The Spirit Lens

by Carol Berg

  The mage’s precaution to ensure his passage served well, as the verger shot the bolt once we were inside. Easy to see why. A thousand lamps hung from the age-mottled ceiling—lamps small and large, wrought of silver and gold, ancient lamps of the simplest design, others intricately wrought, etched, filigreed, or set with gems and jewel-hued glass. The Revelation of the Veil taught us that families could speed an ancestor’s progress through Ixtador’s Ten Gates only by honor and righteous living, not with material offerings. That was a difficult teaching for those who believed gold and jewels could buy anything.

  Only a few of the lamps were lit, just enough to illumine our way across the foyer and through the circles of stone benches that surrounded a display of sand, miniature gates, and glazed water bowls. From the Chamber of Contemplation wide marble steps descended into a maze of polished walls etched with the names of the dead who had passed through this house.

  Rather than continuing down a second stair to visit the Chamber of the Dead, where those brought to the deadhouse were washed and wrapped to lie in peace until their funeral rites, or to the tessilactory, where craftsmen shaped the stone artifacts to be sanctified at those rites, the verger led me down a side passage to a reading room. Built to exact dimensions, two and a half metres in height, width, and length, the close little chamber reeked of incense and scented soap from the verger’s purification.

  Already my head throbbed unmercifully. Incense forever induced the headaches that had plagued me since the explosive ending of my magical studies—the day I confronted my father with the truth of my failure and reaped the whirlwind.

  Rinaldo scribed my father’s full name on his slate and lit three-and-fifty candles, one for each year of my father’s life. We sat cross-legged on either side of the loaf-sized altar stone, and I laid out the smoothed shape of red jasper and its matching spall—the little wedge chipped from the tessila on my father’s funeral day.

  “Now why do you believe you have profaned your father’s memory?” asked the verger kindly.

  “In passion and duty resulting from a recent temple reading . . .” I recounted my braid of lies yet again, feeling vaguely guilty and vaguely heretical—and decidedly foolish for such emotions. My beliefs about Ixtador and its perilous gates had been uncertain for many years. Yes, I kept my altar and carried a spall pouch and judged my every deed as to its efficacy for my honored dead. But extensive reading had brought me to view the Revelation as merely a historically necessary call to reformation after the Blood Wars. Now the spyglass vision had wholly confused my beliefs.

  A gentle man, Rinaldo did not condemn me for my “dutiful zeal,” but counseled me to leave the tessila in its proper place on my home altar next time I needed to grovel before the king and to carry only the unsanctified spall as a reminder of my family duty. “Let us step through the resanctifi cation first. Then I’ll attempt to assess your father’s progress.”

  “Many thanks, Verger.”

  He raised his hands in supplication. “Holy angels, messengers of Heaven, bear my petition for hearing and grace to sanctify this memorial of Onfroi Guillame de Savin-Duplais. . . .”

  As the verger recited the lengthy prayers and blessings required to purge the tessila of profanation, he poured and drank a thimble-cup of thick red liquid and lit the dish of herbs that sat on the altar beside the tessila and spall. I tried not to fidget as I imagined Dante slipping through the enspelled door lock and seeking out the mule’s corpse. I tried not to breathe as the vapors roiled my stomach, and sharp-edged visions of curved swords and smoking battlefields etched themselves into my pounding head.

  Just after the palace bells clanged the quarter hour, Rinaldo lapsed into the trancelike state of a reader probing the mysteries of Ixtador. I shook off my own drowsy half dreams, retrieved a pinch of sleeping herbs from my spall pouch, and dropped it into the smoldering dish. Rinaldo’s trance state would be a bit deeper than usual and last for at least half an hour. I rose quietly and sped down the passage and the lower stair into the Chamber of the Dead.

  Ranks of blocklike catafalques stood like some morbid army, silhouetted against the deeper blackness of the frigid chamber. Few were occupied. The soft white gleam from Dante’s staff directed me to our quarry, a plain bier in a corner roped off for the unsanctified—suicides, felons, blasphemers, and mules.

