The Spirit Lens

by Carol Berg

  Not a step, not a breath, disturbed the stillness. What prisoner might have been held down here was no longer.

  A single red lamp beamed brightly through the forest of columns, marking a great black stone bowl set atop a stepped pyramid some eight or ten metres across. Disproportionately elongated figures of men and women, hacked roughly from the gray stone, supported the bowl.

  “The Coronation Font,” said Ilario quietly. “Step up and take a look. It’s a marvel.”

  The rounded lip felt cold to my hands as I peered into the font. Five half-height pillars protruded a few centimetres above the dark, still surface of the water, providing stepping stones to the center, where the watch lamp’s ruby glow illumined a marble pedestal. A stone tablet lay on the pedestal. “Is that the Heir’s Tablet?”

  “The thing itself.”

  It behooved a sovereign to be specific when he scribed the name of the one who would succeed him, should he die without issue. Soren had written the Duc de Journia, who at the time was Armand de Savin, the white-haired Chancellor of Sabria. By the time Soren died, the Duc de Journia was the late chancellor’s twenty-one-year-old son, Philippe, whom Soren detested.

  “I thought it would be locked away,” I said, astonished, “so no one could tamper with it.”

  “No need,” said Ilario, from below me. “Stretch your hand out over the water.”

  When I did so, the water began to churn. Swirling, burbling, the dark flood quickly swelled upward toward the lip of the font, swamping the half columns.

  I snatched my hand away, and the heaving water calmed. The residue of massive enchantment settled on my skin like spiderwebs, smelling of musty leaves and mildew.

  “Happens it requires a few drops of an anointed king’s blood to prevent all that folderol,” said my companion. “And if a person gets swept off the stepping stones into the water, a hellacious clamor breaks out in the temple, and people come running and pull you out half drowned, and you think some pompous temple aide is going to slap you into one of these cells for the rest of your life, though you just wanted to get a look. . . .”

  Ilario’s rueful expression—and the image of a lanky young boy’s dripping humiliation—elicited an unexpected laugh. But I was quickly sobered by a serious question that should have been the first out of my mouth when my royal cousin handed me this mess.

  “Lord Ilario, whose name is scribed on that tablet? Since the boy died . . .”

  Prince Desmond had died seven long years previous, and three more babes had failed since. Even as the distraught queen grew more reclusive, the suspicion grew that the sad lady was cursed and Philippe should be rid of her. No matter how devotedly my cousin believed his wife would yet produce a living heir, I could not imagine Philippe abandoning his beloved Sabria to the closest male of the Savin line, the near-illiterate Conte Parnasse.

  “No one can pry it out of him,” said Ilario. “After Catalin was stillborn, he came down here and scribed a new name, but he told no one whose name. Not even Eugenie. He said only that she didn’t need to fret; that if the worst befell, his heir would be a person of strong and noble heart, who would care for her as his own sister . . .”

  He tapped one elegant toe. Then he huffed, sighed deeply, and climbed the black stone steps to stand at my side. I waited, grasping that his thought was not quite ended.

  “And then, a month later, on the anniversary of Desmond’s death—that would be not quite two years ago now—Philippe’s horse went mad and threw him. Broke his leg and three ribs. Damned bad luck. I offered to fetch him a charm from Fedrigo, but, as always, he scoffed.”

  I gaped at Ilario, who in turn stared at the tablet, its secret barricaded with enchantments I doubted any mage of our day could duplicate. And I wondered about luck and coincidence and if, perhaps, my royal cousin’s certainty that his son’s deathday would bring him mortal danger was based on more than a single incident. “Have there been other unfortunate occurrences on Prince Desmond’s deathday?”

  “The year prior to the mad horse, their daughter, Catalin Jolie, was stillborn.”

  Holy saints! When Philippe named a new heir, had the queen been relieved that the burden of Sabria’s future did not rest in her womb, or had she been angry that her husband’s throne would pass to someone she did not know, as if he had lost faith in her? Or perhaps . . . Rumor said Queen Eugenie had first brought mages to Castelle Escalon when the little prince lay dying.

  “Lord Ilario, does your sister blame the king for Prince Desmond’s death?”

