Beyond the Pale (71 page)

“What’s wrong with him?” Grace said.

“What? Can you not tell merely by looking at him, Duchess?”

Grace winced at the harshness of the voice. In the castle, a servant who spoke to a noble like that would have been beaten, or worse.

But you’re not in the castle, Grace. You’re not even a duchess
.

She pulled back the blanket and examined the man. He was naked beneath the rough covers, his skin waxy with sweat. He was small, no more than sixty-two inches, but obviously fully grown. The greater size of men compared to women was an artifact of good nutrition. In a stressed population, males were seldom much larger than females. Grace made a catalog in her mind.

White male, approximately nineteen, unconscious and malnourished. Skeletal evidence of rickets as a child. Badly set but healed breaks to the proximal right ulna, distal left
radius, medial left clavicle. Mass of scar tissue from a burn on the left lateral abdomen
.

Had this man come into the ED, Grace would have thought him a product of an abusive childhood, or a kid from the streets. If he was under eighteen, she would have called Social Services. Here he was a normal man with people who cared about him. Everyone in this world lived this way, or at least the commoners. Anger flooded Grace’s stomach. What kind of hell was this?

A gnarled hand placed a warm cloth on the young man’s forehead. A sharp scent rose from it. Grace knew it from her studies. The cloth had been steeped in mourner’s wreath. She could almost smell the salicylic acid. It was some sort of analgesic, good for pain.

Grace followed the gnarled hand back, to the face of the one Adira had called Vayla, then drew in a sharp breath. So not all witches in this world were like Kyrene or Ivalaine. The woman was ancient, her back a hump beneath tattered clothes. Wisps of gray hair had escaped her ratty hood like smoke through a roof. Her face was a map of lines, her cheeks sunken, one eye bulbous, the other a wrinkled mass of flesh.

The crone grinned at Grace, displaying a few yellow teeth. “What? Do you not find me beautiful, Duchess?”

Grace stared at the crone, then she clenched her jaw and turned back to her patient. “His temp is elevated. He’s not cyanotic, so there’s no evidence of pneumothorax. It’s not a viral infection. Abdomen is not rigid or sensitive. No signs of appendicitis.”

“What are you saying, my lady?” Adira’s face was fearful. “Are you speaking a spell? What are you doing to him?”

Grace ignored her. “There must be some other cause for his fever. But what?”

“He is dying,” the crone said.

Grace glared at Vayla. “Not if I have anything to do with it.”

The crone gazed at her, then nodded. “What do you wish me to do, Duchess?”

“Help me turn him on his side.”

Grace hardly needed the crone’s aid. He felt as light and hollow as a bird. He moaned in his delirium—he was waking
up. Grace ran eyes and hands over him, searching, sensing. There had to be something, some clue.…

There. She had not seen it until Vayla snatched the tangled blanket away from his feet. Just above his left ankle was a wound. It was small but deep. Grace bent close, then gagged at the sweet scent of decay.

“I need more light.”

The crone held out a candle, and Grace examined the cut. It was a puncture wound. She could see cloth fibers and bits of dirt embedded in it.

“Dafin cut himself on the plow the other day,” Adira said. “He complained that it hurt, but it was only a small cut. It cannot be this that has made him so ill, can it?”

Grace did not answer. There was no time to explain about invisible microbes and blood poisoning to a medieval young woman. Angry red lines had already begun to snake their way up his leg. A few more hours and amputation would be the only choice, and Grace knew he could not survive that—not here, not in these conditions. Right now there was still another chance.

Grace pulled the knife from the sheath in her boot and held it out toward Vayla. “Heat this in the fire.”

The old woman nodded and plunged the blade of the knife into the coals. They waited, then she withdrew the knife and handed it back by the hilt. Grace could feel the heat radiating from the metal.

“Hold him,” she said.

“Help me,” the crone said to Adira.

Adira shook her head but did as Vayla bid. They gripped her brother’s body. He was moving now and muttered in his delirium. Grace bent over him and paused. Despite his battered body his face was beautiful. A broken angel fallen from above. There was so little that was good in this world. Grace was not going to let him go.

