Division of the Marked (The Marked Series)

by March McCarron

  “As you can see,” Arns said. “There isn’t any evidence to speak of.”

  Bray had to agree. She had seen burnt-down buildings before—though perhaps they had been extinguished sooner—where there had remained pieces of burnt furniture, charred bits of personal items: teddy bears, shoes, books. But here, there was truly nothing left but the jagged shards of wall asserting themselves from the rubble. She looked to Adearre, wondering if even his keen eyes could discern more.

  Adearre cautiously made his way into the building, but he held his hand out, signaling them to remain without.

  “I’m not so sure it’s safe, Adearre,” Peer said.

  Adearre did not respond. He inspected the walls with absorptive interest.

  “What made you believe this was caused by lightning?” Adearre finally asked.

  “Several eyewitnesses came forward; they said they saw it strike,” Arns said. He, too, looked at the remains, as if hoping they would suddenly speak to him, as they clearly had to Adearre.

  The Adourran shook his head. “This was arson.”

  “What makes you say so?” Bray asked.

  Adearre pointed to several points where the wall was entirely burnt out. “You can see, clear as day, multiple points of origin.” Bray did not think this was clear as day, but she nodded all the same. “Not one of those points started at the roof, but on the floor of the second story.” He stepped carefully to the east-facing wall. “You see this pattern in the charring here?” He brushed his fingers against the brick and sniffed the soot.

  “Well?” Arns asked.

  “Turpentine,” he said confidently. “Turpentine was the accelerant.”

  Bray smiled at Adearre. He might occasionally look down at her from his moral high ground, but he sure was good at what he did.

  For the next hour, Adearre searched the debris for additional clues with the help of Peer. Bray sat Arns down and had him walk her through all of the evidence he had collected.

  “Where in the house did you find the bodies once the fire was extinguished?” she asked.

  “Well, there wasn’t much left of them or the house by then, but it seemed they were all still abed.”

  “And these three men who claimed to have seen lightning—they all came forward four days after the fire?” Bray said, paging through the folder.

  “Yes.”

  “Strange, isn’t it? That they should all wait so long.”

  “Yes,” Arns said slowly. “I suppose it is.”

  “I’d very much like to speak to Breeson Parron,” Bray said.

  “I thought that you might.” Arns jotted a note in his diary. “He’s been in a terrible state since the incident, I’m afraid, but I’m sure he’d be more than willing to answer your questions.”

  “Could you arrange it?” Bray asked.

  “Certainly, would tomorrow suit?”

  “No, tonight if you please.”

  Arns frowned but nodded. Bray looked up at the sky—the day dimmed rapidly. She hoped her companions had enough light to see by.

  She waved Arns off and returned to the crime scene. Adearre had just climbed out of the wreckage, Peer at his heels, as she approached.

  “Did you find anything more?” she asked.

  “We did.” Adearre held out a soot-blackened hand, a gleaming fragment in his palm. Bray took the small, thin object and held it up to the light.

  “That is…strange,” she said. “Any theories?”

  “Many,” Adearre said. “None with enough evidence to be sound.”

  It was clear he would not continue, so Bray led the way back to the inn. With any luck, the Cosanta had retired early and she would not have to face them again that evening.

  Yarrow returned to the common room. Ko-Jin sat at the bar, an ale clutched in his hand. Based on the gleam in his eyes, Yarrow guessed it was far from his first.

  “You know what I was thinking?” Ko-Jin asked. Yes, definitely not his first.

  “No. What?”

  “This whole thing,” he gestured emphatically with his mug, “between the Chiona and the Cosanta…”

  “What about it?”

  “It all comes down to attitude. In that, the Chiona have entirely too much of it.” His beer sloshed onto the counter. “I mean, we were perfectly amiable. You’re a nice bloke. And me? I’m delightful. But nooo…” He took a long gulp. “I bet she wouldn’t even help a handicapped boy up a tree anymore.”