  As my mind encompassed the obscenity laid out on the stone slab, sin and grief took on new meanings for which my sheltered existence could not have prepared me. The bruised, lacerated body that lay amid the tousled grave wraps belonged to a once-fair girl of no more than sixteen summers. Scars defiled every portion of her pale skin, their number and varied age witnessing to years, not months, of torment. Even did the sorcerer extract but a thimbleful at each bleeding, a body could not replenish so much in any shorter span. Worse yet, life and mystery knotted so tightly that each wound screamed from my own flesh. For I knew her. Ophelie . . .

  “The leech is expert,” said Dante, his finger tapping the ranks of pale scars along the girl’s arm and those on her neck, exposed when someone had hacked her dulled hair to a knucklebone’s length. “Clean. Precise. Methodical. But I believe the mule began by bleeding herself. These oldest cuts on her thighs are ragged and tentative. And this”—he exposed the ugly red ruin of her left hand, where her family mark would be—“the mutilation of her identity was done quite recently.” He dropped the flaccid limb onto the stone slab. “The body’s keirna reveals—”

  “She is not just a body, not just a mule,” I blurted harshly, throttling a rising anger.

  I could not but glimpse the flash of golden hair in the lamplight of the Seravain library, hear her spritely laughter in the company of her friends. I disliked children and resented when the younger students invaded my library. But the age of fourteen saw some become tolerable, especially the brightest minds as they began to comprehend the true dimensions of the world, the wonders that lay in life, in books, in magic. . . .

  “Her name was Ophelie de Marangel,” I said, “a diligent student, intelligent and insightful. Three or four years ago, she stood on the verge of dismissal, incapable of spellwork. Then, as happens from time to time, she all at once broke through that . . . barrier.” The barrier that separates those who reach for power and find magic in their grasp from those who reach, but find their palms empty.

  I could still hear Ophelie’s desperation when she had come to me in confidence, begging me for some volume that might open the gates of magical understanding. I’d had to tell her no such work had ever been written. I had rejoiced to learn of her awakening. But evidently her palms had gripped a lancet and no true power at all. Self transference—reinfusing her own blood to fuel her magic. Only a child’s perverse reasoning would judge slow death a sensible exchange for magic. And then, what? What villain, what filth, what maggot-souled fiend had discovered Ophelie’s secret sin and taken up the task?

  Dante glanced up from his examination of a small wound beneath her breastbone. “You discovered so much from a guardsman?”

  I shook my head, unable to remove my eyes from the translucent skin stretched over her fine bones like gossamer sails on a master-wrought ship. She could have no flesh beneath that skin. With purpose and without mercy, a sorcerer had bled her dry.

  A fury woke in me, hardening into certainty of purpose. “I knew her at Seravain. Last year, not long after passing her second adept’s testing, we heard she fell ill and was sent back to her family in Challyat. She never returned to school.” I inhaled the blended reeks of lamp oil, incense, and dead flesh, scribing the sight and stink upon my memory with the indelible medium of outrage. “The temple guardsman knew only that a knight found a dead girl at the base of the orchard wall with a dagger in her gut. The Guard Royale assumed she had climbed the outer wall in an attempt to breach the palace precincts and attack the king, but lost her grip and fell on her own weapon.”

  “Unlikely.” Dante uncurled her hand, and I quickly averted my eyes. The girl’s finge
rs were little more than ragged, blood-crusted stubs. “She’d never have topped any wall with hands like these. More likely she was trying to get out of the palace precincts.”

  “Why would anyone do that to her?” I said, swallowing hard. “Was stealing her blood not cruel enough?” What could be more dreadful than watching your own blood stolen drop by drop, knowing that your soul must eventually drain away with it?

  “Identification,” said the mage, crouching beside the bier, touching each torn stub in turn, using a small blade to scrape dried blood into a glass vial. I could not bear to watch. “We leave a trace of ourselves on every spell we work.”

  “And the Bardeu test on her fingers might reveal it,” I murmured. The old formula purported to link a sorcerer and a worked spell, though I had never seen it work successfully.

