Dreaming Death

by J. Kathleen Cheney

  Another patron came down the stairs then, gave them a startled glance, and crossed to knock on the kitchen door. Synen’s wife emerged and the man asked that breakfast be sent up to him after all. Then he headed back upstairs, with only one perplexed glance at the common room’s three occupants.

  “This man,” Cerradine said, “in the dream. Shironne said he knew about you, and he knew about her being in your dream. How is that possible?”

  Mikael had been puzzling over that since she’d said it. “A lot of people know about my dreams and could have told the killer, but about her being in my dream? There are very few people who know that was planned.”

  “Myself, Cerradine, you, and Deborah,” Dahar said. “And the girl, of course.”

  Mikael shook his head. “Plus Kai and Elisabet, who were there when we talked about it, along with anyone any of us have told.”

  “I didn’t tell anyone other than Aldassa and Messine,” Cerradine said.

  Mikael shook his head. “The day before yesterday—or was it yesterday?—when I was on my way back to the fortress, I think someone . . . rifled through my mind. Deborah has a book that lists a type of Pedraisi witch that can do that. Just go in and look around. Not like a touch-sensitive, where I have to be thinking about a subject for her to be able to pick it up.”

  “Deb’s mentioned that to me before,” Cerradine said. “Mind Thief, I think.”

  “That’s why I think it must have been me. I knew about the plan, and he just picked that out of my head, that Miss Anjir was going to try to see into my dream. He wanted to be seen.”

  Dahar picked up an empty glass from the bar and gazed at the maker’s mark stamped into the bottom. “He’s been stalking you.”

  “I think so. If he’s from the original group of priests, then he’s come all the way from the border to haunt my dreams.”

  “How would he know about you in the first place?” Dahar asked.

  “He has Paal Endiren, sir. I’m sure of that now. So he could know everything Paal knows.”

  “And even though Mikael never worked directly with Paal, everyone in the office knew about his dreams.” Cerradine turned to Mikael. “Shironne said he thinks you know what he wants. What is it, then?”

  “I don’t know,” Mikael said. “How am I supposed to know?”

  “If he rifled through your mind,” Cerradine insisted, “then he must know whether it’s in your head or not. You have to know.”

  Mikael chased down the logic of that. Had David Aldassa become a victim only so that the killer could reach him? “I swear, sir, I don’t know what he wants.”

  Dahar came around and peered into Mikael’s eyes. “Will he give us three days before killing again?”

  The man had told Shironne the next victim would be closer to home. Mikael wasn’t sure what that meant, but he didn’t want to find out. “I don’t know.”

  “Then find him,” Dahar said firmly, “before we have to deal with another body.”

  How was he supposed to hunt these men? Aldassa, with all his squads of soldiers, hadn’t made any headway on locating the killers. Mikael nodded anyway, and Synen returned then with a handful of blankets and his son, sparing him from protesting ignorance yet again.

  The cart proved smaller than Mikael had hoped, but adequate for their needs. Synen’s son drove them down to the river, Mikael sitting in the back with Dahar while Cerradine shared the seat with the young man.

  Under the moonlight, a thin fog rose off the surface of the river, the normal smell kept at bay by the chill. Only light traffic flowed through the streets, mostly carters out early to get their loads through before dawn brought congestion to this part of town. In their heavy black overcoats, he and Dahar drew relatively little notice.

  “You weren’t broadcasting,” Dahar said as they drove along the river walk toward the Lower Town Bridge. “Not at all.”

  Mikael cast a surprised glance at him, unsure of Dahar’s expression in the dark. “Sir?”

  “I told Deborah, but you were asleep. You weren’t broadcasting anything. That happened when you were with the girl in my office as well. You kept disappearing from the ambient, almost as if the two of you had locked everyone else out. She stopped you from broadcasting.”

  His breath came a bit short—nothing to do with his dream, though. “She stopped me?”

  “Yes. I don’t know what that means, but it is . . . interesting. Khajurian does that when around her husband.”

