Rogue Legacy by Jeffrey L. Kohanek (snow like ashes .txt) 📕

sound of a slap echoed in the room. “Berrilon and The Hand gave you a real instrument.” Another slap. “They took you from those lowlife taprooms and placed you in the palace, playing for Queen Iglesia.” A third slap rang out, followed by sobbing. “You and your whelp would still be renting a hole above the fishery in Vinhagus if not for us. Rather than thanking us for your position, your house, your new life, you throw it in our face by refusing to honor our deal?”

“No, please,” her father sobbed. “I’ll give you gold. I’ll give you anything.”

“Listen, you weak-willed snake. You made a promise, a promise to Berrilon and to The Hand.” Two thumps of fists hitting flesh preceded a whimper. “We don’t want your gold. We want you to keep your word.”

The sound of a blade sliding from its sheath caused Lyra’s eyes to widen. She stepped from her room and crept down the stairwell. Peeking around the wall at the landing, she saw two men holding her father against a wall. One of the men had a knife held to her father’s throat.

“Last chance, Tascalli,” the man with the knife said between clenched teeth.

Frightened and concerned, Lyra felt helpless as she stared at her father. His eyes flicked about the room, seeking salvation. When her father’s gaze shifted toward the stairwell, it locked onto Lyra. Tears tracked down her face as his expression shifted from terror…to realization…to resolve.

Her father turned toward his attacker. “You can take my life, but that will get you nothing,” he said calmly. “Perhaps I can assist The Hand in another way, but my honor still exists, and I’ll not be a party to treason.”

The man with the knife frowned and stepped back. His frown became a grimace, and he thrust the knife into her father’s midsection. The other man released his grip on her father as the man named Rainer yanked the knife free and used it to gash her father’s neck. Dark red blood spurted from the wound, his hand going to his throat as he slid down the wall and fell to the floor.

“No!” Lyra screamed, descending a few steps before she realized what she had done.

Both men turned toward her, and she got her first good look at them. One stood a bit over six feet tall, his bulky frame capped by a head of curly, dark Vinacci hair. The one her father had called Rainer was a bit shorter, with brown hair and a trimmed goatee in the style of Kalimar royalty. However, it was his eyes that she would always remember – steel gray and piercing. The man’s intense gaze sent a chill down her spine.

“Get her!”

Lyra scrambled up the stairs, ran to the end of the hall, and pulled the door to her father’s room closed. She then slipped into her own room and hid behind her open door. The rumble of footsteps grew louder as the men ascended the stairs, ran past her room, and ripped the door to her father’s room open.

“Look out the window,” Rainer demanded as he tore the room apart.

Lyra slipped out her bedroom door and crept down the stairs, watching the dark doorway to her father’s room as she made her descent. When she reached the bottom, Lyra found her father on the floor, his head tilted to the side, his empty gaze staring into space. She bit her lip as tears clouded her vision. The realization of his loss caused an involuntary whimper.

The thumping of rapid footsteps came from upstairs. She scrambled backward and bumped into the table. The candle tipped on its side, rolled to the table’s edge, and fell to the floor. Loud footsteps ran down the stairs, causing Lyra to panic. She bolted toward the door as the candle settled below the curtain that framed the front window.

A shout came from behind her. “The girl saw me. Don’t let her get away.”

Lyra leapt into the street and ran downhill before darting into a gap between neighboring houses. She crept down the narrow corridor, toward the steep hillside behind the houses, pausing in the deep shadows when she heard the two men run past. There she remained, her heart racing as she held back sobs of sorrow.