Cast In Courtlight

Hard to believe that a girl from the fiefs could be naive—but dreams died hard, and they could be such a damn embarrassment if they were shared. Which, because she was foolish, they had been. The Hawks had snickered for weeks, and without the grace to wait until her back was turned.

She’d stolen their inkwells in response. Except for Garrity’s; him, she’d left invisible ink.

But it had taught her something. The Law? It existed for a reason. The reason being that people weren’t basically as honest as she’d dreamed they would be, when they had the choice.

At home, she’d had no choice: steal or starve. Here, they had a choice. But it was steal or be left behind. Words failed her when she tried to put her contempt for this into them; she often hit people instead. Or tried.

This is when she discovered that Law applied to the officers of said Law. All in all, a discovery she could have done without.

She wondered, not for the first time, what Severn’s life with the Wolves had been like. He wouldn’t talk about it. And that was probably a good thing, if he wanted to keep on breathing. He’d spent time in the Shadows, and the Shadows were unkind; they were the darkest face the Law could turn on the populace. People whispered about Shadow Wolves when they’d had too much to drink. Some even said there were arcane arts that turned good men—well, okay, bad men—into things that weren’t men anymore.

But she’d seen Severn, and she knew that he was more or less exactly what he had been when he’d taken her under his wing after her mother’s death. She’d been five. He was ten. She’d thought she understood him, then—but what had she understood?

That he would die to protect her.

She could live with that.

That he would kill to protect her.

Hating the direction of her thoughts, she turned them aside; she’d become good at that, over the years.

It wasn’t close to dark, yet; the sun was edging across the river, and reflected light turned parts of the slow-moving water a shade of pink that would have been an embarrassment to the man the river had been named after. She paused on the banks, looking up and down their length for as far as the eye—and hers was keen—could see. The riverbanks were where many petty criminals gathered to exchange gold for a moment’s illegal escape from pathos; it was easy to dump evidence, and the river would carry it away before it could be gathered and used in the courts.

Of course, some officers forgot the Laws that applied to Officers of the Law at that point; they called it self-defense. Had any of the injured dealers ever lodged a complaint, Teela and Tain would have been permanent fixtures on the inside of the small prison that sheltered behind the Halls. But oddly enough, there seemed to be a game in this, and you lost if you complained.

Everyone knew, after all, that the Barrani had only been part of the Law for some two decades—the whole of Kaylin’s life. And they had memories that lasted a lot longer.

There were no deals going down.

Even the petty criminals seemed to have decided their stash was better sold on the streets that the Festival occupied. And the streets? Once the carters had got in and done their work, they were almost impassable. You couldn’t walk a foot without someone trying to sell you something, usually at a three hundred percent markup over what it would cost at any other time of year.

She found herself at the foot of the bridge. It was, by foreign accounts, a perfectly normal, if somewhat unimpressive, bridge; you could take a horse across it, and you could certainly march a contingent of men that way—but a wagon was almost impossible, unless the driver was unnaturally gifted and the horses under perfect control. Perfect.

She didn’t much like riding. She stood there, and then leaned over the nearest rail, watching the water pass under her feet. Here, on the boundary of her old life, she let the day unwind. The night was cool, for a Festival night; the air was clear. She wondered, sourly, if the Arcanum was controlling the weather; it was unseasonal. It would also be illegal.

Technically. In this city, even on this side of the banks, power was the order of the day; if you had it, the Law was a petty inconvenience. As long as no one was killed, or more likely, you were very, very good at disposing of the bodies.

Her cheek was throbbing dully; she lifted a hand almost absently to touch the flower placed there by the magic that she most hated. Well, second most. The magic that she most hated was engraved on her arms, her legs, the back, now, of her neck.

But it had been quiet. If it weren’t for the arrogance of the Imperial mages, she would have had nothing to complain about, and this was unnatural. Complaining, according to Garrity, was the gods-given right of people who were Doing Something Useful; it was a little luxury. When, you know, duty forbade larger luxuries, like drinking.

And she wasn’t Doing Something Useful, as Garrity would put it. The Festival season had been expressly forbidden her; she was surprised that they hadn’t sent her out of town on the first coach.

Her cheek was actively painful, now. She touched it, wondering if it was swollen; if the lines engraved there were like the lines of a burn, and had taken some sort of stupid infection. Her skin was cool to the touch, her palm a little too dry.

She let her hand fall, casually, to her side. It was the side at which her daggers were neatly arranged.

Straightening slightly, she turned.

A man was standing at the foot of the far end of the bridge, except that he wasn’t. A man, that is.

Surprise robbed her of words for a moment, but it added the hilt of a dagger, and the rest of the blade followed as she drew it. A warning, really. Or perhaps a gesture of greeting; it certainly wouldn’t do her much good in a fight.

He was Barrani.

She wasn’t. The odds favored him.

Even had she been Barrani, the odds would still favor him. He was, after all, Lord Nightshade, the crime lord under whose sway the fief of Nightshade prospered.

“It is sunset,” Lord Nightshade said as he stepped onto the bridge. The wooden planks didn’t even register his weight. Which, given the age of the bridge, said more about his movement than it did about the planks.

“Almost.” She managed to shrug.

“You shouldn’t be out in the streets, Kaylin. I was, I believe, most explicit about that.”

She shrugged again before his words really registered. Sometimes nerves made her quick; sometimes they slowed her down. Quick was preferable. “Explicit to who?”

He raised a perfect, dark brow. It was perfect because he was Barrani. In fact, his eyes, which were a deep, startling green, were also perfect, and framed by—yes—perfect lashes. His face was the long, fine face of Barrani everywhere, his hair, the long perfect raven-wing black. He moved like a dancer. Or a hunting feral.

But he wore clothing—a long, dark cape over a robe that was both fine and edged with gold. Nothing about Barrani dress was ever less than ostentatious, even when it happened to be the same uniform—sized up—that she herself was now wearing.

She hated that. Anyone sane did.

Well, all right, anyone sane who wasn’t also immortal and perfect and didn’t take unearthly beauty for granted. “Why are you here?”

“Because you are,” he replied. “You’ve been calling me for the last week.”

She frowned. “I haven’t.”

His shrug was elegant; it made hers look grubby. And unlike Teela or Tain, he didn’t even make an effort; he spoke Barrani, and at that, the High Caste Barrani she most despised. Teela spoke Elantran when she was with the Hawks. Even when they were Barrani. When Teela broke into Barrani of any flavor, it meant trouble. “As you like,” he said quietly.

He drew closer, but stopped about two feet away. He did not, however, lean against the railing.

“You’re almost on my turf,” she said quietly.

“Almost is a mortal word.” He gazed at the river, and gestured; it seemed to freeze in its bed, like sleek glass. She could see herself clearly in the momentary reflection; she could see him more clearly, and in the end, it was the fieflord she looked at. Who wouldn’t?

“You have not come to visit,” he said quietly.

She started to reply, and caught the words before they left her mouth, for perhaps the first time today. The fieflord was not known for his sense of humor. Or perhaps he was: He regularly killed people who offended by implying it existed at all.

Bravery was costly in the fiefs. Defiance was more painful, but not ultimately more costly.

“No,” she said when she could talk. “I haven’t.”

Before she could move, he reached out to touch her cheek, his fingers caressing the skin that bore his mark. He did not touch any other part of her face, but he didn’t have to—his meaning, in the gesture, was plain.

“You could remove it,” she told him softly.