  He felt slow-witted, but not enough that he didn’t catch Dahar’s implication. Khajurian was the king’s daughter and was bound to her husband—their minds were profoundly linked, so much so that what one knew, the other did. It was the reason that Khajurian, despite being the king’s only child, wasn’t under consideration to be his heir. The phenomenon was rare but had been documented since the first days of the Anvarrid invasion. Hadn’t Lucasedrion been bound to his wife? A fainter version of the situation had occurred among Anvarrid for centuries, but the Family had proven far more susceptible to an Anvarrid’s binding, provoking a far deeper communion between the individuals involved.

  Dahar was implying that he was bound to Shironne Anjir.

  That was ridiculous. He’d never met her before this week. Didn’t there have to be an exchange of blood? That was the source of the Anvarrid wedding ritual of cutting the bride’s and groom’s palms to combine their blood.

  Mikael shook his head. It shouldn’t even be considered. She was a child still, and as such, he couldn’t discuss that possibility with her.

  The Lower Town Bridge loomed in sight, spanning the man-made embankments of the river. One of the very first things built by the Anvarrid when they’d invaded, the old arch bridge was constructed out of stone stolen from the remains of even older structures, the shapes mismatched and jarring. Time had stained the granite abutments and embankments an unattractive orange-beige. Mikael had always wished the king would tear down the bridge and replace it. He suspected he’d feel that even more strongly after today.

  They left the cart up on the river walk with Synen’s son standing guard.

  The water ran far below its normal level this time of year, exposing a wide swath of slime-covered sands. The bridge’s abutments rose from the stone embankments on the sides of the river, the outer arches reaching over the partially exposed ground. The abutments that supported the central arch had iron rings fixed to their sides, with chains running through them so that fishermen could tie off their boats there. No one fished there this early, and Mikael really didn’t want to consider the sort of fish one could catch in the foul water this far south into the city.

  Lights on the bridge illuminated footprints in the mud past the embankments, signs of slipping and sliding, too many to gain a clear picture of what had happened there.

  Peering out through the light fog, Dahar pointed to the abutment nearby. “Looks like a pile of clothes over there.”

  The victim had been dragged under the bridge where the moonlight didn’t penetrate. Mikael gazed at the nearest set of chains that wrapped under the bridge. He could keep a hand on the chain and hope not to slip. The water ran silent and purposeful there, determined to escape the city. “Let me go down and look around, sir.”

  “I’ll go,” Cerradine said, stepping up onto the wall.

  “Can you swim, sir?” Mikael asked.

  Cerradine’s dark eyes fixed on him.

  “Let me do it, sirs,” Mikael said. “I can swim out if I lose my balance. You can’t.”

  Dahar raised an eyebrow but didn’t argue. He started rolling out the old braided rope they’d borrowed from the stables instead.

  Mikael stripped off his overcoat and jacket and handed them up to Cerradine. He took the rope Dahar offered and tied it around his waist, hoping it wouldn’t snap if it had to support his weight. His teeth started to chatter. “If I go down, sir,” h
e said, “don’t try to come after me. Let me go.”

  Dahar turned a pinched look in his direction. “I’ll do what I need to.”

  Mikael slid down the river wall and landed on the slimy, exposed bank. The footing was terrible, and his boots were going to be ruined. Keeping one hand on the wall, he made his way toward the bank under the bridge, where the shadows were still dark enough to hide a body from view on the street. He heard a carriage rattle past overhead, the sound echoing bizarrely underneath the old stones.

  This time of year the water was low enough that the chain was several feet above the murky water. But under the middle of the bridge, a line was tied, straining off into the water.

  Shironne had said something about a rope or line. That they’d tied the victim to keep him from getting dragged away.

  Shivering now, Mikael made his way closer to the line. There were only a couple of feet of exposed mud under the bridge’s footing, at a sharp incline. He slipped, and one foot slid in the river. Chilly water flooded into his boot.

