Frank-EReturn Read online

  Malthus sighed. I fear I was completely taken in by him. He worked hard at the Sanctuary."

  Larena, Hereward's second oldest daughter, came to the table with a tray of tankards. Her pale hair hung in a long braid down her back. Larena was the most voluptuous of Hereward's daughter, with full breasts, wide hips, and a waist so tiny that Malthus could clasp his hands around it. She met his eyes and then looked away uneasily. Mead?"

  "My cottage tonight? Malthus asked sotto voce.

  "Yes."

  "Mead, yes, I could do with one. Malthus tossed a coin onto her tray and she set a tankard in front of him.

  Her vivacious manner, which always got her decent tips, had vanished days agoright after informing Malthus that he had gotten her pregnant. He lifted the tankard and masked his thoughts with drink, weighing the matter of what to do with her. Larena needed to be moved somewhere safe before the swelling of her belly alerted her pugnacious father to the fact that she was no longer a virgin. With enough preparation, Larena could be put into play as the next move on the chessboard that his efforts against the Redhand family had become. With a little luck, no one would see this move coming until it was too late.

  His gaze drifted across Hereward's other two daughters, fourteen-year-old Rachel and sixteen-year-old Sally with a thread of lewd speculation. Which daughter should I steal next? Sally or Rachel?

  Malthus pulled a gold coin from his pocket, holding it beneath the table as he set the come-hither spell on it.

  Shalto participated in the conversation racing through the common room for a few minutes and then left, ostensibly because he had work waiting at the Sanctuary. Oswyl followed him out.

  Malthus appreciated the skill at subterfuge the gang had developed under his tutelage.

  "Another? Rachel Wiggins stopped at his table, the delicious mounds of her white breasts peeping above the neck of her blouse.

  Malthus flashed the gold coin at her and dropped it down her blouse between her breasts.

  Her gaze went unfocused as the coin slipped down her bodice and lodged against her skin.

  "My cottage around midnight?"

  "Yes. She blinked and her eyes cleared. Did you say you wanted another?"

  "I did."

  He let the talk get heated and departed as it became a roar around him. He found the others waiting when he reached the cottage where he had lived before marrying Merissa. His contributions to the refugee camp were so great that he had been allowed to keep possession of it. It lay on the far west edge of the camp in a secluded, tree-shrouded spot close to the Bonnie Draw River that formed the western borders of the camp. A large rough-hewn table sat in the yard with tree rounds for chairs.

  Torquil stood with his foot on a tree round, staring into the forest. Preece held Rheu on his lap, in the corner of his arms; the boy looked scared. Shalto sat at the right hand of Malthus, his usual spot with Oswyl beside him.

  Oswyl's face was a study in panic, pale and tight. He clasped his hands together on the table, attempting to control his shaking.

  "The priest came by. Malthus scanned their deathly serious faces. He did not need to extend his necromantic senses to taste their fear. Claw brought Yren in shortly after."

  "Damn that priest, muttered Torquil.

  Preece stroked Rheu's head, and the youth looked up at the older one with eyes hungry for reassurance. They'll torture the information out of him."

  Shalto nodded. We're all in danger."

  Malthus licked his lips and lowered his head with a glance to the side. I'll try to rescue Yren. In the meantime we mustn't be seen together until I say that it's okay."

  "Some of us are always together, we can't just split up, said Shalto.

  "Shalto, you and Oswyl are cousins; no one is going to question that. Preece and Rheu have lived together for years. Avoid the other groups and Torquil. Just until I give the word."

  Preece fingered his neck with a sly glance at Malthus. We still going to Hell's Widow?"

  Malthus shook his head. We must put it off for a few days."

  Preece stroked his neck with his finger.

  He knows what I am. How? The heads on the scaffolds. Preece met Heironim and Alex when I sent him with that message to have them ambush Kynyr.

  * * * *

  Lycan rulers were frequently referred to by the outside lands as farmer-kings. The lycans themselves referred to them as chieftains. There was a pervasive informality to their manors and manners. Most chieftains worked alongside their myn tending herds, mending fences, and branding their stock. They were not poor, but neither were they wealthy compared to the kings of the human realms. They kept the common touch that their people loved.

