I snorted. Like everyone in Antora, I feared Lord Endrick, but I'd be a fool not to respect his power. Lord Endrick could not be defeated. He could not be killed or even wounded, certainly not by the Coracks. At best, they were like fleas to him, a persistent irritation, but a pestilence he would eventually crush between his fingers. Sooner than later, I hoped.
Unless the Coracks wanted a prize that was bigger than me. If they asked for that, I couldn't agree. Darrow had begged me not to. But if I didn't cooperate, he and Celia would die.
The best I could do was convince them not to ask. "Endrick is no ordinary man. Bring an army of a hundred thousand against him if you want. It will do you no good."
"Not yet, my lady. That's where you come in."
Almost unwittingly, I sat up straight, shaking my head as fiercely as possible. "What you want cannot be done."
Tenger leaned in to me. "It will be done, and you will do it. The Coracks have not yet decided who will replace Endrick as ruler of the Scarlet Throne, but he will be replaced."
"You will hang for this." I tilted my head toward Simon, to be sure the message was clear. "All of you."
"So you've said." Tenger had probably heard that threat as often as the church bells chimed. "You'll attend our hanging, I assume."
"I'll give the executioner his orders, gladly." My voice became ice. It frightened me to hear it, to realize I was capable of such words. Maybe I was more of a Dallisor than I wanted to believe, because I truly meant everything I'd just said.
Tenger smiled at my threat. "If you fail us, with similar enthusiasm we will execute your servant girl and driver. Only our methods are far more painful, I can promise you that. Now, what do you know about the Olden Blade?"
My gut twisted, but I tried not to let my worry show. If the Coracks knew about that dagger, then they needed my help to complete their wicked plans. They intended to make a traitor of me too. If I was not careful, I would hang with them.
Kestra wasn't supposed to remember me. I'd changed too much in the last six years.
As a young boy, I'd served the Dallisor family, and been paid in misery, mistreatment, and starvation wages. I'd been a scrawny thing back then, able to worm up the fireplaces and clean them out between burnings. When I started to grow, they underfed me, hoping to keep me small.
For most of my years of service, I had believed that Kestra was different. I used to enjoy watching her scramble through the halls of Woodcourt like a wild pup, straightening up only when her governess scolded her or when her father approached. She kept a collection of odd-shaped rocks hidden in her bedroom, even showed me her favorite once, a dark yellow rock shaped like a crescent moon. Her smile was so bright that some days ... on the worst days, it was all I lived for. Privately, I thought of her as my friend.
How wrong I'd been.
Until tonight, the last I'd seen of Kestra was when I'd been dragged off to her father's dungeons. She was my accuser and never blinked once as I protested my innocence. She'd wanted to please her father, and it seemed I was the price for his approval.
Somehow, I had survived the dungeons, and against even greater odds, escaped them. But I left with a bitterness that still burned in my chest, hot enough to endure these next few minutes at her side.
Tenger repeated his question about the Olden Blade two more times, but all he got in return from Kestra was a blank stare, as if he'd never spoken at all. This was a game to her, one I used to see her play in defiance of her father. But tonight's game would not end with a simple missed meal or a rod to her hand.
At Tenger's signal, I pressed on her arm as a warning. The captain wouldn't tolerate silence, and nobody wanted the consequences if she refused to cooperate. Especially her.
"The Olden Blade is a myth," Kestra finally said. "I'd believe in flying oxen before I put faith in some magical dagger."
A vein at the side of Tenger's neck pulsed, something I'd seen before. Most Dallisors wrapped themselves in arrogance the way others might wear a winter cloak, and no one detested that more than the captain. We'd never captured a Dallisor family member before, but we'd certainly cured many Dominion soldiers of their arrogance, usually with a slit to the throat.
I pressed on her arm again, harder this time, but she yanked it away. Fine. If she insisted on doing things the hard way, we would.
"The dagger is real," Tenger countered. "In the War of Devastation, the Halderians had the numbers, but the Dallisors had the Endrean magic. Hoping to ensure victory, Endrick retreated into the Blue Caves, the source of Endrean power. He used the darkest magic there to pour his soul into a dagger made of Dirilium, an Endrean metal harder than diamonds. In doing so, he became like the Dirilium itself: unbreakable, immortal. So powerful that the only thing able to destroy him is himself."
"Or the dagger," I added. "Endrick intended to keep the Olden Blade by his side at all times--"
"But it was stolen by Risha Halderian, I know the story." Kestra sighed as if we were a mere nuisance, like a fly buzzing too near her ear. "And that's all it is, a story. She had no dagger at her execution, which I can attest to because my father was there. If such a weapon ever existed, Endrick's soldiers would have found it by now."
I arched a brow. "If it never exi
sted, then why have his soldiers been looking for it?"
She flinched and quickly recovered, but she knew I'd noticed. That would bother her, hopefully throw off her edge. "What if it is real?" she asked. "Let's assume the story is true, that it is the one weapon capable of killing Lord Endrick. He designed it so that anyone who attempts to wield the blade will die. That's what happened when it was stolen from Lord Endrick seventeen years ago. Risha Halderian died for her theft."
Tenger's eyes lit. "That isn't what happened. Risha stole the Olden Blade and wielded it. She could have defeated Lord Endrick had she not been captured by Dominion armies first, and then killed."
Kestra smirked at him. "So she ... died. Isn't that what I said?"