The Bone Palace - Amanda Downum [100]
“Isyllt!”
Savedra’s face appeared close to hers, eyes dark with panic. The floor was cold and hard beneath her.
“What happened?” She wanted to spit out the lingering reek of blood.
“You fell.” Savedra caught her shoulder and helped her sit up. “The ring started to move, then everything washed red for a heartbeat and you fell.”
“She’s taken precautions,” Isyllt said. The taste of copper dripped into her mouth. She scrubbed a hand across her face and it came away scarlet and sticky—her nose was bleeding. “I can’t break her wards.” And, more quietly, “She’s powerful.”
Fog coiled thick and blue in the streets when Isyllt escorted Savedra out to find a carriage, bleeding orange at lamplight’s touch. Mist swallowed the sky, swallowed everything past a few yards in every direction, but Isyllt knew they weren’t alone in the night. The city lay still and hushed, but the toll of the night bells echoed all around, shivering in Isyllt’s bones.
Savedra jumped at the first peal, then giggled. “Nerves. It still feels like someone’s watching.”
“I think we’re safe from prying eyes for the moment,” Isyllt lied, giving her a lopsided smile.
They found a carriage two streets over, and Isyllt tipped the driver well to make sure Savedra reached the palace safely. Not that the man could do much if a sorceress attacked, but it made her feel a little better.
“I’ll contact you as soon as I learn anything more,” she said as she helped Savedra into the cab. “Please be discreet.”
Savedra’s glare conveyed a wealth of don’t teach your grandmother to suck eggs, reminding Isyllt again that she was a scion of the Eight, and a skilled courtier besides. She covered Isyllt’s hand with her own grey-gloved one, though, and that spoke only gratitude. “I’ll do the same,” she said as the door closed. “Thank you.”
When the carriage was out of sight, Isyllt slipped into the nearest fog-shrouded alley. A moment later her ring chilled as death breathed over her.
“What are you doing here?”
“Waiting for you,” Spider said from behind her. “Keeping an eye on you—I hear of sickness and death in the city.”
“Some might call that pursuance. The law frowns on it.”
This time she followed him more easily as he moved in front of her. Either she was growing used to it or feeding made him slow. His skin was no less pale, but stolen heat suffused his flesh. He stroked her cheek with one long hand. “Some might call it affection.”
A drop of blood glistened black at the corner of his mouth. Isyllt wiped it away with her thumb. “Another willing donor?”
“Do you really want to know?”
His scent filled her nose through the smell of fog and wet stone, and she wanted to lean into it. But she wasn’t tired and lonely tonight; tonight she was working. She caught his wrist and pulled his hand away. After a heartbeat he acquiesced, flesh becoming pliable.
“I hope you don’t leave the bodies lying in the street for constables to trip over.” She scrubbed her hands on her trousers when she let go.
Fangs flashed with his smile. “There’s always the river for that.”
“Yes.” Isyllt thought of the cathedral-cavern beneath the river, of the offerings there. She had dreamed of it too, during the fever, dreamed of finding the swollen corpses of people she knew floating in black water. When she was younger she had dreamed of watching the Vigils pull the corpses of her friends from the slime-slick river gates. Thinking of the corpse-gates set another thought burning in her brain, bright enough that she nearly jumped. “Yes, there is.”
“I thought we might talk tonight,” Spider said. The fog softened the sharp angles of his face, dulled the preternatural glitter of his eyes. Or maybe that was only his glamour trying to draw her close.
She forced a smile. “I’ve been ill for nearly a decad, and I have work to do in the morning. Some other night. You can buy me another drink.”
His mouth curled, close-lipped and very nearly human. “Whenever you wish.” He pressed a cool kiss on her knuckles and faded into the mist.
Isyllt had no