“Morgan Gidean,” said Browne.
“Morgan Gidean,” I echoed.
“Vic Ramna.”
“Vic Ramna.”
“Faye Berlusconi.”
“Faye Berlusconi.”
“Olan Roddin.”
“Olan Roddin.”
And so we went through every name in the circle.
“Hear us,” we said together. “Our minds to yours. Our lips to your ears. Hear us. Hear us. Our minds to yours. Our lips to your ears. Hear us.” And so on.
As we spoke, I imagined the manor, concentrating on the front main entrance.
Soon, I felt a strange pressure on my mind. At first it was one thin layer of something—it felt like paper—covering my whole head. From the inside. And then, after a few moments, there were little breaks in the paper, pressing in.
It was a disagreeable experience.
That sensation, I realized, was caused by other minds contacting mine. More and more breaks in the paper. I assumed that each break represented one mind, which meant there were going to be roughly seventeen breaks in the paper. The paper protecting my brain.
Really didn’t like the idea of that.
But I kept speaking in time with Browne. I was thoroughly used to the jittery sensation I felt when a spell was successfully cast, but the vibration that developed in my voice and in Browne’s surprised me. The two voices vibrated in unison. That was just weird.
And then images of all the people we were calling crowded into my mind. There were no words for them in the spell to indicate that they were or were not coming, but I could feel a sense of compliance.
Browne stopped speaking and pulled her hand from mine. The images disappeared, and I was suddenly all alone in my head again. And a little dizzy.
“All right.” Browne knelt down and scooped up the moss rolls and salt, dumping them into a small burlap sack. “They’re all coming. Now we have to get those crystals.”
We gathered up all the spoons and the knife and, having nothing in which to carry them, piled them behind a hideous settee. I’d come back for them later.
“We need big bags,” Browne said. “As many as we can find. They have to be strong.”
“Should be some in the cellar.”
“Then let’s go.”
I glanced out the window, surprised to see that the sky was still light. It seemed to me that with all that had happened, it should at least be evening.
I couldn’t wait for this day to be over.
Chapter Twenty-five
When Browne and I returned to the manor, struggling under the weight of potato sacks full of the cave crystals, there was a crowd of people gathered in the inner garden. Fiona was standing on a chair, trying to speak. The muttering of the tenants made it hard to hear her. That was nowhere near a surprise.
They were all holding the implements of their occupations, though. I wondered what they’d thought the reason was for being summoned. They couldn’t have anticipated Fiona’s intentions.
“This is necessary to stop the attacks,” I was able to hear Fiona say.
“You don’t even know if Kent is behind this,” called out the hated voice of the Dowager Duchess. She was there to stir things up. I could expect nothing less. “You just want his estate. Westsea isn’t enough. You just want more and more, and you’re willing to throw the lives of these people away to get it.”
“Of course, that’s not—” Fiona began, but the Dowager ran right over her.
“There have never been any problems in Centerfield. You cared about your tenants there. But you have no trouble causing difficulties for the people here so you can blame Kent in a false justification to take his land.”
I couldn’t see the Dowager, but she certainly had a piercing voice when she wanted.
“I’m not going to try to kill people,” I heard a nearby whaler say. He didn’t shout it, there was no way Fiona or anyone any distance away was going to hear him, but his tone left no doubt about the sincerity of his words. “That’s just stupid. I’ll leave.”
“And go where?” the woman beside him asked. “How many estates serve whalers? Lord Ducal gambles all the profits away. The roads are atrocious. Lady Sky is said to be mad. And then there’s Centerfield.”
“There has to be somewhere that the titleholder isn’t expecting me to shove a harpoon through someone’s stomach.”
He had an excellent point.
“This is a proper mess, isn’t it?” a voice said from behind us.
Browne started and then turned to glare at hulking Yonhap for sneaking up on us.
He was unmoved. “So what are you going to do about this?” he asked.
“This isn’t our responsibility. We’ll wait over there.” She pointed. “We want the casters to meet somewhere discreet. Then we’ll find somewhere to get to work. Her Ladyship doesn’t want the other tenants to know about the crystals.”
We moved to a corner of the manor. This incidentally enabled us to better see Fiona, Taro, a row of footmen, and the Dowager.
And Daris. What was she doing there?
“How much more can you be expected to take?” the Dowager was asking of the crowd. “No Karish has ever demanded this from you. No Karish ever would. He wouldn’t have to. Kent would have never dared to threaten a Karish in this manner.”
I wondered if that could be true. I could understand how it might be. People with long histories in a region were probably thought of as belonging to that region, as much a part of it as the trees, accepted as immoveable objects. A newcomer was weak and more easily blown away.
I really hated it when obnoxious people were right. It felt like it unbalanced the whole world.
I saw Younis, Thatcher, and Netan looking at the crowd curiously before joining us. “What’s going on?” Thatcher asked.
“Her Ladyship has lost her mind,” said Browne.
Well, that was a little blunt.
“Then why are we here?”
“I’m waiting for everyone to get here so I can tell you all at once.”
“That’s Olson,” said Thatcher, looking over the crowd. “And Matt.”
