Brood of Bones (39 page)

My tears astonished me, flowing in rivulets down my face. I slid my arms off Tethiel’s shoulders, meaning to step away from him. He did not release me, although I was unsure if he clung to me for my sake or his own.

His fingers at my back felt more like claws, each a pinprick that set hair on end all over my body. I was beginning to feel overbalanced by the sensations transmitted through the single gown; his arms held me, and his chest brushed against mine. Why, without even any gloves on, I could run a finger down his neck and feel the warmth of his skin.

I felt naked. I felt powerful.

The second emotion I found inexplicable but also undeniable. I thought of the opportunities that would open to me by wearing barely anything. In one gown I had the chance of ascending ladders, and I would not require the support of a cane. By extension, I allowed myself to analyze if any further benefits could be gained by removing the twenty-seventh gown.

An idea jolted me with such force that I gasped in his arms.

He leaned back to look into my eyes. “What is it, Hiresha?”

“Tethiel,” I said, “I can save everyone.”

“I thought it was impossible,” I said, “yet I only have to fall asleep with sufficient surface area of my skin touching the Soultrapper’s skin. In my laboratory, I will have control.”

“Your laboratory?
What is this?” He took a step back, his fingers sliding off the small of my back but still holding me. “You mean your dream? You think you can trick him into bedding you?”

“He wears an open vest. I need only lean against his chest...” I grimaced at the thought of touching his oiled breasts. “...and fall
asleep,
and he would not know what I was doing until he found himself in my dream.”

“I think the Soultrapper would very well know an enchantress was falling asleep on his lap.”

“He would never recognize me, not with short hair. Not if I wore no clothes.” I gulped. “He will believe I am one of the boys he forces to wear women’s clothing.”

“If you were nude, he could hardly mistake you for a boy.”

“Do you think me a slattern? I will be wearing my undergarments!”

“You’d be a model of propriety in them, I’m sure, but remember, sometimes men’s eyes stray and accidentally look at faces.”

“I will paint my face. Hide it like you hid yours.”

“That can only go so far.” His gaze roamed up my body. “And I still cannot believe anyone could mistake you for a boy.”

“A boy dressed as a woman.”

“But without a dress on!”

He gripped my sides more strongly, and I noticed his fingers now appeared as black fangs, which pierced my dress to prick my skin. I ignored the needling, knowing it illusion.

“The Soultrapper will recognize you,” he said. “Once he does, he will kill you, instantly if he’s touching you. Remember your Spellsword!”

“I remember Deepmand very well, no thanks to you.”

“How could you sleep, knowing that any second your insides might begin to rot, your skin decay to slime,
your
brain shrivel to dust?”

“I fell asleep with my throat cut. I am a professional.”

“This death will be faster and far less enjoyable.
And to what purpose?
He will spot you.”

“He will not. He must not.” I winced as Tethiel’s fingers bit into me, and another idea sparked in my mind. “You will distract him, with your magic. Craft an illusion of me in my gowns, and the Soultrapper will never notice the true me lying against him.”

Tethiel pushed himself away from me, his arms shaking and shadows crawling up his sleeves. “Don’t ask me to do this. I must Feast on him. The Seventh Flood is the only way.”

“You would be saving thousands of lives. Tethiel, you will be a hero.”

“That is the problem! I’d be doing
good
, and my magic will make me regret it.” His shoulders contracted into a slouch.
“Far better to satisfy it now.”

“By killing nearly everyone in a city?
What could be worse?”

“I don’t know, but it will be.”

“You said you could resist your magic by focusing on me.” I reached toward his trembling shoulders but hesitated, unsure of where one was supposed to touch another for reassurance. I wondered if other people knew these things instinctively or only through careful observation. My fingers brushed his neck, where I had touched him before. “I know you can be a hero. You saved me.”

“I have saved no one.” He pinched his eyes closed. “Now you’ll get yourself withered by the Soultrapper, and I’ll have to Feast on the city a day earlier.”

“The Fate Weaver decides the future, not your magic. And she would never allow the Soultrapper to rule Morimound.”

“What if I die? Your plan puts me at greater risk.” He backed away, his boot dipping to splash in a lily pool. “Don’t you understand? My magic wants me to
die,
I keep it too well leashed.”

“Then rein it in now. Do not Feast on the whole city, merely create one contained illusion of me.”

“I mustn’t cast you in shadow. My magic will remember you.”

I said, “I care more of Morimound’s women than the hypothetical memories of your magic.”

“No! My magic must be influencing you. It worms its way into people’s minds and deceives them.”

“My thoughts are my own, even if yours are biased.” I offered him my hand. “Will you trust me? Your magic could not both inspire my plan and entertain designs of Feasting on the city, as the two goals are exclusive.”

“Are they? Nightmares always find a way.”

