Rarentz wore a sour expression as he and Tashan stepped from the manor’s short entry hall into the chandelier’s glow. Noticing me on the stairs, however, he brightened, bursting into full, honest laughter.
I halted, checking my outfit. Certainly it was unconventional, but not outrageously so.
“What?” I said sharply enough to be heard over his guffaws.
“Nothing!” He stifled his outburst. “I’m sorry, that’s just not at all what I was expecting.”
I looked down at myself again. They were work clothes, but they were still good quality—exceptionally good quality. They also didn’t look like they’d ever seen a day of real work, and if they had, they’d been thoroughly scrubbed.
“I needed something that let me move around, not a dress for the opera. This works fine.”
“It looks fine.” He lifted his hands, apologizing. “It just surprised me.”
Tashan’s eyes had been working, looking me over, then Rarentz. “They’re his,” he said flatly.
Rarentz looked back at the Pathfinder with a surprised smile, but didn’t say anything.
“What?” I wasn’t sure if I’d heard correctly.
“All the lords in this country, they get old, they start looking like jugs of wine. So I doubt they belong to the master of the house.” He gestured, tracing Rarentz’s outline as if measuring. “But they’re about his size, I’d say.”
Rarentz gave an awkward chuckle. “You have a good eye for this.”
“My father was a tailor.” Tashan grinned. “I know something about fabrics.”
“I’m sure I can find something else,” I said, backing up a stair. Somehow it had felt less awkward wearing a stranger’s clothes than those of someone I’d just met. I’d turned back up the steps before it struck me. “Hold on. Why are your clothes in the master bedroom?”
With another chuckle, Rarentz awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck. “Well … it is my bedroom.”
A moment passed in silence.
“You’re not just tending this house,” Tashan said.
“No and yes,” Rarentz said. “My family’s been trying to sell our townhome for years. The trouble is, no one’s buying. It was only supposed to be for a few months, but I’ve been keeping an eye on the place for almost three years now.”
“Then you’re Lord Troidais?” Tashan sounded skeptical.
“Really, that’s my father.”
“But you’re still a nobleman,” I said. “I thought you were in Miss Kindler’s employ.”
“Yes, well … that’s a new development. She helped get me out of a tricky spot, so now I make sure her hedges stay trimmed and no one bothers her. I figure it’s better than staying locked up here by myself or spending money I don’t have.” Open palms patted the air, trying to end the discussion. “So please, keep the clothes. To be perfectly honest, they’re just what I wore whenever I had to muck out the stable.”
It didn’t really make me more comfortable, but what other choice did I have? I nodded my thanks and came the rest of the way down the steps. “What were you ever doing mucking horse stalls?”
“Oh, it’s been a long time since my family had anyone to do our chores for us,” he said with an easy shrug. “Our name might be noble, but the money’s long gone.”
He sounded remarkably reasonable about a situation that would have driven most of Caliphas’s nobles past the brink. For a moment I felt sorry for him, but from the embarrassment coloring his cheeks, it seemed like he honestly didn’t care.
I glanced down the empty entry hall, then to Tashan. “Where’s Larsa?”
“She left,” he said.
“Where’d she go?”
“Someplace called White Corner.” Reading my expression, Tashan added, “She said not to follow.”
“Why? What’s there?” I sounded angrier than I meant to. Larsa had always had her own reasons for coming to Ardis, but I was still offended. I hadn’t just traveled half the length of the country to stand by the wayside while she hunted down a killer.
“It’s where the gutters dump the lowest of the low,” Rarentz said. “She wanted to know where the city’s criminals collect. I told her there. She went off after whoever she’s looking for.”
“And you just let her go?”
Tashan’s steady gaze made me realize how ludicrous that sounded. I should have expected this. Her desire to hunt down this creature had been her only objective since Caliphas. Even the prospect of meeting her own mother never seemed to interest her. This had always been about finding her target.
