Ruler, Rival, Exile (Of Crowns and Glory—Book 7) Read online

  He stood there, waiting. He wasn’t going to leave any of them behind if he could avoid it. Even when the first of the attackers appeared, running toward the settlement with the confidence of a man who guessed there would be no opposition, Thanos didn’t pull back. Instead, he charged.

  The attacker’s sword came up, but it was too late. Thanos’s blade slid into his chest and out again, gleaming in the sun for a moment as the man collapsed. He looked around, and there were already more men coming at him.

  Thanos parried a swing, falling to one knee to absorb the force of it, then cut back across an attacker’s hamstring. He lunged past the man he was fighting, struck out at a second, and kept going.

  The others were there then. The few men from the village who could fight jabbed with boat hooks and fishing spears, while one enterprising man grabbed the sword from the foe Thanos had just cut down.

  Jeva whirled past them, bladed chains spinning, tangling an arm here, cutting a throat there. She fought with the same almost dancelike rhythm Thanos had seen from her before, as she grabbed a knife from one fighter’s own sheath and stabbed him.

  Thanos attacked in concert with her, striking in the gaps her movement left, serving as the still point around which the others organized. He drew attackers to himself, cutting to either side and forcing them back. Briefly, the warriors ran, pulling back toward the edge of the village.

  “They weren’t expecting foes who could fight,” Jeva said. “Cowards.”

  Thanos nodded. The men probably were expecting an easy slaughter, not trained warriors. They would know better now.

  “Pull back,” he yelled to the villagers. They needed to take advantage of the pause to get closer to the boats. “But do it carefully. This isn’t done.”

  They didn’t run. Running would have exposed them too much. Instead, Thanos loped back in the direction of the boats in a half jog, with Jeva beside him.

  “We need to make sure everyone gets out safely,” Thanos said.

  Jeva nodded, and even if she couldn’t understand why someone would do all this, she still ran wide to make sure that no raiders could flank the fleeing villagers.

  The attackers started to come, but now they were chasing, which meant they were strung out. Thanos paused to parry a blow and strike back, then shoved another man into one of those with him and kept going. He saw Jeva swing her bladed chains, keeping foes back or tripping them as they ran.

  The main thing was to buy time for the villagers. They walked and they ran, making for the beach at whatever speed they could manage. Thanos kept fighting, giving ground only to keep pace with them, wanting to buy them as much time as possible.

  He saw some of the soldiers running around him, turned to engage them, and found another slamming a booted foot into his back.

  “Got you now,” the man said, cutting down with an axe. Thanos rolled away, but there were more men there, all with weapons lifted, ready to strike. There was nothing Thanos could do right then but roll and block, hoping for enough room to stand in.

  Jeva slammed into one of the men, garroting him with her chain while she stabbed him with a curved knife. She spun and cut, bringing down a second, buying Thanos enough time to stand up. He thrust, catching a third under the arm with his sword.

  “Thank you,” Thanos called over to her.

  “Just don’t let them get so close again,” she shot back.

  They fought their way down to the beach step by step, and around them the men of the village fought too. Thanos saw a man cut down by the Felldust warriors, but two more stepped in to spear his attacker.

  The beach was in sight now, but Thanos could see the problems there. There had been no time to bring around enough boats, and now there were figures in dust-colored armor coming up the beach from the far side. There would be no way to get everyone onto the boats in time.

  “What do we do now?” Jeva asked.

  There was only one answer to that. “We buy them as much time as we can before we die.”

  Thanos picked his spot on the beach, standing there and planting his feet in the sand. He saw Jeva picking a spot nearby, swinging one of her deadly chains to mark a line in the sand in front of her. The threat was clear: anyone crossing that line would die.

  The first few would, at least. After that, there would simply be too many enemies.

  Thanos found himself wishing he’d been able to go with Ceres. Even if the island she was going to was reputed to be deadly, at least he would have been with her at the end. Now, he was here, too far away from her, about to die without even the chance to say goodbye. Already, he could see the warriors gathering for a charge, while more boats were coming close now, sailing in toward the beach, close enough that their occupants would be able to fire arrows at the fleeing villagers from the decks.

  Except that, as they got closer, Thanos saw that the ships weren’t flying Felldust’s colors. Instead, they seemed to be flying the flags of Lord West’s men. They skimmed in close to the shore like thrown stones, and a hail of arrows came from them, fired as surely as Thanos had seen the men fire from moving horses. They arced up beautifully from the sea edge, and then they dropped.

  They struck the enemy warriors standing on the shore, and Thanos saw them fall like freshly cut wheat. Some still came forward, but he and Jeva moved to meet them, cutting to either side while the villagers piled into the boats. He could see some swimming for the ships of Lord West’s men, while others fit into small fishing boats.

  The warriors from Felldust pulled back, obviously unwilling to get within bowshot.

  “Time to go,” Thanos said to Jeva.

  “Can you swim?” Jeva asked.

  Thanos frowned. “The boat is just there.”

