Mikael suppressed a groan. They had a long night of reviewing musty old files ahead of them, then. “Has your sensitive come by to see him?”
Cerradine gave Mikael a secretive smile. “She was here this morning.”
“You said she knew the other man, the one the city had, was the one from my dream. How?”
“A body like that doesn’t turn up every day, so she knew it was your victim. Besides, she claims she senses your presence in the bodies.”
Mikael gaped at him, the sour feeling in his stomach rising again. “My presence?”
“She always can,” Cerradine said with a shrug.
The colonel had never before told him he left a touch of himself behind in the victims, almost as if he left a part of his soul with each dream. He swallowed. “We should head back to the fortress. I have paperwork to finish.”
“Deborah and I have discussed letting the two of you work together.”
Surprise made Mikael’s breath go short. The idea of meeting someone who’d been running across abandoned bits of his soul quashed any desire he’d had to know more about this woman.
“There are two dead already, Mikael. In your mind somewhere, you have evidence we need. She could get at it.”
“How?” he asked, his stomach roiling again. “I don’t even know how to find what’s buried in my mind.” What could a sensitive do?
“Trust me, she can,” Cerradine said in a placating tone. “If she looked into your dreams, she could find more. I only want you to consider it.”
Look into his dreams? How did he mean for the woman to do that? Was Cerradine suggesting that he allow her to be present while he dreamed? Mikael didn’t know what to say.
Kai made all the proper responses, his diplomatic training showing, and they left the morgue. Mikael forced himself not to look back at the colonel or the body he’d left behind. Once inside the coach and headed back to the palace, Kai turned to him.
“You’re afraid to do what he wants.” No accusation colored Kai’s tone this time, merely observation.
Of course I am. Mikael leaned against the wall of the coach and closed his eyes. “He doesn’t understand what he’s asking.”
“I would prefer to reach a quick conclusion to this case,” Kai told him sternly. “If you can help this way, you should be willing to consider it.”
That was an odd stance for Kai to take, the first time Mikael recalled Kai wanting him to dream. He lifted the blind and gazed outside, just wanting to escape Kai at the moment.
Kai opened his mouth to make another argument, but Elisabet’s hand settled on his sleeve. “Leave it,” she told him. “No one should have to live through that. He doesn’t want to force another.”
Kai gazed at her, an offended expression on his face, as if she’d betrayed him by coming down on Mikael’s side. Then his eyes fixed on Mikael again. The only one of Dahar’s children not to have inherited his green eyes, Kai had eyes of dark brown, excellent for glaring. None of them spoke for the remainder of the trip.
Dahar had left by the time they returned, so they spent the afternoon reviewing files for Cerradine, hunting for anything incriminating the Andersens might have left behind. Mikael suspected the other Family had been too thorough for that. He skimmed through the remaining files in the stack he’d chosen. On the other hand, it appeared that Kai intended to read every word in his. They both continued past sunset. “I have an appointment on the sparring floor,” Mikael lied when the clock on the mantel struck seven.
“Fine,” Kai snapped, not even looking up. “I’ll finish.”
Once Kai began something, he usually stayed with it until the end. Mikael left Kai there, reading in the wan glow of the gaslights. “He’s going to be here all night,” he said quietly to Elisabet as he passed her at the door.
“I don’t doubt it,” she replied.
Deborah was in yet another meeting with the other elders, so Mikael decided this would be an excellent time to hunt for Jannika.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The twenty-twos were gathered in their common room, drinking tea and laughing. Like most common rooms, it was filled with a haphazard collection of furniture—couches and chairs and settees most likely cast off from some household, or purchased with Family credits and then used until it looked cast-off.
Although some had their backs to him, Mikael counted ten women gathered there, along with a half dozen children too young for yeargroups, and two young men. All wore casual garb—loose pants probably retired from the sparring floor, shirts old enough to be gray, some with their sleeves cut out. Sweaters and socks for some of them, the colder-natured among the yeargroup. A long, low table was cluttered with teacups, and one of the toddlers tried to grab one kept just out of reach. A large urn safely set aside on a tall stand kept the hot tea safe from grasping little hands. One of the young women brushed out another’s hair, preparatory to braiding it. That girl eyed Mikael for a moment.
He stood at the end of their hallway, waiting for someone to give him permission to step over the guideline that divided the main corridor from the individual hall. He could walk in there, claiming that it was a matter pertinent to the Daujom, but he didn’t see Jannika among that group, and he didn’t want to annoy them by being high-handed. And it wasn’t legitimately Daujom business anyway. He just wanted information on Kai.
One of the young women prodded another with a bare foot. “Isn’t that Jannika’s current?”
Mikael felt a dull flash of surprise, followed by a brief surge of panic. He did his best to quash his reaction but had no doubt it was felt since a handful of the group’s members began to laugh. He might have initiated this renewed friendship with Jannika, but he’d done so to gather information. He hadn’t expected her to try to court him. And he wasn’t sure he wanted to be her current, however that was meant.
The woman doing the braiding swiveled about so she could see him, and Mikael recognized Iselin. After muttering something indistinct to the other young woman, Iselin rose and wended her way through the ragtag furniture, while he counted in his head to get his emotions under control.
