The Fecund's Melancholy Daughter - Brent Hayward [58]
Nahid looked up once more. The parchment seemed as warm as flesh. He could not tell what the people in the back were doing. He cleared his throat. “‘In the spring, Mummu will visit, returning from the mountains. Mummu has no exemplar or congregation, for he is solitary. When Mummu arrives, he calls his sisters, Kingu and Aspu, from across the water. Anu seldom appears at weddings. His energy is low, and needs to be conserved. Offerings to Anu should include whelps, stillborn infants, corn on the cob, and all forms of metal.’”
“Metal,” agreed the old man, nodding. He smiled at Nahid. “I heard he liked metal. And infants. He was somewhat monstrous. Please continue.”
“Did you write this?”
“Of course not. We’re not writing these documents. We organize them.”
“Why?”
“We’re preparing the temple. For the return of the benevolent sisters.”
“You think goddesses are coming back? Is that what this is about? Your gods were spoiled children.” He wanted to throw the parchment down, walk away, but he hesitated.
“We are all spoiled children,” the man said. “There are poisons inside each of us, trapped. These have spoiled us. And perhaps they spoiled the gods, too. Until these poisons are released, none of us will be able to walk side by side. We cannot point fingers without first looking inward.”
“These aren’t concerns for me.”
The old man said, “There are other concerns for you, it’s true. Streets are not safe anymore.”
“What does that mean?”
“There are fraternities. Factions. Scapegoats sacrificed. There is violence in the alleyways. Already, you must know, gods and goddesses have flown overhead. Soon seraphim will arrive in Nowy Solum. They will teach us to release the poisons. This will be a night of reckoning. No god will land until the city is clean. The skies, the river. You need to join hands with us. You need to come in.”
“No,” Nahid said. Sweating, he held out the parchment.
Beyond the doorway, the rain had abated, though the water dripping from the stonework was loud. Receding thunder rolled across the clouds.
The old man took his parchment. Looking at it, he seemed rather confused and even smaller.
Nahid stepped away and down, into the humid air of the street. His fingers tingled. Barefoot, he splashed heavily in warm puddles.
From the temple to the Gardens of Jesthe—which was a worn patch of land adjacent to the centrum, hardly a garden at all—completely shadowed by the crooked structure of the palace—was only a short walk. Nahid had seen the chatelaine’s servants here, lingering on their breaks, having a smoke, though never had he seen his sister. Then again, he had not stayed for very long.
Now he squatted by a tenement, veins pulsing.
He would wait a moment to see if Octavia showed. If she did not, or if she appeared but would not listen to him, return with him to where she belonged, he would—
Kill the chatelaine.
This sudden thought was like a cold stone materializing in his mind, leaping up from the black and bottomless lake.
Kill the chatelaine.
Of course. That’s what he had to do.
He felt a chilly clarity.
Several large girls loitered in the Gardens, dressed in shabby robes. They talked with each other in clipped tones. One snorted brief bursts of laughter, no doubt at the expense of another. Maybe even at Octavia’s expense. Did his sister dress like these girls? Did anyone in Jesthe talk to his sister, other than the chatelaine?
A head of staff—or whatever the women in charge were called—shouted at two of the staff, telling them to get back inside. They had been smoking. Now they ground out their butts on the wet ground and complied, but not before another curt shout had been barked by their superior. Get a move on. Breath misted.
Nahid grew cold, and colder still. Certainty of what he was about to do spread through him like ice. He wondered how easily the chatelaine would die. On her bed, with his hands at her throat?
As he imagined the spirit rising up from her corpse, three palatinate