Yet something about the record book felt wrong. She could easily imagine dishonesty—but why here, in the list of family members, births, marriages, deaths, titles? Was there another record book, hidden somewhere? Or was something hidden here, in this book?
She touched the book with her magery; to her inner sight the pages wavered, as if under water, and a new page appeared, covered densely with a small crabbed script she did not recognize. As she read, she felt the hair rise up on her body: many of those listed as dead—those with the symbol—were not dead but transferred by blood magery to the bodies of others, some Verrakaien and some not. In such disguise, unrecognized, they could go anywhere, work for Verrakai secretly.
Including her father. Not dead, still alive, hidden? At the thought, panic flooded her, the fear she had controlled while in the tower’s dungeon. She had not told the Knight-Commander—she had been ashamed, even now, to admit how much she feared him, and why. Her uncle had been duke and also punished her, but her father—he had worn the Bloodlord’s hood and mask, he had decreed the torment of her pony and torments even more shameful.
She closed the book and went at once to the door. “I have urgent news for Sir Valthan, which my relatives must not overhear. Tell him we need a safe place to confer.”
Dorrin met Valthan in the dairy. Windowless, stone-walled, the dairy felt chill and dank, light from their candle sending tiny dazzles from the water in the channel where butter and milk kept cool. Dorrin laid the book on the small table Valthan’s men had set there. “You found something bad?” Valthan asked.
“Many things,” Dorrin said. “But this is the worst.” She opened the book and pointed to the mark. “These are listed as deaths, with dates and causes listed. But they are not dead. They live … in other bodies.”
“What?”
“I did not know such evil was possible … but with blood magery, and I suppose the help of Liart’s priests, they can transfer the souls and minds of Verrakai into other bodies, to work secretly for that traitor Haron.”
“So … the prince may still be in danger?”
“The prince, yes, but also the realm as a whole. I do not know who the alternate identities are.” Her own father, not safely dead but alive—where was he? Who was he? She shuddered, forcing memory away.
“How do you know this?”
“There is a page visible only by magery,” Dorrin said. “I can try to make it visible to you—” She put out her power again and the page reappeared. “There, do you see it?”
“No,” Valthan said, scowling. “What does it say?”
“It gives the dates these people were transferred to another body, and for a few it gives that identity.”
“What about those others? Are they now in Verrakai bodies?”
“They’re dead,” Dorrin said. The page gave part of the ritual by which the transfer was done; it disgusted her.
“Well … that’s one thing,” Valthan said, staring down at the page, through the page he could not see. “What will happen if I touch this? Will I feel the one I can’t see?” He put out a finger.
“Don’t,” Dorrin said. “I don’t want to risk it. I need a competent scribe, so I can read this page aloud and send a copy to the prince, but though I have literate men among my cohort, none are skilled at dictation. Do you have a scribe with you?”
He shook his head. “I’m the only one. If you trust me.”
“Of course,” Dorrin said.
“I mean, I might be one of those Verrakai put in someone’s body. I might be about to kill you.”
“We can find out,” Dorrin said. She read out the phrase that supposedly forced the transferred Verrakai to reveal themselves.
“What was that?” Valthan said.
“Proof you’re not a Verrakai,” Dorrin said. “Let’s get this done—time’s passing.”
Valthan wrote to her dictation; then Dorrin copied his copy, which matched her memory.
“Do not let my relatives know you have this,” Dorrin said. “They might find a way to destroy it, if they suspected its existence. It must go to the prince’s own hand.”
“A courier?”
Dorrin considered. “Do you have a man to spare? Considering how many prisoners you have and the Verrakai yet at large?”
“Not really,” Valthan admitted. “But I expect to meet another troop on the way.”
“I still worry that attack on a single courier would be easier than on a troop. If you send one, warn him to stop nowhere but at a grange of Gird—not for water or food or rest.”
When they returned to the great hall, the guard had changed to Phelani; Valthan’s were out in the stable, readying horses and wagons for the morning’s departure. They would sleep there, in relative safety, to be rested for the next day’s travel. Dorrin went to the front entrance and murmured the command word that swung the great doors wide. Sweet cold air flowed in, smelling of early spring, the first faint fragrance of healthy growth. She wanted to walk out into the darkness and never come back. She’d done it once; her escape saved her life and sanity.
And she had come back, unwilling, to save those who would not thank her, the innocent among her bitter and resentful family. In her mind she saw the view that darkness hid—the fields, the trees beyond, the view that should have been as dear and familiar as anything in the world. Instead, longing for the Duke’s Stronghold stabbed her, the familiar inner and outer courts, sunrise seen from the parapet, that dinner table with Kieri at its head and Arcolin and Cracolnya across from her. Her eyes stung with unshed tears.
Would she ever feel this was home? A safe place, a comfortable place?
She stared at the gloom until her eyes dried, then turned and went inside.
Before dawn, Dorrin and Sir Valthan ate breakfast in the dining room of the main house, still from rations they’d brought, and Dorrin wrote out another report for the prince, on the conditions she’d found in the keep.
“You’ll have to take the tower down,” Valthan said. “If it’s been the center of their evil that long—”
“I know,” Dorrin said. She knew, but she felt a reluctance to destroy a work so old, the center of Verrakai House. As if he sensed that reluctance, Valthan put his hand on her arm.
“My lord Duke, I’m serious. They will have built it with blood and bone: it cannot be cleansed. It must be destroyed.”
“And will be,” Dorrin said. “When I have carried out the prince’s commands to find those under Order of Attainder and send them to Vérella. If I spend the weeks it will take to knock the tower down, stone by stone, they will get away.”
“But—”
“I will burn out the entire inside, leave it an empty husk,” Dorrin said. “That should hold the evil at bay awhile, while I do as the prince wished. Later, I can demolish it.”
He nodded. “That sounds well enough.” He sighed. “I do not envy you your tasks, my lord.”
“Nor do I envy you your journey to Vérella with my poisonous relatives.” She pushed back from the table. “I will renew my spells blocking their magery and hope those hold until you reach Vérella. Should you suspect they are regaining their magery, kill them at once. Remember they have powers you’ve never faced; just one of them held four motionless, including the Marshal-Judicar of Gird.”
In the main reception hall, lamps and candles were alight; the women and girls stood in one huddle and the boys in another. Some glared at her, defiant; others cringed. Either expression might be a lie. Dorrin hooked her thumbs in her belt and looked them over.
“Remember my warnings,” she said. “The Royal Guard has orders to kill you if you offer any resistance or attempt to use your magery, should my bindings fail.” For a moment her mother looked triumphant, but Dorrin smiled, putting into it all the Verrakai arrogance, and her mother’s eyes fell. “I do not think they will,” Dorrin said. “And to make certain—” She released the power again, first damping their powers, and then a glamour, making them docile, at least for a time.