When she stood a few feet away, Iselin acknowledged him with a mere lift of her chin. “What do you want?”
“I wanted to talk to Jannika.”
Iselin shook her head. She didn’t look displeased to see him, but she didn’t look pleased either. “Duty. She switched with one of the twenty-fives, took evening in Three Above.”
That translated into going back up two flights of stairs, up the grand stair to the palace, and then up another two flights to the third floor of the palace. And then he had to find her on that third floor. “Quarterguard duty?”
Iselin folded her arms over her chest. “Yes.”
“Thank you, then,” he said from the other side of the line. “That’s all I needed.”
Iselin nodded once and walked away, rejoining the cozy group in their evening’s sit-down. Jannika might have invited him to come have tea with her yeargroup, but Iselin wasn’t going to extend the same invitation. So Mikael made his way from Three Down all the way back up, contemplating what it meant that they apparently considered him Jannika’s current. Since she was on quarterguard duty, Jannika would be near the king’s quarters, or his consort’s—on the other end of the palace. Unfortunately, all the quarterguards were sensitives, so he had to work even harder to keep his reactions under control there.
He paused in the stairwell to catch his breath. When he stepped out onto the third floor, the quarterguard there looked down his long nose at Mikael but didn’t question his presence—the Daujom had access to all parts of the palace at any time. Mikael just walked on, thinking calm thoughts at each sentry as he passed. He finally spotted Jannika near the turn to the king’s quarters, staring stonily off at the far wall.
When he stopped a few feet away, she glanced both ways, possibly to discern w
hether the other quarterguards were ones likely to report her speaking to him while on duty, and only then did she look at him. On duty, her face was impassive, so he had no idea whether she was pleased to see him or not. “What are you doing up here?” she whispered.
“Still hunting information,” he admitted.
He saw a hint of a frown that quickly passed. “About Kai?” she asked.
“I’m afraid so.”
The quarterguard stationed on the other side of the turn into the king’s quarters watched them now, although surely he couldn’t overhear them.
Jannika sighed. “There was a rumor that he’s not Dahar’s son. That was the gossip that went around.”
Mikael felt his brows rise, even as he tried to quell his disbelief. Kai looked too much like Dahar to be anything other than his son, even if his eye color was different.
“Yes, I know,” Jannika said as if he’d spoken aloud. “You asked; I dug up the rumor. That doesn’t mean it’s true. All it means is that someone said it, and it got back to Kai’s ears.”
And what was important was whether Kai believed it, and whether it bothered him enough to have set off his most recent spell of ill temper. Mikael took a deep breath, tucking away that information so he could contemplate it later, where there weren’t sentries standing about with nothing better to do than eavesdrop on his reactions. “Thank you, then. I owe you.”
She didn’t move from her post, but leaned closer. “I could come by your quarters after my shift and we could discuss my payment.”
His flash of surprise provoked that nearest quarterguard to click his tongue at him. He hadn’t been fast enough to quash it. There was no misconstruing Jannika’s offer this time, though. She would go off duty in the early hours of the morning, when he planned to be sound asleep and, he hoped, not dreaming. “Perhaps tomorrow evening,” he said instead. “If you’re not on duty.”
Her lips twisted—disappointment, he decided—and then her face went still again. “Dinner, then?”
At this point, he was free for dinner tomorrow. “As long as my work doesn’t interfere.”
She completely broke her impassiveness by rolling her eyes. “Always work. Good night, Mikael.”
And so he was dismissed. Mikael wished her an uneventful shift and headed back the way he’d come, counting his steps to keep his mind clear of emotion.
It wasn’t until he was in his quarters one level lower—and on the opposite side of the palace—that he allowed himself to contemplate that brief discussion. He changed out of his uniform, wondering why Jannika had suddenly developed such a strong interest in him.
They had been involved before, but it had been, from the beginning, a casual relationship. They had agreed on that explicitly. When she’d decided to drop him, he hadn’t been heartbroken. Given the amount of time she’d been spending with the twenty-fives, he’d guessed it was coming. Now it seemed she’d decided she wanted to renew that arrangement, and possibly more. Apparently others in her yeargroup knew that too, although his sitting with her in the mess a few days before might have been enough to inform them.
While it was pleasing to know she fancied him enough to defy her closest friend’s aversion to him, he wasn’t sure why Jannika was doing so. That was enough to make him question the wisdom of pursuing a relationship with her. He wished for a moment that Deborah wasn’t tied up in elders’ meetings. He would appreciate her advice. Wasn’t that what sponsors were for?
He pulled on an old pair of sparring trousers, tied the drawstring, and lay down on his narrow bed, mind still chasing the conundrum that Jannika presented. As problems went, it wasn’t that bad. But now he owed Jannika something, and he had no idea how he was going to pay, not without raising hopes he wasn’t willing to fulfill.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Mikael went through the usual handful of memos forwarded by the back rooms, personnel planted in different households around the city reporting their progress. It was a tedious process, so Dahar usually waited for him to sort through them first, but this morning he hovered anxiously near Mikael’s desk as he worked.
