The daemon prism, p.22
The Daemon Prism, page 22
“Well done, though.” I riffled through the stack, disappointed to find nothing in Portier’s scholarly script or Dante’s oddly angled one. I tossed the tax notice back in the box, along with a small stack of responses from booksellers and libraries regarding some general inquiries. One large fold of stiff, cheap paper bore the seal of Castelle Escalon’s steward, the usual wrapping for a forwarded letter. I set it aside.
“You should leave Pradoverde, Finn,” I said, as I counted out the tax assessment and his wages. “Leave Laurentine altogether. This Temple inquiry means mortal danger for anyone connected with Dante and me.”
“Nah. You trust me to take care of things. The master does, too, though he does give me the frights, I’ll confess. And it’s … interesting. I’m not just doing sweat chores here. Besides, Nelli is close and willing. Wherever am I going to find all that again?”
Despite all, I had to laugh at his practical view of the world.
Once we’d hidden the money box in a new location, I ripped open the packet from the palace. Inside was a stained fold, sealed with the cheapest wax. The letter was addressed to Lady Anne de Vernaze at the Palace in Merona in a big, loopy script like that of a child. Curious, I perched on the table edge, rising to my feet again as I read….
Lady Anne,
I am writting this to tell you of events that have brot the man you know as Dante to a wild and forrin land. Stubborn as he is, he will not. Nor does he know I do so.
I would prefer to speak as he wuld address you, but his words are like to be bigger than I can spell, and I just have a difficulty enuff as we have not even met, you and me, and you being the nobul lady he values so deeply. Come to that, Dante and I have not met in so many years until this month past that it would be awkward writting to him. So, first to tell you whose pen is addressing you. I am his elder brother, called by name Andero, of late the Smith at Raghinne.
Our father is dead, exploded by a dream. I ween that you are more costomed to such doings than I, but there it is. Words spoke in Da’s dream, and the feraful vision of it, now lead us south to a ruin called Karabayngor. My brother is baset with worry over his frend, the man who cannot die, and guilt over your noble freend and others dead by his doing. He feels portents that an old enemy plots some great evil he cannot guess. You likely know enuff of my brother to heed his parents, as I lernt to when I was but a nub.
A manservant has come with us, one John Doon by name. He is a sneaking sort and and sorely dislikes Dante, but seems a useful companion. Hw says he serves us as honor to his dead master. I watch him carefully.
“No, no, no!” Ilario, dead? John Doon … his dead master. The words could mean naught else. “Gods, no!” My arms crossed my breast as if to hold him in … the lean, rangy grace, whether dancing or fighting … his silliness … his charm, utter devotion, and solid friendship. Such life he exhibited in his most ridiculous posturing … and in the quiet, whimsical, honorable person so few in the world were privileged to know. The gaping hole in my heart, as raw as if the tissue had been ripped away in that moment, could not … could never be … eased. Holding a fist tight to my breast, I read on….
I asked Dante to come when Da got exploded, so as maybe to fix up the badness between them, but Da was hard beyond what I even knew. Dante is grown hard, too, and stubborn, as I said but I am equally stubborn. He lets me see for him.
Excuse my boldness, my Lady, but I think if you care for my little brother as much as he cares for you, you will want to know how he fares. If he travels with me, then he does not miss as as many meals as he might otherwise, and though he frets a deal about you and his frend and those lying dead, he feels a rightful purpose. But since some terrible events in the netherland, more trobles him than be will speak. He is feared to work magic, even as he knows this task will require it. It is a death to him, and I know not how to ease it.
I will do my best to send another report from the south. This fine tavern lady. Marga Tassu, says she will send this on and hold whatever further papers I dispatch to her.
My highest regards and looking forward to meeting you in person on some future day.
Andero, at the town of Mattefreese
8 Estar
8 Estar. Almost a month past. Atop grief worthy of a lifetime’s weeping, I had to imagine Dante headed to Carabangor, the ruin in the dream, the place where the enchantress waited with her terrible jewels. And an old enemy. Stars of night, could he mean Jacard? Of course he would be driven to pursue such a mystery. But to venture so far without sending for me … Stubborn did not begin to name him. Why could I not make him understand that I would venture any danger, any risk, at his side? We were two halves of the same whole; I was so sure of it.