  “There are surer ways, but yes. Not only did our knaves leech her blood to empower magic, but I’d also guess they induced her to work some spell they wanted, just as they forced the assassin to shoot the arrow at the king. But they didn’t want her work identified, which tells me that they expected someone to be analyzing her spells.” He glanced up, his eyes dark pits in the gloom. “Remember the coming violence I spoke of? Odds on, she was to be a part of it.”

  “We should take these despicable mages down,” I snapped. “Have them arrested right now.”

  “Without knowing what spells she’s worked? Without knowing if a trap is already in place?” Dante slipped around the end of the catafalque, cut off a snippet of the girl’s hair, and moved on to examine her right hand. “The actual removal of her fingers occurred a tennight or more past, which suggests her work was complete. This fresh damage comes from her attempt to climb the wall. If we cannot establish a connection between the queen’s mages and either one of the mules, the Camarilla could as easily blame this on me.”

  Certainly the miscreants must be terrified at the girl’s exposure. The discovery of a second mule would warn the king of a coming attempt. And if someone recognized the girl, the lie about her “illness” could be traced to an accomplice at Seravain. I’d have wagered my life that Ophelie’s family believed her still at the collegia, too busy with her studies to write.

  “I’ll find the connection,” I said, skin and soul ablaze. Fifty days yet remained until the anniversary of Prince Desmond’s death. “Now, will you stop touching her? It’s unseemly.”

  Ignoring my protest, the frowning mage again palpated the knife wound beneath her breast. Though she had not been washed, little blood and only a small bruise marked the hole.

  “This guardsman’s story makes no sense,” he said, looking up at me. “How could she have a knife? She’d no strength to disable a jailer. She’d have been desperate to escape and would never have taken time to hunt a weapon she could not wield. As she could not climb, she could not have fallen on it by accident. Even the placement of the wound is odd. So precise. How likely is it to ‘fall on a knife’ in the exact spot and at the exact angle to instantly stop the heart?”

  “But her captors didn’t kill her. You said Gaetana was upset at her exposure. They’d never have abandoned her corpse where she could be found.”

  Dante tapped the deadly puncture. “Find me the weapon that did this. Its keirna will tell us—”

  From beyond the silent stairs and chambers behind us a clanging bell broke the silence, and a resounding thud signaled the opening of the great bronze door. “Verger Rinaldo?” bellowed a man’s voice. “Would a bit of light be too much to ask in a house of the dead? Bring that torch, Jacard. The rest of you, wait here.” Heavy footsteps echoed through the upper chambers.

  “Sainted bones,” I whispered. “I’ve got to get back.”

  Abandoning Dante to tuck the coarse grave cloth about Ophelie, I pelted through the aisles and crept up the lower stair. The last of the hanging lamps were sputtering, as I threaded the maze of Chamber of Remembrance and dodged down the side passage into the reading room.

  The verger had not moved. I dropped to the kneeling cushion opposite him just as heavy boots crossed the vestibule.

  “We require Verger Rinaldo,” snapped the elderly gentleman who filled the reading room doorway. The egg-sized emerald that fastened his black velvet cloak, the high starched ruff, and a heavy pectoral chain, carrying an amulet of woven silver and amber, testified to his exalted station.

  “Pardon, lord,” I whispered. “We are engaged in a reading.”

  “I don’t care about your reading!” he bellowed. “My wife lies profaned!”

  Wife!

  Rinaldo’s shoulders jerked. The verger pressed his fingers to his eyes before staring across at me and then up to the newcomer. Dazed, he wobbled to his feet. “Conte Bianci . . .”

  The name quickly erased my shock. My valet had spoken of a newly deceased waiting woman.

  “Verger, is it true that a corrupt corpus lies in your deadhouse alongside my wife?”

  “Indeed not,” said the verger, his back stiff and his eyes clearing. “That is, a corrupted body lies in the house, but we provide separate accommodation for the unsanctified. No harm shall come to your lamented lady.”

  “I’ll not have it. Corrupt dead are to the Souleater’s minions as honey to flies. Rid this house of the unsanctified, or I shall carry my wife to the Temple Major in my arms. The tetrarchs will strip you of your office. You’ll be washing bodies and scrubbing floors.”

  “Come, come, good lord . . .”

  Dante had been right to press for a quick viewing. Saints grant, this uproar might cover his departure. There was no outside exit from the Chamber of the Dead.

