Burden's Edge (Fury of a Rising Dragon Book 1) Read online

  “That does not necessarily mean they were after you three,” Steward Haroun said.

  “But it certainly doesn’t look good, does it?” Jez said. She focused on Augum. “How did you manage to get the one assassin to kill the other with his dart, anyway?” That was the first time she had addressed him, or even looked at him, since he had stormed out on her.

  “I got lucky,” he simply said. It hadn’t quite happened that way, but he did not feel like elaborating. His thoughts were in turmoil. He was responsible for Cobb’s death. For a son losing a father. For a wife losing a husband.

  “Your Highness?” Steward Haroun pressed.

  “Hmm?”

  “I asked if the assassins said or did anything of note.”

  Augum frowned in concentration as it was difficult to focus past the guilt and shame. He hadn’t even realized the man had asked him a question. He again explained everything that had happened from the beginning, this time stressing the reactions between the assassins.

  “Then they were lovers,” Bridget whispered, stepping up to the woman’s body. “Her name was Nia. Their friend’s name was Riga. And the assassin whose arm you broke, his name we do not know.”

  Leera shook her head. “A trio of assassins, two of whom were lovers.” Her eyes found Augum’s.

  Augum got up and strode to the female assassin. Her face showed signs of a struggle in death. The poison had not been kind. After the other assassin, who possessed a rather plain face with a ridged brow, she was the sixth person he had ever killed while defending himself. Every one of those faces would be etched into his mind forever.

  Augum saw a string around her neck. He reached down and snapped it off, revealing a pendant with half a curved dagger, split down the middle. He suspected he knew who wore the other half.

  “The old me would have called this an ill omen,” Jengo said. “To separate lovers is to curse oneself.”

  “Not helpful,” Leera said.

  “I’m sorry, you’re right.”

  “Can you elaborate on how they blocked your Telekinesis?” Jez pressed.

  Augum plopped down onto the cot across from the lifeless body of Lieutenant Cobb. “The male assassin twice cut off my Telekinesis with a slicing gesture.”

  “Interesting. That’s a rare anti-warlock measure used by witch hunters in the days of old. I believe it’s a jealously guarded extension to Telekinesis. They came prepared to fight warlocks.” Jez indicated the leather cord still around the woman’s hand. “That explains why they tied their daggers to their hands. They were expecting Disarm spells. But since they used Telekinesis and then later Teleport, they have proven to have a combination of warlock and assassin skills. Interesting indeed.”

  Jengo adjusted his robe as he sat beside Augum. “I do not understand who would want to kill you three … or why. You saved the kingdom.”

  “I can think of a few reasons,” Augum muttered bitterly, slowly rubbing his sweaty palms together.

  “I suspect one of the nobles hired the assassins,” Leera said. “I mean, it’s obvious, isn’t it? They have the money to hire them.”

  “But why?” Jengo pressed.

  Leera could only shake her head.

  Bridget continued to look at the items on the table. “They look exotic. Since the shield survived Augum’s First Offensive, they’re likely arcane too. We’ll need to hire an arcaneologist to examine them.” She turned to look at the steward. “It will be expensive.”

  “I can make arrangements for another loan from the Black Bank,” Steward Haroun said, glancing over at Jez. “If you’ll take me to the city in the morning, that is.”

  Jez nodded. “Agreed. We can visit an arcaneologist after. We’ll bring him the evidence and tell him the details, see what he has to say.”

  The Black Bank was Solia’s largest bank. Its reputation matched its name rather nicely, despite the name deriving from its location in Blackhaven. Their interest rates were the most competitive, but being gouged financially was not what people feared when dealing with the Black Bank.

  They sat in quiet rumination for some time, occasionally hashing out a point or two, until Charles returned. “The cloth merchant does not know anything about this particular weave and dye, other than it is foreign. And the guards are questioning Gritchards. I am afraid he is pleading complete innocence in the matter.”

  “Of course he is,” Leera muttered.

  But by then, Augum’s thoughts had drifted to another sacred duty he had to attend to.

