House of Sand and Secrets

by Cat Hellisen

  When I was still a War-Singer, adept of scriv and air, I knew I was powerful, that with training I could have been as great as some of the famous generals of our House. But that – that was nothing. Jannik’s magic unleashed willingly into my control is immense, unbelievable. I am reminded of his mother, of the time we met and it seemed to me that her power could just about strip my skin from my flesh unless she kept it in constant check. Jannik has always been this powerful, and I never understood that. Perhaps the vampiric hierarchy is in place not because the females are the only powerful ones, but because only women have the ability to tap into that power.

  I whirl his magic about myself, and it dances at my command, part of me, but not. A sentient thing, almost playful despite what it is about to do. With a quick inhalation to centre myself, I focus on my task. Carien is lying still. Her hands are palm up on the coverlet, relaxed. The room is sweaty with her trust. I close my eyes, and sink into the darkness inside my head. Everything goes silent around me. With one hand pressed against her stomach, I breathe slower, stiller, and the room changes.

  Vampiric magic is not like scriv. It moves between skin and blood, it follows the shape of heartbeats, the chambers of the human temple. It fills them and walks between them.

  This is not a simple matter of knowing the body like a chirurgeon, and slicing with a blade of sharpened air. It’s about something far stranger and harder to explain.

  Heartbeats echo, loud as if I had my head underwater. Distant drums of the body. I sense my own, slow; Jannik’s in time, and deeper-pitched; the scatter-thump of Carien’s, and the smallest sound of all. So fast and bright.

  I bring the magic neatly to rein and, with a tenderness I almost did not expect of myself, I end the child’s song. I want to ask it to forgive me, that I would have made it my own, if I’d known how. But there are no words in magic.

  The first cramp hits me as I open my eyes. Carien is staring at me, her amber eyes bright as lamps. When she speaks it is with a happy ferocity. “It’s done?”

  I grimace, pressing one hand to my stomach, and nod at Jannik to leave. I would speak with Carien. She has no need of further humiliation. He closes the door softly behind him, leaving us alone in a room already beginning to smell heavy with blood. “I will have servants bring you cloths and food and drink.” With my hand still hard against the pain in my belly I rise from the bed. “When you have recovered I will organize safe passage for you to Pelimburg.”

  “And then what?” Her face has gone pale.

  “There are people who will help me find you a place. I will set you up with a patron.”

  “So I’m still to be beholden to someone else?”

  “Only for a while. You are Iynast. Reinvented, I believe it will not be long before you have thrown the Pelimburg art world into chaos, and gathered many patrons to choose from. I think you will find yourself to be a flame, surrounded by little moths.”

  She manages a weak and painful approximation of mirth. “And there I will burn all those who want me.”

  “It’s your choice. I think there are better ones to make – to burn steady and long, rather than flare, consume and die out after too brief a moment.” The pain is damping and rising, and I wince as another surge passes through me. Perhaps using Jannik’s magic too often will have its toll on me the same way Harun suffered to take his scriv.

  Carien narrows her eyes. Her dark hair is stuck to her waxy skin, the sweat on her temples golden dew in the candle light. “How many lives have you lived?” she asks me. “You’re still just a girl. You’re younger than me.”

  “I know.” I smile sadly at her. “And today I feel it. I am overwhelmed.”

  “You don’t look it.”

  “I was trained to wear a mask, like all House girls.” My face relaxes. “You were never one, were you?”

  She shakes her head. “Garret concocted some fancy tale about House Sidora, but I’m an accident. A throwback.”

  “He hid your ancestry?” He would only have done that were she not from a House; Great, High, or Low. She is most certainly not a Hob. “A low-Lammer?”

  “My mother was. My father.” She shrugs. “I’m no Mata.” She touches her dark-brown hair with the palm of one hand. “Whoever he was, he gave me something of his lineage, the ability to Read.”

  “And Eline Garret created for you some suitable history that allowed him to marry you.” I gnaw at my lower lip. “Why did you say yes?”