  Yarrow was forestalled from asking for further elucidation by the entrance of the Chiona in question. Adearre and Peer’s clothing were well-covered in ash. Bray clutched a folder to her chest. Yarrow checked in on her emotions and found that she no longer felt angry. That, at least, was a relief. He wasn’t sure he had the energy for a second row that night.

  As she approached, he wondered what to say. He wanted to ask if they’d found anything, but was afraid it would sound like a reproach for not including him, which, of course, it would be.

  They were all saved the effort by the entrance of a middle-aged, sandy-haired man. Yarrow had never seen such a wretched-looking person. His face sagged, his hair was unkempt, and his bloodshot eyes drooped like a hound dog.

  “Breeson Parron?” Bray asked.

  The doleful man nodded and Bray made introductions. She guided the man to the private dining room; Yarrow and Ko-Jin followed. Bray shot him a look of displeasure, but did not order them to leave. They all took seats.

  “You were the last to see the Parron family, is that correct, Mr. Parron?”

  The man cleared his throat and said in a hoarse, weary voice, “Aye. I’d been for dinner—it was our family tradition. A big dinner on Da Un Marcu Eve, and, if there was a fourteen-year-old, we’d creep up and check their necks before we went to bed ourselves. Ever since our mother died, Leina, my sister-in-law, has been hosting the event. Well, we had our dinner and sent the kids to bed. We just sat about having a few glasses of wine and chatting until midnight. Then Leina went up to check on Neera—she was fourteen this year, you see—and when she came back down, she looked like she’d seen a ghost. ‘Neera’s marked,’ she says, and we didn’t believe, so me and Klone, my older brother, went up, and sure enough the girl had that big circle printed on her neck, just like all of you. It was a lot to take in. They weren’t over-pleased, because Neera was a great girl. No one wanted to see the back of her. We sat and talked about it for a while, but it was late, past one in the morning, so I set off for home.” Breeson gave a great sigh. “I didn’t find out about the fire until the next morning.”

  ‘Thank you, Mr. Parron,” Bray said, her voice soft with compassion, “you’ve been very helpful. I have just a few questions for you. Did you see anything odd outside the house when you left?”

  Mr. Parron rubbed his hound-dog eyes. “I don’t rightly know the answer to that anymore. I thought I did—I heard a kind of scuffle, like shoes on pavement, you know? And I thought I saw a bit of movement in the alleyway, so I says, ‘Who’s there?’ But no one answers, and I was right tired and my head was so full of Neera’s marking, that I just assumed I had imagined it and I went on home.”

  “Perfectly understandable,” Bray said. “Where exactly did you hear the noise come from?”

  The man shook his head and ran trembling hands through his thinning hair. “I probably imagined it.”

  “Did you think you heard it on the alleyway to the left of the house or to the right?” Bray pressed.

  “The left,” Breeson said, with a surprising amount of certainty.

  Yarrow cleared his throat and Bray shot him a look of warning, which he ignored. “Mr. Parron, did your brother’s home have a wine cellar?”

  Breeson’s brow creased. “Nah, that house hasn’t got a cellar. None of the houses round that neighborhood do.”

  Peer fixed Yarrow with a suspicious look, but Bray acted as though he hadn’t spoken.

  “Were any of the family on any kind of medications?” she asked.

  Breeson managed to loo
k mildly taken aback. “No, they were all in good health.”

  Bray nodded and patted the man’s hand, which lay flat on the table. “Thank you, again, Mr. Parron, for your time.”

  It was a dismissal, but the man did not move. He looked up at Bray with a kind of fierceness. “You’ve been over the site. Do you think it was lightning?”

  “We have only just begun the investigation…” Bray evaded.

  “Do you think it was lightning?” Mr. Parron repeated, fixing her with an intense, steady gaze.

  “No, Mr. Parron,” Bray said at last. “I don’t.”

  He nodded. “Thank you for your honesty.”

  “I will let you know if we learn anything more, I promise,” Bray said.

  Mr. Parron nodded, the animation draining from his face again, and he rose, bowed, and departed.

