Hunter's Season (Elder Races #4.7)(13)

“Of course,” Niniane whispered again.

Riordan’s major domo had just shown them to a sitting room when Tiago blazed into the house. It took some effort to endure the Wyr lord’s presence when he was in a rage. Xanthe retreated as Tiago enfolded Niniane in his arms and asked her questions filled with quiet urgency.

Xanthe stepped out into the hall and looked for the major domo. When she found him, she asked, “How did it happen?”

He looked at her with red rimmed eyes. “We don’t know, ma’am. The Chancellor was late. Well, he almost always works late these days. Tonight he was later than usual. He always tells us, you see, whenever he has an engagement or is detained. He’s a thoughtful lord, a good lord.”

“I know he is,” she whispered.

“But he didn’t come, and he didn’t send word. Finally I sent two servants to look for him. They found him in the park like this. It was clear he had fought. There was blood everywhere. I sent for the physicians then to the palace.”

Rage whipped through Xanthe, its sting as harsh as a cat-o-nine tail. “Why did he not have guards with him?”

The major domo blinked rapidly. “It was not his way. He said it was such a short walk from the palace grounds to his doorstep, he felt stupid calling for a guard every time he made the journey.”

She pulled herself up short. The major domo did not deserve her rage. The people who attacked Riordan did. She nodded to him and left him with a quiet word of thanks, returning to wait with Niniane and Tiago in the sitting room. They didn’t seem to mind when she reappeared, but she went to the window anyway and pretended to stand guard there.

The dark hours trickled by and turned to the bleak gray before dawn when the major domo stepped into the open doorway. “The physicians ask that you come,” he said.

Niniane and Tiago rushed out of the room and raced up the stairs, with Xanthe close behind. She followed them into the bedroom and closed the door behind her on the anxious faces awaiting in the hall. Her hands shook. Any moment now, she thought, I will be sent out to wait with the others.

But no one seemed to notice or care that she was in the room. The physicians didn’t know who she was, and Tiago and Niniane paid no attention to what she did. They were both focused on the man and woman who were tiredly washing up at basins that had been placed on a nearby sideboard.

“He’ll live,” the woman told them. “But he almost didn’t. I was certain a couple of times that his spirit had left his body.” She looked at them. “His injuries were severe and extensive, and we did the best we could but there’s only so much we can do. It may take several hours to a day for him to regain consciousness, and he’ll need to convalesce in peace and quiet. No work and no stress, not for a few sevendays at the very least. He’s a strong man, and he used a lot of that to survive. Now he’ll need to rebuild that strength.”

Xanthe did not truly hear anything past the first two words. As both Tiago and Niniane asked questions and the doctors answered, she slipped like a ghost around all of them and approached the unconscious man on the bed.

She was an expert at murder, and this was how murder was done—by gaining the trust of the people around the intended victim so that you become commonplace, a fact of life like an armchair or a side table. Then no one questioned you when you came close. No one saw as you slipped the stiletto between the ribs, or dropped the poison in the drink.

Or attacked a man in a small neighborhood park.

She looked down at the noble face of the man who lay so quietly, his black hair spread on the pillow. He did not look peaceful. He looked worn and deeply ill, his closed eyes bruised with dark shadows. The coverlet had been pulled up to his bare shoulders. Sometimes when the injuries were so severe, a physician simply had to stop healing because an abused body could only take so much Power coursing through it. This must have been the case with Riordan, for she could see the uneven bump of bandages underneath the covering.

No one was watching, and it was, after all, such a simple thing she needed to do. She reached out a hand and touched his temple, feeling the pulse of life underneath the pads of her fingers. Then, tenderly, she stroked the silken black hair from his forehead. It was the most audacious thing she had ever done, stealing this one moment.

Some extra sense made her turn her head. Niniane stood a few feet away, staring at her. The Queen’s gaze was very wide and startled, and far too perceptive. Xanthe snatched her hand back and cleared her throat. Turned away. Turned back again. She was in an agony of embarrassment.

Niniane stopped her by simply putting a hand on her arm.

Meanwhile, Tiago saw the doctors out the door and closed it firmly on everybody else again. He turned back to join Niniane and Xanthe, looking down at Riordan.

“We’ll have to investigate everybody,” he said. “That includes everyone in his household, of course, and his staff at the palace. The neighbors will need to be canvassed.”

“I know who did this,” Niniane said through set teeth.

“You think you know who instigated this,” Tiago corrected as he slanted a dark look at her. “It could have actually been carried out by almost anybody.”

Xanthe said, “We came through the park where his servants found him. It is a small neighborhood space, with a few trees and benches, and a little shrubbery around the edges. There is almost no place to hide. If someone lay in wait for him there, they would have looked out of place. And there would have been the sounds of the attack. No one heard or came to help him, so it is likely the inhabitants of the neighboring houses were out at some function. His attackers probably watched and waited for just such a time.”