Rix leapt up. ‘The enemy, here? Why wasn’t I told?’
Tobry lowered his voice. ‘It wasn’t the enemy. The people from Tumbrel Town next door were rioting. They’re calling for a revolution and an end to the rotten system run by the greedy noble houses.’
‘Revolution?’ whispered Rix. ‘When we’re at war? What’s Hightspall coming to?’
‘A question that might have been better asked before things came to this state,’ said Tobry. ‘Their leaders were taken and are being tortured; a hundred of the rabble were executed and the rest driven off. The disgraceful business is being hushed up, though that’s hardly the end of it. They seem to think that the nobility are using them as a wall between themselves and the enemy. Which they are. And …’
‘What?’
‘It seems as though most of the trouble is focused on Palace Ricinus.’
Rix’s gaze fell on the portrait and his father’s eyes were on him. He kicked the easel, sending it skidding around until the accusing eyes faced away.
‘I should be out there, fighting. Why am I stuck here with this monstrosity?’
‘Because it’s necessary to the survival of the family,’ said Tobry. ‘And you don’t have an heir.’
‘Tell Mother to pick a wife for me,’ Rix said recklessly. ‘I’ll marry her now and be out defending the walls in the morning.’
‘Even for a scion of one of the noble houses, that seems an unsound basis for matrimony.’
‘What the hell would you know about it?’
‘You’re right,’ said Tobry. ‘What would I know about anything?’ He walked to the top of the stairs then came back. ‘If you’re done with the portrait for now, why don’t you have another go at the sketch?’
‘I’m afraid to. I can’t face any more bad news.’
‘If you are divining Tali’s future, we need to know now.’
‘What if I make it worse?’
‘Get on with it, damn you.’
Rix sketched the windowless chamber on the whited-out canvas, clenching his jaw as he tried to reproduce what had always previously been blind inspiration; clenching so hard that his teeth began to ache. It took but thirty brushstrokes to recreate the last one, exactly as before. It was always easy to get back to the previous sketch, but every stroke after that was agony.
He stared at the two standing figures at the end of the bench as if he could force their faces and identities onto the canvas, but nothing came.
‘They’re mocking me, Tobe. They know I know, but they won’t let me remember. Do you think if I got drunk — ?’
‘With the enemy on all sides and rebellion at the palace gates, that would be a mortally bad idea.’
Rix slumped down, the brush smearing paint across his kilt.
Tobry walked back and forth in front of the sketch. ‘I’d swear that’s Tali on the bench, and she looks dead. But what have those faceless figures to do with it? Did they kill her, or are they trying to save her?’
Without realising he was doing it, he looked at Rix, consideringly.
It was as if Tobry had punched him in the mouth. My oldest friend, who knows me better than anyone and has always supported me, thinks I’m going to murder the only woman I’ve ever been friends with.
Rix buried his head in his hands. And what if he was? What if, as the nightmares whispered, he’d already done something as bad, or worse? He had never wanted a drink more. He wanted to get blind drunk — no, he wanted to
I will not become my father.
Tobry was walking back and forth in front of the sketch. Then he stopped. ‘What’s that in the woman’s hand?’
‘Where?’ Rix said without raising his head.
‘There. Hanging down. Looks like a pair of tongs.’
Rix went to see, and of its own volition his hand rose to the canvas, the brush making a series of small strokes there. With another brush he touched at the hair of the girl on the black bench, then another couple of dabs at the tongs, before the inspiration went as mysteriously as it had come.
‘It’s definitely tongs,’ he said, ‘and the woman is holding something in them. Something small, round, red.’
‘Not red,’ said Tobry, and his eyes were staring again, as if he was looking into his own nightmare. ‘It’s black as a caitsthe’s livers. It’s just got red on it — ’
He walked away, very fast, raking hooked fingers down his cheeks, then ran back and peered at the woman’s blonde head. ‘There’s red in her hair, too. Blood.’
‘Her hair’s almost the same shade of blonde as Tali’s,’ said Rix. ‘It’s got to be her.’
Pain spiked his chest. Was she going to die because his sketch had forecast her death? Why had he done the sketch anyway? Had the voice in his nightmares ordered him to paint it because sometimes Rix’s paintings came true? Was it fixing him onto an immoveable path that led to him killing Tali?
‘But why the tongs?’ said Tobry. ‘And — what’s that in them?’
‘The red on that black marble is her blood,’ said Rix. ‘Are they trying to put it into her head?’
Tobry blanched and whispered, ‘No!’
‘Tobe?’ cried Rix.
Tobry swallowed, let out a parched croak, then gasped, ‘Have you heard of ebony pearls?’
Rix studied the black, red-flecked object in the tongs. ‘No.’
‘I think that’s one.’
‘What are they?’
‘No one knows much about them, but there are nasty rumours …’
‘For the Gods’ sakes, spit it out.’
‘They’re the most powerfully enchanted objects ever discovered and they have a dreadful origin. They’re incredibly dangerous — any non-adept who touches one with bare skin is liable to die most unpleasantly. And they’re so priceless, I doubt that the chief magian has ever seen one.’
Rix walked around the easel, trying not to look at what he had painted. Finally he said, ‘Who has?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Then why,’ said Rix, feeling sick, ‘are they putting one inside Tali’s head?’
CHAPTER 72
‘They’re not putting it in,’ Tali said quietly.
Rix spun around. She had climbed the steps and was swaying on her feet. Her pale features were stark, her gold-blonde hair hanging lank as straw.
‘I’ve just remembered — ’
She crumpled and was about to tumble backwards down the steps when Rix leapt three yards and caught her. He carried her to the couch, holding her tightly as if it was the only way to save her.
Tobry poured a splash of brandy into a goblet, sat her up and pressed it to her lips.
Tali grimaced, swallowed and looked up. ‘The woman on the bench isn’t me. It’s … it’s my mother, ten years ago.’
‘How do you know?’ said Rix, waves of relief sweeping over him. It wasn’t a divination at all.
‘That’s the cellar where she was killed. Mama made me hide, but then they caught her and — they did it.’
‘You were there?’ said Rix. ‘You saw your poor mother murdered?’
‘I told you that already.’ Tali gave him a peculiar look and took a deep breath, only to shake her head and close her mouth without speaking.
‘If you know more — ’ began Rix.
‘Those are my mother’s killers, at the end of the bench,’ she said in a tight, controlled voice. ‘I was eight. I must have blocked most of it out.’
