The sun reached its zenith, and she didn’t have to wait at all.
Palamedes came walking up the northern street, sticking close to the buildings and shops. He looked confused but that cleared when he spotted her.
Raisa left her little alcove and met him by the well.
“Perfectly on time,” she said.
“Where is everyone?” he asked as a greeting.
“Hiding away in their homes,” she explained. “Come on, I know a few taverns that are still open. I’ll tell you more once we’re there. How was your journey here?”
“Uneventful, thankfully,” Palamedes said falling into step beside her. “What about here? Something clearly happened.”
“There’s a killer on the loose,” Raisa said. “One who’s been tearing the throats of women with his teeth. He’s making a bit of spectacle of himself, and Pen isn’t exactly helping with that.”
“This is the job the queen wanted her for?” he asked. “What exactly is she doing?”
They reached the small, almost cozy, tavern down the street. The barkeep looked relieved when they walked into the empty floor and ordered two ales.
“And what do you mean she’s not helping?” Palamedes asked again as they took a table by a window.
“Only that she isn’t made for subtlety,” Raisa went on, explaining everything Pen told her about the Fang, his victims, and the commotion she caused by chasing someone just yesterday.
Palamedes recoiled at the descriptions of the wounds, but leaned forward, intrigued by Pen’s stalker.
“She’s still being followed by someone?” he asked.
“Strangely enough, yes,” Raisa said. “I thought he’d stop once we entered the city.”
“So, you want me to find him?” Palamedes guessed.
“No, I want you to help Pen find the Fang. Her stalker is her business, and she’d want me to stay out of it.”
Palamedes nodded leaning back, but Raisa saw the thought behind his eyes.
“Okay,” he said after a moment. “It’s not exactly political, even if the queen asked Pen. It’s just a crazed murderer who needs to be put down.”
“You don’t seem enthused by the idea,” Raisa noted.
He still sat as if stuck in an interview he did not want to be in.
“Who is following Pen?” he asked leaning forward again. “I saw someone back at the Traveler’s Rest, and she lied about it. Now that person is still here, stalking her, and you’re not concerned by that? She lied to us about some secret meeting in the forest after we dug up her father’s grave.”
“It was Phaos.”
Palamedes went to say more but stopped. His mouth hung open for a second in confusion before he closed it.
“I’m sorry, what?” he exclaimed.
“Pen lied to you, to both of us,” Raisa admitted. “She told me who it was shortly after, in her own vague way.”
“And you believe her?”
“The woman can move her blood outside of her body. Are you surprised that the chief of the gods wouldn’t want to keep track of her?”
“This isn’t some mythic fairy tale.”
“No, he’s basically her uncle.”
He scoffed and took a swig of the ale as if trying to wash down the idea.
“You and your brother are followers of Maniodes, right?” Raisa said. “That’s who’s depicted on your coin.”
“My father followed him, and the coin was his,” Palamedes said. He sighed then continued with, “I don’t think I can help her. She didn’t seem to like me in the first place anyway.”
“To be fair, you only knew her for a little over a week. Pen’s not great with people, but given extra time she can warm up to you.”
“Doubt it,” he said taking another drink.
“Why did you come with us from Kression, then?” Raisa asked irritated.
“My brother asked me to. He said it was what our father would want, being devout as he was,” his voice was as bitter as the ale now.
He looked out the window, not meeting her eyes.
“How is your brother?” Raisa asked, calmer now.
Palamedes shrugged. “Haven’t heard from him since I left.”
Raisa let him have a moment as grief crept into his eyes. It always did at the mention of his brother. The man probably didn’t have much time left, since he was coughing up blood.
“There is another matter,” she said bringing him back from his thoughts.
He looked to her, silently asking her to go on.
“Turns out Arus also has a brother, Tetrides, who’s been scouting out our hideout. So, I’ve got my own stalker too,” she said almost laughing at the comparison. “I’ve been keeping track of him, which is why I can’t help Pen myself.”
“What does he want?” Palamedes asked surprised again.
“I don’t know. He was just looking for Arus before, but I told him he was dead. Ever since then he’s been watching us. He hasn’t made any move against us, though. I just keep seeing him in the alley across the street.”
“Want me to track him down too?” Palamedes asked.
“No, I’ve got him. I just wanted you to know.”
He nodded. “Should I find my own lodgings, then?”
“You can come to the hideout. We can go now actually. Just use the back entrance when you ever need to come or go. Tetrides doesn’t watch the back. So, are you going to help Pen?”
He sighed but didn’t reject the idea.
“I’ll go see her, see what she thinks about having a partner that’s not you. What about this Tetrides? He really hasn’t done anything yet?”
“I’m going to find out answers from him tonight,” Raisa reassured him.
Chapter Thirty One
Pen
“Please, tell me there is some progress, especially given the commotion yesterday.”
Queen Aethra stood at her desk looking over the report the captain gave her about the victim and the chase.
“I didn’t mean to make everyone panic,” Pen confessed, “but I saw a figure watching us examine the new woman.”
“Apparently, there were dozens of people watching,” Aethra said glancing to the parchment and back. “Why was this figure different?”
