15. FIFTEEN #3
“Jamad,” he called lightly over his shoulder. A heartbeat later, the too-large man entered the dispersed dinner party, his eyes winding around the space to fall on Attilatia. Her spine straightened. “Please bring my guest to her room. She seems to be unwell.”
Jamad tossed Attilatia to the floor in the room that had served as hers for the past few months. Thacklore walked in behind them, slamming the door shut. “You wanted a show? Fine. You are up for auction.”
A maid hovered in the corner, carrying Thedexemore. Suddenly nothing else mattered.
“Atti!” the boy squealed, blissfully ignorant.
The woman set him on the floor and left without acknowledgement or eye contact. He ran to Attilatia, and she scooped him into her arms.
“Along with the baggage you carry, I imagine you’ll catch a nice price.” Thacklore’s hawklike eyes were trained on the babe. “The Kovathians have been preoccupied over their short count.”
The hairs on her arms raised. “You said… you said your Seraphinden contacts—”
“Don’t be dense. It was your decision to make this a business transaction, Attilatia.”
She hadn’t considered him putting them back into Kovathian hands. Then again, what consideration had been made before hacking a man two dozen times in the neck? She hadn’t been thinking at all.
“While I do have a colleague in Nelfindar with a good eye for investments, I doubt he’d be interested enough in non-functional distortion technology to pay more than the Tera’thian government for you.
” He stalked to the door, a sneer marring his otherwise polished appearance.
“You’re lucky you’re worth more to me intact.
Otherwise, I’d be glad to sell you piece by piece. ”
The door slammed as he and Jamad exited, locking the door behind them.
Attilatia clutched Thedexemore to her chest, stroking his hair.
She was cold. Relief and regret battled for her headspace.
How could she be holding this perfect, innocent boy?
She’d just murdered a man. She’d done more than murder him.
She’d butchered him and made art from what was left of him.
It had felt good when she was doing it. What was wrong with her?
She’d spent months placating Thacklore to try to rescue Thedexemore.
Now she’d doomed him. It couldn’t end like this. There had to be another way.
Thedexemore picked at the blood crusted along her arms. “What happen, Atti?” he cooed.
A tenday passed in a haze of revolving food trays, guided bathroom trips, and darkness. Attilatia and Thedexemore were kept in isolation. That was ideal, really. She treated each day as her last; they were good days.
They sang songs. Thedexemore had begun stringing more and more words together, Azadonian and Nelfinden.
Sometimes he threw a fit. It was almost always over nothing, and it always made her laugh.
Even his anger was kind. At night, she cuddled him to sleep.
Then she would turn away, arms finding her knees instead.
She thought about the things she’d done, the things she deserved, and the things Thedexemore didn’t. She thought about how, given a second chance, she might do things differently.
She cycled over and over again through planning an escape, realizing it was futile, and considering bargaining with Thacklore all over again—for Thedexemore’s sake.
In the end, she knew that upholding her father’s wishes to keep distortion limited in function was worth more than their lives. She’d rather die doing right by him than live to save her own skin a thousand times over… but this poor boy. She hoped when death came, it was swift for him.
Fifteen days into isolation, Thacklore entered. He threw open the curtains, uncaring for how it had them shield their eyes.
“You are no longer my problem. There is a coach waiting for you outside that will take you to Karval. Your escort will direct you on a ship to Seraphinden. Try to escape, and the boy will face swift execution.”
She gaped. “S-Seraphinden?”
Thacklore’s upper lip curled. “Some idiot sixteen-year-old decided to invest every penny of his inheritance into pure chance.”
Attlilatia’s muscles went weak. Her eyes welled. She swore a stream of Azadonian curses.
“I imagine the Kovathians gave up their bid, knowing that they’d be foolish to pay ships for what an assassin would do for three loaves of bread.”
Her short-lived relief curdled. He was right. This wasn’t over—it might never be. No matter where they went, Thacklore could easily put a Kovathian agent onto them… so long as Thacklore was alive. Perhaps she could kill him now.
As though reading her mind, Jamad stepped into the room beside Thacklore. Her hands fisted.
“Jamad will escort you to the door.”
Attilatia obliged.
She rode away in a carriage, to be indentured to another captor, but she gave the Fates a nod for the idiot sixteen-year-old who’d saved them, sure as the night was black. Maybe this captor would be more merciful. Or at least stupider. Stupid she could handle.
Only one thing mattered: in her arms, living and breathing, sat Thedexemore Jenolavia, heir to the matriarch’s throne and greatest threat to the Kovathian state. He passed gas on Attilatia’s lap and giggled. She blew raspberries on his tummy.