  When the door had clicked shut behind him Bray turned to address Yarrow. “Why would you ask about a wine cellar?”

  Yarrow half wanted to tell her, to explain what he’d found, what he suspected. But he could not—the hostility in her expression, the utter lack of trust, held his tongue. Besides, if he was wrong, he did not want her to know it. He shrugged. “Why did you ask about medication?”

  Bray folded her arms across her leather jerkin. To Yarrow’s surprise—and, it would seem, Bray’s as well—Adearre answered his question. “We found this.” He extracted a broken, charred bit of a medical syringe and placed it on the table.

  Yarrow took it gently between two fingers. “And none of them were on special medication…that is strange…”

  There was a tentative knock at the door.

  “Come,” Bray called.

  The rosy-faced innkeeper popped his head into the room. “Forgive the interruption, but your dinner is ready whenever you’d like to take it.”

  “That would be lovely, Lorren, thank you,” Bray said.

  The man opened the door wide and two serving girls bearing heaping trays of hot food entered. Once the servers had retreated, Bray returned to business between bites.

  “Did you notice anything suspicious about Mr. Breeson Parron?” she asked Adearre.

  He chewed and swallowed. “He was not lying. I would say the poor man has lost ten pounds in the past week by the look of him. Other than that… Nothing of use.” He gestured with his fork. “He has a cat.”

  Ko-Jin snorted, a distant look on his face. “How could you possibly know that?”

  “The short white hairs on his pant legs,” Adearre said simply.

  Peer bit into a roll and spoke through a mouthful, “How do you know it wasn’t a dog?”

  “Because Bray rubbed her nose seven times while he was in the room,” Adearre said, “and she is not allergic to dogs.”

  “Fascinating,” Bray said, her tone droll. “Any chance the cat is the arsonist?”

  Yarrow ceased listening to the banter. He was thinking that, once his Chiona companions had retired, he would see the crime scene for himself. If there was no wine cellar then he was wrong, plain and simple. Perhaps he could just go home. He found himself hoping there was nothing at all to find.

  Bray, still fully dressed save for her boots, sat in the windowsill of her room. She could hear, faintly, Peer and Adearre speaking through the wall, but the noise did not intrude upon her thoughts. She was troubled. The fact that this was arson appeared, at this point, undeniable. And that it should be a coincidence a marked girl perished in the fire seemed unlikely. If the arsonist knew about this girl, it stood to reason that he or she could know about others. Could Yarrow Lamhart’s insane theory actually be…correct?

  The front door opened and closed beneath her and she saw the shadow of a man stride down the drive and turn onto the street, his form briefly illuminated by the nearest street lamp. A man with a long braid. Bray sat up straight. He had turned in the direction of the crime scene.

  Bray leapt from the sill and pulled on her boots hastily. She thought of bringing the others with her but rejected the idea. She could handle this herself—and she would prefer there be no audience.

  She jumped down the stairs, taking them two at a time, and hurried out through the main door. She turned to follow the Cosanta—it could be either of them, but she knew it was Yarrow. She hoped it was Yarrow.

  The night air was chill, the moon a blurry spotlight in the charcoal sky. She trotted quickly and silently up the dark alley until she spotted his form ahead of her. Then she kept back, hugged the shadows, following.

  He stopped by a lamplight, held up a slip of parchment to read. The light hit the planes of his face; his straight nose, angular jaw. She wished he’d grown out of his good looks.

  She watched as he compared the parchment to the street sign and turned down the alley toward the Parron home, or what was left of it. He approached the remains and lit a hand lantern, creating a small pool of light. Bray crouched low, waiting to see what he would do. He did not climb into the ruins of the building at first, but circled around the perimeter, examining where the foundations met the ground. He took his time, pausing occasionally to set down his light and feel the structure. When he had at last made a complete circuit, his shoulders slumped visibly. She wondered what it was he had hoped to find.

