The Drowning City: The Necromancer Chronicles Book One (6 page)

Their food arrived and inside the tavern musicians began to play, deep drums and a woman’s ululating voice. Blue lantern-light
glittered on the cutlery and washed Adam’s face cold and gray.

“How did you meet Kiril?” Isyllt finally asked, picking at the arrangement of rice and fish on her plate. She should have
asked sooner, but she’d spent too much time during the voyage hiding in her cabin. He studied her for a moment, head tilted.
She found herself mimicking the gesture and distracted herself with a rice ball.

“I came to Erisín when I was young,” he said. “Just a stupid orphan brat—I thought I could make a living picking pockets,
become as good a thief as Magpie Mai, or some nonsense like that.” He snorted and sipped his wine.

“I was damned lucky Kiril found me, or I’d have wound up in a cell, or the bottom of the Dis. He helped me find work I was
better suited for.” He touched the hilt of his sword. “So I owe him.”

Isyllt’s mouth twisted. “He always did like taking in strays.” She glanced down and found her goblet empty. Condensation glistened
on the curve of the flagon—chilled, but the wine burned going down and kindled a pleasant warmth in the stomach. She refilled
her cup, let the sweet plum vintage ease the bitter taste in her mouth. Adam watched her, waiting.

The next cup emptied the pitcher and the waiter appeared to replace it. When he was gone, her bitterness began to leak.

“He found me when I was fifteen. Not thieving, but bad enough. Selling charms to pay for a tenement room with three other
girls. I was too stubborn to ask the temple of Erishal to take me in.” She shook her head at half-forgotten pride. “But Kiril
found me, offered me training without the temple vows. I’ve studied with him for twelve years.” She drained the last of her
cup in a single swallow. It was enough of an answer, but she couldn’t stop the rest from spilling out.

“I don’t think he ever imagined I’d fall in love with him. Neither of us did.”

Adam blinked. “What happened?”

Her laugh was soft and ugly. But she might as well finish it now. “Three years ago I finally said something, when he realized
I wasn’t a child anymore.” Though perhaps she’d been wrong about that. “And it worked. We were happy.”

Adam sipped more wine and speared a twisted creation of raw fish and seaweed, finishing it in two bites. “But not anymore?”

The quiet curiosity of the question nearly undid her. She’d grown used to the feigned grief and relentless probing of the
court gossips, and her friends had learned not to ask. She glanced aside, stared at the canal lapping gently below them.

“Did he tell you what happened last summer?” she asked. Her cheeks were flushed, from wine or embarrassment she wasn’t sure.
At least she wasn’t going to cry.

Adam shook his head. “I heard of the plague, but I was in the north that season. Kiril didn’t say anything about it.”

“The plague, yes.” Such a small word to hold so much horror and grief. “The bronze fever. It tore through the city, all the
way to the palace. The queen fell sick. The king begged Kiril to save her, and he tried.” Her voice felt cold and dead in
her mouth. “He tried until his heart gave out, but she died all the same. I thought he was dead too—”

Lanterns swayed in the breeze, rippling blue and violet light across the balcony. Isyllt swallowed against the tightness in
her throat, concentrated on the press of corset stays as she breathed. She hadn’t told this story before, not in so much detail.

“He recovered, but he wasn’t the same. We waded through death to the knees every day, but it finally came too close. And he
said…He said I was too young to nurse an old man to his grave. I argued, but he put me aside. We fought for a year. And now
he’s sent me away, far enough that I can’t play the termagant.”

She smiled, bright and bitter, and shook her head. “And that’s the whole of it, mawkish as a bad play.”

They sat in silence for a time, music and laughter and water swirling around them. “I’m sorry,” Isyllt said at last. “You
didn’t need to hear all that. But as I said, I know what we’re here to do, and my feelings won’t interfere.”

Adam only nodded.

She glanced at the nearly empty flagon and blinked. “Black Mother. Lucky I haven’t made more of a fool of myself than I have.”

“Eat some more,” Adam said, nudging the plate toward her. “Then we can walk it off.”

Isyllt shivered in spite of the heat as they left the tavern, wrapping her silk shawl over bare shoulders. Wine burned in
her blood, stung her cheeks. Corset stays pressed against her ribs, and she wasn’t sure more food had been a good idea.

