Drawn Blades by Kelly McCullough Read Free Book Online Page A

kings you killed than they could ever love you for putting a good queen on the throne. You’re the living symbol of their worst failures, and not a one of them would have thought twice about tipping you back into the fire and watching you roast, if there weren’t any official witnesses about to whisper in the queen’s ear.”
    “True enough.”
    The Elite were tasked with making sure that whoever happened to wear Zhan’s crown at a given moment stayed alive, well, and firmly in power. Utterly loyal to the throne and ruthless in pursuit of their duties, they were among the best mages and warriors in the eleven kingdoms—right up there with my own order or the Dyads of Kodamia.
    Their familiars—earth elementals who took the shape of lion-like dogs the size of small horses—were just this side of unkillable. Tougher and much smarter than the whatsis, the stone dogs have come close to killing me on several occasions. The Elite made brutal and bitter enemies, and they hated me. Both for the pair of kings I’d ghosted out from under them, and for the rather large number of their fellows I’d sent to guard those fallen masters on the far side of the grave.
    All of which made a bad idea of lingering in the vicinity any longer than need forced us to. I started to push myself into a sitting position, but Faran put a hand gently on my chest and spoke quietly. “Stay low. The tank’s a small one with a low rake.”
    I nodded and rolled over rather than sitting up. In a city like Tien, water tanks were among the assassin’s best friends. They tended to sit up high, and most of them had dished tops to collect the frequent rains and reduce the amount of lifting and pumping involved in keeping them full. Perfect for hiding. But the smaller the tank and the lower the rake on the roof, the smaller the cover it provided. That made me plenty cautious as I crawled up to the low edge and looked for what was left of the fire I’d started.
    The answer was a few errant wisps of smoke rising from a black and gaping hole in the rooftops, and not much more. . . . A gaping hole in the rooftops absolutely surrounded by Tienese officialdom. I counted three Elite, a dozen or so Crown Guards, and perhaps fifty Stingers—as we called the yellow-and-black-clad city watch. It was past time to wake Triss and get moving again, and I said as much to Faran.
    She gave a relieved nod. “Wonderful, let’s be gone.”
    “There’s only one little problem we have to settle before our departure.”
    Faran sighed. “Of course there is. Let me guess. Your swords are in yonder big smoking hole in the ground, right?”
    I smiled. I didn’t think she’d have missed them going missing. “They are indeed. On our way out, we need to amble over there, slip through the crowd, climb down the still-hot walls, and root through the ashes, all without drawing any unwanted attention.”
    “Would a really big distraction help?” she asked.
    “Did you have something in mind?”
    “In fact, I did. I was thinking that a tiny little rooftop water tank coming apart when the enormous dragon that has wedged itself inside makes its exit is probably high up on any list of things that would draw the eye.”
    I blinked at her. “Wait. What, now?”
    She smiled sweetly. “Do I need to repeat myself using words smaller than ‘dragon’ and ‘water tank’?”
    I touched the top of the tank with my palm. “Shang . . . is in here?”
    She nodded. “You were pretty badly cooked when I carried you up here. You didn’t actually think you’d recover as much as you have just from a couple hours of lying unconscious on a rooftop, did you?”
    “Shang wedged himself into this tank for me?” A dragon five times the size of the container?
    “Of course not. He did it for me.” Faran rolled her eyes. “Silly old man.” Then she grinned. “Have I ever mentioned how much fun it is to make the legendary Aral Kingslayer gape like an idiot?”
    Was that a joke?
Triss said