"I still don't credit a word of this," she said, "but go on."
"The problem, of course, was that Thamalon and Shamur-my Shamur-were already betrothed. He couldn't just set her aside without risking challenges, a lawsuit, and, for all he knew, assassination. Moreover, such dishonorable behavior might have precluded his ever being accepted among the Old Chauncel at large, Foxmantle bride or no."
"Therefore, the only solution was to murder his fiancee."
"Which he proceeded to do, unaware, like everyone else outside the family, that another Karn, who looked exactly like my daughter and even bore the same name, had slipped back into Selgaunt and was living in secret in Argent Hall. He couldn't anticipate that an impostor would step forward to take the dead girl's place, proceed with the wedding, and so save our House from destitution.
"Nor did he have any notion that Rosenna would cast him aside if invited to wed the Overmaster's son, but that was what she did. Afterward, with no other prospects in the offing, Thamalon opted to go back to his original plan and marry a Karn."
Shamur frowned, considering. She didn't want to believe the story, yet it made a ghastly kind of sense, and in some respects it reflected the character of the Thamalon she knew, a man both calculating and lickerish, his appetites unflagging even now, in the autumn of his life. Still… "You haven't told me how you learned all this."
"By chance. Four years after your wedding, I took a turn serving as a Probiter. During that time, the Scepters arrested a ne'er-do-well named Clovis for bludgeoning a fellow scoundrel who had accused him of cheating at dice.
"There was no doubt of Clevis's guilt, and he had a long history of wrongdoing. Thus, he had little hope of escaping harsh punishment this time around, at least until he happened to spot me walking to court in my judge's robe.
"Clovis recognized me and bribed a jailer to bring me a message. It said that if I would arrange his release, he'd help me learn who poisoned my daughter."
Shamur frowned. "We made certain that the world at large never learned of the poisoning."
Lindrian nodded. "Thus it was clear that the wretch must actually know something. I interviewed him privately, agreed to his bargain, and he told me what he knew. It turned out he had no idea who had wished my daughter dead. He did, however, know who'd sold the whoreson the poison to do the job."
"Who?" Shamur asked.
"An apothecary called Audra Sweetdreams, who ran, and for all I know still does run, a shop in Lampblack Alley. She was Clovis's friend, or as near as such a scoundrel had to a friend. One night, giddy with some narcotic powder of her own devising, she'd boasted that a rich nobleman had paid her handsomely to help him poison Lindrian Karn's daughter, although for some reason, perhaps simply the irrationality of an addled mind, she'd refused to divulge the identity of her patron.
"The following day, I asked some of the Scepters about the woman. They'd never quite managed to catch her committing a crime, but were quite certain she consorted with thieves and other miscreants, providing them with illicit drugs, potions, and probably even poison on occasion."
"I assume you interrogated her as well," Shamur said.
"Of course. I had her arrested on a bogus charge then, when we spoke in private, I offered her much the same trade I'd already made with Clovis. If she gave me the name of the aristocrat to whom she'd sold the poison, she'd go free. If she withheld it, it wouldn't matter that she was innocent of the offense of which she was currently accused. I was a lord of the Old Chauncel and a Probiter, she, a commoner of dubious reputation, and I would have no trouble arranging her conviction and a savage punishment to follow.
"Well, as you already know, she eventually gave up Thamalon. She even told me how he administered the poison. You recall, we always wondered about that."
"Yes," Shamur said.
"It was quite ingenious, in a horrible way. She'd concocted a clear, tasteless liquid harmless to males but deadly to females. Thamalon rubbed it on his lips, then applied it to my daughter's mouth with a kiss."
"That's monstrous," Shamur said. "Did you actually let this medusa go?"
"Yes. You would have done the same, had you given your word. Besides, she was only a tool. What I cared about was finding the fiend who instigated my daughter's death."
"Yet when you finally identified him, you did nothing!" she exploded. "Why didn't you tell me at the time?"
The old man lowered his eyes. "I feared the consequences. Our finances still hadn't fully recovered from the disasters Thamalon had inflicted upon us, and by that time our commercial ventures were thoroughly entwined with his own. If something disrupted that partnership, the House of Karn might yet fall into ruin. I reckoned vengeance wouldn't bring my daughter back, and I had the welfare of my other children to consider. And I was thinking of you."
"Me?"
"Yes. By that time, you were the mistress of a great House and the mother of a three year-old son you adored. I didn't want to tear your life apart."
"Then why in Mask's name are you doing it now?"
"Because it seems to me now that I was wrong. You have a right to know, and this was my final chance to tell you."
She struggled to compose herself. "Thank you. You… you have told me, and I'll need to sit alone and ponder what to do about it. For now, may we talk of other matters? What would you like me to do to help Fendolac and his siblings in the days ahead?"
He answered, but she barely heard him, for her mind was in turmoil. The gods knew, she didn't love Thamalon, far from it. Still, he was her husband of nearly thirty years, the father of her children, and never had she imagined him capable of such malevolence. Yet Lindrian, his illness notwithstanding, seemed entirely lucid, nor could she conceive of any reason for him to lie.
Somehow she had to discover the truth, and if Thamalon truly had murdered the innocent lass who'd adored him, if he'd engineered the chain of events that had trapped Shamur in a loveless union and a life she loathed, then she already knew he'd have to pay.
Chapter 4
Shamur waited with masked impatience for Glynnis, her personal maid, to help her out of her mourning clothes and into her silk nightgown, and even to see her tucked away in the warmth of her canopy bed. At last the officious, chattering lass, who had apparently decided Lady Uskevren needed special coddling in the wake of her "father's" death, extinguished the enchanted sconce by touching the raised oval plate at its base, bade her mistress a final good-night, and retired from the suite, softly closing the door behind her.
Shamur gave Glynnis another few seconds to descend farther down the stairs, making absolutely sure she wouldn't hear her mistress stirring. Then she silently threw back the covers, rose, and pulled on the embroidered white cotton dress, hooded maroon wool cloak, and flimsy, frivolous shoes she'd surreptitiously pilfered from the room of Larajin, the clumsiest of the servants and, Shamur suspected, one of Thamalon's lemans as well. Like the other maids, Larajin generally wore livery, so this outfit was presumably a special one reserved for outings and festivals. Still, it was plainly the inexpensive clothing of a commoner, and ought to disguise a noblewoman, mysteriously prowling the benighted streets afoot and unescorted, very well. With luck, Shamur would have it back in the bottom of Larajin's trunk before the girl ever noticed it was missing.
She had two other items to take on her errand: a truncheon of seasoned ash she'd borrowed from the salle and a blue leather pouch of the platinum coins called suns. She tucked both in the fringed, striped sash Larajin used for a belt, placing them in the small of her back where the cloak was sure to hide them.
Lindrian had died an hour after sharing his secret. The old man's obsequies had taken up the next three days, until his kin finally interred him in the Karn ancestral vault. Ever since then, Shamur had been trying to slip away, but in the daylight hours, with servants swarming everywhere, pestering her with their sympathy and their need for instruction, with friends and relatives popping up every few seconds to offer condolences, it had proven impossible. Not since the first years of her marriage had she felt so stifled and confined.