Mask of Shadows (Untitled #1)(3)
Buying my way into the military.
I hefted the purse from my belt, tugged Rath out of his tangle with the tree, and slowed our pace. Rath peered over my shoulder into the purse.
Igna’s shiny new silver coins and Erlend’s useless old gold clinked around next to a piece of paper. After Our Queen Ignasi ended the civil war between Erlend and Alona, she combined the two nations into Igna and created a new set of currencies. It was meant to unite us or some such nonsense, but I kept finding Erlend gold in Erlend pockets. They couldn’t let go of the past.
“Skimming?” Rath elbowed me. “Not like you.”
“I’m not reckless.” I held up the piece of paper, hiding my fingers behind it as I lifted the ring and squeezed it over an old broken knuckle. “And I like my fingers intact.”
“Excuse you.” Rath touched the last three fingers of his uninjured hand to his lips, thumb and forefinger curled against his palm. “I’m recklessly ambitious, and who needs fingers?”
“An ambitious ass.” I unfolded the paper and grinned. “Praying to the Triad won’t grow that finger back.”
Rath scowled and made the motion again, exaggerating the move. “What’s that?”
“Poster.” Emblazoned across the top were branches of lightning striking the green tree of Erlend over the blue waves of Alona. The Alonian words beneath were repeated in Erlenian, and both were useless to me. “What’s it say?”
I could read a handful of words—names and numbers mostly—but Grell preferred to have us totally at his mercy.
“Auditions.” Rath traced the Alonian and squinted. He was from the southern coast of Alona, and it showed in the bronze hues of his dark skin and the gray flecks in his black eyes—salted eyes, he called them. “Our Queen of the Eastern Spires and Lady of Lightning requires a new Opal for her Left Hand. Auditions are open to those who receive an invitation or individuals displaying appropriate skill and determination.”
Opal was dead then. I picked up our pace. Our Queen’s Left Hand was her collection of assassins and personal guards named for the rings she wore—Ruby, Emerald, Opal, and Amethyst.
They belonged to her and did as she pleased, killing those who threatened her rule. Like the Erlend holdouts, the ones holed away up north who’d started the civil war with Alona. They’d used their territory, Nacea, as a distraction to save themselves when the war went rotten. Now Nacea—my country and my people—was dead and gone. It would take me years to get into the military so I could hunt down the Erlend lords responsible, but if I auditioned, I’d have a way into the palace. They’d be mine now.
They’d no right to live while Nacea stood razed and empty. Rodolfo da Abreu, the mage who’d done what we’d all dreamed of and murdered the Erlends who’d created the shadows, had the right idea: kill them and make sure they couldn’t stir up trouble again.
Of course, he’d ended up dead but so had the Erlend mages fueling the war. I could finish what he’d started and avenge Nacea in one fell swoop.
Six days till the audition. I smacked Rath’s shoulder. “Read it to me again—the invitation part.”
“Auditions for those with an invitation or appropriately displayed skills.” Rath stuffed the poster into my chest pocket. “Who you think got invitations?”
“Young nobles and their friends,” I said without hesitation. “Keeps it fair if they think one of theirs is part of the Left Hand and will be for years to come.”
I’d never killed anyone, but if Our Queen asked, how could I take issue? She ended the war and corralled the nobles. She was the only person keeping us safe from noble greed, and they courted assassination when they betrayed her—just like Rath and I knew we could hang for thieving.
But I’d have to win to get close to nobles, and I’d never fought trained opponents in a straight bout.
Surely, assassins didn’t fight fair.
“There’s got to be more to it,” I said. The auditions were a closed event, and I’d never heard about what was involved. “If there wasn’t, any ass who wanted a title could audition. They must make you kill someone or something.”
“The gentle way you say that sets my soul on edge.”
I knocked him with my shoulder. “If you can feel your soul, then you need a physician.”
“So do you.” Rath ripped through a tangle of vines and stumbled onto the path back to town. He’d have been the perfect fighter with broad shoulders and big muscles, but he winced at blood and took to numbers more than punches even after years of robbing coaches. “What would you even do? Rob them on your way to audition?”
“Shows determination, doesn’t it?”
“Determination to die.” He shuddered. “You never killed anyone, right? None of those soldiers out there rotting?”
I sucked on my teeth. That was a bounty I didn’t need. I’d dreamed about killing nobles—kicking faceless Erlend lords till they knew deep in their bones why I’d come for them, till Nacea’s final screams were seared into their souls. But those were dreams.
“What would it matter if I had?” I scraped my nail across the silver ring. Plenty of Erlend lords had made fortunes from the razing. Lords like Horatio del Seve, whose name I’d burned into my memory as soon as I’d heard he was selling off Nacean land. “Soldiers would kill us just as quick.”