“What happened to them?”
Adamat couldn’t help but look at the blood on the stairs. “One day they disappeared, every one of them—including our informants. We found the whole lot a few days later, forty-three bodies jammed into a drain culvert like pickled pigs’ feet. They’d been massacred by powerful sorceries, with excessive brutality. The marks of the king’s royal cabal. The investigation ended there.” Adamat suppressed a shiver. He’d not once seen a thing like that, not before or since. He’d witnessed executions and riots and murder scenes that filled him with less dread.
The Deliv soldier appeared again at the top of the stairs. “We need you,” he said to Tamas.
“Find out why these mages would utter those words with their final breath,” Tamas said. “It may be connected to your street gang. Maybe not. Either way, find me an answer. I don’t like the riddles of the dead.” He got to his feet quickly, moving like a man twenty years younger, and jogged up the stairs after the Deliv. His boot splashed in the blood, leaving behind red prints. “Also,” he called over his shoulder, “keep silent about what you have seen here until the execution. It will begin at noon.”
“But…” Adamat said. “Where do I start? Can I speak with Cenka?”
Tamas paused near the top of the stairs and turned. “If you can speak with the dead, you’re welcome to.”
Adamat ground his teeth. “How did they say the words?” he said. “Was it a command, or a statement, or…?”
Tamas frowned. “An entreaty. As if the blood draining from their bodies was not their primary concern. I must go now.”
“One more thing,” Adamat said.
Tamas looked to be near the end of his patience.
“If I’m to help you, tell me why all of this?” He gestured to the blood on the stairs.
“I have things that require my attention,” Tamas warned.
Adamat felt his jaw tighten. “Did you do this for power?”
“I did this for me,” Tamas said. “And I did this for Adro. So that Manhouch wouldn’t sign us all into slavery to the Kez with the Accords. I did it because those grumbling students of philosophy at the university only play at rebellion. The age of kings is dead, Adamat, and I have killed it.”
Adamat examined Tamas’s face. The Accords was a treaty to be signed with the king of Kez that would absolve all Adran debt but impose strict tax and regulation on Adro, making it little more than a Kez vassal. The field marshal had been outspoken about the Accords. But then, that was expected. The Kez had executed Tamas’s late wife.
“It is,” Adamat said.
“Then get me some bloody answers.” The field marshal whirled and disappeared into the hallway above.
Adamat remembered the bodies of that street gang as they were being pulled from the drain in the wet and mud, remembered the horror etched upon their dead faces. The answers may very well be bloody.
BY DAVID DALGLISH
A Dance of Cloaks
A Dance of Blades
A Dance of Mirrors
A Dance of Shadows
A Dance of Ghosts
A Dance of Chaos
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Contents
COVER
TITLE PAGE
WELCOME
DEDICATION
MAP
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
EPILOGUE
A NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR
EXTRAS MEET THE AUTHOR
A PREVIEW OF A DANCE OF CHAOS
A PREVIEW OF PROMISE OF BLOOD
BY DAVID DALGLISH
ORBIT NEWSLETTER
COPYRIGHT
Copyright
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Copyright © 2014 by David Dalglish
Excerpt from A Dance of Chaos copyright © 2014 by David Dalglish
Excerpt from Promise of Blood copyright © 2013 by Brian McClellan
Cover design by Kirk Benshoff
Cover model Bryce Bermingham
Cover photo illustration by Michael Frost and Gene Mollica
Cover copyright © 2014 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher constitute unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
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First ebook edition: May 2014
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ISBN 978-0-316-24242-4
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