The Last Page

startle her spectators, who trudged quickly on their way.

This was the country that hunted witches, cut off their legs and left their torsos to freeze in Ghoul Court.

Despite her immunity, or rather because of it, stories of the High King’s witch had inundated the countryside. Litho-slides of her face filled the papers. People recognized her; they did not like her poking around in their cemeteries.

Sena left the fog in the valley and ascended the tree-sheltered lane that led to Nathaniel’s house. By the time she reached her destination, both shoulders were raw and her back sore from the bulging rocks.

It was late. Light filled the sky like the albescent flesh of a mussel; only the land was dark and indistinct. She pushed her way through the years of wild bramble growth and tramped back to the spot she had chosen.

It was early. She had been planning on the first of Thay. But she would have to do this now because by Thay, she would be hundreds of miles away.

Sena had cut away a small section of meadow grass with her sickle knife and formed a circle in the weeds. A carefully balanced stack of round stones rose into a rough conical shape. With a final heave, the ones in her pack dropped like hammer blows, denting the ground. She placed them in the mound and stepped back to assess her work.

For a moment she rested. Finally, she began the formula.

Some of the rocks had come from Caliph’s family burial ground. Others were from the woods. A few she took from the fields and the last three were from the graveyard west of Isca.

She circled the pile, walking backward, repeating the numbers and counting each repetition.

Meant to keep horrors like those at the Porch of Sth forever cordoned from physical dimensions, the numeric statement had been part of the Sisterhood’s set of seasonal traditions for several hundred years. She hoped it would also keep Gr-ner Shie at bay. It was something she could do for Caliph . . . for the Duchy.

Her heart fumbled, feeling momentarily sentimental about Stonehold. Despite everything . . . she liked being here. But I can’t stay! She banished the thought immediately and continued her numeric chant. It was almost complete when the world shook.

An explosion of panicked marsupials filled the air when the movement began. They dropped from the dreadful eves of the house like soft stones, squirming from web-thick attics and churning clumsily into the sky.

Trees swayed.

Sena, despite her nimbleness, stumbled and fell. It felt as though the ground had come alive; it tossed her into the weeds like a doll.

Then, as abruptly as it had begun, everything grew quiet. Sena’s heart clenched rapidly like a nervous fist.

Her meticulously balanced pile had shaken down to a low mound. Another faint tremor rumbled deep inside the mountain.

Standing up, Sena repeated the numeric charm, no longer certain of its efficacy.

The quake had roused the last of summer’s bugs. She watched them take flight, sing wildly, trying to seduce a mate. Overhead, predators circled the yard, feasting on the insects’ heedless love: soft green bodies gnashed in tiny vicious maws.

Sena returned to the castle.

The streets were alive. The cobblestones and lamp-lit bistros along King’s Road were packed with little crowds talking about the quake. The High King’s witch went unnoticed.

Sena crossed into the Hold and over the drawbridge; she took a coach to the castle from the gate. When she arrived, she went inside and began her long climb up to bed.

Caliph’s whisper arrested her. It came out of a blackened parlor that bordered the hallway, a temporary lair where he had holed-up to brood.

“Where were you?”

Sena jumped. She turned toward the tall narrow doorway that framed a curtain of negative space.

“I was at your uncle’s house—thinking.”

Caliph’s shape materialized from the darkness as out of brackish water. Sena’s imagination transformed the scene; she pictured herself hovering over him . . . his body floating in a pond. Shadows filled his eyes and collected around his limbs and neck. His robed arms reached out and pulled her slowly toward him.

It struck her both morbid and funny at the same time. She hadn’t pictured him worrying about her. The realization made her feel strangely warm.

“I’m all right,” she whispered.

“I thought I might have lost you,” he said quietly.

It would be tonight or never, Sena thought. They went upstairs. Sena closed the bedroom door.

She slipped powder into his wine. They drank and flirted. Caliph unlaced her blouse and kissed her shoulders. She wanted him suddenly, savagely. It had been weeks now without relief. But the drug was quick. Foreplay became the only play as it slipped from delicious to slurred to clumsy and revolting. Caliph collapsed, a clouded expression on his face.

Sena sighed.

Distraught but determined, she pricked her finger and whispered the words that would deepen the rest of the mountain herb. If the narcotic did not keep him quiet, the Unknown Tongue would.

She looked at him.

Under the oil lamp he seemed like a sleeping copper figurine. Molten orange and blue-black shadows drooled across him.

Sena hesitated and touched his chest. She grew momentarily softhearted. I love him, she told herself. And he loves me. She held her sickle knife over his chest, deliberating.

With a quick jerk the blade parted his skin.

She chose the muscle of his upper arm for the task. For a moment he did not bleed. Then the dark fluid ran, an endless supply, flowing from the tissue into the silver vial she held below it. He twitched slightly, eliciting a groan.

Her thumb pressed the flesh above the cut and instantly the flow stopped. With her teeth, she tore a piece of clean linen.

Her hands moved delicately, like moth wings, fingers caring for the wound with attentive tenderness. She held the skin apart and filled it with orange powder.

Then she whispered a weak equation, using Caliph’s own blood to mend him. The skin closed slightly.

She took another piece of fresh linen she had soaked in antiseptic and wrapped it several times to bind the wound, embalming him, it seemed.

With utmost care she removed the tourniquet. She stoppered the silver vial and got dressed.

Betrayal.

It caused a strange pain in her heart.

Caliph shifted. A dark wrinkle passed over his features as though from a bad dream. The monkshood would cause vivid hallucinations.

Lifting her pack quietly, Sena turned the gold handle on the door. Her skirt murmured in a rustling chill that trickled from the window. She left him to dream.

CHAPTER 29

Caliph dreamt of Marco.

Vivid stripes seared the horizon like orange marmalade trapped between layers of molten tar. The color was intensely bright. Leaves rustled. Stars peeped down through a steeple snared by trees.

Caliph fought his way through saplings and emerged in a lowering black yard heavy with sinister shapes.

The creature met him in the dark.