  Reaching down under the water, he found the line almost submerged in the muck. He worked a hand underneath it, feeling the tautness as the current dragged at the weighted end. He managed to haul the line above the water, but his feet slipped out from under him. He went down and swallowed a mouthful of river water when he gasped at the cold. He struggled back upright, coughing, using his grip on the rope to steady himself.

  “What happened?” Dahar called from the river wall.

  “I’m fine,” Mikael yelled back. Dahar had to have sensed his momentary panic. He could swim, but he didn’t want to in this water.

  Dahar didn’t seem appeased. He yanked on the old braided rope attached to Mikael’s waist, taking up the slack. When Mikael got close enough, Dahar put out a hand and guided him out of the water, and then together they began to haul back the river’s prize. The line stretched into the water, its burden visible even before they pulled the dead man out.

  Mikael glanced up at Cerradine, who watched with anguish plain in his face. “Stay up there, sir. We don’t need to risk you.”

  He hauled on the line and pulled the body onto the narrow strip of exposed bank; then he turned the body onto his back.

  Mikael stared into the dark eyes of David Aldassa. He suddenly felt sick to his stomach, the death becoming all too real to him.

  “Stop that,” Dahar protested sharply.

  “I’m sorry, sir,” Mikael said, swallowing bile. He calmed himself, trying to get his stomach under control. The faint smell of sewage coming off the river didn’t help.

  He untied the braided rope from around his own waist and wrapped it under Aldassa’s limp arms. Dahar and Cerradine used the braided rope to haul the body up next to the embankment, and then dropped it down again to aid Mikael in climbing up as well.

  Shivering, he sat down next to Aldassa’s body and dropped his head into his filthy hands. His slip had soaked him completely. He could hear Dahar moving about; someone wrapped a blanket around his shoulders. Cerradine silently wrapped Aldassa’s body in a second blanket as Mikael stared into the dark rush of the river. His nose had started running and he smelled and none of that mattered.

  • • •

  The Family uniform felt strange, the trousers different from the ones Shironne normally wore under her petticoats, closer fitting. Despite that, the lack of petticoats made her legs feel strangely bare and exposed. She recalled enough about Family uniforms to know they were similar to army uniforms, so Cerradine’s workers wore this sort of clothing every day. I can get used to this too.

  Deborah had left her alone for a time to speak with the innkeeper, bidding her to try to get some sleep. That gave Shironne time to turn her mind to her other problem instead.

  For some time, she’d expected that once Perrin was safely married off, she would go to work for the army, much as she did now. Only officially, with a uniform and perhaps her own place in one of the buildings that rented rooms to army personnel. But if she was supposed to help Mikael Lee, that meant being near wherever he was. This arrangement at the tavern wasn’t practical. It would be so much simpler if she lived nearer him. Like in the palace itself.

  Or if he lived out in the city. Had Mikael ever contemplated leaving the fortress, going to work for the army instead, perhaps? She quickly dismissed the idea. He was too Family. He didn’t even want to inherit his grandfather’s position because it would mean giving up being Family.

  And then she understood that he actually was in line to inherit his grandfather’s position—the Master of Lee Province, much like a king, but on a provincial level instead. Mikael dreaded that fate with all his heart. Because it would take him away from everything he loved and make him an Anvarrid, and he was relieved that his grandfather wouldn’t accept him because he simply looked too Lee, too much like his mother, who’d merely been a guard and had only been half-married to Mikael’s father anyway.

  And when Shironne reflected that she didn’t know how someone could be half-married, the knowledge came to her that there was some manner of contract, and it had been legally binding only on his Lee mother, but not on his Anvarrid father.

  How do I know that?

  Mikael Lee was still there, at the edge of her thoughts. That was how she could pull those details from his mind.

  She’d woken from his dream with her bare hand on his vest, wool old enough to bear traces of oil from his hands, residue from cleaning, and a touch of lemon, his heart calming under her touch. He’d drifted back to wakefulness more slowly, not noticing when Deborah helped her back onto the chair again.