Yet in all the wrenching emotions the letter evoked, the most frightening was imagining what terrible events might make Dante afraid to use his magic. How could he breathe, how could his heart even beat without it? This must explain what I felt in the aether … how closed and tight and cold his presence.
“My plans have changed,” I said, crumpling the hard-traveled page. “Tomorrow at dawn, I ride for Carabangor.”
LAURENTINE
“I hate leaving you behind, lady,” I said softly, combing Ladyslipper’s coat. “But you’ve gotten fat here at home and I’ll have to ride hard. Besides, I’d not risk you. I’ve no idea where this road will take us.”
To wherever Dante was. That was my only goal.
The horse next to the vacant stall where I hid with Ladyslipper whinnied in a curious note, as if asking who had intruded on the Laurentine hostelry so early.
Some disturbance had waked me in the dark hours that morning, and I would have sworn Dante was sitting on the floor beside my bed. I had stretched my arms, trying to reach him. When my hands came up empty, I had to dash the tears from my eyes, whether from the failure to touch his solid presence or from a lingering sense of despair, I could not have said. I’m on my way, friend. I’ll not leave you alone again. Not ever.
Duskborn, waiting closer to the stable door, snorted and blew. Footsteps crunched on the dirt. Two sets?
I made sure my hood covered my hair and ducked behind Ladyslipper.
“Here we are,” said Finn. “Give me a moment to explain. My lady”—he hurried into the stall—“the men from the north are gone. Picked up and left yesterday, saying they were headed south where there might be building going on. But there’s something else….”
Finn’s urgency quenched my explosive disappointment.
“Nelli told me a lone woman came in yestereve, asking where to find the lady of Pradoverde as she had information of great importance for her. Nelli did as we’d agreed, saying you were gone back to Aubine months ago and weren’t coming back. But Nelli was just feeding her a bite before she rode out, so’s I stepped up and said I could send on her message if she liked.”
“And you’ve brought her here?” I snapped, recalling the extra footsteps. “I told you we needed to be secret.” Of a sudden, the stall felt much too confining.
“Had to. She says ‘a friend of yours’ is in terrible trouble with the Temple, and she’s taken a terrible risk to bring his message. I figured”—he swallowed hard—“a lone woman was taking more of a chance meeting up with you than you were with her. With your … you know.” He widened his eyes and waved his hand at me in a way that could only signify magic. “But even yet, I would have put her off and come to ask you first, but I asked her what friend, and how was I to know it was even someone you cared for. She said he gave her this to show you …”
He held out a small bundle of black string, seashells, scarlet beads, and silver bangles.
Impossible. My breath halted—as suddenly and painfully as if I’d fallen from a rooftop. The bundle was entirely unmistakable. “You were exactly right. Bring her.”
Grief and rage battled for my heart. But I pressed my back to the wall just inside the stall gate and drew my zahkri, the Fassid dagger my grandfather had given me when I could never imagine killing anyone with it. When Finn led the woman through the gate, I stepped into the doorway and blocked her way out. “Who are you and what have you done to the man who owns this?”
Only one person in the world carried a charm to protect himself from crocodiles—Ilario de Sylvae.
CHAPTER 16
LAURENTINE
“My name’s Rhea Tasserie, healer in the service of the Temple.”
She retreated to the corner post of the horse box, poised as if ready to climb over the wall into the next stall to get out. She was almost a twin to the post—tall, bony, all knots and knobs, brown hair cut short for use, not beauty, skin rough from wind and weather. Her brown eyes were young, though. And fearful, maybe.
Her gaze darted from me to Finn and over my shoulder to the quiet stable behind me.
“Go,” I said to Finn. “Watch.”
He vanished into the dusty gray light. I waited for the woman to speak.
“You’re the one, then? Lady Anne, the conte’s daughter?” She bent a knee, little more than a jerk, almost as an afterthought. “He said you were small and beautiful and … fierce.”