She tightened her grip on the knife, then pressed the hot steel tip into his wound. The stench of burning meat filled the air. His eyes flew open, his head went back, and he screamed in agony.

“Murder!” Adira shrieked. “You’re murdering him!”

“Quiet, fool girl!” Vayla hissed. “She is his only chance.”

Adira clapped her hands over her mouth, her eyes wide
with terror. The young man fell back to the cot, unconscious again. That was a small blessing. Grace set down the knife and stood.

“We have to get his temperature down now or his blood is going to cook his brain.”

The crone nodded. “Cold water, girl,” she snapped at Adira. “Get it now.”

There was a small window above the bed. Grace moved to it and threw open the wooden shutters. Cold air flooded the room. She shut her eyes, let the chill cool her cheeks and clear the smoke from her mind. She opened her eyes again and saw a plate of bread on the windowsill, and next to it a wooden cup of wine.

“They are offerings,” Vayla said.

Grace turned around. “Offerings? For who?”

“For the Little People. It is said they can steal a sick man’s spirit. We leave them the bread and wine so they will be appeased and move on to the next house.”

Grace glanced back at the bread. Falken had said the Little People were forgotten, but clearly that was not so. Only weren’t the Little People supposed to be good?

“They are queer beings,” Vayla said, as if she heard Grace’s unspoken question. “Good or evil mean nothing to them. They simply are.”

Adira returned with a bucket of water. She was sobbing as she set it down. Grace and Vayla wetted cloths in the bucket and laid them on the young man’s arms and torso. Then Grace handed the vial she had brought to Vayla and explained its usage.

“Will he live?” Adira said in a tremulous voice.

Grace laid a hand on his forehead. Yes, his temperature was coming down, and the simple would help. His sleep was more peaceful now. There was so much that could go wrong. The knife might not have cauterized all the gangrenous flesh. The infection might have already spread too far. The burn might have sent him into shock. She shut her eyes. No, none of these things were true. She could feel it, could feel the strength of his beating heart as if she held it in her hand.

“He will live,” she said.

It was full dark by the time she left the shack. The boy that Adira had charged to guide Grace back to the castle—
one of the serving maid’s younger brothers—held a small lantern carved of horn, the stump of a candle inside.

“Come, my lady.” His voice was thin and frightened.

Grace nodded and followed after him. She was exhausted, yet she felt oddly light and charged, like a dust mote caught in an electric field. There was so much pain in this world, so much suffering. Was it even worth saving?

Even as she asked herself this, she thought of her last conversation with Leon Arlington. She knew what he would have chosen, and she knew what they would choose. No matter the suffering, it was always better to be alive.

They came to the town square, and Grace was surprised to find it was not empty. A few torches flared and sputtered, masking the reek of the sewer with acrid smoke. A knot of people gathered in the light. The boy tugged at her sleeve, and she picked her way after him through the muck.

They were almost to the other side of the square when Grace saw the man in the black robe. A cold needle pierced her heart, and she lurched to a halt.

“Please, my lady,” the boy said. “Please, we mustn’t tarry. Not after dark.”

Grace hardly heard the words. She took a step forward. The man’s side was to them, his face hidden by the heavy cowl of his robe. Torchlight played across the dark material, a crimson corona. At first she thought it was he—the one she had seen that night in the castle, the one who had dropped the knife—then she realized it couldn’t be. He was shorter and stockier than the one she had seen carving the door.

As she watched, the man splayed his arms out. He was speaking to the gathered people. No, not speaking, but
preaching
, his voice rising and falling like an angry song, although she could not make out his words. The crowd watched him, their rapt faces turned upward, red as blood in the torchlight. Grace took another step forward.

The man’s arms froze in midair. His words ceased. Then, as if he sensed eyes upon him, he turned his head, and his cowl slipped back. His gaze searched the square, then his eyes locked on Grace, and her breath turned to ice water in her lungs.

Even in the dim light she could see that the man’s face
was rough and cruel. On his forehead, drawn in ashes, was a symbol she now knew well. Two curved lines: the rune of the Raven. But it was not this that caught Grace’s gaze. It was the color of his eyes. One was blue, while the other was brown. Memory washed over her in a cold flood. She had seen eyes like that once before.

