The Diminished

by Kaitlyn Sage Patterson

  I took a deep breath. “There’s got to be something to be done about him,” I said. “He can’t be allowed to keep hurting people. Isn’t there some kind of rebel group here fighting to stop people like him?”

  “I never thought I’d see Aphra go off at him like that,” Myrna replied, stepping around my question.

  “Why wouldn’t she say something before? Why wouldn’t she do something?” I asked. “It’s her estate as much as it is his.”

  “She needs him,” Myrna said, simply. “And the contract she signed is even harder to break than yours or mine.” She narrowed her eyes at me, seeing that I was clearly still waiting for an answer to my earlier question. She sighed and said, “You’ve heard the rumors about the resistance, then?”

  “Some,” I said carefully. “I know it exists. I’d like to know more. I’d like to help.”

  Myrna deposited the puppy on the floor, went to the door and checked the lock. She returned to the table and sat back down. “The resistance gives aid to mistreated workers,” she said quietly. “They’re doing their best to end the temple’s protection of the folks who ignore common decency and abuse the terms of their contracts. But their goals extend well beyond what I know.”

  “Are you part of it, then?” I asked.

  Myrna nodded, and hesitated briefly before speaking again. “So is Aphra. She’s been funneling a big chunk of the estate’s profits to the resistance for several years now.”

  “What?” I nearly leapt out of my chair in alarm. “How do you know? Does Hepsy know?”

  Myrna smiled and slid a knife from her boot, thumbing the edge. “I know because I’m Aphra’s contact. And my sister? There’s not a chance.” She studied me closely. “You really want to make sure this doesn’t happen again?”

  I swallowed, loudly enough to feel self-conscious. I couldn’t imagine a way this could possibly end well for me. I’d wanted this—to find the rebels, to stop Phineas—right up until the moment that it became real. Now fear washed over me like an enormous, drowning wave. While the rational part of my mind cried out all the reasons I shouldn’t get involved, a bigger part of me was already screaming, Yes! Yes! I’ll help, yes!

  “I do, but...” My voice trailed off.

  “Don’t you want to be free?” Myrna poured more tea into our glasses.

  “I’ll be free when my contract is over. Free and wealthy.” I chewed the inside of my lip, hating the taste of the lie in my mouth.

  Myrna sighed. “If you’re paid. I wouldn’t count on it. Phineas will strip away a month’s wages for no reason at all. You saw that last night. You’ve not been here long, and of the people you’ve met, we’re the lucky ones. We’re young and strong enough—or pretty and well-spoken enough—to be given positions on the estate proper.”

  I wouldn’t have called Myrna lucky by a long stretch, after what had happened, and she must have seen the doubt on my face.

  “Do you know where most contract workers end up?” she asked, an edge in her voice.

  I shook my head.

  “Almost all of the men and every woman not qualified for estate service wind up working kaffe. It’s backbreaking. The overseers can extend the already brutal work hours on a whim. No one out there eats enough, and when they get sick—which they all do—they have to wait until temple day to see a healer,” Myrna said, anger simmering in her voice. “More than half of them die before their contracts are up. The rest of them are stuck picking kaffe for pocket change until they die, unable to afford anything better.”

  “But aren’t they supposed to be given tools to start a life? Aren’t they saving their wages?”

  Myrna scoffed. “Don’t need more than a basket and a knife to pick kaffe, and they don’t get paid half what they’re promised.”

  “I don’t know what I can do to help,” I said. “I don’t have any real skills, other than diving and what you’ve taught me about horses.”

  “We’ve been looking for a way to get one of us close to Aphra for ages, but Phineas is in charge of the staff, and it would look strange if she were to take an interest in someone all of a sudden,” Myrna explained. “All we’ll need you to do is pass her letters and the money she gives you on to me. It makes more sense for you to seek me out than it does for her. She’s taken to hiding notes in Riker’s stall and dropping coins into his buckets a couple at a time.” She paused, and asked, “How are you at climbing trees?”

