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CHAPTER

Forty-Eight

“E ACH DAY,” Cain said, quoting the Scriptures, “in times of light, in times of shadow, seek for one small pearl of joy and you shall find it.” A pause. “Did I—”

“You found my pearl of joy,” Neema said. “As you well know.” It was not the first time he had made this joke. She stretched, and settled more comfortably against him.

“It amazes me,” he said, stroking her arm, “how often they quote that line in the temple, and no one laughs. No one. What is wrong with people?”

Neema didn’t answer. She was listening to his heart. There was not a better sound in all the world. His heart, afterwards, as it slowed back down. “Eight years,” she said, softly.

He kissed her hair. “Don’t.”

The lost years, the other people, the bitterness, the heartbreak. Don’t.

They were in a barn at the bottom of the Ox orchard—the same one the contenders had filled with sacks earlier that afternoon. “The scene of my triumph,” Cain had said, after they broke in, and even though she was removing his trousers at the time, and biting his ear, Neema had paused long enough to say, “Yes, but I won though.”

Now they were lying naked together, using the sacks as a mattress. “A barn ,” Cain said, putting his hands behind his head and staring up at the rafters. “Like an old-fashioned romance. I’m the tough but misunderstood Ox labourer. You’re the beautiful but jaded Tiger official, come to evict me from my land.”

Neema propped herself on her elbow. “Sheltering from a sudden storm.”

“Naked for some reason.”

“We must huddle closer together, for warmth.” She pressed herself against him.

He held her back. “No, Mistress Tiger. I dare not—”

“But why, rough yet quietly sensitive Oxman?”

Cain gave an anguished sigh. “If I hold you now, Mistress, I fear I shall never let you go.”

“Oh, that’s good,” Neema approved. “I like that.” She straddled him, snagging her fingers in his hair, and kissed him until they both ran out of air. “Round two?”

“The weapons round,” Cain said, and lifted his eyebrows in invitation.

Neema lowered herself closer, breathed in his ear. “Call me Mistress again.”

Sol shook himself awake, picked up his field in his claws and flew it to the other side of existence.

After round three, which they agreed was a tie, Cain threw on his damp uniform and went outside to hunt for provisions. Left alone in the quiet of the barn, Neema stretched out her limbs again, arched her back, enjoying the feel of her body; where she’d invited him in. And then, with some reluctance, she got dressed. She could hear music in the distance, from the Ox palace, and faint chatter. For a moment her mind expanded further—to the emperor and Vabras, to what might happen next. She shrank back from the thought as if burned. She would not worry, she would not project ahead. She would have this moment.

Cain returned from his scavenging trip with a couple of blankets, a pile of roast pork rolls, two bottles of wine and a cake with “To My Darling Husband” written on it in chocolate icing.

“That’s a terrible thing to steal,” she said, as he barred the barn door.

She took a roll instead, lifted the bun to inspect it. “This one has too much crackling, you have it.”

Cain had never heard a better sentence spoken in all his life. “I love you,” he said, and ate the roll in three bites.

Neema scrunched closer. “I love you too.”

He rubbed the grease from his mouth. “I was talking to the bun.”

She laughed.

He looked at her, clear green eyes sweeping over her face, taking in every contour. “Admiring the view,” he said. “They should mark you on the map, you know.”

“Area of outstanding natural beauty.”

He grinned. “Exactly.”

She looked back at him, allowing herself to feel what she had denied for a long time. Not just that she loved him, but that she had hurt him too. Cain, sensing the shift, kissed her shoulder gently, through her tunic. “Was there any particular reason you got dressed?” he wondered. “Was it mainly so I could undress you again?” Trying to deflect the conversation, but it was no use.

“I should have left with you that day,” she said. “I’m so sorry, Cain. I know you waited for me.”

“To the last moment,” he said, drawing away. “Kept hoping I’d see you pelting down the quay with a thousand books under your arm.” He reached for a bottle of wine, and took a deep, bracing swig.

“I’m sorry,” she said, again.

“Well. I wasn’t entirely without fault,” he acknowledged. “Should have trusted you. It’s just… you hurt my feelings.” He laughed at himself.