“I was told he was dead.” And if she was responsible, she’d soon follow him into Ixtador. “Why have you come?”
She folded her long arms across her breasts. Her plain, sturdy traveling clothes displayed no mark of the Temple. Her mouth twisted and tightened, as if resisting an answer on its own.
“He’s not dead. He lies in the hospice at Merona’s Temple Major,” she said, at last. “We only moved him there a half month since, as he’s been very ill. He’s under strict guard at all times.”
A Temple prisoner … brought from the north. Great gods, was he Ferrau’s witness? Relief was quickly overwhelmed by fear. Ilario knew the truth of Mont Voilline, of how Dante had saved his sister and his friend Portier and the world from unimaginable horror. Of necromancy. He was wary of Dante but would never betray him, unless … Calvino de Santo’s wounds flared in memory.
“What kind of illness? What have you people done to him?”
Her long body bristled. “If you’re thinking to accuse me or anyone at the Temple of harming him, you’d best think again. He’ll tell you himself, he was as near dead as a man can be this side of the eternal Veil. He suffered a belly wound, pierced clear through. We Temple healers saved his life.”
“Forgive me for being argumentative, Rhea Tasserie. But I don’t equate saving a life with the right to hold a man prisoner or to torture or murder him.”
“The Temple has every right to protect the people from daemonic evils.” But her gaze faltered and slid off in Ladyslipper’s direction as she spoke.
“Daemonic?” I shook Ilario’s odd little charm at her. “There is no nobler soul in this world than the man who carries this.” Having just mourned Ilario, I would battle the Souleater himself to reclaim him.
But which Ilario had they seen, the lighthearted dandy the world knew or the man who had devoted his life, his reputation, and his considerable intelligence and skill to his royal sister’s protection?
The woman’s bony shoulders twitched under the brown wool. She riveted her gaze to the horse. “That’s why I’ve come. Someone’s got to persuade him to answer what’s asked of him.”
“So it wasn’t your prisoner, but Tetrarch de Ferrau who sent you here. His Excellency didn’t believe me when I said I couldn’t help him.”
“No! I mean, it was neither one of them sent me. He—the prisoner—had told me about you, and I thought maybe an intelligent person that he respected might make him see sense. So I told my superiors that my mother was ill and only I could ease her, and I took his silly charm and came here to find you. But yes, it’s the tetrarch’s questions he needs to answer, elsewise he’s going to be linked to horrible things—blasphemy, necromancy, murder. He’ll be exposed. And his kin will be linked to those things, too.”
Danger hollowed my stomach. Eugenie, so recently maligned as the shadow queen. The king. Their long-awaited child. This woman certainly knew who Ilario was. But did de Ferrau? “Does the tetrarch understand the consequences of his threats?”
“How could I know that?” She pressed one long, slender hand to her brow and scraped her wisps of hair backward, holding tight as if to gather her thoughts. “I’m but a minor healer who’s not even supposed to know this prisoner’s name. Tetrarch de Ferrau is trying to persuade the senior tetrarchs to arrest the daemon mage. He is a most persuasive speaker, a good and holy man, the youngest tetrarch there has ever been, so he will convince them. And then this prisoner will have no choice but to testify. If he refuses, they’ll judge him equal in guilt with the sorcerer.”
Discipline held me steady. I sheathed my knife.
“Why do you think I can persuade him to a course he does not choose of his own? I could go straight to his family and reveal everything you’ve just told me.”
Eugenie would do anything for Ilario. That would reveal the Temple’s despicable use of her brother to the king, and the tetrarch and the Temple would inherit a powerful, implacable enemy. Perhaps de Ferrau believed that Anne de Vernase, corrupted already and hoping to avoid condemnation for her own deeds, might succumb to threats and save them a pot full of trouble.
For a while, I thought Rhea Tasserie wasn’t going to respond. She bit her lip and stared at the stable ceiling—the very portrait of exasperation … or misery. Perhaps she prayed for guidance. But eventually, she hugged her middle again and met my gaze.
