Ghost Undying by Jonathan Moeller Page B

Sicarion did not care. He could afford it easily.
    And his concubines, too, carried out their duties flawlessly. 
    Or else.
    Sicarion stepped into his bedroom. The huge bed dominated one wall, while a pair of doors opened onto a balcony with a fine view of his gardens. His newest acquisition, a young Szaldic woman named Adina, stood near the doors, gazing into the gardens. For all his contempt for the Szalds, Sicarion admitted they had lovely women. Adina had flawless skin, wide blue eyes, and thick black hair than hung to her shoulders. She wore only a tight gauzy shift that displayed everything it covered to good effect. 
    “Adina,” said Sicarion. “Attend me.”
    She turned, head titled to the side, and smiled.
    “Ah,” she said. “The assassin.”
    There was no fear in her voice. Every other time, Adina had quivered with terror, knowing that his slightest displeasure could mean her death. Now she only regarded him with cool, distant amusement, like a scholar contemplating a manuscript. 
    “You will address me,” said Sicarion, “as master.”
    “Whatever for?” said Adina. 
    Rage blossomed through Sicarion.
    “You are about to find out,” he said.
    He had left his weapons with his body servants, but he needed no blades to inflict torment. He summoned power, murmuring a spell of necromancy as green flames blazed to life around his right hand. Still Adina showed no sign of fear. She had seen him use that spell on disobedient slaves before, and knew the agony it could bring. 
    Well, it was time to for her to learn the hard way.
    Sicarion thrust out his palm, and a column of shadow wreathed in green flame burst from his hand and lanced for Adina’s chest.
    A faint smile appeared on her lips, and she made a small gesture.
    And his spell collapsed, shattering against a mighty ward. 
    He stepped back in alarm. 
    “Who are you?” he said, casting a warding spell to deflect arcane attack. “Someone from the Magisterium? A Kindred assassin with a bit of skill in sorcery?” 
    Adina’s face remained cool and remote.
    “I told you, assassin,” she said, “that we were going to continue this.”
    Sicarion remembered the dark warehouse, remembered the old woman’s calm eyes staring up at him…
    He cursed and began another spell.
    Adina, or whatever had taken control of her body, was faster.
    She made a flipping gesture, and invisible force seized Sicarion, lifted him a few feet from the floor, and held his arms and legs immobile. He tried to summon power for a spell, but again Adina gestured, and another ward hardened around him, disrupting his effort to gather arcane power.
    “Guards!” roared Sicarion. “To me! To me…”
    Adina pointed, and the psychokinetic force slammed his jaw shut. 
    An instant later the door burst open, and Sicarion’s bodyguards stormed into the bedroom. He had purchased a dozen seasoned Istarish gladiators, veterans of the brutal fighting pits of the Padishah’s capital, and trained them himself. Their loyalty had been reinforced by spells upon their minds, and they would fight to the death to defend him.
    The gladiators charged at Adina, and the concubine raised both her hands.
    And Sicarion saw a display of sorcery more potent than any he had seen years.
    Shadow and green flame lashed from her fingers, and three of the gladiators fell dead in a heartbeat. Psychokinetic force lifted two of the men and smashed them against the wall with such force that their skulls shattered and their necks snapped. She gestured again, and two more men fell dead, their heads collapsed by blasts of invisible force. A few of the men actually reached her, only to have their blades rebound from her warding spells.
    In a matter of seconds it was over. Eleven of the gladiators lay slain, killed so quickly that they had likely been dead before they hit the soft carpet of the floor. The sole survivor, a grizzled man named Dorgan, knelt with his sword resting upon his palms, terror on his face.