She took the wine from him. “Trusted me with what?”

“You really think I’d kill people for a living?”

She lowered the bottle. “You… don’t?”

“For fuck’s…” He tore his fingers through his hair, exasperated. “Of course not. Why do you think I left my Scrapper gang?”

“How should I know? You never talk about it.”

“They wanted me to kill someone, Neema. Cut me loose when I refused. After beating the shit out of me.” He touched a scar that cut through his hairline. “Wasn’t a killer then, not a killer now. I happen to find murdering people distasteful.”

Neema was struggling to process this. “You’re not an assassin.”

“Oh, I’m an assassin,” Cain said, more cheerfully. “I just don’t kill anyone.”

“Cain, that makes no sense.”

“I know.” He grinned again, delighted. “I’m a walking paradox.”

“But I’ve seen the reports. They send you somewhere, people disappear and… oh.” Neema stopped, as she realised. They disappeared, never to be seen again. No bodies. No evidence. “Where do you take them?”

Cain lowered his voice, despite the fact they were alone. “There’s places in the Scarred Lands that aren’t scarred any more. Not the borders,” he said, anticipating her question. “Deeper. Much deeper. Hidden.” He caught her look. The Scarred Lands. “Well it’s better than death, isn’t it? The only rule is, they can’t come back. They try to leave, then we do kill them.”

Neema was fascinated. “Have you been there? What’s it like?”

Cain shook his head. He’d told her too much already—Fort would kill him. Literally. “What you should be asking is who we’ve sent there.”

Neema crossed her legs so they were sitting knee to knee. An echo of their first meeting, in the storeroom. She leaned forward. “Go on.”

“There’s a pattern to our imperial commissions,” he said. “It’s subtle, obfuscated, but once you see it… It’s been going on for years, N. Ever since the rebellion. Bersun removes Commoners from their posts, and replaces them with Venerants, or people he knows he can manipulate. Not always big positions, but key ones—the warden of a prison mine, the harbour master at Three Ports. Dozens and dozens. Hundreds, maybe.”

She took another swig of wine. “Not all murdered, surely.”

“No, that’s a last resort. They use bribery, blackmail. Or they’ll pension them off. That’s why it’s so hard to prove. And they’re careful—they’ll break the pattern enough that it’s hard to spot. But it’s there. Once you know, you can’t miss it. It’s like this very long, very stealthy Venerant coup.”

Silence in the barn, as Neema soaked this in. Thinking of the courtiers who had come and gone during her time on the island. “You’re saying the emperor’s in league with—”

“—The Five Families. The Tursuls, the Arbells, the Ranors…”

Neema lowered the bottle. “Havoc.”

“Oh he’s definitely benefited.”

“Is that why you broke his nose?”

Cain’s expression darkened. He rubbed a hand along his arm, absently—a sign he was upset, and masking it. “Havoc’s predecessor. Admiral Ryssa Stone. He was promised her position when she retired.”

“She was a Commoner,” Neema said. “I remember.”

“Orphan of the marshes, raised by the Grey Penitents. Impressive woman by all accounts. Rose up through the ranks—no monastery training. But,” Cain lifted a finger, “she made the fatal mistake of telling Havoc that she had no plans to retire for another ten years.”

A cold, thin sensation drifted through her: a death mist. “What happened to her?”

“Funny thing,” Cain said, in a sour voice. “She died in a boating ‘accident.’ Good weather, seasoned sailor. Yet somehow the boat broke up into pieces. No survivors.”

“ The Merry Dolphin .” The boat sign from the Fox Trial. Cain had left it for Havoc to find. “He was responsible for her death?”

“Directly? No—he kept his hands clean. But he knew in advance.” A bitter smile. “He ordered his uniform a month before she died.”

“Eight.” Neema rubbed her face.

“Sorry, have I spoiled the mood?” To cheer himself up, Cain added a sliver of birthday cake to a pork roll, on top of the crackling. He bit into it, coughed, then tilted his hand back and forth. Not bad. When Neema didn’t react, he said, “Are you all right?”

