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rainbowfic2024-02-09 08:47 pm
thisbluespirit) wrote in rainbowfic2024-02-09 08:47 pm
Vert #23; Light Black #15; Azul #2 [Starfall]
Name: Devil's Bargain
Story: Starfall
Colors: Vert #23 (Hope springs eternal in the human breast); Light Black #15 (Fool); Azul #2 (To the bitter end)
Supplies and Styles: Charcoal + Seed Beads + Canvas + Chiaroscuro
Word Count: 3056
Rating: Teen
Warnings: Character death; blood, injury, blackmail.
Notes: 1335, Old Ralston; Cerra Violmar, Lyus Olorne, Marran Delver, Ennia Fievoth. (It's been mentioned a few times now, particularly by Aimon, that Governor Delver was involved in some incident during an important ceremony a couple of years ago. This is sort of about that. Outsider POV.)
Summary: Beware strangers who only want one, small thing.
"It's such a small thing. One item. One tiny favour—and then it's yours."
Cerra watched the stranger. She was beginning to wish she'd walked straight out of the alehouse rather than even start this conversation. She should leave now, but she didn't. She feigned disinterest, drawing back with a shrug. "If you mean well, just give me the cursed seer's address."
"I will. That's what I'm saying. But it will cost you. I want that information, or you'll have to pay in full. 400 solers should do it."
Cerra put down her wine cup. "That's a ludicrous amount. And an unreasonable request. Being dismissed would cost me far more than anything you could come up with."
"I told you. This one's completely genuine and she mentioned your name. She can tell you where your sister is. Invaluable, surely?"
Cerra folded her arms. "And you asked her about my sister because -?"
"I didn't. She's good. I told you. I asked about my own problem and she directed me to you. She says you can get me what I need, and in return, she can offer you the thing you want the most. Such a little thing to ask."
"Like I said, not if I'm caught."
"You have access to the full run of the Governor's Hall. You'll manage. One small piece of information. Take the letter—copy it—whatever you can manage. It's for personal reasons, nothing more. I swear. I need to know which way this vote is going to go—and for that I have to know the Governor's recommendation. It's not a national secret. Won't even be a District secret for much longer, but I can't wait until the politicians are done talking about it."
"Speak to the Governor, then, not me."
"He might be able to fit me in sometime after the debate is over," the stranger said. "Too late. You know what it's like. Hard to get a Governor's attention unless you're already somebody."
Cerra furrowed her brow. "Prove to me it's not a trick; that you do have a seer's name, and she is all you say."
The stranger grinned. He leant forward across the table and slid half a torn sheet towards her, with a single first name on it. Ennia. Must be a hundred such and more in the District.
He's got nothing, Cerra told herself. She shunted her chair back from the small table with decision, and stood.
"She told me," he said quietly, "that there was a guard called Violmar who held everything I needed in her hands. Do the words Daulin and Palpennot mean anything to you?"
Cerra gave an involuntary start. She hesitated, but sat back down. "Even if they do, I'm just a guard. I don't get to rifle through the secretaries' desks."
It was the failure of Palpennot that had begun all this. A small alionrel farm, not up to the new standards demanded by this administration. Cerra stared down at the table. She didn't think about that too much in the light of where she'd ended up. These things happened. It hadn't been personal. They said the reforms made a difference to the health of everyone in the alionrel districts. It hadn't worked out that way for Daulin and others she carried close to her heart, but most of them were past help now.
"Or does loyalty to your employer come before family concerns?"
Cerra lifted her face. "I do what I get paid for. And I like this kind of backstage whispering even less than I like what the Council gets up to."
"But -?" His mouth quirked upwards at the corner, and he made a question of the word.
She sighed. "All right. Tell me what it is you want. As long as it is only one small thing, I'll see what I can do. For Daulin. But I make no promises—I'm not getting thrown out or helping an Eisterlander spy or whatever you might turn out to be for anyone or anything."
"Fair enough," he said. He pulled his chair in tighter. "It's that letter I need to get sight of—from the town spokesperson for Hulvell to your esteemed Governor, dated Gathering three. That's it. Highly local, certainly of no interest to anyone outside this District."