  Whatever he sought, he was not prepared to give up. He climbed into the wreckage and began sifting through the debris, prodding at the floor boards of the first floor, which had remained mostly intact. A sharp breeze raised goosebumps on Bray’s arms and made her wish for a hood to cover her bare head. It shifted the ash, blowing it in her face. She felt it tickle her nostrils and, before she could even think to fight it, she sneezed.

  Yarrow stood up sharply, his eyes scanning the darkness where she crouched. He held up his light, but was too far away to diminish the shadows that surrounded her. “Who’s there?”

  Bray stepped forward, wishing for a more impressive entrance than a sneeze. Damn her nose!

  “Bray? What are you—”

  “What am I doing?” she cut in. “What are you doing? I expressly forbade you from coming here.”

  She climbed up into the wreckage to confront him on equal ground.

  He did not look remotely fazed by her proclamation. “I am doing what I came here to do.”

  Suspicion rushed through her. “And what exactly is that? What are the Cosanta trying to hide?”

  He laughed without humor. “Spirits, Bray Marron! What great conspiracy do you imagine us behind? You think the Cosanta have been killing children? Our own brothers and sisters? Or is it not just the Cosanta, but me personally, you suspect?”

  When said aloud it did sound fairly ludicrous, but she would not concede as much to him. Her ire rose. “If the Cosanta are truly uninvolved, then why insist on representation? And why did they choose you? If your people thought I would be lax merely because we were once close…” She trailed off at the dumbfounded look on his face.

  “That is what you think?” He laughed, and this time there was humor in the sound.

  “Don’t you dare laugh at me, Yarrow Lamhart,” she said, clenching her hands into fists.

  “Please, just listen,” he said, his soft gray eyes imploring. He extended his hand to her, as if to rest it on her shoulder. She swung her forearm to swat the hand away, not wanting to be touched. He saw her movement, and twisted out of its path, causing her to stumble.

  Her skin positively prickled with anger. She punched, hoping to hit him square in the nose. That would show him. But he danced back, bumping into a hunk of wood and tripping backwards.

  “Bray, please…”

  She did not listen. She leapt, aiming to land atop him and drive her knee into his gut. He rolled, and she crashed atop the rubble. A long splinter thrust through her pants and into her thigh. It stung, but she hardly noticed.

  Yarrow, back on his feet, assumed a stance and expression so completely Cosanta in nature: poised, serene. If she had found anger in his mien, hers may well have abated, but that damned impassivity infuriated her.
<
br />   She lunged at him, and he side-stepped. They were, by that time, positively covered in soot. She could taste the ash on her lips, it burned her eyes. She stood, panting, her eyes blazing.

  “Do you never hit back?” she growled at him. She understood why Peer had lost control several days before. To fight a man who refused to strike back was maddening.

  His foot caught in the wreckage and sunk down through the floorboards. She hit him with several quick, sharp punches in the stomach, then leaned back and struck him hard and true in the mouth. His lip split, blood pouring down his chin.

  He ripped his foot free from its trap. “What do you want from me?” he asked, dodging several more blows, and spinning like a dancer out of her range.

  “I want,” she said, as she punched him hard in his injured side—he grunted in pain—“your respect.”

  She was surprised to hear herself say this—it flew from her lips without passing through her mind. But it was true; she did want his respect.

  “I do respect you,” he wheezed, trying to dodge but again, getting tangled in debris and falling. He hissed in pain and when he stood a large splinter protruded from his upper arm.

  “No,” Bray said. “If you did, you would hit back.”

  His brows raised in confusion. The expression irked her further. What had the Cosanta done to her Yarrow? To the boy who had broken a highwayman’s nose with one swift punch? It was like an impostor, an enemy impostor at that, had taken up residence in the body of a person she had once cared for dearly.

  “You want me,” he grunted as she elbowed him in the stomach, “to hit you?”

  “Yes.”

  His mouth tightened. She punched, and this time, rather than evading, he caught hold of her shoulder and pushed her, with the help of her own momentum, down so that her face struck his knee. The pain was deliciously sharp, the metallic taste of blood met her tongue.