Guilty Blood Read online

  From her look I wasn't sure that she'd comprehended. She didn't seem sour or insulted, but rather disappointed, or perhaps slightly sad. The look was gone with a shift of her posture as she set down her cup.

  "Ms. Cylphra. I think it's you who doesn't understand," she said evenly, her gray eyes like silver through the sheen of her spectacles. "I am giving you my advice—advice from a long life that's seen many sad things. Leave this be and go. Go home, or if your conscience won't let you, go far away. In either case, let this drop."

  I'd had enough of this. This surely wasn't what I'd come for and I'd obviously mistaken my hostess completely. I stood and bit my lip to keep back my words—but didn't bite hard enough. "You know, you're nothing like what they say about you. I'd heard all your stories were based on your life, but—" I just looked at the very old woman and gave my most withering scoff. She watched me, seemingly unperturbed—what worked on amorous barflies apparently held little insult to her. I made my way for the door.

  She stood properly, coming to see me out, "Quite true, Ms. Cylphra, but there it is, and there's nothing to be done about it."

  The door was open and I was back on the porch with the morning's early rays spilling sidelong through the cool mist. With the night dispelled, I considered other options aloud. "I should have gone to the church to begin with. They'll know how to handle something like this."

  A sharp scoff pursued me. Looking back, Ms. Kindler was standing in the door.

  "Oh, they'll know. But I doubt they'll believe a stray cat like you," she chuckled dismissively. "And even if they check into your story, they'll hold you for a graverobber while they do—and they'd quickly find they were right to. The Pharasmins deal mercifully with the dead, but tend to be less so with the living."

  I halted on the steps for only an instant, half turning and throwing up a hand in frustration. "What then! Just run off like you say? Feh!" Doing my best to look like I had a direction, I marched down the remaining steps, "I'll handle this myself. Good day, Ms. Kindler."

  I hardly heard her response, and something in her tone, something wistful, halted me, "You're not going to let this drop? Are you?"

  "I think I've been clear about that," I shot back harshly.

  "Well, I can't help you—" she started distantly, but it was my turn to cut her off.

  "You've made that more than obvious." I took another step.

  "But if you're not going to be satisfied until you've had a lick at this," she said evenly, an eyebrow raised archly, "I know someone who might."

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  When I was a child they still called the neighborhood Merridweigh Gardens. I remember attending a lawn party at one of the estates there—wandering off with my brother, staining our hands and faces amid a patch of wild black berries, and upsetting mother mightily. I was embarrassed at the time, but returning I kept a lookout for any hint of that berry patch.

  There was nothing, though. The life had drained out of the community along with the snooty manor owners and their money. What had been Merridweigh Gardens, a cluster of the wealthiest, most envied addresses in Ardis, was now just what folks called "Mud Way."

  No doubting that the name was apt. With none left to defend against it, the Vhatsuntide River had sought to reclaim the grounds along its banks, conspiring with the frequent rains to drench the earth and undermine anything that stood without roots. Puddles sprawled into entire muddy lakes, fueling a marshy degeneracy as once-manicured lawns and bordering woods degraded into fields of weeds and snarls of tangled shade trees. Patches of irregularly scattered cobbles suggested the routes fine carriages once strolled, leading inevitably to the picked-over carcasses of manor houses and the remains of attendant structures. Over it all hung the pervasive musk of wet earth and rotting leaves, making things seem older, and I felt as though I walked among ancient ruins rather than properties abandoned only recently.

  Abandoned, but perhaps not deserted. I'd heard too many stories of Mud Way not to be wary. Stories of homes turned into the courts of cruel gangs and used as the settings of crimes too raucous to commit within city walls. There were also rumors of looters seeking to scrape the last flecks of gilding from overlooked banisters and high molding, only to meet terrible ends at the fangs of beasts and hungry boogeymen. On hearing most of these tales far from their setting I'd cynically dismissed them. Now, here, alone, I chose my path carefully, as though even the most fanciful rumors might be true.

