Fifth Quarter E-Book

Tanya Huff

• Herausgeber: JABberwocky Literary Agency, Inc.
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Serie: Quarters
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 570

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015

Beschreibung

Trained to kill from childhood, siblings Bannon and Vree have only known life as assassins in the Imperial Army. The army is both their mother and father, their lives subject to the whims of the Crown. When their latest target steals Bannon's body for his own, Vree saves her brother by dragging his spirit in to share hers. But two assassins in one body is one assassin too many. To save both their lives, they must abandon the only life they've known, risking Imperial ire and possible execution, to regain Bannon's body. It isn't until after they capture Gyhard, the body thief, that they realize they can't force him to do anything while he holds Bannon's body hostage. But Gyhard is willing to trade Bannon's body for their assistance. All they have to do – while being hunted for desertion and dealing with an unknown power able to Sing the dead out of the grave – is betray the oaths they've lived by and help Gyhard secure the body of an Imperial Prince.

Leseprobe

FIFTH QUARTER

Copyright © 1995 by Tanya Huff.

All Rights Reserved.

Published as an ebook in 2015 by Jabberwocky Literary Agency, Inc. Originally published by DAW Books in 1995.

All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

Cover design by Tiger Bright Studios

ISBN 978-1-625671-23-3

Reviews for FIFTH QUARTER:

“This isn’t fluff, and it isn’t light—but it has so much heart to leaven its dark moments that is a someplace-that-isn’t here in which to find belief in redemption.”

—The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction

“Good fantasy assassin adventure … distinctive … Huff has a lot of fun playing with love, in its many permutations: courtly, lustful, incestuous, parental and selfish … Huff manages to make this more than just another fantasy adventure.”

—Locus

“Another topnotch work from Tanya Huff. (Her) clever tale is sheer delight for the intelligent reader. A consummate craftsman, Ms. Huff always entertains us in a myriad of wonderful ways.”

—Romantic Times

“Tanya Huff has penned a masterful second book of Quarters. Her storytelling is excellent, and her characters are well-drawn. The ending is an interesting twist and quite satisfying.”

—Affaire de Coeur

ALSO BY TANYA HUFF

THE BLOOD BOOKS

Blood Price

Blood Trail

Blood Lines

Blood Pact

Blood Debt

THE SMOKE BOOKS

Smoke and Shadows

Smoke and Mirrors

Smoke and Ashes

THE QUARTERS NOVELS

Sing the Four Quarters*

Fifth Quarter*

No Quarter*

The Quartered Sea*

THE KEEPER CHRONICLES

Summon the Keeper

The Second Summoning

Long Hot Summoning

TORIN KERR NOVELS

Valor Novels

Valor's Choice^

The Better Part of Valor^

Heart of Valor

Valor's Trial

The Truth of Valor

Peacekeeper Novels

An Ancient Peace

THE ENCHANTMENT EMPORIUM

The Enchantment Emporium

The Wild Ways

The Future Falls

STANDALONES

The Fire's Stone*

Gate of Darkness, Circle of Light*

Wizard of the Grove

The Silvered

SHORT STORY COLLECTIONS

What Ho, Magic!

Stealing Magic

Relative Magic

Finding Magic

Nights of the Round Table*

February Thaw*

Swan's Braid, and other tales of Terizan*

He Said, Sidhe Said*

Third Time Lucky*

*available as a Jabberwocky ebook

^also available in the omnibus A Confederation of Valor

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Title Page

Copyright

Reviews for Fifth Quarter

Also by Tanya Huff

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Excerpt from No Quarter

For Fe,once again,because she wanted it so badly

One

There were guards on duty at the entrance to the marshal’s tent but they’d expected that and were accustomed to using less obvious entrances. Problem was, there were guards on duty at the sides and rear of the tent as well.

“Looks like they’re expecting us,” Bannon whispered, his mouth lightly touching his sister’s ear, the esses softened to prevent the sound from carrying.

Vree nodded, right hand rising to brush at the lingering caress of warm breath, eyes locked on the flickering circle of torches that left no paths of darkness.

The guards were spaced in such a way that removing one would alert the others.

She gestured at a sputtering flame; the thick knob of oil-soaked hemp had nearly burned away. Soon, it would have to be replaced. Bannon signed his agreement.

They were in position, ready, when the marshal’s personal body servant appeared with a new torch. As the nearest guard half-turned to watch the exchange, they rose from a sheltering hollow and raced into the skirts of shadow around the base of the tent. His gaze sweeping a heartbeat behind their movement, the guard resumed scanning his assigned area.

Contorted to fit into the triangle of darkness, they could hear only one voice from inside, but as it rose and fell in a conversational cadence, they assumed the marshal had company.

Pressed flat against the ground, Vree slid under the weighted edge of canvas and continued to slide under the red-and-gold patterned carpet laid to define the floor. When she felt Bannon’s touch on her ankle, she dug fingers and toes into the dirt and began to creep on her belly around the perimeter. The marshal’s voice grew louder, and for the first time she heard the rough whisper that answered. Commander Neegan. She grinned. They’d expected as much and made allowances for his presence.

The crushed and dying grass beneath the carpet made breathing difficult, but Vree sucked air past her teeth and kept moving through the thick growth. A parade of heavy-footed officers had mashed the floor flat in the center of the tent, but out where the billowing walls touched the earth, it rose and fell like the dunes of Hedyve. Between the patterns in the carpet and the flickering shadows—the marshal was well known for conserving lamp oil—an extra pair of lumps in the floor would not likely be noticed. When Vree finally paused, she could feel Bannon’s movement in the vibrations of the fabric against her shoulder blades. But only Bannon’s movement. She froze, listening. Wood and leather creaked above and to her left. Both marshal and commander were seated, discussing possible routes for a massed attack.

“They know we’re coming; what makes you think they haven’t moved the furniture around?” Bannon asked, rubbing his palms together as he peered down at the diagram sketched in the dirt.

“Two reasons.” Vree sat back on her heels. “First, the marshal always sits facing the entrance. Always. That doesn’t leave a lot of options with a map table that size. Second …” She looked up at her brother and drew a circle around the sketch with one seemingly delicate, long-fingered hand. “… they don’t think we can make it that far.”

Bannon grinned in anticipation. A shadow-bladed knife flickered against his palm, then disappeared back into a hidden sheath, the motion almost too fast to follow. “More fools they.”