  She laughs. “Why did your bat say yes to you?”

  The lance catches me. I withdraw from her room and beckon for servants to bring her necessities, to give her lady’s gown and let her sleep. I have other enemies to destroy.

  Downstairs I am greeted by silence. Jannik must have already told them that it has been done, that I have successfully bound Carien to us and set her on her path against her husband. There is no sign of Merril. Undoubtedly he has been locked away out of sight, far from Isidro who, of us all, finds him most upsetting.

  “Well,” says Harun. “It will not be long before Eline makes another move.”

  Especially now that we have taken more than mere playthings away from him or humiliated him at Council. “Do we wait?” I ask as I walk to the table. Someone has bought more wine. Harun must have decided to refill his depleted stocks. At least he still appears to be sober and standing. I make no comment, instead taking the glass of apple-coloured wine left on the table for me. “Or do we use this to bring him to heel now?”

  Isidro, always more familiar with the finer blades of cruelty, leans forward with a raptor’s delight. “I could grow to like you. If you keep up this act.”

  On the couch, Jannik slumps further down. He has already tasted the way I think, and while I can feel his unhappiness, I can also feel his reluctant accord.

  “You would do this how?” Harun asks.

  “Isidro knows.” I nod at the vampire in acknowledgement of our unwanted mutual understanding, and offer him a defeated smile. Eline is going to play soft with us, and we don’t have the time or the resources to keep playing this shadow game.

  For the moment we are strong, with magic Eline doesn’t know about. But we may not be able to keep this secret for long. We need to goad Eline into making a thoughtless, angry move, preferably one that exposes him. He’s a cold man, and he doesn’t love people, but he does love power and prestige. If something we do makes him lose face, he’ll react. If he attacks us publicly, we can retaliate. Publicly.

  “We dangle Carien before Eline, and we tell him exactly what I have done to her, to his unborn heir.”

  “And what good will that possibly do?” Harun says “You suggest that we poke a stick at a sleeping sphynx and hope to survive – idiocy!”

  “A very sharp stick, Harun, one dipped in poison.”

  “You wish to anger him.”

  “I wish to make him so outraged he can barely think straight – I want him drawn here when we will it, and to be blinded in his fury. I want him dancing to the tune I choose. Not us to his. And when he makes his mistake, we will be ready to retaliate.”

  And if that isn’t enough to force this game out of the private sphere, then I have my own plans, hidden in ways that even Jannik can’t find. I am, after all, a good student.

  * * *

  Harun can barely hold a pen without shaking, so the job falls to Jannik. He writes with an elegant, slanted hand, something I have always admired. It is a calligraphy that says more about him than his looks do. He signs the letter with slow deliberation; it’s obvious he is reluctant to set his name to it. “There.” He holds the top corner between finger and thumb, waiting for the ink to dry. “Hire a messenger. We don’t want one of Harun’s staff to suffer for this.”

  “And so some unknown should instead?” I say.

  Harun takes the letter from him. “We use one of the Mata Court messengers. Eline will never make a move openly against the prince.” He reads, a frown gathering deeper folds between his heavy eyebrows then nods sharply. “
It will do.”

  “I’m so glad you approve.” Jannik’s head is bowed, the heels of his hands against his temples, long fingers pushing his dark hair in a scraggled mess. “I have never felt so soiled.”

  “Your wedding night must have been remarkably uneventful,” Isidro says from the armchair in which he’s sprawled.

  Jannik lurches back in his seat, all his gloom obliterated. “Will you please just shut the fuck up?” he says in a low harsh voice.

  Even Isidro seems caught by surprise, drawing up to himself like a prodded sea anemone. “It was a jest.”

  “And I am very over your attempts at humour at my wife’s expense.”

  “Yes.” Isidro stays withdrawn. He peers across at me, as if reappraising a doe at the nilly-markets, one that he previously passed over but now sees again in the light of other people’s interest. “So you are.”

