Hearts of Tabat

by Cat Rambo

  “One more will die tonight,” Murga said. “The Queen gave me leave to pick, and it amused me to take them from your roster of possible brides, and distract you even further.”

  “Leave her alone!”

  “My creation has proved dangerous from time to time,” Murga said. “It took a dislike to my acquaintance Jilla, whose job was to make your prospective bride our pawn by addicting her. But if that is not possible, then we will use her as our next Merchant victim.”

  He turned to the Sphinx and said something to her. Nodding her great head, she slipped out the door.

  “Adelina has done nothing to you!” Sebastiano said to the hive. “I implore you!”

  The glass encasing the hive thrummed with the frenetic wings filling it, more Fairies than he ever would have thought it could hold. With a great crash, it shattered, falling down like spilled water. Fairies poured out, filling the room, every nook and cranny, as though somehow the hive had contained every Fairy in the city. The air whined with the sound of hundreds of wings.

  You have been kind, even when you thought it meant nothing, and therefore it means everything, the Queen’s voice said. Therefore, if you can reach her, you may save her.

  Sebastiano turned, but Murga was already slipping out the door. “This is not the end of this, Merchant Mage,” were his parting words, but the haste of his exit reduced the amount of menace.

  Still, Sebastiano took a moment to kneel beside the Duke and pat his wrists and cheeks till the man came to. He blinked foolishly at Sebastiano.

  “Take me back to the castle,” he demanded.

  Sebastiano shook his head. “No time,” he said, and left the Duke there despite the imprecations shouted after him in the echoing, glass-strewn chamber.

  Oh Adelina, be late one more time so I can get there soon enough to save you.

  CHAPTER 57

  If Adelina had not dawdled on her way to the Press, things might have been different. But she paused to admire the view from the top of the Tumbril Stair, and there was fresh news pasted up along Ink Alley to be read, and a competing penny-wide to be bought and studied by lamplight as she walked along.

  The door to the Press hung open in the crimson moonlight. What fresh vandalism was this? She stepped inside to find someone standing there at the mouth of the hallway.

  “Serafina,” Adelina began, and then realized that it was not her secretary.

  The golem towered over her, a huge construction of wood marked with tiny runes. Rusty stains covered its knobby fists; its eyes were hollow black voids, as big as saucers. Its mouth gaped and a screech of agony emerged, shuddering along her spine.

  She stepped back just in time to avoid the blow. The golem was between her and the street now. She opted for the stairs, pelting upward.

  In the Press doorway, what was that creature? A Sphinx? Unfair to send not one but two assassins, her mind wailed, even as she hurled herself into her office and barred the door before searching through her desk for weapons. Only the little penknife she used to sharpen her quills, given to her by Bella long ago.

  The door would not hold long. She heard the slow, ponderous steps of the golem ascending.

  “Little Human,” came the Sphinx’s voice. “Come out, come out, and we will make it easy for you.”

  Slow steps along the hallway, boards creaking under the strain.

  She scrambled through her thoughts, until a plan came to hand. Desperate, true. But if what Sebastiano had said was correct …

  “Let us negotiate,” she called through the door.

  The Sphinx laughed, though the footsteps stopped. “What shall we negotiate?”

  “I wish to die by your hand, not that thing’s.”

  “How amusingly particular of you. And why should I let you?”

  Because you are vain, Sebastiano told me so. “Because you are a creature of true magic, not some thing made from sorcery.”

  A considering pause. “You are more sensible than anyone might think.”

  Vain, Sebastiano had said. He had spent a good quarter bell lecturing her over dinner on Sphinxes and, amused, she had let him go on to see how long it would last.

  “It’s only a thing,” she called. “Dying to something like that is so ordinary. But to die by your blow after looking my fill at your gloriousness …” Dompri, do not let me spread this butter so thick that I slip on it.

  But the reply was amused and unsuspicious.

  “Very well.”

  With trembling hands, Adelina unlocked the door. The golem would smash through it in only a few blows, buying her little time. Instead, she’d gamble it all.

  Uhviodommu, show me your smile. Trade Gods, I will give you all the proper sacrifices, if you let me live through this to do so.

  She opened the door. The Sphinx’s stench struck her, musk and spice and underlying excitement. The golem stood so close that Adelina could have touched it, and she bit back a scream as its head turned to look at her.

  “Never mind that,” the Sphinx said. “Come closer.”

  Her feet seemed like bricks of lead but she forced them down the corridor towards where the Beast stood, her gaze triumphant and amused.

  “Oh, you are magnificent,” Adelina said. “Why does the College keep you hid so often when surely you are the most marvelous thing they have?”

  The Sphinx preened herself, smiling. “So good to be appreciated,” she murmured. As Adelina reached a few feet away, just out of range of the heavy, sharp-clawed paws, she stopped.

  “Come closer, little Human,” the Sphinx murmured like a sleepy cat. Her claws appeared and disappeared, sliding out of the tips of the paws as she flexed them.

  “Will you grant me this boon?” Adelina said hoarsely. She spread her empty hands. “Let me come close enough to kiss your cheek before I kneel before you to die. Will you give me this gracious boon?”

  No creature could be that vain. But the Sphinx smiled deeper and beckoned to Adelina.

  Hard to force herself into reach of that deadly embrace, but she did so, standing so close she could feel the sun-hot heat radiating from the Sphinx’s hide.

  With one hand, she reached up to touch the creature’s face, looking deep into its eyes …

  While the other groped at her waistband for the penknife there and slashed it across the great vein that throbbed in the massive neck, the size of a Human thumb.