I’d come with her mostly because I thought I could help. Secretly, I’d thought maybe the goddess led me to Larsa. That she wanted me to help put an end to something truly wicked. Now, though …
The mark beneath my bandage itched. I could feel the shape, the goddess’s symbol corrupted. Worse than bearing that blasphemy in my flesh, though, was knowing that it was the closest thing to the goddess’s emblem that I could bear. Even thinking about the wooden spiral hanging against my chest made my stomach reel. If that was what my connection to the goddess had been reduced to, what did I truly think I could do to help Larsa?
No wonder she’d left me behind.
I went to one of the windows by the manor door. Tashan said my name, advising me against following, but he didn’t need to worry.
The overgrown lawn of Troidais House looked marshy and faded in the cloudy afternoon. Beyond the weedy gardens and ivy-snarled trees stood the manor’s dark iron gate. A man was standing there.
He reached through a grizzled beard to grip one of the gate’s rusty bars, his bearlike build unhidden even by heaps of rotting rags. He was too far away to be sure, but he looked like the beggar I’d spoken to earlier, the man with the opera singer’s voice.
Had he followed us, first to Miss Kindler’s and then here? Tashan’s warning, which had sounded so uncharitable in the moment, took on an echo of truth. Was he looking for another handout? Did he need help?
I’d just resolved to approach him when his body jerked like he’d been startled. He glanced away, then back, giving the manor a long, suspicious look. Reluctantly, he set off down the street, shuffling away as though he’d been called.
29
BLOODSTAINS
LARSA
If anything still played at the Mirage Theater, no one was buying tickets.
The rickety neighborhood hall likely hadn’t stood straight even in whatever heyday it might have had, but now decorative columns and the sagging marquee cocked at disorienting slants. Broken seating and scraps from amateurish productions climbed the theater’s alley wall, heaped as if the junk had slid from an askew upper story. The garbage seemed to be all that kept the leaning theater from toppling against its neighbors and setting off a cascade of giant, abandoned dominos.
We hadn’t traveled far, just a few blocks, but the streets of White Corner had grown notably less deserted. Grimy figures, strangely ignorant of the cold, watched from empty windows and trash-pile perches. No fires lit the alleys here, the moon’s murky light casting everything in still, frozen shades. Even the rats—so brazen before—merely glared at our passage.
In our tour, the woman in black hadn’t spoken another word. She drifted down the center of the streets as boldly as a noblewoman through her own home, her bangles delicately announcing her coming and trailing her in a procession of airy reminders. No one impeded her passage.
Through the maze of crumpled apartments and trash barricades she’d led me to the tired theater. Gliding into the alley, she picked her way over the garbage heaps like they were palace stairs. I’d been suspicious of the vagabonds on the street. They had some relationship with the woman, even if it was just being familiar enough to keep out of her way. The tight alley beside it, though, could easily be a killing ground.
I stopped well back from the gap’s mouth. “What’s down there?”
“He’s waiting.” She didn’t slow her climb. A moment later she vanished over the hea
p.
Alone on the street, I cursed, searching the surrounding roofs and windows for any shift in the shadows. Nothing twitched, and only garbage rustled in the night breeze. Somehow the lack of obvious threats only made me more nervous. Still I followed.
Beyond the splinter mountain, a faint glow shone through the open backstage door. Stepping partway through, I kept my heel in the frame, expecting the door to slam behind me.
As it was, the woman stood there, her dark gown blending into the gloom, her trinkets pinned to shadows. They shone golden in the hint of light drifting down a short set of stairs.
“There.” The metal glints pointed up the steps.
“This is why people always have to be reminded not to kill messengers. If I find anything other than what you said …” I wasn’t subtle about drawing my blade into the space between us.
The ornaments hung silently.
Tired of her cryptic company, I made my way up the stairs.
Moldy, wine-colored curtains divided the stage. Harsh light leaked through their countless moth-eaten holes, the misshapen constellations doing little to illuminate the cramped backstage. Only the shadows of limp rigging moved, swaying across the bulging bricks of the theater’s back wall.
