Master of restless shado.., p.51
Master of Restless Shadows, page 51
part #1 of Master of Restless Shadows Series
Uneasiness tingled down Ariz’s spine like a droplet of ice water. He stopped as he sensed something like a phantom voice whispering from the back of his mind. The ruddy footman who’d led Ariz up the stairs and into Clara’s wing looked back at him questioningly.
“Lord Hierro Fueres . . . is he here?” Ariz just managed to make the statement sound like a question.
“Yes. Didn’t I mention that her ladyship’s brother has come to offer his condolences for her loss?”
“No.” The word came out flat and uninterested, despite Ariz’s alarm.
The footman, too, appeared somewhat anxious.
“He didn’t seem to be in a good mood,” the footman whispered. “Not at all.”
Ariz recognized all that went unspoken. He didn’t resent the footman for turning back down the stairs after merely directing him the rest of the way to Clara’s drawing room. Ariz had lived long enough as a servant that he understood the pretty footman’s need to avoid catching a man like Hierro’s interest. Moreover, he didn’t expect to be waited upon when he was fully capable of presenting himself and the letter he carried from Oasia.
He passed framed paintings of ancient ossuaries as well as mounted penitents’ paddles, studded with sharp-edged holy stars. As he turned down the corridor he sighted a group of four lady’s maids hunched together outside the tall gold door that opened to Clara’s drawing room. All four wore tellingly dull expressions, particularly considering how much agitation and fear their postures conveyed.
They too bore Hierro’s brand, then.
Ariz couldn’t think of any other reason that they would leave Clara alone with Hierro. Not when their distress at what could be happening behind the door was so obvious in the way they took turns trying to grip the doorknob to open it and then jerked their hands back with gasps of pain. The youngest lady’s maid looked no older than thirteen. Tears dribbled down her slack pale face.
As Ariz drew near them, all four of the lady’s maids looked at him. He read their alarm clearly and now, hearing the low fury of Hierro’s voice through the door, he realized that they were all terrified for Clara. Whatever her failings might have been, she’d clearly won the affections of these women.
“I bring news from Oasia Quemanor, Duchess of Rauma, for her sister, Lady—”
“Please do go in, good sir.” The tallest of the maids stepped aside to allow him past. Ariz felt the brand flare painfully through his chest as he reached for the door. But then a fluttering shadow of the relief he’d experienced in Lord Quemanor’s arms seemed to rise in him like a shield. Ariz gripped the knob, shoved the door wide and charged into the drawing room.
Hierro and Clara stood before the crushed bodies of two little songbirds. The cage that had housed them lay near a blue divan. Clara gasped, her face darkening to a terrible violet as she stared over Hierro’s shoulder to Ariz. Hierro seemed to take no notice of Ariz. He looked utterly enrapt, leaning over his sister, strangling her.
Ariz didn’t think, he simply allowed his momentum to carry him into Hierro. He rammed his right leg into Hierro’s knee, but then the brand gushed up like a geyser of agony searing through his entire body. Ariz moaned in pain and his shaking body collapsed on top of Hierro. All three of them fell together.
Ariz shook against the polished floor, unable to even pull himself upright.
But Clara scrambled to her feet first, gagging and gasping. The front of her gray bodice had been slashed open by a knife that left a fine track of blood. But it was the pale scar tissue just below Clara’s breasts that caught Ariz’s attention. A brand—one so old that it had faded and lay flat, but still recognizable to his eye. She crossed her arms over her chest as she bolted back behind the divan. Ariz had suffered more than a decade of Hierro’s control, but Clara, he realized, must have endured his cruelty even longer.
Horror and sympathy rose through Ariz. Then the pain of Hierro’s black boot slamming into his ribs eclipsed all thought. A whimper escaped Ariz’s throat. Hierro’s gold spurs jingled like bells as he punted Ariz again.
“How dare you lay a hand on me!” Hierro sneered down at Ariz. He drove his boot in again and the stab of pain that shot through his kidneys joined the vast waves crashing through his whole body. Agonized tears welled up in Ariz’s eyes as he struggled to reclaim that brief shade of respite that Lord Quemanor had imparted to him.
