Division of the Marked (The Marked Series)

by March McCarron

  For company, he allowed Bray’s feelings to fill his mind. She clanked with frustration—he could well imagine her blazing look, her flashing eyes. He sighed. They were so very far apart.

  The Isle of Chiona offered a strangely cheerful backdrop for a wake, Bray thought—with the twittering, exotic birds peering down on the congregation from palm trees and the sun shining relentlessly in its bright, cloudless sky. At her father’s wake it had rained, and with the cemetery firmly in the somber shadows of the ill-named Verdant Peaks, the day had felt suitably grim.

  “May the Spirits above accept him into their company…” a solemn, elderly Chiona man pronounced. He stood before an elaborately designed coffin. Bray wondered if Ambrone Chassel’s eyes were still open or if someone had shut them. If she could see through the glossy wood, would he be staring at her still?

  The assembly had grown positively massive. Every Chiona, from those like herself, freshly arrived, to the decrepitly old, had gathered for the ceremony. Bray even spotted several Cosanta who had traveled south for the occasion. They all looked to be of an age with Ambrone. They were the object of many glowers, but appeared not to notice.

  All wore yellow, the traditional funeral color of the Chisanta. Bray, herself, had been given a plain yellow dress for the occasion. After so many weeks of wearing pants, it felt strangely loose and structureless against her waist and legs. The yellow might be traditional, but it too seemed inappropriately bright for such an occasion. The black of her own custom, she thought, was much preferable.

  An old Adourran man recounted the story of how he had met Ambrone on their carriage ride to the Temple. “When we stopped at the inn, Ambrone claimed he was in love with the serving girl who brought us our soup,” the man said with animation. “I’ll admit, at the time I thought him a bit of a cad.” The congregation laughed appreciatively, and the Adourran man flashed a bright white smile. “But as many of you know, Ambrone never did forget that serving girl. The moment he came of age and was free to leave, he went back to that inn, and he married that girl.”

  Bray fidgeted in her chair. It was odd to hear about the life of a man whom she had only known dead. Irrational though it was, she felt as though she were somehow culpable. When people looked at her—and they did often, as she had been pointed out by several as the girl who had discovered his body—she sensed in their gaze a kind of accusation. As if, had she not found him, he would not be dead.

  Peer patted her hand and she clasped his fingers in her own, grateful for the support of a friend.

  Mrs. Chassel stood to speak last. The woman’s face showed its age, her hair streaked liberally with gray. Bray thought, though, that she could see in her the girl Ambrone first saw—a sweet, pretty-faced serving girl. She wondered if they had snuck out at night together, as she and Yarrow had done.

  Mrs. Chassel told the story of how Ambrone had come to her at the age of eighteen, how she had remembered him immediately. Bray could picture this scene as well; she gave Ambrone dark brown hair and gray eyes.

  “I loved you since I was a girl,” Mrs. Chassel said, addressing the coffin. Her voice trembled and tears spilled down her chin, onto her pale yellow dress. “And I will love you always.”

  Mrs. Chassel returned to her seat and a pulley system began to lower Ambrone Chassel into the ground.

  Bray felt tears on her own face and brushed them away quickly. She had no right to mourn. She had not known him.

  After the first few handfuls of dirt were thrown into the hole, the hole that would be Ambrone Chassel’s final resting place, the congregation rose and processed back to the dining hall, where lunch awaited.

  Bray marched with the rest, her gaze training on the strange, bright vegetation of the Isle. As if the colors had been amplified, the hues increased in saturation, every plant and bird assaulted her eyes with their vibrancy. Even the buildings, though simply constructed, with smooth archways and round windows, were painted in a wide variety of vivid colors—blues, yellows, oranges, and reds. The beaches, wide plains of white sand, extended to a clear turquoise sea. The air itself tasted foreign, like hot red pepper and cinnamon.

  It was stunning, but Bray found the heat oppressive. She was accustomed to a cool, rainy climate. The sun, here, seemed determined to scorch her skin, especially her so recently exposed scalp.

