The Bones of Broken Songs: A Historical Mystery Romance (Mortalsong Trilogy Book 2)

by J. M. Stredwick

  “Then what would be left?” I ask, baiting her.

  “The cure,” she breathes shakily, passion building. “The freedom to rebuild the earth.”

  “And this cure is…your blood?” I reemphasize. There is no rational way to say it.

  “I’ll be able to give my magic, and it will multiply. Putting my blood into a human will change the way of their creation into what they were meant to be. It will alter their expiration into immortality. We can bring back the world as it once was. A world of magical beings.”

  “Immortal humans are not magic,” I poach her ideology. “What has been lost should remain lost.”

  “You think? And what if there were some way to bring back the myths and legends of old? The magic of creatures…these impossible beings? In all my understanding of it, the impossible becomes possible if you make a way. What was I created for, if not for the resurrection of magic? And with it, the creatures that host it?”

  My eyes narrow. I feel the rapid beating of my heart, furious in my chest.

  “But you don’t know this, that you could bring it about…not definitely.”

  She feigns a blow to her confidence in this matter, and hisses lightly.

  “I know it as much as you know your love for her. It was never meant to be this way, my lovely one. I wasn’t supposed to be made by her.”

  “Then who were you supposed to be made by?” I ask.

  She stares at me oddly and tilts her head. Her hair catches on her features and she offers me an innocent smile, drunk on her own secrets.

  “Well my plum, you will know soon enough, won’t you?”

  Reki and Idalgo, along with a few other men jerk from their seated positions when they hear me coming.

  “We thought you’d be back sooner,” Idalgo bristles.

  “I’m back now,” I say. “Unruffle your feathers.”

  The sun is lower in the sky, casting rays of sunlight through the slats between trees. I feel anxious to get back to Gia, to make sure she is safe. Whenever I am not around her I have this odd sensation that she’ll vanish.

  “A ship comes in with your payments. Furs and spices. You want me to load it all into the usual place? Or keep it on board?” Reki asks.

  I look at them. My loyal men with lowered regards. Their eyes show weathering, a bit of wistfulness that can only be accounted as longing for movement, for the ocean beneath us. Sighing, I rake a hand through the tangles of my hair.

  “Load it into the usual,” I say, and hear sighs and groans escape them.

  “Look, we are not ready. We’ve the sacrifices to make, and that is going to take us a few days at least. When we bring the furs to Nassau, we’ll get our fill of everything. I’ll ask patience of you all.”

  “And what of your pretty Mistress,” Idalgo hisses. “You got her trapped in your chamber. What are you to do with her? What of the two prisoners that escaped? Do we leave without them, knowing they’re on the loose?”

  “Who do we have out searching for them? Hm?” I round on him. “You think they’ll magically appear? Pop out of the ground like flowers? One hundred gold Louis to the man who finds them!”

  Idalgo’s jaw twitches. What does he want from me? I do my best. He steps forward slowly, and I tilt my head, impressed that he approaches me in this manner.

  “Ida, Ida,” Reki warns him in a hushed tone. “Know your place.”

  The men watch Idalgo come to stand before me, so near to me that I am basted with his breath.

  “You’re our leader. You should act like it,” he seethes.

  “I do what I think must be done. Do you not want everything I have given you? Those nice clothes? Your comforts? Oh, and you cannot die, so there is that.”

  “I swore my loyalty to you,” he speaks low now. “But ever since we took that ship you’ve been a fool of a man. No thought for us. What happened when you saw that girl? Who are these people to you?”

  A gust of wind sweeps through the branches and tousles us. I do not want to explain. I cannot, not to them. Explaining Giselle…Gia would be like explaining a mystery. It cannot be done. My connection to her is unwarranted, and always was. Sometimes I wonder, if I had left my father’s house and never gone to the Bonteque Maison, maybe I wouldn’t have been this person. This liar and thief.

  “Come with me men,” I say. “I think it’s time we had our very own council meeting.”