  “And I am tired of both of you.” Harun is looking frayed and belligerent. He is still not fully recovered from his seven-fold Reading, and the rather diminished supply of alcohol has kept him ragged and ill, prone to shaking fits and nightmares.

  It’s also apparent from his tone that he has not forgotten what Isidro and Jannik have been to each other and that his forgiveness is not ready to be thrown down before either of them.

  He seals the envelope and hands it back to Jannik to stamp closed with wax. The leaping dolphin crest of my House looks up at me from Jannik’s hands, their cetacean faces sly in their humour.

  “There. Done.” Harun calls for a servant and explains what they are to do. “Now we wait.” He jerks the cork free from a new bottle of wine, pouring glasses for us all without asking. He spills only a little.

  “Perhaps we should try and meet our foe in a state of sobriety?” I point out.

  “Do whatever you like, Felicita. I am going to kill someone, and I’ll take what fortification I can, however I can.”

  And there it is, the truth of what we are planning. Until this moment no one has put into words the finality of what we are proposing with this scheme. If it were reversed, Eline would think nothing of removing us. He has already made attempts on our lives, and people have suffered and died because of it. And yet, spoken now, with its hard cold edges, the words make it real, and I do not want to carry such a burden again. I am still bent-backed from my brother’s death. From Dash’s.

  “I’m going to look in on Carien,” I murmur, not wanting to be here and reminded by the straight harsh lines of their faces that we plan to trap and murder our enemy in this spider’s web.

  One of Harun’s new maids gathers extra tea from the kitchens, and more cloths. “I think a little food too, please.” I say. “Something simple – a meat broth and bread for dipping.” When we have everything we need, I ascend to Carien’s room, the maid trotting behind me with her tray of steaming bowls and pots.

  I knock gently on the side of the door and receive no answer. Moving as softly and quietly as possible so as not to disturb her, I open the door.

  Carien is peaceful in sleep, the waxy look she had earlier is gone. Her face is relaxed and the constant hard skewness of her mouth is slack. There is an infantile sweetness to her, one hand curled up and pressed against her parted lips. The ripe smell of blood permeates the room and I open the curtains a little so that I can force Harun’s unused windows open. The place needs airing. People kept like they are sick do not flourish.

  The maid clears away the old things and sets out the new tray. The spiced meat broth coupled with the smell of tea and the rain-heavy air blowing in from the gardens helps lift the feeling of stagnant repression from the room. Even the light spreading through the windows is that eerie golden-grey that comes on the heels of some thunderstorms. A magical colour.

  “Carien?” I say. “You should wake and eat a little.”

  She is exhausted from what was done. I understand because I can feel it too. The aftermath of using Jannik’s magic has left me shaky. Even after a good meal, some rest and several cups of tea I have a washed-out feel like an old bed sheet worn gauzy in the centre. I sit on the edge of her bed and feel myself crumple inside. Carefully, I brush her dark curls back from her cheek where the sweat has dried them in place. Her skin is cold, or my hands are too hot. She doesn’t move.

  A feeling like the unravelling of a favourite shawl starts inside me. There is a hole in the lacework that I do not want to acknowledge, that I hope I can disguise or mend. I hold my palm before her mouth and feel nothing.

  “Rae!” The maid has only just left, she can’t have gone far. I stagger to the decorative cords and set the glass bells in the servant’s rooms chiming. I keep tugging at them as if they will anchor me and the sound will call her back from the dead.

  There is something in me, a sound that makes no sound. A giant invisible beast that presses my ribs out, that shoves all my internal organs apart and still there is not enough room for it. It cannot make its way up my closed and narrow throat, it cannot scream, and so I am like this, my mouth wide open and soundless, rocking on the floor to dislodge the beast, when the servants come running into Carien’s chamber.

  Hands haul me up, and voices call for Jannik, for shrouds, for water to clean away the traces of her death. I am embraced. I am led away. I am made to sit. I am made to drink.

  Jannik says nothing. He holds my hands so that the tea does not spill. It tastes of bitter fire. The sound of sand fills my head, fills my little broken room and covers everything away.