  “And I need it,” Jeva said. She looked around. “You have shown me something, Thanos. My people… the ones who came to Delos were one tribe, but there are more of our places. I will go, I will fetch them to Haylon. Together, we will fight and defeat the First Stone’s forces.”

  That took Thanos a little by surprise.

  “I thought that it was foolish to risk your lives for others,” he said.

  He saw her shrug.

  “Apparently, you have changed my mind. If we’re all going to die, it might as well be for something that is worth it. This is worth it.”

  On impulse, Thanos hugged the Bone Folk woman. She stood there stiffly for a moment, then hugged him back.

  “You Empire folk are strange,” she said. “Still, I would like to think I will miss you while I am gone. Stay safe, Thanos.”

  “I thought that death came for us when it wanted,” Thanos replied.

  Jeva smiled. “Well, try to persuade it that it doesn’t want you for a while.”

  “I’ll try,” Thanos promised. “If you will too.”

  Jeva spread her hands as if to suggest that anything could happen. Still, Thanos had seen her fight. If anyone could come back in one piece, it was her. He held out his hand to her and she stared at it as if expecting a weapon to be there. Then she smiled again and clasped his wrist.

  “I would tell you to be lucky,” she said, “but that would be nonsense.”

  “You be lucky too,” Thanos said to her.

  She nodded. “Now swim, Thanos. I need this boat. I will see you on Haylon.”

  Thanos didn’t argue. Instead, he plunged into the waves, heading for the nearest of the boats. By the time the men there hauled him up onto the deck, he could see Felldust’s ships in the distance, but by then, it didn’t matter. The villagers were safe.

  They’d done it.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Athena didn’t move too quickly as she made her way around Delos. The weight of the amphora of wine she carried prevented it, but it was about more than that. She’d learned quickly that it was better to move slow than fast. Better not to attract attention. She hid her disgust at the drudgery, thinking instead about all that it allowed her to do.

  “You there,” a voice snapped, and Athena turned
to see soldiers coming out of an alley. Three of them, their leader with a mustache that seemed designed to make up for the lack of hair on his skull. “What are you doing?”

  Athena didn’t bother hiding her fear. The soldiers would have been more suspicious if she’d looked unafraid. More than that, fear was what they wanted from her. Athena just hoped that it was all they wanted. Delos was a dangerous place to be alone right then.

  “Forgive me, master,” she said, falling to her knees and setting the amphora down.

  “I’ll decide that when I’ve heard what you’re doing,” the soldier snapped back. “Who are you, and what are you doing?”

  “My new lord has declared that I am no one and nothing,” Athena said, keeping her eyes on the dirt. How many times now had this saved her life? Even so, every time she had to do it, she started thinking of what she would do if she had even a few torturers and guards in her service again. She would hang this one up by his awful mustache, she decided.

  “And what are you doing?” the soldier prompted again. “Make me ask again, slave, and I’ll whip you for it.”

  “Delivering wine, master,” Athena said. “My lord requires that his men are not left thirsty.”

  Her disguise meant that she couldn’t make threats, not directly, but she’d found that there were subtle differences in the things she could say. Mention a lord rather than just some thug who’d claimed her, and they assumed she was the slave of some important man. Mention his men, and they started thinking of what those men might do if they delayed her errand to bring them wine.

  In its way, playing the part of a slave had as many subtleties to it as being the highest of nobles.

  “I’m sure your owner wouldn’t mind sparing us some wine,” the soldier said.

  Athena nodded. “Yes, master. I have cups here.”

  She poured wine for them, wishing all the time that she had poison on hand to use on them. There were times to fight, though, and times to prepare. This was the latter.

  “Are you enjoying your new life, woman?” The soldier laughed as she poured his wine for him.

  Athena shook her head. “It is awful. As far from my former life as it is possible to get.”

  The soldier laughed at that, then threw the dregs of his wine in her face.

  “But it is your life now,” the soldier said. “And an old slave like you can’t expect more. It’s not like a wrinkled thing like you will catch some man’s heart so that he frees you!”

  The others joined in the laughter then. Still, Athena forced herself not to react. So long as this stayed with merely casual cruelty, Athena would force herself not to react. She could endure more than this.

  She had endured more than this. In the time she’d been on Delos’s streets, how many people had struck her or sought to humiliate her? There had been almost nowhere to sleep that was safe from the wandering gangs of soldiers, or the slavers, or simply the desperate people who would take what she had because they needed it just as much.

  Still, there were always worse things that might happen. These men might decide to rape her or kill her, just because they could. They might insist on seeing her to the site she was supposedly delivering wine to, and then they would see the truth. They might even recognize her, although that seemed less and less likely with every day that she spent in the dirt.

  “Go,” the soldier said at last. “I’ve better things to do than waste my time with you.”

  Athena thanked him profusely as she hurried off, stumbling under the weight of her wine jar. A part of her wished that she didn’t have to carry it, but she’d found out early on that wine was easy to get hold of and provided a good excuse to be walking around the city. Soldiers could believe that someone like her might have been sent out with wine, when they might not have believed another excuse.

  It gave her a reason to walk the city, and it gave her a way to carry what she needed to carry. It gave her a way to start to fight back.