  Keeping to the thin tree lines that once separated estate from estate, I prowled swift as I could, hoping not to encounter anyone else along my way. The Watch didn't patrol Mud Way anymore, and anyone I might run into likely had a purpose more nefarious than my own. Such didn't speak well of the one upon whom I was calling, but I knew how nobles were with their homes and to what lengths pride would drive some to keep up even the most easily contradicted appearances. I had no doubt that my host, the Mr. Barttley that Ms. Kindler had suggested I call upon, would be an eccentric, but to resist the rot that permeated the area—both the vegetative and human varieties—his home must be a fortress.

  It was nearing noon when I came to "Barttley Manor," a wreck of especial decrepitude threatening to topple into the Vhatsuntide. The estate grounds had transformed into a morass, soggy earth weakening the ground and the grip of trees, fence posts, and foundations alike, giving everything an unnerving, off kilter appearance. The manor house was the greatest victim, loosing its footing and resettling unevenly. The whole structure looked as though it were undertaking an impossibly slow drunken reel, staggering backward before its inevitable pitch to the ground.

  But what marked the ruins among the others were its furnishings, the ones scattered about what of its yard hadn't fallen away into the river. Not garden furniture, but carved tables and a pile of sturdy dining room chairs, a dry sink spilling shattered ceramics, a mossy divan, and more, all scattered upon the weedy lawn as though partially carried off but discarded with frantic haste. Where every other home I'd circled was a wreck, they were deliberately emptied wrecks. Something here had kept the looters at bay.

  With each step toward the sagging house my boots sunk slightly deeper into the soggy earth and I indulged speed over caution, imagining myself sinking into the swampy lawn if I tarried too long. Reaching a front corner, the house leaned above me, its weathered timbers scaly with the scabby remnants of flaking paint, its façade riddled with shadowy cracks, ingresses welcoming to all manner of beetles, worms, and earwigs. Especially earwigs, an infestation of the ugly brown bugs swarmed in mindless whorls, poking antennae and clawed anuses from seemingly every split panel and dark gap.

  "Did nothing lie dead in this damnable city anymore?"

  Doing my best to avoid touching the house itself, disgusted by what thrived within its moldy walls and the suggestion of even fouler things within, I made my way to the remains of the porch and with a single high step mounted the platform. The sturdy front door remained trustworthy, settling in its frame only slightly and holding a good lock. Not a great lock, though, as some inexpert prowler had obviously been at it, leaving the broken end of a metal pick within the keyhole. It took some convincing, but lending my shoulder to it, the door reluctantly ground open.

  With the sun still high in the sky, gray light filtered into the house through myriad cracks and crusty windows. The invasion of air through the opened front door sent unaccustomed eddies through the entry hall, throwing heavy motes of dust through room, filling it with a cloud of must and old mold smells. The entry had been emptied, with only a stained stairwell reaching to a second floor balcony above. Empty doorframes opened off the hall, the rooms beyond either empty or littered with the wreckage of toppled furnishings. Although shadows clung to the ceiling high above, the house's interior still managed to feel claustrophobic, as though the stale air was decaying along with the memories of past lavishness.

  The creak of an upstairs floorboard whined through the stillness, the noise muffled by the thick dust. The second floor covet
ed its shadows more than the first, hiding everything behind a row rounded balusters. It the noise was anything more than just the complaining of the old house itself, I decided it was probably just some savaging animal—a rat or raccoon—or perhaps a squatter, nothing more dangerous. Or maybe even Mr. Barttley himself. I smirked. My errand was growing more ludicrous by the minute, and from the state of the place it was obvious nothing more discerning than scavengers or transients still made a home of the place. But regardless, I hadn't come all this way to leave my curiosity unsatisfied.

  I'd halfway climbed the creaking steps, reaching a wide landing at its midpoint, when a mangy hunting dog surprised me, appearing from around the corner at the stairs' summit. It didn't so much pad onto the balcony as tumble, pitching like a marionette mastered by a manic child, shuddering and threatening to collapse with every awkward motion. Its filthy head lolled toward me, though what gazed down squirmed in the dog's eye sockets.