As he frowned at my hand, the fangs at the end of his arms clicked together. When his gaze lifted, his eyes no longer reminded me of common aquamarine. Reflecting the moonlight, they stunned me with the adamantine luster of silver diamonds.

The teeth attached to his palms transformed back into fingers: scarred and misshapen fingers, although decidedly human ones.

“I think you are stronger than I, my heart.” He clasped my hand between both of his, nerves thrumming up my arm. “But you must promise not to look at your illusion.”

“I promise, Tethiel.”

“Then we must hurry, before wisdom catches up to me.”

He strode down the garden path and downstairs. As I followed, I glanced once more at the glittering wreckage of my gowns; spotting a shawl embroidered with a purple iris, I snatched it before hurrying downstairs.

I covered my hair with the shawl on my way outside the manor, where a brown horse kneeled before us. Tethiel mounted first, and as I situated myself to sit sidesaddle behind him, the horse vaulted forward.

I clung to Tethiel, having a legitimate suspicion that the horse meant to kill me. We raced down streets glowing with moonlight, leaping over garden plots and walls, plunging through the darkness of groves. I felt like a bat, flying blind.

At every turn in our path, silent figures waited for us. Some Feasters gleamed in their flamboyant clothes, and the horse snapped its teeth at them. One beautiful maiden glowed like starlight, bobbing down the street with her feet skimming the ground; she spoke in a curiously deep voice as we passed.

“Enchantress, if you’ve spoiled the banquet....”

She had mouthed the words, I realized, which had come from behind her. A black stalk connected the maiden to the forehead of a monstrosity comprised of spear-sized fangs and a gaping mouth large enough to swallow an ox and wagon.

The horse’s hooves left the toothy maw and maiden lure behind us, and the next Feaster bled in a frightful manner from a gash on her chest, lifting the blood in her palms in homage. She seemed unconcerned with her own mortal wound. Hanging roots of banyans hid an even more sinister presence, and I heard an oozing and glimpsed something pale and human-sized slithering around the trunk.

I clutched Tethiel tighter, with the sole goal of positioning my jostling chin closer to his ear. “The acolyte said city guards surround my manor.”

“They won’t dare leave their tents,” he said.

The horse leaped from the road into a park. Two Feasters with jeweled swords pointed us through the strangler fig trees, and the horse slowed, stalking between pavilion tents situated in my gardens.

My manor rose before us, lamps brightening the east wing. The horse stopped in a shadow of a mango tree, and Tethiel lowered me to the sod.

“Hiresha, I will enter by the front door with the illusion. Whatever you do, don’t look at it. And in case this is the last night for either of us....”

He lifted my hand and kissed it. I was proud that his fingers did not even blacken with magic.

I padded into the garden, squinting up at the manor windows. The moon shadowed this side, yet two lamps shone in the crystal panes. Guards peered out into the night, and I felt obligated to subject myself to the incivilities of ducking behind colonnades and crouching behind topiary.

Tethiel’s voice whispered through my mind.
They will see you
.

Instead of crossing between two hedges, I froze in mid-step, out of surprise more than acknowledgement of his warning. A light from a raised lamp flickered over the ground ahead of me, and I exhaled at the near miss.

A glance behind showed no sign of Tethiel, only moonlit branches and shadows. I shook my head and bent over, clutching my skirt, and hustled the last distance to the manor wall.

I had no choice but to exhibit my calves while scrambling up to a window. It was locked, and I could not reach anything higher on the wall. I pressed my hand against a crystal pane, wondering if I would have to break it after so recently replacing my windows.

A skull with blond hair grinned through the glass. I bit on my knuckles to keep from screaming, and in that instant I noticed the bone head also possessed sunken eyes and was supported by an emaciated body. Skeletal arms pried open the window to let me inside.

I asked, “Physis?”

Her ratty dress lacked a single jewel. “Father said no casting. Not this close to the soul collector.”

“Do not presume yourself welcome in my home, merely because I am relieved to see you.”

Her arms trembled as she closed the window behind me.

A casual observer might have mistaken me for an enchantress of modest ability with her underfed servant, striding down the hall. The onlooker could not know I had attained the rank of elder, nor that Physis could—at a thought—become a statuesque beauty or a hideous monster.

Notwithstanding, no casual observer would have spotted us, as Physis closeted us out of sight whenever guard or servant approached. In one such delay, I spoke to her in a whisper.

“We must find the boys’ dressing room.”

“You told me that already, fluff head.”

I had grown weary and begun to forget details. “If you had located it, I would not be forced to repeat myself.”

The Feaster had a disturbing tendency to sniff at doorways, licking her lips, yet we soon found the dressing room. One boy sat sobbing; he clutched the blouse he wore and twisted the fabric, while another youth was attended by a servant painting spirals on his face.

Physis extended her fingers like claws. “Anyone scream, and I’ll eat your tongue out of your mouth.”