The Smoke-Scented Girl (9 page)

“Never did find out what happened to her
son,” his neighbor said.

Evon half-dragged the magician down the
street past the last houses and out of sight behind a dune, then
released her. She made no effort to keep his coat closed over her
body, and Evon, embarrassed for both of them, turned his back on
her and held out her cloak and satchel. “Thank you,” she said. Her
voice was husky, almost raw-sounding. He heard her rummage in her
bag, and after a few minutes she said, “You can turn around now,”
with what almost might have been humor.

Evon turned and found her fastening the last
few buttons on her dress. She bent and picked up his coat and
handed it to him, gingerly, as if she expected him to take hold of
her again. “You’re not dead,” she said. “You should have
burned.”

“Did you want me to?” he asked.

She reacted as though he’d slapped her. “Of
course not,” she said. “But everyone burns. There’s never been a
single survivor. So I want to know, why you.”

Her directness, and the calmness with which
she spoke, unnerved Evon more than if she’d screamed at him or
threatened him. “It’s a new kind of shield,” he said. “It almost
didn’t work. I think your spell is a good deal more potent than any
fire I expected it to defend against.”

She wrapped her cloak more securely around
herself and shivered, then lifted her bag to her shoulder. “What do
you want from me?” she asked.

Evon was again unnerved. “I want to
understand that spell,” he said. “It’s what I’ve been researching,
fire spells and protecting against fire. I think we can use it in
the war. Will you—I can teach you the shield spell in return, if
you like. I don’t mean you any harm,” he insisted.

“I’m not a magician,” she said. “And you
don’t want this spell.” She turned and began to walk away. Evon
grabbed her wrist, realizing how stupid that was only after he’d
already taken hold of her. She stopped and looked down at his hand.
“Let go of me.”

“Look,” Evon said, feeling desperate, “I’ve
been trying to find you for weeks. I just want to talk to you. Come
with me. Just an hour. Maybe two. Then...I don’t know. But—” She
looked up at him, and her face was so empty of emotion, her eyes so
dead, that he was seized with a wrenching sympathy for her. “I
think you need help. My name is Evon Lorantis. I want to help you.
What’s your name?”

Confusion, and some other emotion he had no
name for, flickered across her face. “Kerensa,” she said. “Kerensa
Haylter.”

It was Evon’s turn to lead the way, retracing
their steps toward the heart of the city and the inn where he and
Piercy were staying. He had to resist the urge to take Miss Haylter
by the hand and tow her along after him. Every time they turned a
corner he expected her to take off running in the opposite
direction. But she stayed close by his side, not speaking, not even
looking at him in the brief moments when he glanced over to
reassure himself that she was, indeed, still with him. The scent of
smoke that drifted from her wasn’t as pungent as he’d imagined it
might be, this close to her, more of a memory of a smell than the
smell itself. He wondered what she was thinking. She hadn’t sounded
insane, but that haunted look in her eyes suggested that whatever
grasp she had on reality was tenuous. And nothing she’d said, from
the moment he’d confronted her, fit the picture he and Piercy had
drawn from the evidence. How could she not be a magician, with
magic like that at her disposal? And yet she’d seemed reluctant—no,
that was far too tame a word for the way her whole body had gone
rigid as she’d screamed at the victim to get out. It was as if the
spell was under someone else’s control, and that was simply
impossible. He glanced at her once again, and this time met her
eyes as she did the same. Her skin appeared too creamy, as if she
had no pores, and he wanted to touch it to see if that were true.
Her face was expressionless, and after a moment she looked away.
Evon flexed his fingers, once again resisting the urge to tether
her like a kite to keep her from drifting away.

He kept an eye out, as they walked, for
Odelia or anyone who looked like a member of Speculatus, casting
their net wide in the hopes of catching Miss Haylter in it. It was
a pointless impulse; Odelia and anyone she had with her would be
dressed just like anyone else. But meeting Odelia had roused some
of the old paranoia he felt whenever he dealt with her. Suppose she
had approached him because she knew why he was in Inveros, and had
used him to find the rogue magician? Evon felt his shoulders
beginning to hunch defensively. It was not beyond possibility that
Odelia would attack them in the middle of the street, despite the
throng of innocent bystanders.

