Part 95 (1/2)

”So, you haven't said anything about my grays.”

Kylar raised an eyebrow. ”What? Do you want me tell you if your trousers make your b.u.t.t look big? They do. Happy?”

”So you have been looking at my b.u.t.t. What do you think of the rest?”

”Are we really talking about this? Now?” Kylar glanced at her b.r.e.a.s.t.s again-and got caught.

”The haughty disdain thing will work better for you if you don't blush,” Vi said.

”They're great,” Kylar said. He coughed. ”Your grays, that is. Not that your b.r.e.a.s.t.s-I mean style is perfect for you. Just over the line between s.e.xy and obscene.” your b.r.e.a.s.t.s-I mean style is perfect for you. Just over the line between s.e.xy and obscene.”

She refused to take offense. ”First I take their attention, then I take their life.”

”It looks cold.” This time, he didn't look at her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. Barely-despite the small attention-getters standing at attention on top of her large attention-getters.

”I'm a woman. I don't get to pick clothes for comfort.”

”I can't believe I'm having a conversation this long about clothes.”

”You call this a long conversation about clothes?” Vi asked. ”Haven't had many lovers, have you?”

”Just one. And not for long, thanks to you,” Kylar said.

That shut her up. Thank the G.o.d.

He got up and started moving. They had to hide every time the patrol boat pa.s.sed, Vi so she wouldn't be seen, and Kylar so Vi wouldn't know he could go invisible. Kylar had worn fairly tight clothes himself, an old pair of grays that Momma K had had fetched for him. The more anyone knew about the extent of his powers, the more vulnerable he was.

They reached the sunken gate to the Maw an hour after midnight. There was no one guarding it.

Kylar tried the latch. It wasn't locked. He looked at Vi. Obviously, he liked that as much as she did. Still, how could the G.o.dking know they were coming? He moved to open the door when Vi touched his arm. She pointed to the rusty hinges, motioning for him to wait.

She touched each of the hinges in turn, murmuring, then nodded to him.

He tried the rusty door. It opened silently.

”Well, I'll be d.a.m.ned,” Vi said. ”So it doesn't just work on little girls.”

Kylar eased the door shut and stared at her. ”Why don't you try it on yourself?” he asked.

”I already did,” she said. ”Anyone further than five feet away can't hear me.”

”That's not what I meant. Anyway, how can you be sure it works?”

”You didn't hear what I just called you.”

”Which was?”

”True, but not clever enough to repeat.”

He hesitated. ”Vi, before we go in, I need to ask you something.”

”Shoot.”

”I got into wet work because of a child named Rat. He was Garoth Ursuul's son, and it was to please Garoth that Rat cut up Elene's face and raped Jarl and tried to rape me.”

”I didn't know,” Vi said. ”I'm sorry.”

”It's not important,” Kylar said gruffly. ”I got away.”

”I didn't,” Vi said quietly. She sank into herself, into those years of nightmare. ”For me it was my mother's lovers. She knew what they did, but she never stopped them. She always hated me for what I cost her. As if I was the one who f.u.c.ked some stranger and got pregnant and made her run away. I don't know if she wanted me at first or if she was just too much of a coward to take ergot or tansy tea.”

Vi knew it was a reasonable fear. A sufficient dose to induce an abortion was a hairsbreadth from a lethal dose. Every year, Hu claimed, thousands of girls who ”took sick and died” had actually taken too much poison. Others took too little and bore maimed children.

”After she ran away, my mother had nothing to survive on but her looks. She was too proud to be a wh.o.r.e outright, so she attached herself to one b.a.s.t.a.r.d after another. She could never do what had to be done.”

”And that's how you're different from her?”

”Yes,” she said softly. Then she came to herself. Why had she been talking so much? She'd never told anyone about that s.h.i.+t. She'd never had anyone who would have cared. ”Sorry, you didn't need to hear that. You had a question?”

Kylar didn't answer. He was looking at her in a way no one had ever looked at her before. It was the look a mother gave her child when she fell and bloodied her knees. It was compa.s.sion, and it went right through her, past her sarcasm and her bravado. It knifed through the ice and dead flesh that were all she thought she had inside and found something small and alive and bathed it in warm light. He was seeing all the putrefying yuck that she'd walled up, and he wasn't recoiling from her the way he should have.

”Hu Gibbet made you kill her, didn't he?”

She looked down, unable to face the open warmth any more. She didn't trust her voice.

”Second kill? One of the boyfriends first?”

She nodded.

This was ridiculous. They were having this conversation outside the Maw? ”What was your question?” she asked.

”When I quit wet work, I couldn't let it go, and it's only now that I know why. When Jarl showed up at my door, part of me was relieved. I had what I'd wanted for my whole life, but I still wasn't happy. Have you ever had someone look at you and understand you and totally accept you? And for some reason, you just couldn't accept that acceptance?” someone look at you and understand you and totally accept you? And for some reason, you just couldn't accept that acceptance?”

Vi swallowed. Her heart filled with longing.

”That's what Elene was for me. I mean, is for me. I promised her that I'd never kill again, but I can't be happy if I don't finish this. When I left, I left her a pair of wedding rings so that she'd know I still love her and want to be with her forever, but I'm sure she's furious with me.”

The weight in Vi's pocket burned. She told her tongue to move, to tell him, but it was lead in her mouth.

”If it were any hit but this, she'd never forgive me. If I do this, the Khalidorans will lose, Logan will be king, the Warrens will be different forever, and Jarl won't have died in vain. If there is a One G.o.d, like Elene always says there is, he made me for this kill.”

Jarl? How can he talk so calmly about Jarl to me? ”So what was your question?” She sounded a bit militant, even to her own ears-Jarl! G.o.ds! Her emotions were so out of control she couldn't even identify them-but Kylar answered gently. ”So what was your question?” She sounded a bit militant, even to her own ears-Jarl! G.o.ds! Her emotions were so out of control she couldn't even identify them-but Kylar answered gently.

”I needed to know if you were in this with me. All the way to the G.o.dking. All the way to death, if it takes that. But I think you've already answered me.”

”I'm with you,” Vi said. Her whole heart swore it.