  The dining hall, usually full of low tables and silken cushions, had been cleared for the funeral, the food set up in a buffet style. Several serving men and women circulated with trays bearing small crystal glasses of an amber-colored liquid. A young Adourran girl handed her and Peer each a glass. There were rather too many people for Bray’s liking, and more and more streamed in through the door. Peer and Bray kept moving from one place to another in the hopes of finding a location out of the way.

  “There’s Adearre,” Peer whispered, then took hold of her hand and guided her through the masses until they reached their friend.

  “Some shindig, aye?” Peer said, smiling.

  Bray elbowed him in the gut. “It’s a funeral. Show some respect.”

  The corner of Adearre’s mouth twitched. “The food is excellent, though. And the fashion!” He put a hand to his heart and fluttered his lashes.

  Bray speared him with a look. “I liked you better when you didn’t make jokes.”

  He winked and smiled, then turned to listen to Peer.

  A drum sounded a resonating tattoo and the crowd fell silent. The same Adourran man who had spoken at the funeral stood on a platform at the head of the room. He held up his own small glass, and the crowd did the same.

  “To Ambrone Chassel, may his spirit fly fast and find joy,” he said in a carrying voice.

  “May his spirit find joy,” the assembly murmured, and as one the company downed their glasses.

  Bray attempted to knock back the entire contents in one mouthful, as she saw others do, but she had not expected the drink to burn so badly. She sputtered and coughed, eyes streaming. Next to her, Peer had the same difficulty. A few heads turned to chastise them—perhaps coughing at the toast of the dead was some sort of insult or omen of bad luck.

  When an older Dalish man bearing a tray full of wine glasses passed, Bray grabbed one to help diminish the burning in her throat. It was a deep, blood red and wonderfully dry and flavorful. Bray gulped gratefully.

  “This is quite good, Peer,” she said, then turned to discover that her companion was no longer by her side. Neither was Adearre. She searched the crowd and could not locate them. She could not see a single face she recognized.

  The room began to spin before her eyes—due to the combination of alcohol, heat, and lack of food, no doubt. She longed to be away from this wretched, stinking heat, from these strangers and their accusatory stares. She weaved her way through the crowd, bumping into people here and there, not stopping to apologize.

  She forced her way back out into the afternoon sun. Still much too warm, but blissfully free of people. Bray stumbled around the side of the building, towards the sea. Perhaps the water, at least, would be cool. Last time she had felt this way she had had Yarrow to lean on. Yarrow, she thought, why must he be so very far away?

  She did not realize there were two people sitting close on a bench until she had tromped noisily into their presence.

  Bray stopped short, swaying slightly on the spot, and the two people turned to face her. One, Bray was horrified to see, was Mrs. Chassel, the other a Chiona man she did not know.

  “I’m sorry,” Bray mumbled, her already flushed face growing redder. She attempted to retrace her steps but Mrs. Chassel called out to her, “Wait.”

  She rose and turned to face Bray, her lined face red and streaked with tears. “You are the girl who…who…”

  Bray nodded, so Mrs. Chassel could leave her painful sentence unfinished.

  “I’ve wanted to speak with you—could you come and sit?” She gestured to the bench, and the man beside her stood to make room.

  Bray would much rather not come and si
t; her vision still swam and she could not bear the thought of explaining to this woman how she had found her husband, how the sword had been stained with blood, how his body looked broken and sprawled, how gray and lifeless his face had been. But she could not think of how to refuse politely, so she shuffled forward and took the offered seat.

  “What is your name, child?” she asked. Bray did not much like being called a child—she was fourteen years old, thank you very much—but she answered nonetheless. “Bray Marron.”

  “Very pleased to meet you, Bray Marron. I am Vindella Chassel,” the woman said. “And this,” she gestured to the man who had given up his seat, “is Quade Asher.” Quade Asher inclined his head. He was much younger than Mrs. Chassel, perhaps in his mid-thirties. He had fair skin, dark glittering eyes, and a prominent, slender nose.

  “I’m sorry for your loss,” Bray said.

