Sword of Hemlock (Lords of Syon Saga Book 1) by Jordan MacLean

her face.  To his eye, she
was one more comely Bremondine wench, his for the taking.  With her tunic
unlaced a bit as it was, she had made sure his eye looked no further than that.
    She had had little time to prepare, coming straight from the
castle, and the illusion was less than perfect.  Had he been any less befuddled
with drink he would have noticed that the cloth of that fetchingly unlaced
riding tunic was too fine, too costly for a tavern whore, or that she had
unusually long nails on the little fingers of both hands.  Likewise, it should
have struck him odd that she had not taken off her cloak indoors on such a warm
night.
    “Gikka, did you say?”  He gave her a dull smile.  “An
unusual name.  Bremondine, is it?”
    “Aye,” she murmured, watching him.  She kept her hand light
over the concealed dagger at her hip, ready to fly, but no.  His eyes blinked
blearily.  She saw no light of recognition in them, no guilt, no fear.  The
name of the Brannagh squire made absolutely no impression on him.  He was
indeed drunk or simply ignorant.
    “Sir Finnig of—,” he grinned at her before he drew out the
chair beside him.  His mind was as transparent to her as if he spoke aloud—it
was best any half Bremondine bastard he might sire tonight know as little of
him as possible.  “Just call me Finnig.” he slurred, patting the seat.  With a
demure smile, she took a chair opposite him rather than the one he offered.  It
put her back to a wall where she could watch the door behind the two men.  Let
them read the gesture as they may; she would not let herself be trapped behind
the table.  She turned her chair out at a messy angle to the corner, an angle the
drunken knights would not notice but enough to leave her free to move clear.
    “Gikka,” he said again.  “I know that name.”  He turned to
his companion and almost knocked himself off balance.  Somehow in the same
motion he managed to drop himself into his own chair.  “I say, Bernold,” he
called loudly, “do I know the name Gikka?”
    But the other knight only sighed in exasperation and drank
his ale, as if he had performed his part in this show many times before.  “How
should I know?”  He raised the mug in a grumpy salute to the woman before he
turned his attention back to his drink.
    Curious.  Bloody odd, in fact.  For murderous guilty men,
they seemed quite at their ease.
    The trail leaving the glade had gone cold already, and Gikka
had seen no point in taking up the search there.  She supposed that the
villains had just been paid for a difficult job, and likely they would want to
celebrate.  So the women had ridden at all speed along the western road
straight toward Farras, the only city within a day’s ride of Brannagh. 
    They had to find Pegrine’s killers tonight.  Tomorrow, an
the brutes had a brain between them, the “knights” would vanish and two more
common men would leave the Farras gate than came in the day before.  But
tonight, Gikka wagered, they’d not pass up a last chance to lodge and board
like kings.
    Just outside Farras, she and Renda had seen the Wirthing
arms on two horses’ bridles at a roadside inn, and it seemed likely that they
belonged to the men who had taken Pegrine, being as this inn was the nearest to
Brannagh lands.  But with Wirthing’s lands not too far to the south, his
knights were a common sight in Farras, especially during the festivals of the
Gathering.  Gikka had to be certain.
    She had gone into the tavern alone.  If they were real Wirthing
knights and not the ones the women sought, they would certainly remember
fighting beside the Knights of Brannagh and possibly even under Lady Renda’s
command during the war, and she would find herself embroiled in the demands of
her station and stayed from her purpose, while Gikka could quietly take her
leave, unseen, unnoticed, and no harm done, either to them or to the thousand
year alliance between Wirthing and Brannagh. 
    But if