  “Steward Haroun,” Augum began in solemn tones as he stood. “It is time to make the visit. I will fetch my blade and breastplate. Then I need you to accompany me to see Mrs. Cobb and her son, Samuel. We’ll collect Briggs along the way.” He would respect and honor the old tradition. As the Lord of Castle Arinthian, Augum was responsible for the man who had died protecting that castle. Even had he not been its lord, he was the one who had foolishly and recklessly demanded that Cobb release the door bar.

  Haroun inclined his head, whispering, “As you wish, Your Highness.”

  As Augum passed, Leera stopped him with a gentle hand. “Please come see me after,” she whispered, dark eyes full of compassion and sorrow.

  He did not say anything, feeling as though he did not particularly deserve her company at the moment. He should not be consoled. What he needed was to stand in front of everyone and take a good thrashing, for that was all he deserved.

  That thrashing awaited him in the morning.

  He gave her a pensive look before silently striding out of the room.

  Burden’s Edge

  Augum slammed the door to his room. He stood for a silent moment, barely able to breathe. Then he yanked off his winter coat and threw it aside; furiously unfastened the sheath that held Burden’s Edge and let it fall away; and unstrapped and tore off his gilded Dreadnought steel breastplate, which clattered to the floor. He fell back against the door and slid to the ground, tears rolling down his cheeks.

  Mrs. Cobb’s reaction to her husband’s death replayed over and over in his embattled brain. He had placed Burden’s Edge on the floor at her feet, kneeled before it, bowed his head and told her the full truth of what had happened and that he accepted responsibility for the man’s death. Like an echo between canyons, he could still hear her agonized wailing, a cry that had shattered the snowy peace of the village, bringing people into the streets. He could still see Samuel’s broken face and the way uncontrollable gasping and violent shaking had seized the boy. He could still feel the planked floor trembling as Steward Haroun and Captain Briggs had run past to catch Mrs. Cobb as she fell.

  Throughout it all, with his head bowed, Augum had waited on his knees for her to dismiss him, as custom demanded. Some hours later, well into the night, she had done just that, laying a shaking hand on his head. He had expected three words. Three most apt and deserved words steeped in tradition. “I condemn you.” Instead, she had whispered, “I forgive you.”

  But he could not forgive himself.

  Augum focused on the single candle lit in his room, a fat pillar sputtering from a winter draft. With a vicious gesture, he telekinetically slapped it aside. The candle hit the floor, splattering hot wax. The room went almost completely dark, for the moon was a thin crescent and snow-laden clouds hid the stars. Only the faint candle light from the hall lit the gap between the door and the cold floor.

  Burden’s Edge, the blade of his ancestor, Atrius Arinthian, founder of this castle, sparked now and then. Traditionally, the one who was Lord of Castle Arinthian wielded the blade, which had been passed down through the generations. It was an arcane short sword made from perfectly tapered and seamless Dreadnought steel, the finest steel known, crafted eighteen hundred years ago. In battle, it amplified his summoned longsword at the expense of sword agility, for the weight of the two blades combined into one.

  His eyes wandered to his gilded breastplate, sitting forlorn nearby, its hard silhouette lit by the thin blade of candlelight from under
neath the door. The Dreadnoughts had forged each of the trio a breastplate as a final thank you for vanquishing the Lord of the Legion. Over the heart was a crest depicting a ferocious dragon standing before a copse of trees. Surrounding the crest was the inscription Defendi au o dominia—Defender of the Kingdom. Each was named. This one was called Augum’s Defender.

  A soft knock came at the door. “Augum?” Leera whispered. “I heard a crash. Are you back?”

  Augum raised a hand to lift himself by the door handle, only to make a fist and lower it.

  “Aug—? You in there? I … I miss you.”

  I miss you too, he wanted to say. How he wanted to hold her, to feel her warmth and her hand idly running through his hair. How he wished he still deserved her love.

  She waited on the other side in silence. At last, she shuffled off.