"And you want this so you can make money out of it, is that it?"
"With very good reason. A modest amount—and a matter of life and death from where I'm standing. But, of course, it's all up to you."
After the family business had become a family disaster, Daulin had gone to Eisterway, with plans to set up a new line of work there. That had been two years ago. Cerra hadn't heard from her since. Travelling down to Eisterway during her leave last year hadn't got her anywhere either. She'd had no proper leads and not enough time to get anywhere. Daulin was the youngest; the last member of her family Cerra had left. She didn't mind the Governor as much as this shady stranger might suppose, but she didn't care about him and his causes either. Daulin was the only one who mattered.
One letter, she thought. Burn it, why not?
It wasn't easy to get a moment alone in Chief Secretary Stolley's office, where the letter would be kept. Cerra would need an extremely good excuse to explain away being found poking around in drawers and cabinets. The secretaries and their staff didn't expect guards to give them a hand with the paperwork.
She spent couple of days kicking her heels, waiting and keeping a closer eye on who put what where than she'd ever done before, and decided she was never going to get a chance to even look for it. She'd have to take a different sort of risk, one that should at least give her a moment alone to try hunting for the cursed letter. She set a small fire in one of the empty offices, and then raced down the corridor, shouting for the great bell to be rung and ordering everyone else out as she passed. Once the bell sounded, everyone had to leave the building other than selected guards who were supposed to stay and investigate before the city's fire fighters reached the Hall.
It was the best shot she'd have. Cerra darted into the main office and opened the drawer where Stolley kept private correspondence. Time to see if her luck was in for a change.
"Your information." Cerra passed the paper to the man, as they met for a second time, passing as if by chance in the water gardens. She'd taken the letter, copied the details in private, and then slipped it onto the desk under a pile of other papers once she'd finished. She'd heard Stolley raking down some of the junior staff later on the subject, but that wasn't her problem. Secretaries were, in Cerra's view, worse than any Governor. They were the ones who filed and stamped everything and allowed no exceptions, no interpretation of rules, nothing that didn't fit in all their little lines and boxes and endless forms. They were the ones who crossed through applications and appeals—this one or that one deemed not even worthy of a look from the Governor or any other official. They calmly and neatly filed away the ruined hopes and desperate last pleas. She despised them all.
She'd expected the stranger to renege on his side of the bargain. He looked that type. If this attempt hadn't worked, she wouldn't have bothered with another one. Not worth it, not for someone like that. But his request had proved possible and so here she was, because hope died the hardest of all.
He pocketed the folded square of paper she'd given him with a light laugh, but as he moved forward, as if to carry on past her, he pressed a card into her hand. When he'd gone, Cerra raised her hand to examine it: Ennia Fievoth, it read, and there was an address—a street in a village up in the mountains, a few hundredlengths east of Old Ralston.
She knew where she was going on her next day off-duty.
The starstone seer didn't call herself that. She sniffed when Cerra did, and said that wasn't how it worked at all. She saw connections in starstone, she said; lines across time that bound people together.
"But you know where my sister is?"
Imai Fievoth sat Cerra down at the table. Her tiny cottage was disconcertingly mundane, even prosperous inside. The walls were painted pale yellow, the furniture was minimal and old, but of good quality, and she had a whole shelf full of books in an alcove, some of them new. Cerra took comfort from that. If she was keeping herself through this line of work, she must be good, mustn't she? Or, of course, people were that desperate to fool themselves. There was always that.
Ennia Fievoth was too settled here to be for a complete fake set up by Cerra's shadowy stranger, not unless her neighbours and the people Cerra had asked for directions were in on it too, but people who 'read' starstone for a living could be as easily bought as anyone else.
"I've already seen," Imai Fievoth said. "I told your friend."
"Not my friend. I barely even know him. Did he ask you about me or Daulin?"
"He asked a lot of questions. None about you; no, but I told him where the lines led."
"And my sister—where is she? Is she in Eisterway? What do you mean by a 'line' anyway? How does this work?"
Imai Fievoth smiled. "It's the line you need to take to make the connection. Yours leads to the Governor."
"That isn't helpful," said Cerra. "The Governor won't care about this. Why should he?"
