Princess of Blood Read online

  For Pippa Livia Wright

  PRINCESS

  OF BLOOD

  TOM LLOYD

  GOLLANCZ

  LONDON

  Contents

  Dedication

  Title Page

  Soldiers of Anatin’s Mercenary Deck

  What Has Gone Before

  Interlude 1

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Interlude 2

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Interlude 3

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgements

  Preview of The Man with One Name

  About the Author

  Also by Tom Lloyd

  Copyright

  What Has Gone Before

  Stranger of Tempest – Book 1 of the God Fragments

  Once, Lynx was a soldier – an idealistic young man in the warrior state of So Han. As a commando lieutenant he was at the spearhead of So Han’s war of conquest, but refused to engage in the atrocities being committed. After killing his commanding officer in a duel he was sent to the brutal To Lort prison and forced to labour in the mines there.

  Eventually the Hanese conquest imploded and To Lort prison was taken over by a foreign governor called Lorfen, who saw something of himself in Lynx. He taught the damaged young man the philosophy of the Vagrim brotherhood – a nebulous group of war veterans who had found renewed purpose in helping and protecting others – and released him.

  Years later, an older, wiser and slightly more rotund Lynx arrives in the town of Jangarai. Hoping to find more work as a bodyguard, he meets Kas, a woman of Anatin’s Mercenary Deck, and with his welcome in town fast running out Lynx agrees to join her company for a rescue mission.

  On the way the company encounters a group of Knights-Charnel of the Long Dusk – one of the most powerful of the militant religious orders on the continent. They are escorting a young half-Hanese woman who appeals to Lynx for help and when he confronts them, Lynx learns she is a mage. The power of the Militant Orders stems from their control of mages and fragments of the five shattered gods, which they use to create magical cartridges that every gun across the known world uses.

  When the smoke clears, the Knights-Charnel lie dead and Lynx has a new ward, Sitain. Matters become further complicated when the rescue mission turns out to be covering the escape of an assassin called Toil from the city of Grasiel. Their flight turns into a street battle after Lynx and Sitain are betrayed to the Knights-Charnel by one of the Cards, Deern, and they are pursued from the city by the Knights-Charnel’s elite Torquen regiment.

  Toil persuades Anatin to leave the road and head across the wilds surrounding Shadows Deep, an ancient Duegar city-ruin where elementals and monsters reign. Forced underground, the outnumbered Cards are beaten to the only bridges that cross a miles-deep canyon blocking their path. To even up the odds Toil awakens a huge dragon-like creature and in the ensuing chaos Lynx ends up luring the monster out on to the main bridge where he and his comrades manage to bring it down. Leaving any surviving Charnelers lost in the darkness, the Cards escape to the surface and don’t look back.

  Honour Under Moonlight – a novella of the God Fragments

  Midwinter in Su Dregir brings a festival of costumed revelry and Lynx arrives at Toil’s apartments to escort her to the Archelect’s ball. There he discovers two corpses in strange costumes instead of one living Toil. Before he can work out what’s going on, a watchman appears and an assassin attacks. The watchman dies and Lynx flees.

  Following a clue left by Toil, Lynx goes in search of her. More costumed assassins ambush him and despite the efforts of his comrades, he is captured by Toil’s enemies. Toil meanwhile has discovered a plot to upturn the balance of power in the criminal gangs of Su Dregir. After preventing a massacre she goes to rescue Lynx and, with the assistance of her employer’s bodyguard, turns the tables on the remaining assassins before killing the traitor.

  Interlude 1

  (Now)

  ‘So a pederast, an assassin and a convict walk into a palace.’

  ‘Shut up.’

  Lynx sighed. ‘What? I’m bored.’

  ‘I don’t care.’

  ‘No one’s listening.’

  Toil’s voice lowered to the whisper of a razor being sharpened. ‘What part of “I don’t care” confuses you?’

  ‘What’s the harm in passing the time with a joke?’