  Sick? Crippled? My mind recoiled though the possibilities, dismissing each for more uncanny explanations as disgust seized my limbs. Had I been cursed? Did nothing lie dead in this damnable city any more? The bug eaten remains of the dog carcass's muzzle peeled back, revealing rows of shattered fangs. A dry rasp issued over its limp, dusty tongue, a noise that might have been a growl had the thing been whole. For the second time in as many days the primitive demand for blind flight shrieked through my mind. Had I not spent the past hours reliving my retreat from the Venachdahlia crypt, I might have fled again, but the built up frustration and indignance fought it back. If I was to be murdered, it would be for pride, not cowardice.

  The corpse flung itself—a patchwork of fur scraps, dangling ligaments, and flaking bone shards—down the stairs. Dodging against the landing's banister I reeled for an instant as the railing gave against my weight, threatened to collapse, but ultimately held. The canine tangle of knotted hair and broken limbs landed at my heels with a clamor of sickening snaps, its teeth and exposed ribs scoring the wood with equal ferocity. It didn't bother to regain its footing, and in an instant was lunging at me sidelong, as though whatever foulness enlivened it still saw no difference between gnashing fangs and the jagged split in its side. Its wild spill had given me just enough time to vault halfway up the next flight of steps, and when its gnashing rot lunched toward me I held the high ground. My shout of revolted anger punctuated the impact as I spun my boot in a sidelong kick. Its body gave overmuch, my boot sinking into its splitting hide, overbalancing it. Wildly flailing limbs went out from under the thing, sending it toppling backward into the landing's heavy wooden banister. The railing balked at this second abuse and, in a cacophony of splintering wood and scrapping bones, collapsed, spilling the hound to the ground a half-story below.

  I rushed up the remaining steps and spun, preparing an even more forceful kick, expecting to find the creature already loping up after me. The house's heavy silence had returned like a blanket of smothering smoke. Over the second floor railing I looked down upon the dog carcass, which now resembled a trod upon tomato more than an animal. Several furious joints and ravenous organs twitched amid the mess of bones and dog fur, but those broken bits had lost the coordination to pursue me. For a too-long moment of morbid curiosity I tarried to watch the thing die, but its mindless struggles didn't cease. I almost pitied it as I thought of the life, whatever it was, trapped within the abomination below, condemned to wait for decay's slow release rather than death's sympathetic end.

  A door's echoing slam startled me back to the moment. Cursing myself for not expecting something worse after seeing the dog-horror—and for not fleeing of my own volition when I'd had the opportunity—I snapped my attention down the hallway, hand quick for my dagger. Slits of dusty light streaming weakly through the patchy ceiling lit the corridor, revealing facing rows of rotted portraits and sunken doors, but otherwise blessed emptiness. Except there was something more, the simple waver of light, that of a lantern or candle, flickering from the hall's end.

  The house couldn't be on fire, the tinderbox would have gone up in moments had even a spark strayed across its floorboards. Someone was actually here. I'd given up on actually finding Mr. Barttley shortly after laying eyes upon the manor, entering only to see what kind of jest Ms. Kindler had sent me upon. Expecting a fool's errand and finding a death trap, I shocked myself by again coming to wonder if someone might in fact be living in this wreck.

  Although the complaints of the long untrod flooring countered any attempt at stealth, I gingerly made my way down the narrow hall. When the flickering light fell upon my boots I stood before a solid oaken door, its lower portion carved halfway through by endlessly repeated clawing. Could the dog corpse have been a guard imprisoning Mr. Barttley? Or even some roaming monstrosity that had found like decay within the manor, trapping its careless owner within? Such seemed improbable, but I'd witnessed more than my fair share of improbabilities in the past few hours. With good manners seeming a distant and potentially a dangerous liability in this ruin, I gripping the door handle and shouldered my way into the lit room without knocking.

