by Jordan Reece
“Could Tallo have been angry enough to seek revenge upon you?” Scoth asked.
Soberly, Kyrad said, “I want to think better of him, but yes, I could see him feeling spitefully towards me. It would be easier for him to be angry than to reconcile his own imbalances.”
“How would he hurt you, if he could?”
“Tell naughty stories, I venture, of the time we spent together. Tell everyone about the insatiable older woman and her many young escorts. But what audience this would find is not large. I am not so well known by the populace of Ainscote that many would care what I do and whom I do it with. And since what I do is hardly scandalous, and whom I do it with are adults who give their consent, I can’t see these stories being of much note. And it’s no secret in Rosendrie what I do, but when I give such hefty donations to the schools and city hall and the fire department and the widows-and-orphans charity and plenty more . . . well, let’s just say that people will overlook almost anything when you are giving them money.”
Carefully, Jesco drank from his bottle of fizzy drink. Kyrad was a keen observer and said, “You did not let that touch your lips or tongue.” Realization instantly glimmered in her eyes. “You are a seer, are you not? Yes? Could I offer you some object to prove my innocence?”
Surprised, Jesco looked at Scoth. The detective had not expected this turn in conversation. “I do not know that it is necessary at this time-” Scoth said.
She cut him off. “I have told you all that I can about Tallo Quay, and I would like to not be suspected in the murder of that other man. Let’s cut straight to the quick of this and have it be done. There must be something of mine that would show a seer that I have spoken nothing but the truth. Clothing? I was in bed at the time of this murder . . . does it matter if they have been washed since then? Could you touch my blankets or pillow?”
Scoth raised his eyebrows at Jesco. It was his decision. Gesturing to Kyrad’s hand, Jesco said, “Do you have pieces of jewelry that you always wear?”
She extended her hand. The ring on her smallest finger was too tight, and wholly unlike the finer pieces she wore. It was a plain silver band with a dull blue rock caught in the clasps. “This one was my grandmother’s, and she gave it to my mother. Then my mother gave it to me. It’s only ever fit upon my small finger, and lately, it’s grown too tight even for that. I can’t get it off and should so that I can have it resized. But you mustn’t think I have put it on to hoodwink you.” She tugged at it hard to demonstrate. The ring did not budge.
“I would be able to tell if you had,” Jesco said. This old ring would lay him low with all its history, but it would have the answers.
“And I must have reassurance that this will be private, should you see business matters. I am aboveboard, more or less, but there are still things that would not be advantageous for everyone to know about.”
“Your business matters are not of interest to this investigation,” Scoth said. “We’re only here concerning Hasten Jibb.”
“I can nudge the thrall to more relevant matters,” Jesco said. “Scoth, would you be willing to get my wheelchair from the carriage?”
“For after your thrall,” Kyrad said, and gestured to two of her escorts. They came over and she instructed them to bring the chair inside.
“You are well-versed in seersight,” Jesco commented.
“I was not educated much in childhood; I remedied that condition as soon as it was possible after my marriage. I couldn’t bear to have my ignorance be a permanent condition.” Kyrad winced at her ring. “I pity you for what you are about to see. Nudge away from my bedchamber as much as you can.”
Jesco did not need to touch the ring to be certain that this woman was innocent. But his feelings were not evidence. Moving his fizzy drink to the far side of the table in case he collapsed, he scooted to the edge of the sofa and removed his glove. Kyrad splayed out her fingers so that he would not bump any of the bejeweled rings. The friendly hubbub in the room was stilling as the escorts gleaned that something different was going on.
Thunder rumbled over the house. The storm had not spent itself in full, and the light out the windows was dimming. Jesco pressed his finger to the ring.
-he was-
-he was-
-she was-
-she was watching him die—
She was sitting upon a hard wooden chair beside the bed, and he was taking his last breaths. The only color in him was in the bright red of his hair, what of it hadn’t gone gray. Mine dropsy, she had known it was mine dropsy when he started to cough months ago. She hadn’t needed the doctor to confirm it.