“And Cowell,” Netan added.
“What the hell are they doing here?” Thatcher asked.
“The Kent casters,” Browne reminded me.
That couldn’t be good. “Point them out to me.” They had no business here. They should be removed.
No, not removed. Restrained. We didn’t need them running back to Kent and warning him. Though he might know already. The casters had to be there for a reason.
This was going to end so badly.
“This has nothing to do with you!” someone shouted.
This created a thick silence.
The Dowager flushed a hilarious shade of red, and I realized that last comment had been made by a tenant to the Dowager. That was beautiful.
“You do not address me, you filthy little cretin.”
And there went all of her credibility. She was usually smarter than that.
Then Daris was laughing. If laughter could be said to be clumsy, hers was, stumbling from one pitch to another, stopping for a moment and then starting again. And she was swaying. She looked spectacularly drunk. “You’re all so blind,” she cackled, loudly enough to be heard by everyone. “It was so easy.”
For a few moments, everyone waited for her to continue. She just grinned.
“What was easy, Daris?” Fiona asked.
Daris laughed.
And a few of my memories slid into place. Memories I wanted everyone to know about. “You poisoned the fish,” I called out. “You helped start the fires and impeded those who tried to put them out.” Daris didn’t admit to this, but she didn’t deny it, either. “What did Kent offer you?”
The laughter drained from her face. “More than my own family ever did,” she said darkly.
Everyone started whispering. I didn’t know whether the knowledge that Fiona was being sabotaged by her own sister would win support fr
om her tenants or cause them to believe the whole family was a liability and should just be tossed.
Out of nowhere, a dark cloud developed around two men, little darts of blue light spearing throughout. I wouldn’t have noticed it so quickly if I hadn’t been looking in that direction. What was that?
And those two tenants starting screaming, in fear, and in pain. Those around them drew back quickly, staring in shock as the men scrubbed their arms, torsos and legs, as though trying to scrape something off.
The Kent casters were whispering. No one around them seemed to notice. Or maybe they just didn’t realize that what they were hearings were casts.
“Browne!” I said, hoping she had an effective reaction to this.
“I have no idea,” she responded.
If she had no cast to deal with this, and couldn’t create one on the fly, I had no chance of using a spell myself. I had to think of another way.
The two tenants collapsed, still screaming, and another cloud developed on the other side of the crowd.
More and more clouds began to develop, enough that I could tell when one would appear by a slight warping of the air. I couldn’t hear anything but the horrific screams.
The first two tenants were bleeding from the eyes and ears. It was sickening.
I noticed Taro stepping back sharply, pulling Fiona off the chair and back with him. So when the next cloud appeared, it surrounded only the Dowager. Her screams seemed to be filled with outrage rather than fear.
Taro’s eyes were wide with shock.
Marcus and Cars came out of the manor, no doubt drawn by the screams.
So the thing to do was take the Kent casters down physically. They were all bigger than I, but that didn’t matter. Surprise was a fabulous tool.
I got a whole two steps before Thatcher caught my arm and jerked me to a stop. “Where do you think you’re going?”
I really disliked it when people who had no right to do so thought to put hands on me. “To break their concentration.” And maybe their noses.
“Fine idea,” said Browne. “Cheon, you take Olson. Biden, Matt. Spencer, Cowell. Just bear them to the ground and cover their mouths.”
The three casters ran into the crowd. None of them seemed to hesitate, seemed to realize or care that they might be bringing themselves to the attention of the Kent casters and risking being caught by one of the dark clouds.
Released, I tried to follow. This time, it was Browne who caught my arm. “Stay still.”
“I can’t just do nothing.”
“I’m not telling you to do nothing. I’m telling you not to be stupid.”
I fumed for a moment. I couldn’t do anything with a cast, and I’d been prevented from doing anything physical. What was I supposed to do? Just stand there?
“Can you see any of the other casters?” I asked her. “The ones who put us to sleep?”
“No, but they might not be the only ones he recruited. There’s no telling how many he’s got.”
So, possibly, there were other casters loyal to Kent, in this crowd, or hidden from view on Fiona’s land, or waiting on Kent’s land for some countermeasure from Fiona. And wasn’t this a catastrophe?
How had these casters come up with a spell like this, anyway? How had they known they would be effective? The vision of how they would have developed such spells, how they would have tested them, made my throat clog.
I watched Biden launch himself at the slim young man who’d been identified as Matt. They landed hard. That had to hurt.
I saw Taro yank Marcus back this time, and another black cloud appeared, capturing nothing but air.
Thatcher snuck up behind Olson and caught him by the throat, yanking him right off his feet and slamming him into the ground. Then he covered his mouth with his hand.
And was bitten for his trouble. He quickly pulled his hand away.
Not all of the tenants had run away. A whaler was standing firm, watching Thatcher and Olson. When Thatcher removed his hand, the whaler, expression resolute, thrust her harpoon right through Olson’s eye.
I put my hand over my mouth and averted my gaze as I gagged. I could have been happy spending my whole life without seeing anything like that.
