VAELRIC
By the time I return to the room, the fire has burned low enough that the cold has begun reclaiming the stone around it. I close the door behind me, test the latch out of habit and add two logs to the grate before taking off my sword belt. The book I left open is waiting beside the chair has not become more interesting after dinner.
I sit down. The author has reached the point where three hundred cavalrymen are about to discover that enthusiasm is not a substitute for reconnaissance, and I make it through two pages before realizing I have read the same sentence twice. Something about the room is bothering me, though I cannot immediately identify what. I look toward the door. It is closed, the latch remains exactly where I left it, and no shadow interrupts the thin line of light beneath it. The corridor beyond has been quiet since I came upstairs.
I return to the book, but another paragraph passes without leaving much behind. The fire settles beside me while someone laughs downstairs loudly enough to suggest either excellent wine or poor judgment. Otherwise the building is quiet. The bed is undisturbed, the wardrobe closed, the washstand exactly where it should be and the curtains drawn across the window against the cold. My sword rests within reach beside the chair.
I lower the book slightly and look toward the door again. The door is locked and latched,, but the unease at the back of my thoughts does not lessen when I confirm any of that.
Then I understand.
Nobody is coming through the door because whoever I am waiting for has already arrived.
I close the book over one finger and settle back into the chair as though I have merely lost interest in military incompetence. “You can come out now.”
Nothing moves immediately. Whoever is hiding in the room is disciplined enough not to react simply because I have spoken, which improves my opinion of him slightly.
Then the curtain beside the window shifts.
A man steps from the narrow darkness behind it, dressed plainly enough to avoid attention and carrying a compact crossbow already drawn. He has chosen the only part of the room the firelight does not reach properly, and the fact that I failed to notice him when I entered is irritating enough that I make a note not to repeat the mistake.
His eyes settle on my face with the satisfaction of somebody finally confirming a suspicion. “Vaelric Serrath.”
I look from him to the crossbow. “That depends considerably on what you intend to do next.”
“You’re under sentence of death.”
“So I have been told.”
“They’ll pay well for you.”
There is no Imperial insignia on him, no uniform and no particular loyalty in his expression. Whatever brought him into my room has less to do with justice than with the assumption that delivering a condemned Serrath prince to the Crown will improve his circumstances.
I place the book carefully on the table.
The crossbow rises at once. “Don’t.”
My hand stops several inches from the sword.
He is not nervous. That matters. His stance is balanced, his finger remains outside the trigger until he needs it, and he has positioned himself far enough away that reaching him before the bolt leaves the bow would require either stupidity or a considerable amount of luck.
Unfortunately for him, neither is necessary.
I glance once toward the locked door and then back at him.
His expression changes as he follows the look.
Only slightly.
But now he understands why I checked it.
I smile.
“You chose an excellent place for an ambush,” I tell him. “The difficulty is that you are still inside it.”