If he could just get up . . . or barring that, at least summon the self-control to catch Hierro’s boot and jerk the man off his feet. But Ariz could hardly draw in a breath now.
Hierro smiled at him as he landed another brutal kick. Ariz remembered Hierro kicking a hunting dog to death in this very same way years before.
It couldn’t end like this. Not when he’d finally found a spark of hope to make him want to survive.
“I—”Ariz struggled for anything that could save him. “Your back was to me. I didn’t know—” Ariz couldn’t finish the sentence in a lie. Instead he simply cut himself off short as Hierro’s boot punched into him again.
“Please, Hierro,” Clara rasped. “Please stop!”
Surprisingly, that did still Hierro. He turned to regard his sister with an exasperated expression. “God’s tits, do you ever cease your incessant begging?”
Clara bowed her head, perhaps in shame or obedience. Though Ariz remembered doing the same thing to save himself from having to look at Hierro and feel the agony roused by murderous hatred of his handsome face.
“Please,” Clara whispered again. “He didn’t know it was you. How could he have raised a hand against you if he had? He was only defending your sister.”
Hierro made a disgusted noise but stepped away from Ariz. He tossed himself down into the blue velvet divan and swept his hand through his hair, smoothing it back. For a moment none of the three of them moved. Hierro lounged, while Clara stood looking bedraggled and beaten. Ariz sucked in a breath. His ribs felt like knives scraping his lungs, but he had to breathe—he had to keep himself alive. He lifted his gaze to the painted ceiling, attempting to think of nothing but the blue sky and spills of holy gold stars above him.
“Close the door!” Hierro shouted and one of the lady’s maids immediately obeyed him.
Out of the corner of his eye Ariz noticed Clara back away to a card table. She plucked a white lace shawl from the back of a chair and wrapped it around her. Hierro leaned forward in his chair.
“So, why are you here, Ariz?” he demanded.
Ariz closed his eyes. The afterimage of gold stars shone violet behind his lids.
“I was sent with a letter.” Ariz managed to get control of his left arm well enough to draw Oasia’s letter from his coat. “For Lady Odalis.”
Hierro snatched the letter from Ariz’s hand. He cracked the jade-green wax seal and then read the missive. Anger began to fill his face again and Clara retreated behind the card table.
“Your idiotic obsession with saving that limping brat hasn’t just cost me one agent but two!” Hierro glowered at Clara. Then he crooked his finger and beckoned her to him. The color drained from her face as she staggered toward him.
Ariz managed to roll onto his side. He wondered if he could make himself catch hold of Hierro’s leg, if the other man started after Clara again. Hierro didn’t even bother to glance down at him. His attention locked on his sister as she dragged her feet steadily toward him.
“It seems that Oasia doesn’t want you living under her roof. What a surprise! And on top of that she’s decided to send this”—Hierro nudged Ariz with the toe of his boot—“to stay with you.”
“That’s good. It would have been foolish to use Ariz to assassinate Fedeles Quemanor.” Clara gripped the arm of the divan as if attempting to use it to anchor herself from drifting nearer to her brother. “Since he came directly from your service, it would cast suspicion back on you—”
“Are you trying to claim to have arranged this for my good?” Hierro gave a cold laugh. “After so many husbands, I would have thought that you’d be a better liar than that.”
“I can’t lie to you, Hierro.” Clara very obviously released her grip on the divan and stepped up to Hierro’s side. “I truly do believe that it would have been shortsighted to use Ariz directly against Fedeles Quemanor, when he could be exploited to far greater effect.”
Hierro curled his hands around Clara’s throat but didn’t close his grip. He studied Clara’s pallid face. Ariz wondered if his own expression was as curious as Hierro’s.
“All right,” Hierro said at last. “You’ve got my attention. But your explanation had better be damn good, my dear.”
