A Future, Forged by Aiki Flinthart

Author:Aiki Flinthart
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
ISBN: 9780994592873
Publisher: CAT Press
Published: 2020-04-05T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY

DALLAN

Dallan studied Teya, debating how to approach her. She hadn’t spoken a word the whole way from the Chinshi. Now, back in her bedroom, she sat curled in one of Neri’s plush armchairs. Her knees were drawn up to her forehead, her good arm around her legs as though they were a shield.

‘What happened?’ he asked, dropping into another chair with a heavy sigh. ‘I’m guessing you weren’t able to kill him?’

Teya said nothing.

‘Where’s my dagger? You—’

The door burst open and Ying rushed in. She hurried to Teya’s side and stroked the girl’s unruly auburn hair.

‘Are you alright?’

‘Don’t.’ Teya pushed the touch aside, giving a glimpse of haggard shadows haunting her expression.

Ying looked to Dallan. ‘Did you…did it go…where’s Perrin?’

He scrubbed at his jaw. ‘I made it as far as the cells beneath the tower. He’s there, alright. I almost had them convinced to release him to me. Then the weishi got a message and the boy was taken from the cells and upstairs in the Chinshi somewhere. No way I could stop them.’

A strangled cry burst from Teya and she covered her face.

Dallan groaned and rested his head on the chairback. ‘Never mind. I know it was too much to ask of you. I’m sorry. Killing someone is harder than people think. The first few times, anyway.’ He uttered a harsh laugh. ‘It does get easier, unfortunately.’

Ying sent him a reproachful glare and he tried to shunt aside the burn of angry disappointment low in his guts. How the diyu was he supposed to get close to Han before the hunli ceremony made him too powerful to ever stop? He was a fool for putting so much hope in such a slight chance. Teya was untried and inexperienced. For all her superficial streetwise bravado, she was still very young.

He rose and paced the room as he tried to think his way through the mess. It had all happened too fast. Han held every strong piece on the qi board. Dallan, and the eight juns he’d managed to convince to help, had few resources and little support. Most other juns were either complacent, or terrified of Han. Now that the man was on the brink of controlling the First and both Second jundoms, those few juns brave enough to stand against him would withdraw if decisive action wasn’t taken soon.

Neri appeared in the doorway. ‘There’s no news from the Messenger House criers and no bells have rung from the Chinshi to alert the city to any deaths.’ Her eyes glittered. ‘I take it you failed?’

Teya shoved up from the chair, rigid. ‘Yes! I failed, alright. I got scared. His shangwei was there with a gouri sword at my throat!’

Dallan paused in his pacing. ‘What? Why? Did he suspect you?’

She flushed pink and turned to the window. Outside, an early winter storm lowered dark clouds over the city. Lightning flickered and thunder growled in the distance, but Dallan suspected she saw none of it.

‘No,’ she murmured. ‘I…I think he’s suspicious of everyone.

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