* * * *

“Well, Neegan …” The marshal leaned back in the folding camp chair and set the empty flagon on the table with a sharp crack. “… second watch is nearly over and still no sign of them.”

“Too early to relax, Marshal.” Commander Neegan’s whisper had been given him many years before by an enemy archer. The commander had not only survived the battle but seen to it that the archer did not.

Marshal Chela smiled, the expression bracketing the rounded curves of her face with deep creases. “I never relax,” she said cheerfully. “It’s why I’ve lived to a ripe old age.” She reached for the flagon, remembered it was empty, and sighed. “There’s another bottle in that case behind you, Neegan. Get it, would you?”

“Allow me, Marshal.” In one lithe motion, Bannon rose to his feet, set the clay bottle on the table, and lightly touched his blade to the commander’s neck, just by the white pucker of the old scar.

Chela leaned forward slightly, eyes narrowed. “Aren’t you removing the wrong target?” she murmured.

Vree tapped the older woman gently on the shoulder and laid a line of steel across her throat. “Don’t move,” she warned. “It’s very sharp.”

Apparently oblivious to the knife tip dimpling his skin, Neegan held out his hand. “You owe me forty crescents, Marshal. I told you they could do it.”

* * * *

“I don’t want this becoming a siege; they’re on springs and we aren’t.” Marshal Chela laced her fingers over her ample belly, the silver and ruby ring that proclaimed her a priestess of Jiir, Goddess of Battles, gleaming on her shield hand. “Any suggestions?”

Commander Leesh stepped forward, her voice a bare shade off eager. “Why don’t we just charge the city? They wouldn’t survive an all-out attack.”

“Neither would most of us,” Chela pointed out dryly. Leesh was the youngest of her four commanders and anxious to prove a political promotion deserved in spite of evidence to the contrary. “And try to remember that the people of Ghoti are as much citizens of the Havakeen Empire as you are. It is our duty to attempt to find a solution that doesn’t end in slaughter.”

“Governor Aralt commands a great deal of personal loyalty.” Neegan’s harsh whisper quieted the rising mutter of speculation. “His people follow him, not a series of … misguided ideals.” The dead and dying of another, earlier rebellion made themselves heard in the pause. “He promises them glory, a return to days of petty kingdoms and hollow crowns.” With a graceful gesture, the commander sketched that past in the air. “What chance does the Empire’s promise of peace, order, and good government have against that?”

Then he spread his hands, offering the answer. “Aralt is the key. Everything revolves around him. Remove him, and this rebellion falls apart.”

“And how do we remove him?” Chela asked, although she strongly suspected she knew what his answer would be. Although his most recent promotion responsibilities kept him from exercising his skills, Neegan was quite possibly the best military assassin in the seven armies. “Aralt’s locked himself up tight in the governor’s stronghold.”

“I have two who could do the job.”

Leesh snorted in disbelief.

The marshal ignored the interruption. “Aralt’s no fool for all his posturing. He’ll be expecting the attempt.”

“Yes,” Neegan agreed.

“These the two who removed Pahbad?”

“Yes.”

“You’re assuming that two will succeed where a single assassin might fail.” He’d fought to have them trained together using that very argument and had been proven right time after time but, this time, Chela shook her head. “No. They’d never get to him.”

Neegan smiled. “Would the marshal care to place a small wager.…”

* * * *

As she slid her dagger back in its sheath, Vree felt the familiar bleakness that came with the end of a mission. One moment, she and Bannon were a single unit with the use of not one pair of eyes or ears or hands, but two; the next, she stood alone. This time, the dislocation was almost painfully abrupt. This time, they had no retreat, blood singing, back to safety. This time the separation occurred just as senses climaxed at the “kill.”

And there’s nothing worse then melodrama in the middle of the night, she told herself scornfully as she made her way around the table to Bannon’s side, ignoring with long practice the sexual undertones in the original, melodramatic thought.

The marshal fought the urge to touch her throat where she could still feel the cold pressure of the blade. “I’m inclined to believe Commander Neegan’s assurances that you two can target the governor. When can you go in?”

“We’ve been mapping the stronghold since the army arrived, Marshal.” Bannon spoke for them both. “If the weather holds, we could make an attempt as early as tomorrow night.”

Chela nodded. At this time of the year in the southern part of the Empire, there would not be rain. “Make it then.”

* * * *

As they left the tent, Bannon reached out and smacked one of the guards at the entrance on the butt. “Nice work,” he said, loudly enough to turn heads.

“How’d you get in there, you little shit!” the soldier demanded, flushing a ruddy scarlet in the torchlight.

Bannon laughed, dancing back out of his way. “I can’t believe you didn’t see us march right by.”

Well aware that this failure would mean nights spent at other, less prestigious duty posts, the guard weighed the odds of nailing the brother before the sister reacted and decided discretion was the better part of not having his throat slit. “Sod off,” he snarled.

Bannon laughed again and draped his arm across Vree’s shoulders as they moved out into the camp. “How about wasting a quarter-crescent in the baths.”

She glanced over at him, fighting the tremors that started under his touch, telling herself they were caused by the tension of the last few hours, nothing more. His dark eyes glittered in the charcoal mask and she could feel the brittle energy coming off him in waves. “Wasting?” she asked, pointedly wrinkling her nose.

Ivory flashed in the shadow of his face as he lifted his hand to grin at the smudge of lighter skin showing through the camouflage. “Well, there’s always a bit of cold water in a borrowed helmet….”

The baths, one of the many businesses that followed the seven armies with the intent of separating soldiers from their pay, shut down at the end of the second watch. It took an extra half-crescent to convince the proprietors to keep the fires going a little while longer.

Vree lay back in the warm water and tried not to listen to the appreciative murmurs of the bath attendants as they scrubbed her brother. It made no difference that they’d murmur the same nonsense over her had she not made it very clear that she preferred to wash herself. Fingers puckering, she sighed and dragged herself out of the tub.

“You’re too skinny, sister-mine. You should eat more.”

Vree snorted and straightened, reaching for one of the soft cloths hanging on the line beside her. “I’ll remind you of that at the next wall we have to go over.”

“And I’ll deny every word.” He lifted an arm and tried to snake it around the slender waist of the departing attendant. She twisted lithely away, damp braid flicking a practiced dismissal as she left. Bannon turned to her companion who backed up a step.

