Elizabeth Haydon - The Assassin King

“Same to you,” Gwydion replied. “On both counts.” Melisande grinned, her golden curls bobbing within her hood, then stepped into the darkness of the coach. Gerald climbed in behind her. “Don’t worry, m’lord. I’ll see to her safety.” Melisande leaned out the carriage window. “I’ll see to my own safety. Make certain you see to yours.” Gwydion nodded, shut the door, feeling like the world was coming to an end. Again. He stood in the darkness of the courtyard, watching until the carriage was swallowed into the dark branches of the trees and the night. Melisande Navarne had never been in the woods to the northwest of her home. She had been to Tynan once, to the wedding of Rhapsody and Ashe, and had once been allowed to go with her fattier to the province of Canderre, northeast of Navarne, to visit distant cousins. She had begged him to take her east to Yarim as well, because the exotic desert clime enchanted her imagination, and she longed to see the place her mother’s family and her own black eyes had come from, but Stephen Navarne had always ruled it too distant, and the times too dangerous, to risk. One day, when you are older, and the world is better, we will go, Melly, you and I, he had said. One of the saddest lessons of Melisande’s young life was the knowledge that even though one day she might indeed see Yarim, the only one of the circumstances in her father’s promise that would come to pass was that she would be older. On occasion she had also traveled to the southwest, most especially to the coastal province of Avonderre, where her family attended religious observances at the great seaside basilica of Abbat Mythlinis, the cathedral dedicated to the element of water. It was a place that she had both a fascination with and a fear of. Melisande sat back in the dark against the smooth fabric of the seat, listening to Gerald Owen snore, and closed her eyes, thinking about the basilica. She remembered the first time she saw it, on the Naming Day of someone’s child she didn’t remember, and had been afraid to go inside. It was one of her earliest memories, from when she was no more than four years old. The basilica had been built at the water’s edge and fashioned to resemble one of the great broken ships of the First Cymrian Fleet, the vessels in which her ancestors had come to this continent, fleeing the coming cataclysm on the homeland, the Island of Serendair, on the other side of the world. Being young, she had not realized that the representation of an enormous shipwreck had been intentional; she had believed they were entering the cadaver of a real ship, sundered on the sand, and the thought had disturbed her greatly. Once inside, she was even more certain that she was right. The immense entrance doors, fashioned from planks of varying lengths with a jagged notched pattern at the top, appeared to depict a vast hole torn in what would have been the keel of the ship, with a crazily angled spire that was supposed to represent the ship’s mast. Great fractured timbers, the bones of ships lost in the passage, were set within the dark stone walls, making the interior resemble the skeleton of a giant beast, lying on its back, its spine the long aisle that led up forward, the timbers ancient ribs reaching brokenly up into the darkness above. If looking up had terrified her, looking to the sides was even worse. A line of thick translucent glass blocks had been inlaid in the walls at about the height of her shoulders. The churning sea was diffusely visible through them, bathing the interior of the basilica, and the faces of the people gathered therein, with a green-blue glow. Instead of feeling the power of the All-God, or appreciating the celebration of the birth of a new child, she had instead panicked and screamed until her mortified father had removed her from the basilica. Now she was on her way to the Circle, to a place her father had respected but felt was unsafe to bring her. Beyond that, she was charged with traveling to the lair of a beast that was, in her time, the matriarchal wyrm of the entire continent, a being about whom the history books were full of dire tales, from the abandonment of her triplet daughters to the rampage that left the western half of the Middle Continent in cinders. Rhapsody had called the stories lies, had loved the dragon and in fact had gone to stay with her during her pregnancy, trying to learn everything she could about the care and delivery of a child with dragon blood. She trusted the dragon; Melisande trusted her adopted grandmother implicitly, but still wondered if there wasn’t at least a grain of truth in the old stories. Whatever else she was, Melisande was blessed with an intrepid spirit and a curious nature. Being the younger child of a noble line, with little expectation of ever sitting in the duchy seat of her father’s line that her brother now occupied, she had been allowed to explore what she wished, to study subjects and skills normally reserved for boys, and to question the ways of the world. So when she was asked to embark on the mission she was now undertaking, she knew she should be nervous. Instead she was merely excited. She was dozing, wrapped in light dreams of the basilica of water and the dragon’s lair of the lost sea, when the first bolt hit as her carriage came under attack. Gerald Owen was shocked awake by the impact. “Driver—driver!”

“We’re under attack,” came the muffled reply. “Stay down.” The elderly chamberlain’s eyes opened wide; Melisande took his hand, and together they moved clumsily to the floor of the coach as it picked up speed, the vibration from horses’ hooves thundering through the shell. From the roof of the carriage they heard a light thump and the sound of a crossbow firing in return. “The footman is an expert in the crossbow,” Owen said to the girl, trying to keep his voice from shaking. “The Lord— made certain of it. He should be able to repel anything that might give chase.” Melisande nodded and smiled encouragingly. Several more thuds slammed into the back of the carriage, behind where their backs had been a moment before. The lady shuddered at the sight of four bolt tips sticking through the upholstered fabric. Outside the carriage they could hear the noise of pursuit and evasion, shouted commands and cursing. The carriage rattled and shook from side to side as rocks and ruts in the road were made into more serious obstacles by speed. “Don’t—don’t worry, m’lady,” Gerald Owen stammered. “I’m not,” replied the girl. “But you are standing on my hand.”

“Apologies,” the chamberlain mumbled, quickly moving his foot. Missiles screamed by beyond me window in the carriage door. The sound of a bolt hitting its mark echoed from above, a crossbow firing in return, and the carriage rocked wildly from side to side, spilling the contents of the seats to the floor and sending the two passengers sprawling. With a horrific thump and another violent shake, the carriage lurched violently as it ran over something large in the road; Melisande shuddered. By the sound and direction of it, it seemed to be the driver. Her theory was born out a moment later as the carriage began swerving unevenly in the roadway. Shouts from above could be heard, answered by others behind. “I—I don’t think the door is locked,” Melisande said, watching it flap open and closed. Gerald Owen struggled to his knees and crawled over to the door, reaching to lock it. Just as he sat back, a rider appeared at the left side of the carriage, visible only in minute flashes through the velvet drape, and slammed his hand against the carriage door, then reached through the curtain at the window. The thunder of a horse could be heard next to them. “Go away!” Melisande shouted. “Just go away! Leave me alone!”

“M’lady, shhhhh,” Gerald Owen cautioned, reaching for her. The hand came through the window again, farther this time, a rough, calloused hand with sword blisters on the palms. It grasped wildly, then pulled back again. Melisande dodged as it came within a hairsbreadth of her. She straggled toward the right side, but the careening coach was veering between ruts in the road, the horses unbalanced by whatever was occurring in the combat. The arm lunged in once more, this time grazing her cheek before seizing a handful of her hair and dragging her back toward the window. The Lady Navarne gasped aloud. Gerald Owen lunged awkwardly for her, grabbing her legs and pulling her back, but the hand did not let go, only wrapped her hair around it like a rope, and yanked again. Fury replaced the panic in the black eyes. Melisande pulled the knife Gwydion had given her from her boot and, with an artful arc, swung at the arm, missing. Another yank, and her head grazed the window curtains. Melisande, her back now against the bottom of the door, slashed above her head, hitting her mark and dragging the knife shallowly across the wrist of the arm that had held her fast an instant before.