And then I realized that the harpoon had not actually pierced any part of the caster’s person. The whaler had just thrust it into the ground beside the caster’s face. Thank god.
So far, everyone who’d been hit with a cloud had either died or was clearly close to it. There had to be a way to make the deaths quicker.
Or how about stopping their deaths altogether?
The Dowager had collapsed and was trembling on the ground as though suffering a seizure. Taro jumped to her side, kneeling, reaching out.
Marcus pulled him away. I couldn’t hear what either of them said, but they were clearly shouting, Taro struggling to reach his mother, Marcus holding him back. Marcus was taller and larger than Taro. The trader won.
The air before me warped and seemed to whine. I watched Browne remove a crystal from her sack, hold it out, and hum.
The black cloud and the gleam from the crystal didn’t react well to each other. They kind of exploded in my face. I felt no pain but I was blinded for a few moments.
When I could see, all the clouds were gone. The three Kent casters were on the ground. So were a dozen tenants, either twitching or, I assumed, dead. Browne knelt by the nearest, feeling the person’s wrist and leaning far over to put her face next to his. After a moment, she stood and moved on to the next victim.
Taro, finally released by Marcus, was crouching on the ground beside the Dowager, who had finally died. He wasn’t touching her, but he was holding his hand over her face. Not close enough to feel her breath, if she were breathing, or to do anything useful. I wasn’t sure what he was doing. I couldn’t read anything from his face.
She had been the last of his immediate family.
Fiona was going to need to hold another mass funeral. Too many in too short a time. Her run as titleholder had been plagued with disasters. I didn’t blame anyone for feeling the way they did. This was a mess.
Fiona rubbed her face. For a moment, she appeared beaten and weary. Then she firmed her jaw and squared her shoulders, looking around at who remained.
“Farmer Cox,” she called out, and this was the first of a string of names she listed. “Please carry the fallen to the ballroom. Find some people to help you. Cekina.” She looked at her housekeeper. “Make sure family members can see the victims. Bailey, arrange for the Kent casters to be taken to the court room. I’ll trust your judgment concerning their restraints. Dune, take Lady Daris and lock her”—she had to think about that for a moment—“in the small tack room. Lerana,” she said to the whaler. “Take your harpoon to the court room.”
Fiona remained while the others leapt to do as she ordered. She stood there while many of the tenants who had run away crept back. I guessed they hadn’t gone far.
Fiona crossed her arms. “Well?” she challenged them all.
None of the tenants seemed to know what to say. They glanced at each other and grumbled nearly inaudibly. But they tightened their grip on their tools and they didn’t leave.
“Source Karish, Shield Mallorough, Healer Browne, I would appreciate it if you would all come with me.” She strode into the manor.
I went to Taro, who was still kneeling beside the Dowager. I pushed back some of his hair from his temple. “Do you want help carrying her in?”
“No,” he said, his voice flat. “I don’t . . .” He seemed unable to continue.
“I’ll take her in,” Marcus offered.
Taro seemed to think about it for a few moments before nodding.
I patted his shoulder. “I’m going to go see what Fiona wants.”
“No, I’m coming.” He rose to his feet. “Fiona needs us for something. I don’t think she would ask me if it weren’t important.”
“I don’t think Fiona is in a position to consider the feelings of anyone e
lse right now.”
“I have no reason to spend more time with the Dowager dead than I would alive. It’s just her body.”
I didn’t for a moment believe that was what he really felt, but it would be heartless to press him.
I exchanged a look with Marcus before he knelt down to pick up the Dowager’s body. He was gentle with her.
He was a good man.
Taro took my hand and wrapped it around the crook of his arm. I let him lead me back into the manor and through to the court room.
The three casters had been tied onto dining room chairs, backed against each other in a tight triangle. The whaler stood in front of one of them, staring at him as she leaned against her harpoon.
That caster seemed to find her intimidating. I didn’t blame him.
It wasn’t long before Fiona entered the room, heading straight for the Kent casters. She circled them for a few moments, just looking at them. The caster facing me watched her stoically. “Have you ever read the Titleholder List of Authorities?” she asked them. None of them responded. “They say I’m allowed to kill anyone who threatens the lives of my people.”
Ah, another piece of legislation that had outlasted its usefulness. In High Scape, people broke into the homes of the titled all the time, often armed, and when caught it was expected that they would be turned over to the Runners, not killed.
Sometimes it felt like Flown Raven and the surrounding estates hadn’t moved through time with the rest of the world.
But, then again, these people weren’t just trespassers. They had actually killed people. So that made things a little less clear to me. I was just so uncomfortable with the idea of Fiona killing people, intentionally, with a clear head.
“I’m sure you know,” Fiona continued, “that execution is the usual punishment for murder. But I am the magistrate in these parts. I can sentence you any way I wish. I could put you in the deepest hole I can have dug out. A hole too deep to climb out of. A hole too narrow to lie down in. Or even sit in. You would only be able to stand, no matter how exhausted you got. And I would never let you out. I would have food dropped in on you every other day or so and you would stand there and soil yourself and eventually go mad.”
Heroes at Odds Page 30