Kethry took his wrist before he could wave her away and felt for his pulse.
He stared at her anxious face, so close to his own, and felt his heart skip for a reason other than fear. Damnit, you fool, she's just worried that you're going to die on her before you can help her with the information they need!
Then he thought, feeling a chill creep down his back; Gods -- I might. If Char has had a watcher on me all this time, it means he's suspected me of warning Stefan. And if that watcher chose to strike tonight only because I spoke to a pair of strangers -- Archivist, your hours are numbered.
Kethry checked Jadrek's heartbeat, fearing to find it fluttering erratically. To her intense relief, it was strong, though understandably racing.
'I -- gods above -- I think I will be all right,' he managed, pressing his free hand to his forehead. 'But I would be dead if not for your kyree.'
'Who was that?' Kethry asked urgently. 'Who -- '
'That ... was a member of the King's personal guard,' he replied thickly. 'Brightest Goddess -- I knew I was under suspicion, but I never guessed it went this far! They must have had someone watching me.'
'Watching to see who you talked to, no doubt,' Tarma said grimly, her lips compressed into a thin line. 'And the King must have left orders what was to happen to you if you talked to strangers. Hellfire and corruption!'
'Now I'm a liability, so far as Raschar is concerned.' He was pale, and with more than shock, but there was determination in the set of his jaw as he looked to Tarma. 'Char has only one way of dealing with liabilities ... as you've seen. Lord and Lady help me, I'm under a death sentence, without trial or hearing! I-I haven't got a chance unless I can escape. Woman, you've got to help me! If you want any more help with finding Idra, you've got -- '
Kethry had angry words on her tongue, annoyed that he should think them such cowards, but Tarma beat her to them.
'What kind of gutless boobs do you think we are?' Tarma snapped. 'Of course we'll help you! Damnit man, it was us coming to you that triggered this attack in the first place! Keth, clean up the mess. Go ahead and use magic, we're blown now, anyway.'
Kethry nodded. 'After the visitor, I should say so -- even if there wasn't anyone 'watching,' he'll have left residue in the trap-spell.'
'Did you pick up any 'eyes'?'
She let her mage-senses extend. 'No ... no. Not then, and not now. Evidently they haven't guessed our identity.'
'Small piece of Warrior's fortune. Well, I'm getting rid of the body before somebody falls over it;
it's likely this bastard was the only watcher. Archivist, or you'd have been caught out before this.' She paused to think. 'If I hide him, they may wait to check things out until after he was due to report. Hell, if they can't find him, they may wait a bit longer to see if he's gone following after one of Jadrek's visitors; that should buy us a couple more hours. Jadrek, are there any empty rooms along here?'
'Most of them are empty,' he said dully, holding his hands up before his eyes and watching them shake with a kind of morbid fascination. 'Nobody is quartered along here who isn't in disgrace; this is the oldest wing of the palace, and it's been poorly maintained and repaired but little.'
'Gods, no wonder nobody came piling out to see what the ruckus was.' Tarma's lip curled in disgust. 'Bastard really gives you respect, doesn't he? Well, that's another piece of good luck we've had tonight.'
And Tarma turned back to deal with the corpse as Kethry began mustering her energies for 'clean-up.'
* * *
Tarma bundled the body into its own cloak, giving Warrl mental congratulations over the relatively clean kill; the kyree had only torn the man's throat out. The man had been relatively small; she figured she could handle the corpse alone. She heaved the bundle over her shoulder with a grunt of effort, trusting to the thick cloak to absorb whatever blood remained to be spilled, and went out into the corridor, picking a room at random. The first one she chose didn't have its own fireplace, so she left that one -- but the second did. It was a matter of moments and a good bit of joint-straining effort to stuff the carcass up the chimney; by the time she returned, a little judicious use of magic had cleaned up every trace of a struggle around Jadrek's quarters, and Kethry and the Archivist were in the little bedroom that lay beyond the closed door in his sitting room. The mage was helping Jadrek to make a pack of his belongings, and Jadrek was far calmer now than Tarma had dared to hope. Warrl was stretched across the doorway, still growling under his breath. He gave her a gentle warn-off as she sent him a thought, his blood-lust was up, and he didn't want her in his mind until he had quieted himself.
Jadrek had lit a half dozen candles and stuck them over every available surface. The bedroom was as sparse as the outer room had been, though smelling a little less of damp. There was just a wardrobe, a chest, and the bed.
