The Winner's Curse (The Winner's Trilogy, #1)(53)

Kestrel dropped it.

He grabbed the back of her neck and hauled her up. Her breath came quickly, in short bursts of fear. He smiled, and she saw him again as he had been in the pit, pitching the sale of Arin. This slave has been trained as a blacksmith, the auctioneer had said. He would be perfect for any soldier, especially for an officer with a guard of his own and weapons to maintain.

No Valorian in the city had a guard of his own save General Trajan.

Kestrel saw again how the auctioneer had met her eyes that day. His delight when she had bid, his expression when others had joined. He hadn’t been excited to see the price drive higher, Kestrel realized. He had been anxious.

As if the sale of Arin had been meant for her, her alone.

The ground trembled with approaching hooves.

The auctioneer’s smile grew wider as Arin dragged his horse to a halt. The auctioneer motioned toward the shadows of trees. Armed Herrani appeared. They trained their weapons on Kestrel.

The auctioneer walked toward Arin, who dismounted. He placed one palm against Arin’s cheek. Arin did the same to him. They stood, creating an image Kestrel had seen only in dust-covered Herrani art. It was a gesture of friendship as deep as family.

Arin’s eyes met hers.

“You are the god of lies,” she hissed.





27


They marched her to the house. Kestrel said nothing as rocks and twigs cut into her bare feet. When the auctioneer pushed her into the entryway, she left bloody footprints on the tile.

But she was distracted from this by another sight. Harman, her steward, floated facedown in the fountain, blond hair rippling like sea grass.

The general’s slaves crowded the hallway beyond the fountain, shouting questions at the armed men, whose answers were a jumble of phrases like We’ve seized the city, The governor’s dead, and, over and over, You’re free.

“Where’s the housekeeper?” said the auctioneer.

There was a shuffling among the slaves. It wasn’t so much that the Valorian housekeeper was thrust forward as that the slaves stepped away to reveal her.

The auctioneer seized the woman’s shoulders, backed her up against the wall, pressed a broad arm across her chest, and drew a knife.

She began to sob.

“Stop,” Kestrel said. She turned toward the slaves. “Stop this. She was good to you.”

They didn’t move.

“Good to you?” the auctioneer said to them. “Was she good to you when she made you clean the privies? When she beat you for breaking a plate?”

“She wouldn’t have hurt anyone.” Kestrel’s voice rode high with the fear she could no longer contain. It made her say the wrong thing. “I wouldn’t have allowed it.”

“You don’t give orders anymore,” the auctioneer said, and cut the woman’s throat.

She sagged against the wall’s painted flowers, choking on her blood, pressing hands to her throat as if she could hold everything inside. The auctioneer didn’t step away. He let her blood splash him until she slid to the floor.

“But she didn’t do anything.” Kestrel couldn’t stop herself, even though she knew that it was stupid, utterly stupid, for her to speak. “She only did what I paid her to do.”

“Kestrel.” Arin’s voice was sharp.

The auctioneer turned to face her. He raised his knife again. Kestrel had just enough time to remember the sound of a hammer against anvil, to think of all the weapons Arin had forged, and to realize that if he had wanted to make more on the side it wouldn’t have been hard.

The auctioneer advanced on her.

Not hard at all.

“No,” said Arin. “She’s mine.”

The man paused. “What?”

Arin strolled toward them, stepping in the housekeeper’s blood. He stood next to the auctioneer, his stance loose and careless. “She’s mine. My prize. Payment for services rendered. A spoil of war.” Arin shrugged. “Call her what you like. Call her my slave.”

Shame poured into Kestrel, as poisonous as anything her friends must have drunk at the ball.

Slowly, the auctioneer said, “I’m a little worried about you, Arin. I think you’ve lost clarity on the situation.”

“Is there something wrong with treating her the way she treated me?”

“No, but—”

“The Valorian army will return. She’s the general’s daughter. She’s too valuable to waste.”

The auctioneer sheathed his knife, but Kestrel couldn’t sheathe her dread. This sudden alternative to death didn’t seem like a better one.

“Just remember what happened to your parents,” the auctioneer told Arin. “Remember what Valorian soldiers did to your sister.”

Arin’s gaze cut to Kestrel. “I do.”

“Really? Where were you during the assault on the estate? I expected to find my second-in-command here. Instead, you were at a party.”

“Because I learned that a slave to the harbormaster would be there. He gave me valuable information. We still have to deal with the merchant ships, Cheat. Send me. Let me do this for you.” The need to please this man was clear on Arin’s face.

Cheat saw it, too. He sighed. “Take some fighters. You’ll find more at the docks. Seize all the ships or burn them. If even one leaves to alert the empire that we’ve taken the city, this is going to be a very short-lived revolution.”