Prince of Storms by Kay Kenyon Read Free Book Online Page B

the bright, the bloody floor shimmered in its glare.
    â€œRemain here, Lord Inweer,” Breund said. He left with what haste his old legs could muster. He would be the bearer of dark news, indeed: The solitaires fled. And toward what machinations?

CHAPTER FOUR

    They fought, Titus Quinn and Lord Hadenth, a match that could have but one outcome, being a human against a Tarig. Titus had a knife; the lord, boot blades and extruded claws. But the Tarig had ridden a brightship through the silver fire of the sky. His skin was gone, and the last scraps of his mind. Titus closed for the kill. But the lord, still proud, turned and walked into the embrace of the storm wall.
    â€”from Annals of a Former Prince
    IN D EEP E BB , Quinn moved among a contingent of guards across the plaza, making for the hill of mansions.
    At his side Zhiya said, “Let me take stock of the hangar. No need for you to come among them.”
    â€œIf they wish me dead, easily done.” Four hundred eighty lords remained.
    â€œWhy hand them the knife, my dear?”
    He didn’t believe these Tarig posed a danger. They still feared the mSap. He could activate it and destroy their door home. They wanted to go home, now that it was inevitable, now that, he suspected, they no longer cared about staying—the whole charade being over: the radiant land, the gracious lords, the patriotic war.
    Zhiya said, “The worst is, they took the brightships.”
    He nodded. A major blunder that they had let the brightships get away.
    Zhiya’s guards, twenty strong, clattered in full weaponry behind him. Her ready force of supposed godders provided him with bodyguards if not a fighting force. They crossed two plaza bridges and began climbing the steps, now moving double-file, Quinn and Zhiya in the lead.
    â€œSend Ci Dehai to Ahnenhoon,” Zhiya said, “to stand watch over it.”
    He had thought that he should send the general. But it did little good to hold the fortress when the engine could be activated remotely. Had the solitaires that power? He thought that they did.
    But why would the solitaires want to restart Ahnenhoon? The game was over for them. They would now be a small, despised fragment of the Tarig elite. They could not, even with all their powers, hope to control the population unless by the consent of the masses. Ahnenhoon was likely safe from them; they had fled for their lives, as simple as that. And yet it was safest to order Ahnenhoon reduced to rubble.
    â€œWhat happens if I take Ahnenhoon down? Dismantle the engine.” They ascended past the terrace where he had once hidden with Lady Demat when Ghinamid was on the hunt. Then, a few steps more, and off to the left lay the garden of the child he’d known only by the term of endearment Small Girl . His history was all here, woven into the adobe stone of the mansions where he had been prince, fugitive, prisoner. They went past the mansion of Chiron, climbing.
    â€œI could have the army take it apart. Rebuilding might be impossible for a handful of lords.”
    â€œTime to do it, Titus.”
    But taking away the thing that fueled the Entire might paint Quinn as an enemy of the Entire. “Sentients might see it as the Entire’s death sentence. They might favor Sen Ni.”
    â€œThen she takes control. But without Ahnenhoon’s engine, she is declawed. Tear it down, I say.”
    They entered the hangar. Empty of ships, as he had known; but still, a shock. Twenty-three solitaires had escaped, all of them except Inweer, who waited in the shadows against the distant wall. The enormous shelter with its wedge-shaped ship bays was a lonely and bloody scene. Zhiya went forward, kneeling by the nearest body.
    Breund came forward. “Master Regent, Inweer is still here.”
    â€œThank you, Breund. Did Lord Inweer raise a hand against these guards?”
    â€œNo, Regent.”
    â€œOr threaten you?”
    â€œNo, Master Regent.”
    Well,