  Most people she could shut out as long as their emotions were mild. Even when stronger emotions came into play, she could usually force them away. Mikael seemed to be the exception. Her sense of his presence now occupied a small corner even when quiet, like a sleeping dog.

  How long had it been that way, and she’d simply not noticed? Since she’d realized he was in the dreams, a presence that the victims could feel, watching over them to deal out justice later? How long had she been gleaning bits and pieces of memories from his mind?

  We’ve found Aldassa. The sleeping dog suddenly bayed, thundering through her mind. We’re taking his body to the headquarters. We’ll come back for you.

  Shironne felt her eyes sting with tears again. She’d known that, too . . . that he’d found David Aldassa’s body, caught in the river’s current but still tied to the footings of the Lower Town Bridge, just as she’d seen in his dream.

  She hadn’t wanted to know. She didn’t want to, even now. Even though she’d known exactly why they’d gone down to the river’s edge.

  She wished she could shut him out, not share Mikael’s vague sense of guilt, that feeling that he was responsible for David Aldassa’s death, that he’d failed to figure out what the killer expected of him, and that he would be responsible for the next death as well if he couldn’t figure out what he supposedly had tucked away in his mind, probably still in pieces, because that man believed he knew.

  But it was hers too, that guilt.

  • • •

  Dahar’s hand descended on Mikael’s shoulder. “Come on. We need to get him out of here.”

  Mikael stood, his boots squishing. Dahar would want to get the body to the army’s morgue as soon as possible, before people saw it and talk spread of another death. Dahar wouldn’t want panic in the city.

  Following Dahar’s lead, he picked up one end of the wrapped body and lifted it up over the stone embankment. Synen’s son came and helped, his face pasty but otherwise in control. Mikael climbed over the wall last, and they laid the body in the cart. This time Cerradine sat in the back with Mikael, one hand on Aldassa’s body, while Dahar sat up front with Synen’s son.

  They drove in the direction of the army’s headquarters, and Mikael held the blanket around him with one hand. They passed through the Lower
Town’s fetid streets, past the temple, and up toward the better parts of the city. Cerradine’s eyes were fixed on Aldassa’s body, making certain it didn’t slide in the hay. When Mikael glanced back toward the river, he was the only one to see him.

  In the pallid light of a streetlamp, Paal Endiren stood near the corner of the Black Street Temple, barely visible in the shadows.

  Mikael pushed himself out of the back of the moving wagon and landed hard on one knee. Dahar yelled after him, but he waved Dahar off as he jumped to his feet and jogged back in that direction.

  Endiren still stood at the far corner of the temple, arms wrapped about himself in the cold.

  Then two men in brown tunics emerged from the shadows from behind Endiren. They grabbed him and started dragging him down the temple steps toward an approaching coach.

  Mikael ran. He dashed through a hundred sets of chimes in the temple’s white colonnade, setting them tinkling discordantly. When he reached the end of the colonnade, across the temple’s wide steps, he saw that the men had reached the coach and were pushing Endiren into it. He barely fought them, as if he was simply too weak.

  Mikael reached for his pistol, only to realize he didn’t have any weapon with him, so he ran down the steps toward the coach. It began rolling again, the horses picking up speed as it headed deeper into the Lower Town. Mikael’s wet boots slipped and he tumbled down the last few hard steps, rolled to his feet, and kept running.

  But the coach was moving too quickly, its lead on him growing as the driver’s whip cracked in the silence. Mikael followed as it turned a corner onto Fenless Street, but when he reached that corner, it was gone.

  He stopped there, breathing hard. He pressed a hand against his stomach, suddenly nauseated by the exertion and frustration, making him break into a sweat. His breath steamed in the cold.

  The colonel jogged up beside him. “What in Hel’s name was that, Mikael?”

  “That was them,” he said without hesitation. “They had Paal Endiren.”