Blood Spirits (22 page)

Then he opened his eyes, and stared at me uncomprehending. “
Gespenstisch
, Ruli,” he observed in a whisper.

“I'm not a ghost,” I said in German back to him. “I'm Kim.”

His eyes closed. He seemed to be processing. I could imagine how bad his head hurt by how long it was taking to grasp this fact.

“You got clocked by one of your marble poets. There was a fire.”

“A fire?” he repeated voicelessly, then struggled up on an elbow, his fine hair dark against his pale forehead. Thin, brittle lines of blood had matted into his hair, frozen into reddish-brown wires.

My stomach heaved, and I looked away. “Maybe you should lie down again.”

“I have to . . .” He lay back, his face pale and moist. He swallowed several times, obviously fighting nausea. “Shurisko?”

“He's right here. And three cats got out. I hope that's all you had,” I added.

“Three.” He winced, then made another effort, checking when he inadvertently put his elbow on one of the papers. It crackled, and he jerked his arm up, then fell back with a groan, his fingers scrabbling restlessly. “Tell me. What . . . happened.” He closed his eyes.

“A marble bookend fell on your head, I think. At least, I found it lying next to you, and you've got a huge knot right there behind your ear.”

He tried to shift, and halted when one of the papers crackled again. His eyelids flashed up and he froze. “What . . .”

“It's your sources. And the Project. I grabbed them when I went back for the cats. I had to stuff them in my shirt. Got kind of messed up. Sorry about that. Look, I couldn't find a phone, so I should go find someone, but I wasn't sure who I should get. I'm not even sure where your neighbors are—I don't want to get lost in the snow.”

His hands brushed over the diary, and touched a couple of the carbons, now creased and rumpled, a few, regrettably, from melted snow. His jaw lengthened with pain.

“Here. Let me help with that,” I said, and began to pick up the scattered papers. They were all still on the rug, but I didn't know how much longer it would stay dry. The snow beneath us had to be melting from our combined body heat. I scrambled the papers together then said, “Let's go. Your car is waiting.”

His voice was slightly stronger. “Garage?”

“Gone. But your car is in the driveway.”

He began to move, then fell back, his face blanching. He brushed his fingers over one knee, which was so swollen his jeans looked like a tube.

“I can't bend it,” he whispered.

“Get the other under you. I can pull you to your feet,” I said as I picked up the papers and once again stuffed them inside my shirt.

It took a couple of tries, his face so pale it was nearly green. He hauled himself up, and I pulled his arm over my shoulder. For a step or two he tried not to lean on me, but that changed fast. We staggered clumsily into the snow, followed by the anxious dog.

It seemed to take forever. Honoré's pace was slow, and a couple of times he stopped, either from dizziness or because he was compelled to look at the stone shell of his house, smoke billowing from every window and blending into the heavy snowfall.

At last we reached the car. He eased into the front, teeth gritted as he maneuvered his leg in. That knee had swollen into sausage-like distortion, and the cut on his head was bleeding again from his efforts. I hoped his skull wasn't fractured.

Shurisko leaped into the back, filling the entire space as I fell into the driver's seat. I cranked the engine. Warm air blasted from the heater. Within a minute the car began to smell like wet dog. “Where should we go?”

“Ridotski House. Go this way . . . past second house . . . left turn onto Mathilde Street.”

During the summer, it would have taken maybe a minute to get there. Possibly two. But the journey seemed endless, with me crouched white-knuckled over the steering wheel, as if proximity to the windshield would improve visibility. The car bumped over the snow well enough, but my progress was slower than an amble, I was so afraid of ramming into another car or a tree or even a house. I was so flustered it took forever for me to figure out how to navigate by the street lights. They seemed miles apart.

I wasn't sure I'd recognize the Ridotski place when we reached it, but Honoré took care of that. “Turn here,” he said, his voice slightly stronger. “Up the hill.”

I remembered that steep little hill. The car was a good one, but not a sleigh pulled by animals with sturdy hooves. It shuddered in the mass accumulation of white, then slid gently back down the hill as I spun uselessly at the wheel, until we came to rest against a snow bank that blocked the entire driver's side.

