Page 87 of Play of Shadows

I’ll be sure to tell her you approve, I told him.Now, without wanting to sound ungrateful, it would be a big help if you’d leave me so I can try to keep us from getting killed.

Corbier gave no sign of hearing me and I felt excitement beginning to build up in me anew.In all my years of duelling, I never faced a Dashini before. This will be most diverting.

No – you can’t—

‘Damelas. . .’ The anguish in Shariza’s tone gave voice to the danger I faced. Whatever attraction there might be between the two of us wouldn’t stop her from fulfilling her duke’s command. ‘Put down your rapier.Now.’

‘Yes, of course,’ I said, but my hand didn’t move.

I see the flaw in her. She keeps watching your eyes. A mistake.

I’m begging you, don’t do this—

Is this affection for you that afflicts her? Whoever heard of aDashini being lovestruck?

Shariza’s not our enemy, you idiot!

She will be and you know it. Whatever attachment she may feel for you, she is loyal to Pierzi who wi—

Pierzi is dead, you fool!

There was a moment where Corbier’s confusion made him hesitate, but just as quickly it was gone, buried beneath the Red-Eyed Raven’s bloodlust.They’re all the same,he raged.One day soon you’ll be no use to this duke and when next you meet his Dashini, you’ll find her eyes devoid of any sentiment for you.

‘Damelas, please,’ Shariza said. The tip of her blade was trembling at my throat. ‘Don’t make me do this.’

‘Brother, look around you!’ Beretto called out, trying in vain to intervene. ‘The guards are aiming crossbows at you.’

But Corbier was determined to get revenge on everyone he could for the pain that burned inside him. He would use me to spill as much blood as it took to wash away the memory of Ajelaine’s murder. Combat was the only pleasure left to him, and the duel with the Vixen had aroused a mad desire for vengeance too powerful for me to contain.

Unless . . .

I forced my eyes to focus on Shariza–onlyShariza, and sent my thoughts back to the moment on stage when our lips had met for the first time. The kiss had come and gone all too quickly, but like Beretto always says,‘A true player can fall in love seven days a week and twice for matinees.’I drew those sensations back to me, allowed myself to experience both desire and hope for a love I knew could never be mine.

What are you doing?Corbier demanded.

Now it was my turn to refuse an answer; instead, I pushed further into the memory, feeling my arms around Shariza’s waist and hers around mine, going deeper still until now he could seeboth herandAjelaine at once.

No! Ajelaine is dead– murdered by Pierzi! Don’t make me—

I replayed that kiss, that embrace, the promise of a future together over and over again, even as Corbier resisted with all his hate and sorrow.

‘Hold him a moment longer,’ Rhyleis called out.

Corbier turned to see the Bardatti standing next to him, rising up on her toes to whisper into his ear.

What is that tune she sings?he demanded of me.Why does it sound so familiar, like a melody from my childhood. Soothing, like. . . a lullaby?

I felt a tightness in my forearm and saw my left hand was now wrapped around Rhyleis’ throat as Corbier forced my fingers to squeeze her into silence. A moment later, my hand fell away, my knees buckled and darkness overtook me, its embrace so warm and gentle that I wondered if this was what death felt like.

Chapter 43

The Stranger

He woke inside a stranger’s home and a stranger’s life. A foreign landscape of shabby furnishings bordered by stained walls suggested a leaking roof, all fogged with the stench excreted by the dregs of humanity doubtless housed on the floors below. Unmerited poverty festered in slums, this he had always understood, but not why any sane, able-bodied man or woman would choose to live in confined misery rather than chance the streets where at least one wouldn’t feel so. . .entombed. He examined the bandage wrapping his left hand. A wonder they’d found cloth clean enough for the purpose in a hovel like this.

‘He’s waking up.’

A beguiling timbre, melodious and sweet, rich in devious subtlety. The light-haired one, then: the Bardatti who’d bewitched him. Through the dim haze of candle smoke, he sought out the sharp features of her face and found her watching him. The conceited smirk badly needed wiping from her lips.

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