  Those hopes died quickly. The verger swept his arms toward the doorway. “Let us set your mind at rest. You’ll see that every care has been taken. Grief must not spur haste.”

  As the conte stepped out, mumbling sentiments to the effect that proximity less than the moon’s distance would be too close, Rinaldo laid a hand on my shoulder. “Pardon this unfortunate interruption, Sonjeur de Duplais,” he whispered. “Were it anyone but a man who’s lost his wife of nine-and-forty years, I’d send him packing. In any case, your father’s reading seemed dreadfully confused. Come back another time, and we’ll try again.”

  A slender, sharp-featured young man in adept’s robes lit the passage with a jeweled lamp. My blessing words trailed after the verger, as he, the conte, and the adept swept out. I scooped up my tessila and spall and hurried after, willing Dante to be up the stairs and out of the deadhouse before the conte reached the lower chamber. We must not have our interest—or our confederacy—exposed.

  “Adept Jacard, would you please tend the stairway lamps?” asked Verger Rinaldo, gesturing the conte to wait before descending into the dark. As I held quiet at the end of the passage, the nimble young man used the verger’s long-handled brass taper to light a good third of the hanging lamps over the downward stair. Blast! No one would pass beneath them unseen.

  Cursing Dante for leaving the entry door unlatched, I climbed the upward stair. I was nearing the main level when a clamor broke out both from above and below me. Conte Bianci shouted unintelligibly from below, while from the direction of the foyer, a ferocious baritone intoned, “Portier de Duplais, show yourself, you talentless maggot!”

  I raced upward, unable to mistake Dante’s resonant tones. A handful of gentlemen cowered in front of the entry doors.

  The mage stood in the center of the foyer, his staff belching flames and a thundering noise that rattled the hanging lamps and set them swaying, chains and pendants jangling as in a whirlwind. “Where is my servant?” he bellowed.

  As my mouth opened and closed soundlessly, the mumbling conte boiled up the stair behind me. “Burn that cursed mule tonight, Verger!”

  As if propelled forward by the nobleman’s wrath, I stumbled into the foyer, straight into Dante’s glare. “There you are, insect!”

  The conte’s party halted at my back. “What in the infernal depths—?”

  “Did I give you permissi
on to pursue your own activities, apprentice?” Dante’s visage pulsed the purpled black of a stormy sunset. “Floors un-swept. Materials scattered. Accounts incomplete. Never . . . never . . . do you take it upon yourself to decide when to come or go. Return to my chambers and finish your work or I’ll encase your feet in lead before the next sunrise.”

  He reversed direction and waved his flaming staff at the oaken entry doors. One of them flew open, crashing against the wall as if a battering ram had struck it. At least ten nearby lamps smashed into the tiled floor, sending the cringing gentlemen attendants scurrying to Conte Bianci’s side. The sharp features of Bianci’s adept glazed with awe. Mine likely did, as well.

  As the mage swept into the thorny garden, one scheme, then another, careened through my head. For better or worse, I was left with the span of a moment to set my course. I had best trust my original plan.

  I folded my arms around myself and set my shoulders shivering. “Witness, great lord, holy verger, good gentlemen,” I said with appropriately trembling voice, “that I resign my commission as Master Dante’s apprentice as of this hour. Should I fail to survive the night, I beg you invoke the Camarilla to avenge this affront.”

  As the white flames vanished beyond the hedges, I tucked my chin into my chest and fled, leaving the gentlemen attendants jabbering like magpies and young Adept Jacard laughing.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  12 QAT 49 DAYS UNTIL THE ANNIVERSARY

  On the next morning, Lord Ilario perched atop a waist-high wall in a private courtyard, feet dangling in the yellow wall fllowers. His mouth gaped with a horror grown throughout my recounting of the deadhouse venture.

  “Honestly, lord chevalier, the venture itself could not have worked out better,” I said, attempting to ease his concern before he toppled backward into the fishpond. “Damoselle Maura placated Dante by assuring him that she would have me fetch his books from Seravain until she could assign him a new assistant. Then she offered me the position as your secretary, as we’ve planned all along.”