Page 15 of A Trade of Blood

I studied the man’s aged face carefully. This fellow, then, was Castus’s uncle. I sighed inwardly: more than half of this damned investigation would probably be figuring out all the relations tangled up in this gentry feud. I sniffed my vial and began to build two family trees in my mind: one for the Buravs, the other for the Armentas.

“You are all unmanageable!” snarled the custodi princeps at the crowd. “I am half tempted to lock you both up for disturbing the peace!”

At that, I strode forward and said, “I agree. You should do so.”

The custodi princeps did a double take. All eyes locked upon me as I walked out to join him.

“I am Signum Dinios Kol,” I said, calmly but loudly, “of the Special Division of the Imperial Iudex. I am taking control of this investigation. You may all leave.”

There was a stunned silence. Then the Burav crowd shouted and jeered atme.

I stood up to my full height and placed a hand on the locking hiltof my sword. “You may leave,” I said, “because Castus Armenta is now in my protection, because it is my investigation now. If anyone were to attack or harm him—or attempt to free him from my custody by force of arms—they would be interfering with an individual implicated in a formal Iudex investigation. This crime is often met with a short trial, and a short rope.” I tapped the herald of the eye within the box pinned to my breast, indicating that I was an engraver. Then I carefully stared about at every one of the drovers surrounding me. “I shall remember all your faces, all your stances, all your words. I will remember themforever.I ask you, then, not to do anything foolish in my presence. I cannot forget it, so I cannot let it go unmet.”

The crowd hesitated, uncertain. This was an old trick I had learned from an elder engraver: people did not like being aware that their faces and actions were being recorded by the Empire, and found themselves reluctant to hang about someone so altered. They often forgot, of course, that these were but memories, and I could do little with them alone—and they also forgot, thankfully, that all such recorded experiences could be permanently destroyed simply by parting my head from my shoulders.

How ironic it felt then: though I’d just been bemoaning the punishments of my alterations, now I brandished them to cow these fools.

“I’ve already spoken to Burilis Burav,” I called to them. “He withdraws from the city as we speak. As folk of his house, you should do the same.” I gave the Armenta warrior a hard look. “Indeed, all should do so.”

The Armenta warrior blinked, taken aback by my intrusion, then nodded. “I will. If the Iudex claims Castus’s custody, I will step down.”

“Then we are done here.” I turned back to the crowd. “Unless some truly wished for violence?”

There was a fraught silence. Then, reluctantly, the crowd of Buravs slowly began to depart.

The custodi princeps waited until most of the crowd had shuffled away. Then he sighed and muttered, “Titan’s taint! I was damnedsure we’d have blood there, and most of it mine!” He looked me over. “That was skillfully done. Are you always able to get folk to stand down like that, Signum?”

“No,” I said honestly. “It often goes much more poorly than that.” I bowed to him. “I apologize that we weren’t formally introduced, sir.”

“No need,” he said, mopping his brow. “There’s nothing formal about this day. Though I’d not have the Iudex arrive to find all my city filled up with brigands clamoring to start a gentry war! That’s a black mark against me and mine.” He doffed his leather hat and bowed. “Princeps Atun Seriv, canton custodi.”

“There’s no black mark, sir. You did well to hold them off as long as you did.”

“You’ve already been to the inn, then? Seen the body?”

“We have. I came to speak to Castus Armenta directly about the event.” I turned to the Armenta warrior, who still stood before the door of the jail. “I note you remain, sir. Who are you?”

“Trikao Armenta,” he said. “Uncle to Castus Armenta. I tarry here only to see if there is some way I could help clear Castus’s name of guilt…” He leaned on his lance like an old man on his cane. “But, I admit, I can think of very little.”

“You can’t offer anything to dispute his crime, sir?”

“I wasn’t here,” he said. “I don’t know what happened—beyond what everyone claims, which is that the boy is guilty as sin.” He removed his helmet. Though his beard was white and full, his pate was as bald as an egg. Then he squinted at me. “Ho, there! Have…is there a chance we have met before, Iudex?”

I paused, puzzled. “I doubt it, sir. I would, ah, remember you.”

“Of course you would, given your nature…Hm. Still, I find something familiar in your face…” He shook his head. “But, no. I can’t comprehend this crime—what young Castus was doing, or why. It’s a great tragedy. He is my sister’s last! To hear he was consorting with a Burav girl—and that hemurderedher in some fit of pique…I am aged ten years by this day, I swear.”

“What might you mean, your sister’s last?” I asked.

Trikao looked at me warily, then glanced at Seriv. “I…take it the signum’s not from here.”

Princeps Seriv shook his head. “I doubt the Empire told him much at all. Beyond that war was about to break out between you lot and the Buravs.”

“That’s so,” I said. “If you’ve more details, I’d be eager to hear them.”

Trikao’s air of weariness grew to despair. “Ohh,” he murmured. “Strange, to have someone not know something that hangs over me so heavily…and especially given all the poisonous gossip that washes about this canton.” He ran his knuckles through his white beard and looked at me. “My sister Velona is head of our clan. Her children were to inherit her spreads—her lands—when her passing came. Yet three of her four children have perished in the past three years. And now the last, young Castus, is locked up within. That’s why I stand here—Imust protect the last inheritor. Even when he is accused of such a horror.”

There was a dense silence as I absorbed this.