  I shrugged. “I’ve climbed up more buildings than trees. Not too many trees in the capital, and a roof is a good place to hide. Why?”

  “You’re going to be even more useful than we thought.”

  I grinned at her. “When do I start?”

  * * *

  Phineas came into my rooms late that evening, looking as dapper and well-rested as the first time I’d seen him in Hamlin’s parlor—the complete opposite of the wild, furious person I’d seen in the stable yard. Myrna froze the moment he stepped through the door, and she watched him with wary eyes. I started to stand, but he waved me back into my chair. He took a seat on the edge of the couch and looked at the cards spread over the table.

  “I certainly hope you aren’t betting real money,” he said. “She cheats.”

  Myrna threw her cards down and kicked my shin. “Dzallie’s eyes!” she exclaimed. “You best give me my money back.”

  I tried to gauge Phineas’s mood, but I must’ve stared too hard. He glanced at me, and for a moment, he let his cool mask slip, and I saw the irritation in his eyes.

  He clapped his hands and said, “Ladies, ladies. I’ll only take a moment. I’ve come to apologize for my behavior last night. There are times when one twin can bring out the worst side of the other. Singen and I tend to exacerbate one another’s faults.” He took a deep breath. “Myrna, I know you had no way of predicting that Aphra would see or notice Vi. I’ll give you all the time you need to recover, and as an apology, I’ll even allow you to keep your wages for time lost.”

  Myrna rose, wincing, to her feet and bowed deeply. “I’m extremely grateful for your generosity, sir.”

  “Would you, perhaps, give me a moment alone with Vi?”

  “Of course.”

  When Myrna’d closed the bedroom door behind her, Phineas turned to me and reached out to rest his hands on my shoulders. I tried to flinch away from him, but his grip was like steel.

  “I’d like to offer you an apology as well, Vi.” He spoke loudly enough to be heard through the door. Then he hissed, “If you ever cross me again, dimmy, I’ll lay your head on Tueber’s harvest altar and boil your bones to feed my kaffe pickers. Now say thank you.”

  Phineas’s grip on my shoulders was sure to leave bruises, and he held his face so close to mine that the sharp reek of kaffe on his breath enveloped my head in a cloud of the foul stench. Cold sweat trickled down my spine, but I wasn’t frightened.

  I was furious.

  Determined to stay calm, I took a deep breath. I knew he had the upper hand now, but I wouldn’t be forgetting this anytime soon. “No need to apologize, sir. I knew better. I shouldn’t have put your surprise in jeopardy just to get some actual work done.”

  Phineas narrowed his eyes, but he released my shoulders with a final ferocious shake. His voice once again a tad too loud, he said, “Lovely. I’ll have the seamstress come and fit you for clothes for the party in the morning. In the meantime, you’ll continue your riding lessons and your work in the stables, but you’ll have no more lessons with Hepsy. Instead, you will report to me for training every day. I’ll expect you in my study after the luncheon hour. Is that clear?”

  “Yes, sir,” I breathed.

  “First lesson.” Lightning fast, Phineas reached out and grabbed my ear, twisting it viciously. “You must speak audibly.”

  Despite myself, I whimpered. Anger beat away the fear that raced through me, and in the deadly calm of fury,
I steeled myself. I was going to stop this man. Someday, he wouldn’t be able to hurt anyone any longer.

  He gave my ear a last hard yank, and the room swam before my eyes. I gasped when he released me, slumping down in my chair. He patted my cheek. As he headed for the door, he called over his shoulder. “I’ll expect you tomorrow. Good night, Obedience.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  BO

  I barreled into Clem on my way out of the study and bounced off her, jostling a spindle-legged table and upsetting a vase of bright purple flowers. The woman was sturdier than a Willand pony.

  She glared up at me. “You best see to your friend afore I shoot him. I done had enough of this nonsense.”

  “Where is he?” I asked.

  “Out yonder.” She pointed vaguely in the direction of the front door. “Seems he’s set to kick over every bush in that near field afore the sun sets.” I groaned and started for the door. “You get him under control. If the boss says to fill him full of lead, I ain’t giving him more than one chance to quit.”