Pen tried to not feel scolded by a teacher, but that’s what was basically happening. She made a mistake and had to account for it now. She couldn’t admit the figure was probably her father. She’d only told Raisa that detail in private, and she could not have the city guards out looking for him.
“There was blond hair stuck to the dead woman’s fingernail,” Pen started. “This man in the crowd had similar hair to it, and when I got too close, he bolted.”
Aethra nodded, probably agreeing that is was an odd occurrence, and gestured for Pen to go on.
“So, I chased him, but I lost him in a bent alley and a market crowd.”
“I’m glad you saw him,” Aethra said laying the parchment down. “I’m not glad that he got away, but you clearly tried. Why do you think he was there?”
Pen had no bloody idea, mainly because it wasn’t him.
“I don’t know,” Pen confessed. “Maybe he was watching over his kill? Like a vulture waiting for everything to be clear before going in to eat?”
“That’s disgusting,” Aethra said appalled. “You don’t think he’s going back to …”
“Maybe not. I mean, I hope he’s not still eating them after death.”
Her stomach rolled at the idea. Based on the look Aethra gave, hers did too.
“Is there anything else to report?” Aethra asked.
“No, Your Grace.”
“All right, try to not let him escape next time.”
“I didn’t intend for that this time.”
The queen’s cold gaze shut Pen up, clearly not appreciating the tone. This was a woman who demanded respect and expected orders to be followed.
Pen wanted to meet that gaze. Previous Blood Warriors, like Hamia, were revered and loved, e
ven by royalty. That reputation was dead, though, by hundreds of years, and here Pen was back mouthing off to actual royalty.
Pen lowered her eyes and bowed to the queen, hating herself for it as well as talking back in the first place.
“I’m sorry, Your Grace,” she said. “I’ll catch him soon.”
“Good. You may go.”
The asylum was as cold as always, but it was quiet this time. That silence still felt tense, and Pen was not helping with that.
The Fang might end up in here if she ever found him.
“Hi, Pen!” Gabris shouted when she entered the underground storage room. She had no idea what else to call it.
“Hello,” she replied to the boy working by his father, Valakis.
Giving a small wave to them, she kept walking past the bodies lining the walls. It still felt wrong down here, like their dead eyes were accusing her of breathing.
Skiachora entered her thoughts then, and the irony was not lost on her. She would take a perfectly nice nap among the ghosts of her husband and son, yet couldn’t handle the very solid corpses.
Wondering if Dagger and Scythe would be fine down here, she reached Biros’s lab.
She nearly slammed the door shut again without entering.
Biros stood at the center table, covered to the elbows in gore. His hands were completely lost inside the cracked open corpse’s chest.
“Is that the woman from last night?!” Pen nearly shrieked but managed to keep her voice down.
Closing the door, she hoped Gabris hadn’t seen anything.
“It is,” Biros said, calm as ever. “I thought examining her organs might provide some insight.”
“Like what?!”
She cringed at the squelching noise his hands made leaving her organs. At least he had gloves on.
Forcing herself to step next to the dead woman, Pen saw her face. Valakis had washed her hair, and her eyes were closed now. Ignoring the mess of her throat, and torso now too, she looked rather peaceful.
Biros had cracked her rib cage and opened it wide enough to showcase her lungs and heart to the world. The stillness of the organs was horrifying, but seeing them move like this would have been worse. Just seeing them exposed was wrong. This heart should still be beating.
Pen looked back to the woman’s serene features, a sharp contrast to the wounds.
“Did you manage to find anything?” she asked softer this time.
“Not yet,” Biros said, “but I retrieved her stomach and cut into that earlier.”
“Why?” Pen sighed.
“For a woman who was hired by royalty to hunt down this man, you are rather squeamish about this.”
“Blood is one thing,” Pen snapped, “rummaging around organs is another.”
“I’m not doing this for fun, mind you,” Biros defended. “I’m trying to find any scrap of a clue in the least likely places. This man has been biting people to death, feeding on them, it’s not much of a stretch that he might be feeding them something too.”
“So, did you find anything?” she asked feeling chastised again.
“Sadly, no,” he said. “There was only more blood. I imagine she inhaled or swallowed a lot as he attacked her. That would account for it all over her mouth too, coughing it up.”
Nausea played at her throat again.
“Check her lungs too,” Pen suggested. “Is there anything I can … help with?”
She wanted nothing more than to leave, but that seemed rude.
“No, I’m just about finished,” Biros said. “Do you know her name yet? Contacted her family?”
“Not yet, that was my next step,” she said relieved that she could leave, but dreading to find out more.
The Lion’s Den was her only lead again. The latest woman worked there, so someone had to know her, maybe Mellas. Pen knew she was only assuming based on their shared profession, but it wasn’t too much of a stretch. They worked in the same place.
Unfortunately, it only opened at sunset. She intended to go earlier anyway and demand to talk to someone. Right now, though, she headed back to her rooms.
She had to update her journal, along with grabbing some food. She hadn’t eaten all day.
