Shadows of Asphodel (22 page)

“Conveniently,” he said, “the dead never lie.”

Ardis felt like she should muster some disgust, but she couldn’t convince herself that this was all that different than her own assassinations. He had a point. His necromancy could be gruesomely efficient.

Wendel retreated, the glass of absinthe held high, and waved at the couch.

“Shall we talk about something other than my scars?” he said. “As much as I love to relive my failures, I had other plans.”

“Failures? Surely they can’t all be your fault.”

“True.” He tilted his head, his eyes full of darkness. “Please, sit.”

She sank onto the couch and stared up at him. He turned his back on her and flexed his shoulders forward, his skin tautening. Stark white scars raked across his shoulder blades and ran down the length of his back.

“The scar below my left shoulder blade,” he said. “See it?”

“Which?”

“The thickest one. About as wide as a dagger.”

“A… dagger?”

“Yes.” He sipped his absinthe, then laughed hoarsely. “Stabbed me in the back.”

She shrank back on the couch. “You survived?”

“Backstabs are easier to survive than you might think.”

“Now I have to know,” she said. “Who stabbed you in the back?”

His shoulders stiffened, and he didn’t say anything for a moment.

“An assassin from the Order of the Asphodel,” he said.

She sucked in her breath. “They tried to assassinate you?”

“That’s not what I meant.” He glanced back at her and grimaced. “This bastard didn’t like me, that’s all. Never did, once he found out that I was a necromancer. He always thought I was overshadowing him.”

She chose her words carefully. “He was one of your colleagues.”

“Exactly. The moment they healed me, I hunted him down and finished him.”

She cocked her head. “Healed?”

“Oh, temporal magic. Like Konstantin’s technomancy.” He shrugged. “To be honest, I have lost count of how many times I returned a little worse for the wear, and they patched me up and sent me right back out again.”

“I wouldn’t call a backstabbing a little worse for the wear.”

“You grow accustomed to pain.” He drained his glass. “As I’m sure you know.”

Ardis pressed her hand to her neck and looked across the room at Wendel. She couldn’t stop staring at his back. The assassin’s dagger had left its mark, yes, but most of his scars were far older, far deeper. They slanted across his back in parallel lines, like a tiger had clawed his skin, though she suspected the ugly truth.

“Whipping scars,” she said, under her breath.

He glanced sideways at her. “Pardon?”

“You were whipped. Weren’t you?”

“Obviously,” he said.

His voice was rough from alcohol or emotion. He poured himself a shot of absinthe and drank it straight, then grimaced.

“When?” she said softly.

Wendel set down his glass and stood with his hands clenched at his sides. His skin looked paler than usual. Uncertainty shadowed his face.

“I was sixteen.”

“Why?”

He shut his eyes, and shook his head. “It isn’t something I wish to remember.”

She crossed the room and touched his shoulder, her fingers feather-light. He looked at her, and his eyes were dark and glittering.

“Please,” she said. “You don’t need to hide your scars from me. I want to know you.”

“Ardis,” he said. “You are one of the few who has ever truly known me. And I would not want you to remember me that way.”

When she stepped closer, he retreated from her touch.

“I would rather know the truth,” she said.

“The truth of my life,” he said, “will die with me, as it does with us all. And my memories will fade as my bones grow old, and I will live on only in the memories of those who cared that I should not be forgotten.”

Ardis stared fiercely at him, the threat of tears prickling her eyes.

“That’s such a selfish kind of sadness,” she said.

His mouth dropped. “Selfish?”

“I feel terrible looking at your scars,” she said, “but you leave me to guess at who hurt you, and why. It was the Order of the Asphodel, wasn’t it? Though I’m sure you hate them for much more than a whipping.”

“Correct,” he said, looking anywhere but her eyes.

She shook her head. “Don’t plan to die and leave me with lies.”

Wendel took his glass and strolled unsteadily to the couch. He stumbled into the table on his way there, then glowered at the glass in his hand.

“A bit too much absinthe,” he muttered.

Ardis sank onto a chair opposite him, her arms rigid at her sides.

“The Order whipped me,” he said, “for my disobedience. Until that day, I had obeyed them. I practiced my necromancy on animals. On cats, at first, since they learned that was how I started. They killed the creatures for me.”

He bared his teeth at the memory, the lines of his body taut with tension.

“This was in Constantinople?” Ardis said.

“The city was beautiful,” he said. “It gave me the best memories of my childhood.”

But he said it in such a hollow voice she found it hard to believe him.

“Can you believe,” he said, “I ever hoped animals would satisfy their morbid curiosity?”

She could, if only because she could imagine so clearly how he had lost his innocence.

Wendel stared into the distance. “Inevitably, they brought me a dead man. He had been hanged.” He rubbed his neck as if remembering bruises. “My magic was strong enough, at the time, but my mind… I blacked out. When I refused to revive the next dead man, I was whipped. Severely. They couldn’t hold my hand to a cadaver’s skin and force the necromancy out of me, but they could force me to obey them.”

Ardis shuddered. “You were sixteen?”

He laughed utterly without humor. “I was their prodigy.”

“And since then…?”

Wendel tilted his head, a look of cruel scorn on his face.

“What do you think? I killed and I brought them back. I killed them all, Ardis, and the Order only had to ask me. I am exactly what they wanted me to be. The only thing good about me is that I’m a good necromancer.” He spread his arms with a mocking laugh. “Better than good. What can I say? I have my pride.”

Ardis challenged him with her stare. “You don’t sound proud to me.”

“They didn’t suffer,” he said. “I killed them as mercifully as I could. Most never even saw me until I revived them.”

“Why?” she said. “Why bring them back, after you killed them?”

“The Order wasn’t done with them.” He narrowed his eyes. “Are
we
done? I don’t want to talk about this all night.”