Moonlight shimmered on rooftops, glittered on the water. The city was full of spirits tonight. Or maybe it always was, and
she only now heard them. Not ghosts, but water creatures, jungle creatures, flitting and whispering in voices she couldn’t
understand. She paused, eyes closed, and let the strange sounds wash over her. The ground spun beneath her.

Adam’s hand closed on her arm and she opened her eyes. “Are you all right?” he asked. His calloused fingers were warm against
her clammy skin and she fought not to sway on her feet.

Very lucky not to have made more of a fool of herself.

“Can you feel them?”

His smile stretched lopsided. “Some of them. Not like you do. I hear them sometimes, the louder ones.”

She cocked her head, studied the play of shadows over his face. “Are you a witch?” she asked, even though she caught no hint
of power under his skin. But the way he moved, alert as a mage…

“Not even a little. Charms are Xin’s job. I just kill things.”

She looked down at his hand, let her vision unfocus. Colors blossomed around him, deep forest greens and grays, swirled red
and black around his hands and sword. “You’re good at it.”

“I am.” For an instant his eyes gleamed green-gold like an animal’s and a sharp-toothed shadow hung over his.

“What are you?” she whispered. “Not just an orphan brat.”

He smiled a wolf’s smile. “Tier Danaan. Half-breed, at least.”

Isyllt blinked, colors fading. Adam was just a man again—a man she was leaning on drunkenly in the middle of the street. She
straightened and took a step back. “I’ve never met one before.”

“People in civilized places usually haven’t.” He started walking and she fell in beside him. “I wasn’t raised among the Tier.”
The careful flatness in his voice warned her away from the subject.

They crossed an arching bridge over one of the broad canals that bordered the districts; someone sang from a passing skiff
below. The breeze tugged strands of Isyllt’s hair free of their pins, stuck them to her sweat-damp shoulders. And they called
this the dry season.

Descending the bridge steps, Isyllt tripped on an uneven stone. Adam caught her before she fell. The streetlamp’s glow revealed
a crack in the rock, several inches deep.

“The street is sinking,” Adam said, pointing down the side of the canal where the pavement sloped sharply toward the water.

“Lovely. Let’s hope it doesn’t finish the job tonight.”

The streets in Straylight were narrow and cracked and the houses tilted drunkenly, some leaning so close their gardens grew
together. Wards dripped from shop signs, shimmered in windows and doorways. Many lamps were out, only a few puddles of orange-gold
glow marking their way. Someone stirred in the blackness of an alley, racked with a consumptive’s cough. Isyllt heard death
waiting in that wet rattle.

A trio of young men passed them, armed and swaggering. Isyllt felt their angry stares and her fingers twitched. Adam’s hand
settled lightly on his sword hilt. “I think we’ve outstayed our welcome,” she whispered. She traced a careful charm in the
air—
not worth it.
The men kept walking.

She and Adam turned a corner onto another well-spelled lane. The street marker had been broken off its post, an octagonal
wooden sign nailed in its place. A lantern swayed above it, rippling light and shadow over Sivahran letters.

“What does that say?” Isyllt asked.

“Salt Street. I’d guess it also translates to
No Assari welcome
.”

“Or any other foreigners.”

The spirits were quiet here. Warded away, or frightened. Isyllt heard human voices instead, raised in emotion. A woman stood
in the street, arguing in Sivahran with an older woman framed in a shop door. The old woman spat in the gutter and slammed
the door as they approached.

“That,” Adam murmured in Isyllt’s ear, “was nothing polite.”

The woman in the street sobbed angrily, shoulders slumping. She turned toward them and light fell over her face—the customs
inspector from the
Mariah
.

“Miss Xian-Mar?” Isyllt stepped closer; the woman’s eyes were swollen and shining, but she wasn’t crying now.

She blinked, dragged a hennaed hand through her unbound hair. “Lady Iskaldur.” She straightened, tugging at her coat.

“Are you all right?” Impossible not to feel the black worry that hung over the woman like a pall.

“My niece is ill. She needs help, but that
jhanda
—Forgive me. The witches won’t help me.”

“Is there no physician you can go to?”

“It’s no longer an ailment for medicine.” Her voice was calm now, but her face was ashen and her hands twisted together.

Isyllt paused for several heartbeats. “Can I be of some assistance?”

Anhai’s eyes flickered toward Isyllt’s left hand. “Lady, I couldn’t impose on you for a family problem.” Her voice cracked.

“What’s wrong with your niece?”