Colonel Cerradine came in as Mikael read through one of the notes.
“Dahar, Mikael can read without your help,” Cerradine said in an amused tone. He laid his hat on Kai’s desk.
Dahar glanced up but otherwise ignored the statement.
“Are there files I can review?” Cerradine hinted.
“Did you get the dead mouse out of the file box?” Dahar asked. He picked up one of Mikael’s paperweights—a large river rock—and began to toss it from hand to hand.
Mikael belatedly realized that Dahar had addressed him. “Oh. Yes, no more dead mouse.”
He began packing the last files, having organized his and Dahar’s earlier that morning. He grabbed up the stack left behind atop Kai’s desk and slid them into the back of the box. “I hope these will be of some help.”
Cerradine watched the rock move back and forth. “I do too.”
“How is the case going, sir?”
Cerradine tore his eyes away from Dahar. “We’re searching for eighty different things, Mikael. Aldassa finally located where the first body went into the river. The killers didn’t do that, by the way. The farmer who owns the land found the body the next morning and realized what he was dealing with. He was afraid that if word got out, buyers would believe his crops were cursed, so he got one of his field hands to help him drag the body to the river and dump it in.”
Well, that solves that discrepancy between the two deaths.
“I doubt the general populace has made the connection to the massacres,” Cerradine added. “The rumors are only of blood magic so far.” He grabbed the paperweight midflight and set it firmly back on Mikael’s desk, glaring at Dahar.
Looking offended, Dahar perched on the edge of Mikael’s desk and crossed his arms over his chest.
Mikael stifled a laugh. “I can go talk to a couple of writers if you think it would help, Colonel. See what they’ve found out.” Dimani would have heard something, surely.
“I’d appreciate that, Mikael.” Cerradine picked up the box of files and, carrying it carefully by its leather straps, walked out of the office.
“I assume you didn’t find anything in your papers,” Dahar said, “that we need to take up with the Andersens.”
Mikael shook his head. If the Andersens had broken the law and blamed it on nonexistent vigilantes, he hadn’t seen any evidence of it.
• • •
Cerradine handed the file box over to his driver to stow in his carriage and, after checking his pocket watch, headed upstairs to the king’s household, hunting Deborah. She often checked on the king’s consort, Amdiria, in the mornings. He ran her down there, talking quietly with that white-haired lady. Almost old enough to be Dahar’s mother, Amdiria had always treated Dahar more like a son than a brother-in-law. As Dahar’s closest friend growing up, Cerradine had often been included in her motherly affection.
Amdiria stretched out a hand when she saw him lingering in her doorway. Cerradine went and kissed her cheek. Amdiria spent most days in her wheeled chair in her rooms, so she enjoyed visitors. While a patterned burgundy throw covered her withered legs, her warm smile and teasing voice countered her frail appearance. Cerradine chatted with her for a while before stealing Deborah away.
Deborah looked more rested than she had the last time he’d seen her, and very professional in her formal black uniform, high collar tightly hooked. He linked arms with her and drew her down the ornate hallway toward the stairs.
“Thank you for staying a bit, Jon,” Deborah said. “She doesn’t have visitors as often as I’d like.”
Cerradine grinned. “She rather likes me, you know.”
Deborah shook her head in mock despair. “No accounting for it. Why are you here bothering me?”
The exasperation i
n Deborah’s voice was only half-joking, he knew. She was always busy. He tugged her into the alcove beside the stairs, still in sight but not within earshot of the nearest sentry. “I ran the idea past Mikael yesterday, of working with Shironne. Did he mention that to you?”
“No. I’ve been busy trying to convince the elders to allow it. Yesterday’s incident changes things.”
He’d hoped she would have a definite answer from them. Apparently not yet. “So what do we do?”
“I will hold Mikael in the infirmary the next time he dreams. I’ll try drugging him, as per the elders’ instructions. Since he managed to slip off the palace grounds last time, I’ve asked a few people to keep an eye on him. If I don’t make any progress with the other elders, we’ll talk about . . . finding some other way.”
“Thank you, Deb.” He dropped a kiss on her forehead and they went on to discuss more personal matters as he walked with her down to the grand stair.
• • •
Mama took Shironne’s hands in her own, knowing full well that meant that Shironne would catch everything she thought, not just what she said aloud. “I want you to do your best to obey Verinne.”
Shironne held in a groan. “I will try, Mama.”
When she’d been a toddler, Verinne had already been old and fragile. She’d been terrified of Shironne’s father but had even stood up to him on a couple of occasions for the sake of Shironne’s mother. He hadn’t been above striking an old woman who got in his way, though, so her mother had begged Verinne to stay out of their altercations. Over the last sixteen years, Verinne had become more and more brittle, like crazed glass about to break.
“It’s only for a few days, sweetheart.” Her mother’s mind swirled with regret and resignation. It was frustrating that she must go to such lengths to preserve her family’s income. She didn’t want to sell the estate in the countryside, but they were running out of funds, and she had few options left.
Dreaming Death Page 17