“Forget it, Bannon,” the young man declared, tossing a cloth at the tub and covering a yawn. “You’re finished, and we’re closing.”

A few moments later, as the lamps went out behind them, Bannon rubbed a dribble of water off the back of his sister’s neck and asked, “Coming with me?”

Vree shook her head. “No.” He always asked. The answer never changed. After a kill, he needed distraction, but she needed quiet. “You going to Teemo’s?”

The whores at Teemo’s were regularly inspected by the army healers. An empire had not been won by either ignoring the needs of its soldiers or the consequences of disease.

“I thought I might.”

“Remember we’re working tomorrow night. Don’t stay too late.”

His sigh lifted the damp hair off her forehead as he leaned forward and smacked a kiss down on the crease between her brows. “Don’t fuss, sister-mine. I’m old enough to take care of myself.”

Old enough. As she watched him stride away, Vree heard the echo of a piping voice demanding to know why she always had to be older and when would it be his turn. Sometimes that one-year difference stretched impossibly far. The one year between six and seven; the corporal had brought the news of their mother’s battlefield death to her, she’d had to tell Bannon. The one year between fourteen and fifteen; Neegan had wanted them both in his command, had been able to pull enough strings to get them there, so she’d been held back for further training until army regulations said Bannon was old enough to be posted. The one year between twenty and twenty-one … Old enough.

Except he’d always be her little brother.

And that’s the problem, isn’t it? she asked herself as he disappeared into the night. Spitting the taste of self-pity out of her mouth, Vree started back to camp. Mooning about it wouldn’t change anything. There wasn’t anything she could change.…

The baths, the brothels, all the extras, were officially outside the patrolled perimeter—although the marshal had been heard to remark on more than one occasion that she knew what the Sixth Army would rush to defend if it came to an attack. Vree slipped unseen past a sentry grown bored near the end of an uneventful watch and picked her way carefully around snoring bodies until she came to the place where the Fourth Squad, Second Unit, First Company, First Division, Sixth Army had been ordered to sleep. The weather had been hot and dry, so hardly anyone had bothered unfolding the tiny, oiled-canvas tents the army issued as shelter to the common soldiers, and she found her gear right where she’d left it, piled next to Bannon’s. Others might lose possessions to petty pilfering, but no one messed with an assassin’s kit.

She nodded to Corporal Emo hunched over his wineskin, then glanced up at the sky. The Road to Glory arced overhead and The Archer continued to aim away from the heart of the Empire. A priest of Assot, God of Music and Prophecy, had long ago declared that the Empire would endure until The Archer turned his bow. Vree, inclined to believe that the priest had been sucking back too much sacramental wine, checked anyway—just to be certain.

Head pillowed on her arms, she closed her eyes and listened to the sound of the army. It was like being in the belly of a great benevolent beast, wrapped in protection, secure in the knowledge that if death came in the night, it would have to come a long way and through many lives to get to her.

Tensions the bath had been unable to touch leached out of her muscles. Slowly, her breathing slid into the cadence of those breathing all around her, and it was as a part of the greater whole that she finally slept.

* * * *

One moment she was asleep, the next she knelt on the shoulders of a young recruit, her dagger point hovering over the wildly rolling surface of his left eye. As her brain caught up with the responses trained into her body, Vree could hear Corporal Emo and several others howling with laughter, could see the terror on the boy’s face, and could smell the result of his fear.

She flipped the knife in the air, caught it, sheathed it, and stood. “You joined us just before we left the garrison, didn’t you?”

The boy stuttered out an affirmative as he scrambled to his feet.

“What’s your name?”

“Avotic.” He noticed the moisture spreading over the front of his kilt, realized suddenly what it meant, and flushed a deep red. Although he had to be at least fifteen to have been posted, embarrassment dropped his age a good four years. “Th-they call me Tic.”

Vree shook her head. “Let me give you some advice, Tic. When a corporal orders you to shake someone awake who wears a black sunburst …”

Tic swiveled his head to stare down at her pack. Scuffed and faded from years of use, the six sunbursts stamped into the worn leather still showed they had once been dyed black. His eyes widened and he swallowed, hard.

“… you tell that corporal to stick his head up his ass and salute it.” She had to raise her voice to be heard over the laughter. “Do you understand what I’m telling you, Tic?”

“Y-yes.” It didn’t seem to matter that he was at least a foot taller than the woman he faced.

“What?”

“If I wake you up again, you’ll kill me.”

Watching from his bedroll, Bannon snickered and Vree tried not to smile in response. “Close enough. Go clean up, you stink.” As the kid ran off, she turned on Emo. “One of these day, I will kill one.”

“Not a chance.” Wiping streaming eyes, the corporal heaved a satisfied sigh. “You’re too good. And now the little shit knows he can die. Thanks to me, he’s a better soldier.”

“Thanks to you?” Vree snorted, bending and dragging her kilt out of her pack. “Which brings up another question,” she continued, buckling the limp, blue pleats around her waist. “Why am I always chosen to give these little lessons of yours?”

“Because you look so sweet when you’re asleep,” Emo told her, secure in his rank. Those of the Fourth Squad standing closest to him made exaggerated movements away. “That pointy little face of yours goes all soft and you have the cutest habit of cupping your cheek with one hand.” His voice lost its false, syrupy tone, and he snorted. “Your brother, on the other hand, looks dangerous only while he sleeps.”

“That’s because I’m dreaming of you, Emo.” Bannon stood and scratched at the triangle of brown hair in the center of his chest. His nose wrinkled at the smell of unwashed bodies, latrine trenches, and great vats of boiling mush. “Life in the army,” he murmured. “Gotta love it.”

“ ’Cause you can’t do shit about it,” several voices answered in unison.

* * * *

“Vree? You going out tonight?”

Vree turned her head and stared incredulously at the woman standing just beyond weapons’ reach. “No, Shonna. I was feeling bloated and I thought I’d check if my black breeches, my black tunic, and my black ankle boots still fit.”

Shonna shrugged and rubbed the back of her neck with one hand while the other traced circles in the night air. “Yeah, well, I mean …” She sighed deeply and started again. “Look, do you think that maybe, on your way back you could pick up a chicken or something?”

“I’m on target, Shonna.”