  Athena walked down to an inn that had reopened now that the attack was done. The customers there were all soldiers. The innkeeper had been killed, but his family had been kept there by the new owners, along with all the former servants there. Athena walked in, picking her way between the tables, noting which factions among the First Stone’s forces were there, listening as she went.

  The innkeeper’s wife was chained by her wrist to the bar of the place. Athena walked over, nodding to her.

  “You sent for more wine?” she asked. She dropped her voice. “The Empire shall rise.”

  It was probably a foolish phrase to choose. It said too much about who she was and what she wanted. It would help anyone who started hunting for her to find her, and they would start hunting for her, once Athena got started. It was necessary, though. A rebellion needed symbols as well as security. It needed hope.

  Athena almost laughed at that. At the thought that she might be leading a rebellion. At the thought that there might be any hope left in Delos.

  “In the back,” the woman said. “You’ll find what you need there.”

  Athena nodded, heading into the back room of the place, where a pair of men were working in chains, moving barrels. Athena could remember when they’d been dressed in silks and velvets, loyal nobles under her husband.

  “The Empire shall rise,” she murmured as she got close.

  They returned the greeting, looking at her expectantly. Athena opened her wine jar, reaching down inside until her fingers found the leather thong tied there. She drew it up out of the jar, the pouch on the end coming out with an effort.

  Athena passed it to them. There were daggers inside, and coin. Not much to work with, but it was something. It was a start. It was the difference between two broken, beaten men and two potential allies. Maybe they would die before they could be useful, but if Athena kept going, some would start to survive.

  “They say the First Stone is gone from the city,” Athena said. She’d gotten that piece of information from a bath house attendant. “Taking most of his men with him.”

  Information was as valuable a weapon as any knife, used well. Athena had known the lesson back when she had been a queen, but she hadn’t been as disciplined about it as she should have been. It was why Stephania had been able to take her kingdom behind her back. It was why she’d been surprised by the rebellion.

  Now, there was no room for such slackness. There was no army, no vast treasury, to make up for any failures. She had to build carefully, but also build quickly, spinning pieces of information and the little respect that she’d retained into a web of contacts.

  It was a strange web. There were those such as the two men she’d just armed who were old supporters from the days when she’d been the queen. Athena needed more than that though. There weren’t enough nobles left to rely on them alone. The ones who hadn’t been killed in the rebellion and then the invasion often weren’t in positions where they could be useful. Half of them had already been moved on using the slave galleys of Felldust.

  That meant that she needed others. There were former members of the rebellion, who didn’t truly know who she was, or who thought that even Athena was an improvement on what was happening now. There were ordinary people who hadn’t been able to get out of the city fast enough and who had found their lives as free folk torn away.

  Athena used them all as she built up her resources.

  She walked out of the inn thinking about what she might do with them, and kept on going down the street, heading for her next stop. There was a fortune teller on the Street of Seven Arches who had managed to keep her small booth, and collected as much information about those who came to her as she could while spinning beautiful lies for the thugs who wanted their futures told.

  The truth was that Athena hadn’t worked out what she was going to do next yet. She’d never imagined that she would find herself building up a rebellion rather than trying to break one down. She’d never imagined that she would survive the assault on the city, or Stephania’s betrayal.
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br />   “I will not be stopped,” Athena said.

  She started to dream of what might happen. Maybe she would find a way out of the city, into the arms of whatever remaining supporters she had. Maybe she would stand at the head of a new rebellion as it swept up over the city, tearing through the First Stone’s forces as they turned their backs on slaves armed with knives and needles, poisons and stolen tools.

  If she could do that, perhaps she would be a queen again. She would rise up on the backs of those who supported her, and the ones who would not acknowledge the nobility of her blood would still fall at her feet for her role in freeing them.

  “Or they will be made to,” Athena said.

  None of it would bring back what she’d had. Her husband was dead. Her poor, mad son was dead. The few friends she’d allowed herself were gone, either to the grave or in the chains of the enemy. But she could build something new, and she could take revenge on those who had helped to steal from her. She would—

  “You. Slave!”

  The words snapped Athena from her reverie. Another of Felldust’s thugs stood nearby, gesturing for her to come over to him. Would this be the time that she found herself killed for no better reason than because it would amuse some warrior?

  Athena wouldn’t believe that. She wasn’t going to die here. The rebellion hadn’t killed her. The invasion hadn’t. She had a purpose, and she was going to fulfill it, no matter how many warriors she had to bow and scrape to.

  “At once, my lord,” she said, hurrying over. She knelt before him, already readying the amphora to give him the wine he almost certainly wanted.

  He looked her up and down, then shrugged as if she wasn’t worth even that much of his time. He shoved her back into the dirt, snatching her wine container from her. Athena was just glad that the weapons were gone from it, or she would have had to find a way to kill him. “Be on your way.”

  It was a small cruelty, but Athena filed it away, just as she’d filed away every other one in her life. She couldn’t do anything about it now, but soon, things would be different. Her hatred was the only thing sustaining her right then, but it was more than enough.