  “I understand. Thank you, Miss Clem.”

  As the screen door slammed behind me, she yelled, “I’m no miss. Just Clem.”

  I rushed out into the fading afternoon and found Swinton in a field of philomena bushes. They were awash in the red light of the setting sun. Their flowers, normally creamy white, looked as though they’d been dipped in blood, and Swinton’s white shirt glowed crimson. He took hold of a bush. Yanked. Waxy leaves and petals flew through the air, but the plant’s roots held firm.

  “Swinton.” I approached him the way I would a spooked horse—slowly, speaking softly the whole way. “Swinton, come inside. It’ll be dark soon.”

  He silently continued his assault on the bush.

  I took a step. Another. When I got close enough, I laid a hand on his shoulder. And then I was on my back, staring at the flame-licked sky, its pinks, oranges and reds more vibrant, more real than any sunset I’d seen before. Air rushed back into my lungs as the door to the house opened and lanterns were set out on the porch. With the light came the pain. I gasped, took several shuddering breaths. Something tickled my ear, and Swinton’s face appeared above mine.

  “Are you planning to lay in the dirt all night? I want to be well away from this place before the moons set.”

  Taking my hand, he hauled me to my feet.

  “Do you plan to apologize?”

  “No.”

  “Fine,” I sighed. “But it doesn’t make any sense to leave tonight. Aunt Ephemella will give us dinner, a bath, a bed. A real bed, Swinton. Plus, it’s been years since I’ve seen my aunt.”

  Swinton’s face went blank. He spun on his heel and strode toward the house.

  “We can leave tomorrow,” I said, dashing to catch up.

  He whirled on me. “You may do whatever suits you, little lord. I’m not staying under that woman’s roof. Not for a minute. I’ve fulfilled my obligations to you. Pay me what you owe, and I’ll be out of your hair.”

  “What do you mean? I thought we were going to Southill together. I thought...” I trailed off, remembering falling asleep with his fingers wrapped around mine. “Was it something in the papers you took?”

  “You saw that, did you?”

  He shoved a handful of loose papers at me. I glanced around and, finding no one in sight of the field, tilted the papers to catch the light of the setting sun. The top page was some sort of ledger. Names ran down one side, and neat columns of numbers and symbols filled the rest of the space. I couldn’t make heads or tails of it. There was a letter addressed to my aunt, acknowledging her request for additional contract laborers for the coming harvest. On the bottom of the stack of papers, a letter bearing the official seal of the Suzerain gave specific instructions for the infusion and distillation of a tincture of philomena blossoms. The letter was signed simply “C & A.”

  Swinton watched me as I read, shadows gathering in the furious lines of his face. In all the time we’d spent together, I’d never seen him so mad.

  “I don’t have any idea what all this means. It looks like what my aunt said—that she’s running the farm as a favor to my mother to fulfill a temple contract.”

  “Never mind that you’ve been lying to me about who you are. We both knew very well that was the case. But this is too much to be borne. The contract is with the Suzerain, Bo.” He snatched the papers away from me, found the ledger and waved it in my face.

  I batted it away. “So? They’re making something for the Suzerain. What of it?”

  “What do you know about philomenas?” he asked.

  “Nothing. Why?”

  “About fifty years ago, someone got the bright idea to use philomenas for perfume. They smell remarkably similar to the karlenias that grow in Samiria, but they’re much hardier plants. Cheaper to maintain. They planted acres and acres of land with the flowers and built several perfumeries. They imported the latest solar-powered distillation equipment and trained staff from all over Ilor to work in the perfumeries.” He looked at me, his mouth set in a hard line. “You’ve really never heard about this?”

  I shook my head.

  “Everything turned upside down. The unlucky souls who’d been hired to pick the flowers turned on each other, on themselves. It was the bloodiest disaster in the history of Ilor. The people who worked in the factories died. All of them, within just weeks of beginning their work. The managers were able to destroy the essential oils they’d produced and keep the perfume from being exported to the rest of the Alskad Empire, but the investors from Alskad lost scads of money and thousands of people here died.”