The other woman looked uncomfortable but dragged up half a grin. “So kill a chicken, too.”

The food provided by the seven armies was nourishing but monotonous. A number of establishments outside the perimeter took advantage of that and for a price no one had to live on mush, black bread, and sausages.

“You lost at dice again.” Vree knew her too well for it to be a question.

“Yeah, but I’ll come around. It’s just …”

“It’s just more of the same. And the answer’s no.”

“Then lend me a crescent.” Shonna took a step forward, hand outstretched. “Until payday.”

“No.”

Shonna’s hand dropped under the weight of Vree’s response and she wiped her palm against her kilt. “I thought I meant something to you.”

A few hours of pleasure, an attempt to raise a barricade around other desires … “Not after you tried losing my money at dice.”

“I should’ve known better,” Shonna muttered sullenly. “Your kind doesn’t have feelings.” Her voice straddled the line between challenge and insult.

Vree merely stared, expressionless, until the other woman nervously began to back away.

As she turned and stomped toward the center of camp, sandals slapping against the packed dirt, Bannon separated from the shadows to stand at Vree’s shoulder. “She wasn’t good enough for you, sister-mine,” he said softly. “But then, who is?”

Her gaze pulled around by his tone, Vree caught a glimpse of an expression she couldn’t identify and wondered, not for the first time, how much he knew.

* * * *

The Sixth Army had camped close enough to Ghoti to intimidate and far enough away to maneuver, leaving a large expanse of scrubby ground to be crossed under the eyes of enemy sentries perched on top of hastily erected earthen defenses. Fortunately, shadows were plentiful and the sentries were distracted—not only by the might of the Empire arrayed against them but by the growing fear that they just might have made a fatal mistake.

Access to the town was limited but far from impossible.

Did they honestly think that would stop us or do they just not think? Vree wondered as she followed her brother into the wedge of darkness between two buildings. She sifted the night, searched the sights and sounds and smells for threat, and signed, “All clear.” The town could be empty of life for all the notice it took of them. When Bannon nodded, she led the way down a garbage-strewn alley toward the governor’s stronghold.

In this, the southernmost part of the Empire, walls were made of formed mud, broader at the bottom out of necessity and angled gently upward toward a red-clay tiled roof. By sunlight, the city was an attractive patchwork of orangebrown. By starlight, the vibrant colors had muted to shades of gray. The smell of chilies fried in oil lingered in the shadows and through the shutters that closed off one deeply recessed window, Vree could hear a low voice singing to a fretful baby.

“… I will feed you bits of rainbow/red for laughter, blue for sorrow …”

… yellow kisses, green tomorrows. Their garrison-mother had been fond of the song, and Vree wondered if she’d been from Ghoti or if the lullaby had traveled across the Empire. She glanced at Bannon to see if he’d heard and found him waiting for her to confirm that no danger lay concealed in the open market they had to cross. Calling herself several kinds of fool, she slapped her mind back to the job at hand. The danger in an easy target came from falling off the edge.

The governor’s stronghold—an octagon-shaped wall enclosing a tall central tower and a number of squat outbuildings—was both the oldest structure in Ghoti and the only one made of stone. The wall showed signs of recent reinforcing and the massive gates were shut, barred, and guarded.

Vree gestured to her left and Bannon nodded, slipping past her to take point. She could feel herself responding to the new level of danger, could see the same response in the way her brother moved.

Over the last few months of rebellion, Governor Aralt had swept clear the area around the stronghold, destroying anything that might provide shelter for the enemy should they force him back to a final stand. The darkness, combined with one of the eight angles, provided all the shelter that Vree and Bannon needed. Fingers and toes found purchase in cracks a lizard would have ignored. Head to head, pressed flat against the wall’s rough capstones, they scanned the enclosure, hidden by the uneven ridge of an unfinished and unusable sentry box. They’d come this far once before, but from now on, every move would be the first move.

“Aralt’s no fool for all his posturing. He’ll be expecting the attempt.”

Vree touched her brother lightly on the shoulder. He winced as he saw the three heavily armed and wary rebels march across the court and disappear behind one of the outbuildings. Up in the tower a trio of shadows bristling with weapons carried a flickering lamp past a narrow window.

Patrols, he mouthed.

She nodded. It looked like Aralt was, indeed, expecting them.

The stone grew warm beneath them as they watched.

No pattern, Bannon signed at last.

They both knew that a pattern would eventually emerge; that people were incapable of sustaining truly random action. A pattern would make their job easier, safer, but could take several nights to determine. A delay would please no one except, perhaps, the governor.

As yet another three-rebel patrol paused directly below them, Bannon nudged her and flicked his thumb up. No surprise, Vree mused. In five years, he’d voted they turn from the target exactly twice. The first time, they’d returned the next night equipped to deal with the unexpected, four-legged guards. The second, they’d gone in farther than they should have, started back too late, and ended up trapped together for a full day in a hidey-hole barely big enough for one of them. Unable to move, barely able to breathe, it was the only time Vree had ever had more than enough of her brother and had found herself, after hours of his chin digging painfully into her shoulder, wishing that she worked alone. And why am I dwelling on old failures now?

She spat on her palm to chase away bad luck.

Staring down at the skinny, dark on dark silhouette of a teenage boy, his spear held tightly across his body, trembling angles announcing that he’d rather be anywhere and doing anything else, she finally nodded.

* * * *

The interior of the tower was vastly more complicated than it appeared from the top of the wall. Over the years, countless divisions had created a jumble of small rooms and crooked corridors that followed no logical course. Cloaked in darkness, the assassins avoided two patrols and then were very nearly discovered by a grumbling servant stomping around complaining about all the noise.

“… up at dawn and ’spects me ta sleep wi’ all this racket …”

Bannon mimed slitting her throat. Vree rolled her eyes and motioned for him to get moving. The old woman hadn’t seen them; there was no need to kill her.

Their information—and they knew better than to ask how Commander Neegan had gotten it—put the governor’s quarters on the top floor of the tower. Hugging the inner wall of a wide curved hall, they found a flight of stairs, climbed seven steps, and emerged onto a carpet so plush they could have marched the entire Sixth Army across it without making a sound. The room contained only a trunk beneath a high arched window and across from it, a pile of cushions broken into squares of shadow by the night. Opposite the door they came in was another, the beaded curtain hung across it so thick that it appeared from a distance to be a solid barrier.

