StarCrossed

by Elizabeth C. Bunce

  Down the side street a blackened heap still smoldered on the cobbles. “Was anyone —?”

  “No,” he said quickly. “It’s just their belongings. What was left of them, anyway. Crockery, bedding. Books. Apparently they were running quite a trade in seditious literature. We’re lucky they didn’t burn the whole block. Bardolph must be feeling lenient these days.”

  I breathed through my mouth to quench the smoke smell, but couldn’t draw my eyes away from the dying bonfire. Just last week I’d seen those twin boys tussling in the street. It had taken me a shocked moment to realize they were playing at Sarists. One boy raised his hands against his brother, who clutched at his chest and cried out, “Magic, magic!” before falling dramatically to the cobbles. Their mother, a small, tired-looking woman with nervous eyes, had been swift to round them up and usher them back inside — but someone must have seen them anyway.

  “Are we sure they got away?”

  Rat just looked at me, silence the only possible answer.

  The bakery was busy at this hour of the morning, packed with its typical Seventh Circle trade of harried fishwives, out-of-work dockhands, and night girls fetching supper before sashaying off to their beds. Rat, sensing my desire to avoid their company, steered me down the alley and through the bakery’s kitchen door. He grabbed a hot loaf from the counter and gave me a gentle shove toward the stairs. An orange tabby descended from the landing, tail erect, scolding us loudly.

  “Talk to her,” Rat told it. “She’s the one who was gone all night.”

  Upstairs, I found a bottle of wine and leaned against the table. There was a stool, but I was too tired to move the cat. Rat fished a bowl from the shelf and tore the bread into chunks, pouring wine over them. “Milk would be better, but I know you worshippers of Tiboran.”

  “Not even you can find milk these days,” I said. As a flatmate, I liked Rat just fine. His room, the top floor of an old bakery in the Seventh Circle, was big enough for two, out of the way, and always warm. The window dropped onto a clay roof with quick access to the buildings next door, so it was easy enough to go to work and, usually, come back again unnoticed. I couldn’t complain.

  Especially because lodgings hadn’t been that quick to come by when I got back to the city. Strangely enough, saving a nob family from the Inquisition doesn’t endear you to many Seventh Circle underground types. When Rat took me in — in return for my assistance in a little scrape involving him, two Temple Street boys, and a cartload of imported Vareni tobacco of debatable ownership — I was just grateful for the walls and roof. Our arrangement was simple: I paid my share of the rent on time, he provided the food, and we didn’t ask each other too many questions.

  “I recognize that look,” Rat said. “You’re planning something.”

  I stirred the sodden bread with my spoon. “They’re going to execute Durrel.” Rat was silent. “He didn’t do it.”

  “I hate to quibble, but I’m not sure the evidence agrees with you, and the Ceid certainly don’t share your faith in him.”

  “Lots of unhappily married people don’t kill their wives. And why would he need money? Wouldn’t it be easier to stay married to his rich wife than kill her and have the cash flow dry up?” Even to my ears, that sounded weak.

  “What are you going to do?”

  I looked up, rubbing the back of my neck. “How do I get in to see the Ceid?”

  “You don’t,” Rat said. “They’re untouchable. It would be like walking up to the Celystra and demanding to see the Matriarch. Fair enough, bad example.” He leaned against the table, looking thoughtful. “Well, I suppose you might try the daughter; she’s just odd enough to grant you an audience. But why in the world would you want to?”

  I made a noncommittal grunt, and Rat pulled my bowl away. “Look at yourself,” he said. “You ignore the curfew, come home bloodied and battered from a night in jail, and you’re still looking for ways to get into trouble.”

  “That’s not it,” I said. “I just want to help him, if I can. Maybe I can find out what really happened.”

  “And if you find out he really killed her?” Rat’s voice was gentle. “Never mind. How are you planning to do it?”

  I sighed. “I have no idea.”

  He gave me a little grin and patted me on the arm. “Well, that’s never stopped you yet.” He plucked my spoon from the bowl and licked it clean. “I’m off to the baths.”

