The Traitor Queen

Anyi rubbed her hands together eagerly. “So what will we use as bait?”

Gol snorted. “It’s obvious. Your father intends to lure Skellin here with something he wants more than anything else.”

Lilia’s face went a little pale. “Black magic?”

“No,” Gol said. “Skellin wants to know he has full control of the entire underworld. If he finds out Cery is alive, he’ll know there’s always the danger Cery will try to get it back – with Guild help. He’ll risk a lot to kill him.”

Anyi’s eager grin vanished. She stared at Cery, searching his face as if hoping for a sign he was joking. When he nodded she scowled and crossed her arms. “Gol’s right. That is too much of a risk.”

“What else do you suggest? What else would tempt him to risk coming this close to the Guild?”

Anyi looked at Lilia. “Black magic—”

“He won’t risk trying to capture her. She could be many times stronger than him. In fact, for this to work it has to be obvious that Lilia isn’t here. He might believe the Guild doesn’t know I’m here, but he won’t as easily believe she doesn’t. Lilia will have to be seen somewhere else before he’ll come looking for me.”

“But you’ll need a magician here,” Lilia pointed out. “Or you won’t be able to stop him killing you all.”

He nodded. “Yes. Kallen. Tell him that we have a plan to trap Skellin and ask how we should contact him when we’re ready. Don’t tell him where the trap will be sprung of course. I have a feeling he’d decide keeping people out of these passages is more important than catching Skellin.”

Lilia nodded. Anyi was shaking her head. “I don’t like it,” she said.

Cery crossed his arms. “Why?”

“I...” She looked away and scowled. Abruptly she got up, grabbed a lamp and stalked out of the room.

The room was silent for several heartbeats. Lilia glanced at Cery and Gol, then hurried after her.

Cery stared at the empty doorway. His heart twisted in a way that was both painful and pleasant. He did not want to risk anybody’s life. Certainly not his own. But they could not stay here forever.

Thinking back, he remembered the angry, defiant young woman he had tried to keep in contact with after parting from her mother. Anyi had hated him – or at least she had behaved as if she did. Knowing that he had somehow won her over was a bittersweet pleasure. It had come at the price of her safety.

But then, being related to him was all it took to make life dangerous, especially while a rogue magician Thief ruled the underworld, and that rogue hated Cery.

“For once your daughter and I agree,” Gol said in a low voice. “It is too dangerous.”

“Let’s see what Kallen says to that,” Cery replied.

* * *

Within a few paces, Anyi slowed down to let Lilia catch up, but did not stop walking.

“Are you all right?” Lilia asked.

Anyi shook her head. “No. Yes. I... I need to think.”

Her tone suggested that she wasn’t in the mood for talking, so Lilia stayed silent. She drew magic to create a globe light, and Anyi wordlessly turned her lamp’s flame down low to conserve oil. They didn’t travel far. After a few hundred paces Anyi’s stride became purposeful and soon it became clear she was leading Lilia to some rooms nearer to the University that she’d recently discovered.

Anyi chose one room at random, then, since there were no chairs, sat down on the floor with her back to a wall. Lilia sat down beside her, disturbing a dust-covered broken plate. She wiped the surface clean, uncovering a Guild symbol imprinted into the underside. This isn’t very old. I wonder how it got here.

“I shouldn’t care,” Anyi said.

Lilia turned to look at her. “Of course you should. He’s your father.”

Anyi’s mouth twisted into a bitter smile. “Not much of one. For most of my life he ignored me. It was only when his other family was murdered that he paid any attention to me.”

Not sure what to say, Lilia said nothing.

“That’s not really fair, though,” Anyi added, her voice quieter and softer. “Mother left him. She said it wasn’t safe being the wife of a Thief, and that she couldn’t stand being hidden away all the time. I don’t think two people should be forced to be together if they don’t want to be.”

“How did Cery come to marry again?” Lilia asked. Divorce was something only the king could grant. She couldn’t imagine a Thief asking the king to end his marriage.

Anyi shrugged. “He just did.”

“But that’s...”

“Bigamy?” Anyi looked at Lilia and shrugged. “Not really. Nobody in the underworld can afford a legal marriage. I suppose Cery could, but why pay attention to one of the king’s laws when you don’t pay much to the rest of them? We have our own ways of declaring ourselves married – or unmarried.”

Lilia shook her head in wonder. “It’s a whole other world.” She shrugged. “Though I could say that about the family my parents were servants for. We might have been a part of their world, but we weren’t in their world. It would have been nice to be that rich, and to be able to order people around, but sometimes they had even less choice about their lives than we did. They don’t get to decide who they marry, and they do have to ask the king for a divorce – and hope he grants it.”

“Perhaps that’s why Sonea never got married. She’s not from the Houses so she doesn’t have a family deciding who she marries, but she’d have to have a legal marriage if she did and then if she wanted to end it she’d have to hope the king let her.”

Lilia chuckled. “I can’t imagine some man ordering her about.”

Anyi grinned. “No. More likely it’d be the other way around.” But as she met Lilia’s gaze she grew serious again. She looked away and sighed.

“He’s going to get himself killed. He finally lets me into his world and now I’m going to lose him.”

“Only if things go wrong – and we’ll make sure that won’t happen.”

Anyi gave her an accusing look. “You think he’s right.”

“No.” Lilia shook her head. “But I suspect we won’t have much say in it.”

The other girl scowled, then her expression became thoughtful. “You could tell him Kallen doesn’t want to do it. Put Cery off for a while.”

Lilia nodded. “I could. But then he might try to do it without Kallen.” She thought back to what Cery had said. “I can’t help thinking he is right about one thing: Skellin will guess you all came here. Where else would you go? He probably knows there are tunnels. It’s not a secret in the Guild, so I doubt it is outside of it. He’ll come to have a look eventually. When he does, he’ll find you here. And if I’m away in lessons, I won’t be able to stop him killing you all.”

Anyi turned to look at Lilia, her brow creased with worry.

“Perhaps the only way you can be safe is under the Guild’s protection,” Lilia continued. “I know none of you like that idea, but if Cery’s trap fails, that’s where you’ll end up anyway. I suspect the Guild won’t like it either, but they’ll be more willing to protect you if there’s evidence Skellin actually entered the Guild’s underground passages.”

Anyi groaned and rubbed her face with her hands. “You’re making sense, and I don’t like it.”

“I don’t either,” Lilia admitted. “But I know I can’t be the protector you need. Mostly because I’m not here that much, but also because I don’t know how powerful Skellin is. If he comes here with Lorandra I doubt I’ll be able to protect myself, let alone the rest of you. Even if he doesn’t, how are you going to let me know you need my help? What if I don’t get here in time?”

“We’ll use an escape route.”

“What if you don’t make it? Even if you do, you’ll come up in the Guild’s grounds and if he’s still following you then you’ll have to seek the help of the Guild anyway.” Lilia sighed and felt the frustration and worry of the last few weeks gather up behind her words. “It’s not safe down here, and you could be living more comfortably, and it’s so hard getting food to you, and... I miss you.”

At that last admission, the flood of words that had been pouring out of her ran out. She felt her face heat