by Dora Machado
Despite the tangle of confusing gorges and gulches, Bren knew his way around by heart. As a youth, he had spent many joyful days with his friend Marcus—son and heir to Arnulf, lord of Konia—tracking the canyon’s ghost lions and hunting the elusive three-horned goats that inhabited the cliffs.
Whatever joy he felt returning here fled when he remembered Marcus. He had not been cursed, and yet he was also gone. Given Bren’s situation, it would’ve been easy to sail by the banks of Konia and forget the old lord. But Bren treasured his friends and honored his elders, and the alliance with Konia was vital to Laonia’s security.
Bren’s wound bothered him little. Lusielle had done a remarkable job at mending him. The extraordinary potion was restoring his strength much faster than he expected. He had no trouble riding his horse and, after his skirmish with the cliffs, he was confident he could take care of himself in a fight if the need arose.
The seed house of Konia dwelt not in the famed heights of its astounding rock formations, but rather in the cradled safety of one of its narrow valleys. It opened suddenly at his feet as his horse topped the next ridge. It was strange. No sentries were posted there. He spotted horses at the stables, but no grooms. At the edge of the cliff, the entry tower was unguarded.
“Something’s not right.” Bren unsheathed his sword and hopped down from his mount, signaling a sequence of commands that sent his scout galloping back to guard the trail and his men deploying around the entry tower.
“Nobody in here,” Old Petrus announced after sweeping the small chamber.
Bren didn’t like the feel of this. He looked down the narrow shaft. A set of permanent ropes dangled all the way to the bottom. They weren’t cut, tangled, or rigged as they might have been in the case of a sudden attack. He hooked his foot in the loop and his fingers around the handle.
“Let me go first,” Petrus said. “You’ve been sick, my lord.”
“I was feeling a lot better until now.”
“Is it wise for you to go down there?”
“Wise?” Bren said. “No. Necessary? Yes. Wheel me down.”
The ropes dropped a thousand spans down the shaft. The slow, cumbersome access was a drag to the valley’s inhabitants but a source of pride for Arnulf. The lord of Konia boasted often that the entry to his seed house could be protected by a single man against thousands. As Bren spotted the ground below, he hoped the Lord of Konia had been right.
The guard at the bottom of the entry tower was curled in the corner with his forehead on his knees as if asleep. But he wasn’t asleep. He was dead, sitting in a puddle of his own congealed gore. Cautiously, Bren stepped out of the tower. An eerie silence welcomed him to the little vale. The birds chirped. The chickens clucked. The goats in the pens bleated hungrily when they saw him. But not a single human voice could be heard in the hollow.
One by one, his men landed at the base of the tower. When they were all together, Bren led them towards the seed house.
“Attacked, you think?” Petrus said.
“No evidence of battle,” Bren said. “Nothing’s burnt. Nothing’s missing. Nothing has been looted or stolen so far.”
The gates to the stately villa were open. Bren signaled for his men to split up and scout the place. Alone, he crossed the courtyard and mounted the steps without spotting anyone else. An old mastiff wagged his tail when he entered the hall. An awful stink scented the air. The flies had already arrived. Bren thought he had stumbled into one of his nightmares.
The bodies were neatly lined up in rows on the stone floor. Some were covered with sheets, tablecloths or rags. The rest remained uncovered. By his estimation, they accounted for at least half of the seed house’s population.
How? When? Why? Bren saw no signs of violence on those bodies, no battle wounds, pox marks or plague boils.
The incongruent sound of a child’s giggles echoed through the hall. The old dog got up, nails clicking on the floor as it pawed its way down the corridor and up the steps. Bren followed. He paused on the landing and had to rub his eyes. Was he seeing right?
Dressed in the finest green silks, a little red-haired toddler stood at the top of the stairs looking down on him. The child’s wide eyes were fixed on his sword.
“Hello.” Bren tucked his sword behind his legs. “I reckon you must be little Marcus. Is your grandfather here?”
