Spiritwalker 3: Cold Steel (23 page)

The young man caught me looking. “Caught you this time, haven’t we? You’ll not escape
my uncle now he has taken an interest in you himself.”

I offered him a courtesy, to mock him. “My apologies about the horse.”

Despite my sword, the fool took a step toward me, a hand raised as if he believed
he could slap me.

“Enough, Jata,” said the mansa. “Do not touch her.”

The young mage turned away from me at once. “The village boy is close by, Uncle, I’m
sure of it. He doesn’t have the wit to hide, thinking himself so much better than
he is.”

“Your envy serves you ill, Jata,” said the mansa. “Go out and look again. Find him.”

The nephew’s eyes flared with anger, but he made no retort. Instead, he tramped out.

The mansa gestured toward my sword. “However curious I am about you, Catherine Barahal,
I will order my soldiers to kill you and your companions if you cannot bring me Andevai.”

Rory’s lips curled back. Bee took a step toward me.

I was not a fool. I lowered my blade. “Andevai is in the spirit world. Perhaps with
your help, I can get him back.”

The mansa laughed, but the djeli did not.

With a frown, the mansa reconsidered. “Bakary, is she telling the truth?”

“A mirror is the water that allows me to look onto the other side, Mansa,” said the
old man. “It should be possible to discover if she lies or speaks truth. Especially
since the mirror in this house is the mirror through which their marriage was chained.”

I had been racing down one path, thinking I might convince the mansa to convey us
to Haranwy. Like a noose at my throat, the djeli’s words yanked me to a halt.

“What do you mean, Honored One, that a mirror is the water?” I asked.

“It is not solid, like stone, and yet not lacking substance, like air. Therefore,
it is water, for we djeliw can see through it to the spirit world which lies both
beneath and above us.”

I caught Bee’s gaze with my own, looked down at the packs, and back up to her. Her
brow wrinkled as she grasped and considered my unspoken plan. I was playing a very
deep game of batey, about to try a hit whose arc would pass right over every person
near me with but a small chance of reaching the stone eye that was the goal.

Upstairs, the front door opened and closed. Footsteps approached.

A soldier appeared at the kitchen door. “Mansa! The legate has arrived.”

With a sucked-in hiss, Bee closed her hands into fists. We managed to grab the packs
before soldiers herded us up the stairs after the mansa. The chest, with most of Vai’s
dash jackets, had to be left behind, but fortunately no one seemed to notice that
my sword was still unsheathed. I wondered if they could see the blade now that the
mansa’s magic had faded.

In the entry hall the mansa greeted Amadou Barry and Lord Marius, speaking with his
own voice to equals. “It is good you came quickly. I have momentous news. I received
word this morning that General Camjiata has landed at Gadir.”

Bee and I glanced at each other as Lord Marius exclaimed, “At Gadir! He has returned
to Iberia! That is the news we feared most!”

Amadou Barry marked us as we climbed into view. His red-and-gold half-cape glistened
with raindrops, and made him look quite dashing. “Beatrice! I knew you would return
to me!”

Bee’s expression was one of the queenly pride that we of Kena’ani upbringing call
the Dido’s Fury, a womanly emotion associated with the famous story of the dido and
Aeneas, when the queen realized the untrustworthy Roman soldier of fortune had been
seeking to rule over her through marriage.

“Legate Amadou Barry! I did not expect to meet you here! Nor, indeed, was any meeting
with you a thing I desired, not after our last unfortunate encounter and the condescending
insult you offered me. I realize that a man of your exceedingly high position in the
world and your exceptional wealth and standing must look at a young woman such as
myself with disdain. You may consider my impoverished circumstances and Phoenician
connections to be marks against me which you are gracious enough to overlook. But
I assure you I am proud of who I am and where I come from. I was sorely mistaken in
what manner of man I thought you were. I now understand you are not the sort of man
on whom a vulnerable young woman is wise to cast her hopes.”

Every man except Rory was staring at Bee with expressions so broad that only actors
playing in a farce would have used such gaping mouths to express shocked surprise.
I choked down a laugh as I nudged Rory with my hip and indicated he should take the
packs to the stairs.