She shook her head slowly. Everything she had worked for these past eight years. Everything she had believed in. Somehow she had thought that Gedrun, the counterfeit emperor, had at least shared his brother’s beliefs in the monastery reforms; the opening up of the court to Commoners. All the things that had bound her to him. “The reforms are just a distraction…” A nasty thought struck her. “You didn’t think I was involved in all this, did you?”

Cain winced. “Well…”

“Fuck you,” she said quietly.

He lifted his hands, helpless. “You’ve been clamped to the emperor’s side for eight years. You rose so high, so fast, Neema. Be fair. I had to wonder.”

“Fuck you .” She leapt to her feet and stalked off, her voice floating back from the darkness. “You fucking arsehole.”

“Well, that was nice while it lasted,” Cain said to himself, and finished his bun. “Can’t we say we’re even?” he called out to wherever she was, raging in the dark. “You thought I killed people for a living. I thought you might be part of a Venerant conspiracy. Turns out we’re both much nicer than we thought. That’s a good thing, isn’t it? That we’re not horrible after all?”

He waited. She came back. She’d been crying.

Cain’s face fell. “I’m sorry.”

She sat down next to him. “I thought I was making things right. I thought he was on our side.”

He put his arm around her, brought her close. “We all did. Brother Bersun: Brusque but Benevolent. He was on our side, those first years. It’s the one thing I don’t understand, how he could have changed so much. How he could turn his back on everything he believed in…” He stopped.

Neema had that look on her face when she knew the answer to something, and couldn’t wait to share it. He’d sat next to her through school. He’d seen it a lot.

She told him her theory. How Bersun had died after the rebellion and how Gedrun had replaced him.

Cain took a swig of wine. “Shit. So they’re blackmailing him. Clarion, Kindry. Vabras. Forcing him to run things the way they want.”

“I don’t think so. I think they got more than they bargained for. He is smart , Cain—”

He stopped her, put a finger to his lips as he listened into the silence.

It was only now she realised that the music had stopped some time ago. The party was over.

The barn doors rattled against the bar, making her jump.

“Contender Ballari. Contender Kraa. Open up, in the name of the emperor.”

Hounds.

Cain was already on the move. Grabbing a coil of rope, he headed up the ladder to the store landing above. By the time Neema had caught up with him, he’d tied the rope to a post and was slinging it out of the window. He clambered through, beckoning for her to join him.

The Hounds were still rattling the door. Thank the Eight Cain had barred it. She followed him down the rope, landing on her knees with a thud. She got to her feet, wiping her hands.

“Fox palace,” Cain whispered, circling her wrist. “We need to—”

“Contender Kraa. Contender Ballari.”

Havoc stepped out of the darkness, a sword at his hip. A troop of Samran Hounds surrounded them, batons raised.

“What’s this about?” Neema asked, determined to stay calm.

Havoc threw her a cold look. The bridge of his nose was painfully swollen, and there were dark bruises under his eyes. His voice sounded thick and stuffy when he spoke. “His majesty the emperor demands your presence.”

Cain had assessed the odds. Even he couldn’t fight off that many Hounds. “Of course. Lead the way.”

Havoc turned to the Hound sergeant. “Contender Ballari is refusing to comply.”

Before Cain could protest, the squad surrounded him. Raising their batons, they beat him to the ground, kicking him for good measure as he curled up, arms over his head, trying desperately to protect himself.

“Stop!” Neema screamed, as they held her back. “He’s not resisting. Stop!”

The Hounds kept beating him, until finally Havoc called them off. Panting hard from their efforts, they dragged Cain to his knees. Blood streamed down his face.

“Monsters,” Neema spat.

Havoc took a torch and held it close to Cain’s face, inspecting the damage with a satisfied smile. A deep gash in his brow, another above his ear. A torn lip. His jaw was starting to swell. Havoc brought the flame closer, laughing as Cain tried to draw back. For a second, the torchlight turned Cain’s eyes from emerald to bright yellow. The flame distorted his face, sharpening his cheekbones. His lips parted in a dangerous grin, his teeth red with blood. Sharp teeth…

Havoc stepped back, disturbed. The illusion vanished. A trick of the torchlight. “Get him up,” he told the Hounds. “Let’s go.”