I killed the engine and clambered out the passenger door. Shurisko leaped past Honoré, prancing about anxiously. The car heat had wakened up the cuts all over my hands, which were stinging in little jabs of red heat.

Getting Honoré out of the car was tougher than getting him in. I wanted to leave him there and get help, but he insisted on going with me, so together we plodded grimly up the long white-shrouded driveway. The house seemed miles from the road, emerging at last from the white curtain. A puff of wind stirred the snow, and there was the front door, not twenty feet away. Fifteen. Thirteen. Nine. Trudge, trudge, and at last I reached for the knocker. My throat hurt. I discovered I was crying.

The door opened, and there was the shocked face of a housekeeper. A few moments later Beka appeared.

“What is this?” she exclaimed, then threw the door wide. “Enter!”

Shurisko galloped in, shedding snow in every direction.

A crowd of servants appeared behind Beka. At a gesture from her, two men took over from me. “Upstairs,” she said, “the yellow room.”

They helped Honoré toward the stairway to the left, leaving us to follow up in a long spiral. At the top, the housekeeper opened the door to the first room in a long hall, then yanked an embroidered satin bed-cover off the bed as the men eased Honoré down.

Beka gave me a questioning look.

I rejoiced at every sign of normalcy and got control of my shuddering breathing. My lungs still burned, and my breath smelled smoky. Or maybe it was my clothes. “There is a fire at his house.” I moistened dry lips. “Something fell on his head.”

Beka said quickly, “How bad is the fire?”

“Very.”

Beka turned to someone behind me. “Call the brigade.”

Footsteps ran off. The housekeeper had produced a cloth from somewhere and bent over Honoré. He clapped the cloth to his head and lay there, shivering. “Let me be.”

The dog bounded in and leaped on the bed.

Beka snapped her fingers. “Shurisko!”

Honoré gave out a groan of relief, holding out his hand, which the dog frantically licked as he trampled lovingly (and no doubt painfully) all over his human. But when Beka snapped her fingers a second time, Shurisko obediently leaped down, and sat, head at an alert angle, as if he was relieved that someone was in charge. Or maybe that was me, projecting my emotions onto the dog.

Beka ordered one of the guys to take Shurisko to the laundry to dry him off and feed him, then turned to me. “Kim, the guest bathroom is at the end of this hall. Make use of the bathrobe in there—it's fresh. You might want to get out of those clothes. I will be back shortly.”

She went out as I set the papers carefully on a little table against the far wall, out of the way.

The housekeeper, with a furtive, wondering glance at me, beckoned and led me to a bathroom that was the most modern thing I'd seen in this country. I shucked my clothes while the bath filled with steaming hot water. Soon I was soaking my aching body in stinging heat. The headache I hadn't even noticed began to throb less. The lassitude was such bliss I caught myself on the verge of falling asleep, and sat upright. Whoa.

I used the waiting shampoo and soap, then climbed out and wrapped myself in the bathrobe. It only came down to mid-calf (Beka was probably five one in heels), but it was warm and soft. I felt as heavy as a stone, and yawn after yawn seized me as I dried my hair, ran the waiting comb through it, and left it to hang down the back of the bathrobe.

From the guest room came a yell of pain, then Natalie Miller's familiar voice. “That's it. No more torture. Your kneecap was kicked out of alignment. You'll be glad to know I just fixed that. But it might be fractured, which would need more attention.”

Honoré muttered something, then Nat laughed. “No, now I'm going to wrap that sucker up, so breathe easy.”

Beka peeked out of Honoré's guest room. “Ah, Kim. There you are. Honoré wishes to speak to you.”

I joined them, intensely self-conscious in the bathrobe, though it covered more of me than the average evening gown would have. So much symbolism in clothing, I thought as I approached the bed, where Nat was laying out bandage stuff next to Honoré's leg. She'd already cut his jeans up to the thigh. The sight of his swollen, discolored knee made my stomach curl, and I looked away from it.