  Claw Redhand was no exception.

  Until he had two heart attacks close together a few months ago, he had ridden out with his myn to work at the day-to-day tasks. His days had become empty and his life more and more restricted. His physician, Sheradyn Kelly had forbidden him to work, have sex with his wife, change shape, drink, and smoke. The result was a growing resentment and frustration coupled with occasional rebellions: he still drank and smoked.

  Making matters worse, he had a mysterious group of raiders attacking steadings and hamlets in the north; a group in Hell's Widow, the nearest Waejontori town, had been murdering his couriers; and he had just had a second lawgiver killedthis time a mon he had admired for years.

  He stood in a corner of the cell watching his guardsmyn preparing to torture Yren Maddox, the accused killer of the lawgiver Padruig Caimbeul. All that Claw felt watching it was an indurate indifference to Yren's pleas and a grim satisfaction that he had caught at least one of the murderers who would soon be spilling his guts to identify the others.

  The bleak cell had no windows; only the spyhole with its sliding shutter for the guardsmyn to peer into its straw-carpeted interior from the heavy wooden door. They stripped the scrawny youth's clothing off, manacled his wrists and ankles, and attached the ankle chain to a hook on the floor. They hooked his wrist irons to a chain that hung over a bar in the high ceiling and linked to a wheel mounted on the rear wall.

  Yren wept and protested his innocence as Belgair turned the wheel, jerking the young lycan upward. Belgair continued until Yren's body had been pulled as taut as a bowstring. The youth screamed when his shoulders and hips started to come loose from their sockets.

  Claw circled Yren. That's tight enough. Letting his hand turn into a claw, the chieftain swiped the youth across the back, leaving five deep furrows.

  Yren shrieked.

  Claw swayed, and grunted, kneading his chest. Make him talk, Belgair."

  "We will."

  Two more guards entered, carrying an iron kettle filled to the brim with burning coals. A third followed with an armload of irons to be thrust into the coals for heating.

  Claw managed to stay on his feet without assistance until he reached the stairs, and then he leaned against the wall as he climbed, breathing heavily, and stopping every three or four steps to catch his breath. Yren's screams followed him, fading slowly from earshot as the thick stonewalls and floor finally closed the sounds out.

  No matter how closely he tried to follow Sheradyn's orders, no matter how faithfully he took his medicine, the pain dogged him. He staggered along the corridor to the Great Hall, and sank to his knees in the doorway.

  "Master Claw! Kissie bent over him.

  Kissie was Claw's favorite nibari. Her people were a race of slaves created by the sa'necari necromancers and the vampires. Centuries of deliberate genetic manipulation had removed the innate human aggressiveness, leaving nothing more than a tragic docility. They were like the deer, but without the instinctual capacity for self-preservation. A few well-intentioned attempts to free them had been made, but always ended in disaster. The nibari could not survive on their own. They had been too damaged by the genetic experiments of the hemovores.

  "Get someone to help me. Claw blinked, gulping air, his voice harsh and raspy. I think I did too much."
/>   Kissie fetched two myn and they got Claw to his suite, undressed, and put to bed. Kissie tucked him in. I'll get Sheradyn."

  "No. I just need rest."

  * * * *

  Malthus stood in the yard and watched the last of his core band of pawns disappear into the darkness. He needed to increase their numbers. Fifteen lycan youths worked at the camp. Some of them he influenced, and others he owned through insinuations of power so subtle they did not realize he had touched them, and a few he held in his pockets for money and favors. Regardless of the methods, they all belonged to him. However, only a small core group had been primed for murder: Preece, Shalto, Oswyl, Yren, Torquil, Rheu, and the recently killed Nesswen.

  A sound in the bushes drew his gaze.

  "Come out of there."

  Larena emerged, her mouth twisting in unease. You said to come."