“Is something wrong?” Miss Haylter said. Her
husky voice had no emotion to it.

“Nothing,” Evon said, straightening and
trying to walk normally. All he needed was for her to panic and run
away, forcing him either to chase her through the crowded streets
or start the whole process of finding her again. He scanned the
crowd again. Surely Odelia would stand out, dressed like the
harbinger of death she was?

His heart pounded once, hard, as he realized
Miss Haylter was no longer beside him. He turned to see her
standing three feet away, looking up at the sky, not moving.
Pedestrians brushed past her, but she seemed unaware of their
presence. Evon went to her side and took her arm, not caring that
it was a stupid idea. “Is something wrong?” he asked, echoing her
earlier words.

“This is a bad idea,” she said. “I can’t help
you. You can’t help me.”

“Just...give me one hour. Please.” Her arm
lay unresisting in his grasp. “You can’t know what’s possible if
you won’t even talk to me. Please.” How far would he get if he
picked her up and carried her away? About ten feet, that’s how far,
and then she’d start screaming and he’d either be tackled by
concerned citizens or arrested by a stern constabulary, and either
way he’d lose her again.

She lowered her head to look at him. “You
don’t understand anything.”

“Then explain it to me. But do it at the inn,
not on the street.” Evon tugged gently on her arm, and after a
moment she began walking. He kept hold of her until they reached
the inn, then indicated she should precede him through the door. An
older woman at the desk glanced up briefly, then gave them both a
longer, disapproving look. “No guests,” she said.

“My sister,” Evon said, “and she won’t be
staying long. You don’t mind, do you?” He gave her what he hoped
was his most winning smile, when inside he was screaming at yet
another delay. Miss Haylter stared at the wall above the woman’s
head, focused on something only she could see. The woman looked at
Miss Haylter, then at Evon, and began tapping her fingers in a
one-two-three rhythm on the desk. Evon slid a coin across the desk
toward her. She slid it out of sight. “Good day to you both,” she
said, “but your...
sister
...better be gone in an hour.”

“Thank you,” Evon said, and bowed Miss
Haylter toward the stairs, carefully ensuring that she went first
so she wouldn’t have anywhere to flee to, if it came to that.

“She thought I was a whore,” Miss Haylter
said as they passed the second floor landing.

“I’m sorry,” Evon said.

“It doesn’t matter.” They left the stairs at
the third floor and Evon led the way to the fourth door on the
left.

“Oh. I’m traveling with a friend. He’s no
danger to you, but I wanted to warn you.”

She turned that blank gaze on him. “You’re no
danger to me either,” she said, and Evon wasn’t sure if she was
talking about his motives or his abilities. He opened the door and
indicated she should enter; she did so without hesitation.

From the en-suite bath came the sound of
gurgling water and a voice loudly humming a popular music-hall
tune. “Evon? Did you find her? I was just drawing a bath—my
superiors were most assuredly pleased to hear about Speculatus,
though ‘pleased’ is probably too subtle a word for their reaction.”
Piercy, naked at least from the waist up, poked his head out of the
bathroom and said, “I—
Evon!
” He slammed the door and added,
“Was it so impossible for you to declare in a loud and carrying
voice that we have company of a very feminine nature?”

Evon put his hand over his mouth so Piercy
couldn’t hear him laugh. He looked at Miss Haylter and was
surprised and comforted to see her eyes lose that dead look for a
moment. “Piercy, put your trousers on and come out here to greet
Miss Haylter.
Kerensa
Haylter,” he said.

After some banging and the sound of water
draining, Piercy emerged, fully dressed though not as sprucely
garbed as he usually was. “Miss Haylter, did you say? A pleasure,”
he said, taking her hand and bowing over it. “You have been a
difficult woman to find, and I say that with great feeling. Too few
cities are equipped with adequate laundry facilities, and some of
my clothes will never be the same again. So your name is actually
Kerensa? We wondered, Lore and I—”

“Will you sit, Miss Haylter? Piercy, stop
babbling and get Miss Haylter a drink of water. One for me too, if
you don’t mind. It’s been rather hot for both of us.”

Piercy stopped halfway to the jug, his face
ashen. “Are you all right?” he said in a low voice. “Evon, did
she...were you actually
there
?”

