Brood of Bones (34 page)

“You must promise,” he said, “not to betray my presence to the Soultrapper until I strike.”

I exhaled in relief. “Is that all?”

“If the Soultrapper is on his guard, he may realize I attack him only with illusion. He might resist long enough to scourge me with his magic.”

“Or long enough to activate the Bone Orbs and mutilate the women.”

Sadness tempered hunger, at the edges of Tethiel’s face. “You will promise, then?”

“I wonder that you even asked. Of course, I promise.
And...
I wanted you to know something.”

My direct address had almost been of his first name, which would have been most improper. Now, uncertainty fluttered through me about my phrasing, or even what I wanted to say.

“I think that I wish to thank you. I could not have located the Soultrapper without you.”

“Nor I without you, Enchantress Hiresha.”

Not knowing how to thank him for more, for the red diamond, I trod out of the gazebo. My servants covered me from the rain on the way to the carriage.

The patter of hooves on brick streets accompanied by the louder sound of the rain lulled me to sleep. To pass the time in my laboratory, I considered Deepmand’s offer to decapitate the Soultrapper. The suggestion was impractical, as the Soultrapper would see the scimitar drawn, and I was uncertain he could not activate the Bone Orbs all at once, with one thought. No, we needed Tethiel to cast a nightmare of instant death.

Deepmand’s peculiar expression, when I had mentioned his forced retirement, had been of fright and betrayal. He had no right to look at me that way after I had discovered the Soultrapper and would free the city within hours, and I felt wronged by his lack of confidence.

I blinked awake, seeing the carriage door open and Deepmand’s beard dripping in the rain. Striding out, I gazed around the Bazaar for sight of Tethiel.

A man rode toward me, with another on horseback beside him, yet both these horses had black coats, while Tethiel’s mount had been brown. The cloaked men dismounted.

“We speak for the Father.”

One lifted his hood, revealing the pockmarks and scabbed skin of a leper, and I recognized him as one of Tethiel’s dandies, although he now only wore a plain leather vest.

I peered through the bursts of rain. “He is close?”

“Close enough. The Father can’t let himself be seen by the Trapper.”

The second leper said, “He has to be sure, before he lifts the black chalice. He wants you to scare the Trapper into admitting he’s who he is.”

“I thought he trusted my judgment,” I said. “Tell him to strike the moment I speak to a wine merchant.”

“No. You’re to scare the Trapper.”

This made a measure of sense, as his Feasting would perform better if the Soultrapper was frightened, yet I had thought Tethiel wished to attack at the first available moment. I had not expected to have to converse with the Soultrapper, and I found my stomach tightening and my breathing sharp.

Deepmand pointed across the Bazaar, and I dragged myself between the merchant stalls. The rain began to weigh down my gowns.

Maid Janny said, “What’s going on?”

“You have nothing to fear,” I said.

“Great. Now I’m terrified.”

I spotted a banner reading, “Taste Liquid Diamond,” and another, “Anlash’s Fine Wines, A Life-Changing Experience.” His arrogance disgusted me.

The one-armed merchant sat in a rope chair, while two assistants—two followers—lounged on barrels. At the sight of me heading toward him, he started,
then
tried to hide the reaction by rising to his feet.

“Madam Enchantress, a rare pleasure. I trust my wines have satisfied you?”

The sight of him filled me with revulsion. He lifted his single, overlong arm in greeting. His beady black eyes squinted out at me from between drapes of hair as oily and slick as seaweed, and raindrops skidded down his oiled potbelly and between breasts more voluminous than mine.

I said, “I know what you are, Anlash Niklia. I pronounce you under arrest for the death of Faliti Chandur and the endangerment of every woman in Morimound. Your execution will be summary.”

“I—you must’ve drunk too much of my stock. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

His face flashed with shock, and his eyes darted to Deepmand in fear.

The whispers died out in the Bazaar, and merchant and customers alike looked up from wares as I shouted.

“Anlash Niklia, tell me you are not a Soultrapper!”

“I’m not a Soultrapper. Whatever that is, I’m not one. I’m just a vintner.”

His eyes held mine the whole time, to see if I had spotted his lie. I had: Both sides of his mouth turned down in a facial shrug, indicating no confidence in his words; his remaining arm reached toward his neck in a sign of desperation, and his voice dropped in pitch, whereas in a nervous but innocent man, it would have climbed.

“You lie.” I raised my voice high enough that Tethiel would have to hear me. “You are a Soultrapper!”

“Nah-no-no!
I’m not even a gemcutter now. I have no magic.
If Soultrappers have magic.”

I wondered why Tethiel waited. Behind me, one of the cloaked lepers spoke.

“Threaten the roach.”

“Let’s see how he squeaks,” the second one said.

My vision had begun to swim and not merely from the rain. This encounter was not going as I had planned: Tethiel should have attacked, and any threatening move made overtly against the Soultrapper might frighten him into slaughtering the city’s women. I did not wish to follow the advice of the dandies behind me, yet I did not see what choice I had.

“Spellsword Deepmand....”

“Elder Enchantress?”

I leaned both hands on my cane, feeling unstable and close to tipping over sideways in front of all the onlookers in the Bazaar. Within moments, I might see the Soultrapper kill every woman in Morimound. I could not order the Spellsword to decapitate him, yet I had to do something. I glanced around once more for Tethiel on his horse, and after seeing nothing, I screamed at Deepmand.

“Seize him!”

Lightening his armor, the Spellsword launched himself through the air. His gilded gauntlet clamped onto the Soultrapper’s throat, lifting him off his feet.