“It’s no secret that you hate Fedeles, so if he’s assassinated by a man who can be traced back to your service, then that will cast suspicion on you and everyone who supports you.” Clara spoke in a hoarse whisper and Ariz wondered just how close Hierro had come to actually killing her. “But if Ariz were to kill Fedeles Quemanor’s enemy, then his actions would obviously be attributed to the Duke of Rauma, not you or Prince Remes.”
Hierro’s mouth twitched, but then a thoughtful expression spread across his face. He tapped his fingers across the red welts that marked his sister’s neck.
“Use him to murder the royal bishop, you mean?” Hierro asked.
“He is a threat to Remes’s claim to the throne,” Clara said. She dropped her gaze to Hierro’s feet, but Ariz noticed the slightest smile flicker across her lips. “Or there is . . . Papa.”
Hierro raised his brows as if surprised by his own admiration of Clara.
“A death in our own family would remove suspicion from you,” Clara went on in the same sad soft tone. “And at the same time Papa’s demise would provide you with complete control of the Gavado armies. You will require them to suppress those nobles who don’t accept Remes immediately.”
Ariz stared at Clara, feeling nearly as awed as he was horrified by her cleverness.
“Oh, Clara, you’re so frail and pious. Sometimes even I forget what a heartless little bitch you truly are.” Hierro laughed with genuine warmth. Then he glanced down to Ariz. “And you. You don’t breathe a single word of this to anyone. Not one word. Understood?”
Ariz nodded as if he was convulsing and he bit down on his tongue to keep from letting any admission of what he’d already confessed slip out of his mouth. Fortunately, Hierro quickly returned his attention to Clara.
“I do like your plot, but it still leaves us with the problem of how to be rid of Fedeles and Oasia and their brat.”
“Once the duke and duchess are implicated in the assassinations, the entire nation will turn against them,” Clara responded. “Their lawful arrests and executions will return our nation to peace and legitimize the rightful ruler of Cadeleon.”
Hierro nodded but then commented, “I notice that you failed to mention the crippled whelp.”
A shudder, almost like a suppressed sob, shook through Clara. She clasped her hands together as if in prayer as she lifted her head to gaze up at Hierro.
“He is innocent. Completely innocent,” Clara whispered. “You must spare him.”
“There is nothing I must do,” Hierro replied. “Only what I will or won’t.”
“Please—” Clara began, but Hierro silenced her with a quick slap across her cheek.
“Don’t ruin my mood,” he chided her. “I happen to be feeling generous and willing to indulge you in something, but not that. So ask for something else before you begin to annoy me.”
Clara sagged but then straightened again. “Then will you move against that Haldiim abomination, as I asked?”
“Captain Yago has already done away with the Bahiim in charge of their little park,” Hierro replied.
“Her body may be dead, but the sacred grove still blazes in my mind.” Clara caught Hierro’s hand between hers. “And there’s a chance that your enemy on Crown Hill could seize the grove. You remember the letter, don’t you?”
“Of course I remember the letter.” Hierro sighed in the theatric manner of the much put-upon hero of a romantic comedy. Or at least, as if he found all of this somehow funny. “And yes, I remember the royal bishop’s rants about Meztli’s scarlet shields rising from Crown Hill to save us all if the Labaran attack on the Hallowed Kings continues. Those were just two of the reasons why I wanted Fedeles and Oasia removed immediately. If you recall.”
“Do you really believe that your assassins armed with mere blades could have killed either of them?” Clara offered Ariz an apologetic glance. “As skilled a swordsman as he is, not even Ariz would have been a match for Oasia, not inside her own home. The instant he moved against her, Oasia would have torn him apart.”
Ariz knew Clara was right. In fact, the idea had been a kind of comfort to him on some occasions.
“And Fedeles Quemanor’s shadow is not a thing that can be laid low with a common blade,” Clara said. “Remes already lost two assassins attempting that very same thing. Those poor men were slaughtered like lambs. Had I not intervened as I did, Ariz would have remained in that house and died for nothing.”