  The Next Morning

  Augum awoke with a start to banging, which he felt directly on his back, for he had fallen asleep propped up against the door.

  “Get up, Stone, your day of reckoning has come,” Jez said from the other side. “Stone, you hear me in there? You’re not trying to weasel out of this by feigning sickness, are you?”

  Augum stood, groaning as he did. His back hurt something awful, and he had had terrible nightmares of everyone he cared about abandoning him.

  “Stone—?” Apparently, that groan was enough for her to open the door, something she never did. But her face, which had been cross with annoyance, softened upon seeing him. “Unnameables, the state of you. Did you sleep on the floor or something?”

  Augum picked up Burden’s Edge and placed it on his trunk at the foot of the bed, then rubbed his tired face. “I might have.”

  “Charles. Charles!” she called down the hall. “Hot water and soap.”

  “Yes, Ms. Terse,” came the distant reply.

  Jez picked up Augum’s Defender, polished a spot on the gold with the back of her sleeve, and sighed. Meanwhile, Augum shuffled over to his desk and pretended to organize his satchel.

  Jez placed the breastplate on the trunk beside the sword. “The Academy Herald was published this morning. I teleported a few parchments in for early perusal.”

  Augum said nothing as he blearily tried to focus through his sleep-deprived haze. The echoes of a wife and son’s wailing bounced around in his brain.

  Jez cleared her throat. “Might as well tell you the bad news.”

  Augum stopped fiddling with his satchel and stiffened.

  “The other heralds picked up the same story. The Blackhaven, The Antioc—the entire kingdom is reading it as we speak.”

  “Peachy.”

  First Footman Charles came in with a steaming washbasin and a cloth. He placed it on a washstand and hurried to Augum’s wardrobe.

  “I’m not a kid anymore, Charles,” Augum said, striding to the basin. “I can dress myself.”

  “Of course, Your Highness, but tradition and protocol demand otherwise—”

  “Not today, Charles!”

  “As you wish, Your Highness.” Charles nonetheless quietly laid out a clean academy robe on the undisturbed bed, along with fresh undergarments, including a linen undershirt and a linen pair of pants.

  “Not that one, unless you want it bloody.”

  Charles blanched. “Yes, my lord.” He removed the shirt.

  Augum shook his head at himself before gesturing at the bottom of the door where he had slept. “I’m sorry, Charles. Rough night.”

  “Perfectly understandable, Your Highness,” Charles replied while grabbing a privacy screen that leaned against the wall. He unfolded it and placed it around the wash basin.

  Augum got undressed behind the ridiculously ornate screen. The girls had each received similarly hideous screens, gifted to them all by a rich noble. His was gilded and depicted scenes of the countryside and toiling workers. He swore that one of these days he would burn it. Today, however, he longed for a hot bath and a rock to sleep under for a generation.

  He could see Jez over the screen as he changed. She leaned against the doorframe, her foot propped behind her.

  “You’re taking the world on your shoulders again, Stone.”

  Augum dropped his garments to the floor and splashed his face with water from the basin. “We need a lock on the front doors. Maybe an arcane one, if possible.”

  “We can probably arrange that down the line,” Jez replied. “But it’ll be expensive. Might be easier to cast sealing spells for now, along with other protective enchantments. Either way, it’s impossible to cast them on every window and door in the castle. We’ll have to protect ourselves at night by enchanting the doors and windows of our rooms. If the assassins were smart, they would have crawled in through a window instead of trying the front door. We were lucky.”

  “That’s because I was an idiot,” he snapped.

  “So … just being yourself?”

  He popped his head above the screen to glare at her. She was smiling wryly, arms folded across her chest.

  “I told Cobb to let them in so we could face them head-on,” he said, returning to washing up.

  “Cobb died doing his duty. Had you let the assassins depart, who knows how else they would have come at us. Perhaps they would have come in through a window and picked us apart one by one.”

  “I should have gotten you.”

  “Yes, you should have, but everything is clearer in hindsight. You did what you thought right at the time.”