"You'll understand when the time comes. You—your friend—the Governor. When you've paid in blood. Then you'll find a way to your sister."
Cerra rose. She gave the woman the a curt but still respectful nod of farewell. Imai Fievoth lived up in these mountains. She and the villagers probably breathed in these old stories from childhood—had nothing else to amuse themselves with up here, either. Cerra had nearly bought into it too, desperate enough to cling to any lead, however unlikely. A vague, uneasy prophecy was all she'd received for her pains. The only consolation was that at least she'd got away with the theft of the letter. She was no worse off than before.
She thought that was an end to it until she was halfway home and ran into the stranger again. He was ambling around at the side of the road, and once she walked past, he fell into step with her, as she headed back to Old Ralston.
"Imai Violmar," he said. He smiled. "I've got another task for you."
"That was a once-and-only." She clenched her fist at her side, unseen by him. "And as for your so-called seer -!"
The man who had not yet even given her his name, widened his eyes. "Didn't you like her? I thought she was impressive, much better than I'd anticipated."
"If you don't get out of my way, you'll regret it!"
"Oh, no. You would. Because, here's the thing: you weren't as careful as you thought when you filched that letter. Now, I can make sure the business stays quiet, or I can send my witness them go straight to your commanding officer and the Governor's Chief Secretary. And I was under the impression you wanted to stay in your job."
A chill crept over Cerra. Now she saw it all, much too late. It had been a trap, and she had walked right into it. Much as she would have loved to thump him, cursed piece of wave-rot that he was, she'd left herself no option but to keep on with this and hope that there was an other side of it to reach at the end.
It didn't feel so bad to strike at the North Eastern Council, she'd admit—but she didn't enjoy being tricked into it, like the worst idiot alive.
"Ah. You do."
Cerra drew in a breath. "What is it you're after now? I can't keep on crying fire, you know. You should have gone to one of the secretaries. Bet some of them would have loved playing this sort of game."
"I don't want more information," he said. "I have to speak to the Governor in person, and you can arrange that for me."
She choked on her laughter. "I told you, I'm not one of his secretaries or assistants."
"No. But you're going to be on duty in the Sharan gardens on Rosfallen Day. All you have to do is give me a chance to speak to the Governor when he's completed the rituals and is left alone in one of the groves. Barring his loyal yet discreet guard, of course, who will lead him to the planned spot."
Cerra turned her head to study the man's face. It was a warm day—autumn had not yet made its sting felt – but she shivered at the glint in his light eyes. "What good will that do? He's hardly going to want to talk to anyone at that point in the ceremony!"
"It's a private audience. Can't get one any other way," said the stranger. He paused, forehead creasing. "You must hate him. Don't you? I would, if I were you."
Cerra shrugged.
"Fine. But you have to agree, or, as I said, you'll find yourself arrested and imprisoned for theft, not just dismissed. Or maybe this counts as treason? Who knows what they might do to you for that?"
"Can't refuse, can I?" She adjusted the straps of the bag on her back. Old Ralston was already in sight, the sturdy grey towers of the fort coming into view before any of the houses it dwarfed. Even though the sun was still shining, the clouds above were shifting and a light spot of rain fell on her hand. "You want to talk to him—that's all?"
"That's all. Then we'll be done. You'll be paid, too."
Cerra walked on, her pace even. When you've paid in blood; the Governor—your friend—you, that's what the starstone seer had said. She buried the thought. What did Imai Fievoth know anyway?
She told herself that as hard as she could every day after that, right up until Rosfallen Day. She had to do it now. Best not to think about the worst thing her troublesome stranger might do. Even an outsider to North Eastern would think twice before spilling blood in the middle of one of Emoyra's most sacred places.
Nothing else could be permitted to be true until it was too late to choose and, one way or another, Cerra was finished with this.
The trouble was, it was never too late to choose.
Cerra did everything the stranger asked of her. She could have dived into the river after if she'd wanted—got away free and cleansed of guilt. The stranger almost certainly would have tried to dispose of her too afterwards, but she'd thought her odds of besting him in a struggle were good. Much as she'd insisted to herself she had no reason to think of murder, somewhere in the back of her head, she'd planned all that before she arranged the scene and brought them all to this spot. The twisting gravel path led through the trees and out here, close to the running water. It was out of sight of the main shrine. It suited the purposes of each of them. It was perfect.