  Malthus ran his tongue over his lips and his fangs descended, long and needle thin. He was getting bored with her already, but her blood still tasted fine. One of the greatest joys in his life was impregnating them. The vast majority of his kind were sterile by age thirty. There were many theories as to why that was and none produced results: except one. Malthus was thirty-six and as fertile as an adolescent. His mother, Sidera Tyrins, was a bio-alchemist and toxicologist, and she had found the key to preserving and extending sa'necari fertility. She kept it very secret. Few knew that she could do it. Sidera Tyrins had made her son Malthus her greatest achievement.

  "Have you been there long?"

  "No, she answered in a small voice.

  Malthus gestured for her to sit at the table. I haven't much time for you, Larena. Your sister Rachel should be here soon."

  Larena slunk to the table like a beaten puppy. Poor Rachel."

  "Alas poor Rachel. Malthus sneered. Your father makes a large matter of holding his daughters forth as forbidden fruit. Look but don't touch. Taking his daughters delights me. There's only one of you I can't possess, because some fool of a mage warded her mind."

  "Kady."

  Malthus nodded. So I'll have to kill her instead."

  Larena flinched from his words, folding in on herself. What did she ever do to you?"

  "She married my enemy ... the one who killed my spiritbrother, Heironim."

  He wrapped his arms around Larena from behind, causing her to cringe. She moaned in pain as Malthus necromantic gifts slithered into her mind, strengthening the aspects of her jealous personality that most pleased him, reducing her inhibitions, and deepening his control over her with Coercions, Sways, and Triggers.

  Malthus patted her shoulder when he finished. Now, Larena, I want you to go straight to your sister Kady and throw yourself on her mercy. Poor Larena, pregnant by a married mon, too in love to abort, and too protective of her love to reveal his name."

  * * * *

  When Kynyr had first informed Cooley that Cullen's murderers might be out to kill him, Cooley had been terrified into silence about his parentage. Cooley had begun to work through his fears the day that Kynyr's father was murdered. He wanted his name back. He wanted to be Cooley Blackwood again. He had been born a bastard, the lycan son of a Waejontori madam and a lycan courier from Red Wolf. For months now, the orphan cub had been known as Cooley Sinclair, his ancestry hidden from all but a few who stood as his protectors. Changing his name made Cooley feel as if a piece of his soul had been ripped out of him along with a huge chunk of his heart. His perceptions of himself had been stolen from him.

  In the deepest corners of his heart and soul, Cooley wanted to reclaim his identity as Cullen Diomedes Blackwood, junior. More and more he felt as if he walked in his father's shoes and found parts of Cullen in himself. He asked himself each day what his father would have done in his place. Although he was only eleven-years-old, Cooley began to reshape his self-image into that of his father. He knew what his father would have donehis father would have fought to the bitter end and defied his enemies and the enemies of his friends. Cooley decided that he could do no less.

  And with those realizations, Cooley matured. He experienced a sensation of settling into the role he wanted to play, the person he wanted to be.

  "I am my father's son."

  Todd still refused to teach Cooley the arts of war, although he had begun teaching Cooley techniques for avoidance. Cullen had taught him the way of blades with a fighting knife in each hand since he was five years old.

  In addition to the generous stipend that Cahira doled out to him from his inheritance, Cooley had been sneaking out to ride in secret match races, pitting Larkspur and Glorygirl against the horses of grown mynand winning.

  Cooley dug his secret stash of money out from behind the headboard of his bed, and counted the golden coins. Rory had had the right idea, but not the training or the funds to implement it. Cooley did. Tomorrow he would go and have a proper belt made to hold his bladesthe blades that he intended to purchase from Raonul the smith.

  Todd would try to take his blades away; Cooley felt certain of that. Standing up to Todd would not be easy, but Cooley now had more than enough reasons for resorting to what he had learned from his father.

  The growling in his stomach interrupted his planning and he decided to go out to the kitchen and make off with some cookies. As he passed Cahira and Todd's room, he heard crying and stopped. Cahira put a brave face before the world, but Cooley had heard her weeping many nights before over her slain son Branduff. It filled him with determination to fight back.