His thin lips parted in a rotten grin.

Dread wrapped clammy fingers around Grace’s throat. He knew her. He had seen her, and remembered her, and now he would walk across the muddy square and kill her.

Grace stumbled backward, and the glare of a torch burned her retinas. She whirled around and staggered forward, searching with blind hands, then ran into something hard—a stone wall.

“My lady … what is it?”

Her vision cleared. She saw the boy before her, his face a pale moon of fear in the dimness. She glanced over her shoulder. A ruddy glow flickered at the mouth of the alley—the town square. But there was no sign of the Raven cultist following her. There was still time.

A new urgency filled her.

“The castle,” she said. “I have to get to the castle. Now.”

The boy gave a jerky nod, his eyes large. She knew her face was as hard as her words, but she didn’t care. At that moment only one thing mattered. The boy sprinted down the muddy alley. She picked up the hem of her gown and struggled after him, while knowledge burned in her mind like poison.

No pain
.

Grace knew who the conspirator was.

Travis dropped the poker he had been using to stir the fire and looked up as the door to his chamber flew open.

“Grace,” he said when he managed to find his tongue. “What’s going on?”

She stepped into the room. He had never seen her like this.
Sweat sheened her forehead, and her cloak was askew over her gown. Her green-gold eyes blazed.

“I know what they mean, Travis,” she said. “The words we saw in the snow, by Gloaming Wood.”

It felt as if the fire went out, although he knew it still crackled on the hearth. Travis stood. The room was quiet—he had not seen Melia or Falken all day. The bard and the lady were scheming something, as usual.

“What do you mean, Grace?”

“No pain.” She took another step toward him. “They don’t feel pain, Travis.”

“Who don’t feel pain?”

“Ironhearts.” Her words were rapid as gunfire. “I mean, they
do
feel pain. I’ve seen that. It helped me escape from one in Denver. But I don’t think they feel pain like we do, and I don’t think it lasts for long. It was a mistake to think we could look for the wounded conspirator. Even though he was injured, we never would have known it.”

Cold understanding washed over Travis. “So that’s what Trifkin was trying to tell us—that the wounded man might not seem like one.”

Grace gave a stiff nod. “But there’s more, Travis.” She licked her lips. “I saw something in the town.…”

Sickness rose in his throat as he listened to her quick, fragmented words. When she finished, he forced himself to swallow his dread. They had been wrong—so terribly wrong.

His eyes locked on hers. “We have to get the others.”

Minutes later the five ran down a corridor. Beltan’s mail shirt chimed a dissonant music, and both he and Durge gripped the hilts of their swords. Aryn’s face was puzzled, but there had been no time for Travis and Grace to explain in detail. They had just told the others to follow, that Grace had learned something about Lord Alerain.

“Where did you last see him, Travis?” Grace said between gasps of breath.

He glanced at her. “I think it was just after this—”

There was no need to say more. They passed through an archway and came to a halt on the edge of a long room. Crimson torchlight spilled upon the floor. It was hard to tell where the light ended and the blood began.

Aryn screamed, then clamped a hand to her mouth as
Beltan gripped her shoulders. Travis’s stomach wrenched, and he heard Grace let out a cry of dismay beside him. With slow steps Durge approached the body.

Alerain’s head had been hewn off and had fallen several feet from his body, connected to it only by a river of red. His eyes stared upward in a ghastly expression. Durge knelt beside the corpse and, with deliberate motions, unlaced and opened the seneschal’s tunic. A ragged wound snaked down the center of his flat chest, freshly scabbed over.

Nothing can harm me now.…

Now Travis knew why Alerain had reminded him of Jack earlier that day—both had had the same look of sadness in their eyes. The seneschal had been saying good-bye, just like Jack did in the Magician’s Attic.

Durge looked up. “Alerain was an ironheart. And the conspirator. Though it appears his partner caught up to him before we did.”

Beltan’s voice was hoarse. “How did you know, Grace?”

She stared at the body and spoke in sharp, clinical words about the man with one blue eye and one brown eye—how she had seen him once, speaking to Alerain, and how she had seen him again in the town that night, preaching the word of the Raven.