Blade needed to catch his breath after that burst of rhetoric. But he did not take his eyes off Yezjaro, who once again stood silent and motionless. Both fists were clenched now, pale in the darkness.
Blade decided that it was time for the grand gesture. He reached into the pouch that held the diamond and drew out a tightly folded piece of thin paper.
«Honorable Instructor,» he said. «At much expense of time and risk of our lives, Lady Musura and I have learned all that we needed to make this. It is a map of the tunnels into the palace, especially to the house of Lord Geron. With it is all other information needed to enter the house and take Lord Geron's head.»
Blade held out the map. Mechanically Yezjaro's hand rose to take it and close on it. The instructor's eyes met Blade's. Blade continued. «I ask nothing in return for this. Lady Musura and I trust in the honor of those who served Lord Tsekuin, that they will permit us to take our part in the avenging of his death upon Lord Geron.»
«I understand,» said Yezjaro tonelessly. Blade would have liked to hear more from the instructor. But that seemed hopeless. Yezjaro looked half stunned and totally speechless. They could not afford to spend much more time out here, where unfriendly eyes and ears might pass by.
«So be it,» said Blade. «This is not a matter I can ask you to decide here on the spot. But when a decision has come forth, let word be sent to the House of the Twelve Lanterns on the Street of the Silver Dragon. From there it will reach us swiftly, and we will know what to do after that.»
He did not add how much he hoped the dabuni would admit him and Lady Musura to their plans. That would be showing a weakness. Instead, he turned away in silence, leaving the instructor standing in the darkness. But as he turned, Blade could not help wondering why he had become so deeply determined to have Lord Geron's head. That determination went far beyond what he might feel for simply getting rid of a dishonest or tyrannical ruler. Was he beginning to think according to Gaikon's standards of honor?
Lady Musura was curled up on her sleeping mat in her corner of their dingy little back room by the time Blade returned. The stub of a single candle had almost burned out, leaving a haze of sour-smelling smoke in the room.
Lady Musura awoke as Blade came in. She sat up and lit a second candle as he dropped his swords to the mats and began undressing in silence. Her eyes seemed to be glowing brightly with an unexpected inner light.
«Yezjaro came?»
«He did.»
«You gave him the copy of the map?»
«I did.»
«Did he say anything?»
«Very little.»
«Nothing to show what he will decide?»
«Not a word. I think he appreciates the trust we have shown in his honor. But if this will lead him along the right path! don't know. I don't even know when we will know.»
«Well, then, there's no need for you to stand there grinding your teeth.» Lady Musura laughed. «Come and sit down beside me, Blade, and tell me tales of your travels. Do you realize how little we really know of each other, considering how much we have done together?»
Blade dropped his robe to the floor and sat down in his breechclout. Lady Musura lay down again, resting her head on one raised hand. Her eyes, still with the strange light in them, roamed up and down Blade's massive body.
For weeks now Blade had found it easy to think of Lady Musura as a woman, when he wanted to. But they had been working too hard for him to want to more than once or twice. Tonight-well, for the first time in many weeks matters were out of both their hands.
Lady Musura's large eyes seemed to penetrate Blade's skin and read his thoughts. One slender arm crept out from tinder the quilt and a long-fingered hand began to trace patterns on Blade's bare thigh. He turned to look down at her. Those lips that he had once thought unappealingly thin creased in a smile. Blade bent down and touched those lips with his own. They flowered open, warm, wet, quivering. Then a small supple tongue crept out and flicked back and forth across Blade's own lips.
Lady Musura's hands rose to creep around and caress the small of Blade's back. He thrust his own arms down, drawing Lady Musura up against his body. His hands slipped in under the robe she was wearing, caressing the warm, taut skin stretched over the supple muscles. Her gentle curves felt beautiful to Blade's exploring bands.
His hands crept up from the slim waist to cup the small breasts and feel her nipples harden against his palms. He heard warm breath hissing in his ear. A hand crept from his back around to his stomach, then down into his groin. He became more aware than before of a swollen stiffness down there. Lady Musura's unexpected warmth and softness were drawing their response from him.
Lady Musura twisted to one side, heaving the quilt off the mat onto the floor. Blade stood for a moment to throw off his breechclout, then knelt beside the woman as she quickly flung away her last garment and lay back. Her finely muscled legs drifted apart as Blade's hand stroked the patch of damp black hair between them. Her hands rose again and clutched at Blade's hair, pulling him down until his lips could circle first one nipple, then the other.
But Blade's hands kept up their work while his lips did theirs. His hands alone were enough to bring the woman to her first peak. A quick shudder, a quicker twisting of the small neat head on its slender neck, a whimper and moan deep in her throat.
The sight and sound pushed Blade's own desire even higher. He lifted himself on his hands, held himself there for a moment as Lady Musura shifted under him, then sank down, deep into her. He felt her warmth and wetness take him in, saw her eyes open wide at the feeling of him inside her, heard his own gasp.
Then he was rising and falling deep within her, and Lady Musura was thrusting her hips up toward him to take him in and in and in. His groin became one hot, glorious, delicious agony, that he knew would explode in the next minute. But the next minute came and went, and the minute after that, and still more minutes, and the writhing bodies on the mat did not break apart, and the explosion did not come.
When it did come, it came first in Lady Musura. Her fingernails sank deep into Blade's back, so that sharp pain penetrated even through the erotic daze that surrounded him. Her lips curled back from small white teeth, and all the breath in her body came out in a series of great whooping gasps. Blade felt her pelvic muscles twisting and contracting like bands of steel, and her wet channel tightening wildly around him.
Then his own explosion came, and for a little while he was unaware of anything around him. A dozen armed men might have entered the room, and he would not have been able to raise a finger-or even an eyebrow.
But the frenzy passed, and he sank down on top of Lady Musura, still deep within her but supporting his weight on his elbows. Silence returned to the room, silence broken only by deep gasping breaths as they both tried to refill their starved lungs.
Eventually Blade rolled off the woman and lay down on the mat beside her. Her warm limbs wrapped themselves around him again, but this time she was only making herself comfortable for sleep. The silence in the room deepened.
Blade and Lady Musura found the lovemaking neither unexpected nor unwelcome. It deepened the bond between them and took away some of the tension of waiting for Yezjaro's reply.
But the last of the tension did not disappear until that reply came, four days later. It came on a single sheet of paper, tightly folded, sealed with wax, and shoved under the door of their room.
BLADE AND LADY MUSURA AT THE THIRD NIGHT HOUR OF THIS DAY NEXT WEEK, AT THE MIDDEN OF THE INN OF THE PERFUMED WIND ON THE STREET OF SAYA. WITH YOU WE SHALL BE TWENTY-NINE. VENGEANCE TO OUR LORD. DEATH TO LORD GERON.