The Binder's Game (The Sighted Assassin Book 1) Read online

  The only question I had remaining was whether it was a game of dice or one of Tsatsun.

  As I made my way out of the tavern, I heard Orly rolling the dice again and then tossing them across the table. I resisted the urge to glance back, afraid of what I might see.

  Somehow, I’d have to pull myself out of the game. Only… I didn’t know how.

  18

  It was a night for killing. In my line of work, many nights were like that, more than I wanted. But I was an assassin, and in a place like Eban, that meant I was busy.

  Tonight, I didn’t come on a job. Tonight was for me.

  I crouched on the rooftop, staring down at the massive estate filling nearly the entire block and rolling a pair of darts in my fingers. The last time I’d been to Benahg’s estate, I’d nearly died. That wouldn’t happen this time, but then this time, I came only for information.

  Men patrolled along the fence outside the estate, though they made an effort to look as if they didn’t. Most were casually dressed and walked the street as if they simply strolled along it rather than stalking. The short sword one wore gave him away, as did the bulk indicating a hidden crossbow on another.

  Whoever now controlled the estate did not want a repeat of the last time.

  There would be others watching, but I didn’t see them. That surprised me.

  I shifted in place, sliding my feet carefully along the rooftop, until I was at the edge. Unlike in other places within the city, I couldn’t jump from this roof to the next. They were spaced far enough apart here to give each estate enough room for greenery and a garden.

  That was why I had come tonight.

  Carth thought to use me. Orly thought to use me. I was getting tired of it.

  Worse than that was the fact that Talia had lied to me. I hated how much that bothered me, but I couldn’t let her know that. It wouldn’t change anything if I did.

  Talia and I were friends. Even before I knew of her role in the Binders, that was all that we could be. Now that I understood some part of how she served Carth, I knew with certainty that we couldn’t be anything else.

  But that didn’t mean I couldn’t find out why she had sacrificed our friendship.

  The patrols were spaced as far apart as they would get. I jumped from the roof and landed in the small alley between buildings. Somewhere distant, a cat meowed. In my homeland, a single cat meant bad luck, but then I’d never been one to believe in such superstition. It was probably the reason I had such terrible luck.

  Darting across the street, I checked my pouch, making certain I could reach inside quickly if needed. The supplies were from Carth, ironic given that I might need to use them to find out why she used me.

  Vines grew along the side of the stacked stone wall and I lumbered toward it, trying not to appear like I ran so that I drew attention to myself, but not wanting to linger. At the wall, I grabbed at the vines and flipped myself over.

  Once inside, I paused, crouched against the rock. If anyone had seen me, the next few moments would reveal their presence. I didn’t hear the sound of anyone running and nothing moved. For now, I had escaped notice.

  The garden hadn’t changed since the last time I was here, but what had changed was the urgency which drove me. It had been personal the last time and although this time was personal this time, too, there was a different reason for it. That changed things.

  I drifted into the shadows of the garden, pulling my dark cloak around me. My Sight allowed me to see the darkest of shadows, and I used that to help me find the best way to move unnoticed. Manicured hedges rose on either side of the path, and I squeezed through an opening between them. Better to move within the garden itself than along the path. Besides, this time I had no interest or need to enter the house.

  This was to be scouting only.

  Unfortunately, scouting missions often didn’t work out as I hoped. This was no different.

  The other side of the hedge was a wide, open grassy space. A young man sat bent over a bowl, a streamer of smoke rising from it. He looked up, alarmed, and his bowl clattered to the ground.

  Damn. One of the security, or was this family? Hell, I still didn’t even know who controlled the estate. I assumed it was Benahg’s son, but that didn’t mean I was right.

  It didn’t matter. I had to reach the man before he made any noise.

  I flicked the dart in my left hand at him. Tipped in coxberry, it would drop him, but not kill. Killing was often necessary—and the job—but I wouldn’t do it if it were not. That was the reason I went stretches without getting hired. It was also the reason I sometimes forced myself into jobs where I hadn’t been hired.

  The man started to fall by the time I reached him. I caught him and lowered him to the ground. The grass smoldered where his bowl had fallen, and I stamped it out. No use lighting the estate on fire.

  I searched the man and found a single knife but nothing else. Pocketing the knife, I dragged the man toward the hedges and pulled the dart out of his arm. Darts could be reused; even after what Carth had given me, I didn’t have so many that I could afford to waste them. More than I usually had, and well made at that, but a time would come when that supply dwindled.

  With only a knife on him, that meant he wasn’t one of the guards. Family, then.

  A soft gasp came from behind me.

  I rolled, coming to my feet with a dart in hand and ready to throw, but hesitated.

  The reason I had come here stood across the small green watching me. Her eyes widened in recognition and then flicked down to the man. She reached for the pockets of her dress but I shook my head and motioned her to the middle of the small clearing.

  She started to open her mouth, but I raised a finger to my lips.

  If the woman was here, then others would have come with her.

  I pointed to the ground and mouthed the word, “Stay.”

