The Bone Palace (25 page)

Folly or not, their mission was certainly trespass, and on foreign soil no less. Ashlin might be used to such things, but Savedra’s head was crowded with visions of Sarken warlords riding down on them and demanding explanations. The hills were empty, though, save for the usual skitter and scurry of wildlife and birds wheeling overhead.

Snow fell in slow fat flakes that melted when they hit the ground. The sky hung low against the mountains, clouds shredding on their peaks, while sunrise pink and gold cooled to grey. The snow was soft but the wind cut like a razor, mocking Savedra’s autumn clothing.

The road became overgrown the closer they rode to the
castle. In better light Savedra saw grey crystals glittering amid dirt and pebbles only a few yards past where they had turned back the night before; the salt of the villagers’ wards. She touched the bag of herbs and salt in her coat pocket. Despite the fabled mystic senses of the hijra, all she felt was cloth and rasping grains. Likewise the cord around her neck felt no more powerful than the pearls she wore at court.

At the foot of the steep, tree-choked slope they found a long ruin that must have once been a stable. The roof had collapsed, and all it housed now were weeds. A rabbit burst from cover when they drew too close, vanishing into the undergrowth with a white flash of tail. In the shadows behind the building, stone steps led up the hill.

After scouting the area, they left the horses tethered in the dubious shelter of the stable, unconcernedly cropping grass. The animals’ calm was reassuring—beasts, unlike most humans, could sense ghosts or strong spirits.

The stairs were cracked and crooked, flagstones washed away and pushed aside by tree roots. Savedra lost count after seven hundred, and they were no more than halfway up. Leaves and fallen pine needles crunched and skittered with every step, sometimes obscuring broken stones and ankle-turning holes. Before long she could hardly hear the crackle of leaves beneath boots over the wheeze of her breath. Sweat soaked her back and her legs and lungs ached to burning. Even Ashlin was winded, and she took some satisfaction in that.

Near the summit, the path cleared the tangled trees, wrapping around the edge of the cliff for several yards before climbing again. To the left, only a few feet of rocks and weeds and scrubby grass separated their feet from a
long drop. Far below the Ardos¸ snaked around the cliff, and pine-thick hills rose on the other side. Snowflakes swirled and spiraled and vanished into grey haze; Savedra regretted her downward glance immediately. The right-hand view was safer, but still breathtaking in its height. And ahead of them the fortress rose, a towering weight of age-stained stone. After a moment’s rest they kept walking, into its shadow.

By the time they reached the final landing, Savedra had no more strength to admire the view. Instead she sat with her back to the hulking gate, laying her head on her knees and waiting for her breath and heart to slow. Her side ached like a knife between her ribs and her racing pulse made her nauseous. Ghosts or demons were welcome to eat her, if it meant she didn’t have to get up again.

“Here.” Ashlin crouched beside her, passing a water skin and a wedge of oily cheese. “Slowly,” she cautioned as Savedra lifted the bag.

When her stomach ceased its seasick roil and the pain in her side faded, she rose to face the castle.

Carnavas was a fortress, not a palace like those in Erisín. The hulk that loomed above them was solid, heavy walls and arrow-slit windows, built for defense. Built to last for centuries, but twenty-seven years of neglect had taken their toll all the same. Moss and vines webbed the stones, and saplings pressed against the walls like an invading army.

The portcullis was raised, and unlikely to lower again. Corroded iron spikes bled rust down the narrow walls and the bird nests clogged the lattice. The ground below was crusted grey with droppings. The great ironbound double doors beyond were in no better condition, the wood dry
and splintering. One side stood ajar, a handspan gap leading into shadows. The only sound was the rustle of dry leaves and the mournful sigh of the wind.

Cahal crouched to study the filthy ground. “No one has passed this way recently,” he said, voice hushed either in caution or out of respect for the stillness. “And no large animals.”

“That’s something, at least. I’d rather not walk into a bandit nest.” Ashlin adjusted her sword, and Savedra checked her own dagger hanging at her waist.

“If there is anyone inside,” Iancu said, “they’ve likely heard us coming by now.”

“Yes.” Ashlin raked a hand through her sweat-stiffened hair. “No use dithering on the doorstep.” She started forward, but Cahal intercepted her with a glare.

