Page 54 of A Trade of Blood

“She won’t be able to keep water down until she’s giventreatments,” I said gently. “I’ll have a medikker come tend to her immediately. For now—Iunderstand she says she saw something last night?”

The kitchen maid nodded, her face as pale as fresh milk. “Yes, sir. There…there was a man here last night. Standing outside. Skulking about, on the northern side of the house. I saw him, sir.”

I stooped to put myself on the same level as her. “When?”

“Don’t know, sir. It was before young Zansay’s funeral rites, I know that. But I saw him creeping up the lawn. Stuck to the shrubbery wall, like he was hiding. It was…” She coughed mightily. “…strange.”

“Did you get a decent look of him?”

“I did, sir. Which is what’s so strange, I think. Because at first he moved like a burglar, sneaking up. But then he got close to the house, and he strode out toward the servants’ door. Then he stopped and looked at the windows and door, like he was expecting someone, or…or wasn’t sure if he wished to continue. But he stood in the lamplight for a good while.” She swallowed. “A Tala man. Young, strong. Had a beard. Dressed like a drover or field hand. Don’t remember more, sir. I’m sorry.”

“What you’ve given me is more than enough. What did he do after he stood there?”

“He slowly walked up to the servants’ door. But…I never heard it open, sir. He’d come down the servants’ path, and the servants’ gate is warded with a vinegate, so you have to have the right…right reagents key to get in. So I thought maybe he was a friend of a servant, given a key and come to pay respects to Zansay. But he never knocked or came inside—or if he did, I didn’t hear it. Then I saw him running back along the path, and after that I heard the shouts of fire.”

“He went to the servants’ path? Back to the gate?”

“Yes, sir. Then the smoke came pouring in…I collapsed. Someone came crashing in, I think one of the grooms. They picked me up, and…next thing, I was lying on the grass outside, coughing. That’s all I know, sir.”

I thanked her for her testimony, then strode a few steps away withSeriv. I said, “Please fetch her a medikker. Then I need your men to search the servants’ path and see if there are any signs of passage.”

He sighed. “Suspect we’ve got a wide search ahead of us, sir. But—we seek a Tala man, looking like a field hand, moving about here before midnight.” He glanced at me. “Folk of all kinds serve the families, but…I will say a Tala field hand is much more likely to serve the Armentas, sir.”

“We don’t yet have evidence to suspect the Armentas, Seriv. As you know.”

“I do, sir. But common folk don’t need evidence. A story’s good enough.”

I sighed, thanked him, and sped off to find Ana as the sun crawled into the sky.

—

I found hersitting in the main path of the Burav estate gardens, hunched and leaning among the blossoms and blooms. As I neared her, she called out, “Your gait is quite wearied, Din!”

“You know my gait at this distance, ma’am?”

“I’d know it at a quarter league, boy. Come and report.”

I stood before her, took a wheezing breath, and did so, recounting all I’d seen and all that Seriv had told me. When I finished, she reached out and gently grasped the stalk of a nearby flower—my memories whispered that it was diamdouni—and her white fingers crawled up until they found its bloom. Her index carefully explored its petals like a bee might seek its nectar.

“A bleak morning,” Ana said. “Yet I note—the house has not crumbled, or caved in?”

“True. It still stands.”

“Hum. The fibers of its vine are strong? You don’t see any fraying?”

“Not from here, no.”

“I suspect it is covoli-vine, then. Famously fire-resistant.Burilis Burav, being both a former Apoth and an Orbiis officer with great knowledge of environments, likely selected it as the safest buildingstock for his family. So. You can make your inferences at your leisure…”

I nodded gloomily. “The fire was no accident.”

“Oh, not at all. Covoli-vine would not have permitted the blaze to spread so quickly that it surprised the entire household! A reagent did this, then, a…a compound. Something akin to phalm oil—though that would have destroyed even this house, as it can turn a leviathan’s carcass to ash.”

“Is there any chance we could track the reagent? See who could have purchased or stolen any hereabouts?”

“I doubt it,” she said scornfully. “Think, child! How was most of the land of this canton made?”

“Ah,” I said. “They burned back the old forest…”