But, at the last minute, she jumped the wrong way. She let herself understand too soon what the stranger meant to do. She couldn't stop watching him—he wouldn't really do it, would he? He wouldn't raise a weapon in this place. But she saw his hand go for it, and there were limits. Limits to what you did, no matter what. Limits to how far you failed in your duty, when people paid you in good faith. And you didn't let some piece of southern sea-shit kill another North Easterner right in the deepest heart of Rosfallen.
Cerra jumped the wrong way, and came between them. She was the one who wound up on the damp long grass, fighting for breath against something stealing in through the wound; something that had been guaranteed to make this kill easy. Maybe whoever had asked her treacherous friend to do this didn't think much of his aim.
He'd put her in this trap. He ought to have been prepared for the cornered animal to turn and bite. She tried to laugh, but she couldn't. She'd never have thought she'd choose to die defending this Governor—any Governor.
What happened next was out of her vision and utterly out of her power. A struggle, she imagined from the sounds, but her whole world had concentrated down to the need to keep breathing. Her muscles constricted. She could barely move. Her shoulder that had been numbed to start with, now burned.
The Governor was there again suddenly; his ceremonial robes of Rosfallen blue bloodied all the way down the front. The hand that he put to her arm was sticky with it. "What did they pay you?" he demanded, his grip tightening painfully.
She choked and clutched at him with the hand she could still raise. Her fingers slid over the fabric of the robes, and she dug her nails into his flesh for purchase. "Daulin," she rasped. "My sister. Find my sister."
The hard look his face cleared into compassion she had no wish to see. She closed her eyes against it. Maybe that starstone seer wasn't so useless after all. Cerra's body convulsed. Everything darkened at the edges.
The Governor hadn't gone. "Hold on. Help is on its way."
"Daulin," she tried to insist, but she could only mouth it now. The fire was spreading through her veins. She couldn't breathe—she couldn't breathe -
"I promise," he said; the last thing she heard.
This was how you got the Governor's attention.
Story: Starfall
Colors: Vert #23 (Hope springs eternal in the human breast); Light Black #15 (Fool); Azul #2 (To the bitter end)
Supplies and Styles: Charcoal + Seed Beads + Canvas + Chiaroscuro
Word Count: 3056
Rating: Teen
Warnings: Character death; blood, injury, blackmail.
Notes: 1335, Old Ralston; Cerra Violmar, Lyus Olorne, Marran Delver, Ennia Fievoth. (It's been mentioned a few times now, particularly by Aimon, that Governor Delver was involved in some incident during an important ceremony a couple of years ago. This is sort of about that. Outsider POV.)
Summary: Beware strangers who only want one, small thing.
"It's such a small thing. One item. One tiny favour—and then it's yours."
Cerra watched the stranger. She was beginning to wish she'd walked straight out of the alehouse rather than even start this conversation. She should leave now, but she didn't. She feigned disinterest, drawing back with a shrug. "If you mean well, just give me the cursed seer's address."
"I will. That's what I'm saying. But it will cost you. I want that information, or you'll have to pay in full. 400 solers should do it."
Cerra put down her wine cup. "That's a ludicrous amount. And an unreasonable request. Being dismissed would cost me far more than anything you could come up with."
"I told you. This one's completely genuine and she mentioned your name. She can tell you where your sister is. Invaluable, surely?"
Cerra folded her arms. "And you asked her about my sister because -?"
"I didn't. She's good. I told you. I asked about my own problem and she directed me to you. She says you can get me what I need, and in return, she can offer you the thing you want the most. Such a little thing to ask."
"Like I said, not if I'm caught."
"You have access to the full run of the Governor's Hall. You'll manage. One small piece of information. Take the letter—copy it—whatever you can manage. It's for personal reasons, nothing more. I swear. I need to know which way this vote is going to go—and for that I have to know the Governor's recommendation. It's not a national secret. Won't even be a District secret for much longer, but I can't wait until the politicians are done talking about it."
"Speak to the Governor, then, not me."