  ‘Because if you don’t shut up I’ll rip your kneecaps off and use them for earmuffs to block out your bloody whining. You’re not standing here for your health, we’ve got a job to do, remember?’

  Lynx shut up and looked around at the grand hall of Jarrazir’s Bridge Palace once more. It was magnificent, he had to admit. Jewelled light shone through a long bank of stained glass windows running almost the entire length of the hall. Dancing motes of emerald, blazing orange and glittering sapphire washed over the assembled crowd of Jarrazir’s nobility. A spray of red carpet surrounded the pair of thrones at one end, all canopied by pristine white cloth bearing the symbols of the city and prayers stitched in red. Flanking them was a battered pair of stone urns that bore only fragments of faded glazing. They looked strangely out of place there until Lynx realised they were Duegar artefacts.

  After an hour of the sight Lynx felt it was all very pretty, but lunch was fast intruding on his thoughts as the scents of spices and roasted meats hung thick in the air. As a portly and tattooed ex-soldier of a nation everyone hated, he was very aware how noticeable he was at the best of times and right then the great and the good were out in their finery to notice and be noticed. Unobtrusively sidling over to the buffet probably wasn’t an option.

  Swan-necked maidens with bare shoulders stood like serene statues, or perhaps well-behaved cattle, while watchful matrons in silk headscarves fussed at their side. Prowling around the girls displayed like goods were knots of young noblemen, searching out both marriageable flesh and offence. Several had more than one glove tucked into their belt that did not match their clothes, proof of a duel to come.

  Official delegations studded the throng, obvious by their matching clothing and uniforms, while members of the priesthood stood out even more clearly. Just ahead of Lynx were the starkly austere priests of Insar, in plain white robes with heads cleanly shaved, while red and grey figures displaying the intricate braiding and geometric patterns of Catrac’s cult loitered near the far wall. Lynx looked down at his own clothes. Fortunately the grey and green of Su Dregir’s Lighthouse Guard was as understated as he could have reasonably hoped for. The fact he was in any form of uniform was a detail he remained unhappy about, but now wasn’t the time for that discussion so he contented himself with not looking like an utter tit. This was Toil’s business and he was just window-dressing for the hour.

  Lynx felt a nudge from the man beside him.

  �
�Tell me the joke instead,’ Teshen said. ‘Distract me from the urge to fire a burner into the roof.’

  Lynx glanced up at the huge pale beams, so high the grain of the wood was invisible. Flags of every colour fluttered in the slight breeze, representing each of the city-state’s several hundred noble families, while the beast emblems of Jarrazir hung over the empty thrones.

  ‘It’d stop the boredom,’ he conceded. ‘Maybe even cook a dove or two if one is lurking up in the rafters.’

  ‘You’re not still bloody hungry are you?’

  ‘I could eat.’

  Toil turned around, eyes flashing with anger. Ahead of her stood the Su Dregir Envoy himself, chatting to a doughy old lady wrapped in purple silk like a child’s sweet. The captain of his personal guard stood just behind them, but if either man had heard the conversation over the general hubbub they chose to ignore it. Lynx doubted it, given the pederast comment was aimed at one of them.

  ‘Both of you, shut your traps right now,’ she hissed. ‘At least try to look like real guards.’

  ‘Sounds like someone’s a little on edge,’ Teshen whispered primly once Toil had turned back. The tone didn’t exactly match the man’s dead-eyed killer look, but joining a mercenary company had forced Teshen to develop a light-hearted side, even if he remained firmly in the alarmingly lethal category.

  ‘It’s the dress,’ Lynx said. ‘Maybe the heels. They don’t look comfy.’

  ‘Oh, I like the heels,’ joined in Payl from the other side of Teshen. ‘The poor bugger who had to buff her feet to make them presentable, however – now they have cause for complaint.’