  Thought right at the time, Augum repeated derisively in his head. He had acted recklessly and it had cost Cobb his life.

  “There has to be a better way than having to enchant our rooms every night,” he said, drying off his face with a towel.

  “There is. Allow the enchantments to last a few hundred years until they sink to permanence. Then no arcane thief will get through. Come on, you’re dealing with assassin warlocks. A clever one will always find a way through. You know this.”

  Augum gave an acquiescent grunt. “Charles, please ask Steward Haroun to organize a village memorial ceremony this evening with Bailiff Roper.”

  “Very good, my lord,” Charles said, bringing over the pants, a plain cotton shirt, and the amber robe. “And Steward Haroun asks what should be done with the bodies.”

  Augum accepted the shirt and put it on, jamming his bad elbow in the sleeve. “Prepare them for cremation in the old way.”

  “Even the assassins?”

  “Even the assassins.” People cremated bodies these days, afraid their loved ones would be raised as the undead if another necromancer ever came along. History was, after all, cyclical.

  He accepted the pants next. “And make sure the traditional epitaphs of the Unnameables are spoken.” Last thing they needed was more cult converts.

  Charles passed him the academy robe. “I will pass on your wishes to Steward Haroun, Your Highness.”

  Augum put on his fresh academy robe then froze. “The whole village heard the wail of anguish …” And knew of his failure to protect them.

  Jez didn’t miss a beat. “And they saw their lord and prince on his knees before the wife of a slain soldier. They saw you take responsibility for what happened.” She sighed as she tapped the doorframe twice with a fingernail. “You may not believe this right now, but … I’m proud of you, Augum.”

  Augum stopped tying the golden belt of his academy robe to look over the privacy screen, but Jez was already gone.

  * * *

  The senior men and women of the castle, along with the entire village council, joined the trio for breakfast, something Augum had not expected. The meeting had been arranged by his steward, who judged there was much to discuss. Augum was sure he was right, but in less than an hour he would be whipped, thus he would have much preferred to be left alone. Alas, duty was duty.

  Talk revolved around the assassins and how to defend the village and the trio. Captain Briggs had released Disciple Gritchards, for he had professed innocence the entire time and there wasn’t a shred
of evidence tying him to the attack. Though he had said it was “the Unnameables visiting Prince Augum with their karmic wrath.”

  Augum picked at his eggs, chive potatoes and bread, recalling the prior night’s conversation with the man.

  The warm sun streamed in through the arched glass windows, the outer ledges of which had an accumulation of snow. The sound of knives and forks scraping on fine china bounced around the room.

  Augum telekinetically floated a nearby salt cellar. The exercise especially helped distract him today, for he had much to look forward to: whipping, classes, the Occupation Ceremony, and the bending of the knee before that manipulative Rupert Southguard and his scheming wife. Then there was the memorial ceremony and the investigation into who had hired the assassins. Gods, and he hadn’t even had a chance to delve back into the discussion about the girls declaring with him, having simply run out of time. Of course they wouldn’t declare with him now, but waiting another year was out of the question. He knew what he had read about Arcaners was what he wanted to do for the rest of his life. Why wait? He knew his path and was determined to tread it, even if it meant inventing his own unsanctioned, haphazard and imperfect course made from scrounged-up scraps of information. And if his gut was right, the kingdom would need Arcaners sooner rather than later. If he had to declare alone, so be it. That would be no one’s fault but his and his alone.

  Augum tensed as a young servant brought in a stack of scrolls and doled them out. The table went quiet.

  “Have … have you read any of the heralds yet?” Leera asked, searching his face. She had come to him after Jez had left. They had spent a few quiet moments together, saying little, merely holding each other. It had given him precious strength.

  Augum shook his head as the young servant placed a rolled-up parchment before him. It partially unrolled, revealing the academy crest.

  The girls each received a copy as well, but only Bridget picked hers up.

  “Can I read it aloud for you?” she asked gently.

  Augum placed his fork beside his plate and sat up straight, hands in his lap. “Might as well get it over with. Let’s hear it.”