As for the largest, the one mostly grey, with a white stomach, her eyes seemed to shine like blue stars now, and she stood quivering in a raging fury, upright, refusing to kneel. The mage’s partner, the lean one who moved so gracefully, approached, and raised a knife for the kill.
Yet at the last moment the mage stayed his partner’s arm. Instead, he brought his head next to the hound’s, despite the snarling lips and gnashing fangs, and appeared to whisper something into the matriarch’s ear. Those ears fell then, the muscular shoulders hunching. And the mage backed away, gesturing. The countless fetters and chains of twisted shadow fell away like smoke and the hounds rose.
The tall matriarch shook herself, chuffing; then, with window-rattling howls, the four bounded off in all directions, growling and snarling their enraged frustration.
Sister of Cold Nights let out her breath, whispering to herself, ‘Not since Dissim’belackiss…’
‘What was that?’ Agayla asked from her side, glaring, and wiping blood dripping from her nose.
‘Nothing. Interesting times, yes?’
‘Who is that little shit?’ she growled. ‘That was far more than Warren magics.’
‘Yes, it was. The Enchantress is sure to be interested.’
‘She knows already,’ Agayla answered, daubing at her nose.
Of course. T’riss watching through her eyes.
In the square, the pair now walked to the two guardians at the gate to the Deadhouse. The mage and the short guardian whom she knew as Faro spoke together. She ached to hear their conversation, but thought it unseemly go to running across the square. So she walked – determinedly. Agayla accompanied her.
By time they reached the gate, the pair had entered the grounds and were approaching the House. For an instant a terrifying dread clutched her chest – Ancients, they are not going to assail the House? The entire city could be in danger.
But no such confrontation arose. To her eyes the two merely seemed to dissolve into the shadows and disappear as they neared the threshold.
Agayla clutched at her sleeve. ‘What was that? Did they enter? What did you see?’
‘I know not.’
Agayla growled wordlessly, yanked her grip free. ‘Don’t play the enigmatic Elder with me! What did you see?’
‘What you saw. They disappeared.’ She nodded to the guardians who were standing before the small garden gate, barring their way. ‘You allowed them entrance?’
Faro nodded while his fellow held his huge halberd at the ready. ‘Indeed.’
‘Why?’ Agayla snapped.
‘They correctly intuited the limits of our purpose.’
‘Which is?’
To this Faro said nothing. Not used to such open defiance, Agayla actually growled just as the hounds had.
‘You are unfamiliar with the House?’ Sister of Cold Nights asked her.
‘Yes,’ she grunted, reluctant to admit her lack of knowledge. ‘The Enchantress warned me to stay away from it.’
T’riss would know. ‘Wise of her.’ She gestured to the guardians. ‘These two are charged not with keeping things out of the grounds. They are charged with keeping things in.’
Faro inclined his head in agreement.
‘And did those two enter the House?’
To this Faro merely shrugged. ‘I care not.’
Agayla snarled anew, but Sister of Cold Nights bowed her farewell. ‘We will learn no more here.’ She turned away; the Napans were retreating, the large one, Urko, carrying their unconscious mage.
‘Interesting times,’ she repeated to Agayla, and, inclining her head in farewell, walked off. She heard Agayla’s heeled boots cracking against the cobbles as she stormed away in the other direction.
Lastly, she scanned the murk for any sign of the one some named the guardian of Shadow, Edgewalker. But he had departed as well.
* * *
Tattersail awoke to the splitting agony of a headache such as she’d never before experienced. Blinking, she peered about; she lay in the street, sodden from mist and dew, and no sign of the storm remained. It was just before the dawn.
Groaning, she pushed herself upright. Her glance happened to skitter across the gory wreckage of two bodies down the street – each now supporting several seabirds and stray dogs – and, gagging, she staggered off.
She touched the back of her head and felt a crust of dried blood there. Gods, she’d hit her head hard. What a headache! How many bricks had fallen on her, anyway? She even had dried scabs from a nosebleed.
Nursing her head, she carried on through the Manor House district and up Rampart Way to the Hold. Here, the sleepy predawn guards let her in with a nod – as a mage she was expected to be coming and going at all hours.
She climbed the stairs to the top floor and eased open the bedroom door so as not to wake Mock. She pulled the ruined dress over her head and dropped it to the floor, then soaked a cloth in a basin of water and wiped the dried blood from her face. Mock, hidden beneath the thick blankets, stirred then. She crossed to the large four-poster and drew back the covers.
It was not Mock in the bed; it was her maidservant, Viv. And she was wearing only a thin singlet.
The girl blinked sleepily, stared, then gaped. Her face went as white as the sheets heaped about her.
She threw herself forward to wrap her arms round a stunned Tattersail, sobbing. ‘Don’t blast me into nothingness! He made me do it! Threatened to sell me into slavery to the Dal Hon if I didn’t! Please.’
Tattersail pulled at the girl’s arms, trying to extricate herself. All she could manage were single soothing words such as, ‘Quiet. Yes. Fine.’
The side door to the wash chamber opened and Mock walked in, fiddling with his untucked shirtings. ‘Get a move on…’ he began, and then he looked up. His brows rose, then he suddenly, inexplicably, laughed. He waved to the bed. ‘She was scared by the storm so I let her sleep here, that is all. Nothing more, dearest.’
Viv gaped anew, making choking noises. Her face blazed a red to match her hair. Tattersail gestured for her to leave, and after one look up at her mistress she gathered together a handful of the sheets and scuttled off.
Mock went to a sideboard and poured a glass of wine. ‘Please, dearest. It looks bad, yes. But what would I want with another, really, when I have you?’
She just shook her head – her aching, pulsing, reverberating head. ‘I’ve been a fool, Mock. But I’m not that much of one.’
He leaned back against the table, opened his arms. ‘Please! That girl? A dalliance. Nothing more. Nothing serious. Really.’ And he tossed back the wine, but she noticed his hand shaking.
She realized with a shock that right now he was very scared of her. She merely shook her head. She simply felt tired. So very tired of it all. ‘I’m not going to do anything, Mock. We’re just finished.’
She went to an armoire, dug around and found a travelling bag. Into this went shirts and trousers and skirts and her Deck of Dragons. While she packed Mock kept speaking, but she ignored him.
‘What do you mean, finished?’ he was saying. ‘You would throw away being a marquessa for this? Show some judgement, child. Some sense of proportion. Really. I do think it is time that you grew up. We make a great team shipboard, we really do. But, fine, if we don’t get along in private that need not be a problem. We need not share a room. You can have the pick of any you should choose – benefits of being a marquessa, yes? Or even a queen.’
She was pushing her toiletries into the bag when he made this last comment and she had to stop herself from raising her Warren to show him what she thought of that loathsome idea.
When she reached the door he finally lost his temper. ‘Fine!’ he yelled. ‘You’ll never be anyone! You lack the backbone. Go back to your farm or your fisher parents or whatever! You’ll be a nobody!’