“Indeed, I am done with all of you lordly men!” Bee’s gaze flashed sideways to note
Rory’s movement, then back to her audience. “You believe you have the right to own
me merely because you wish to possess me. Some of you desire to control me because
I walk the dreams of dragons and others because you consider me beautiful. But I am
not your property to be handed about or exchanged according to
your
desire rather than my own. Be sure that I realize you are all far more powerful in
this world than I am, for I am only a young woman whose household has neither wealth
nor noble status to raise it into the ranks of those who stand on high and look down
upon the low. Be sure that I realize you could kill me, or arrest me, or forcibly
assault me, or purchase me from the elders of Hassi Barahal house if you offered them
a rich enough inducement or a frightening enough threat. We who are not protected
by wealth and high station are so vulnerable in the world, are we not?”

“You cannot be Beatrice Hassi Barahal!” Amadou Barry looked as if he had seen a poisonous
snake unexpectedly rearing up out of thick grass. “You are some manner of malevolent
spirit who has taken the form of an innocent girl.”

“Not as innocent as you would wish, Legate!” she said with a smoldering gaze that
made his face pinch as she looked him up and down in a frankly sexual way. “Did you
not murmur in the greenhouse that you wished to instruct me in the music of sweet
pleasure? That I would be an ‘apt pupil’ if only I let you take command of my heart
and my more intimate parts?”

Lord Marius whistled under his breath. “Ripe Venus! No wonder your courtship failed!”

It was all I could do not to burst out laughing at the way her erstwhile suitor’s
hands crushed into fists and his face tensed with anger at her plain speaking. I was
sure Bee felt my shaking, for she swept an axe-blow glance in my direction to warn
me to keep my peace.

“How was it you phrased it, Legate?” She tapped a finger against her perfect chin
as she glanced at the ceiling for inspiration. “What awkward poetic phrases did you
use to describe my—”

“You dare not mock me in this impertinent way.”

“I
am
mocking you, Legate. You considered me beneath you, and you meant that in so many
different ways. But I am not the woman you wish me to be. I never was.”

She dismissed Amadou Barry with a proud lift of her chin and settled her implacable
gaze on the mansa of Four Moons House. He was staring at her with an expression of
outright astonishment, but I could see the beginnings of a condescending smile pull
at his lips. The clock ticked over and rang six bells. No one moved until the last
echo of the sixth bell died away.

“You may think me amusing, Mansa,” she said, “for I must suppose you are now thinking
I am a fiery little lass ripe for plucking by a strong man in his prime. But I do
not find you amusing, nor do you awe me, you and your cold magic. You would have murdered
my dearest cousin just for the sake of getting hold of my dreams.”

“I do what I must,” he said, with a frown at her rebuke. “You do not understand the
consequences.”

“
I
do not understand the consequences? My dearest cousin is the
one who would have died, had your command been carried out. I would have been forced
to marry a man against my will, and been cast into your House as a prisoner. You couldn’t
have protected me from the Wild Hunt regardless. I would have been dismembered and
my head thrown in a well. So don’t tell me that I am the one who does not understand
the consequences.”

Rory had moved halfway up the stairs, while I stood on the first step. Bee unlaced
the basket and pulled out the skull. There was a struggling silence, broken at last
by Lord Marius.

“Whose skull is that?”

“This?” she asked with a flutter of eyelashes. “This is the skull of my mother-in-law.”

“Did you smite her dead with a scolding lecture?” the soldier asked with a laugh.

“Married!” Amadou Barry’s face was cut with a look of sheer jealous rage. He took
a step toward her, but Lord Marius fastened a hand on his arm, halting him. “Who married
you?”

Bee ignored him. “I did not smite her. I rather liked her, and I believe she rather
liked me, although we did not have the leisure to come to know each other well before
the unpleasant incident in which she died. I show this to you, Mansa, to let you know
that legally you have no grounds to force me to your will. I am a
nitaino
—a noble woman of independent means—in the Taino kingdom. No court and not even my
family can use the threat of legal possession over me now. I have standing under Taino
law.”

“How did your mother-in-law die?” I asked.

“Why, thank you for asking, Cat.” She swept them with a combative gaze. “The Wild
Hunt killed her on Hallows’ Night. They dismembered her and threw her head in a well.”

“Bright Jupiter!” muttered Amadou Barry.

