The Queen of Lies
3. The Backwash (Heath and Sword)
6. A Suitable Arrangement (Jessa)
8. Twin Shields (Heath and Sword)
11. Apostasy (Heath and Sword)
14. The House of the Seven Sighs (Maddox)
15. When Kisses Can Lie (Heath and Sword)
23. The Dolmen (Heath and Sword)
26. Landry Manor (Heath and Sword)
29. The Sword of Saint Jeffrey (Heath and Sword)
33. Parlor-Room Intrigue (Satryn)
34. Parlor-Room Mystery (Jessa)
38. Mother Knows Nothing (Jessa)
42. Unfinished Business (Heath)
Copyright © 2015 M
ICHAEL
J. B
ODE
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
.
ISBN: 1507862970
ISBN 13: 9781507862971
Library of Congress Control Number:
2015902016
To J. Michael Wilbanks, for being the best friend ever.
“The strong devour the weak. So it can be said that weakness is the source of strength.”
“I don’t know what’s worse to believe—that life is random and meaningless or that it was deliberately designed to be shitty.”
CKNOWLEDGMENTS
I’d like to thank my parents, sister, and friends for their support. I also want to thank the team at CreateSpace, particularly my editor Angela, for their support in making this book.
I give a particular shout-out to the inventor of wine and the cast of drunks who inspired me.
Also special love to my D&D group (Logan, Will, David, Erin, Dreama, Dan, Jason) who allowed me to develop some of the characters in this book. And of course… my Facebook friends whose likes actually did make a difference in making this book a reality.
NE
Serra
S
ERRA FLOATED UP
the stairs to the eastern wing of Landry Manor, her long black robes billowing behind her. City Inspector Berringer followed, never closer than ten paces behind, torn between his fear of dealing with the Invocari and his desire to see that his case was cleared of foul play. There were six bedrooms in each wing of the house—twelve total, not including the servants’ quarters.
Serra was a slight girl, but the robes of the Invocari and her levitation were designed to give her an air of menace. Her face was deeply shadowed under her heavy cloak, and her sleeves covered all but her fingertips. She was the dark specter of Rivern’s law, ever vigilant against all threats physical and metaphysical. Today was her first time assisting in an investigation.
“The master bedroom is at the end of the hall,” Inspector Berringer said, clearing his throat.
Serra didn’t reply. Her silence was as much a badge of office as her robes or her starmetal rings.
It was a vast, well-appointed room, dominated by a large four-poster mahogany bed draped in purple silks. An ornate armoire was crowded into one corner. Serra noted the old nobility were loath to part with any of the ugly antiques from the days of the monarchy. So they crammed the little used spaces of the manors.
She lingered in the doorway and looked to the ceiling. Inscribed above the bed was a circular warding seal of moderate complexity. It looked intact as far as she could tell. Warding wasn’t really her specialty, but the Cabal was short on wardens.
The coroner, one of the few practicing necromancers in Rivern, was already on the scene along with one of the wizards from the college—a blood mage in red robes who wore gold-rimmed spectacles. The abbess was present as well. She wore long robes and a white veil that masked all but her eyes. Serra could tell she was dark of skin but could make out little else about her.
“There are no eyes,” Isik the necromancer grumbled. He had a thick Volkovian accent and the surly demeanor to match.
The body of Lord Landry and his wife were still in bed, their eyes burned out, their lifeless faces contracted in terror. The tableau was horrifying in the context of the ornate furnishings and exotic purple silk bedding. Black veins spidered out from the orbits of their eyes and corners of their mouths. Lady Landry was twenty years the junior of her husband and probably quite fetching while alive.
Isik complained, “I can’t recover the final moments of a corpse that has no eyes.”
“Can you at least confirm it was an attack by Harrowers?” the abbess inquired.
Isik shrugged. “It fits. You didn’t need to drag me all the way across town to say this.”
“We’re just being thorough,” Serra said. “We’ve never heard of two attacks occurring at the same time. And we still need you to confirm the time of death.”
“Bah,” Isik said, shaking the wrists of the Landry corpses. “Midnight…ish.”
The chance of having one’s soul carried off in the night, Serra knew, was vanishingly small. More people died by falling into one of the three rivers each year than those who died by the hands of the Harrowers, but the arbitrary and grisly nature of these deaths (the eye sockets burned out, leaving the skull completely empty) made the danger greater in peoples’ imaginations. With three of these deaths in as many months within the city proper, the people of Rivern were panicking.
Achelon the Corrupter had unleashed the Harrows upon creation five hundred years prior. When they finally were banished, their echoes remained in dreams to return each night to claim twelve souls, one for each of the twelve Harrowers (the thirteenth abstained for some reason). With twelve people dying out of everyone in the world, every night and in different nations, the chances were extremely remote of it happening to multiple individuals in the same city.
“Cause of death,” Serra said, “harrowing. This investigation is closed.”
A
FTER FINISHING HER
reports at the Invocari tower, Serra walked home, exhausted. The sun was little more than an orange sliver on the horizon. Now that her shift was over, she wore civilian attire: a burgundy dress with black laces up the front. No one gave her a second glance as she jostled through the flow of people to her apartment. The Invocari were everywhere in Rivern; you just didn’t always see them.
When they did appear like dark sentinels floating over the streets, people gave a wide berth. Even Serra didn’t recognize most of them in their hoods, but when they cast their gaze toward her, she placed two fingers to her collarbone in a salute of respect. The dark watchers sometimes returned the gesture by curling all but those same two fingers into the folds of their sleeves.
The Invocari were terrifying because they had to be, but beneath their robes they were the best men and women Serra ever had the honor of knowing. She loved all of them like family. Like her, most had been orphaned or abandoned. The Cabal had given them a home in order to gain their unwavering loyalty, but it was loyalty well deserved.
Serra stopped outside her apartment building.
An old man in tattered gray robes stood across the street, watching with milky eyes. His face betrayed no emotion, and he stood eerily still amid the people jostling by. As an Invocari, Serra had become accustomed to the unnerving, so the sensation of unease was doubly troubling to her.
She regained her composure and marched toward him.
He looked Genatrovan, and she guessed he was eighty or ninety; it was difficult to tell. “Excuse me, sir,” she said. “Do you need any assistance? I can guide you somewhere if you need. It’s no trouble.”
He sighed and smiled kindly to her, the warmth in his face suddenly breaking through his stoic facade. His eyes were white from cataracts. “No dear. I have nowhere to be but here.”
“It’s just,” she continued, “this isn’t a very good part of town for beggars. There have been a few disappearances lately, and with all the talk of Harrowers, it’s really better for you to sleep somewhere warded.”
The old man took Serra’s hand. “Whatever is meant to happen will happen. I’m too old to spend what little time I have left worrying about what might or might not be. Death comes for us all when it is our time. What matters isn’t when, but
what
we did before those moments. You should spend time with friends and people you love. Surely there’s another man you’d rather be talking to. There’s one watching us from the window now.” He pointed at her building.
She turned in time to see a pair of curtains on the second floor shutting abruptly.
Serra blushed. It was Warder Vernor’s apartment. She’d been sweet on him for the last few months and suspected he harbored similar feelings. Had he been waiting up for her? It was strange how they always seemed to meet in the hallway.
“My vision is better than it appears.” The old man released her hand and winked. “I’ll be fine. You should run along.”
“Okay. Be safe!” She smiled and turned to her apartment building.
She beamed as she entered the cramped lobby. Behind the desk, Loran the watchman was scribbling in his logs. He had a round, kindly face and a bushy red mustache. “Who were you talking to?”