“I heard something I shouldn’t, and to speak it—” She shook her head, jaw and mouth clenched. “I should be forever exiled for revealing a Temple secret. But I cannot—If the slightest word leaks out to the prisoner’s family, he will disappear. No one will be able to prove he didn’t die of his wounds in Coverge. Ask anyone serving at the Temple hospices in Jarasco or Castelivre. They’ll tell you about the swordsman companion of the daemon mage and how he died of a belly wound back in Desen’s month. No one who tended him in those first few days ever saw me. No one else knows he survived.”
“He would disappear?” Bless Dante, who had taught me to leash my power for magic, else anger might have propelled me all the way to Merona to crush the Temple Major on its tetrarch’s murderous head. “How dare you claim Ferrau is holy? By this measure, your own life is forfeit.”
“His reasons are not petty,” she said urgently. “It’s the mage he wants. The necromancer. None of the rest of you. Certainly not me.”
“No reasons suffice. You’re speaking of secret execution of a good and decent man. Murder.”
“A man complicit in unholy rites—and in the murder of a dozen servitors! Though”—I could feel her retreat from her charge as soon as she’d spat it out—“not necessarily deserving of a charge of blasphemy or its severest consequences.”
Holy angels, severest consequences … not just death, but excruciating death.
“Again, healer, state why you’ve come to me. If the chevalier will not spew whatever falsehoods your tetrarch demands to save his own life, then what can I possibly do?”
She folded her arms and turned away. “I could get you inside the Temple walls. He says you are ‘eminently resourceful in matters of seeing.’ I’ve no idea what that means. I don’t want to know. I am trying to convince you to persuade him to confession. That’s all.”
I gaped. Released a slow breath. Ilario knew of Lianelle’s potion. Part of my young sister’s legacy was an enchanted concoction that left its user unseeable. He would never have even hinted of such a resource to this woman if he didn’t trust her … or was desperate enough he had no alternative.
I picked up the brush and resumed grooming Ladyslipper, letting the rhythmic motion and the feel of her, warm and living, settle my agitation as thoughts shaped themselves into this new pattern. Rhea was offering to help me rescue Ilario. Or leading me into a trap.
Rapid, shallow breaths jerked her shoulders. Fingers wrapped around her sleeves tapped and squeezed. Excitement? Fear? Or a war going on inside her?
“How can I possibly trust you?” I said. “How will you not be tainted by our wickedness? How will you reconcile your conscience?”
“Your friend trusts me. Everyone else at the Temple thinks him a fool. But I was with him when he was out of his head and said things … he wished he had not said. Eventually, when his position became clear, he allowed me to know that charm would be recognized by his friends. I had thought it nothing of worth.” Her trembling hands rubbed her upper arms. “If my superiors discover I’ve come here, I’ll tell them that I hoped to gain higher status in the Temple by persuading the prisoner to speak what he knows. They already believe me hopelessly naive about how the Temple must navigate political waters. As to conscience, I am damned if I do this and damned if I do nothing. But I am a healer before all, and I would not see this man dead.”
Her voice cracked as she spoke this last. I wanted to believe her. Perhaps de Santo’s fate had bruised her conscience. Saints’ mercy, if this was a trap, I had no choice but to leap into it. Dante would have to wait a bit longer. I could not allow Ilario to be murdered, too.
“Come along, then,” I said. “We’ll ride together. You will follow my lead until we get to Merona. And if one hair on my friend’s head is harmed, I swear I’ll see your tetrarch hanged by his thumbs as fodder for crows.”
LEYNOUE
Mud. Thick, sticky, sloppy mud everywhere. The rainstorms that lashed northern Louvel in late winter were legendary, and those that came near paralyzing Rhea and me must have been recorded as the worst in living memory. I had chosen to return to Merona via the river route, lest Rhea have Temple allies awaiting us on the main road. But I regretted the choice bitterly as we slogged our way to Leynoue, only to find no bargeman willing to challenge the swollen river’s dangerous currents. Entire trees hurtled downriver. It didn’t help to know the road from Laurentine to Merona would have been a similar sea of mud.