  * * * *

  Once Larena had left, Malthus re-entered his cottage to consider what changes he needed to make to his plans. When he had accepted the assignment from Queen Tomyrilen's general, Lord Daemon, Malthus had not known that Daemon was simply another alias of the ancient vampire Lord Brandrahoon. That had become the first complication in what was turning into a host of them.

  He had arrived here to infiltrate Red Wolf and murder the ruling family, while his units in Hell's Widow severed the clan's access to Waejontor in the west and his armies in the north raided villages, hamlets, and steadings as they moved to cut the clan off from their allies in Creeya and Iradrim.

  It had all seemed such a simple matter.

  Then he had met and become obsessed with Merissa Redhand and run afoul of Kynyr Maguire in the course of his pursuit of her. Maguire had destroyed his forces in Hell's Widow and contributed to the destruction of a third of his army at Three Stones.

  "I can't put off dealing with Kynyr."

  Malthus entered his study, activated the spirit door he had created, and revealed his room within a room. He went to a cabinet and took out his string of globes, a book, and a ledger. Malthus carried them to his desk and settled in with them.

  The book was a catalog of poisons arranged according to the Romilay scale with one being the mildest and ten the most deadly. Starting with level four, many of the poisons mimicked the effects of known diseases in such a way that the average Reader would not detect them and be forced to diagnose the disease rather than the poison.

  Malthus thumbed through it, scanning the information and the charts that applied to lycans.

  He had scarcely begun when he came across the name Black Mountain Fever, a disease spread by the bite of infected ticks found in the moist marshy regions of Waejontor. The disease itself had a ninety percent mortality rate and the poison one hundred percent. The trouble with level four was the degree to which it needed to build up in the body tissues.

  He glanced at the tables. One dose a day at one-gram doses required one hundred doses to kill and ten doses to demonstrate the onset. Nearly a third of a year! Malthus did not have that long to eliminate Kynyr. He saw that there was a series of charts related to it. Up to six doses a day could be administered before it became evident that it was not a disease. Dosing at six a day cut the time required to kill down. Mixing it with certain narcotics, such as Pollendine, more than doubled the effectiveness, raising the poison from a level four to a level eight. Dosing would be a matter of opportunity and
hence erratic, but it could be coped with.

  "It's time to die, Kynyr."

  Malthus tapped the golden globe on his string and six cases of jars appeared on his desk. Going through them, he found a jar of Black Mountain Fever. First, he filled a six-ounce bottle, and then filled twenty vials with individual doses and sent the rest back into the globe. He tucked the vials and bottle into his pouch, sealed the spirit panel, and headed to the living room to await the arrival of Rachel Wiggins.

  * * * *

  The three surviving MacFie brothers, Artair, Eanruig, and Tobrytan, sat drinking together in the antechamber to Artair's suite at the Three Candles Inn, located in Hell's Widow, Waejontor, half a day's ride from Red Wolf. The cozy, parlor like room suited them. It had large cabinets on two sides, a small hearth to warm it, and a square table in the middle where they sat.

  Artair, the youngest of them, was the scholar in the family, educated at the Monastery of St. Albans. He had wanted to become a monk in the Order of St. Tarmus located in the far west at Lorendon Crossing. Father Keikero had agreed to accept him and Artair would have been the first lycan in an otherwise entirely sylvan community, practicing celibacy and asceticism in the pursuit of and devotion to knowledge and learning. Their oldest brother Fergus had refused to allow it.

  Fergus had groomed Artair to be the polished, educated spokesmon for the family, the one who could do more than simply a bit of reading, writing, and figuring. Therefore, he had been not willing to allow his youngest brother to go haring off into the western wilderness. If Artair had a serious flaw, it was that bitches had a tendency to fluster him.

  Until last fall, there had been five of them, close-knit and loyal, like so many lycan families. Then Jordi, their middle brother, had been killed by a group of myn led by a sa'necari who shot him from horseback with poisoned arrows on the edge of their lands. Fergus had roused the clans that served their Lord Duncan MacLachlan and led them north to avenge Jordi and destroy the sa'necari at Hell's Widow. Fergus MacFie died, protecting their headstrong cousin Darcy when her bloodlust got the better of her and she chased an enemy into the path of a group of crossbowmyn.