  The hot blood, so warm it almost burned her, poured out, but she tolerated the flood, letting herself be covered in it, cupping her hands to catch a spouting heartbeat’s throb as the Sphinx staggered backward, hearing the steps of the golem behind her.

  Sphinxes destroy magic, Sebastiano repeated in her head. She prayed that her guess was right as she whirled and flung the blood directly at the onrushing golem.

  “Adelina!” Sebastiano, rushing up the stairs too late.

  But no.

  The golem slowed, stopped. Went still.

  Slowly, ponderously, it went to its knees, and then fell forward. The floor shook underfoot, the entire building reverberating with the crash.

  Sebastiano moved forward as cautiously as though he thought the floor might give way underneath him, staring at her.

  “I thought to come save you, but you are clearly adept enough at that, my heart,” he said. He looked down at the golem, then touched his face. “He preserved her with vile magics,” he said sadly. “No wonder my wound would not heal.”

  “Who?” she demanded. “And what was that? And …” She glanced down at herself. “How will I ever get clean of all this?”

  “You’re standing in the midst of a fortune,” Sebastiano said. “We must salvage what we can, else the College will be quite annoyed. As it is, who knows what will happen here, with that much Sphinx’s blood soaked into the floorboards?” He grimaced.

  He eyed his future bride and smiled.

  “Just think of the stories we’ll tell our children about this.”

  CHAPTER 58

  A delina stood watc
hing the docks. A fine Spring morning. Only traces of herringbone clouds overhead, latticed like messenger kites, but the fickle wind might leaden the blue skies at whim.

  One of the Duke’s big expedition ships, the Quarrelsome Gull, readied itself to leave. Crocks of pickled vegetables, each an arm length tall, were hoisted aboard; one slipped through the netting to smash on the planking in a vinegary explosion of white shards and yellow rounds.

  Three carriages rumbled up to disgorge a stream of occupants. The Duke among them, a puppy trailing him on a silver and gilt leash. Also Bella Kanto, her face drawn and thin, dressed in traveling leathers. Several trunks were dislodged from carriage racks and carried aboard by sailors.

  Adelina kept to her spot beside the warehouse door. No one is supposed to mark an exile’s departure, but as long as I don’t rush up wailing, what can he say? She strained her eyes, trying to catch Bella’s expression. Bleak as Winter. Adelina pressed a hand to her heart, trying to quell the ache.

  The Duke saluted Bella with a kiss on the cheek, ceremonial and formal, and then did the same with Ruhua, who led the way aboard, followed by Bella. The Duke saluted again; sailors began the dozens of steps necessary for casting off.

  Oh Bella. When will I see you again? Sebastiano had offered to come with Adelina but she had turned down the suggestion. Eloquence would have scowled with jealousy; Sebastiano merely paused, searching her expression. Not for guilty betrayal. He wants clues how to best comfort me. So she’d kissed him and simply said that she needed to say goodbye alone. He’d be waiting for her now at the chal shop a terrace up.

  As a pair of sailors worked together to withdraw the long plank, the puppy barked, lunged against the chain, and the startled Duke dropped the lead. The silver chain streamed behind the running dog as it sped toward the boat.

  Everyone watched; the dog’s intent was clear, but would it make it? The sailors withdrawing the plank paused to watch, but did not extend the plank back out. Already the ship was moving, pulling away, an arm span, another.

  The dog was so close, so very close, running so fast that the chain was a line in the air. It came to the edge of the dock and jumped from the very edge, hung suspended as everyone held their collective breath …

  And gasped as the dog’s front paws hit the plank’s very end and managed to propel it forward. It lurched for an awkward, off-balance moment, then leaped again and was on the boat, beside Bella. She didn’t touch it, but it huddled against her knees, stared back at the Duke with an almost Human look, defiant.

  The Duke said something, rolled his eyes, made a let her have it, then gesture and turned back to his carriage without waving farewell.

  The Quarrelsome Gull was yards away from the docks now; the great sails puffed and billowed, catching the wind. Adelina stood witness. She stared until she could see the ship no longer against the water’s dazzle, a bright harsh glitter that gave her the excuse for tears.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  For my grandmothers, who thought me odd, but doted on me nonetheless.

  Thank you to the many people who enjoyed and abetted this book, including but by no means restricted to:

  Kate Baker. Dave Butler, M.C.A. Hogarth, Terra LeMay, Sandra Odell, Wayne Rambo, Rebecca Stetoff, Rachel Swirsky, and Sandy Swirsky.

  Thank you to the members and staff of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America, aka SFWA, who were patient whenever I ignored my Presidential duties to hide and write.

  A very special thank you to Kevin J. Anderson, who is a gentleman and a scholar and also a keen editor capable of spotting exactly where a manuscript needs more life. Thank you for writing “yum” in the margins of all the meals.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Among the places in which Cat Rambo’s 200+ published stories have appeared are Asimov’s, Weird Tales, Clarkesworld, and The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, and her work has consistently garnered mentions and appearances in “year’s best of” anthologies. Her collection Eyes like Sky and Coal and Moonlight was an Endeavour Award finalist in 2010 and followed her collaboration with Jeff VanderMeer, The Surgeon’s Tale and Other Stories. Other collections include Near + Far, which contains Nebula-nominated “Five Ways to Fall in Love on Planet Porcelain,” Neither Here Nor There, and Altered America: Steampunk Stories.

  While Seattle-based, Cat often travels in her role as the current President of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA.org). She lives with one spouse, a cat named Taco, and an inordinate amount of books.

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