“Sandalwood,” Bannon murmured, his breath brushing the word against her ear.

It took her a moment to understand what he meant and then another to separate the scent of the beads from the scent of him.

There were no sounds coming from the other side of the curtain; no sounds, no light, no patrol. As Vree used the back of her wrist to lift the strands nearest the door frame away from the polished stone, Bannon slid through the narrow opening. Vree counted three heartbeats, moved to follow, then froze. From the other side of the curtain came the flicker of an open lamp and the sound of marching feet.

A patrol. They’d have to go back. She turned and suddenly realized it wasn’t one patrol she heard but two. They couldn’t go back. The leading edge of approaching lamplight already threw three grotesquely elongated shadows against the stone just outside the room. The short flight of curved stairs had hidden the second patrol until it was almost too late.

Heart pounding, Vree dove for the tiny angle between the bottom cushions and the wall. Face pressed against the tile floor at the edge of the carpet, she squirmed into the only shelter the room had to offer. The patrol was on the threshold when she realized Bannon wasn’t going to join her.

Too late to join him.

He’s hidden on the other side. There was no question about it, but she didn’t like discovering that they’d separated. Not alone. Just apart. Barely breathing, she listened to the footsteps grow louder, then suddenly stop as the carpet caught the sound and held it.

Then she heard the rattle of sandalwood beads closely followed by a muffled curse.

“Blow it, Eline, I could’ve killed you.”

“Had to hit me first,” a second voice growled. “Whacha so jumpy about anyway?”

“Place looks different in the dark.” This new voice was young, not quite settled into adult depths, and Vree found herself thinking of the boy with the spear.

Eline snorted. “Gotta lamp, doncha? Hardly dark.”

“Where have you just come from?” This was the first voice again. She still sounded irritated.

“Storerooms, if you must know.”

“Did you see anything?”

Eline, Vree realized, had come through the curtain. You didn’t see anything…

“Lotta dark. Nothin’ else.” He yawned, noisily. “Don’t expect to neither. Fool’s hunt this.”

“At least they’ve put a fool on it.”

“Up yours, too,” Eline told her genially. “Come on,” he snarled at his silent companions. After a moment, Vree heard the stone pick up the scuff of their footsteps.

“What is it?” The boy’s patrol was still in the room.

“Something’s not right …”

“That’d be Eline,” muttered a second woman.

The first snickered and agreed.

Vree waited until the beads stopped whispering warnings against each other, then rose swiftly to her feet, cushions tumbling forward. Although training and instinct both told her she was alone, exposing herself a little at a time would do no good if someone had been left behind.

No one waited in the gray wash of starlight that spilled though the arced window.

No one.

She crossed the faint trail dragged through the air behind a heavily sweating body and stood by the curtain.

No sound.

Bannon …?

There was nothing on the other side except corridor. Stairs curved down the outside wall to her right, gray shading quickly to black, and a narrow hall disappeared in darkness to her left.

Bannon! She’d have heard it if he were captured or killed, but knowing that didn’t stop the sudden erratic beating of her heart. Patrols coming at him from two directions. He can’t go back because the curtain keeps him from seeing how close the danger is. The only thing he can do is go on. Her back pressed against the wall, eyes useless in the total lack of light, Vree followed. They’d planned for separation the way soldiers planned for the loss of an arm or a leg in battle.

A change in air currents drew her to the other side of the corridor where questing fingers found an arched and open doorway. With a patrol on his heels, Bannon would’ve gone through it. She slid one foot forward and the toe of her soft boot nudged up against a step. The governor’s quarters were on the top floor of the tower. Bannon would’ve gone up these stairs. Fully aware she’d be trailing him, and as much able to put himself in her place as she could put herself in his, he’d wait for her the moment he found a hole secure from passing patrols.

The stairs, barely wide enough for two to walk abreast, rose straight from darkness to the gray outline of another door and offered no security.

Halfway to the top, Vree grunted as the stone dipped first to the right then the left and the height of the risers abruptly changed. Any intruder who ran up these stairs would be in for a rude shock and a painful stumble if not an out-and-out fall. It was a simple precaution but—on other occasions with other intruders—an effective one.

The stairs ended at a balcony set into the side of the tower. A pair of narrow windows looked out onto it and a low stone balustrade separated it from the night. Nowhere to hide, no choice but to keep moving. As Vree crawled rapidly toward the far end, the large, complicated set of chimes hanging between the two windows caught her attention. Shrine to the winds. South wind, she amended, glancing over her shoulder at the position of the stars.

Flat on her belly against the cool tiles, she slid sideways and carefully snagged the lowest of the pale blue ceramic disks. Although she wore Jiir’s medallion around her neck, the Goddess of Battles had never insisted on exclusive worship and Vree firmly believed in taking every possible precaution. Overhead, bits of paper and fabric hung limp in the still air. With nothing to tie to the shrine with her prayer, Vree smudged a bit of charcoal across the center of the disk. Then she smiled. The bottom curve had already been marked.

Bannon.

Another long flight of stairs, identical to those she’d just climbed, finally brought her to the top floor of the tower. Flames danced in the copper bowls of open lamps set into the wall all down the short corridor and more light spilled out through an open door halfway down one side.

The governor’s apartments. If there’d been a guard, Bannon would have waited in the darkness at the top of the stairs. He’d know she was close behind him and that it was vital the guard not give the alarm. But he wasn’t waiting. So there hadn’t been a guard. With no cover in the corridor, he’d be waiting just inside the first room.

Why hadn’t there been a guard?

Squinting, senses straining, Vree moved toward the light. The banded wooden door had not only been left open but secured back. She frowned. An open door was an invitation to enter. A trap? Possibly.

Where was Bannon?

The room was empty. No furniture, no brother, no governor. Only green and white tiles, a large hanging lamp, and yet another open door.

Something was wrong.

The hair on the back of her neck lifted and she was halfway across the room before she realized she’d moved. Fists clenched against her thighs, she forced herself to be still, to listen…

Nothing in the next room.

But in the room after…

Something large fell; too large for even the plushest carpet to absorb the impact.

Vree had heard bodies fall on every surface, in every state of dying.

The taste of iron in her throat, she ran.

The second room passed in a blur of shelves and scrolls and books and a low table she went over not around.