  Lynx smirked over at Payl. The woman was usually calm and professional – as second-in-command to a lazy, roguish drunk she had to be. That she’d joined in was a testament to the sheer boredom of standing amid that crowd and waiting for the city’s ruler to finish whatever was taking so long.

  ‘Was it you, Lynx?’ Teshen asked. He was a burly man with long pale hair and under normal circumstances wore the Knight of Tempest as his badge – Lynx’s direct superior – but today he was just another Su Dregir guardsman.

  ‘Well, I don’t like to brag,’ Lynx said. ‘But I reckon I’ve a certain deftness with a pumice stone.’

  It was just possible he could see the tips of Toil’s ears turning scarlet with fury, but he knew she wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of turning around again. Toil – ruin-raider, assassin, agent of Su Dregir, plus half a dozen other unsavoury things – had scrubbed up remarkably well, he had to admit. A layered silk dress of the Archelect’s green and grey ran from calf to neck, following the Jarraziran form of leaving arms and feet on show, with her dark red hair in a complex triple braid down her back.

  ‘Almost fell over with shock when I saw her,’ Teshen said. ‘Who’d have thought under those hobnailed boots was a pair of feet like that? Probably best Anatin didn’t come with us; man’s got a thing for a well-turned ankle. I know I’m new to this, but I’m guessing elite guardsmen shouldn’t have a hard-on.’

  Lynx had to agree, the feet really had been a surprise. Toil wore thin sandals – straps of grey silk exposing neat, uncallused heels and pristinely groomed, painted toenails.

  ‘Are all you fighting women like this?’ he whispered to Payl. ‘All with your little beauty secrets?’

  Payl snorted. ‘My feet look like they got chewed on by feral dogs. Just as well I’m tall. No man ever bothers to look that far down.’

  ‘I’ll tell Fashail to report back next time he’s hard at work down there,’ Teshen said.

  ‘The boy knows he’ll get his nuts cut off,’ Payl said confidently. ‘As scary as you are, Teshen, he ain’t that stupid.’

  ‘It’s the arms that get me, I reckon,’ Lynx said after a moment’s reflection. ‘So she’s secretly a delicate little princess when it comes to her feet, now we all know, but it takes real skill to pull off the arms.’

  ‘Not so much,’ Teshen said dismissively. ‘I’ve seen Reft do it easy enough.’

  ‘I meant, pull off that concealment.’

  ‘Ah.’

  While almost every woman not in fighting dress had bare arms, none sported the number of scars Toil did. A lifetime of fighting and clambering about the pitch-black caverns of Duegar city-ruins had done little to support today’s role of bookish secretary to Su Dregir’s official Envoy.

  It had required a complex variety of ribbons, torcs, bracelets, painted charms and rings to distract from the battering Toil’s arms had received over the years. Close scrutiny would catch her out still, but with luck few would be getting that close. Toil was a distractingly beautiful woman for those who would be distracted and physically imposing for those who wouldn’t.

  ‘How about you, Aben?’ Teshen asked the last of the group serving as guards to the Envoy. ‘Anything you’d like to add?’

  Aben was new to their number, a bigger man even than Lynx, with tanned skin, an easy smile and neat black curls spilling out from under his official cap. Currently his face was scarlet and he seemed to be having some sort of silent shaking episode, possibly a coronary.

  ‘You okay there, friend?’ Lynx said with a nudge. ‘Looks like something in your head just burst. Was it the feet? Does a well-turned ankle do it for you too?’

  Aben’s eyes swivelled in their sockets as though seeking an escape. He’d worked for Toil for several years now. She was the boss to him, a ruthless and remorseless figure within the Su Dregir underworld. She wasn’t a person to be joked about in her earshot and was someone with a long and enthusiastically vengeful memory.

  ‘Hey, look, more people come to join the vigil,’ Payl commented. ‘And of fucking course it’s the last bastards we want to see here, there or anywhere else.’

  Lynx turned as Teshen voiced the words they were all thinking.

  ‘Bastard shitting Charnelers.’