  As Rat strolled to the door, I glanced over his blue satin doublet and matching breeches. Topaz-pale, they set off his fair hair and bright eyes. “Are you seeing Hobin tonight?”

  “And tomorrow, if things go right.” He blew me a kiss. “Don’t wait up.”

  “You never bring your friends home,” I said. “It’s me, isn’t it? I embarrass you.” I struck a defiant pose, sticking out my bloody chin.

  “Careful. I am this close to getting milord to spring for a new apartment. Don’t make it so tempting.”

  “See if he has any word about the war, will you?”

  Rat paused, his hand on the doorknob. “Word about the war. Right.”

  “Don’t start.”

  He came a few steps back into the room. “You should have joined up, Digger. Why are you hanging around the city, when it’s so obvious there’s somewhere else you want to be?”

  “And there’s such a big call in the prince’s army for short, ugly young women with missing fingers and a limp.” I pulled away from the table. “I’m no camp follower.”

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself,” Rat said. “The limp is barely noticeable.”

  After that, I fell into bed and slept all the way through till night, waking cramped and knotted in more places than I could even identify. I pushed open the shutters. The night air still smelled of smoke, and the moons of Zet and Sar shined down through the haze. Royalty and magic, a good omen for Prince Wierolf’s campaign. I curled into the corner of the window, wondering where they were now. I’d had one sweet letter from Meri, now a mage in the prince’s army, before the fighting started, and then nothing. News came in snatches, and we clutched at it: The prince had found unexpected allies in the north, where distance — both physical and ideological — had bred less devotion to the king, and several noble houses had either capitulated without struggle or pledged outright support. The fighting was now concentrated on the plains of Gelnir, where wealthier houses with more to lose by a change in regime had made treaties with Astilan’s forces and now stood in defense of the routes toward Gerse and the throne.

  The only thing I knew for certain was that Wierolf still lived; any report of his orange banner falling would make swift course to Gerse. But of the Nemair I had heard nothing, of Wierolf’s infamous army of wizards only rumors; that they rode before him like an unseen apocalypse, laying waste to the countryside and bewitching innocents in their homes. Those were Royalist claims, to strike terror into Bardolph’s subjects and drive us harder to the king’s side.

  I’d come back to Gerse ready and eager, I thought, to do — something. Storm through the streets leading a battalion of my underworld cronies on secret Sarist missions to undermine the king and the Inquisition? Well, not that exactly, maybe. But something.

  Instead I’d returned to a city I could barely recognize, and I couldn’t find my place again. I’d tried, gone poking around in likely places, looking for Sarists. I’d thought they’d be easy to find for someone like me; I could see their magic, track them to their hidden lairs, offer my services as thief-for-hire. But it hadn’t happened. The problem with the likely places was that Bardolph’s men had gotten there already, long since cleaned them out and burned them to the ground, and the stale smoke and ashes left such a bitter taste in my mouth that eventually I’d stopped looking.

  Below me, the city was silent. It was past suppertime, and the streets should have been noisy with traffic, people gathered at fountain and tavern, children playing along the river. Thieves lurking in the shadows. A lot had changed while I’d been gone. And not just
me. Everything changed, when Tegen died.

  I should have expected what happened. I was Tegen’s — Tegen’s girl, Tegen’s partner, Tegen’s — whatever — and with Tegen gone, his work went with him. Though I saw plenty of sympathy in the eyes of the old friends who’d seen me back, I knew what they were thinking. I was bad luck. My partner had died on a job with me, and nobody wanted that kind of fortune rubbing off on them.

  Plus I’d come back with the taint of nobs all over me, like a scent the others could pick up from blocks away. It was one thing to sneak into their bedrooms and lift a necklace or a letter or a bottle of wine you could never afford to buy. It was quite another to move in, cozy up to their children, and play their pet. Nobody knew who I was anymore. And I didn’t blame them. I wasn’t exactly sure myself.