A thumb-width gap slit the curtains. I parted them with the point of my sword.
Light flooded the stage, the footlights blindingly intense. Squinting and raising an arm, I pushed through, ignoring the baking sensation across my forearm.
Several dingy linens hung in straight lines and square corners, the legs of battered easels extending from beneath their frayed edges. A semicircle of hidden canvases transformed the stage into a gallery. It wasn’t a particularly large display—only five tall pieces in total, and all of their subjects well hidden. All of them, but one.
Someone who looked like me smiled into the limelights.
Overly lush with light and blooming flowers, it was a portrait in oil, a red-haired maiden half-dancing through some imagined Elysium. Her face upturned to a springtime sun, she basked runty features that would never grow particularly feminine. I knew, since they were the same baggy eyes and pronounced nose that mocked me from every mirror. I’d never wear a lacy shift like the one hanging from her boy-shoulders, but I couldn’t be too offended. Even though it was my figure, I doubted it was truly meant to be me.
A vagrant stood at the uncovered work, a muddy rainbow of pigments smearing his forearm. Fingers torn through tattered gloves directed a long brush in making adjustments. He assessed every dab and peck from multiple angles, pursuing some invisible perfection.
“There’s plenty left to do.” His voice cracked, as though he hadn’t spoken in some time. “But I hope you’ll help me finish.”
Half-turning, he let a thin-lipped grin chisel his sallow face. He looked faded, blond hair bleached nearly to white, eyes worn to the barest gray. Beneath a bird’s nest of unwashed hair, lean cheekbones and a sharp chin went to waste. He looked like a storybook prince, but after the fairy tale was well ended.
I launched across the stage.
What little there was of a smile faded from the stranger’s face, but he didn’t move to defend himself. He merely took a step away from the canvas.
My blade sheathed itself in his collar, dry skin splitting with the sound of tearing paper. He’d flinched as I struck, sending the blade into his neck instead of fully across it.
I yanked the sword free—its length as clean as when it entered—ready to roll away from his reprisal. But his hands didn’t so much as twitch, still loosely gripping his brush. He studied me openly, head tilting quizzically on his half-severed neck.
I brought the second swipe across, intent on chopping the trunk of his neck from both sides. Faster than I could swing, he turned to watch it come, lowering his chin just enough to catch the blow on his jaw. Dead skin tore, steel screeched across bone. Despite the force of the blow, his head didn’t move even a hair.
My sword snapped back, again ready to defend against what might come. His eyes followed the blade, but then merely returned to mine. He looked tired. Bored.
I snarled and struck again, hacking high. He shifted, the blade embedding itself in corded muscle. I wrenched back, not checking for his counter blow.
My sword bit again, widening his smile, feeding him steel.
And again.
Growing rage quickened every strike. Deliberate thrusts gave way to wild hacks. Not one did he try to avoid. Instead, he choose where each landed, guiding the steel into dense muscles, parrying with joints and thick bones. His expression didn’t betray a hint of pain or anger, even as I hacked it to pieces.
What there was only stoked my outrage.
The swipes blurred together. I felt every bite, heard his bones splinter, but he never gave ground. I perforated arms, sliced clothes to ribbons, sent an ear slapping against the plank floor.
Screaming echoed around me. For an instant I thought I’d struck some organ inside him still alive enough to feel. Then I realized the shriek was my own. I channeled it into a word. “Why?”
With my off hand, I grabbed the sword’s guard and heaved. The blade struck deep, and something inside him, muffled by muscle, gave a wet crunch. Slowly the sword forced deeper, sinking through the gristle of his bloodless heart.
I held it there, head close to the empty wound, hair spilling across the blade, the only sound my uneven gulps for breath.