“Wait your turn, Captain.” His sword rasped free of its scabbard; the steel gathered pale daylight and cast a watery shimmer against the wall. He braced his free arm against the door, and Savedra held her breath.

Wood creaked and groaned, then swung inward with a shriek of rusted hinges. The sound echoed like a scream. A flock of birds burst from a nearby tree with a rattle of branches, croaking disapproval. Savedra flinched, and Ashlin grimaced. Cahal ducked and crouched behind the other half of the door, waiting for a response.

None came, and the echoes faded into the sighing wind. The birds settled in another tree, glaring indignantly at the clumsy humans.

“Well,” Cahal said at last, uncoiling from his crouch. “Now the ghosts really know we’re here.”

The old witch’s story had filled Savedra’s head with visions of corpse-strewn halls, skeletons clutching rusted
weapons or ghosts wailing and screaming for revenge; the ghosts in her imagination looked suspiciously like stage specters in artfully tattered shrouds and greasepaint. None of that confronted them as they stepped into the narrow courtyard.

The stones were fouled with dead weeds and leaves and bird droppings, and feathers drifted like dark snow in the corners. Vines cocooned the well and the wooden cover was broken and half fallen away. The yard smelled of stone and damp and mildew, shit and the sharper pungency of cat urine. Savedra pinched her nose against a sneeze. The ground
was
littered with bones—they crunched alarmingly as she stepped farther in—but they were tiny fragile things. Mice and fallen birds, not the castle’s slain guardians.

Despite the stink and ominous doors and hallways and broken-shuttered windows that stared down at them, an ache spread behind Savedra’s breastbone. It must have been a pleasant place once—empty flower boxes hung beneath windows, and rotten trellises climbed the walls, tangled with browned roses. Drifting snow and the slanting morning light lent the yard a ruined, antique beauty. Like yellowed lace, or funeral art.

Something hissed in the shadows and Savedra yelped. Eyes flashed copper-green in the gloom of a doorway and Ashlin’s hand closed on her sword hilt. A heartbeat later Cahal laughed at both of them as a scruffy striped cat bolted up a flight of stairs and vanished down a gallery. Ashlin laughed too, but touched her shoulder to Savedra’s in mutual reassurance.

They startled a few mice and feral cats as they explored the ground floor, and one sleepy owl, but found no other
signs of life or unlife. Signs of the previous inhabitants were all around them, though. Beans spilled out of rotted bags in the pantries, and jars of preserves encased in dust lined the shelves. Dishes still littered the kitchen counters, and drawers held crumbling receipts and recipes and lists of stores. The altar in the narrow chapel was spotted with wax, the candles toppled and chewed by rodents. A few tarnished silver sconces still clung to the walls, while others had fallen to reveal cleaner stone beneath. The icons of whatever saints or gods the Sarkens prayed to were darkened and unrecognizable. Moth-eaten clothes and linens filled chests in the servants’ quarters, and hints of lives littered the rooms: a shelf of moldering books; a carven box filled with needles and buttons and an ivory thimble; a pair of shoes heavy with once-bright embroidery, much too fine to be worn for daily chores. Paintings hung in flaking frames, long-faded portraits or hunting scenes.

The second story was much the same—no corpses, no waiting monsters, but memories thick as cobwebs everywhere. No one spoke as they searched the rooms, and Iancu’s face grew sadder and more strained with each vanished life they found.

On the next floor a painting watched them as they climbed the stairs. A woman sat in the foreground, white-skinned and sable-haired, with dark eyes and beautiful cheekbones still visible beneath the web of cracks that marred the oils. A man stood behind her chair, one hand on her shoulder. He was tall and lean and well-dressed, but his face was too chipped and shadowed to make out.

Ferenz III Darvulesti
, the tiny plaque read,
Margrave of Carnavas, and the Margravine Phaedra
.

“Who are you?” Savedra murmured, raising a hand to
the painting and pulling back before she touched the canvas. The frame was grey with dust, but her hands were worse. Her nose had long since closed off in self-defense.

“Who indeed?” Iancu asked softly, standing beside her. Savedra studied his face for any hint of recognition, but his frown only deepened.

