1. Return to Kirinoll #3
Umber pivoted and seized his wrists. From the corner of his eye, he saw Imalroc stiffen.
The duke swooped in before Rerdas could even begin to think of an excuse to stop him.
He stood with his head craned back, his lips mashed against Umber’s. Only sheer force of will kept him in place. That, and closing his eyes so there was no chance of seeing Imalroc’s face. His cheeks burned.
Umber stepped back with a chuckle. “I can’t keep myself from kissing you even covered in dirt and smelling like a pigsty. You’re impossible.” His smile grew as he took in Rerdas’s expression. “Ah, you look a little flushed, dear heart.”
“Just... so happy to see you,” he choked.
“Don’t leave again without my permission.” Umber chucked him under the chin gently. “You’re mine now, and I intend to make the most of you. Would that I could walk on with you, but I am on the queen’s business, I’m afraid.”
“You flatter me,” Rerdas managed. “My cousin is expecting my return.”
The duke held one of Rerdas’s hands in both of his. “Come to Marasette tonight.”
“I’d... love to, but Etiana… We’ve business to discuss. May I see you tomorrow?”
The bright smile turned disbelieving. Undisguised impatience fractured Umber’s cheer. “After so many days apart? You’ll discuss your business tonight and then attend me at Marasette.”
“But—”
Umber sighed. “Really, Rerdas, I hope you realize I’ve put up with no small amount of inconvenience from you, and I’m not of a mind to permit more. You’ll be at Marasette tonight.”
He was a prize the duke had already won, and there would be no wriggling out of his grip until the duke wanted to toss him aside.
Heckly’s warnings about what had happened to other favorites who had displeased the duke echoed in his ears.
He needed Umber to grow tired of him eventually, but not when they still needed every possible shield.
And they couldn’t add a disgruntled royal peer to their growing list of enemies.
Rerdas bowed awkwardly with his hand still trapped in Umber’s and mumbled acquiescence. Satisfied, the duke smacked another loud kiss against his cheek and climbed back into the hansom.
Rerdas stood in the road, staring forlornly after the hansom in case the duke looked back. Once it veered out of sight, his gaze slid back to Imalroc. The area was less busy and there were few people in the street to overhear him if he tried to explain. He ought to explain.
“Imalroc,” he whispered.
The battleboxer wouldn’t look at him. All he said was, “Let’s go.”
Numb, Rerdas turned and headed for home. He should be running back. He should be happy, or at least hopeful, because they had a chance of saving Aunt Uralta now. This feeling of something unbearably tight around his neck had to ease at some point.
When he finally burst into the grounds house with Imalroc, Etiana shot up from her seat at the table. Alarm streaked across her face before it turned into teary-eyed joy.
“Eternals above!” She swept him into a bone-crushing hug that left him wheezing. Imalroc gave her a wide berth and dropped into a chair.
For a precious moment, the relief of being home was all he could feel.
He draped himself over Etiana, sucking in the first proper gulp of air since he’d arrived in Kirinoll.
The glowing fire, small but cheerful, the cinnamon sticks Etiana kept in a bowl on the mantel, the flour-dusted fresh bread on the counter—all of it embraced him.
Hammond appeared from the back of the house, a mug in his hand, and the relief evaporated.
Rerdas pulled loose and spun toward the cupboard.
He snatched the tea tin from its place on the shelf and ripped the lid off.
The scent of cloves curled in his throat.
The tin had recently been refilled, and he stared down at the little pile of evil leaves.
He wanted to tip them all straight into the fire.
“Hammond went to fetch the medicine for us,” Etiana said. “I was able to pay for it and the Queen’s Tax from Imalroc’s winnings, but we’re down to bread onyx now. We’ve got to get back into a battlebox.”
“Don’t you want to know what we discovered?” Rerdas asked softly, still staring down at the Little Dreamer.
Etiana bit her lip. The wild look in her eyes belied her even tone when she finally spoke. “Did you find something?”
“This is poison, Eti.”
He was met with stunned silence.
“What?” It came from Hammond.
Rerdas turned back to the table. Hammond and Etiana both stared at him as though he foamed at the mouth. He looked to Imalroc for help, and the battleboxer gave him a tiny, wordless nod.
He tried to untangle everything he needed to explain.
“We’re in a far bigger mess than we could ever have known. Kuraya has been using us since Aunt Uralta got back. She knew we would do anything to hide the sleeping sickness from her, but it’s not a true disease. It comes from this stuff. The sultana called it the Little Dreamer.”