  Alphonse

  Claire’s hair is dirty and matted. I feel that I have failed her in some way, her clothing tattered and hanging limply off her thin body. We have traveled further into the ground and were surprised to find a room, dug into the earth, full of provisions. Almost as if there had been people camped out down here for weeks on end. There were barrels and barrels of ale. Chests of dried meats and fruit. Baskets of coconuts and, through careful arrangement, a place where cheese was wrapped and stored. Claire thought that maybe this was where the villagers kept their surplus, but I disagreed. This was formed to conceal people, to hide them while they watched and waited. For what, I do not know.

  She leans against the dirt wall, firelight dancing along her face. I’ve kept our fire going so that we can see well. A fire pit had been there as well, set up with a spit and all. I wondered if the people who stayed here hunted on the Island above and returned to cook their fresh meats. The thought of fresh meat makes my stomach growl.

  “I cannot sleep,” she tells me, annoyance rippling her face. “I keep having nightmares about those godforsaken creatures.”

  “I know,” I say, staring into the fire.

  “Do you ever wish we had a normal life, one where we had our own homes, some children? That we had never gone to Switzerland? Off into the hills like crazed adventurers?” she asks me. Her voice lilts, as if she’s pretending she’s not thought of it before.

  “I wonder,” I tell her. “Often.”

  “We didn’t have much choice,” she says as if combating against herself. “And really, we’ve done well for ourselves. It has taken many years, but we are here. We’re so close I can almost taste the freedom. Freedom from the chase.”

  “You speak as if we are not trapped in an exit-less cave,” I smart.

  I let my hands drop, relaxed on my propped thighs. The warmth of the fire makes my skin tender. Nights on the cold stone ground have me aching all over. As if I wasn’t just shackled up in a prison cell. I feel weaker than I once was. We have walked miles beneath the ground, taking twists and turns. We leave markers, using stones to carve markings on the walls. Left or right. The length of the tunnel. Sometimes we backtrack and go down alternate paths. When we found the room of victuals we decided to stay and regroup; refresh ourselves.

  “It cannot be exit-less. Not now that we’ve found this,” she motions to the barrels and crates stacked up around us.

  “Yes. There is a way out. The way we came in,” I speak stiffly. “Its madness searching around these tunnels.”

  “We will get out. We cannot be trapped here for all eternity!” she snaps. “We could dig our way out, if it came to it.”

  “Dig?” I chuckle. “You think we could dig our way out of here?”

  “Do you have any better ideas?” she retorts crisply, folding her arms over her chest.

  “I’m trying,” I mutter. “The only course that I see to take is to keep searching the tunnels. It has to be connected to something. They could be caused by the earth…but some I would think manmade.”

  “Yes! And while we do this, Gia could be dying above us. Benjamin could have sacrificed her already and gone on his happy way,” she stands then, pacing angrily.

  The fire flickers and crackles. Darkness wavers around us, tantalizing the worst of our senses. In my younger days, I would have been glad to have her alone in a dark firelit space. I wonder, is it the distance between us or the cave setting that does not spark this same desire in me? Reminiscing upon the days in Switzerland are painful. She was so beautiful against the snowy backdrop, the mountains and clean air fulfillin
g our senses, numbing us and invigorating us all at once. Her hair was white gold, so pleasantly coiffed and accentuating her facial features, her lips plump with smiles as we traveled in our cheaply bought covered wagon, new Swiss clothing, and sturdy boots.

  We had stayed nights in taverns and hotels across Switzerland, pouring over the maps that we’d stolen from Vauquelin. We saw the Cabal’s location as holy ground, the one thing that would fix what had been done. We were young. Gullible. But damn, what I’d give for that time now. The luscious moments we’d had alone, where she allowed herself reprieve from the bitterness of her fixation on vengeance. We learned much, certain potions and brews meant for magic workers, but also the leftover elixirs that gave me hundreds of loyal men. With that, we built our empire. Slowly, ever so slowly, recruiting men from taverns, government officials, those in high places, and situating ourselves as renowned merchants. Her father never knew. Never found us. Though I did greet him in passing while we’d both been staying at. He asked me, and I felt sorry him. Not sorry enough to give her up, but sorry.