In the third room was a carved wooden bed, the embroidered coverlet a tumbled heap of jeweled brilliance in the lamplight. Crumpled at the foot of the bed, was a body.

Not Bannon.

Her heart started beating again and training surged past the remnants of her panic.

The old man collapsed at the foot of the bed fought to hold onto life. His lungs struggled to lift the weight of his ribs high enough to breathe. His hands spasmed against the rich folds of his robe. His fingertips, lips, and eyelids were already tinged with blue.

On the carpet beside him was a metal goblet and on the carpet beside the goblet, a spreading stain.

Vree dropped to one knee and bent over the spilled wine, then straightened and spat the scent of poison off her tongue. A certain death but far too slow. Still on one knee, she studied the old man.

Governor Aralt.

Why he’d chosen to kill himself when he knew the Empire would save him the bother was a question best left between him and his gods.

Where was Bannon?

She’d seen his mark at the wind shrine; he had to have come this way. An irrational fear began to drag icy fingers down her spine and she desperately searched for another answer. The room was crowded with heavy pieces of furniture piled with cushions and draped with silk—an unattractive mix of north and south that could provide a hundred hiding places for her brother. Was he here? Had he come in, found the governor, heard her coming, and hid? It was the sort of stupid joke he might find amusing.

So would she if it meant the end of being without him.

She couldn’t have gone past him and he wouldn’t have gone on, so he had to be here.

“Haul your ass out of cover, Bannon, and let’s get going. This isn’t funny.”

Her whisper pierced the shadowed corners, pierced the shroud that dying had wrapped around the governor.

He opened his eyes. Unfamiliar features twisted into a familiar expression. “Vree …”

She stared, not believing.

“Vree …” Cold fingers clutched at her wrist and pressed out a pattern only her brother knew.

The world became a dark and unfamiliar place. “Bannon?”

Two

“… saw no guard, knew I should’ve waited, but …” His face twisted and even the shadow resemblance to Bannon disappeared. He was an old man, in agony. And as unbelievable as it seemed, he was her brother. “Hurts, Vree.”

“I know.” Knew exactly what the poison was doing to the body he now wore. Knew there wasn’t anything she could do about it but watch him die.

“Have to tell you …”

His fingers were freezing. She fought a futile urge to try and rub warmth back into them. “I’m here, Bannon.”

“He was in the room. Don’t know how he saw me. He smiled. Drank. Motioned me forward. Knew you were behind me, so I … went.” He’d been sucking in air between each short burst of words but had to stop and breathe a moment just to live.

Vree felt as though iron bands had been wrapped tight around her ribs. Obviously, whatever had happened, she hadn’t been close enough behind him. Hadn’t been close enough to save him. She wanted to close her eyes but was afraid he’d die while they were closed—half believed that only her attention kept him alive.

A soldier who died off the battlefield became one of Jiir’s ravens, doomed to feed off the fallen, off the discarded bodies of those who were granted a place in Her host. But surely assassins were allowed a wider battlefield? Vree thought of the great clouds of winged scavengers that settled down to feast on the bloody flesh scattered over the ground when the fighting ended and nearly shuddered. Goddess, please … But Jiir listened to pleas only when they were accompanied by a sword thrust.

She remembered Emo grunting into his wineskin, “You live, you die, you rot,” and found less comfort in that.

“Something about him …” Bannon had gathered enough strength to continue “… drew me.”

The governor had not been a physically attractive man; not judging from the wreck he’d left behind. “What drew you?”

“Don’t know.” He frowned, the expression pure Bannon although the features were not. “Calm,” he answered at last. “Strength. Don’t know!”

“Shhh, it’s …” She couldn’t say that it was all right because it would never be all right again.

“No. Got to … tell you.” A purpling tongue scraped against his lips. “Looked at me. I was him … and he was … me and then he jumped.”

“Jumped where?”

“To me. Then … pushed me into him.” A shudder ran down the length of the old man’s body and his teeth clattered together like dice. “Dying.”

“He pushed you into his old body and he took yours?” Not all the training in the Empire could have kept the shrill note of disbelief out of her voice. She stiffened, head cocked, but no one appeared to have heard. Apparently, the orders the governor had given to keep everyone away still held. With a fingernail grip on her self-control, she turned back to her brother. “That’s impossible!”

The expression on the face of the man lying in front of her said everything necessary. She’d seen that expression a hundred, a thousand times. Obviously, it wasn’t impossible. “He can’t have gone far. I’ll go after him. Bring him here. Make him give you your body.”

Bannon shook his head. “No time. Be dead … when you got back. Vree …”

He wanted something from her. She recognized a tone she’d heard all her life.

“Oh, come on, Vree, just this once …”

But he had only one thing left to want; only thing that she could give him. Nothing should hurt this much and not kill you. Teeth clenched around a howl of pain, she began the movement that would drop a dagger out of a forearm sheath into her hand. When this is over, I’m going to find Aralt and I’m going to make him beg me for death.

“Vree, let me share … your body.”

The dagger snapped back into the sheath. “What?”

“I know what … he did. How he did it. Moment we shared … took it. Let me jump … into your body.”

Vree opened her mouth and closed it again. Bannon was all she had, all she’d ever had besides the army. But to die for him? To allow herself to be pushed into a dying shell?

He read her thoughts off her face and shook his head. “No. Two separate actions. I jump. I don’t push. You stay.”

“We share?”

“Yes.”

“My body?”

“Yes … Till we get … my body … back.”

To have Bannon in her body. And isn’t that what you’ve been wanting? she asked herself, desperately clamping her will around a hysterical desire to snicker. To have Bannon be a part of her. Know everything she was. Everything. No. But weighed against the only alternative, against going on alone…

“Vree?”

No time left to decide. Her heart slammed against her ribs and sweat trickled down her spine. She could smell her terror and his death. “Do it.”

Invasion! A kaleidoscope of images tried to force an entry into her mind.

Vree fought to pull the barricades down. This is Bannon! Let him in or he dies! A crack appeared and then another and then he was in, and she nearly lost herself in a maelstrom of shared memories subtly skewed and alien emotions; of being just for an instant, someone else and knowing what they knew, feeling what they felt. She struggled to hold on, to accept, to not fight it although every instinct demanded she defend herself.