  THE MELANCHOLY RAVEN

  We wake alone. The house is standing expectant, waiting for Eline to strike. I think of the body cooling in the blue room and press my fist against my mouth until the urge to sob passes.

  Another little game piece, fallen. We met at a party, and her first words to me were about the Ives’ girls who had just been brought into the House games of power and prestige. I couldn’t tell if she felt sorry for them or not. Certainly, she didn’t see them as innocents. But she never had their weapons, their training. And she lost because of that, and more importantly, because of me.

  I let the tremors pass through me. She’s gone. She’s not going to paint raw and wild pictures, or smoke ‘ink in back street tea shops.

  And with her, our leverage is gone. It was one thing to think of provoking Eline into an outright attack so that we could use his anger to our advantage, but it’s become too big now, too dangerous.

  Carien is dead, murdered. I shouldn’t have made the offer at all.

  I put my pride before her safety. “Jannik?”

  He stirs next to me.

  My head is clear, as if the sand of his mind has scoured away all the ugly things that were confusing me. It frees me, gives me purpose again.

  “How are you feeling?” he asks.

  It doesn’t matter. “We need to leave.”

  Jannik sits up, rubbing at his eyes. “Do we now?” I think he has grown used to my changing moods, content to see where my heart is taking me now.

  My stomach clenches, over and over, as if willing me to just give in a retch all over my bed.

  I did this.

  I did this.

  What did I think I was going to do, in my pride, in my stupid belief in my power?

  I can add another name to the list of the dead, to the people who are gone now because of my fucking pride.

  None of this must show in my face, must flash through my thoughts. I take my failures, my aching need to cry, to beg forgiveness, and I shove it deep into my mind-room. More secrets to keep, but I need Jannik to believe in me. “We must go to Eline ourselves, minimize the damage.”

  He is silent.

  “Please.” I put one hand over his, and pull him to me with just a thought. I can feel how our bond is stronger; I already know that he will do this – that he agrees with me. I am already condemned by my actions; committing this murder within the safety of Harun and Isidro’s home, with their consent and help will only condemn them too.

  When this is over, Carien, I will say m
y, “I’m sorries,” I will call your ghost and set it free. If I can. Already Harun’s servants will have covered all the mirrors so that the ghost will leave. I don’t even know if it’s true, but the Hobs believe it, and I have come to trust their superstitions. They’re no more ridiculous than mine, after all.

  Jannik pulls his hand gently out from under mine and gets up. He chooses a jacket of dark blue, and begins to dress as if he is putting on the last of his armour.

  I go to the dressing table, with its little collection of combs and bottles. The mirror is indeed covered; a long silky length of dark-green cloth has been draped over it. While Jannik knots his tie, I flip over my little hand-mirror and catch a glimpse of my face, drained and sickly. I slide the glass behind a collection of perfumes.

  “You’re certain?”

  I start, and glance away from the flash of the silver, hoping that he hasn’t seen it. “Yes. More than certain.” I will play my final move, and if that fails, we can strike some kind of bargain with Eline; we will have to even if it bankrupts us. It’s what we should have done in the first place. After all, MallenIve runs on bribes and deals and schemes. And blackmail. I should have understood it from the very first, and if not, I should have realised when Harun paid House Ives in favours to change their vote.

  There is no resolution in a never-ending war, and I already knew that.

  * * *

  Jannik and I walk hand in hand down the stairs and slip out of the front door with the ease and silence of ghosts. Of the ghost that should be leaving. Don’t hate me for this, Carien, I need you to understand how sorry I am. When I’ve said what I need to say, I’ll let you go.

  It will be a while yet before the others know that we’re gone, and it is easy enough to hire a carriage once we are on the main thoroughfare closest to Harun’s street. The night has dropped heavily, an indigo veil spattered with faint city stars. The gas lamps that line the roads emit a sulphurous glow, and the waiting carriages have a sinister look, their nillies standing dejected in their traces. Jannik pays the nearest driver a handful of brass for his service.