“I think Miss Elltis owes me a promotion for
that shield spell,” Evon said. He held the only chair in the room
for their guest, then took a seat on the edge of his bed and waited
for her to take a long drink before tossing back most of a glass
himself. He felt dry and itchy and wished he could have taken the
bath Piercy had drawn and then drained. “I don’t think we were
followed, though I’m not sure how I would have known if we were. I
didn’t see Odelia, at least. But she implied she had some way to
find Miss Haylter, so I think we should assume she will eventually
find her here.”

“That’s not good, Lore. My superiors were
quite specific on the topic of Speculatus. They demanded that we
stay out of their way, and I am more than happy to abide by their
wishes on this point, if all their members are as virulently
antisocial as Odelia Cattertis. Pity you can’t—” He clamped his
lips tight on the end of that sentence, addressed to Miss Haylter,
and Evon glared at him. Miss Haylter seemed not to notice. “That is
to say, I sincerely hope we do not have to deal with Odelia and her
postulated companions,” Piercy finished lamely.

“She wants to find me,” Miss Haylter
said.

“Her organization wants your secret and they
won’t be gentle in extracting it,” Evon said.

She turned her empty eyes on him. “And I
suppose you will be.”

Evon was stung. “I don’t mean to
extract
anything from you. I simply want to talk.” He knelt
on the floor in front of her and put his hand on her forearm. “Miss
Haylter,” he said, “this spell isn’t under your control, is it.
It’s something that’s been done to you.”

She nodded, turning her face away.
“Something,” she agreed, “though I don’t know what.”

“You find certain people, and when you’re
close enough, the spell activates,” Evon guessed, spinning out what
they’d already learned with what he’d observed just an hour ago.
“You don’t choose the...targets. You burn them. And it starts over
again.”

She nodded again. “It drives me,” she said.
“It goes away for a while. Six days, or five weeks—I never know how
long. Three months, once. Then the urge falls on me, and I have to
go where it drives me. I don’t have any choice.”

“Could you not, perhaps, ignore it?” Piercy
asked.

She looked up at him, her too-smooth skin
glowing in the light from the window. Her eyes were as dead as
ever. “I tried, once,” she said. “The second time, I knew what it
meant and I wouldn’t follow. It ached inside me for weeks, months
even, and then I was standing in the marketplace and it was like—”
She turned away again. “Do you know what it’s like to burn from the
inside out?” she said, as calm as if she’d just asked them if they
preferred coffee to tea. “After the first few seconds, it hurts so
much you can’t feel the pain. That sounds wrong, doesn’t it? But
it’s how it is. I burned, and I died, and then I was myself again
and there was nothing alive but me for hundreds of feet, all
around. So many people dead, and more dying, and I walked away
unmarked. Other people paid for my fear. I don’t ignore the urging
anymore.”

“How did it start?” Piercy asked.

She ignored him, fixing her gaze on Evon. Her
eyes were hazel, more green than brown, and dark-circled as if she
hadn’t slept in days. “How did you find me?” she asked.

The image of himself sniffing the wind made
his face grow warm. “I...cast a spell. A scenting spell. Following
the, um, your unique....” Her unwavering eyes unnerved him yet
again. Even when she spoke, she seemed to live at the center of a
stillness so profound he felt as if he were losing himself in it.
“It was quite difficult,” he added, though he didn’t know why.

She smiled a faint, amused smile. “Such a
polite way of telling me that I haven’t bathed in weeks,” she said.
The smile was so at odds with her demeanor that it threw Evon off
balance even more.

“It was the scent of the spell we tracked,”
Piercy said. “Lore is right, it was difficult.”

“I thought I’d be easy to trace, with the
trail of destruction I was leaving,” Miss Haylter said. “I was
going to turn myself in, several times, but I couldn’t risk being
locked away when the urge struck.”

“You think you should be punished for
something you had no control over?” Evon asked. “It’s not as if
you’re doing this intentionally.”

“Does it matter to the people I kill?” Miss
Haylter looked at her lap. “You can’t help me,” she said. “I’ve
done too much evil to be forgiven. I’d like to die, finally. It
hurts, coming back together, more than the dying. Every time, I
think, maybe this is the time the Gods let me stay burned. And
every time I come to myself and it starts again. I only want to be
allowed to die.”