  ‘Least all those who chased us will be dead by now,’ Payl added quietly. ‘Don’t fancy getting recognised by anyone after Grasiel.’

  ‘So – an assassin, a convict and a whole boatload of pederast shites walk into a palace,’ Lynx muttered.

  Toil spun right round, cheeks now spotted pink with anger. ‘If they’re here, you lot keep your mouths shut, understand? No jokes, no witty asides, no …’ Her eyes narrowed as she focused on the Charnelers and Lynx saw anger turn to murder in her eyes. ‘Godspit and the shitting deepest black!’

  Without warning she started off, shoving Payl out of her way. In his surprise Lynx barely noticed her slip a dagger from Payl’s belt as she stalked forward.

  ‘What? So it’s all right for her to swear?’ Teshen commented in a mock-hurt voice.

  ‘I’m going to fucking gut you like a fish!’ Toil roared across the great hall.

  Lynx and Teshen exchanged looks while Payl and Aben started off after the spirit of vengeance. Ahead of Toil the crowd erupted into chaos.

  ‘Well, that’s the boredom part sorted out,’ Lynx said.

  ‘Should we …?’ Teshen nodded after the others.

  ‘If you like, but they can handle it I’m sure. And I’m damn sure Toil can handle herself. Not like I’m keen for her to win friends here anyway, given what she wants to volunteer us for. More importantly I’ve just spotted a roast pheasant that no one’s watching. Reckon it’s near enough lunchtime.’

  ‘Is there beer?’

  ‘Round here? Fat chance.’

  Teshen shrugged as shouts filled the air. ‘The sacrifices we must make … Lead on, my friend.’

  Chapter 1

  (Three Weeks Earlier)

  A dusting of snow lay on the ancient city of Jarrazir as five figures hurried through the still hours of night. Every stone and tile sparkled in the silver glow of the Skyriver, every curl and twist of the bay’s waters was limned in white moonlight. Statues of heroes and rulers watched from the great arc of the Senate wall, beneath which the Deep Market nestled. The market itself was a sweeping warren of walkways and arches, arcades and canopies, spre
ad over three storeys in parts and bewildering in the detail and intricacy of its design.

  The five figures kept silent as they wound their way towards the market’s heart, the three who led moving with the confidence of familiarity. Jarrazir was a city of old names and older customs, one of which was a prohibition on alcohol so the night-time streets were empty and silent. The Deep Market in particular was deserted – the cold of winter and its unsettling, unearthly design of both Duegar and human magery meaning even vagrants kept clear at night.

  Had she been alone, Lastani would have been apprehensive at best. She had lived her whole life in Jarrazir; a childhood of tales and superstitions not so long left behind for more academic pursuits. Only the reassuring purpose of Mistress Ishienne ahead kept her focused on the task in hand.

  No, not quite. Not just that. She suppressed a nervous giggle. There was something more bringing her here, to the oldest part of an ancient city where even the light of the Skyriver struggled to reach. There is the possibility of something quite wonderful too – a place in history perhaps, should we be successful.

  Lastani bit her lip and kept on walking. She would not be the one to draw Ishienne Matarin’s ire this night, not at the culmination of all her teacher’s work.

  Let Castiere do that. He’s incapable of keeping his mouth shut. Let him be the fool who sullies this night with some idiocy, I will be the perfect pupil at least this once.

  As they rounded a corner and entered a small square cut through with jagged shadows, she glanced once at Castiere as the slender young man drew level in his haste to get to the market’s heart. He saw her looking and flashed Lastani a grin, his excitement bubbling close to the surface.

  ‘Almost there,’ whispered Mistress Ishienne, her voice carrying clearly in the hush despite the scarf across her face.

  The words were unnecessary, perhaps an indication of Ishienne’s own anticipation. This might prove a breakthrough in her work, the fruits of years of translating and deciphering a script thousands of years old. Lastani could not fault this one crack in the detached calm that had been a constant of Lastani’s four years tutelage.