  “You can’t think like that,” I say. “Don’t let yourself.”

  But, how can she not? She doesn’t know what I know. That Benjamin will keep her safe with all that he has. He would die before he allowed the Bone Woman to reach Gia. This I know. This makes him more threatening. He is the same, yet, is changed. Something about him is harder now. Like clay charred and cooked to solidity. Lucky for me, clay is easy to break.

  “Are you cold?” I ask her as she shivers, rubbing her upper arms with her hands.

  “No.”

  “Sit with me,” I say. “I’ll warm you.”

  This is one thing I have said to her many times before. She gives me an expression that shows that she knows what I am doing. But I am not doing what she thinks. I don’t think I am. Part of me hates to see her suffer. Part of me needs her to suffer.

  “I think you are a conniving fool. I don’t know you. I don’t know what is true anymore,” she hisses at me. “You perpetuated a lie. The lie that Benjamin was the one who killed her. You told me that. You told me…”

  She buckles, anguish creeping in her throat.

  “You realize I cannot trust you?” she whispers hatefully.

  What can I say? My heart thunders with anxiousness. I want to make her believe me. She has to believe me.

  “I told you Benjamin killed her because I thought that is what I saw,” I say.

  “You thought that was what you saw?” she sniffs, and laughs bitterly, and then mimics me. “Oh, you asked me a question before, I had plenty of opportunities to answer…but only now I say that I thought it was him I saw. This is pathetic. You think I’m the sort of girl to believe you? I never trusted you. I will never trust a man. I’ll do it all by myself!”

  Her voice hums against the walls of the cave. Her fury like pikes aimed for my head. I realize that I don’t make sense. That the things I say are scattered and the lies are falling apart, slipping like sand between fingers. But what else can I do? I feel an insane sense of fear, something that a man should never feel. I will lose her either way.

  “Claire!” I yell, and stand.

  “No!” she shrieks. “You’re a liar. You lied to me all these years, and I went blindly with you. I spent so many years thinking…I not only went along with you, I…I gave myself to you in so many ways!”

  Tears are building in her beautiful eyes. They are glassy in the light, but she holds them back. I know that she abhors crying. I think that she knows that I am keeping something from her, she just does not know what. She’s aware of it but can’t decipher what it is that I am keeping from her, and I will not explain. I cannot explain. With any luck, she will go blind for the rest of our lives. I think I can still make this right.

  “Really? Do you hear yourself? You think I am lying because I did not tell you the details now? You know I am not good at…communication. I was afraid you would leave. I did not want to explain it for fear that I did not know what I was saying,” I expel the words into the silence.

  “You disgust me,” she utters, as vicious as always. The epitome of Claire.

  “You are being irrational. I have always been here for you. I’ve done everything I could in order for us to find and save Gia. Now you’re attacking me, telling me that I am your enemy? I am your only ally, Claire!”

  A hiccup of sadness shows on her face and tears spill down her cheeks. She places a hand over her mouth.

  “This is not right,” her voice is just a breath. She knows that something is wrong here. But I cannot have her understand. I need her to believe that I am for her, not against her. But I see her budging, wilting against my words.

  “We are going to do this. Together. We’re going to save Gia. We’re going to get everything we both want.”

  She wipes her tears away as if she’s angry that they exist.

  “Like I said before. Prove this to me,” she says.

  We’ve slept for a few hours. She prods me awake and I jerk upright. Our fire has burned out and I fumble for the items. A few feet away the torch is lit once again, and Claire is holding it. There are shadows beneath her eyes and she appears to be hardened with resolve. We begin our trek and choose a different tunnel to follow this time, marking our paths as best we can on the walls with our sharp rock. There is only silence between us. That and the gritty crunch of the earth beneath our boots.

