Serpent's Tower by Karen Kincy Page A

his shirt and kicked off his boots.
    Naked, he tossed the gown onto his bed and stared at it for a full minute. There wasn’t any way around this. Nobody would believe him to be a lady if he wore black assassin’s clothes. He tugged the silk over his head.
    Interesting. It hung rather well on him, though the latest styles favored small bosoms.
    He stood with his hands on his hips. Hardly child-bearing hips, though he was rather tall for a woman. Outfitted with the evening gown, he braided his hair and looped it around his head, pinning the black serpent to his skull.
    There. Ladylike.
    With only the cosmetics remaining, Wendel crossed the hall to the communal bathroom. A mirror of dull glass stretched along the wall. He leaned over the cracked porcelain of the sinks and shadowed his eyes with kohl.
    Boots shuffled on stone as a recruit froze in the doorway. “Ma’am, you can’t—”
    “Stop staring and get to work.” Wendel glared sideways at him.
    The recruit’s jaw gaped. For heaven’s sake, he thought a woman might wander into an order of exclusively male assassins?
    “You—you’re the princeling.”
    “Christ, they told you that already? What an irritation. I suggest never repeating the name, if you value your body’s integrity.”
    “Yes, sir!” The recruit stepped back. “May I use the toilet, sir?” he babbled.
    “Don’t wet yourself.”
    Returning to the mirror, Wendel scowled at his reflection. In truth, he was a princeling when he joined the Order of the Asphodel. A disinherited Prince of Prussia, to be more precise, though he loathed the useless title.
    The past was long, long ago. The future was his priority.
     
    ***
     
    Music from the party spilled into the street. A Turkish folk song, complete with jangled tambourines. Henry Spebbington, a prosperous British businessman, had requested an Oriental party with a Scheherazade theme.
    His rival had requested him dead.
    The doorman waved Wendel into the club without a second glance. Spebbington wanted a thousand and one girls to attend the party, which was of course impossible, but he welcomed all the ladies in Constantinople.
    Wendel entered a foreigner’s fantasy of a harem, peacocks strutting between waitresses wearing absurdly flimsy costumes. It took him a moment to spot Spebbington; at the back of the club, the businessman lounged on tasseled cushions, dressed like a ridiculous sultan. A trio of women giggled and clung to Spebbington’s arms, despite his pockmarked face and thinning ginger hair. The man was obscenely rich.
    A waiter passed with a tray of liquors; Wendel knocked one back.
    This part was the worst. Isolating his target before killing and interrogating him. Spebbington didn’t look like he wanted to leave any time soon. Perhaps he could be persuaded to venture into one of the back rooms.
    Wendel wandered over. “Pardon me.” He spoke in a smoky purr, his English flawless.
    Grinning, Spebbington looked him up and down. The alcohol reddened his cheeks and glazed his eyes. What a sloppy drunk.
    Wendel masked his sneer behind a coy smile. “Lord Spebbington?”
    “You must be mistaken, darling. I’m not a lord.”
    “Aren’t you a sultan today?”
    Spebbington chuckled. “I suppose I am.”
    Wendel traced the rim of his glass and sucked a drop of liquor from his fingertip. Spebbington gawked, his attention riveted, though he didn’t make a move. Jesus Christ, did he need to be even more obvious?
    “Sir,” Wendel said, “might we have a word in private?”
    “Yes, certainly.” Bracing himself on the ladies, Spebbington staggered to his feet and offered his arm. “Right this way.”
    Wendel took the man’s elbow and steered him into the back, where the fragrant smoke of incense drifted between shadows. A passing waitress smiled at Wendel, sympathy obvious in her eyes—the women working in this club made a living from rich bastards like Spebbington. Wendel hauled his target into an empty room.
    “Darling, you