Lianon & Rhianna ~excerpt (unedited)
“What are you doing?” she demanded, stepping into the barn.
He rose smoothly and turned. If she’d startled him, he gave no sign of it. In one hand he cradled a squirming puppy that was desperately trying to apply its tongue to his face. He scratched it behind the ears and it settled down, enjoying the attention.
Blood rushed to Rhianna’s face. What exactly had she expected him to be doing? Wringing puppies’ necks for fun?
The Emissary regarded her with a frown and shame washed over. “You don’t think much of me, do you, miss?”
What was she supposed to say to that? She certainly wasn’t going to apologize for thinking ill of a murderer. “I don’t imagine you much care what I think of you.”
“Coward,” he said with that charming, infuriating half-smile.
Oh, if she didn’t loathe him by now, she was well on the way to it. “All right, have it your way.” Hands balled into fists at her sides, she raised her chin. “I think you’re nothing but a thug and a murderer. Membership in a guild and the sanction of the goddess don’t make you any better than a man who kills for pleasure. You may be able to ape the courtesy of civilized society, but on the inside, you’re just a brute with no other purpose in life than to slake your lust for violence.”
Master Lianon only grinned wider, the scoundrel. He lifted the puppy up before his face and it immediately began wriggling again, its tongue swiping at his cheek. “You don’t think so, do you, pup?” he asked it on a chuckle, his pleasantness so maddening Rhianna barely stopped herself from stamping her foot.
“Why don’t you ask the families of your victims?” she snapped. “I daresay their sentiments would differ from that puppy’s. They certainly wouldn’t be slobbering all over you.”
He raised one brow and set the puppy down. It cavorted about his feet and began to nip enthusiastically at his boot heel.
“So it seems you already know all there is worth knowing about me, then,” he said softly, stepping towards her. His eyes were narrowed on her face, but she couldn’t read anything in them of his intentions. She stood her ground, refusing to let him see the unease that had her pulse hammering. “I’m a killer, nothing more, with no hope of redemption.”
“We’re all redeemable,” she said, her tone so sanctimonious she cringed inside to hear it.
“So I should give up the business, find the love of a good woman, settle down? Become respectable?”
If his tone weren’t so solemn, she’d have sworn he was mocking her. As it was, she couldn’t quite figure out how to reply. To hide her growing disquiet, she inched her chin up a little higher and fisted her hands in the folds of her skirt.
He took another step nearer–he was close enough to touch her if he wanted. Close enough to grab her. “Do you think I would make a fine sheep-farmer?” he asked. “Or a candle-maker? A shopkeeper?”
“I don’t know you well enough to answer that, Master Lianon.”
That annoying half-smile returned, and this time she could see the mockery in it. “But you know me well enough to disapprove of me.”
She struggled to keep the anger from her voice. “I disapprove of what you do. You kill people for money.”
“There’s plenty of non-lethal work to be had in my business. I could make a respectable living as an Emissary without ever having to take a life.”
She stared pointedly at his earrings. “And yet you have taken ten.”
“Oh, I’ve killed more than ten people, young lady.”
Young lady. The smug, condescending bastard! Her palm itched to slap his face.
He reached up to touch one of his earrings. “Half my work comes direct from the Chancellery, did you know that?”
She opened her mouth to reply, but he shook his head, his expression silencing her. “My first kill was a noble who liked to take his carnal pleasures with children. Boys or girls, it didn’t matter, but the younger the better in his mind. It saddens me to say there were plenty of people all too pleased to provide him with victims.”
Her face heated further, the more so because such a vile monster as he described deserved to be punished. But murder was still murder. “So rather than stand trial for his…his crimes, he was hunted and killed like a dog.”
“His family is politically important in Sylphae. The scandal would have been devastating to them—and to the government. And though his crimes did not merit execution—more’s the pity—he wouldn’t have survived a week in prison before one of the other inmates took him out, likely with a good deal less mercy than he had of me. Criminals have their standards, just like anyone else.”
She glowered at him. The rationality of his argument only made her more obstinate in her need to put him in his place. “So he was executed without trial, with no opportunity to defend himself or face his accusers.”
“His accusers were children—some as young as six!” he snapped, angry at last. “You think I didn’t investigate the Chancellery’s allegations? I’ll tell you this much—I wished I hadn’t given him that much consideration. A nine-year-old boy was violated in the most vile way imaginable because of my reluctance to kill an innocent man. I gave the whoreson the opportunity to defend himself—with a sword. Instead, he blubbered and begged for his life, the whole time blaming his victims for tempting him.”
Rhianna could only stand there, swallowing hard against the lump that formed in her throat. His face was taut with rage, his eyes focused on some point beyond her shoulder. As if he couldn’t bear to look at her, as if she were the one who was not worthy of regard. By increments, he composed himself until he was calm once more.
“I have never killed an innocent man, miss.” He scowled, his gaze meeting hers at last. “My business is an unpleasant one, I’ll give you that. I deal with rapists, murderers, flesh-peddlers—men and women who thrive on violence and the exploitation of the weak and defenseless. They’re people who would give you nightmares if you’d experienced but a tenth of their cruelty. But you haven’t, you grew up here in a safe place with people who love you, something for which you should be grateful. I grew up in the gutter. I’ve seen what these brutes do to people who can’t protect themselves, people who have no recourse for redress under the law. My vocation is my reply to that. My dealings with that evil are what let me sleep at night.”
Rhianna stared at him through a haze of moisture gathering in her eyes, contrite and angry at the same time. But she was big enough to admit that maybe she’d misjudged him a little. “Master Lianon, I…” She spread her hands helplessly. “The light is failing. There’s no reason for you to ride back to the city in the dark.”
He smiled and shook his head. Shrugged as if hefting a weight from his shoulders. “I appreciate the offer, miss, but in truth I should be getting at it. Your cousin will not benefit from my having lingered here, even for a night.” He stepped away, moving to his horse, unlooped the reins and drew them over its head. She had an inexplicable urge to follow him, but made herself stay where she was, keeping her hands buried in the folds of her skirts to stop them from fidgeting.
He swung up into the saddle and looked down at her, his lips quirked up at one corner. “I shall do my best to abide by your wishes in this matter, lady.”
Lady. Not young lady or miss.
Lady.
“Thank you. Godspeed, Master Lianon.”
She watched him ride out, then returned to the house. She didn’t seek out her uncle but went straight to bed. She was exhausted, drained both emotionally and physically, but images of the Emissary’s small, deft hands and boyish face kept her awake long into the night. And when she finally slept, her dreams were all of him.