A Time of Dying (Araneae Nation) (13 page)

“Too many if you ask me.” Not that he had or he seemed to mind. “She’s very stubborn.”

“So I’ve noticed.” His lips quirked. “It’s a trait she passed on to her son.”

His criticism made me ask, “What brings you to Cathis? Are you sworn to the Mimetidae?”

“Gods no.” He flashed a golden token at me. “Lourdes of the Araneidae is my patron.”

“So you are far from home.” Erania was the northernmost city in the Araneae Nation. It was perhaps the one place safe from the plague. For what could survive that barren land?

“You could say that.” His wilted smile reminded me his true home, Siciia, was much closer.

“Will you tell me how you came to be here?” And of the odd allies he had made.

“If you return my knife.” He held out his hand. When I shook my head, he ordered, “Put it in your pocket at least. You can’t walk around with it out in the open. Surely you must realize that.”

Surprised he intended to allow me to keep his blade, I did as he suggested. I pocketed it and sidled past him into the hall. I knew my way to the garden, but I dreaded going there. Why Isolde had chosen to meet in the one place Murdoch warned me against exploring, I could not imagine.

“Well?” I prompted him. “You aren’t a herald or emissary. So what are you?”

“If you find the answer, share it with me.” He looked at the coin he had not yet hidden. “I’m on loan from Maven Lourdes. I was part of a contingent sent from Erania to deliver her youngest sister to Beltania. Mana had been visiting her cousin, Rhys, the new Araneidae paladin, and she was meant to be escorted to Beltania as well.” His hand closed over the token. “We did as the maven asked. Her sister was given into the custody of the Salticidae maven, Sikyakookyang. We reunited Mana with her aunt, the maven. By all rights, we should have returned north afterward.”

“Why didn’t you?” Most followed their orders exactly to the word and not a letter past.

“We were told in Beltania that the plague had come to Cathis. Vaughn was, understandably, frantic to return home.” He shook his head. “Mana refused to let him go alone. She petitioned her aunt for permission to accompany him as a healer. Surprisingly, Maven Sikyakookyang agreed.”

“I’m amazed Sikya let Mana out of her sight.” Let alone with Vaughn. “What then?”

“I found myself in a quandary. Did I return to Erania knowing Maven Lourdes’s sister was safely where I had vowed to see her taken while the paladin’s favorite cousin had chosen not to stay where he had instructed? Did I dare face them and risk their displeasure, a thing I cannot afford, or did I brave the journey south with Mana, so that when I stood before my paladin, I had firsthand knowledge that Mana, who is as dear to Rhys as a sister, was, in fact, safely in Cathis?”

“I would have done just as you have.” I frowned. “Paladin Rhys must have known that when Mana heard of the Mimetidae’s plight, she would follow her betrothed and aid his clansmen.”

Bram flipped the coin once, catching it on his palm. “You would think so.” He shoved both hands in his pockets. “The thing is, when Vaughn and Mana left Erania, they were not promised.”

My mouth opened on a gasp. “They bonded so soon?”

“Their life threads were tied within days of our reaching Cathis.” He stared straight ahead. “I don’t know the particulars, but I’m sure Lleu does if you’d rather ask him than question Mana.”

“That makes no sense.” None at all. “With Vaughn’s position as a future paladin and Mana’s calling as a spirit walker, their clans should have been in negotiations for months if they came to an understanding at all.” Even now, “I can’t fathom what his clan thought hers had of any value.”

The Salticidae lived simply off their land. Their harvests were their riches. What had enticed a crafty maven such as Isolde to let her eldest son marry into a clan so opposite their own? What had Mana offered? Had Vaughn demanded they be allowed to wed? Did that mean he loved her?

A hand on my shoulder stopped me before I wandered into the garden unaware. Isolde sat on a stone bench. Gone was her bold black hair. In its place was a more sedate silver to complement her age. When Isolde spotted me, she lifted a hand in greeting. I returned the gesture and glanced back at Bram, who was already retreating to a benched alcove. “Will you wait here for me then?”