Honoré squinted at me past Nat's shoulder. Sweat stippled his face as he slowly unclenched his teeth, and his body relaxed incrementally. Nat had obviously given him some kind of pain killer.

His bloodshot eyes narrowed as he made an effort to speak, “I don't understand.”

“There was a fire,” I said. “I'm sorry about the house.” And to Nat, “I looked for a phone, but didn't find it. Do you have 911 here?”

“Fire brigade,” Nat said. “Beka called them.”

Too late
. But I wasn't going to say it.

Honoré whispered, “Cats . . . did you say the cats got out?”

“Three did,” I said, holding up three fingers, and he relaxed a little.

Beka said to Honoré, “What exactly were you doing?”

Honoré took a deep breath. “Showed her the Project. Smelled fire. Went to check. Don't remember anything more.”

His eyes closed as Nat finished bandaging his leg. She straightened up. “That will do until you can get your own doctor to look at you.” She turned to me. “How long was he out?”

“I don't know. It felt like hours, but it must have only been a few minutes.”

“How did you get him out?” Beka asked.

“Dragged him on a rug.”

Honoré opened his eyes again. “The Amaranth rug?”

“It was mostly reds.”

“Then it survived.”

Beka whispered to us, “The Amaranth rug is a family heirloom.”

“I left it lying there in the snow under the firs.”

Beka opened her hands. “That won't hurt it. But fire would.”

I didn't want to say that the rug was all he had left of his house, but from the faces around me, I was not the only one thinking it.

Nat said to Honoré, “You're definitely concussed.” Then to Beka, “I suggest getting some ice for his head. He needs to stay flat and quiet. His pupils are normal, at least, so we're ahead on that front, but we need to keep checking. And he needs to see a doc to make sure there isn't more damage under the hood.” She tapped her own skull. “As well as see to that.” A jerk of her thumb at his knee.

Beka said, “You hear, Honoré? You need to rest.”

Honoré's lips whitened. “I need to know what is happening . . .”

Beka hesitated, then gave a firm little nod. “Then we'll have something to eat in here. You may lie flat, we can check on you, and you can listen all you like. I'll make arrangements.”

She ran out, and Nat beckoned me out into the hall. She took up a station by the door so she could watch Honoré, and I stood at the other side. “You look like you lost something. Got an injury?” Nat asked softly.

“I'm wearing somebody else's bathrobe. And there's nothing to change into but my smoky clothes.”

“Relax. Bek's probably got her people on the hop with the laundry.”

“Okay.” I peeked in at Honoré. He lay quiet, his eyes closed, so I whispered, “Speaking of injury, I don't mean to stick my nose in your business, but shouldn't Honoré be hospitalized? Check that.
Is
there a hospital here?”

Nat grinned. “Sure is. Nice one. Or will be, when they finish redoing it. One of Alec's first projects. But by our standards, it's little more than a sanatorium.”

“What, the so-called guardian families can buy Maseratis but can't see their way clear to setting up a modern hospital?”

Nat laughed. “You sound like me when I first got here. Alec did get them a state-of-the-art x-ray setup, but no one would use it. You gotta remember how removed they are here. X-rays, in most people's views, are a cross between death rays and superstition. Wouldn't go near it. Had to get an ultrasound, and even then. . . .” She shrugged.

“Superstition!”

“Sometimes, a good part of any medical treatment is in the mind of the treatee. The fact is, there are only four of us doctors trained outside the country, and we all had to adjust to the realities here. We learn from the midwives and horse doctors, and they learn from us. So anyway, Beka will probably get their Dr. Kandras over here later on, and he'll feel the knee, and nod, and maybe throw in some Latin—though he usually doesn't try that on with the toff set, who've lived in the West. But Honoré will be happy if the guy says, ‘Stay off it and you'll heal.' Ah. Here they come. I could use a cuppa.”

Beka's servants appeared, one wheeling a cart loaded with food and two steaming pots. We stepped out of the way so they could go into the bedroom. On the other side of the bed was a coffee table with two armchairs. One servant loaded dishes onto the table as another fetched a pair of ladder-backed chairs.