  Slipping between the hedges, I noticed two men waiting. With two coxberry darts, I left them unmoving. Then I returned to the girl.

  It didn’t matter if anyone discovered I’d returned. She was the reason I had, and I did not intend to return a third time.

  She stood with her hands clasped in front of her and fixed me with a serene expression. She stood in front of a known assassin, one who had taken down three men with darts, and she remained unflinching. It was a testament to the type of women Carth used and gave me a renewed appreciation for her.

  “You should not have come,” she said.

  I kept her at the edge of my Sight as I made a sweep around the grounds. I had only seen two other men, but that didn’t mean they were the only two out there. There might be others, and I wouldn’t be surprised again.

  “Probably not,” I agreed.

  “She did not send you this time.”

  I shook my head. “Did she send me the last time?”

  The woman shrugged, a slight movement of her shoulders. “You came, didn’t you?”

  “I came,” I agreed. “Why did she send me?”

  “If you don’t know, then it is not my place to tell you.”

  “That’s not the answer I need,” I said, taking a step toward her.

  A knife appeared faster than I would have thought possible. She held it out, her hand steady.

  I backed up and raised my hands.

  “That’s all the answer you will get.”

  “Why are you here?” I asked. I nudged the fallen man with my boot. “Is it him?”

  She fixed me with an unblinking stare.

  “Who is he?” I studied the man’s face and didn’t recognize him. “I’ll find out even if you don’t tell me.”

  “Are you so confident of your skill?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you don’t need me to tell you.”

  I tipped my head and pulled a terad-tipped dart from my pouch. “And if you work with her, you don’t need him alive.”

  I made as if to flick it and she put herself in front of me.

  “Don’t,” she
said, pushing the knife toward me.

  The corners of her eyes twitched and the pulse in her neck bounded a little more forcefully than I would have expected.

  I lowered the dart and shook my head. “Does Carth know?” I asked.

  “Does she know what?”

  I motioned toward the fallen man and she slipped to the side, making a point of keeping her body in between me and the man. If I really wanted to harm him, she was making it clear that I would have to go through her. “That you care for him.”

  “I don’t—” she started.

  I dropped and started to flip a dart toward him and she threw herself in front of me completely. The knife dropped to the ground and her hands extended over her head, pleading with me now. The confidence was gone, though I didn’t doubt it would return.

  For a moment, I wondered if she played me.

  Knowing what I did of Carth and the way she used her women, I wouldn’t be surprised. She would place a woman here and use her to extort… what? Information? Or was this woman here for a different purpose? Was there something else that she was meant to steal? Regardless, it wouldn’t surprise me for Carth to have someone here so skilled at deception that she could convince another that she cared—truly cared.

  But there were certain signs that would be much harder to fake. The way her eyes occasionally flicked to the man, as if reassuring herself that he still breathed. Or the way that she kept her foot in contact with him. Even the rapid tapping of her pulse in her neck, though that could be as much about me as it was about any feelings she had.

  Given the games I played, and the games that were played with me, I gambled. I thought the odds were in my favor this time.

  “Tell me,” I said.

  The woman shook her head. “Do what you must with me, but please,” she said, that word whispered, as if difficult to say, “leave him out of this.”

  “Who is he to you?”

  I wanted to know, mostly because I doubted that Carth knew, but partly because I was curious. After what I’d been through, and how much I’d nearly lost, it would do me well to know that some good came from what happened here.

  “An assignment,” she whispered. “At first.”

  “Now?”

  She pulled her hands back, blinking as if realizing what she did, and leaned down to retrieve her knife. She slipped it back into a hidden pocket, again moving faster than I would have expected. If all of Carth’s women were like this, they were more dangerous than I had experienced.

  Was Talia?

  That still troubled me. She was my friend—or had been, before she nearly died, killed for… something. Either for Carth or because of me, though neither Talia nor Carth blamed me for what happened. Talia had always been my friend. The confident owner of the Brite Pot, a tavern and inn where I could drink safely. Now that was gone.

  Talia was gone.

  “I don’t know,” the woman whispered.

  I made a show of putting the darts back into my pouch. “Tell me the assignment.”

  “Carth will—”

  “She will know what he is to you if you don’t tell me,” I said.

  The woman glanced down at the man, her face twisting through a series of emotions, the most she’d shown since I had appeared, and then she looked back over at me. “I was to retrieve a ledger from Benahg’s home.”

  “What was in the ledger?”

  “I didn’t see the contents,” she said. “When you were here, it meant my responsibility was over. You… you were a distraction so I could get the ledger out.” She looked over at the man and sighed. “You will tell Carth now?”

  “Tell her what? That you fell for your assignment?” I asked. “You wouldn’t be the first. But no. I won’t tell Carth now.”

  Besides, I needed to know what sort of ledger Ben would have kept that Carth would have found important enough to place her woman here, but I couldn’t come up with anything. But for me to get out from under the thumb of Orly and Carth, I had to learn what they knew. And this woman either didn’t know anything or chose not to share. Either way, I wouldn’t push her any more than I had.

