Red Tide (6 page)

Caval among them, judging by his tone. He'd been against coming here from the start, though. Not that he had argued with her, of course. He never did these days, even when she was wrong, and maybe she
had
been wrong to come. Veran's words on the journey to Dian returned to her.
Ain't no one ever caught the gray fever that's recovered from it. Ain't no one taken less than a year to die from it either.
Evidently Zalli's neighbors had feared the spread of the infection, and so put up the effigy to invoke the White Lady's blessing.

Because a tribute like this was sure to win the goddess's favor.

“Will the Chameleon heal Zalli?” Karmel asked Caval. “If we took her to the temple—”

“No.”

“Why? Because Veran failed to kill me?” She couldn't keep the sting from her voice.

“Ah, even if he'd succeeded, the Chameleon wouldn't have lifted a finger.”

“But he promised—”

“Veran walked out on the priesthood. Or had you forgotten? The Chameleon is not a forgiving god.”

“Nor an honorable one, it seems.”

Caval shrugged. “We are his servants, not he ours.”

That last was something their father might have said, but Karmel did not voice the thought. Most of her thoughts these days were better left unsaid. She studied her brother. Caval looked more drawn than usual today, his cloak pulled close about him in spite of the heat, his right arm—the arm stabbed by Mili on Dragon Day—cradled in his left.

If Caval was aware of her scrutiny, he gave no indication. “Are we going in?” he said. “Or shall we wait until someone out here recognizes us?”

He had a point. Eleven days it had been since the Chameleons' failed coup. Eleven days hiding in rat-infested warehouses, or houses abandoned after the fires on Dragon Day. On the few occasions Karmel had ventured outside, it had always been at night for fear of encountering a familiar face. Yet now she stood in plain sight—

Caval put his hand on her arm. She looked left to see a squad of Storm Guards approaching along Peer Street. One of the men sported a black eye, while a second had a fresh cut across his cheek. Karmel had heard rumors of tensions between the Storm Guards and Mazana's mercenaries—tensions that had boiled over into outright conflict after Dutia Elemy Meddes vanished six days ago. But it didn't have to be the Revenants these soldiers had fought. Looters, the remnants of Imerle's personal guard, another faction within the Storm Guards: there was no shortage of trouble abroad in Olaire. It might even have been Chameleons they'd clashed with, for the priesthood's play for power on Dragon Day had been neither forgotten nor forgiven. On Karmel's travels, she had seen several old friends swinging from makeshift gallows, including both Imrie and Colley. She had cried when she found them hanging together, knowing she was as much to blame for their deaths as anyone.

A murmur of conversation from the Storm Guards reached her. She was tempted to engage her power, but if the soldiers had already spotted her, they would know she was a Chameleon when she disappeared. If, on the other hand, she remained in sight, there was little chance of them recognizing her.

What about Caval, though?

“Let's go,” she said to her brother, gesturing to Zalli's door.

Caval strode toward the house. “Best if I go first,” he said. “I'm not the sort of man you want at your back.”

For a heartbeat Karmel could only stare after him. Then she set off in pursuit.

She caught up to him at Zalli's door. Closer now, she saw someone had carved “bitch” in the wood. Zalli's only crime had been to be struck down by illness, but then blame was always attached to the victims. It made Karmel wonder whether the damage to Zalli's house had indeed been caused by the fighting on Dragon Day, or whether the woman's neighbors had tried to drive her out.

Caval pounded his fist against the door.

No answer.

Behind, Karmel heard the Storm Guards coming near. The tread of their feet was audible over the lapping of waves from the Shallows two streets away. She felt their gazes on her, but she did not look across. Nothing suspicious here, just two hooded strangers calling on a woman with a deadly and possibly contagious disease.

Caval knocked again.

Karmel clasped Veran's ring in her left fist. What in the Nine Hells was she doing here? With his final breath, Veran had requested that Karmel be with his wife at the end, but he'd had no right to ask that of her. She owed him nothing, and Zalli even less. What was she supposed to say when the woman opened the door? “Hi, I'm the person who killed your husband. I'm the one who left his body for the fish in a cave below Dian.”