Twenty years and five children and he was still a stranger . . . that woman had taken the best of him and the strumpet had had the nerve to show up on the doorstep, begging to be let in to say goodbye. Goodbye from her and goodbye from their son . . . he had fathered a son upon her and the boy was a redheaded, sniveling creature born of betrayal upon her hip . . . much too old to be carried, much too old to be sniveling, she would have slapped her children for sniveling at his age . . .
Jesco was looking at Kyrad’s grandparents. The man upon the bed was taking rattling breaths, each at a longer and longer distance from one another. The woman was named Amena, and she was watching him. Her mind drifted to her long-dead grandmother, who could remember a time when this land was without mines. Scant memories, since she had been small, but she remembered the golden fields of wheat belonging to their family, and how her lunch pail was full on the flowery walk to the schoolhouse. It was all a dream to Amena.
Rattle, rattle, rattle. He had stood so tall and proud once, and now he was a shriveled husk under the blanket. There were footsteps in the hallway belonging to the children . . . Faugnas and Alastasia were arguing in whispers about that woman since she had come back . . . Alastasia wanted to be merciful and Faugnas did not . . . Faugnas understood that the cuts of meat on his plate had been thinner over the last years for the money going to that woman and her child . . .
This had all happened long in the past. None of it had anything to do with the case at hand, and Jesco pushed away from it. Amena’s memories pushed back, demanding their due, and there was so much of her in this ring . . . at the funeral when that woman dared to show with her ill-begotten brat, the vicious slap Amena delivered to the gasps of the mourners and the boy wailing like he was two and not six or seven . . . at the weddings of Faugnas and Silvestre where she stood proud . . . at the home of Alastasia in a heated argument, the daughter defiant that the sniveling brat was her half-brother and now he was a man and Amena could not dictate who entered Alastasia’s own house . . .
But Amena did not have to enter it again.
She had meant to give the ring to Alastasia as her elder daughter, but it passed to the younger in Livina. Sweet but silly, her daughter Livina, yet Amena preferred her now. It moved from hand to hand and he was-
-he was-
-she was-
-she was—
Livina was getting out! Out from this dirty air, away from these dirty people and dirty mines, oh, she was going to the city! Where every day was a festival and the shops never closed . . . Mama was not happy that she was leaving, but Livina was so happy to get away from the tide of anger washing from wall to wall in their tiny house . . . some man is going to get you in trouble in Cantercaster and don’t think you can come back here . . .
The train stopped at Vellen Station and she stepped out and into her future. Time skipped, since Livina did not always wear the ring. Her job at the slaughterhouse forbade jewelry, so she only wore it now and then on her days off. The city was not all that she had thought it would be but there was Colton, her brooding poet who wrote such fearfully dark verses and always looked so far beyond where anyone else could see . . .
When Jesco saw her next, her face was tight. Colton had blown away with the wind, but he had left something behind in Livina’s belly. She would not take drake root to rid herself of it. He would come back . . . oh, he would come back and se
e her with their beautiful child and the darkness in him would turn to light . . . then she was standing before the door of that cramped house she had been so thrilled to leave and her mother was staring silently at her and the baby . . . Mama was going to send her away and then she and Beri had nothing . . . was he married . . . no, Mama . . . may as well come in . . .
The sting of relief through Livina pierced the ring and left its mark, and pierced into Jesco and left a mark upon him as well. Relief to have a home, gratitude to be forgiven . . . Mama was a harsh and angry woman but she took in Livina and when Mama held Beri, when she dandled him upon her knee, something had grown softer in her. She was not as Livina remembered . . .
He pushed. Livina married a miner who raised her son as his own and gave her two redheaded daughters . . . Kyrad grew up in front of the ring and he sped it along until she was a young woman in a nightdress before a bathroom mirror . . . in disgust to climb into bed with that old man . . . he grunted and slobbered and snored but it was a trade, life was a trade, and she would trade on this so her back didn’t break in the mines and the dropsy didn’t take her . . . he was in poor health and not going to live more than a year and after that, after that she was free and she would never chain herself and her fortune to a man . . . how she loathed chains . . .