  Dozens of eyes pinned me in place, and for a startled moment I though it'd walked into some sort of ambush. A grotesque perfume unlike the wet must that permeated the rest of the house washed over me, the malodorous twin of the stench that exploded from the kicked dog corpse. Once this room had been a library, though a leaky ceiling had ruined whole shelves and rotted out parts of the flooring, pitching much of the collection to the floor. The trove had included more than just books, with tarnished figurines, the chipped busts of stern scholars, and stranger objets d'art scattered amid the shelves, upon the floor, and lolling crookedly upon the walls. Yet there were new additions, inexpert taxidermies and morbid folk art worked in palettes of fur, flesh, and viscera, nailed upon exposed walls and suspended from toppled shelves by the weight of heavy albums. It was their eyes, the hollow gazes of rats and snakes and caught pigeons by the dozens, that had transfixed me and the smell of their decay—many of which had been rotting for months or more—that offended my senses.

  I staggered back into the hall in disgust, trying to steal a half-clear breath. At first I mistook the noise for the grating of something being drug in short unsteady bouts across the splintering wood floor. Then the hiss exploded in insane intensity, filling the room, echoing down the hall, spilling through the manor's cracked timbers in a riot of shrill, maniac cackling.

  Chapter Three: The Lost Prince

  The mad cackle sliced through the rotting manor, shrill like the shriek of a rusty hinge, but one without a wall to halt its opening scream. The tooth-needling whine rose and tittered, unleashing some insane hilarity, stretching on and on rather than reaching a crescendo. A chorus of nails on slate would have been more welcome.

  That first impression remained throughout and long after the meeting.

  The combination of razor-edged noise and the reek of animal rot had forced me back from the open door, a one-two punch to the head and gut that momentarily disoriented me and knocked me to the brink of retching. A quick clench of my eyes and gorge brought me back to myself. Straightening, I turned back into the room to face the source of the noise.

  Were the library the manor's mind, it would certainly be an appropriate one for this rotten, broken-backed body. The remnants of a shattered skylight admitted a gray haze, but also copious leaves, invading ivy coils, and mold-ringed rainwater puddles. The bookcases lining the walls gaped. What few shelves weren't snapped or sagging bore pointlessly few volumes, the majority being strewn upon the floor or reduced to pulp and loose pages by weather and pointless destruction. Everywhere else were the ruins of a once noble collection, with scholarly busts, high-backed reading chairs, and the curiosities of forgotten studies wrecked and dashed haphazardly about the room.

  But none of this was the source of the room's reek. Instead, the grotesquely tempting sweetness of rotting flesh spilled from horrible dissections nailed upon rotten walls and shelves repurposed as splintered
frames. Pigeons, rats, snakes, and less identifiable base creatures hung blasphemously naked, their insides rearranged, recombined, or removed at the insane whim of some probing sadist. I had no more than a moment to sneer my disgust and seek the object of my instant loathing before, like some hellish genie, the source of that deranged laugh jolted up from the floor to sprawl upon a cluttered table, in doing so sending dozens of battered tomes to finally loose their muddy pages across the floor.

  After the encounter with that horrible dog-thing, some part of me expected to find Mr. Barttley dead. As usual, my pessimism didn't disappoint. What I hadn't anticipated was just how lively a corpse he would be. For the second time that day I was silently screaming curses to myself, wondering if the living even outnumbered the wandering dead in this damnable city.

  Regardless of the answer, I wasn't about to switch from one side to the other today. My knife reassuringly solid in my white-knuckled grip, I prepared to test my reflexes against those of the corpse, ready to stick the thing and dash out of the manor should it prove as senselessly ravenous as its rotting pet.

  With some effort it peeled itself from the table, listing awkwardly as it took me in, volleys of that lunatic noise blaring from the snaggle-toothed remains of its face.

  "Oh ho ho! A ripe one! Too long since we've had a guest—a real guest," the dead thing cackled. Rigor locked its jaw in place, causing it to toss its head with every word, nodding like a frantic puppet. Its words were an obscene coo, like a cruel child trying to lull a small animal with its tone even as it promised tortures. "Is it a talking one? Or do its sounds hide inside?"