“We weren’t told we would have to do more than lend our patience and I find I have no depths in me which long to give,” Ki’e’iren said, putting her hands on her hips, but to my surprise, Tigraine slapped her hard across the face.
Ki’e’iren froze, mouth open, eyes lit with inner fire.
“You aren’t the only princess here, so stop acting like you are,” Tigraine said, leaning in close to make her words more threatening. “Would you risk the futures of the fifteen of us for your own pettiness?”
“It is possible that I would,” Ki’e’iren said, snapping her mouth shut and flexing her hand as if she would slap Tigraine back.
I felt as though I was back on my parent’s holdings, keeping the mares from biting. I shook Grosbeak’s pole between them.
“Nnnnrggh,” he muttered.
“Enough, I beg you,” I said before forcing my gaze to run over all the wives as I spoke. There was Givanna, the poet, and the lovely redhead I’d so admired, and Margaretta’s hopeful face. “Think carefully on what you will do. I know not what perils may lie along the way or what will happen to your bodies, or chances of returning to your lives, if harm befalls you. But if we fail, you’ll remain here, cold and untouched, insensible until time fades away or the magic unravels.”
“How will you bring a man back from death?” Tigraine asked, making her way to my bodiless advisors. “And what will we do with these?”
“I thought we might take them with us,” I said grimly. “Why should I be the only wife with a Wittenbrand advisor?”
“We do not wish to go anywhere,” the head that looked like a mermaid spat.
“All the more reason to take you,” Tigraine said, picking her up by the hair and inspecting her.
“Ewww, they’re all dead!” Margaretta said, scrubbing her hands on her dress even though she hadn’t touched any of them. “I don’t like touching dead things.”
“You say that now,” Grosbeak purred. Was this him being charming? “But you’d sing another tune if you tried it.”
“No,” Margaretta said primly. “I do not think so.”
“And can these advisors advise?” Ki’e’iren asked. “Do they know how to find this place where a rib is missing and broker a deal with Death?”
“If we knew, we would have mentioned it by now,” the head with the crown said.
“Perhaps you can bargain with Death for the knowledge.” Tigraine’s eyes were on me as if watching to see what I might do. It was a practical suggestion, though I would have no idea how to go about doing it.
“Hedoeswalk among us now,” Grosbeak said with a leer for Tigraine. “Why not try the princess’s suggestion.”
“You do not amuse me, revenant. Keep your charms to Margaretta,” Tigraine circled the heads.
“Oh please, no!” Margaretta said, her hand clasping her own throat.
I cleared my throat. “Is there a way, advisors of my husband, to call Death to you? I cannot bargain with what is not here.”
“The dead see him,” one of the heads said in a bored tone.
“Can you see him, then? Dead as you are?”
“Thenewlydead,” that head corrected.
“Or those dying,” the head with crown agreed. “Not possibly dying, but dying in truth. The man who lingers long on a gut wound may indeed see Death. I’ve witnessed that myself. Or the woman bleeding out after childbirth may hear his footsteps, or the victim of a poison with no antidote may converse with him. All these might earn the chance to bargain with Death while still living.”
“Well, I’m hardly going to kill someone just to draw Death near,” I said wryly. “Perhaps there is another way?”
There were murmurs but they sounded discouraging and I looked from face to face. The head with the crown sniffed, and Margaretta crouched in front of her, staring, eyes wide.
“Back up, girl-child. I can see right up your skirts.”
“Eee!” Margaretta skittered backward, kicking one of the heads in her haste. It, in turn, knocked over the next and the next, and it took me a moment of scrambling with the help of the wives to set them all straight again and calm down a frantic Margaretta.
“I think that maybe you should stay here with me,” I told her grimly, but as she made her way to me, something pricked my side under the arm where I held Grosbeak.