“Of course,” she said flatly.

Wendel grabbed the absinthe and looked like he wanted to drink straight from the bottle. Then he shook his head, and reached for his glass. His hands trembled as he poured himself yet another drink, and he spilled the liquor.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to be so brusque with you.”

When Ardis stood, her legs felt loose and liquid. She had drunk only one glass of absinthe, so she blamed it on the adrenaline in her blood.

“Come here,” she said.

He tilted his head to look at her. “Come where?”

“To bed with me.”

He frowned. “Forgive me if I’m not in the mood for—”

“I want to
be
with you. Unless you want to be alone.”

“No,” he said, the word small and quiet.

Taking his hand, she led him into the bedroom. She let her bathrobe slither to her feet and slipped under the sheets. He lay beside her and let out a shuddering sigh. She closed her eyes and rested her head against his chest.

“Thank you,” she said.

“For?”

“Telling me.”

He breathed out. Tension lingered in his muscles.

“You know I would never leave you,” she whispered.

“Ardis.”

His voice snagged on her name, and silence filled the space between them.

“After Constantinople,” he said, “you may wish for never.”

Ardis shivered. The heat of his skin wasn’t enough to negate the icy fingers of dread. She pulled back to look him in the eyes.

“That’s my call,” she said.

He had a little shadow of a smile. “You sound so confident. Borderline arrogant.”

“You should know.”

He laughed, and she kissed him, the bittersweet taste of absinthe on his mouth.

In the soft gray hush of morning, Ardis sat by a window in the hotel restaurant and watched rain drizzle from the sky.

Wendel hunched over the table, sipped his coffee, and winced.

“Better?” she said.

He squinted at her. “I would appreciate an assassin right now. Put me out of my misery.”

She tried not to smile. The absinthe had left her with a slight headache, though she hadn’t been nearly so ambitious last night.

“You look terrible,” she said.

“Thank you.” Frowning, he stirred more sugar into his coffee. “Last night…”

“Yes?”

“I—I might have said too much. Blame it on the devil of drink.”

She sipped her chamomile tea. “After that much absinthe, I’m amazed you stayed awake for as long as you did.”

He glanced into her eyes. “You asked about my scars.”

Her fingers tightened around her teacup. “I did. Thank you, again, for telling me.”

“And after I told you…?”

She realized, then, what he meant. “You don’t remember?”

“No.”

Quietly, he straightened the silverware. She reached across the table and stilled his hand. When he looked at her, she smiled.

“You didn’t talk much more that night,” she said.

He tilted his head, a gleam in his eyes. “Should I regret not remembering?”

She snorted. “We were naked in bed together, but it wasn’t that scandalous. You fell asleep. I didn’t want to wake you.”

“Ah.” He smirked. “So you need some more scandal tonight.”

Her face burning, she returned his smirk and steered the conversation in a different direction. “You never did hear my secrets.”

“Oh? You have secrets?”

She raised her eyebrows at his teasing skepticism, then narrowed her eyes.

“Please,” she said. “Are you actually that arrogant? The world’s supply of mystery doesn’t belong to you and you alone.”

He leaned back and laughed. “I’m calling your bluff.”

“Go ahead.” She swigged some more tea. “My mother was a courtesan.”

“And you?” he said, still laughing. “What do I owe you for last night?”

Ardis’s stomach clenched, and she barely stopped herself from dumping the pitcher of water on the table all over his head.

“Clever, Wendel,” she growled through gritted teeth. “Don’t be such a bastard.”

“You can’t be serious.”

She glared at him.

“You are?” Wendel sucked in his breath through his teeth. “Please don’t kill me.”

“I’m thinking about it,” she deadpanned.

He studied her very intently. “How did…? Did you…?”

She smiled mysteriously.

“You never asked,” she said. “You have no idea where I’m from or why I’m here. Weren’t you even a little curious?”

He tilted his head downward and tried to look innocent.

“I may have been distracted,” he said, “by your skill with a sword. And your beauty.”

Blushing, she rolled her eyes. “Flatter me all you want, Wendel, but I still won’t tell you my secrets unless you behave yourself.”

He folded his hands on the table. “I told you my secrets.”

Not all of them, but she didn’t bother to point that out.

“I’m from San Francisco, California,” Ardis said. “When my mother came from China, she started a brothel and trained some Chinese girls to be sophisticated courtesans. Skilled in the arts of music, dance, and seduction.”

Wendel leaned closer, his eyes like saucers. “And you?”

She coughed. “God, Wendel, don’t look so eager. You said it yourself. I’m skilled with a sword. Not singing and dancing.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose. “When did it end? When you killed that man?”

Ardis finished her tea and put down the teacup with a decisive clink.

“He mistook me for one of the brothel girls,” she said. “No matter how many times I said no.” Her mouth felt dry, and she swallowed hard. “He threw money at me. Literally. Like that paid for what he tried next.”

Wendel never looked away from her eyes. “Ardis,” he said softly.

Under the scrutiny of his eyes, she flushed and stared at her fingernails.

Ardis hadn’t told anybody but her mother the whole story. She wasn’t sure she wanted to keep talking. But she could feel the unspoken words crammed in her throat. Choking her. She breathed in and squared her shoulders.

“You can’t blame me for killing him,” she said, and she sounded blasé.

“I don’t,” Wendel said.

She cleared her throat. “I could keep talking, but I don’t think any of it would be appropriate breakfast conversation.”

He dipped his head. “You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to.”

When their gazes met, she saw the worry in his eyes. And she understood exactly why he had been so hostile to her questions.

What had he said on the train?
I have no use for your pity.

He probably wasn’t even pitying her. But she didn’t think she could accept his concern, or if she could acknowledge her weakness.