The Soultrapper opened his mouth, and a wail filled the Bazaar. I dropped my cane to cover my ears while the shriek echoed from every direction, a high sound of sudden pain rising from many throats. All around me, women gripped their bellies and collapsed.

I too clutched my abdomen, anguished in knowing the worst was happening. Tethiel had to strike now, before the Soultrapper killed the rest of the women, and I glanced about for signs of illusions descending from the clouds, of nightmares running across the Bazaar. I saw nothing but stunned citizens gaping at the sprawled women, where blood spread over rain puddles.

Lifting my chin, I screamed at the sky. “Kill him!”

“You really mustn’t,” the Soultrapper said, his voice now relaxed, almost a purr. “Or Morimound will lose all its women.”

“They,” I asked, “
they’re
not all dying?”

“If I die, they all die.”

He spoke the truth. I could not believe it, yet I could see he did. The Soultrapper had not killed all the women, only those nearest, I presumed; the Fate Weaver had spared the rest so far.

My chest stung as if I had inhaled a fume of burning poison ivy; I had not anticipated that killing the Soultrapper would activate the Bone Orbs. I had not, because that meant we had no way to stop him; it meant that Tethiel, who knew so much about Soultrappers, had engineered a plan that never could work. Killing the Soultrapper would only mean killing half the populace of Morimound, all in one second.

The day’s drowning heat fled from me, and I felt frozen. Tethiel could destroy Morimound in a second, through the Soultrapper, yet he would never do that. I could not believe he would do it; I had seen sadness in his face. He must have been delayed, maybe attacked elsewhere. I could not think that Morimound was in the chokehold of not only one man but two.

I glanced over my shoulder, and past the golden hump, I saw the two dandies dragging Maid Janny away, an arm stump pressed over her mouth and a knife over her throat. One leper hushed me with a finger to his flaking lips, and then he drew a thumb over his throat.

“No!” I called after them, although I could not say if to entreat them to release Janny, or for the Lord of the Feast not to strike.

Turning back to the Soultrapper, I saw Deepmand lift his scimitar and rest its blade between the folds of the Soultrapper’s chins. The Spellsword glanced to me, for orders.

I said nothing, knowing nothing that could save Morimound now. Despair lanced through me in a line of pain from throat to hip. I had failed once again.

The Soultrapper touched the Spellsword’s neck.

Deepmand gasped and flinched away, a welt blackening his skin where the Soultrapper’s finger had fallen. The scimitar dropped from his hand to smash against the wet bricks, and the rest of Deepmand followed it, his arms slackening and his massive torso tipping back like a leaning tower; he landed with a crash.

I watched dumbfounded as Deepmand’s beard shriveled, and the skin on his neck bubbled, wheals swelling and bursting to release a stench both sulfurous and rotten like a bloated goat I had once found by the riverbank.

“His death is on your hands, Enchantress,” the Soultrapper said. He bit his thumb then traced a symbol of blood on Deepmand’s forehead, a glyph.

I waited for Deepmand to stand, for his gaping eyes to show some sign of life. He was a Spellsword of the Mindvault Academy and my protector; he could not die.

When he stayed still, I sank to my knees; the weight of my saturated gowns bore me down, and the knowledge of my failure paralyzed me. Deepmand’s gilded plates now were not armor but a sarcophagus.

“You are to blame for their deaths as well.” The Soultrapper gazed over the fallen women, shaking his head. He motioned to his two followers. “Bring me my sons.”

“Yes,
Your
Divinity.”

While the followers drew knives and approached a woman, I could only stare at Deepmand’s shriveling face. He should not have been fated to die, not so soon before retiring with the family he loved, in the city of his birth. I glared up at the Soultrapper, the person who deserved death more than any, yet the one man who could not be threatened, let alone killed.

The Soultrapper waved his hand to the nearest onlookers. Many had run away, yet a few remained to gawk. These now stiffened, walking forward as the Soultrapper spoke.

“Remove the enchantress’s golden humpback. I’d wager it’s the source of her power.”

Five men—three of them guardsmen—gripped me, tugging at my back. I could not believe they would listen to the Soultrapper after what he had done; by the surprise on their faces, neither could they believe it. The Soultrapper had possessed their minds.

The men struggled with the bindings that tied my hump to my gowns. Eventually, they would have them unknotted, and then I could be killed by anyone with
so
much as a knife.

I could only think how Tethiel had betrayed me, how I had lost Deepmand and even Janny. My worthless magic could not save me. I was alone and helpless.

The Soultrapper buckled my golden hump onto his back; it made him glitter like a jeweled scarab, one with a fleshy underbelly and missing three legs. He palmed his shoulder stump with his remaining hand as he walked between rows of Bone Orbs. His followers had brought them one by one, and the rain washed them free of blood.

I could scarcely focus my eyes. A boiling sickness filled me.

“Twenty-six of your sons died, Your Divinity.” The followers carried a crushed Bone Orb and knelt as they rested it beside others that had broken, fractured into white pieces and leaking strong-smelling venom.

“Born before their time, at a great loss to Morimound,” the Soultrapper said. “Enchantress, you murdered my sons and fifty-one women today. You do not deserve free will.”

He waved his hand, and something gripped my mind, pawing at it and digging fingers into my consciousness. I felt as wronged as I had as a girl when Uncle Gobind had touched me. Then, I had struggled against shame, drowsiness, and stronger hands. Now, I felt worse, yet this time I embraced my lethargy, fleeing down the marble steps to sleep.