Brood of Bones (15 page)

I felt immoral appreciating the spectacle of my estate. Although I kept my gaze down, I could not help but hear the bees and glimpse the reds of my hibiscus gardens. Nor could I avoid the agony of the marble splendor of the stair in the entrance hall, or daylight streaming onto gilded hand railings from windows with diamond-shaped panes.

“Mister Obenji,” I asked, “has the Bright Palm arrived?”

“A boy has been sent to escort him here, Elder Enchantress Hiresha.”

“Excellent. Now, if the Bright Palm asks, you must attest that Lady Sri is fifty-eight years old.”

“Why, the Lady Sri is even younger than I thought.”

“Do not persuade me of your senility, Mister Obenji. She is seventy-four. However, the Bright Palm cannot know it, or he will not heal her.”

“He would let such a lady die? Have they no mercy?”

“Bright Palms lack all feeling and act in accordance with a set of tenets. They heal neither the elderly, nor the rich.”

“I admit, Elder Enchantress Hiresha, I feel a measure of apprehension.”

“I have planned what to say. You need only support me.”

“And I will do so gladly,” he said. “Ah, I believe I see the Bright Palm on the path.”

I squinted out the window into the gardens, yet even after rubbing my eyes, I failed to distinguish the Bright Palm from the gardeners.

Mister Obenji adjusted his turban and strode out the doors. “Greetings, Lustrous Bright Palm, and welcome to Sunchase Hall.”

A man wearing sackcloth halted his march before the steps leading up to the doors. His fingertips glowed. “I must go no farther,” he said. “Anyone living in such a prison of decadence could have no use of my blessing. I would not doom their soul to more years of luxury.”

His slack gaze fell on me, and he spoke in his monotone.

“Hope remains for even
your
most stifled of souls, Hiresha of Morimound. Liberate yourself of wealth. The Order of the Innocent will accept its burden for you. Then you may receive my blessing.”

“It is not I who needs healing, Bright Palm. My destitute guest is dying.”

Mister Obenji said, “You must help her. She would not even have the coin for a funeral.”

“This woman, she is a relative?”

“No,” I said, “and her family would not accept her. She is cast out and without support.”

The Bright Palm took the stair’s first step then paused. “She has your support, and you are condemned.”

“She may stay under this roof,” Mister Obenji said, “but she is fed only rice and beans.”

“I promise to throw her out onto the streets,” I said, “at the first available opportunity.”

The Bight Palm walked through the doors. “Take me to this worthy soul.”

I felt uncomfortable beside the Bright Palm, aware of his uncanny strength. Even with eyes turned away, I could point out his direction; the power flowing in his veins created a sensation of pressure in my skull.

As we arrived in the sickroom, Sri the Once Flawless cried out. “Mister Obenji! What a pleasure to see you again.”

“We have come with help, Lady Sri.” He knelt beside the bed, and she gave his nose a playful squeeze.

The Bright Palm touched the silk sheets. “I disapprove of this as a place of healing.”

“I will have flax blankets sent for, straight away,” Mister Obenji said.

The Bright Palm’s face stayed neutral as he looked down at Sri. “How many winters has she lived?”

Mister Obenji said, “She’s youthful at fifty-eight.”

“She appears older,” the Bright Palm said.

“The sun has aged her skin prematurely,” I said. “She deliberated her days away on the God’s Eye Court.”

“I believe she has lived more than sixty years,” the Bright Palm said. “Her time has been spent.”

Sri wailed, yet the Bright Palm seemed not to hear her as he turned to leave. He would have departed by the time I thought of something to say.

Mister Obenji defied his own aged body and leapt in front of the Bright Palm. “You must heal her. She carries a child who will never live a single year of life unless you intervene.”

I believed the Bright Palm considered, although his face gave little sign of it. He said, “Expose the wound.”

Sri held the covers over herself. “Not in front of Mister Obenji!”

“Worry not, Lady Sri,” he said, kneeling beside her and taking her hand, “I will gaze only into your beautiful eyes.”

Maid Janny lifted the covers, and the Bright Palm laid his hand on Sri’s swollen hip. White light pulsed down the veins of his arm, spreading from fingertips until his hand held such power that I could see it even with my eyes closed. The light leaked into Sri, her bluish skin turning pink, and the bruises shrank.

“Sri,” I asked, “why did you rise and break your hip anyway, instead of sensibly staying in bed?”

“Heehee.”
She touched one of the curled ends of Mister Obenji’s white mustache. “Maybe I saw someone worth falling for.”

Thrusting my chin outward in disgust, I glanced back to her most prominent feature and thought of the unchild growing inside her like a bone tumor. “Bright Palm, I will donate twenty gold pieces to your Order, if you direct
your
magic into her womb.”

The light flowed deeper inside her, tracing paths to her heart and down again, pooling in her womb’s nutritive sac. It percolated farther, the pattern of veins blurring white in her abdomen; I planned to analyze the sight in my laboratory.