  Mrs. Chassel extracted a handkerchief and dabbed at her face. “Thank you dear, but I think we both know it wasn’t a loss. Ambrone was stolen from me. That is why I wanted to speak to you. I had hoped you could tell me everything you saw in that chamber. Perhaps there was some clue?”

  Her eyes filled with such hope, it made Bray’s heart ache. She frowned and tried to summon the scene back to her mind. “There was the sword,” she said, “and the…I mean, him—” Bray narrowly avoided using the word ‘body,’ which she thought might be insensitive “—and there were crates and a lot of broken glass on the floor…”

  “Broken glass?” Quade asked, speaking for the first time. His voice took Bray by surprise, his accent quite like her own; rough and musical and decidedly working-class. “Was there a broken window to account for it?”

  “There were no windows,” Bray said. “So it was quite dark.” She added this to excuse her unhelpfully minimalistic description.

  Mrs. Chassel clasped her eyes on Quade. “Do you have a theory?”

  “Well…the glass could have already been there…” he mused.

  “Don’t you two keep your artifacts in glass containers?” Mrs. Chassel asked.

  “Aye,” Quade said, “but I can’t think how that would relate. We’ve never found anything worth stealing, let alone killing for.”

  He turned back to Bray and she felt her head spin more intensely. He was a pleasant man to look at. “I apologize, but I need to ask you a grim question.” His eyes flickered to Mrs. Chassel sympathetically. “Was there blood on the ground beneath his body?”

  Bray felt sick, but she tried to summon that dark room to her mind once again. There was blood on his clothes, she remembered that well, but she did not recall any blood on the ground. “No, I don’t think so.”

  “What does that mean, Quade?” Mrs. Chassel asked.

  “I imagine it means that he was not killed in that room—that his body was merely hidden there. It also likely means that the glass and anything else in that chamber were unrelated.”

  Mrs. Chassel sighed, her shoulders slumped.

  Quade knelt and unleashed the full power of his gaze on Mrs. Chassel, gripping her hand with his own. “I will go speak to Dolla Adder. I promise you, Vindella, I will not let this rest until your husband, my friend, is avenged.”

  He rose and strode away, back to the noise of the gathering within the hall. Mrs. Chassel watched him go.

  “He and my husband shared a love of old things and dirt. They’ve spent the last fifteen years together, searching for treasure and finding only bits of garbage. Of course, as Quade will always remind me, even garbage has value if it’s old enough.”

  “He wanted to find all of those magical things of legend too?” Bray asked. “Like the Scimitar of Amarra and the Seve Tapestry?”

  Mrs. Chassel laughed. “Who, Quade?” She returned her handkerchief to her handbag. “No, he is too much a realist to believe in such things. He just loves history, discovering the way people lived before us. My husband was the dreamer.” A fond expression crossed her face.

  “So you don’t think any of it is real?” Bray asked. How could she follow her husband around the world for so many years, if she did not think the things he sought existed?

  “Ambrone looked his whole life and found nothing extraordinary. No, they are not real. But it made him happy to think that they were.”

  “Who is Dolla Adder?” Bray asked.

  “She’s a Chiona, an expert in criminology. She’s here for the funeral, but most of the time she travels around to crime scenes all over Trinitas. Quade is hoping she’ll look into my husband’s murder.”

  “I’d like to help if I can,” Bray said, giving Mrs. Chassel an earnest look.

  “That is sweet, dear. But what more can you do?”

  Bray didn’t have an answer for this, but she would not be deterred.

  “Do many people study criminology?” she asked.

  “Only Dolla, as far as I know,” Mrs. Chassel said. She gave Bray a piercing look. “You aren’t considering it yourself, are you? You are a young, beautiful girl. Do something nice with your life. You don’t want to spend the rest of your days with dead bodies, do you?”

  “If it meant I could help people?” Bray asked herself aloud. “Yes, I think I could do that. Bad people should be stopped.”

  “And if one of those bad people puts a stop to you?”

  “They couldn’t touch me,” Bray answered, a fire in her eyes, her voice ringing with confidence.