“I will.” His haunted expression told me what he saw through that arch. Death.

He would have been here during the height of the plague and seen the worst of its carnage. I had accumulated so many questions from Bram, and the female I strode toward held all the answers.

When she grinned so crookedly at me, I wondered what the information would cost me.

Isolde elected not to rise and clasp my hands in greeting. Instead, she patted the bench, and it became clear I was unable to avoid sitting beside her. I sat gingerly, on the edge, angled her way.

“You wanted to see me, Lady Isolde?” My formality made her lips flatten.

“We’ve been over this.” She dusted her hands. “Call me Isolde plainly or nothing at all.”

I bobbed my head, though she might have missed it, staring at the garden as she was.

“You know what happened here.” She sounded certain of it.

“I do.” I took my first good look at what had served as a mass grave.

The grass was clipped short and neat around the farthest edges, but the rest of the lawn was a scuffed reminder of the somber purpose this garden had last served. Heavy pots were stacked with their contents spilling onto the ground. If there had once been flowers here, none remained. What was left of a milling stone path seemed lost amid the confusion of the torn lawn and bare dirt.

“You feel it, don’t you?” She held out a wavering hand. “There’s something here.”

Leaning forward, I inclined my head so my earring swung free. I listened and was rewarded with blessed silence. I exhaled through a burst of relief. “There’s nothing here,” I assured her.

Lowering her arm, Isolde twisted on the bench until our knees bumped. “Is that right?”

“Isn’t it?” Unsure what she expected from me, I played on her impatience for my answers.

“Play games with me at your own risk.” She pointed at me. “Be aware I win at all costs.”

“I sense the unease of the place,” I ventured. “It’s not uncommon after such tragic events.”

That seemed to appease her. “Mana is cleansing the garden of negative energy.”

“Murdoch said as much to me.” After sitting here, I understood why she felt moved to do so.

“You and I are of a mind, I think.” She patted my knee. “I was once a maven-in-waiting. I too have had to make rash decisions to protect those who became my clan. Though I made mine years after becoming maven, after the rightful paladin had passed and I was left to rule alone.”

I kept quiet. Rebelling against her son’s plans for me was one thing. Doing it to her face was another.

“Ah, I recognize that look.” She cackled. “Gods know I wore it often enough in my youth.”

“Paladin Vaughn seems certain that Hishima will want to wed me despite our differences.” I let her glimpse my fear. “If he comes, it won’t be desire for my wellbeing that brings him here.”

“I know that. Vaughn does too.” The steel of her gray hair slipped into her expression. “You have no choice. I had none, either. I did my duty for the sake of my clan, and you will do yours.”

“In return for your son’s aid, I will leave with Hishima and see that our pact is upheld.”

“Good.” She patted my knee again. “Then we’re in agreement.”

“It appears so.” My lack of enthusiasm earned me another amused look.

“I won’t ask why you ran from him. It’s your business. It won’t help me to know, so you can keep that to yourself.” She bent down and hefted a satchel from the ground. “Now this, this we need to discuss.” She held my spade in her hand. “You made this my business when you dug into Mimetidae soil. My son sees the larger picture. An alliance with the Segestriidae gives us the two richest clans in the nation at our backs. He likes that. I like it too. But the problem is this. By seeing the big picture, he misses what’s right in front of him. Me? I think death is in the details.”

The spade glinted as Isolde rolled the handle between her palms.

“What are you going to do with that?” Dig me a grave among the souls left in her garden?

“Give it back to you.” She kept the spade whirling. “No female should be left unarmed.”

“Thank you.” Though I had no use for it now, I admit I was relieved to see it again.

“Don’t thank me yet.” She drove the blade into the ground. “I expect answers for it.”

With a final longing glance at the spade, I rose. “I’m not interested in such a trade.”

“Pity you want to do things the hard way.” The gleam in her eyes belied her sentiment.