  We walk for hours, listening to the groaning ache of the dark earth. Sometimes we dodge giant webs and odd insects. I attempt conversation with her once, but she is silent. She had ended up laying with me last night to keep warm. I assume she now regrets it.

  As we walk, we hear a trickling noise. A noise that we have not heard yet in this place.

  “Quiet,” Claire says, holding out a hand to stop me as if my breathing could cloud out the noise. “Do you hear it? It sounds like water.”

  I listen, straining to hear it. But it is there. A soft tinkling noise, telltale of the best resource a man could find.

  Claire runs ahead, and as we go there is a gradual lightening in the passage. Light. True daylight. We race forward and my eyes sting as the light becomes brighter. The whisper of trickling becomes a cacophony of spraying water. As we finally reach our destination, rounding off into a wide cavern, we stop to take in the vision before us.

  There is a large pool of blue, and overhead, a waterfall pours a thin strain down into the crevasse. All around the cavern walls, there is greenery growing, little roots, vines, and branches spiking through the dirt, hanging off the walls. I see nearly a whole tree growing there, dangling, half of its body concealed by the earth. More importantly, radiant daylight shines down on the water. There is a jagged hole in the earth where the water pours down, and this space is large enough for five men to climb through. From the water's surface to the top of this hole it is almost as high as a building.

  “I’d ask if you’re afraid to climb…but…” I attempt to jest.

  Claire gives me a cocky smirk.

  “Shall we?” she says as if we are going for a walk about a garden.

  I grab hold of her arm.

  “Let me go. I’ll climb up and find a rope,” I say to her.

  As expected, she ignores me. But why would I say this to her? She is uncontrollable. I chastise myself for saying anything. Me telling her not to do something results in her always doing that exact thing I did not want her to do.

  I peer into the blue waters, the depth of it endless, vibrating with shimmers; as if it is a chasm leading to the center of the earth. I fight the thrill that climbs through me and jostle myself ahead of her.

  We are silent as we go. This is a perilous climb, but there are many things to hold on to. I glance at her skirts, hoping they don’t catch. We’re accustomed to discomfort, but I am weaker than I once was. I struggle myself through the vines, taking each movement slowly.

  “Test your hold before you move,” I say.

  She glares at me and says nothing but tes
ts each foothold before she takes it. She is above me, and I think to myself, I will try to catch her if she falls. The air above us smells fruity and humid, and I breathe out thankfully. I ache as I hurl myself upwards, trying to be always near to her. It’s not one of the worse climbs we’ve made, as it’s at a slight slant and we have numerous foot and hand holds. The water beneath us would catch us if we fell, but it would be no soft landing.

  When we are near the blistering light of the hollow that will lead us out of this place, the waterfall spraying us with its tiny needles, Claire struggles to draw herself up over the ledge. I press her upwards by her buttocks and she tumbles over.

  “All right, Claire?” I ask her. I hear a muffled noise of affirmation.

  Drawing my own self up is difficult, and my hands are shaking on the roots. My arms are weak, tensed and stiff. I grapple for the ledge and gain my foothold, drawing myself up and over. The exertion of it sends sharp pains through my limbs and I fall over on the hard jungle ground panting. My god, I need to be in better shape.

  “Alphonse.”

  It is in her tone. I can hear that she is already standing, and that she is alarmed. It’s in the hesitant whisper of her voice. I whip my face to see what it is that she’s disturbed by, and freeze. We are surrounded by men.

  “Monsieur Alphonse Chardones,” a darker image, voice coldly familiar, comes into focus.

  I stagger to a stand. It is Vauquelin. He eyes me with a riddle of a smile, one that professes his gladness to be greeting us. His hair is still a dark silver, drawn back at his neck. As he always was, so many years before when I was spending each day of my youth in his service, he is domineering and yet calm. Ethereally calm, his eyes just as gray as his hair. He seems to have lost some weight and appears wolfish in his getup. Now his cheeks and chin are a bit more angular, the settle of his jaw observable in his gauntness.