“Here,” Cahal called. He kindled a lantern and held it aloft. Their own footprints showed stark against the pale drifting dust, but other, fainter prints were visible beneath it. Like tracks in trampled snow clear beneath a fresh fall. Short, narrow feet—a woman or a small man.

“How old are these?” Savedra asked.

Cahal shrugged, sending orange light swaying across the walls. “Hard to say.”

The tracks led down the corridor to a bedroom that must have belonged to the Margrave, and crisscrossed the floor there. Bed hangings pulled free of the great oaken frame, and the lantern cast their shadows like great tattered wings across the walls.

Savedra and Ashlin tugged back the curtains and pried the shutters open. The windows facing the cliffside were wider than those overlooking the path; anyone who could scale the cliff and the walls deserved to take the castle. The panes were glass—warped, leaded diamonds. A great extravagance, no doubt, whenever Carnavas had first been built.

Savedra studied the room and the footprints. They led to all the places one might expect in a bedroom: the bed; the wardrobe; the dresser, whose mirror was shattered and turned toward the wall. The dust blanketing the sagging mattress was disturbed as well, as if someone had curled against the pillow. She touched the dimpled cloth, almost
expecting some ghost of warmth there. Her fingertips left shadows behind, and she rubbed the silk-soft grime onto her coat. She brushed against the velvet hangings as she turned, and a panel tore free of the bed frame with a snarl. The cloth fell with a muffled
whump
and a billow of grey. She sneezed until her eyes and nose ran. Her hands were grey as well, and every inch of exposed skin itched.

Behind the carven doors of the wardrobe she found dresses, rotten as the bed curtains, fur and jeweled trim pulling free of fragile cloth. Dark, striking colors, garnet and crimson and deep forest green, the sort the woman in the portrait would have worn well. A tall woman, with a narrow waist and a bosom that Savedra could only envy. Mostly heavy, tight-laced gowns suitable for mountain weather, with a few looser high-waisted designs hung to one side.

“Vedra.”

Ashlin’s voice, unusually soft, distracted her from inspecting the dressing table. The princess stood in the doorway of one of the adjoining rooms. A bathroom, Savedra had assumed, or perhaps a connecting bedroom if the margrave and margravine hadn’t shared a bed.

Instead she peered around Ashlin’s shoulder into a nursery. The shutters stood open and daylight poured like weak tea over a table and rocking chair, a clothing chest, and a cradle. The faint draft of the door opening sent motes spiraling through the slanting light.

“They had a child,” Savedra said, soft as a whisper.

“No.” Again that queer hush in Ashlin’s voice. Her hand twitched toward the blanketless cradle, toward the table and the half-knitted cap there, stitches still on the needles. “They were expecting one.” Fingers clenched, and her fist fell hard against her thigh.

Savedra’s mouth opened, closed again on the princess’s name. “Sorcha—” Not very convincing, but it drew a humorless laugh from Ashlin.

“It’s nothing.”

Savedra caught the other woman’s arm as she strode toward the bedroom; her fingers smeared grey on Ashlin’s sleeve. “It isn’t—”

“It
is
.” She twitched her arm free. “Leave it be. It doesn’t matter.”

Bootheels clacked on stone as she vanished into the hall, leaving Savedra to turn away before Iancu noticed her prickling eyes, or her filthy hands clenching helplessly in her coat pockets. But concern and anger wouldn’t let the matter lie. She blinked her eyes dry and followed, leaving Iancu and Cahal exchanging glances in her wake. Ashlin’s trail was easy to follow; booted footprints led up the stairs, past the fourth story and up again, to an open trapdoor.

The wind caught at Savedra’s clothes and hair as she stepped onto the tower, belled her coat-skirts and tugged at her loose trousers. Her eyes watered in earnest with the force of it, rinsing away lingering grains of dust. Ashlin stood by the crenellations, silhouetted against the pewter-bright sky. Her arms were crossed tight, cupping her elbows with opposite hands.

“I’m sorry,” Savedra said after a moment of staring at the princess’s back. She crossed the weathered floor to stand beside Ashlin, the span of a wide stone block between them, and peered over the edge. She regretted it before she truly realized the height, the length of the sheer plunge below. The Ardos¸ unwound like a grey ribbon, something delicate and ornamental, not the murderous
icy rush she knew to be the truth. Not, she imagined, that the cold and current would matter by the time you reached them.