  “Certainly not. The boy was sickly from birth.” Ilario spun in place and tripped down the stepped dais. “We’d best move on. We came looking for evidence of Michel.”

  The royal tombs of Sabria’s kings nestled in cold, dark bays between the heavy piers. Thick iron doors broke the occasional spaces of flat wall.

  “Preparation rooms, chapels, storehouses, who knows what they were?” said Ilario, as we peered into the airless chamber behind one such door. Anyone of adult stature would have to duck to enter. Despite the cramped doorway, the ceiling stood at a reasonable height. “The verger says the lintels were built low so dead souls could not escape.” He shuddered.

  We opened and closed every door. Some revealed bare cells. Some revealed heaps of what might be rotted carpeting, or worse. We found splintered shelves, broken chisels, and a rusty vise.

  The crypt must have held fifty royal tombs—some sarcophagi little more than stone boxes, carved with symbols, some marked with elaborately adorned altars and graven memorial stones, some adorned with carvings of horses, wine casks, and other symbols of wealth and prosperity. More than once I jumped when our lamp revealed a pale face with solid black eyes—a nouré, a statue erected to honor the dead, its naked form swathed in real garments and jewelry, lacking only lifelike eyes so as not to be mistaken for the departed one.

  Time had ravaged most of the tombs. Once-bright paint had faded on walls and furnishings. The fine garments that draped the nouri hung threadbare, ravaged by insects, vermin, and damp. Gemstones sat in tarnished settings or had been dug out and replaced with less precious stones.

  The weight of so many tombs and altars, pillars, and cells oppressed my soul. The black, accusing stare of the nouri from their dark recesses dredged up my own long-buried darkness. And when I caught a whiff of cedar, the old wounds hidden underneath my doublet flared with pain, igniting searing memory. . . .

  The hammering fire so unexpected . . . and then another piercing blow comes fast. The world explodes in pain and blood. Shoulder. Back. Searing agony, accompanied by a flailing blade and madman’s cries: “Failure! Fool! Incapable.”

  “Father . . . don’t!”

  Lancing fire splits my left arm elbow to wrist. Life escapes in warm floods. Knees buckle. Side skewered with flame . . .

  “Master, help me! Dufreyne . . . Garol . . . Mother!”

  Get up, get up. On your feet or die this moment. Sweet angels defend! He’s strong as a rabid dog. Grab his wrist. Ignore the pummeling; that hand holds no blade.

  The earth wavers . . . light shimmers . . . fades into gray . . . Let go of his knife hand and you die. Hold on and you’ll collapse . . . and die. So, let go, then. Aim for his throat. One chance . . .

  “Soren’s tomb is the farthest in. I hope he’s kept his clothes on at the least. Viewing your sovereign in the raw is different when you actually knew the fellow.”

  Ilario’s prattle dispersed my vision as the wind scatters feathers. But the pain lingered, and I could still smell the reek of blood and mortal panic. The scent of dry cedar never failed to rouse these persistent fragments of horror—memories of the day my father had tried to kill me, and I killed him instead.

  “Portier, are you quite well?”

  “Yes, yes, I’m fine,” I said, near breathless from a burgeoning headache. Half-sick, hands trembling and hot as if yet drenched in nine-year-old blood, I fought to lock away the cursed past like a stray book in its proper cupboard.

&
nbsp; When I opened my eyes, Ilario wore an expression of drawn worry so at odds with his raked cap and dangling feathers, I had to smile. “All right, I am not fine,” I said. “As with you, Chevalier, crypts and deadhouses give me the frights. Now, what were you saying about Soren?”

  Soren’s tomb was the newest memorial, erected only eighteen years past, so it was only to be expected that it would show less deterioration than the others. Rosemary and lavender had been sprinkled liberally about the alcove to deter insects, and the rich colors of its frescos had been laid on deeply. But not only did the nouré’s robes of silk and ermine appear to have been taken from the royal wardrobe that very morning, but at least three hundred candles burned in wrought-iron sconces. Fresh-cut iris and purple flax bloomed in pewter urns.

  “The crypt must not be so unvisited as you thought,” I said.

