Stephen Deas: The King's assassin

‘More light!’ said the man who looked like the thief-taker. ‘And get some bread and some clean water. We can at least be civilised about this.’ He took a deep breath and then stared hard at Berren. ‘Well. What to do, eh? What to do? I thought about leaving you be, but Syannis wouldn’t have it. You ran right past him in the Bitch Queen. Close enough to touch, he said. He thought you were a ghost.’

‘He’s really here?’ Berren blurted out.

Not-quite-Master-Sy frowned. ‘He was. He’s gone now — left the city on the evening tide — but before he left he was kind enough to ask me to find you. So here we are, stuck with each other. I know who you are, Berren of Deephaven. You were once his apprentice. As for me, I’m his brother. Prince Talon of Tethis.’ He paused. ‘I would say “at your service” but under the circumstances,’ he shrugged, ‘probably not.’

Berren’s mouth fell open. ‘I knew he had a brother.’ One door and he had to get past two men to be through it, plus the two snuffers behind the desk and the prince himself. His eyes searched for other ways.

‘He had. . has . . two.’ Prince Talon’s brow furrowed; he shook himself. ‘What in the name of the four gods, Berren of Deephaven, am I supposed to do with you?’

‘Let me go, sir. I’m nothing to you.’

Talon laughed. ‘Maybe so, but I can’t just set you free. Tarn here thinks I should dump you in the sea with stones around your ankles and frankly I’m inclined to agree. But you did kill Radek of Kalda and I could kiss you for that. So. What do I do with you?’

Beside him the snuffer called Tarn scowled. ‘He came at you with a knife, Prince.’

‘He did. Be fair though — he thought I was Syannis.’ Then he frowned. ‘As if that really makes a difference.’

‘But I was right! Master Sy really is alive then?’ asked Berren.

‘Well you seemed to think so.’ Talon raised an eyebrow. ‘You and your knife. The one that I keep coming back to in the hope you’ll say something useful about what it was for .’

Berren hardly heard. ‘I didn’t believe it, not really. I didn’t see how he could get away. And after what he did. . Even if they didn’t catch him there and then, they’d never let him escape. They’d have chased him to the end of the world. They’d have taken his head or sent him to the mines or something. They couldn’t let him go, not after. .’ He couldn’t finish. ‘And then I saw him on a ship and so I came looking, and I was looking and looking for months, and then people said he’d be in the Bitch Queen, and there he was, only then outside it wasn’t him, it was you. I thought I’d been seeing things. Ghosts. None of it real. But he is alive. Right?’

Talon sighed. ‘Yes, he is. Syannis left Deephaven just like you did.’ He exchanged a glance with Tarn. ‘There was some. . trouble, he said.’

‘I didn’t leave . I was jumped by a press-gang!’

Talon cocked his head. ‘Really? Syannis said you ran away after you killed Radek. Press-ganged? Explains why he never found you.’ He looked at Berren’s face and scowled. ‘ Did you run away after you killed Radek? Not that I much care but it does seem to trouble Syannis.’

‘Sort of. Well I was going to. After. .’

‘After. .?’ Talon’s eyes narrowed as if looking for something inside Berren’s head. ‘Syannis thinks you killed Radek for him , but you didn’t, did you? I see no pride in you at all. Just shame and fear.’ He growled. ‘I’m missing a part of this story, aren’t I? Something Syannis never thought to mention. I think you’d better tell me what it is.’

Berren saw Tasahre again, covered in blood. He pinched his lip. ‘Master Sy killed. .’ He couldn’t make her name come out. A quiver ran through him. ‘Didn’t he tell you what he did?’

‘He killed whom?’

‘My teacher.’ Gods but it was hard to talk about her without screaming, even now.

Talon screwed up one eye and peered at Berren. ‘He didn’t say anything about that. Just that you were the one who’d killed Radek. And that after that you ran away.’

‘I ran because Master Sy. . killed my teacher.’

‘I see. And he mattered to you, did he?’

Berren couldn’t answer, could only look away and try to will back the tears. ‘She,’ he whispered.

‘ She? ’ Talon blinked. ‘Oh dear gods. Your face. .’ He sat back into his chair. ‘I think I see.’

‘She was my friend.’ Friend wasn’t the right word but it would do. No reason for anyone else to know any more. ‘She was a sword-monk.’

‘Sun and moon!’ Talon stared at him in wonder. ‘Well, there’s a thing. Syannis has no idea. So Syannis killed your. . friend and you ran away straight into the arms of a press gang? Is that what I’m supposed to think?’

Berren nodded. ‘Same night.’

‘And that was all, what? A little over two years ago now. And how long have you been in Kalda looking for him?’

‘Few months.’

Talon shook his head. He rocked forward in his chair. ‘While I’m deciding what to do with you, you can tell me what you know of Saffran Kuy.’

The warlock. Berren shivered. He couldn’t speak.

‘You look like you just ate a lemon.’ Talon didn’t smile. ‘Tarn, go and find out why it’s taking so long to get some more candles! It’s not as though they’re mountain lilies, for pity’s sake!’

While Tarn got up and left, Berren took a moment to gather himself, to push away Tasahre and everything that came with her. ‘I used to think there were good men and there were bad men,’ he said, ‘and that most men, when it came down to it, were bad ones. But Saffran Kuy was something else. He was far more than bad. He was wicked. Evil. .’ He pushed his lips together, struggling to find words for the warlock who’d made him cut out a piece of his own soul, who’d made him murder a man he didn’t even know. He held up the stump of the little finger on his left hand. ‘That’s the least of what he did to me.’

‘Saffran Kuy is a monster, is he?’ Berren nodded and Talon smiled. ‘Well then, Berren of Deephaven, I suppose I won’t be dumping your headless corpse in the sea tonight after all. But you’d best tell me the rest of your story while I decide what I am going to do with you. And you can end it with exactly what you were going to do with that knife. The truth, mind. Lie to me and I’ll know it.’

So Berren told him about Master Sy, about how the Headsman had come to Deephaven and murdered the thief-taker’s old friend Kasmin and how Master Sy had hunted him down no matter what he had to do. He told Talon about the priests and the sword-monks and Tasahre and what the warlock had done to them both. When he got to the coming of Radek and the fight aboard his ship, he had to push back the tears again. By the end, with Radek dead and Tasahre bleeding out at his feet, he couldn’t stop them any more. Talon listened in silence. Outside, through the windows, the sky was starting to lighten. Dawn was coming. They’d been up all night.

‘I’ll tell you a bit more about Radek one day,’ Talon said after a long silence. ‘Let’s go onto the roof and watch the sunrise. I always find that helps.’ He stood up and Berren followed him out of the door into a hallway, and then through another to a balcony. The slope of the city faced south and east, and in winter the sun came up over the cliffs of the canyon. Talon stood beside Berren. The sky on the horizon was already turning pink. For a moment they were alone. ‘And then you got press-ganged?’

Berren stared out over the water, lost in memories. There was more, but the rest was his own, to be held and cherished. He shrugged. ‘We sailed into Kalda one day. I saw a ship come by next to mine. There was a man on the deck. It was Master Sy. I couldn’t just do nothing .’