"He might be able to fit me in sometime after the debate is over," the stranger said. "Too late. You know what it's like. Hard to get a Governor's attention unless you're already somebody."
Cerra furrowed her brow. "Prove to me it's not a trick; that you do have a seer's name, and she is all you say."
The stranger grinned. He leant forward across the table and slid half a torn sheet towards her, with a single first name on it. Ennia. Must be a hundred such and more in the District.
He's got nothing, Cerra told herself. She shunted her chair back from the small table with decision, and stood.
"She told me," he said quietly, "that there was a guard called Violmar who held everything I needed in her hands. Do the words Daulin and Palpennot mean anything to you?"
Cerra gave an involuntary start. She hesitated, but sat back down. "Even if they do, I'm just a guard. I don't get to rifle through the secretaries' desks."
It was the failure of Palpennot that had begun all this. A small alionrel farm, not up to the new standards demanded by this administration. Cerra stared down at the table. She didn't think about that too much in the light of where she'd ended up. These things happened. It hadn't been personal. They said the reforms made a difference to the health of everyone in the alionrel districts. It hadn't worked out that way for Daulin and others she carried close to her heart, but most of them were past help now.
"Or does loyalty to your employer come before family concerns?"
Cerra lifted her face. "I do what I get paid for. And I like this kind of backstage whispering even less than I like what the Council gets up to."
"But -?" His mouth quirked upwards at the corner, and he made a question of the word.
She sighed. "All right. Tell me what it is you want. As long as it is only one small thing, I'll see what I can do. For Daulin. But I make no promises—I'm not getting thrown out or helping an Eisterlander spy or whatever you might turn out to be for anyone or anything."
"Fair enough," he said. He pulled his chair in tighter. "It's that letter I need to get sight of—from the town spokesperson for Hulvell to your esteemed Governor, dated Gathering three. That's it. Highly local, certainly of no interest to anyone outside this District."
"And you want this so you can make money out of it, is that it?"
"With very good reason. A modest amount—and a matter of life and death from where I'm standing. But, of course, it's all up to you."
After the family business had become a family disaster, Daulin had gone to Eisterway, with plans to set up a new line of work there. That had been two years ago. Cerra hadn't heard from her since. Travelling down to Eisterway during her leave last year hadn't got her anywhere either. She'd had no proper leads and not enough time to get anywhere. Daulin was the youngest; the last member of her family Cerra had left. She didn't mind the Governor as much as this shady stranger might suppose, but she didn't care about him and his causes either. Daulin was the only one who mattered.
One letter, she thought. Burn it, why not?
It wasn't easy to get a moment alone in Chief Secretary Stolley's office, where the letter would be kept. Cerra would need an extremely good excuse to explain away being found poking around in drawers and cabinets. The secretaries and their staff didn't expect guards to give them a hand with the paperwork.
She spent couple of days kicking her heels, waiting and keeping a closer eye on who put what where than she'd ever done before, and decided she was never going to get a chance to even look for it. She'd have to take a different sort of risk, one that should at least give her a moment alone to try hunting for the cursed letter. She set a small fire in one of the empty offices, and then raced down the corridor, shouting for the great bell to be rung and ordering everyone else out as she passed. Once the bell sounded, everyone had to leave the building other than selected guards who were supposed to stay and investigate before the city's fire fighters reached the Hall.
It was the best shot she'd have. Cerra darted into the main office and opened the drawer where Stolley kept private correspondence. Time to see if her luck was in for a change.
"Your information." Cerra passed the paper to the man, as they met for a second time, passing as if by chance in the water gardens. She'd taken the letter, copied the details in private, and then slipped it onto the desk under a pile of other papers once she'd finished. She'd heard Stolley raking down some of the junior staff later on the subject, but that wasn't her problem. Secretaries were, in Cerra's view, worse than any Governor. They were the ones who filed and stamped everything and allowed no exceptions, no interpretation of rules, nothing that didn't fit in all their little lines and boxes and endless forms. They were the ones who crossed through applications and appeals—this one or that one deemed not even worthy of a look from the Governor or any other official. They calmly and neatly filed away the ruined hopes and desperate last pleas. She despised them all.