“There is nothing there to heal,” the Bright Palm said. “I have completed the blessing.”

Their magic worked in an imprecise manner, strengthening the body to mend its own wounds. Apparently, Sri’s constitution did not know where to begin with the unchild.

I pursued the Bright Palm on his way out of my manor, to guarantee he did not abscond with any small treasures, “for my own good.” As he approached the front doors, Spellsword Deepmand said, “You have done a good deed, Bright Palm.”

“I serve the Innocent,” he said.

The doors opened onto the view of a man riding a horse up the gravel path. I recognized him by his satin coat as the fop ambassador.

“Enchantress Hiresha,” he said, “I hope you have not corrupted this simple Bright Palm with your gold. We wealthy are such a poor lot.”

“Those of my order may handle gold safely,” the Bright Palm said. “We are immune to avarice.”

“And for that,” the fop said, “you paid no more than your humanity.”

The Bright Palm regarded him with a statue’s gaze. The fop withstood it, his hands resting in an overly relaxed manner on his saddle horn, although his horse stiffened as if preparing to bolt.

The Bright Palm said, “The richness of your clothes speaks to the poverty of your soul.”

“A respectable soul of good quality costs entirely too much to maintain,” the fop said, “and I find your clothes pretentiously poor.”

My brows lifted in astonishment. I always had wished to say something similar but had never done so, and I wondered how the Bright Palm would react. Of course, he lacked the ability to take offense at the slight.

As if he had not heard the insults, the Bright Palm marched down the hibiscus path and away from the manor.

“Ambassador,” I said, “you waste your breath arguing with a Bright Palm. Their minds are intractable.”

“To sway opinion should never be the motive of argument. I argue only for pleasure.”

“A most impractical philosophy.
Ambassador, since you were not invited to Sunchase Hall, you may now leave.”

“I came after witnessing the parade you gathered at the God’s Eye. You do know that nothing good
will come
of those full bellies.”

Narrowing my eyes, I wondered if he could know of the unchildren. His tone had been calm, not at all conspiratorial, as if he merely had a low opinion of infants in general. “I find your flippancy offensive,” I said. “Deepmand, inform Mister Obenji to never allow this person on my property again.”

“With pleasure, Elder Enchantress.”

“In that case, Enchantress Hiresha,” the fop said, “I will await you at the High and Dry Inn. You have the power to see everything, while I know everything but see nothing. Together, we have much to discuss.”

Again, the rapscallion presumed to invite me to his quarters. Wishing I could demonstrate my offense with a sharp heel turn, I dragged my gowns around and into the manor.

Once the doors shut behind us, Janny said, “He’s a handsome gent, isn’t he?”

“He powders his face,” I said, “a sign of lasciviousness and deceit.”

“I have noticed,”
she
said, “that women here paint their faces.”

“Painting is entirely different.
Quite respectable.”

“Of course.”
She grinned in a most childish fashion. “Also noticed he sweated under all his fancy yarns. You should meet him and discuss how stifling clothes can be, ask if he might suggest a way to find relief.”

“Maid Janny!”

“I could ask him for you, if you’d like.”

“Your effrontery is only surpassed by your impropriety. Now, if you will assist me, I must contemplate.”

We had reached my guest room, and Janny helped secure my arms to the harness to facilitate my sleeping. Although embarrassment had accelerated my heart rate, I required only a hundred seconds before I lifted into my laboratory.

I reviewed the portion of the fop’s conversation when he had mentioned the women’s “full bellies.” No guilt or shame disturbed his face then, too little emotion at all to suggest he knew more than he should about their wombs’ unwelcome guests.

For the remainder of my sleep, I prepared myself mentally to meet Salkant of the Fate Weaver and his non-pregnant daughter.

The priest had shed his yellow and black robes to work bare-chested in his vineyards. Over his sweat-glistening potbelly dangled a wonder, a paragon diamond. The size of a strawberry, this emperor of jewels threw specks of prismatic light over the moist dirt and green grape leaves. The priest pruned the vines, shears clutched in his partially amputated fingers.

“I know you bargained with a Feaster,
Flawless
,” he said accusingly. “A scorpion-tailed spider revealed it in her web.”

“It did?” I could think of nothing better to say.

“I studied the silk prophecies, in which your pattern lies always at the center.
But because you will prevent the Seventh Flood, or provoke it?
I realized I could not be certain.”

The priest’s words stung me and increased the temperature within my gowns from broil to roast. Under my breath, I said, “I am not the Flawless.”

I stood on the path at the edge of the vineyard, unable to approach Priest Salkant, as the vines tied to wicker supports grew too close together to allow my gowns clearance. And I would not be seen walking on dirt.

“I judged the Feaster innocent,” I said.

“They never are.”

“Innocent of involvement in the mass pregnancies.
I solicited his reconnaissance in exchange for a postponement of his sentence. The transaction was both reasonable and upright.”