    “I’m not kind!” Tears stood in her violet eyes. “Elua, why couldn’t you be different? I know your history! The Queen heeds you, my cousin Nicola dotes on you, even my father acknowledges your merit! Why do I have to be the one member of my House to send you off to die, and all for that viper’s brat?”
    “I’m not dead yet, highness,” I murmured.
    “No.” Valère L’Envers turned away, fussing with her wardrobe. “But you may be soon, and I need to prepare for it. Well,” she sniffed, “never let it be said that I allowed a D’Angeline peer to face death ill-garbed for it.”
    Favrielle nó