Still seated, Isolde swept her leg hard under mine and shoved the center of my chest with her palms. I stumbled back, and she leapt at me, wild hair dancing joyfully around her head. Her teeth were bared in the same smile her son wore, but hers was edged with a crazed glee where his was colder, more calculating. When I hit the ground with her atop me, I gasped, stunned and panting.

Reaching behind her, she dislodged my spade and held it to my throat. “Well?”

I turned my head a fraction in the hopes of meeting Bram’s eyes, but he glanced aside.

“What do you want?” I narrowed my eyes at him. I would remember this betrayal.

“Keep that fire, girl.” Isolde eased up so the spade no longer cut into me. “You’ll need it.”

“
Lady
Isolde…” I grated, “…please remove yourself from my person. I can’t breathe.”

At once the blade was cold at my throat. “Now that was plain rude.”

I almost laughed. “Assaulting a guest isn’t?”

“Guest.” She snorted. “It’s a polite label for what we both know you really are.”

Fury lent my voice a bitter edge. “Yet your son applied it, and he is your paladin, is he not?”

“If you’re asking if I fear my son, then no, I don’t. It’s hard to fear your own child after you spend a few years wiping its arse.” She bent so our noses almost touched. “Don’t try and threaten me, girl. Unless you want to find yourself in chains upon Hishima’s arrival, you will cooperate.”

Panic set my heart pumping. I dared not be at such a disadvantage when he arrived.

I forced out, “Ask your questions.”

She leaned back but kept pressure applied to my neck. “What brought you to Cathis?”

I kept my tone civil. “I followed the plague here.”

“Murdoch says you looted the bodies. Is that why you kept to the fields? Easy pickings?”

Shame made my gaze slide to her chin. I could not meet her eyes. “Yes.”

“Is that what you do? Follow the plague and make your living stealing coin from the dead?”

Again I answered, “Yes.”

After seeming to decide something, she said, “Tell me about the spade.”

“It’s a tool.” I shrugged. “I use it to dig up graves and take what treasures I can from them.”

“It’s also a weapon.” She lifted my earring. “How would you feel if I took your treasure?”

Her thighs pinned my arms to my sides, but my nails dug into the dirt. “Don’t touch that.”

“Who’s to say I can’t? You? A thief who has taken much from me and mine telling me that I can’t have reparations from her?” Isolde threw back her head and brayed to the sky. “You’ve got balls. More than some males I’ve met. Balls won’t save you. Information, well, that just might.”

“I’ve answered your questions.” I even told the truth, mostly. More than I had for Murdoch.

“I need more from you than frippery if helping you is to be made worth my while.”

Pushed to my limits, I snapped, “What I know, no one in their right mind believes.”

“Ah. Then we understand one another.” She stood then, propping the spade on her shoulder.

I gawked at her. “We do?”

I began to see why her son had replaced her.

Isolde was stark raving mad.

“Give me your arm.” She clasped my forearm and pulled me onto my feet. “Come with me.”

With no other choice, I followed her through an archway similar to the one where I had left Bram waiting. “Where are we going?” Speaking of my guard… “Should I tell Bram I’m leaving?”

“If he hasn’t noticed you’re gone by now, he’s hardly fit to be your guard.”

“Good point.” I doubted the sluggard had moved an inch from where we left him.

“Murdoch said you’re friends with Mana?” Isolde shoved opened a door and peered inside.

“I am, or I was.” I hastened when she waved me forward. “Her greatfather had business with my uncle. We spent several days together each time Old Father came to visit my uncle Ghubari.”

“Did you ever visit her in Beltania?” Isolde waited until I passed, then rammed her shoulder into the door, jiggling a bolt in place behind us. She leaned against it, listening. Content we had not been followed, she crossed the room and dragged a heavy wooden easel from the corner.

But that wasn’t what caught my eye. Spread across a weathered work table were metal items I recognized as being curative implements. Their purpose, I could not guess. I saw a syringe and a tray filled with several vials of reddish liquid. Blood perhaps? Several amber bottles sat in neat rows. Their labels faced the wall as if by design. There were scalpels and other items I could not name. Rather than ask after Isolde’s health again, I catalogued her odd collection to ponder later.