I trust him with my life. He trusts me with his life. I trust him with …

* * * *

*Vree? Vree! Wake up! We haven’t got time for this!*

She could feel the dry, dusty fibers of the carpet pressing into her cheek. Smell the poison mixed with wine spilled out onto the floor. Hear…

*Slaughter it, Vree! Wake up!*

“Bannon?” Eyes opened, all she could see was a pale hand curled up like a great, bloated, dead spider. When she tried to lift her head, her body felt as though it no longer quite fit. “Bannon?”

*I’m here.*

“It worked?”

*Don’t be an idiot, of course it worked. Now get up. Aralt, that carrion eater, is getting away.*

The muscles in her thighs began to spasm. Her legs jerked and kicked and her feet scrabbled for purchase against the floor. “Bannon, stop it!”

*Vree, no!* Bannon’s voice rose to a near incoherent shriek that slammed against the inside of her skull. *Don’t.*

Panting, she forced herself to relax, to not expel the invader. Her brother. Gradually, she gathered all the bits of her body back under her control and, slowly, got her hands under her and pushed herself up onto her knees. “Just let me do the moving. Understand?”

*Yeah.* He sounded subdued, but she knew it wouldn’t last. *I understand.*

Ignoring the corpse sprawled beside her, Vree stood. Every movement was surer than the one before as, with every movement, she reclaimed more of her scattered self. Although constantly aware of Bannon’s presence, as long as he remained a passive passenger, she felt she could ignore him enough to manage. He had, after all, always been a constant presence in her life. Kind of like ignoring a nagging toothache…

*I heard that.*

*Not now, Bannon. We haven’t time for …* Which was when she realized that she wasn’t speaking aloud. *Shit on a stick! Do you know everything I think?*

*No. You have to put it into words, then I hear it the way you hear me.*

Because the alternative would be unbearable, she believed him. *But you can hear me when I speak?*

*I can hear what you can hear. And I see through your eyes. And I feel what you touch.*

*It’s like the opposite of what we always had while we worked—two sets of senses, one directing will.*

*I guess.*

She felt her shoulders rise and fall in a gesture she had no control over. “Bannon!”

*Look, I’m sorry, but it’s hard.*

*I know …*

*No. You don’t.*

Yes, she did, because she felt his bitterness and his pain and his fear of dying. Like a wave she barely managed to keep her footing under, his emotions rolled over her and retreated. Fists clenched, she ground her teeth in anger. Aralt had a great deal to answer for, and she’d enjoy making him pay. “We’ll get your body back,” she murmured as though Bannon still stood beside her. “And we’ll cut Aralt loose to shriek in the darkness.”

Tentatively, for the floor was not always exactly where she thought it should be, she walked to the window, careful to remain out of the line of sight from below. Time had not stopped just because the impossible had occurred and she—they—were still in the heart of an enemy stronghold. Her hand held the heavy swag curtains motionless and she looked out at the sky. The stars had danced most of the night away.

“We’ve got to get out of here.”

*Agreed.*

But instead she stood staring at her hand as though she’d never seen it before. It was too slender, a strong hand but a woman’s hand. The nails were too even, they should have been ragged, chewed to the quick. The white line of scar from the second knuckle to the base of the thumb—where had it come from?

“Bannon.”

The sound of his name barely carried past her lips but he heard it.

*Not mine …*

“No. Mine.” And suddenly, it was her familiar hand again. She felt his presence draw in on itself, wrapped around equal parts of torment and terror. She wanted to reach out and touch him…

… with her hand…

… hers…

… but she couldn’t, so she settled for getting them safely out of the stronghold instead.

By the time they were over the wall and back into the city, her body was responding with the fluid grace and economy of movement they had always shared. If Bannon occasionally added his control to hers, Vree couldn’t tell, and she supposed that was all that mattered.

*Head for the South Road.*

She paused, one foot half raised. *What?*

*Aralt is going north, toward the Capital.* If the city had another name, no one remembered it. No one had used it in generations.

*And we’ll go north right after we tell Commander Neegan what’s going on.*

*No.*

Vree slid into the shadow cast by the damp, aboveground wall of a cistern. *What do you mean, no?*

*Commander Neegan won’t believe you.*

Her protest died, unformed. In the commander’s place would she believe that an old man had stolen her brother’s body and pushed his life out into a dying shell? Would she believe such an impossible story without the presence of Bannon’s thoughts beside her own?

*He’ll think I died in there and you’ve gone crazy,* Bannon insisted. *The army thinks assassins are half crazy anyway. You’ll be shackled so you don’t hurt anyone. Probably drugged. We’ll die like that, Vree.*

*The commander has known us all our lives.*

*So what.* His hostility surprised her.

*We could convince him.* But in the face of Bannon’s certainty, she was no longer convincing even herself.

*We’ve got to go north now or we’ll lose all chance of catching Aralt and my body.*

*If we leave the army like this—if we desert—they’ll hunt us down.* Assassins who* deserted were under an immediate death sentence; an Imperial edict designed to reassure the citizens that the army’s more subtle killers remained under control.

*Slaughter it, Vree! Why would they think we deserted? They’ll think the odds finally caught up to us and we died in Ghoti. And if you’d stop arguing, we could have him by dawn and be back in camp before they even miss us.*

*Don’t be an idiot, Bannon …*

*He’s in my body; I should know how far he can get! He’s only a couple of hours ahead of us.*

*And it’s less than a couple of hours till dawn.* Very pointedly, Vree turned to face the east. Whether the frustration she felt was his or hers, she had no idea. *If Aralt was ready for you, he was ready to travel. He might even be on horseback.*

*No, no horse.*

*How do you know?*

*I just know, okay? I just know.*

She ground her teeth and struggled to find order in the emotional maelstrom inside her head; fought to separate her reactions from his. *So we skirt the army for the South Road, and then what?*

*And then we find Aralt and reclaim my body.*

*You really think it’s going to be that easy?*

His anger started her heart racing. *I don’t care a crow’s ass about how easy it is or isn’t going to be! I want my body!*

*We’ll never be able to go back.* The silence in her head was the loudest sound she’d ever heard. *Bannon?*

*It’s me or the army, Vree. Your choice.*

An assassin has no family but the army. But it wasn’t a choice and he knew it.