They hated her.
They wanted to take Naphates Mines away from her . . . not the role of a woman, a widow, just sell to us, sell and live in prosperity, buy wardrobes full of pretty dresses and let us do the dirty work . . . They came to her, one man after another with their fists already closing over her business but only to leave empty-handed. She would not sell so they pushed their sons at her . . . so young, so beautiful, so alone, so naïve . . . in the conviction that through marriage they could gain what she would not give.
But they were her damn mines now.
The boys, she loved her boys, she took in a girl here and there and loved that too, there was Jasper, Yannis, Stansen, Gorman, Hylo, Sulla, Ames, Tallo . . . Jesco experienced the giving of the timepiece from her perspective and she was smiling but filled with annoyance at this bratty man-child who would not face his reality like she once had . . .
She had no respect for that.
She was sick in bed and they came to her in ones and twos to keep her company. To read the news, to tell jokes, to warm away the chills . . . Jesco nudged and nudged to center himself at this period of time, but it held nothing more than what she had told them. While Hasten Jibb was being murdered, Kyrad Naphates was sniffling and coughing as the escort minding her for that night brought in medication and stayed at her side. It was the woman at the billiards table, who was named Rallie and she was one of the sweet ones . . . not sweet as was her job but genuinely sweethearted . . . tell me what you’d like to do that you never have been able to . . . I want to see the ocean . . . you’ve never been? Not ever? . . . All she wanted was the sea and Kyrad loved her all the more for it. They’d go in early summer, the two of them and a handful of the boys, rent out the top floor of . . .
Jesco pushed away from the scene, which was intimate though not sexual. There was no trace of Hasten Jibb anywhere within Kyrad’s ring, not his face, not his name, nothing at all. Jesco turned to the courier company but neither was there Ragano & Wemill here. She used a different service.
He was growing weary of trying to keep his focus, overwhelmed with Amena and Livina still clamoring in the background, there were beds and babies and parties and boardrooms and illnesses and dinners and there was that sniveling, redheaded brat with his mouth wide open in a shriek to see his mother slapped . . . there was Mama stepping aside to let Livina and Beri enter . . . Mama, I made such a mistake never mind that what is his name? Beri? Beri after my father? Oh, Livina! Let me hold him . . . there was handsome Vangelis with his cuffs and paddle and Kyrad had waited all day in those dull financial meetings to enjoy this . . .
. . . angels above, was she going to enjoy this . . .
. . . she had been a very bad girl . . .
He took his hand away from the ring and went limp. They were waiting for him, Kyrad and Scoth and two of the escorts, and he collapsed with a flurry of hands shooting out to break his fall.
“There is nothing for us here,” he said to Scoth, and blacked out.
Chapter Seven
He came to in the carriage. A drumbeat of rain was striking the roof, and a heavy and furious torrent was obliterating the world through the window. It was evening. The carriage shuddered in the wind, and no wind until now had been strong enough to do that. Jesco was Kyrad was Amena was Taniel and all of them quaked with the rocking of the carriage.
A man was sitting beside the wheelchair. Worry had folded his brow into two parallel tracks. His hair was wet and flat and Jesco stared at the detective, who he had never seen before in such disarray. A panel was lying on the seat, and a light flashed red above the buttons along the wall.
“It’s not her,” Jesco mumbled, his words coming out mashed. He was looking at the world sideways with his head bent. His neck could sway from side to side, but not hold up his head. The thrall had left him limp.
“I know,” Scoth said. “I knew that before you touched the ring. A guilty party would not have been so swift to offer herself to a seer. We just needed the proof.”
Home. Jesco had heard Scoth repeating home as his senses were returning. Home. Destination home. But what came out of his mouth was his previous remark, his brain looping upon it. “It’s not her.”
“I know, Jesco,” Scoth said, and hearing his first name broke the loop.
“Tallo . . .”
“Yes. The next step is to track down Tallo Quay of Ipsin.”
“Home . . . why were you saying home?”
