To Seduce An Assassin (The Omaja Series Book 2)(15)
“The emperor has retired for the evening. He is probably asleep by now.”
“Wake him, I beg you. This is important.”
Two guards escorted Teldin to Yavi’s wing, and he waited behind them in the hallway outside the emperor’s door.
One of the guards rapped on the thick wood. “Sire, we have a message for you.”
The emperor opened the door almost immediately, dressed in his robe. A candle burned on the nightstand, signaling that he hadn’t been asleep just yet.
He frowned, examining Teldin’s face. “What is it?”
Teldin swallowed, bowing. “Sire, the day I left with Queen Jiandra’s letter to her sister, I was stopped by a group of highwaymen just north of the outpost on the border with Villeleia.”
The emperor’s eyes narrowed. “What did they want? Your coin?”
“No, Mahaj. I wasn’t robbed. All they did was read the letter, then tell me to make sure it arrived. Then they watched me go south, threatening to hunt me down if I tried to return to the palace to inform you.”
“Did you deliver the letter to Miss Stovy?”
“Yes, Mahaj. Three days ago. She said she would leave the next day, and meet our palace guards at the southern outpost as the queen instructed. She is surely traveling this way, getting closer to the border as we speak.”
Emperor Yavi nodded. “I’d better join the guards at that outpost.”
§
Yavi dressed in his leather armor, put on his cloak, and crisscrossed his scimitars over his back. He rappelled out of his bedroom window in the moonlight, hoping his brother would not catch up with him this time or even realize he’d left. Yavi didn’t want to alarm Jiandra unnecessarily by waking them with the news. He could take care of whatever bandit activity was being planned involving Graciella’s coach by himself, and have her here at the palace safe and sound by morning.
Moments later, he’d stolen Sikar from his stall and exited the western gate into the city, once again with a warning to the gate guards to keep quiet about his departure. He pulled his hood over his face, leaned low, and urged Sikar into a gallop through the cobblestone streets of the capital city.
Outside the city walls, he rode past the open farmland owned by the palace, land they were desperately working to grow successful crops. The moonlight illuminated the rows of cabbage, potato plants, and cauliflower, all carefully spaced and tended by local peasants. The plants were fed with what limited water they were able to divert from a nearby half-dried-up, frozen riverbed. The heavy snow on the southern mountain range that winter would hopefully swell the river closer to its original width, and if so, they’d have plenty of water come summertime for the summer crops.
That was Yavi’s fervent prayer, anyhow.
He rode hard for a couple of hours, reaching the foothills of the southern mountains a little after midnight. He could see the torchlights of the guard tower just ahead and rode in that direction, alert for any sign of movement outside the outpost. He paused in the trees before reaching the stone tower, not wanting to alert anyone to his presence.
He hoisted himself into a tall tree to get a better view. All seemed to be in order at the tower. A guard was walking the top of it, holding a torch, keeping an eye on the road coming north out of Villeleia. Yavi watched the road as well for a while, calculating in his head how soon Graciella’s coach could be crossing the border into Nandala. If she’d spent the previous night in Caladia, she would have already been here by now, so he figured they must have stopped in Frocklin Grove, another two hours south of Caladia. There were no other inns that he was aware of on the northern stretch of Caladian road through the lavender fields; her coach drivers probably intended to drive her through the second night all the way to Darpan.
Well, fine. He’d watch and wait, and he’d make sure he delivered Jiandra’s little sister to her safe and sound.
§
Terijin’s first assignment as Uman’s general was to kidnap the Stovy girl and bring her to Faril, and he intended to see that it was done without a hitch. Uman wanted to use her to control the twin emperors as well as strike a bargain with the queen, for the Omaja stone. He had sent Terijin with three mercenaries to intercept the girl’s carriage before it reached the outpost where guards loyal to the Zulfikars would be waiting to escort her to Darpan. That meant they would be extremely close to the Villeleian border, but Villeleia and Nandala were allies now, and Villeleia left their northern border unattended for the most part.
Terijin and his men waited behind a boulder up on a bluff where they had a bird’s eye view of the road below. It was a clear, starry night, and they could see for miles. Soon, a torchlight appeared in the distance, heading north out of Villeleia. Terijin straightened up to see better from his lookout. It was a coach.
“There,” he muttered to the henchman at his side. “It’s probably her. Let’s go.”
They were easily in position and ready to pounce by the time the coach arrived. Terijin motioned to one of the mercenaries to jump, and he did so, landing on top of the coach. As he scrambled toward the driver’s seat, a second mercenary leapt onto the back of the coach, attacked the footman, slit his throat, and tossed him to the ground.
Once the driver was killed and shoved off the seat, the mercenaries stopped the coach so that Terijin and the fourth man could open the coach and capture the girl. When Terijin yanked the door open, a knife immediately plunged into his neck. His air supply was cut off, and he panicked for a second, but then he grasped the handle and yanked the blade out. A booted, feminine foot planted itself firmly against his chest, shoving him back, hard. As he tumbled backward away from the coach, he saw his other henchman reaching in to grab the girl. She kicked and fought viciously, and landed the heel of her boot against the henchman’s jaw, causing him to stagger back a bit. From out of nowhere an arrow sailed through the air and struck the mercenary in the side of the head, and he crumpled to the ground.