Hammond set the mug down very carefully on the table. It landed with a musical little clink. Etiana groped for the back of a chair, her gaze never leaving his face.
Rerdas winced, legs protesting, as he collapsed onto a stool near the table and flicked the tea tin away from him.
Then, he began from the beginning. He told almost the entire story, and by the end of it he could feel Hammond’s fear and Etiana’s rage filling the kitchen.
His cousin’s face was slack, her gaze boring into the tea tin as though she wanted it to be Kuraya’s head.
“We all need to leave,” she said in a low voice.
Rerdas nodded. “Yes. I think it’ll be safer. But Kuraya and her advisors keep watch. We would need a good excuse to leave the city, and they can’t know that we’re bringing Aunt Uralta with us.”
“We have a good excuse already. I thought it was only a slim possibility, but now—” She drummed her fingers against the table, and then seemed to make up her mind with a firm nod.
“You will go to Umber and tell him that because of Wester’s block on the battleboxes, we must take Imalroc out of Kirinoll. Tell him we’ve been offered a fight in Lakara.” Her gaze lingered on the tea tin even as Imalroc sat up sharply.
“Have we?” Rerdas asked, his stomach sinking. Imalroc in another fight…
Imalroc broke in. “Why does he have to go see that shitheap of a duke?”
Etiana finally looked up from glaring at the tea tin as though she could set it alight. She answered Rerdas’s question first, but her gaze stayed fixed on the battleboxer.
“Yes, we really do have the fight set if we want it. The great battleboxes outside the capital rarely attract Kirinoll fighters. They want to pit their champions against ours. And Rerdas must visit Umber to tell him we’re leaving.
That way our story will get back to the queen.
” She narrowed her eyes at Imalroc. “Why do you care if Rerdas goes to Umber?”
“I don’t.” Imalroc shrugged.
Something twisted horribly beneath Rerdas’s ribs, but he couldn’t afford to dwell on it.
Etiana turned back to him. “When you speak to Umber, make it clear that we are desperate, and that we’re nervous about leaving the house. Drop hints that we’re moving some precious things to Heckly’s estate. Kuraya will assume you are talking about my mother. Can you go in the morning?”
“Tonight.” The word tasted unpleasant. “He wants me to visit tonight.”
“Even better. Hammond and I will come up with a way to hide my mother. We must leave quickly. I want to be gone by midday, if we can make it.” She turned to the butler.
“Hammond, can you take me to Dantin Heckly’s?
We must speak with him tonight, or we’ve little chance of getting out. I don’t have funds for a carriage.”
“Of course, milady.” Hammond stared at the tea tin with a dazed expression.
Etiana stood and laid a gentle hand on his arm. “Don’t think of it, friend. We could not have known. Thank the gods for Rerdas’s discovery. We have a chance.”
She fixed Rerdas with a steel-eyed gaze and gave him a little nod as she swept to the door. Hammond followed her out of the cottage, and Rerdas and Imalroc were left in the silent kitchen.
He slumped forward on the table, resting his chin in his hand. “It’s… I thought it would feel better. Being back here.” He swallowed. “When we were riding home, all I wanted was to be here.”
The silence that followed was heavy, constricting, and made him want to flee. The battleboxer studied the grain of the table.
“You want many things,” Imalroc said quietly.
Rerdas flinched. That sounded like a polite way of pointing out that he wanted too much. And from Imalroc in particular.
It was true. He wanted the battleboxer to open his arms and let Rerdas crawl into them. He wanted the heat of Imalroc’s body, his mouth, his touch obliterating every other gnawing thought. He wanted to forget, just for the space of a kiss, where he was and what he must do and all he feared losing.
He wanted all that, so he had the strength to stand up and drag himself to Umber’s bed.
And that—asking Imalroc to distract him from the bed he’d angled himself into—was neither fair nor kind.
They were in Inofar again. They both wore different masks here, and they played a different game than in Draal.
“You should get some rest,” Rerdas murmured. “I’ve got to wash up and go to Marasette.” He still half-hoped that Imalroc would talk him out of it.
Imalroc’s brow furrowed, but he did not look up, even as Rerdas rose and stepped away from the table.
“Eat something, at least.” Rerdas cut a thick slice from the bread and brought it to him. The battleboxer made no move to take it, his chin propped in his palm, gaze unfocused. Rerdas set it out on a cloth at Imalroc’s elbow and hunted around the icebox for butter or oil. There was none.
Nothing left to say. Nothing but apologies that Imalroc had to be tired of hearing. Rerdas hesitated for too long at the bottom of the stairs, waiting for words that never came.