The carriage swayed violently in the wind. Scoth kept his voice calm, but there was growing panic in his eyes. “The storm is getting vicious. It isn’t safe to travel. My home is much closer than the asylum, so I changed the autohorse’s destination.”
Jesco slipped into a whirling confusion of memories that were not his. The star shining in his mind’s eye was stormed and he was drowning within hundreds of individual histories. Then he saw Rafonse among them, and that was Jesco’s own history. He launched himself at the towering bear of a man just as he had done as a boy. The friendliest fellow in the world, that had been Rafonse, and his arms closed over Jesco’s back as the big man roared his welcome. There were a great many bones in the human body, but not one of Rafonse’s bore a scintilla of meanness or spite. He was not a handsome fellow to the objective eye, but five minutes in his company and he became radiant.
Isena was quieter in her greeting, but her husband’s joy always seeped into everyone around him and she was no different. Jesco was firmly in his own memories now, and he walked with them down the lane away from the asylum. He was twelve, giddy with excitement, and in his room were his brand new whirly-gig and tool case that they had given him for his birthday. There was a street fair several blocks away and they were going to buy a poof of pink cloud candy wrapped upon a white stick . . . listen to the music and wander through the shops . . . his brothers hated him but Rafonse was his brother-in-law, his new brother, and he liked Jesco just fine . . .
The carriage. Home. Scoth. The memories receded and Jesco said, “Your hair is a mess.”
“You aren’t looking so put together yourself,” Scoth said. Some time had passed since they last spoke. It was dark outside the window and the detective no longer looked so alarmed. The storm had not abated in the slightest, but the autohorse was slowing. They had arrived at Scoth’s home.
Little of it could be seen through the window save a tall, shadowy structure. The horse stopped and Scoth got out. Light blossomed within the doorway and he returned to the carriage. For a moment, he stared at Jesco and the chair in puzzlement. Then he retreated and came back with boards, which he leaned from the ground up to the open door of the carriage. Turning Jesco to face away from the house, he rolled the chair to the top of the bo
ards and lifted it onto them. Then he rolled Jesco down to the ground and pushed him into the house. The bags were deposited beside him. Pulling out the planks, Scoth closed the door and ordered the autohorse to go to the stables with the carriage.
Jesco could only see his legs beside an umbrella stand. The chair turned and went forward. “Where . . .” he muttered, losing the strength to even keep his eyes open.
“I’ll set you up in the spare bedroom,” Scoth said.
“I can’t touch the sheets. You have to make it up with the things in my bag.”
“All right.”
“But you can’t touch them.”
The wheelchair stopped and Scoth said, “How am I to make the bed?”
“You have to make it with your hands covered.”
Scoth muttered a stream of vile oaths. Some time later, Jesco was lifted from the chair. His head tilted and his cheek touched a cool, smooth fabric.
-he was-
-he was-
-he was Laeric—
He was walking into The Seven Temptations and there was Collier . . .
Jesco was laid in the bed and the thrall ceased. “You know Collier. So do I.”
“How did you . . .” Scoth swore again and said crossly, “Get out of my mind.”
That was the last Jesco knew until morning, when he opened his eyes to a strange bedroom. It did not look like it had been intended in its construction to become a bedroom at all. The ceiling was high and the windows along the wall behind the bed were massive, filling the room with a weary gray light. Bookcases stood tall along the walls, crammed with books from end to end. Even more books and sheaves of paper were laid atop the uneven rows.
Jesco’s suitcase was beside the bed, as was his wheelchair. It was quiet outside of his room, and he assumed that Scoth was still sleeping. Rain pattered down and streaked the windows. He shifted in the bed and was startled that he could shift. It had been an intense thrall; however, he had not worn himself out in the days beforehand. His recovery would not take long, and the thrall from Scoth had been exceedingly small. His arms felt weak but he could move them with relative ease; his legs felt weaker but he could flex his toes and make tiny kicks. Control of his bladder had stayed with him, yet it was not going to remain that way if he didn’t find a lavatory. He recalled that he had packed for disaster, and he got hold of his suitcase to take care of the problem. Tucking the soaked pad into a bag and tying the handles, he set it down and dozed.