  Hours later, Bray walked with her feet in the water, her yellow dress hiked to the knee, and stared out at the setting sun. The sky was afire with pinks, reds, and oranges, and they cast their hues upon the sea beneath. The water rushed out, burying her feet in white sand and rising above her ankles. Moments later, the tide pulled back, tugging the sand with it and causing her feet to sink still deeper.

  Bray’s mind sparked with newly formed resolution. The Chisanta could study and do as they liked, and she would work to become a defender of the innocent and a bane to the wicked. The determination coursed through her like a drug. Little felt better in life than a sense of purpose.

  Chasku sits across these waters, Bray thought. Perhaps the seawater she touched would turn round and head north, to the Cape of Cosanta and to Yarrow. Then again, perhaps it would not.

  Yarrow ran his ink-stained finger along the script-covered parchment and mumbled aloud to himself. He dipped his pen in the inkwell, tapped it several times, and began to scribble a note on a second, fresh sheaf of paper.

  “Do you ever leave the library?” a drawling voice asked from behind him.

  Without looking up, still scratching at the parchment, Yarrow said, “I’m surprised you know what a library is, let alone where to find one.”

  Arlow laughed, sat down, and crossed his legs at the ankle. “We can’t all be as bookish as you. Or as obsessive.”

  “The answer may be in here, Arlow,” Yarrow said, a crease forming between his dark, thick brows.

  “Yes, but it may not as well.” Arlow reached for a book from Yarrow’s collection, flipped it open, and read: “‘Man will reach for the heavens only when his thrust exceeds his drag…All that exists has ever existed…1,729; 4,104; 13,832.’” Arlow flipped a page. “And then it’s just names! ‘Jacus Maynar of the Morse Forest, Chiona; Kenrra Melva of Porramore, Cosanta; Seo-Song of Bykju…’” Arlow threw the book down carelessly. “Utter nonsense. I will never understand how you can read this stuff without going as mental as the Fifths themselves.”

  Yarrow set his pen down and rolled his shoulders, a vain attempt to alleviate the ever-present knot in his back. He brushed at the long strands of hair that had worked their way free of his braid.

  “No Chisanta has studied the original transcripts of the Fifth since Aldron Chapleton.” Yarrow gestured to the sheaf of parchment before him. “And that was two hundred years ago. We can’t continue to rely on second- and third-hand reports that are incomplete and outdated. Not with so much amiss, so much at stake.”

  Yarrow had spent the better part of ten years studying
the transcripts of the Fifth and had still barely scratched the surface, so dense were the records.

  “Well, you’ll need to give it a rest tonight. We are going to the city to celebrate,” Arlow said.

  “Da Un Marcu isn’t until tomorrow, and it hasn’t been much of a cause for celebration of late,” Yarrow said as he began to jot another note. Arlow reached across the table and grabbed the pen from his hand, smiling devilishly.

  “Not Da Un Marcu,” Arlow said. “We’re celebrating something else.”

  “What then?” Yarrow asked.

  “Guess,” Arlow said, plainly in high spirits.

  Yarrow offered his friend an exasperated expression. “You’ve finally received your first gift?”

  Arlow clicked his tongue in mock disapproval. “Now, Yarrow. Just because you haven’t guessed my gift yet, doesn’t mean I haven’t got one.”

  Yarrow smiled. “I do have to hand it to you, I’ve never met a man who could take a game of ‘guess’ to such extremes. That one has been going on for over a decade.”

  “This should be easier, especially given your giant brain,” Arlow said. Yarrow hadn’t felt Arlow this pleased with himself in years. The small ball that was Arlow’s emotions in Yarrow’s mind whistled with joy. Just focusing on his friend’s feelings made his own heart lighter. He must have just gotten the thing he most wanted.

  “You’re going to Accord?”

  Arlow beamed. “To advise the King himself!”

  Yarrow’s tired face broke into a genuine smile. “Well done, my friend,” he said and shook Arlow’s hand heartily.

  “I’m meant to leave tomorrow,” Arlow said.

  “So soon?”

  Arlow was his oldest friend—how strange it would be to lose him.

  “Yes, which is why we are going to celebrate. Go get changed, you look a mess.”