The little boy turned around and trotted away. Bren mounted the last step just in time to watch him stand on the tip of his toes in order to reach the knob and open the massive door at the end of the hallway. The door clicked shut behind the child and Bren was alone again. Had the little boy been a ghost?
He stole through the gallery and put his ear to the door. He heard rustling, then nothing. Cracking the door open, he glimpsed an expansive, airy chamber paneled in polished blond woods. A massive bed draped in translucent netting stood against the far wall. Bren approached the bed and swept the netting aside with the tip of his sword. Mouth gaping in rigor, frozen face painted with death’s ashen gray, the lord of Konia lay under the covers.
“I know you’re there.” Bren faced the sumptuous drapes. “I won’t hurt you. Come out.”
A girl stepped out from behind the curtains, a plump youngster of maybe ten or eleven. She held the toddler in her arms. A freckled-faced little girl of maybe five clung to the older girl’s skirts. Moving cautiously, the frightened little group edged around Bren and came to stand by the bed.
“I tried to close his mouth,” the older girl said. “But it wouldn’t close. I started to line them up downstairs. But they’re too many.”
By the turd of the Twins. “Is … Is everybody else dead?”
“Dead, yes, or gone,” the girl said. “The last of the servants left when grandfather died yesterday. They were afraid of the sickness.”
“Why did they leave you behind?”
The girl held up her braid. “Three red-haired siblings in one household. It’s bad luck. We’re bad luck.”
Damn Konian lore and old superstitions. The children had been purposely abandoned. Bren took a knee before the girl and looked her in the eye. “You’re not bad luck. In fact, I wager you’re good luck. You’re alive, aren’t you?”
“They said we survived ‘cause we are demons.”
“Is that what you think?”
She shrugged.
“What are your names?”
“I’m Irina,” the girl said. “This is my sister Caryna and my brother Marcus. Who are you?”
“I’m Brennus.”
“Brennus, Lord of Laonia?”
“Aye.”
“My grandfather said you’d come,” Irina said. “Are you going to kill us?”
“I’m here to help.” Bren sheathed his sword and patted the toddler’s curls. “I was friends with your father when we were both as young as this little rascal.”
Much to his surprise, the boy threw his arms around his neck and affixed himself on his hip, clinging to Bren with dogged grit, even as he stood up to further survey the chamber.
“Can you tell me what happened here, Irina?”
“We had a party,” the girl said. “The night before last. To celebrate Grandpa’s return. Even the guards and the stable grooms were invited to attend. Everybody started to die at the party. The nannies died too.”
“When did your grandfather die?”
“He lasted the longest. But he was too sick to go for help. He told us. Stay put. Hide from the crimson colors. Don’t give them the box. Give it to Brennus, Lord of Laonia. He’s bound to come.”
“What box?”
“Konia’s box.”
The girl pulled a round bejeweled box from behind the curtains where they’d been hiding and gave it to Bren. He beheld the testament box in his hands. The lord of Konia had been too sick to lead his grandchildren to safety, but the old fox had lasted long enough to make his final preparations.
“My lord?” one of his men called. “There’s something here you ought to see.”
Fear widened the children’s eyes as Bren started to leave the chamber. He couldn’t begin to imagine how they felt about being abandoned in this isolated lair with the dead.
“Come,” he said, balancing the boy on his hip and the box under his arm while offering a hand to the girls. The girls clung to him with little warriors’ grips. He worked his way down the stairs, skirting the main hall, trying, albeit unsuccessfully, to shield the children from the horror of so much death.
“What is it?” he said when he reached the kitchens.
“This.”
A large barrel stood by the door, a sample of cooperage excellence, built of the finest pale Quercus wood. Several pitchers were on the table next to the barrel. Bren sniffed an empty cup. Wine, fragrant, sweet and spiced. Excellent quality. A dog lay dead by the barrel, where the bung was slowly leaking and a pool of wine stained the floor.
A shiver iced Bren’s gut. “Did you children drink of this?”
