Queenslayer by Sebastien De Castell

Author:Sebastien De Castell [Castell, Sebastien De]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Fantasy
Publisher: Orbit
Published: 2019-05-21T00:00:00+00:00

29

Patronage

“What now?” Reichis asked as we left the jail.

It was only a couple of hours into daylight and already the sun was irritating the black marks around my left eye. “I don’t know,” I said, pulling my hat down. “This is all way beyond us.”

Mariadne was sitting at a bench some thirty yards down the street, waiting for us. What in all the hells was I supposed to tell her?

“So we run?” Reichis asked.

I hesitated. I knew it was the right thing to do. This was law and politics and intrigue. Everybody seemed to have a stake in everything. Me? I was just a card player with a talking squirrel cat and a guilty conscience.

Reichis sensed my discomfort. “You want to try to bust her out?”

I shook my head. “Those locks are too heavy for my castradazi coin to pick. Even if we could, she’s got no money and nowhere to go. She’d need help, maybe even royal help, to get out of this.”

“So we go see the queen?”

“And do what? Ask her for a favour? No, she’s deep into this. We go making trouble with her without a plan, and I’m liable to wind up back in my own Daroman cell.”

We walked past a potted tree on the street and Reichis paused to pee on it. I guess he’d missed that one earlier. “Well, there’s one obvious thing we could do,” he said.

“What’s that?”

“Let her die.”

I looked down at him. I was going to ask if he was serious, but I really didn’t need to. Reichis is a survivor. He’ll take on just about anything for me—that’s just a part of our business arrangement. But with Reichis you’re either part of the deal or you aren’t, and if you aren’t, well, then you’re on your own.

“I can’t do it,” I said. “Whatever’s going on, Tasia’s not to blame for it. Somebody’s using her, and now she’s going to die for no damned good reason.”

“All right,” he said, shaking the dust from his fur. “Then saddle up a horse, pull some powder and let’s kill us a few marshals.”

“And then what? We spend the rest of our short lives running from the long arm of Daroman law?”

Reichis snorted. “See, this is what you always do, Kellen. You talk yourself in circles until you run out of options and somebody’s pointing a sword at your belly.”

“So what do you think we should do?” I asked.

“Well, the way I see it, if we can’t break her out, then we need help—political help. So who do we know who’s got political clout and doesn’t hate us yet?”

Damn. I hated to admit it, but the little bugger was right. “Martius,” I said. “Count Adrius Martius.” Back at court he’d told me he’d be staying in Juven, not ten miles from here. “Let’s borrow one of Mariadne’s horses and go get us a patron.”

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