Anhai stopped arguing and started walking, Isyllt and Adam trailing along. “It started as a simple fever. A common childhood
complaint, rarely serious…I was taking care of her while her mother was away.” She shook her head, a wealth of anger and fear
in that gesture.

“And it’s beyond the physicians now?” Isyllt shivered. “I’m a mage, but I have no miracles for you.” Kiril had tried that,
and she’d seen the good it did.

“Not beyond—outside. A ghost found her, slipped through my wards, and now I can’t cast it out again.”

Isyllt smiled. “Ghosts I can handle.”

Anhai’s house sat on the far side of Jadewater, in a quiet, well-kept neighborhood past the temple spires. Isyllt recognized
the reek of illness and anger and death before the woman led them up the steps. She felt the ghost as they crossed the threshold,
felt strength and madness. A shudder crawled down her back and her blood quickened.

An old woman opened the door for them, gray hair tousled beneath her scarf. She stared at Isyllt and Adam.

“How is she?” Anhai asked.

“No better. Her mother is with her now.”

Adam caught Isyllt’s arm, pulled her close. “How dangerous is this?”

She shrugged and tugged free of his grip. At least the hall wasn’t spinning. “Take me to her,” she said to Anhai.

The girl lay on a narrow bed, curtains and blankets pulled back. A pleasant cluttered room—toys piled on shelves and books
and quills scattered across the low desk, but the specter’s presence filled the room like rank fog, drained it of warmth and
color. Salt lined the windows and door, but it was too little too late. Another woman sat beside the bed, gray and drawn,
henna-streaked hair in tangles around her face.

“What’s her name?” Isyllt asked, leaning over the bed. The girl looked no more than ten or eleven, darker skinned than the
other women but ashen now. Sweat-damp curls clung to her face and sprawled across the pillow. Bruise-shadowed eyes were closed
and her narrow chest rose and fell too fast.

“Lilani.” The other woman looked up, eyes widening as she saw Isyllt. “Who are you?”

“A mage.” She crouched beside the girl, brushed a hand against her fevered brow. The child twitched but didn’t wake. “You’re
her mother?”

She nodded. “Vienh Xian-Lhun. Please, Lady, if you can help—The ghost is inside her now. She’s fighting, but…”

Isyllt nodded. It lay like a seething shadow below the girl’s skin. “Do you know who it is?”

Silence filled the room, save for Lilani’s labored breath.

“My grandmother,” Vienh said at last. “Deilin Xian.” She licked cracked lips. “We knew she hadn’t had the proper rites—her
body was lost—but I never imagined…” She shook her head angrily. “The house was warded, rot it! The whole damned city is supposed
to be warded.”

“Do you have more salt?” Isyllt asked Anhai. The woman nodded and darted down the hall. “Brush those seals away,” she told
Vienh, jerking her head toward the window and door. “They’re worthless now.”

The woman did it, fast and efficient, while Isyllt leaned over Lilani again. The girl’s skin burned dangerously hot, and they
had no time for ice and cold compresses. Ghostlight flickered in the black diamond and a chill washed through the room. Lilani
sighed, hair scratching on the pillow as she turned her head. Her eyes flickered, showing Isyllt bloodshot whites and amber
irises.

She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she held. Just a fever. Not the plague. The room swam as urgency warred with wine
in her blood. She’d never tried an exorcism drunk before.

Anhai returned with a jar of salt. Isyllt ran white crystals through her fingers, letting their clean strength reassure her.
“Shakera. Anhai, Vienh, leave the room. Please,” she added as Anhai’s eyebrows climbed toward her hair.

“Why?” Vienh crossed wiry arms, dark eyes narrowing.

“Because you’re both the ghost’s blood, yes?” They nodded. “And when I draw her out of Lilani, she may try this with either
of you. And I don’t want to do this three times in a row.”

They relented, retreating into the hall. “Adam, come here.” He came, warily. “Have you ever been part of an exorcism before?”

“Yes. I didn’t enjoy it.”

“I doubt this will be any more pleasant. Help me move the bed.”

They dragged the heavy wooden frame away from the wall, until Isyllt had enough room to trace a circle of salt around bed
and child. “Sit with her,” she told Adam.

He propped Lilani up in his lap, leaning her head against his chest and stroking her hair when she moaned. He knew what he
was doing, thank all the powers. Isyllt swallowed, her stomach clenching.