I knew my sword hadn’t harmed him. That silver symbol of my own impotence worked well enough against the slaves of vampires, but not vampires themselves. Had it been sharpened wood or properly blessed, it might have interrupted the foul force that gave his corpse life, leaving him helpless within his own husk. But I hadn’t expected to face him tonight. I thought I’d have time to prepare, to gather the tools I’d need. I’d expected it would take weeks to track the rebel that had eluded Grandfather for decades. I hadn’t expected his messenger, and certainly never should have followed her. Yet here he stood, unbreathing, unbleeding. Silent.
I’d come all this way, faced him as I’d dreamt for so long, and vented less than a fraction of a lifetime of outrage. I could hear Grandfather’s voice, again and again: If you must blame someone, blame your father.
Yet the storm I’d brewed for decades hadn’t budged him a step.
I anticipated his cold, dry fangs shredding my throat.
But he didn’t move. Even as exhaustion caused my impaling blade to shudder, he didn’t flinch. The smell issuing from his clothes and opened innards had a dry dustiness to it, like books in an attic. It wasn’t altogether unpleasant. In fact, it reminded me of Kindler’s home.
“I already gave you my life once.” Rivascis’s voice drifted from just over my head, calm and barely louder than a whisper. “Stay with me until dawn, and if you still wish it, I’ll give it to you again.”
I recoiled two or three steps, not bothering to struggle my sword free.
“You gave me your life?!” I screamed, barely resisting the urge to throw a manic laugh in his face. I could hear the tremble in my voice. “Is that what you think, you sick leech? What life did you give me? You left your daughter blind in a sewer, helpless and surrounded by corpses! Do you expect me to thank you for that? For a lifetime of nightmares?”
“Siervage calls you ‘Granddaughter’, doesn’t he?”
I gaped and nearly sputtered. “Do you think that meant he raised me like some princess? That his servants treated me like royalty? You know what that made me!”
I tore off my glove and peeled my sleeve up to the elbow.
“I know the name of each creature that gave me these scars. Every bite and tear made by a tutor or nursemaid. If that hell’s what your life’s worth,” I shook my arm toward him, “then it’s not worth shit.”
Eyes narrowing, he took a step toward me. I matched with a backward step, reflexively drawing the dagger from my belt. The blade was nothing compared to the silvered length still skewering his body, but its weight in my hand made
me feel less helpless.
His eyes remained locked on my arm, even as he gripped the hilt of the sword jutting from his chest. Awkwardly, he dislodged the silvered blade, willfully slicing his palms in extracting it. The weapon freed, he twisted it in his grip and presented it back to me.
“Forgive me.” His voice was barely a whisper.
“No,” I said before I was even sure of his words. I snatched the blade out of his hands.
Rivascis’s head bobbed in a single shallow nod. He turned away, returning to his easel. “It pained me to leave Caliphas, but I had disobeyed Siervage’s will and killed several of his servants. To stay would have jeopardized those I betrayed him for—including you.”
“Please. I’ve lived around vampires my entire life. You all think you’re so tragic.” I pointed with the useless blade. “I’ve gotten the gist of your story. You’re not some wronged prince. You’re a coward and a traitor.”
He retrieved something from the lip of his easel. At first I thought the dark, enameled length was a brush, but it clearly had no bristles.
“Traitor.” He repeated the word slowly, as if it were a name he hardly remembered. “So you’re my father’s poetic twist? His ironic executioner? He’s filled my daughter’s head with his lies and then set her loose against me.” I could hear his smirk. “Sounds like Luvick.”
“I’m not here on his orders. I came to kill you on my own.” It sounded like gallows defiance, but this was what I wanted. If I was going to die, I was doing it for my reasons.
He gave a casual hum, not bothering to glance up. With a word that sounded like a reptilian curse, he touched the polished stick in his hand to his opposite forearm, still crisscrossed with empty gashes. A minuscule storm of black energy rained from the wand. Wild but soundless, the lightless power filled his already healing wounds, knitting them at an even more unnatural speed. Even his severed ear, his rent chest, and a dozen other violations restored themselves. I’d seen this magic before. It was the same power Jadain had refused me just hours ago.
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