When she pressed a hand to her delicate throat, they all flinched.

“Cold mages are themselves at risk of being hunted down on Hallows’ Night. I understand
it is the reason mage Houses are reluctant to rise to positions of political power
in the world. Power draws the Hunt as scent draws hounds.”

Amadou Barry and Lord Marius gave each other startled looks. They had clearly never
known there might be a hidden reason the
mage Houses did not set themselves up as princes and emperors in their own right.

The mansa had not gained control of Four Moons House by being impulsive, thoughtless,
crude, or impatient, but even his temper had its limits. “These secrets are not yours
to share.”

“Who is to stop me from sharing them?” exclaimed Bee. “Will you kill me right now
with your magic? Crush me with cold? Shatter me like iron?”

Ice crackled across the tabletop. Bee smiled so gloatingly that had that smile been
turned on me, I would have slapped her; it had happened, on one of the rare occasions
when we fought.

“I would have you stop and consider one thing before you act, Mansa,” she said.

“What we thought was a log has revealed itself as a crocodile,” remarked Bakary.

“I expect you mean to tell us, Maestressa, for you have quite the storyteller’s gift,”
said Lord Marius appreciatively.

“My thanks,” she said with a pretty courtesy. “Queen Anacaona died because the Wild
Hunt must take blood on Hallows’ Night. Because I was hidden from the Wild Hunt, Queen
Anacaona was taken in my place. Isn’t that a thing you would like to know how to do,
Magister?”

“Die in your place?” said the mansa.

Bee laughed with genuine amusement at his jest. “Would you willingly die in my place,
to spare me?”

His smile flashed. Its easy charm shocked me. One could never look at the mansa and
see him as anything except a man of exceptional status and self-confidence, because
he lived at the pinnacle of rank and wealth. I had not known the man had a sense of
humor, or was able to laugh at himself. The obvious had blinded me: All along Vai
had modeled his arrogant behavior on the mansa’s, because Vai had been trying to be
like the man who commanded his life.

“You intend to trade the secret of how you hid from the Wild Hunt in exchange for
your freedom,” said the mansa. “How like a Phoenician!”

“I have not relinquished my claim to her!” cried the legate.

The mansa looked Amadou Barry up and down in a way that
reminded me of Vai at his most obnoxiously cutting. “Legate, I mean no offense, but
to offer to make a woman your mistress is not a claim. I will offer her a legal standing
within Four Moons House while you are merely demanding she gratify your sexual desire
for her.”

“I will marry her! She belongs to me!”

“I do not belong to you, Amadou!” cried Bee so indignantly that a suspicion flowered
that she still retained a partiality toward the man. “Perhaps I do not want to marry
any man. Perhaps I no longer see marriage as a contract that can benefit me. Look
at my poor dear cousin, chained to a man against her will. Is this all I am to be
allowed to hope for? I have decided it is not.”

“Yes, quite magnificent,” Lord Marius said with a shade too much sarcasm for my liking.
“You can’t marry her, Amadou. The day after tomorrow you are to marry the prince of
Tarrant’s daughter. I shall have to take charge. You are all dazzled by her fabled
beauty, as the Hellenes of old squabbled over a woman and all for her cherry lips
and fulsome bosom—”

“In fact,” I corrected, “Helen was the heiress to Sparta, a splendidly rich kingdom.
They were fighting over her inheritance, not her beauty.”

“—but I am not willing to lose the war we are fated to fight because of a squabble
over a woman. If we do not use her gift of dreaming, then General Camjiata will. You
all know I have no interest in her comely person, so I will take her into my custody
until we have sorted out how to best make use of her dreaming to defeat Camjiata.”

“Very well, Lord Marius, I surrender most humbly and gratefully, knowing I am to be
well kept by such notable personages as yourselves,” she said, wielding the blade
of sarcasm. “I must say, at least General Camjiata pretended to give me a choice.
There is something about the illusion that makes one like a man better for the sake
of his wishing to be polite. Yet what can a poor young female do in circumstances
such as mine? I will languish in the cage of your making and never learn those things
I dream of learning. Meanwhile, naturally, you will find my lips are sealed and my
secrets untold. The mansa will never learn how I hid from the Wild Hunt in a way cold
mages might also protect themselves.”