  Watching how she knelt next to the fallen man, I wondered if it mattered.

  19

  When I reached the part of Eban more familiar to me, I began to slow. It wasn’t very late, and the streets were surprisingly full of people. Surprising until I remembered that we neared the Eban Landing Festival. I’d lived outside of Elaeavn for many years and I still hadn’t become accustomed to all the festivals and celebrations that places outside my homeland enjoyed. Some, like Harvestfest or Summer’s Night, were sensible. Others, like the Landing Festival, one that I still hadn’t managed to get a reasonable explanation for, made less sense.

  Because of the festival, the streets were busy, and most of the people were intoxicated. Music came from the open doors of taverns, and shouts and song filled the night. A woman who reminded me of Carth appeared in the distance, and I trailed after her. Doubtful that it was her, but I let myself wander and follow.

  My other years in Eban at Landing Festival, I’d had jobs. With such noise and chaos, someone like myself could use the distractions and easily slip in and complete the assassinations I needed. Since working with Orly—and now Carth—my external jobs had declined.

  Not that I minded, not much at least. Mostly, I took the jobs for the coin, but Carth had seen to it that I didn’t need the money as I once had. And my supplies were well stocked, unlike other times when I was without work.

  It left me in an uncomfortable place.

  Attempting to find why Carth had used me to reach Benahg had yielded nothing other than the fact that her woman was more deeply buried than I suspected Carth knew. The information might be valuable, but I couldn’t think of any way that I would use it without putting the woman in danger, something I had no interest in doing. She’d done nothing to me, only used the distraction that I’d provided to get the ledger out of the compound.

  And if I were honest, I couldn’t deny that what Carth did had a certain value, especially if she opposed men like Orly, even if others were hurt in the process. How could I judge that when I had been the reason that so many had been hurt before?

  No, my frustration stemmed from my inability to find anything useful.

  I hesitated on a street corner, not surprised to note the Brite Pot in the distance.

  How had I ended up coming this way?

  I had followed a woman who resembled Carth, but she wouldn’t have been out in the city, and certainly not on a night like tonight. I had been foolish and careless. After what happened, I needed to be more careful, especially in this part of the city. I’d been attacked, and Talia had nearly died, here before. These were places that the city guard didn’t patrol, places that the thief-masters controlled, where the occasional death—especially of one from Elaeavn—went unnoticed—or at least, not minded.

  Maybe something else had drawn me here. Once, I would have claimed it was the sense of friendship, and maybe if I were completely honest with myself, the distant hope of something more. Now that was gone, extinguished by the reality of life within Eban.

  As I turned, deciding to make my way to the river and take another chance to watch Carth’s ship before she left the city altogether, a familiar voice caught my attention.

  Without meaning to, I made my way down the street.

  There was agitation mixed into a woman’s voice as she argued with someone. I reached into my pouch, palming a few of the sleek darts that Carth had provided. Most were tipped with coxberry, the sedative enough to buy me time, but a few were terad tipped, the toxin quickly deadly.

  Down an alley, I saw Talia.

  And nearly dropped my darts.

  I’d never seen Talia like this before. A beautiful woman, with dark hair and dark skin she kept covered more than most in Eban, she moved in a deadly dance, knives flashing as she fought off five men surrounding her. With odds like that, I would never have given Talia much of a c
hance, especially after the way her throat had been split the last time I’d seen her, but she kept them at arm’s length.

  Had Talia gotten caught up in the remnants of Orly’s attempt to draw Carth out? That fool plan had involved a bounty on prostitutes, knowing how Carth and her Binders were organized, and too many innocent women had been hurt by it.

  The attackers weren’t accustomed to working together, and none had anything more than a sword, but even that inexperience wouldn’t matter with their numbers. Nothing I’d seen told me that they were pressing too hard, content to keep her bottled up, almost as if waiting…

  Damn.

  Talia might be in more trouble than I realized.

  Even after she had used me, or at least, allowed me to be used, I didn’t want anything to happen to her. She was—or had been—a friend. The Great Watcher knows I have few enough of them to let something as foolish as getting used get in the way.

  Stepping to the side of the alley, I flipped two coxberry-tipped darts at the nearest men. They stumbled back a step and fell before the others knew the situation had changed. Two more darts sailed on either side of Talia, hitting the two men there. They fell.

  That left one man.

  Talia glanced at me and her eyes narrowed. I couldn’t tell if she was thankful to see me or annoyed.

  She darted toward the man and knocked his knife out of his hand before he even realized what she had done. Then she slipped forward, the tip of her knife pointing underneath his chin. His eyes went wide but he had the sense not to move.

  “Who were you waiting for?” she whispered.

  I backed toward Talia, keeping an eye on the mouth of the alley, not wanting to end up with a sword in my back. Other than the festival revelry, I heard nothing on the street.

  But I knew that wasn’t the only way people moved in the city. At least, it wasn’t the only way that I moved, and I knew I wasn’t alone in using the rooftops.

  Looking up, I noted a dull reflection off a barbed crossbow bolt above me.