She'd expected the stranger to renege on his side of the bargain. He looked that type. If this attempt hadn't worked, she wouldn't have bothered with another one. Not worth it, not for someone like that. But his request had proved possible and so here she was, because hope died the hardest of all.
He pocketed the folded square of paper she'd given him with a light laugh, but as he moved forward, as if to carry on past her, he pressed a card into her hand. When he'd gone, Cerra raised her hand to examine it: Ennia Fievoth, it read, and there was an address—a street in a village up in the mountains, a few hundredlengths east of Old Ralston.
She knew where she was going on her next day off-duty.
The starstone seer didn't call herself that. She sniffed when Cerra did, and said that wasn't how it worked at all. She saw connections in starstone, she said; lines across time that bound people together.
"But you know where my sister is?"
Imai Fievoth sat Cerra down at the table. Her tiny cottage was disconcertingly mundane, even prosperous inside. The walls were painted pale yellow, the furniture was minimal and old, but of good quality, and she had a whole shelf full of books in an alcove, some of them new. Cerra took comfort from that. If she was keeping herself through this line of work, she must be good, mustn't she? Or, of course, people were that desperate to fool themselves. There was always that.
Ennia Fievoth was too settled here to be for a complete fake set up by Cerra's shadowy stranger, not unless her neighbours and the people Cerra had asked for directions were in on it too, but people who 'read' starstone for a living could be as easily bought as anyone else.
"I've already seen," Imai Fievoth said. "I told your friend."
"Not my friend. I barely even know him. Did he ask you about me or Daulin?"
"He asked a lot of questions. None about you; no, but I told him where the lines led."
"And my sister—where is she? Is she in Eisterway? What do you mean by a 'line' anyway? How does this work?"
Imai Fievoth smiled. "It's the line you need to take to make the connection. Yours leads to the Governor."
"That isn't helpful," said Cerra. "The Governor won't care about this. Why should he?"
"You'll understand when the time comes. You—your friend—the Governor. When you've paid in blood. Then you'll find a way to your sister."
Cerra rose. She gave the woman the a curt but still respectful nod of farewell. Imai Fievoth lived up in these mountains. She and the villagers probably breathed in these old stories from childhood—had nothing else to amuse themselves with up here, either. Cerra had nearly bought into it too, desperate enough to cling to any lead, however unlikely. A vague, uneasy prophecy was all she'd received for her pains. The only consolation was that at least she'd got away with the theft of the letter. She was no worse off than before.
She thought that was an end to it until she was halfway home and ran into the stranger again. He was ambling around at the side of the road, and once she walked past, he fell into step with her, as she headed back to Old Ralston.
"Imai Violmar," he said. He smiled. "I've got another task for you."
"That was a once-and-only." She clenched her fist at her side, unseen by him. "And as for your so-called seer -!"
The man who had not yet even given her his name, widened his eyes. "Didn't you like her? I thought she was impressive, much better than I'd anticipated."
"If you don't get out of my way, you'll regret it!"
"Oh, no. You would. Because, here's the thing: you weren't as careful as you thought when you filched that letter. Now, I can make sure the business stays quiet, or I can send my witness them go straight to your commanding officer and the Governor's Chief Secretary. And I was under the impression you wanted to stay in your job."
A chill crept over Cerra. Now she saw it all, much too late. It had been a trap, and she had walked right into it. Much as she would have loved to thump him, cursed piece of wave-rot that he was, she'd left herself no option but to keep on with this and hope that there was an other side of it to reach at the end.
It didn't feel so bad to strike at the North Eastern Council, she'd admit—but she didn't enjoy being tricked into it, like the worst idiot alive.
"Ah. You do."
Cerra drew in a breath. "What is it you're after now? I can't keep on crying fire, you know. You should have gone to one of the secretaries. Bet some of them would have loved playing this sort of game."
"I don't want more information," he said. "I have to speak to the Governor in person, and you can arrange that for me."
She choked on her laughter. "I told you, I'm not one of his secretaries or assistants."
"No. But you're going to be on duty in the Sharan gardens on Rosfallen Day. All you have to do is give me a chance to speak to the Governor when he's completed the rituals and is left alone in one of the groves. Barring his loyal yet discreet guard, of course, who will lead him to the planned spot."