  Although apparently I’d landed another job saving noblemen. It seemed I just couldn’t keep from sticking my fingers into their business. What had really happened to Durrel’s wife? Was he just an unlucky suspect, or was he being framed? Besides the question of who wanted me involved, which I could hardly ignore, there was Durrel himself. He wouldn’t kill anybody. I had nothing to support that but a core of certainty in my gut, but I felt it, somehow. I knew it. I didn’t care what the evidence said; somebody was lying, somebody was wrong. That lost, anguished face hadn’t hidden the cold iron of a killer. And he was more than just a nob who’d been nice to me; he was Meri’s kin. I hadn’t had a lot of people to turn to in my life, and I knew what it was like to be in danger and have somebody step up out of nowhere and say, You’ll be safe now; I won’t let anything happen to you. I was bound to help him, if I could.

  The Keep was a far cry from the Inquisitor’s dungeons where Tegen had died, lost and alone, and there was nothing of Tegen in Durrel, but my stinging heart couldn’t help drawing the connection. I wasn’t going to leave a man I cared about behind in prison, ever again.

  I peeled myself from the window. Nursing misery by moonslight wasn’t remotely productive; I’d be in a puddle of it by morning if I didn’t get out and do something. Since it seemed I had plenty of room in my taxing schedule of fomenting rebellion, I gave my abused limbs a creaky stretch and set out into the evening to hunt up what I could about Durrel’s dead wife.

  Grea — Rat’s aunt, the baker, and our landlady — caught me the instant I stepped off the stairs. “You’re not off again?” She planted herself between me and the door. “You’re barely in.” She was a tall, wiry woman with arms like a stevedore; there was no way I was getting past her by force or stealth.

  “Just to look for a healer for my eye,” I hazarded, hoping Grea wasn’t hiding an apothecary in the kitchen. The common room was nearly empty, just one of the regulars, an old soldier sent back from the front, drinking sleepily by the cold fireplace. “I’ll be home by curfew.” Grea was legally liable for her tenants; if I was caught — again — she could be fined. Or worse.

  She gave me a narrow-eyed stare, then stepped aside. “If you come back without stitches, there will be hells to pay.”

  Nodding, I waved her off, silently vowing to help roll out dough when I got back. My hip was still sore, so I hired a boat, and by the time we slipped into the moonslit water, I was almost cheerful. Movement soothed me. A locked door and a bottle marked poison were practically a holiday. Nosing around a murder might turn out to be entertaining.

  It beat the hells out of what I’d been doing the last couple of months, at least.

  Durrel and his wife had lived far across the city, at an ugly old lump of stone called Bal Marse, and I wanted a look at the place — the murder scene — before I decided my next move. I took the boat as far as I could, then took to the streets by foot, easily finding my way by Bal Marse’s watchtower, which loomed over the rest of the neighborhood. I clung to the shadows, but couldn’t help glancing over my shoulder at every imagined sound behind me. I had a knife and my lock picks this time, and I wasn’t taking any chances, but I was still skittish from last night.

  Bal Marse meant “well defended,” and that wasn’t a euphemism. Clearly the Ceid thought it was more important to look powerful than beautiful. Kings had once garrisoned soldiers there, and the tower looked straight at the royal residence. A flag of alarm over Hanivard Palace would be clearly seen, armies quickly dispatched. The house itself was a plain-faced, blocky affair, long and low with few windows, the square watchtower like a striking snake protecting the estate. But the windows were dark, the torches in the courtyard cold and unlit. Was the property abandoned? A high wall edged an empty alleyway, only the blank backside of a warehouse for a neighbor. I flexed my hands and shook out my neck. Scaling that wall should have been as easy as trotting up a flight of stairs, but my sore hip screamed at me with every step.

  Finally I got lucky. Someone had left a gate unlocked. I said my thanks to Tiboran, and braced myself for a dog or four to come barreling at me from around the house, but the yard had a lonely, empty feel, like nobody alive was anywhere nearby. Even without its mistress and master, a grand house like Bal Marse should still be occupied with servants and staff and other family members. Hadn’t Durrel told me Talth had four children? Where was everyone?