  Ilario stared at the tomb bathed in candlelight, one arm folded across his sleek doublet, elbow resting in his hand, allowing him to chew a thumb thoughtfully. “Whatever are you doing, caeri?”

  My skittish nerves prompted a rude answer. But I bit it off. The softly voiced question was not for me, but rather for the dear one he believed had supplied these adornments.

  After a few moments, he snapped his head around. “It’s surely Antonia who maintains all this. Soren was her only true son, nigh a god to her. Though, certainly, she has been all kindness to Geni and me. She had no need to adopt us . . . me, especially.”

  He returned his gaze to the altar, and the half-again-larger-than-truth nouré of his foster brother looming. I didn’t think he believed his assertion. Queen Eugenie, wed to another man—another king—had been lavishing her dead husband’s tomb with love. How much more evidence against her would Philippe need?

  “Onward,” said Ilario, with far less enthusiasm than he’d shown up to now.

  When Ilario pulled open the iron door tenth from Soren’s tomb, the chamber sighed a tainted breath: sweat, ordure, and the acrid stink of pain, torment, and despair that seeped from walls and ceiling. Our lamplight pooled on a stained stone floor, and a litter of long, pale shards of freshly splintered wood.

  A single sturdy chair stood bolted to the floor in the center of the room. An accusation. A monument to evil. Even as my soul recoiled, the agente confide inside me noted that I would need to bring Dante to examine its stained arms. Perhaps some residual enchantment might identify the devils who had tormented a young girl in this pit. The metallic flavor of blood drowned my tongue, as if the stolen ichor hung in the air like mist.

  “Sancte angeli,” whispered Ilario, touching the chain dangling from the ancient wall—steel links not rusted, but new and sleek and merciless. The manacle at its end gaped open, warped and twisted, a jagged break splitting the thick metal. “However did the girl manage this?”

  He held out the torn metal. The cursed thing pricked my fingers like stinging nettle.

  “Magic,” I croaked, cramming my fingers under my arm and fighting not to drop the lamp. “Someone’s magic broke it. Perhaps her own . . . but a mule so near the end . . . unlikely.”

  Swallowing bile, I held the lamp high and circled the chamber, examining every centimetre of the damp walls. Ophelie had learned Michel’s name. But the conte had no power for magic. There should be one more chain, at the least, two if the sorcerer who had freed Ophelie had been a prisoner as well.

  On the wall opposite the dangling chain, another bolt had been fixed to the wall. Close examination revealed more. “Chevalier, come. . . .”

  I shone the lamp on markings scratched in the wall near the floor, scarce distinguishable from the dirt and mold that crusted the stone. A series of minute tick marks—eleven in a ragged row, with the first nine crossed over in the manner of one counting off a tenday. More interesting were what appeared to be an R, encircled by a twisted rope or vine, and a word scratched in tiny letters—Altevierre.

  Ilario, crouched beside me, touched the first mark. “The Ruggiere device,” he said, confirming my guess. “Michel was here.” But wherever the conte had gone, his chains and manacles had gone with him. If the tick marks indicated the length of Michel’s imprisonment in this cell, then he had been held here only a short time.

  Neither of us knew what Altevierre might signify, only that Ophelie had repeated it in her dying mania. As I sketched the wall markings in my journal, Ilario hunted more, but without success.

  “We need to take the manacle,” I said. “Dante might be able to identify the spellworker.”

  Without speaking the need aloud, we moved with accelerating urgency. Those who had used this room knew verger’s schedules and little-used stairways better than we did. Even Ilario would have difficulty explaining our presence.

  With a rusty gripping tool left in the crypt by some ancient bronze-worker, I worried a small piece of the torn manacle free and dropped it in my spall pouch. The shard had to be enough. Our lamp was fading. Then, as if our anxieties had made themselves manifest, a distant grind of metal heralded light footsteps on the grand stair and women’s voices murmuring.

  I pressed the chevalier’s arm. Shielding the lamp with our cloaks, we glided through the maze of columns, past the glistening black font. Thready enchantments brushed spirit and flesh like a storm of spiderwebs.

  Halfway from the font to the tetrarch’s stair, our lamp died. Saints and angels! Blinded, I stretched out my arms.