  “Why didn’t you say something when we were riding up?” I asked, horrified. “You knew what these flowers were then, didn’t you?”

  “What was I going to say? I thought you were just checking up on someone else’s investment. I didn’t know this was all yours.” He took a deep breath. “There’s more, Bo.”

  My breath caught in my throat. “Do you know what those marks mean?”

  “I have an idea.”

  I waited.

  “I recognized one of the names on the list.” There was a hitch in his voice. “When the priest came with Taeb’s ashes, there was a young man with him, an initiate who’d been studying with Taeb. He wanted to tell us what a good friend Taeb had been to him. His name was Basel Felp. I got word last month that he died in an accident, and here he is, on this list. There’s an X by his name, and it’s dated a month ago.”

  “All these Xs, by all these names... You don’t think...” I trailed off.

  “I don’t know why, but I think the flowers your aunt is growing here are connected to my brother’s death. I think the temple is testing whatever it’s making from these flowers on children. Ilor’s children.”

  I caught sight of Clem and Hoss standing on the edge of the field. Their shadows stretched out before them, specters in the growing darkness. I didn’t want to be a part of any of this. Maybe I should have stayed home with my books and my horses and my endless, tedious lessons. I’d gone my whole life without knowing I even had a sister. There was no reason I should have felt compelled to go halfway around the world to find her now.

  Even as I thought it, I knew it wasn’t true. Every day I’d spent away from home, I’d learned more about myself. I’d grown stronger and smarter, and learned more about the people I’d someday rule. There was no way I could walk away from this now. Just knowing that my money, my land was a part of whatever it was the Suzerain were doing made me complicit.

  The weight of the cuff was heavy on my arm, reminding me of my promise to the empire. I had to do something. Had to stop this. Had to free Vi. Had to take charge of the empire I was born to lead.

  Still, doubts filled my mind. “You don’t know for sure that’s what killed your brother,” I said hesitantly. “He might have died of the flu, like you
said.”

  Swinton glared at me and shook his head.

  “What?” I asked. “What is it?”

  “I know he didn’t. I think I’ve always known.”

  “How? How could you possibly?” I wanted to reach out and help him through this old grief, but he stood just out of arm’s reach.

  “No one at home died. No one in Williford even got sick.”

  I didn’t want to face the implications of what he was saying. I needed there to be a different explanation. “Swinton, be reasonable. Taeb was at the temple. He was an initiate in training, wasn’t he? It makes perfect sense that the disease didn’t affect you in Williford. He was far away.”

  Swinton’s fists clenched. His shoulders tightened. “If you could take your head out of your own ass for a minute, you might understand. The school was in Williford, down the road from my house. But only the boys there got sick. No one else, not even the anchorites. They claimed they’d kept it contained. They said it was the will of the gods, but, Bo, I could feel him. He wasn’t sick. He lost some essential part of himself, and I nearly lost myself, as well. I could feel his terror, his rage before he died.”

  “Gods save us,” I breathed.

  “They can’t,” Swinton said. “They aren’t real.”

  I stared at him. “You don’t believe in the gods?”

  Swinton sighed. “Never mind. It doesn’t matter.”

  My head spun, and I looked across the fields. “If the anchorites and the Suzerain know that these flowers are so dangerous, why would they continue to farm them? To produce these distillations? And why would my aunt have that list? You think the temples are actually using this substance for some...nefarious purpose?”

  “Open your eyes, Bo!” Swinton said in frustration. “It’s obvious that they are. I don’t know why, but I do know that the people who died in that first accident—the laborers, the factory workers? They acted like the diminished do when the grief finally takes them.”

  I shuddered at the implications of what he was saying. His grief, his fury, was written all over his face. I stepped forward and laced my fingers through his, looking deep into his eyes. “I’ll make you a promise, Swinton. The moment that Vi is free of her contract and away from Plumleen Hall, I’m going to do everything in my power to learn exactly what is going on—and I’m going to stop it.”