“We’re not allowed to drink wine,” Irina said.
“Nanny said we’d grow beards if we drank it,” Caryna added in her little girl’s voice.
“I think these people have been poisoned, my lord,” Petrus said.
“You might be right,” Bren said. “Can you manage to turn the barrel?”
It took three men to shift the barrel and confirm the worst of Bren’s fear. He understood on the spot why Arnulf had been certain Bren would come to Konia. On the back of the barrel, at the bulge of the girth, the talons of the high grassland falcon crossed to form Laonia’s seal. Stamped right below it, as if it were a drop of blood dripping from the clenched talons, was Bren’s personal seal, the house of Uras’s tear.
Chapter Thirty-eight
HATO SCOURED THE RIVER BANK FOR signs of his lord. It was still early, but Hato kept hoping Bren might change his mind about answering the Lord of Konia’s summons. Arnulf had to know that Laonia had not attacked his back borders. Messengers had been exchanged. Inquests had been conducted. Even Teos’s Chosen had found the evidence against Laonia inconclusive. But Bren had a soft spot for the old lord of Konia. It troubled him that Arnulf could believe that under his rule, Laonia would break the code and attack Konia.
“A day’s ride,” Bren had said. “A minor detour.”
“We don’t have time for detours,” Hato had argued.
“The call hasn’t come yet. It’ll only take me a few hours.”
“What about the woman?”
“I told you, I’m not killing her. I’d sooner use every available moment to ensure our alliance with Konia and further Laonia’s cause. This could be my last chance to set things right with Arnulf. I’ve got to take the swim anyway, on account of those wardens rowing our way.”
As his lord had slipped into the river, Hato hadn’t had any more time to persuade Bren from his course. The lad was right. Rebuilding the alliance with Konia was a strategically vital necessity for Laonia. And as long as Bren lived, he would do well for Laonia.
Still, Hato didn’t like his lord riding around Konia with only a few men for protection. He had wanted to ride alongside, but one look at Hato’s swollen knee and Bren had forbidden him to come. Old men shouldn’t be required to follow young men’s orders, even when they made sense.
Hato decided to leave the looking out to younger eyes and return to the space he had claimed for himself in the cargo hull. He had set his pallet down there, along with a makeshift desk where he could spread out and do his work. He had more instructions he had to write to his agents, inquiries to make, leads to follow, sentences to study. He limped over to the ladder and, hobbling down the troublesome steps, made his way among the tightly packed rows of casks and sacks to the back of the hull.
The woman stood by his desk with her hands clasped as if she had been patiently waiting for him. She smiled at him, as if a pretty smile could conceal the deceit in her eyes. Everything on the desk was intact, exactly as he had left it, yet he knew better. The minx had been going through his things. He didn’t know if he should admire her for her craftiness or scorn her for her recklessness. In any case, he knew how to play the game too.
“Did you lose your way in the cargo hull?”
“Lost? Me?” she said. “No. I’m precisely where I want to be.”
“Is that so?”
She brushed her hand against the Tolonian trade seal marking the cask closest to her. “An impressive feat and a generous ally.”
“Laonia’s is a resourceful lord.”
“But is Tolone really a faithful ally?”
“It could be, if what you told the Lord Brennus about the lady encouraging your escape isn’t true.”
She didn’t even bother responding to that. “I overheard the men saying that the Lady of Tolone has granted permission for Riva to land his army on her shores.”
“It’s a theory at the moment.”
“But if it were true—”
“Laonia could be done.”
“On the other hand, there’s this.” She pointed to the Tolonian trade seal. “What does the Lady of Tolone get in return?”
“Why this sudden interest in highborn politics?”
“I’m curious, that’s all.”
“If you must know, the Lady of Tolone and the Lord of Laonia are betrothed.”
A fist to the belly may have been kinder. She tried to absorb the blow, but Hato saw her flinch. He got a perverse sense of satisfaction from the pain he spotted in her eyes. Perhaps she would remember to fear him now. On second thought, could Bren be right? Could she really harbor feelings for his cursed lord?