They crossed the South Road, east to west, on the Ghoti side of the embankment—the sentries patrolling along the top unaware of the enemy slipping through the darkness behind them—and getting out of town was as easy as getting in. Driven by Bannon’s uncompromising need, Vree stayed as close to the road as she dared, stealing from one bit of shadow to the next, using the night as cover. How, she wondered, had Aralt managed? While he had Bannon’s body, he wouldn’t have the skill to manipulate it. At least we didn’t find him pinned to the road by arrow fire from the top of the embankment.

*Shut up, Vree.*

Just for a moment, she’d forgotten what he meant and had, for the same moment, forgotten that her thoughts were no longer her own. *Sorry.*

The terrain began to climb and the road with it.

*There’ll be a squad where the road crests the ridge.*

*I know.* She kept moving toward the dim glow of the banked watchfire.

*What are you doing, Vree?*

*Aralt is going to have to swing wide around; if we cut close, we’ll gain on him.*

*And if you cut in too close, you’ll be seen.* His tone bordered on the edge of accusation.

Vree stopped, crouched in the shadow of a thorn tree. Her teeth were clenched so tightly together that a muscle jumped in her jaw. *And just what’s that supposed to mean?*

*You don’t want to leave …*

*So I’ll allow myself to be seen?* She spat the thought at him. *So I’ll have to go back to camp or be shot as I cross the perimeter? Do you think for an instant that I want you in my head for the rest of my life?*

*Do you think I want to be here?* Bannon snapped back.

Panting slightly, Vree stared at a thorn, four inches long and silver-gray in the starlight. When they were children, armed with thorn daggers, they’d saved the Empire from a thousand rebels, winning honor and glory and the notice of the Emperor himself. Together. Always together. She forced her fingers to uncurl. Who was she going to hit? *We’ll get your body back. I promise.*

Bannon remained silent as she moved closer to the watchfire, but she could feel him holding back, in no way adding his skill to hers, allowing her to prove her commitment. Black shapes stood around the fire that had been lit in the middle of the road; kilts and sandals and tunics, round helms and shields and pikes imposing uniformity on the silhouettes. Vree could hear the quiet murmur of voices, then a loud laugh, then…

“Slaughtering bugs!”

“Not lice again.”

“Bugger you. Something just bit me.”

“Good,” muttered someone else. “Now it’ll die and not bite us.”

She knew those voices. All of them. The Fourth Squad, Second Unit, First Company, First Division, Sixth Army had provided the soldiers who were watching the road. Knowing what to look for, she began to pick out individual shapes. Nub had a way of wearing his helm that made his head look as though it sloped straight from crown to nose. Wora slapped the shaft of her pike constantly from palm to palm. They said she’d be corporal when Emo finally took his wineskin into one battle too many. The slim figure pacing nervously around the perimeter of the light could only be Tic, his youth radiating off him.

Her squad. Their squad. Hers and Bannon’s.

*Vree?*

*No.*

*But I …*

*Just no, okay? Be quiet.*

They’d be easier to pass than strangers because she knew their habits. Harder because she knew them and there was no way to even say good-bye. She had no idea why that should matter, but it did.

As she drew even with the fire, a burly shadow shambled off the road and straight toward her. Corporal Emo. She froze, trusting the night to keep her hidden, eyes narrowed to slits so that the whites would not betray her. He continued to come directly at her. They’d served together five, nearly six years. Did he know something?

Then, less than a body-length away, he stopped. And there was a dagger in Vree’s hand.

*Kill him!*

*I know what I have to do.* But as she hesitated, Emo hiked up his kilt, reached into his sling, and directed a stream of urine practically at her feet. *He doesn’t see me, Bannon.*

*He’s probably too soaked to see anything.* Vree could feel relief under the derision. *What if he’d aimed six inches higher?*

*Then I’d have killed him on principle.* She felt almost giddy. *How can he piss for so long?*

*How can he drink so much?* Bannon asked in turn, a shrug implied.

Emo finally tucked himself away, belched, and turned to go. Then he stopped, frowned, and stared into the shadows. Vree felt his eyes meet hers, saw recognition dawn, and she slowly stood. His gaze dropped to the dagger in her hand, then went back to her face.

He knew her speed, he knew her skill, and he wasn’t so drunk that he didn’t know, at that moment, how close he stood to death.

No one in the squad would be surprised if Emo died in the bushes, too drunk to have seen the enemy. Vree could feel the weight of the dagger she held, feel the familiar grip under her fingers. This close, she couldn’t miss; could close her eyes and with a flick of her wrist still bury it in Emo’s throat.

You don’t see me, she mouthed. I wasn’t here.

*Vree! What are you doing?*

Emo stared at her, startled. She wondered what he saw. Who he saw. Finally, after several lifetimes, he nodded. I don’t see you.

* * * *

*You’ve brought the hunt down on us,* Bannon snarled when the watchfire had faded to a glow in the distance.

Vree remembered a younger man with large callused hands and a ready laugh; Emo before the wineskin became his constant companion. *He won’t say anything.*

*How do you know?*

*He was a friend.*

*He was my friend, too, but I’d have killed him.*

That was not an argument she wanted to get into. Bannon hadn’t been the one with the dagger in his hand and those kinds of choices were easier to criticize than to make. *There was no need to kill him.*

Bannon gave a mental snort. *You think he’ll keep his mouth shut just because you used to fuck him? Think again. They’ll know you didn’t die in the city. They’ll come hunting for you, Vree, and when you die, I die, too.*

All at once she was very, very tired. *So we’ll try to get your body back before that happens.*

* * * *

They hadn’t caught up to Aralt when dawn began to elongate the shadows and brush the cloaking night away. But neither had there been any indication that they themselves were being followed.

*Keep going! He can’t have gone that much farther!*

As Bannon’s thoughts bounced around her head, brittle and beginning to shatter, Vree realized how tightly his sanity had been tied to finding Aralt quickly. What if he lost it? Would he drag her down with him, or would madness dissolve their unnatural union and send him screaming off as a disembodied spirit?

*Vree!* Her name echoed in her skull as she moved farther away from the road. *What are you doing?*

Locking her fear away, she chose her words carefully because her calm appeared to be the only thing holding her brother together. “I’m taking advantage of this water hole,” she murmured, as her approach sent a trio of wild goats bounding away. “I’m going to take a long drink, and then I’m going to make myself a little less obvious for day travel.”

*But we have to catch Aralt!* His protest was shrill enough to be almost painful.