The Burning White (Lightbringer #5) - Brent Weeks Page 0,436

asked.

Then Quentin saw the woman as her face lifted in tear-streaked rage, and every bad premonition he’d had was confirmed. She was Tisis Guile. Which meant the body she held was Kip’s.

Quentin pushed through the crowd, aided by his narrow-shouldered frame and his garb, which made some people step aside for him.

He lost the next thing Zymun said, but from his intermittent glimpses of the Prism’s gleeful face, he could tell it was cruel. Nor did he stop even as Quentin moved closer and closer, taunting her so much that even some of the Lightguards looked uncomfortable.

“—dear. You know we’ve a tradition in the Guile family of passing around our whores. My own mother rushed from my uncle’s bed to my father’s as soon as she figured out which one was a winner. Some people might call that slatternly or opportunistic. Terrible things to say about a woman in such a vulnerable position, though. She was just making the best of it, wasn’t she? And look! Now she’s the White, and no one even talks about her tawdry early days. Me? I don’t call a woman like her a disloyal whore, I call her practical. Besides, who wants to share a loser’s bed? You ought to consider trying her approach: find out what it’s like to be fucked by a winner, for once. Tonight, maybe? I can promise you won’t remember Kip’s name by dawn. Hell, you might not even remember your own.”

He looked up at his men, and the Lightguards laughed belatedly like the sycophants they were. Some of them chuckled awkwardly instead, like men who suddenly felt like they’d gotten into something much worse than they’d bargained for.

Tisis launched herself at him, screaming incoherently.

He slapped her hard, as if he’d been waiting for it.

Then he leaned over, just as Quentin finally made his way to the front.

“Careful, sweetheart. I’m going to interpret that pathetic attack as spirit, fire, whatever you want to call it. But do it again, and I call it treason. And you’ve seen what I do to traitors.” He turned. “Now, then, what’s happening up on top of my tower?”

Tisis’s nose was streaming blood, but she rose to her hands and knees.

Just in front of her, one of the Lightguard shifted his weight and put a hand on his hip, flaring his cloak out around where his pistol was tucked, cocking it with the back of his hand as he did so, as if by accident. He cleared his throat to cover the sound, looking away.

Zymun’s back was turned, and the Lightguards were turning with him to head back to the Chromeria.

Tisis leapt to her feet, grabbing the pistol from the Lightguard’s belt. She leveled it at the back of Zymun’s head, not a pace away.

But a spear butt flashed up between them and threw the pistol into the sky. And in a blink the spear’s holder—the Lightguard commander, Aram—was holding Tisis, his spear under her neck, choking her.

“Treason!” Aram shouted.

Several other Lightguards took up the shout. It all had the feeling of something poorly choreographed. The people in the square looked merely horrified.

“My lord!” Aram said loudly. “What should we do with this traitor?”

Zymun put his hand to his heart as if sorely wounded. “No, no, no. Tisis, why?!” He lowered his voice. “Thank you for giving me the excuse, my dear. Oh, and just so you know—that pistol wasn’t even loaded. You stupid, stupid girl.”

He turned back to the crowd. “The Glare is too cruel for this poor woman. And I shouldn’t want her to have to wait for justice. Who knows what might happen before tomorrow? Put a rope up on the Glare, and hang her. Immediately.”

“No!” someone cried out in the crowd.

Zymun went purple. “What? You saw what she just tried to do! She tried to kill me!”

“Mercy, my lord, mercy!” someone shouted.

Others began to take up the chant.

“Enough!” Zymun screamed. “Who the fuck do all you people think you are, anyway? I am the High Lord Prism Zymun Guile. I am untouchable. Invincible. To dare to raise your hand against me is to die! And anyone who says different will share this traitor’s fate. The next to shout for mercy will hang beside her. This I swear!”

The crowd fell silent, aghast. A young man stepped forward as if to shout—but his family grabbed him and clamped a hand over his mouth.

“What’s the holdup?” Zymun demanded. “Hang her!”

The Lightguards shuffled their feet. “Sir, there’s . . . We don’t have any