Reaching the tall building her rooms were in, meat pie in hand, Pen wished she could stay a touch longer, but the sun had started sinking below the buildings.
The main door was unlocked which made her pause. Several people lived here, a couple of families too, and they all had keys to the front. One of them probably just forgot to lock it again. Pen tried to shake off the paranoia, but it clung like spider’s silk in her hair. The corridor inside was empty, and Pen locked the door properly behind her.
Familiar voices of her neighbors bled through the walls, and everything seemed normal. The door had never been left unlocked before. Pen made her way to the second floor, looking for anything else amiss.
Nothing was unusual until she reached her floor and spotted the man standing outside her rooms.
“What are you doing here?” she exclaimed, relaxing at the same time. She hadn’t realized how tense her shoulders were as she was looking around.
“Well, that was a lovely greeting,” Palamedes said pushing himself upright from the wall. “I shouldn’t have expected less.”
“Sorry,” Pen muttered closing the distance. “I just didn’t expect to see you here. How did you get in?”
“Young lad downstairs let me,” Palamedes said. “Told him I was looking for a woman with purple hair, and he instantly knew it was you.”
“Okay, so what are you doing here?” Pen asked. “You just stormed off, and now you’re back perfectly fine?”
“I did leave, but believe it or not, I actually felt bad. I went to Kaliasma and sent Raisa a letter. She asked me to come here and help you,” he explained, watching her closely.
Any retort died on her tongue. He still sounded annoyed but honest. She didn’t know how much she could tell him, but Raisa did trust him. She was floundering in a storm trying to get this Fang on her own.
Raisa trusted him enough to ask him to come, the least Pen could do is trust her.
With Raisa in mind now, Pen wondered if there was something else they should talk about. It had been a few days, close to a week even, and Pen felt like something was missing. She promised herself then that she’d go visit her and Drivas again soon.
“Okay,” Pen said nodding. “This is actually good timing too.”
Pen passed him, taking her key from her pocket.
“Wait, really?” he asked. “I thought you were going to … disagree.”
“Why did you pause there?”
“Well, I was going to say argue but I didn’t want to start anything,” he confessed.
Guilt tugged at her with the comment.
Unlocking the door, she let Palamedes in behind her and closed it.
Taking a breath, Pen turned to him. “I put you through a lot, after dragging you from home, and then lied to you about half of it.”
His eyebrows shot up. Pen was surprised by the honesty in her words too, but it actually felt good.
“Um …” he scratched his short beard. “Care to tell me who was in the forest then?”
“I can’t,” she stated. “I did meet someone, but I can’t say who.”
He sighed and watched her for a moment, thinking.
“You’re going to have to trust me on that,” Pen stressed, agitated that he was so forceful on that subject. It didn’t really matter to him anyway.
To her surprise he nodded.
“So, what information do you have on this killer?” he asked.
“A lot recently, but no direct connections yet. Well, except one, kind of.”
“Kind of?” he asked.
Pen led him to her desk explaining the journal and map, even showing him the hair she found. The only connection she really had was the Lion’s Den. She hoped it would provide more of a picture of the Fang’s habits, but the markings were still scattered. Sti
ll it felt good to talk to someone.
Turning back to Palamedes, who stood with his back to the window, she froze. A large brown hawk sat on her windowsill outside, watching them both.
“Pen?” Palamedes said drawing her attention again. “You all right? You looked spooked for a second.”
“I’m fine,” she said a little too quickly. “I … got distracted by the bird outside.”
He turned and took a step back in surprise.
“Whoa, I’ve never seen one that close before. What’s it doing? Is it trained?”
“I don’t think so,” Pen said watching the hawk.
Normally, birds would twitch and look around. Always on the lookout for predators, or in the case of this giant one, prey. This hawk sat perfectly still, just watching her.
“Anyway,” Pen said trying to pull the conversation away from the surprise visitor, “the Lion’s Den is connected now to two of the women. That has to lead to something.”
“Right,” he said leaving the bird alone. “It opens soon. We should head there.”
“I was thinking the same. Come on.”
Glancing to the hawk again, feeling his beady eyes on her, Pen threw her cloak back on.
They entered the corridor again, and Pen locked the door. Halfway down the stairs she paused.
“I’ll meet you outside,” she said to Palamedes.
He glanced to her, eyebrow raised.
“I left the journal behind,” she said.
Rushing back before he could say anything, Pen got her door open and locked it behind her.
The hawk was still there, just outside the glass. Pen walked right up to him and unlatched the window. The panes opened from the middle, pushing the hawk off his perch.
The size of the bird, and his wingspan, made her back away. Fear clawed into her heart as he settled onto the sill again, still watching her.
“Are we going to have a problem?” she asked Phaos, trying to push the fear down.
The gods could look like anything or anyone. Maybe one could impersonate her father, but that wouldn’t explain the empty grave.
The hawk’s head tilted left then right. No.
“Is my father alive?” she whispered. “He is, isn’t he? And I know he’s not just some mortal man. He actually is Maniodes, right?”
Grief of the Undying (The Ichorian Epics Book 3) Page 18