“Oh please,” Hierro cut her off. “You could hardly have known that Oasia would send him to you.”
Ariz wasn’t so certain and the realization filled him with an icy dread. Had Clara asked to stay with Oasia knowing that she would be refused and that Ariz would be sent to her instead? Did she understand her sister so very perfectly? Or did she possess some other means of manipulating events around her? She’d known Dommian’s name and character well enough that Ariz had suspected him of being her informant. But there could be someone else.
“If Oasia and Fedeles are to be completely destroyed,” Clara went on, “then they must first be stripped of their power. Only when they are helpless and friendless can we be assured of killing them. And only then can their deaths serve a greater purpose.”
“No doubt. But there’s not much sport to be enjoyed in such a plan,” Hierro commented.
“We aren’t trying to win a game. This is a holy war,” Clara replied.
Hierro laughed.
“When you’re chosen by God, the two are the same thing, darling.” Hierro pulled his hand free of Clara’s fingers. “But just for your sake I’ll go and see if I can’t stir up the Haldiim District—”
“You have to destroy their grove.”
“I don’t have to do anything,” Hierro snapped.
Clara bowed her head and this time Ariz glimpsed the fury that she hid in the shadows of her loose hair.
“It isn’t just in Anacleto that the Haldiim are spreading. They may seem like nothing with their quaint trees and ill-kept grounds, but those little parks of theirs harbor dangerous power. Ancient power that could ruin everything. They will corrupt all that is true and holy just as a cancer consumes a body—”
“Fedeles Quemanor is no Bahiim and he’s no more welcome in their grove than I am. You should have seen the show last night. He ran away from Crown Hill crying after one paddling from that dead crone in the grove. A second violation might well kill him.” Hierro gave a laugh but then cocked his head and considered Clara. “I suppose I might have a use for the grove after all.”
“You will destroy it?” Clara asked.
“Of course. Eventually,” Hierro replied. “Though there’s more than one way to destroy something. You of all people should know that.”
He stepped over Ariz and, tossing the door open, he left them. In his wake the lady’s maids crept back into the drawing room. Clara knelt and gently touched each of the dead songbirds as if offering them last rites. Then she moved to Ariz’s side and offered him a tired smile.
“Never fear, Ariz. Hierro’s games will be his undoing in the end.” She wiped the beads of cold sweat from his brow. “And your death, when it comes, will be glorious.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Having listened inattentively to the descriptions of Jacinto’s new theatrical masterpiece, Fedeles gave his blessing for Jacinto to abscond with Atreau and Master Narsi. Then he hastened to his wife’s wing of the mansion. He left his guards behind in the hall before he strode into Oasia’s study.
Inside he found his son playing cards with Mistress Delfia’s twins. A soft rosy glow lit Sparanzo’s winsome face as the ruby necklace he wore lit in response to Fedeles’s seething shadow. The necklace resembled one Hylanya had worn, except that these stones were smaller and seemed to Fedeles as if age and the elements had weathered them down to a kind of purity. When he’d touched them they radiated safety and strength. The locket at the center of the necklace was so sedate that Fedeles found himself overlooking it, even when he attempted to make a study of its worn surface. His gaze seemed to slide off it.
He didn’t feel entirely comfortable with Oasia’s decision to make Sparanzo wear the string of blessings that Clara had sent. At the same time he could hardly argue with the fact that the necklace bore only protective signs and that there was no one whom he would rather have protected.
Both Sparanzo and Celino betrayed the fact that they perceived the blessings flaring to life when they looked to the shining stones. Marisol on the other hand turned her head immediately to where Fedeles stood. The color drained from her face as she glanced to Fedeles’s shadow. She straightened as if she thought she might have to fight him off.
“I’m sorry.” Shame tempered Fedeles’s frustration. He spoke softly and smiled, though he suspected that neither action reassured the children while a writhing monstrosity still spilled out from around his feet. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”
“I’m not scared, Papa.” Sparanzo gave him a guileless smile and then lowered his gaze to Fedeles’s shadow. “Are you scared?”