  I looked over the flat stone walls, down across the dusty courtyard, along the perimeter wall. Talth’s maid had seen somebody leaving her mistress’s rooms in the small hours of the night, and Durrel swore it wasn’t him. Could it have been an intruder? The more I looked at the building, the more unlikely that seemed. Even if security was a little stiffer when the house was occupied, there were no windows big enough to climb through on the first two stories, and it would take even a skilled climber a good effort to scale one of those smooth stone walls. So maybe Talth’s murderer had been welcome here, known to the household. A visitor, if not a member of the family or staff.

  Whoever had left the gate unlocked was just as careless with the kitchen door, which swung easily on well-oiled hinges. Why would anyone leave a well-defended house open to the elements and intruders?

  It didn’t take long to see. The house was empty, just a stone shell with no furnishings to speak of, as if thieves or debt collectors had swept through and taken away anything that wasn’t bolted down. In fact, it was so picked over it was hard to tell what some of the rooms had been used for. At the center of the ground floor was a huge, round court, pillars soaring to a colonnaded gallery. Whether it had once been a reception or dining hall, or something else entirely, I couldn’t decide. The only decoration was the family seal, a sigil of intertwining initials set into the stone floor.

  It was eerie walking through the crust of a building where someone had been murdered. I shook off a shiver and found a set of stairs leading to the private spaces upstairs. Without furniture to guide me, I thought it would be hard to find Talth’s bedrooms, but one entire wing of the second story had been converted to apartments, and though all the hangings and case goods and rugs had vanished, the way the rooms unfolded into one another, plus the new fireplace with its massive carvings of Mend-kaal in the stonework, plainly announced that someone important had called these rooms home.

  I wandered through them, but only the outermost chamber had windows, and the rest of the rooms barely received any of the filtered moonslight. It didn’t matter; it was obvious that any evidence that might have been in this room was long gone. Whoever had stripped these rooms had done away with any clues as well. I wondered which chamber Talth had died in, lying in her sweat and horror, waiting for Marau to finally stop the beating of her heart. A stain on the floor to give up her position, maybe? A shaft of moonslight to show me the cold flagstones? But there was nothing. She could have died here two weeks ago, or twenty years, and it wouldn’t have made a difference. With a grim sigh, I went back downstairs.

  Yet as I crossed back through the empty court, something that wasn’t moonslight flashed in the corner of my vision. Swearing silently, I spun slowly back around, my eyes squeezed closed until the last moment. I hadn’t imagined it. There, by an arche
d doorway, in a streak like the mark left on the floor from heavy furniture, was the faintest trace of something that should not have been there. I knelt on the floor beside the mark and cautiously dipped my fingers toward the flagstones, tapping the floor just lightly enough that a stream of silvery mist spread out from my touch like the radiating arms of a star, flooding the floor with glittering light.

  There was magic at Bal Marse.

  Of course there was.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  I scowled at the ceiling. “I’m sure you find this amusing,” I said, addressing the gods directly, Sar and Tiboran in particular. All over the country, the Inquisitor and his Confessors were desperate to expose magic — real or imagined — wherever it lurked, and they had devised the most cruel and elaborate methods for seeking it out. And here I, the Inquisitor’s wayward, gutter-rat sister, could see magic, plain as moonslight, could wake it up with a touch — and I’d developed the most ridiculous knack for stumbling over it everywhere I went.

  I drew my finger in a wary arc against the stone floor, silvery dust sparkling in my wake. This certainly put the murder in a new light. Was Talth a Sarist? Was she magical? That would give almost anybody in our nervous city motive enough to kill her, although most people would just call down the Greenmen to do the Goddess’s dirty work. Unfortunately one sweep of glitter on Talth’s Round Court floor couldn’t tell me much. But it was more to go on than I’d had that morning. I crisscrossed the court, trying to see a pattern to the magic, but it was too confusing. There was a large sort of blot near a back entrance, like someone had spilled a bunch of it, and there was a wide swath sweeping along the floor. Here and there throughout the room were small random scratches, as if magical mice had been milling about, searching for crumbs.

  From outside, I could hear the temple bells clanging the hour. Pox. I’d forgotten about the blasted curfew again. I hurried back toward the river. If I didn’t get to a water landing soon, I was going to have to walk back to the bakery, and risk being picked up again. And that would try even Rat’s patience.