Page 9 of A Trade of Blood

“No, sir.”

“And yousawnothing?”

“Nothing! Nothing save when I looked in the room, and then I fetched the custodi straightaway!”

“Which way to the room?”

She pointed down one passageway. “There’s a custodus stationed before it. The rest of them went running out to the jails, where I heard the two families are threatening to kill each other!”

I peered down the passage, which wound along the rounded walls of the building. A trail of prints stained the fretvine flooring there: bloody footprints, now quite dried. They ran the length of the hall like music notes scrawled upon a parchment.

“They won’t even let me clean up,” said Ithia piteously. “I’m sure I’ve lost all my business for the month. And I shall lose more, surely, if the Armentas and the Buravs reallydogo to war! The whole city, and canton—hell, the whole of the Empire shall fall to pieces if that happens!”

I thanked her and returned to Ana.

—

“So,” Ana purredas she took my arm. “Did I hear aright? It appears that the two werelovers,as we guessed?”

“So it seems, ma’am.”

“Mm. Two lovers, from two feuding gentryclans, meeting secretly under false names for their tryst!” She scoffed. “How puerile. Howderivative.I pray it is more deviant than it appears!” She paused. “Still…I admit that though this murder appears straightforward, it is a trifle confusing to me, Din.”

“How so, ma’am?”

“Well. IfIwere to kill a girl in a room in a city, what I wouldnotdo is run outside bloodier than a butcher’s sweat rag and then scream to ensure every eye was put upon me! Anyone of sense would make a stealthier escape—awindow, or a side door, or some better exit, off into the dark.”

“Perhaps it’s as Burav said, ma’am—there is a madness in the Armenta line.”

“Well, there’s madness and then there’s goddamn idiocy! But I note—our briefing did not contain any mention of the boy’s story of what happened, true?”

I consulted my memories, my eyes shimmering as I pulled the briefing from the depths of my mind.

“No, ma’am,” I said. “The boy has yet to speak, apparently.”

“Hum! And the innkeeper did not hear the girl scream?”

“She repeatedly claimed not, ma’am.”

“Nor do we have any witness who claimed to have heard any commotion?”

Again, I consulted my memories of the briefing and confirmed that wasso.

“Then that, I grant,” she said, “is mildly intriguing. Let’s view the scene, then, and see if we can determine why the boy chose to pierce this girl with something besides his eager pri—”

I pulled her down the passageway.

A single custodus was stationed before the chamber door, dressed in the pale blue of his order and clad in a steel cap. He was shocked to see us, and as he unlocked the door he said, “I’d have thought you’d come with my princeps, ma’am! Yet right now, he and the rest of my peers are at—”

“Yes, yes, at the jail,” said Ana, yawning, “preventing either alynching or a massacre. So we heard! I will assume they are doing a very good job. Please remain here while we view the room.”

The custodus bowed, then quickly stepped back—far enough, I noted, that he would not see into the room when we opened the door.

I turned the knob and pushed open the fretvine door.

The smell of blood and gore washed over me in a tremendous wave. I grimaced, prepared myself, and peered inside.

She lay upon the floor on her left side, one pale arm draped awkwardly behind her back. She was wearing a mothsilk nightgown, one of terrifically expensive make. The stain of blood had crawled up the fabric until it resembled a length of shore drawn upon a map. I was faintly surprised the blood had not crawled any higher, for the pool of gore around her was so tremendous that it threatened to fill every crevice of the vined floor.