  “You feel it, lady? Someone’s here.” The woman’s voice came from the direction of the King’s Gate. “Who’s there? Step out!” Yellow beams danced through the forest of pillars.

  Edging one foot forward, I cursed my stubborn pride for refusing to commission charms. A guidespell would have been useful. But as I slid around the next pillar, a fan of pale blue light stretched out in front of me, just bright enough to enable me to avoid inconveniences like dangling lamps waiting to collide with my head. Astonishingly, the light emanated from Ilario’s hand.

  “Stop right where you are!”

  We dodged through the remaining pillars, ducked into the passage, and raced up the Tetrarch’s Stair. Guided by better light than Ilario’s blue fan, the footsteps pounded the lower stair at the same time I poked my head through the door.

  “All clear,” I whispered. The side aisle was deserted, but we had no hope of getting away before our pursuers emerged behind us. Venturing into the temple nave would be even more foolish, as the domed vastness offered no better cover than a few benches and potted flowers.

  “Duck behind Albriard,” said Ilario, as we shut the door quietly and huddled in the memorial alcove. “He’ll not mind. Stay put until they’ve gone.”

  It took me a moment to realize Albriard was the kingly statue looming over my head. As I weighed the wisdom of remaining three steps from the doorway, Ilario darted down the aisle. He dropped to his knees before the tomb he’d venerated on our arrival and touched forehead to stone.

  The door burst open, sending me deep into the shadow of King Albriard’s effigy. A tall, gray-haired woman paused a handsbreadth from me and glared down the aisle. I did not breathe. Of formidable stature, sturdy limb, and smooth, well-defined features, she might have stepped off a temple fresco—the very image of the warrior angel who cast the Souleater into the abyss. Once one had met Mage Gaetana, one would not forget her.

  Another woman passed the Tetrarch’s Door. Clothed in emerald silk, she, too, stood above an average woman’s height, though unlike that of her robust companion, this woman’s presence scarce moved the air. Slender-boned, frail, her luminous skin pale as moonlight framed in heavy loops of ebon hair, she seemed almost transparent. “Who is it?” she said, in breathless quiet.

  “Your bastard brother is the only visitor I see,” said the sorceress, her muted contralto as chilly as the stones and tinged with hostility. “What would he be doing down below?”

  A laugh rippled like starlight on water. Gentle humor, in no wise mocking. “Ilario? Ah, dear Gaetana, my brother would not visit the crypt were his tailor
to set up shop there. Dark places frighten him terribly—my fault, I fear. It’s only some temple aide or a wayward child has visited the kings today. Go back. I’ll rejoin you soon.”

  The Queen of Sabria glided down the memorial aisle, laid a hand on Ilario’s shoulder, and knelt beside him, making the same ritual gesture—a kiss of her fingers to lay on the stone. After a few moments, sister and brother stood and embraced.

  “I was missing him today, Geni,” said Ilario, as they strolled down the aisle arm in arm, the dark head and the fair almost touching. “You’ll not tell anyone, will you? Of all things in the world, I’ll not be seen as a Moping Mariah who lurks about tombs. My reputation!”

  Gaetana stepped back through the Tetrarch’s Door and closed it softly behind her. Expelling my long-held breath, I sagged against King Albriard’s monument.

  Eugenie laid her head on Ilario’s shoulder. “Ah, sweet brother, I miss him, too. So very much. Someday . . .” They moved out of hearing before she completed her thought.

  Was it possible Philippe and Ilario were so wrong about this lovely woman? Could one who appeared so fragile wreak the Souleater’s own torments on a girl of sixteen? Heaven bless that I was but the investigator of this mystery and not the judge.

  Only as the two walked away did I notice the implement dangling from Ilario’s left hand. Absurdity filled the dark voids left by our delving and my own brief odyssey into past despair, and I slid to the floor with a disbelieving chuckle. Our guiding light had come from Ilario’s crocodile charm.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  13 QAT 48 DAYS UNTIL THE ANNIVERSARY

  “I ’ll say this investigating is not half so entertaining as I thought it would be. Murders. Mules. Crawling around in dreadful places.” Goblet of wine in hand, Ilario leaned on his wrought-iron balcony rail that overlooked the swan garden.