Her own confusion was enough that she didn’t realize what Spider was doing until he moved again. Her throat ached; she was shouting at him to stop, but she couldn’t hear her own words. The kukri flashed in his hand as it arced down and metal sparked on stone. The vampire’s head rolled free, tangling his long black hair. His lips continued shaping soundless accusations while the last of his unlife oozed onto the ground.
“He was going to tell me why,” Isyllt whispered, staring at the twitching body. Speaking made her cough, which made her throat ache all the more.
As she watched, the edges of the wound blackened and curled-the burn of spelled silver. Vertebrae glistened like pearls amid bloodless grey-pink meat. The corpse began to blanch even more as flesh shrank against bone; color drained away till his skin was white as ashes. Even his hair faded, paling from root to tip. When it was over he lay still, legs curled toward his chest, one arm stretching toward his missing head.
Trembling, Isyllt crawled on hands and knees to reach the corpse. The hand that had held her throat had been cold and undead, but still moving flesh. What she touched now was rough and unyielding as stone.
Spider took her arm and helped her up. Blood smeared her skin, already tacky. The lantern had gone out-the only light was the pulse of her ring. “Why?” she asked.
“I’m sorry.” Again, despite the roar in her ears, she could hear him. His tone and insouciant stance were anything but sorry. “I thought he was about to eat you.” He wiped the knife clean on the hem of his coat and handed it back to her.
She couldn’t argue with him, not when she couldn’t hear herself speak. She willed the witchlight brighter and turned to find Khelsea.
The inspector crouched beside the broken lantern and another petrified vampire. This one had not died as prettily-one silver bullet had shattered his breast and the other his skull. Azarne brooded over a third corpse like her namesake bird, her hands sticky with blood.
Khelsea looked up when Isyllt knelt beside her, her face drawn and ashen with pain. She only shook her head when Isyllt spoke, and when she pulled a hand away from one ear, a thin streak of blood glistened on her palm.
From the vaulted chamber, Azarne and Spider tracked their brethren’s spoor down a narrow corridor, up a flight of half caved-in stairs to another room. Isyllt knew the den was near before they reached the top of the steps; the musk was unmistakable.
The room reminded her of the lairs of street children she’d known in Birthgrave. Of places she’d slept herself. Torn, stained mattresses and nests of blankets wedged into corners, a single lamp on a broken wooden crate. Only the smell of sour sweat and stale food was missing, and Isyllt was just as glad the vrykoloi hadn’t brought their dinners here.
And as with orphan dens, the vampires had hoarded precious things, hiding them under mattresses and loose stones. But this treasure was more than polished stones or bits of glass, pennies or a sharp knife. Gold and gems sparkled and glittered under the erratic witchlight. Earrings and bracelets, chiming girdles, fabric stiff with gold bullion, slippers glowing with sequins and stones. Jeweled coffers and vials of perfume, statues of saints carved in bronze and sandalwood and alabaster.
But not all the clothing was the same size, nor all the colors those Isyllt remembered Lychandra to wear. How many tombs had been pilfered over the years?
Among the glitter of jewels, she found a long lock of brass-blonde hair, braided and coiled and tied with silk thread. A lover’s token, the kind sweethearts exchanged. Had Forsythia kept a knot of her vampire’s hair in return? Isyllt wished she could have asked him, and didn’t know whether to weep or curse in her frustration.
They emerged filthy and exhausted from a sewer access in Birthgrave. Not the sort of place Isyllt liked to be at midnight, but she was too tired and sore to be nervous. If anyone tried to cut their throats or purses, she would be perfectly content to let Spider eat them and throw the bodies in the river.
No one tried, though, and they staggered into a better neighborhood and finally managed to waylay a carriage. The man’s eyes widened when she showed her ring, and she shoved Khelsea into the cab before he could decide to bolt. Spider ghosted inside as well, but Azarne had vanished.
The carriage deposited them at St. Alia’s, Archlight’s own hospital-the driver didn’t wait, despite Isyllt’s promise of more payment if he did. Khelsea found a physician to inspect her ruptured eardrum, but Isyllt waved away offers of assistance. The hospital was unusually full, and she wanted sleep more than anything-dying in the night of the concussion was a risk she was prepared to take.
Spider waited for her when she emerged; the building’s wards were too powerful for him to easily pass. He didn’t offer her his arm this time and she was just as glad, though she could have used it.
“He thought I killed Forsythia,” she finally said when they reached Calderon Court. She could hear again, though her ears still rang like cathedral bells and her voice sounded queer and not her own.
Spider shrugged. “I imagine lairing there hadn’t been good for his mind. Who knows what he thought, or why?” He met her eyes unblinking, but she didn’t know his tells enough to find truth or deception in his face or stance. He wasn’t telling her everything, though, and he’d silenced Forsythia’s vampire before she could learn more. “Does it matter? You have what you sought.”
“No,” she said at last, wrapping her arms around herself. She couldn’t stop shivering. “It doesn’t.” He was a demon, with his own agenda-she couldn’t let herself forget that for a few kisses.
He reached for her, but stopped at her flinch. “You should rest. I’ll find you again when you’ve mended.”
And he was gone, with only a cool draft to mark his passage. Isyllt lingered on the steps, watching the eastern sky pale. The moon had set, and false dawn glowed above the rooftops. The Dragon’s fire, chasing the Hounds below the western horizon. The leader of the pack was already hidden by the city skyline.
By the time the second hound had nosed beyond view, the sky was tinged with blue and her shivering had become a teeth-rattling tremble. Lights flickered to life in nearby windows. At last she turned, unlocked the door with shaking hands, and began the slow climb to her rooms.
Spider was right: She had accomplished what she needed to. The queen’s jewels were found, and would be returned to her crypt, and Mathiros need never be the wiser. The vrykoloi responsible were dead, and she had the petty satisfaction of revenge for the attack on her and Ciaran, and more knowledge of vampires than she’d had before.
But there was a dead woman moldering on a slab without justice, and Isyllt still didn’t know why any of it had happened.
Sleep claimed her as soon as she pressed her face to the pillow, but it brought neither peace nor satisfaction.
PART II Nocturne
CHAPTER 8
On the seventeenth of Hekate, seven days after the party, a carriage left Erisin through the Aquilon Gate, on the north road to Arachne. The coach bore no colors or devices, but everyone in the palace knew it carried Savedra Severos and was bound for her family estate. Four Severoi guards rode beside it-all the archa would lend her-and an octad of hastily hired mercenaries. Excessive, some said, but everyone also knew that banditry in the countryside increased with every wave of Rosian refugees driven south.
Rumors and speculation chased each other through the court: Savedra had quarreled with the prince; she had quarreled with the princess; her famous loyalty couldn’t withstand an assassin’s gun pointed at her own head. Ginevra Jsutien displayed her wounded cheek with brave fragility, and was cosseted and made much of by her peers. She spoke no word against Savedra, but her silences were eloquent.
The prince saw Savedra off, though their farewells were stilted. Of the princess there was no sign; she had