Or perhaps simply that Veran had died trying to save Zalli. That he'd been thinking of her at the last. Would that come as any comfort to the dying woman, though? Would that make her final days easier?

A part of Karmel wanted to push the ring under the door and walk away. But she knew she would not. What had happened in Dian hadn't been Veran's fault. He'd done it all for the sake of his family. Karmel might have done the same thing herself two weeks ago.
Forgive me, girl,
he'd said.
Just following orders.
Caval's orders, to be precise. The recollection made Karmel uncomfortably aware of her brother at her shoulder, and she struggled against an urge to edge away from him.

And yet were Caval's reasons for betraying her any less compelling than Veran's? If she could find it in herself to forgive Veran, could she not do the same for her brother?

Still Caval's knocking had drawn no response. He reached for the handle instead. Karmel shook her head. If Zalli had been forced to bar the door against an ax-wielding neighbor, she wouldn't have left it unlocked—

The handle turned, and the door opened.

Caval stepped inside. Karmel hesitated. She couldn't turn back now, though. The jingle of the Storm Guards' armor was just behind, and how would it look to them if she retreated having come this far?

The door opened directly onto Zalli's front room. The scent of dewflowers was so strong Karmel half expected to see the floor scattered with petals. Yet it could not mask the stink of sweat and smoke and corruption. The light streaming through the doorway cut a bright fissure through the darkness. Karmel saw the shadowy outline of bookcases against the walls, a chair pulled up to a fireplace. The windows to her left were boarded. Dotted about the room were vases filled with wilting flowers.

Karmel took a step inside, then stopped. She didn't want to go any farther. Veran's wife was nowhere to be seen. There was no point in calling out to her either, since she was obviously dead. Death left in its wake a silence like no other.

Then a shadow detached itself from the wall to her right and moved into the light.

Karmel felt the blood drain from her face. She turned for the open door.

At a gesture from the stranger it slammed shut, plunging the room into darkness.

*   *   *

Senar Sol blinked sweat from his eyes. The opening of the door had let in a welcome breath of air, but now that it was closed again he felt the heavy heat settle on him once more. His gaze lingered on Karmel. Their confrontation on Dragon Day had lasted for barely a handful of heartbeats, yet he'd clearly left his usual warm impression on her, for there was fear in her eyes along with something altogether darker. Caval put his hand on his sword hilt, his half smile suggesting he relished the prospect of a confrontation. When he stepped forward to shield Karmel, the priestess shuffled to her left as if spurning his protection.

Senar remained still, wary of doing anything that the Chameleons might misinterpret as a precursor to an attack. Earlier, the Remnerol shaman, Jambar, had assured him this meeting would not end in bloodshed, but the old man wouldn't have warned Senar if he was sending him to his death. True, the Chameleons didn't look like they'd put up much of a fight. Both were so haggard they might not have slept since Dragon Day, and Senar hadn't forgotten the wound Mili had inflicted on Caval's sword arm. He couldn't afford to take them lightly, though—especially here in the darkness, where he'd find it harder to follow their movements if they engaged their powers.

“Mazana Creed sends her regards,” he said.

Caval showed his teeth. “Mazana Creed, is it? And here I was thinking you were Imerle's man.”

“I am no one's man,” Senar said, more sharply than he intended. Not even his own, he sometimes thought.

Karmel spoke. “Where is Zalli?”

“If you mean the woman who lived here, she is dead.” Judging by the smell of the place, she could be buried under one of the floorboards. Neither Mazana nor Jambar had told Senar how the woman had died, or even her significance to her two would-be visitors. The Chameleons didn't seem overly distressed at her passing, though. If anything, Karmel's expression showed more relief than sorrow, while her brother's look was one of wry amusement.

“How did you find us?” Caval asked.

“Jambar told me you would be here.”

“The shaman has taken to finding people, has he? Is that before or after he makes them disappear?”

“I'll ask him next time I see him,” Senar said. If there ever
was
a next time. The Remnerol had proved impossible to track down these past few days, though only for the Guardian it seemed.

Karmel waved a hand at a fly buzzing round her. “What do you want?”

“Mazana Creed wants to speak to you.”