She was resilient; he had to give her that. She pulled herself together and kept at it. There was more to her than met the eye.
“The birthmark I bear,” she said. “What does it mean?”
“I thought you said he told you everything.”
She had the grace to blush, but she wasn’t about to give up. “It’s important, to him, to King Riva, to the Pious, to you.”
Hato said nothing.
“You’re a hunter, too.” Her eyes detoured briefly to his desk. “The chief hunter. Or maybe you’re more like a collector. But what is it that you collect, my lord? And most importantly, why?”
Her neck was surprisingly strong under his grip. Her pulse beat wildly against his palm, but she didn’t yell or scream when he slammed her against the wall. “Don’t presume to play with me, girl. I’ve got no patience for common wenches like you. He might be smitten with you, but I’m immune to your wiles and impervious to anything but my lord’s interests.”
Her lips moved, but no words made it through his tight grip. Hato was furious at Edmund for getting them into this mess, at Bren for refusing to do his duty, at himself for all the time wasted without tangible results.
The woman had little value to him now. She had become a liability for his lord, an impediment to his progress instead of the opportunity she had been meant to be. Hato squeezed harder. This is how Bren must feel right before he killed them, bursting with power, stronger than the Twins and superior to the Thousand Gods.
“Are you a plant?” He shook her. “Are you working for Riva? For Orell? For who?”
She shook her head. Her lips made the word “no” several times.
Hato was reluctant to believe her. He had no hard evidence that she was a mole, but the uncommon kindness she had shown to his lord and the fact that she had stuck around this long were enough to sustain his suspicions.
She croaked an improbable sound. “Hill—i—ssssssel.”
“What?”
“Hill—i—sssel.”
Hato’s grip relented.
The woman fell on her knees, gasping for air.
“How do you know that name?” He clutched her chin. “I asked you a question!”
The wheezing wench had the gall to smile.
“You have very little regard for your life.”
“On the contrary,” she said. “My life seems to be acquiring more meaning by the moment. Because,
Lord Hato, I have something for you.”
* * *
Hato read the strip in his hand for the third time, drinking the words as if he was gorging on sweet Laonian wine.
The highest will plummet,
The lowliest will rise,
A venomous battle decides.
The damned can’t be freed but the free can be damned
Just as surely as the wicked will win.
His old heart pounded a good ruckus. The vellum. The decorations around the edges. The writing. The tone. The last sentence. This strip matched Lambage’s in every way. It was part of the same document. He was sure.
“Where did you say Hillisel found this?”
“In the thirteenth temple’s archives,” Lusielle said.
“Do you know who Hillisel is?”
“Your agent?”
She didn’t know. “What else did Hillisel say?”
“I already told you, we didn’t have a lot of time to talk.”
“Much is riding on the shoulders of fools.”
“Hillisel said that the last line was supposed to be familiar to me.”
It was this last line that had Hato giddy with excitement, the sentence that directly linked this newest verse to Robert’s riddle and Lambage’s verse.
“Why is the verse important?” she said.
“It’s none of your concern.”
“What do the words mean?”
“Nothing to you.”
“Maybe I could help—”
“Nobody can help,” Hato said. “Those words were never meant to be understood by reason.”
She frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Exactly what I said. Now, go away. I’m busy and you’re wasting my time.”
“I wonder,” she said. “Is there room in your world for other people to be loyal to your lord as well?”
There she went again, pretending to care. “What do you know of my lord and his struggles? What do you know of the betrayals we’ve suffered, the setbacks we’ve endured? Do you think you can bat your eyes at him—at me—and have us eating from your palm? Well, think again. The day he decided to spare you, you became worthless to me, an inconvenience, dead weight on an uphill road. We’d all be better off if you disappeared. Be off with you, and stop pestering me. There’s nothing you can say or do that can make a difference to anyone.”