Cerra turned her head to study the man's face. It was a warm day—autumn had not yet made its sting felt – but she shivered at the glint in his light eyes. "What good will that do? He's hardly going to want to talk to anyone at that point in the ceremony!"
"It's a private audience. Can't get one any other way," said the stranger. He paused, forehead creasing. "You must hate him. Don't you? I would, if I were you."
Cerra shrugged.
"Fine. But you have to agree, or, as I said, you'll find yourself arrested and imprisoned for theft, not just dismissed. Or maybe this counts as treason? Who knows what they might do to you for that?"
"Can't refuse, can I?" She adjusted the straps of the bag on her back. Old Ralston was already in sight, the sturdy grey towers of the fort coming into view before any of the houses it dwarfed. Even though the sun was still shining, the clouds above were shifting and a light spot of rain fell on her hand. "You want to talk to him—that's all?"
"That's all. Then we'll be done. You'll be paid, too."
Cerra walked on, her pace even. When you've paid in blood; the Governor—your friend—you, that's what the starstone seer had said. She buried the thought. What did Imai Fievoth know anyway?
She told herself that as hard as she could every day after that, right up until Rosfallen Day. She had to do it now. Best not to think about the worst thing her troublesome stranger might do. Even an outsider to North Eastern would think twice before spilling blood in the middle of one of Emoyra's most sacred places.
Nothing else could be permitted to be true until it was too late to choose and, one way or another, Cerra was finished with this.
The trouble was, it was never too late to choose.
Cerra did everything the stranger asked of her. She could have dived into the river after if she'd wanted—got away free and cleansed of guilt. The stranger almost certainly would have tried to dispose of her too afterwards, but she'd thought her odds of besting him in a struggle were good. Much as she'd insisted to herself she had no reason to think of murder, somewhere in the back of her head, she'd planned all that before she arranged the scene and brought them all to this spot. The twisting gravel path led through the trees and out here, close to the running water. It was out of sight of the main shrine. It suited the purposes of each of them. It was perfect.
But, at the last minute, she jumped the wrong way. She let herself understand too soon what the stranger meant to do. She couldn't stop watching him—he wouldn't really do it, would he? He wouldn't raise a weapon in this place. But she saw his hand go for it, and there were limits. Limits to what you did, no matter what. Limits to how far you failed in your duty, when people paid you in good faith. And you didn't let some piece of southern sea-shit kill another North Easterner right in the deepest heart of Rosfallen.
Cerra jumped the wrong way, and came between them. She was the one who wound up on the damp long grass, fighting for breath against something stealing in through the wound; something that had been guaranteed to make this kill easy. Maybe whoever had asked her treacherous friend to do this didn't think much of his aim.
He'd put her in this trap. He ought to have been prepared for the cornered animal to turn and bite. She tried to laugh, but she couldn't. She'd never have thought she'd choose to die defending this Governor—any Governor.
What happened next was out of her vision and utterly out of her power. A struggle, she imagined from the sounds, but her whole world had concentrated down to the need to keep breathing. Her muscles constricted. She could barely move. Her shoulder that had been numbed to start with, now burned.
The Governor was there again suddenly; his ceremonial robes of Rosfallen blue bloodied all the way down the front. The hand that he put to her arm was sticky with it. "What did they pay you?" he demanded, his grip tightening painfully.
She choked and clutched at him with the hand she could still raise. Her fingers slid over the fabric of the robes, and she dug her nails into his flesh for purchase. "Daulin," she rasped. "My sister. Find my sister."
The hard look his face cleared into compassion she had no wish to see. She closed her eyes against it. Maybe that starstone seer wasn't so useless after all. Cerra's body convulsed. Everything darkened at the edges.
The Governor hadn't gone. "Hold on. Help is on its way."
"Daulin," she tried to insist, but she could only mouth it now. The fire was spreading through her veins. She couldn't breathe—she couldn't breathe -
"I promise," he said; the last thing she heard.
This was how you got the Governor's attention.
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:'( Poor Cerra! This was such a gripping read!
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I like the nicety of that offer, which is not the same as give.
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At least Delver keeps his word.
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