“As she wanted to speak to Elemy Meddes?”

A fair point. Senar had heard rumors of Mazana inviting the dutia to a meeting at the palace before disposing of him. There were also stories of her tracking down and executing the Sabian dignitaries who had survived Dragon Day on the ship of that Gilgamarian Kalisch, Agenta Webb. Senar could believe them too, but as it happened, the emira had bigger plans for the Chameleons. And he wouldn't have agreed to fetch them if he thought he was leading them into a trap.

“It's been eleven days since Dragon Day,” Karmel said. “Eleven. Why has it taken so long for her to track us down?”

To answer that question, Senar would have to tell the Chameleons what Mazana intended for them, and that was something he couldn't risk doing until she had prepared the ground. The Guardian himself had had three days to get used to the audacity of her scheme, and even now, when he considered it, he found himself shaking his head.

“We're wasting time,” he said. “If Mazana wanted you dead, she would have sent a squad of Storm Guards in my place. Or the executioner.”

“We're supposed to take your presence as a comfort, then?”

There was nothing he could say to that, so he kept his mouth shut.

The silence dragged out.

Karmel stared at Caval. Of the two of them, Senar had assumed it would be Caval who called the shots. But a twitch of the man's shoulders in answer to Karmel's questioning look suggested he would leave the decision to his sister. Perhaps that was for the best too. There was a lightheartedness to Caval that left Senar feeling uneasy, for it indicated a carelessness of spirit that would make him impossible to predict.

Karmel looked back at the Guardian, her expression defiant. “You say Jambar foresaw this meeting. So tell us, do we come quietly?”

Senar scratched the stubs of his missing fingers. “Most of the time.”

“And if we don't, do we leave here alive?”

“I won't try to stop you.”

It hardly needed saying, of course, that Mazana wasn't the sort of woman to take no for an answer, no matter how politely the question was posed. Or that she could easily find the Chameleons again if she wanted to. It wasn't as if one could run far on an island surrounded by dragon-infested waters. If anyone knew that, it was Senar himself.

Karmel held his gaze, then took something out of her pocket. Senar tensed, but it was only a ring. A wedding band. The priestess tossed it aside, and it struck the floor before rolling into darkness beneath one of the bookcases.

“Lead on,” she said.

*   *   *

As Romany strode through the palace corridors, her stomach pitched and heaved in time to the distant lap of waves against a seawall. The air was humid, as if it retained a memory of the water that had once filled these passages, and there were other signs too of the recent flooding: the waterlines on the walls, the silt that crunched beneath Romany's sandals, the stench of decay from some fish left to rot in a courtyard.

Behind the priestess walked a Storm Guard she'd met at the palace gates. He had insisted on escorting her to Mazana Creed, but he needn't have bothered. Thanks to Romany's sorcerous web, she knew better than he where the emira was to be found. At the last intersection, she had gone left when the soldier had continued straight on, and the man was now jogging to catch up to her. As he drew level, he started prattling about his respect for the Lord of Hidden Faces, no doubt working himself up to asking if Romany had taken a vow of celibacy. At the gates he'd relieved her of her knife. The priestess felt oddly incomplete without it.

As they turned a corner, the Storm Guard fell silent. Mazana Creed was coming toward them. She looked more like a courtier than a ruler, with her air-magic pendant and her dress cut so low it seemed its maker must have run out of material before he could finish it. She walked with a muscular stride ahead of six Storm Guards. Six bodyguards to protect her in her own palace? Doubtless the emira feared trouble in the early days of her reign, though judging by where the soldiers' gazes were fixed, they must have been expecting an assassin to spring from her backside.

An assassin?
Romany thought sourly.
I'm over here.

Mazana slowed when she saw the priestess. Her expression darkened. Evidently she was no more pleased to see Romany than Romany was to be here. The emira was taller than the priestess, but not nearly as attractive as she probably thought she was. Her face had too many hard lines, and her eyes had a tinge of redness as if she'd been crying recently. Romany considered. How should she play this encounter? Of all the people to antagonize, a woman who had murdered a god was probably worst among them. If the priestess could nettle her, though, might Mazana send her away and thus force the Spider to choose another?