Robert Asprin - Uneasy Alliances

Dayme tried to warn them. "Asphodel!"

At his shout, the wizard whirled. Their eyes met for an instant. Hatred and anger burned in that furious gaze, and Dayme felt a force reach out for him.

The prostitutes saw their chance. They fell on the wizard, hacking and stabbing with their tiny blades. Arms rose and plunged with frantic outrage and swiftly blackened with the blood of their stalker.

Dayme could only stare as the wizard sank under the onslaught. The women did not stop. They stabbed and stabbed, giving release to all the rage and terror they had lived with the past nights. Then, Asphodel stepped back gasping and wide-eyed, her white dress a stained ruin. Dayme went slowly to her side.

"Who was he?" she asked, barely able to speak as she trembled.

She might have been a spectre that haunted the park the way she looked. Dayme wiped a smear of blood from her cheek and patted back the hair that had fallen around her face. "He came from Carronne," he finally answered. "I never learned his name."

Asphodel sighed and looked over her shoulder. The whores stood away from their grisly work. Pieces of the corpse lay hacked and scattered around their feet. The women stared from one to the other with expressions that betrayed confusion in some, fury and vindication in others. One by one they drifted back into the bushes. From somewhere in the foliage came the sound of weeping.

"I guess it doesn't matter," Asphodel said. "One of my ladies found this opening, and we waited to see who came out. I knew it had something to do with my missing ones." She sighed again and peered into the tunnel's gloom. "They're dead, aren't they, Tiana and all the rest?"

He nodded quietly. "All but the one he took tonight. She's still alive, though somewhat battered."

Daphne chose that moment to emerge from the opening with the prostitute slung over her shoulder. She dumped her burden unceremoniously in the grass.

Dayrne frowned and knelt beside the woman. "He didn't hit her that hard. She should have come around by now,"

Daphne spat. "She did. Then, she took a good look at-" the one-time princess, hesitated, looked at Asphodel, and spoke more softly. "She saw her friends and realized how close she'd come to joining them." Daphne shrugged and cocked her head to one side. "She fainted."

Asphodel glanced from Dayme to Daphne and back again. She realized who the princess had meant, and that the younger woman had tried to spare her some horror. Her old eyes misted over, but she blinked back any tears-

"Some of my brothers will bring them up in the morning," Dayme said gently. "There's no need for you to see them the way they are."

"They're family," Asphodel answered. She held up her dagger. With a look of disgust she flung it aside and wiped her hand on her dress. "I'll be here to help."

Dayme started to protest, but Daphne touched his sleeve. "It's her decision," she told him. "You know, personal business." Then, with her usual tact, she pointed to the wizard's remains. "Besides, they don't look any worse than that."

Asphodel walked to the corpse and stared at it for a long moment. Daphne went with her, bent down and retrieved her dagger from the ground near the wizard's hand. "It's Chenaya's," she informed Dayme. "She'd be pissed if Host it." Then, she turned away and vanished into the park.

Alone, the old whore turned to Dayrne and touched his arm. "Thank you," she said.

"For what?" he answered with a shake of his head. "I didn't do anything."

It was almost true. With all the blood spilled this night, his was the only clean blade in the park.

Daphne scandalized the palace by arriving, not in a gown, but in an outfit borrowed from Chenaya's closets. She looked as beautiful and deadly, all in soft black leather, gleaming with buckles and ringlets and weapons. Her night-black hair flowed over her shoulders. Pride stiffened her spine; she lifted her chin high as she strode into the Hall of Justice.

Two seats had been placed upon the dais. Kadakithis and Shupansea sat there side by side, looking down upon her. Molin Torchholder stood beside the Beysa, Walegrin by his prince. It was the audience she'd requested and no one else. Her husband simply had no sense of theatrics. But then, he had no sense, period.

She looked up and met his stare as she stopped at the lowest step. His jaw gaped in astonishment. It was the acknowledgment she had sworn to get from him-and it tasted sweet indeed.

"Second thoughts, my husband?" She rested one hand on her hip, taunting him.

His hands fluttered. "You look-" he bit his lip and cast a sidewise glance at Shu-sea. The sentence hung unfinished. The Beysa at that instant looked less like a carp, more like a shark protecting her catch.

Daphne had expected to gloat, to draw out the moment of her triumph, but she found now she had little stomach for that. Better, she decided, to end this quickly, break her ties with this pathetic little man, and get on with her new life.

"You want a divorce, Kitty-Kat?'' She looked at each of the four on the dais and grinned. It's all a game, Chenaya had once told her, everything is a game. Daphne realized the truth of that. These were the master gamers of Sanctuary she faced. "These are my terms."

"List them, Princess, and we'll consider."

Daphne shot Molin a withering look. "Shut up, Torch. This is between Kadakithis and me. You're merely here to witness, and I extend you that courtesy only because I know you're even more eager for these two to wed than they are. I half expect you'll share the marriage bed."

Molin maintained an outward calm, but Daphne knew him better than that. She turned back to her husband.

"First, I want the estate immediately south and adjacent to Land's End. It's abandoned right now, but the way people are flocking to this pisshole these days it's not likely to be so for long." She paused, and her brows narrowed, "I require agreement. None of this is negotiable."

Kadakithis rubbed his thinly bearded chin and glanced at Molin. The Torch gave a not-very-subtle nod, and Daphne smiled to herself. Puppet and puppet-master.

"We'll draw up a deed," the prince answered.

"Second term," she continued. "One half of your personal fortune."

Kadakithis rose from his seat. His eyebrows shot upward, and he gripped the arms of his chair to steady himself. "What!"

Daphne clucked her tongue. "Won't it be worth it to get rid of me? Besides, think of all that gold on the Beysib ships. I'm sure your bride will offer a dowry worthy of a man like you."

The prince sank back into his seat. At last, he waved a hand. "All right, damn you! Yes, I'll even agree to that. As you say," he added caustically, "it'll be worth it to be free of you." He glowered down from his high position. "You're not at all the sweet wife you used to be,"

The accusation caught her completely off guard, and she barked a short laugh. To her utter surprise she found within herself a sudden sympathy for Shupansea.

"Third term," she said, regaining control of herself. 'T retain all my titles and any property in Ranke that Theron hasn't seized along with the throne."

"Done," Kitty-Kat agreed disinterestedly. "What else?" She rested a hand on the pommel of her sword and let go a small, inaudible sigh. "There was one more term, originally," she said. She faced Walegrin and waited until he shifted uncomfortably. "I wanted the first knuckle of the little finger of your right hand to wear on a chain about my neck," she told the garrison commander. She watched all their faces as she said it, and she wasn't disappointed by their reactions. "Look at them," she said, addressing him directly. "They'd have given it to me, too."

Molin stepped to the very edge of the platform, but Kadakithis caught his sleeve and pulled him back. "You're insane!" her husband shouted.