I glanced over my shoulder to see that most of the brides of Bluebeard were, indeed, silently crying. And why would they not be? I had just walked them through a living nightmare, and it was only the beginning. The exceptions were Tigraine and Ki’e’iren. One of whom was watching the Wittenbrand as if she might leap and rip their throats out at any moment, and the other was watching them with what looked somewhat like jealousy. My husband, it seemed, was no judge of women, or he would not have selected such a viper to put in his vault.
I would have to be very careful with these two at my back.
“Well, if you aren’t motivated to succeed yet, there’s no helping you,” Grosbeak said happily. “Your husband is nearly gone for all eternity, you will soon follow him, and Coppertomb will dance on the backs of your kin. Improbable as any win for you would be, it is your only chance now.”
“And yours,” I said acidly. “As you have been grafted to my fate.”
“It’s a sacrifice indeed. Never say I have not been for you the most excellent of friends.”
“You have certainly not been the most excellent of friends,” I replied.
“Oh, well, it doesn’t count if you add unnecessary words. That’s just deflecting from the meaning, which proves you cannot resist my charms.”
“Tell yourself whatever you must to get through the next two days,” I said. “And then you will see, one way or the other.”
“So much hope,” he said, smacking his lips. “I like this look on you, Izolda. It’s nearly brilliant. Do keep it up.”
CHAPTERFIFTEEN
We foundBluffroll’s army along the way as we followed Death through the heaving, disintegrating world that had once charmed me utterly with its vibrant intensity.
“Who are they?” Margaretta had whispered in a tiny voice.
The head she was holding replied sagely. I thought it was Vireo’s voice. “The army of Lord Bluffroll. Called, it would seem, to savage the mortal lands on the behalf of the Bramble King and to take for him the many kingdoms and sew their bodies and lives into the earth that they might feed a new age. Would I were not dead, that I might march with them.”
“You would go with them? To destroy the mortal world?” Margaretta always sounded like life had surprised her all over again. “He said he was going to make the royalty of Pensmoore his footstools!”
“All the more reason to go. Have you ever had a prince as a footstool?”
“I … no, of course not!”
Vireo laughed. “You might like it. Even the blushing bride Izolda found she had a taste for our ways once she was inducted into them.”
“Byyourtreachery,” Grosbeak reminded him.
“And I’m not even asking to be repaid,” Vireo agreed. “I’m a generous soul.”
I did not speak, merely followed our silent guide through the ranks of the army of Bluffroll. They looked like him — green of skin, with pronounced lower incisors that peeked up through their lips. Male or female, all were built large and broad, their hands so full of weapons and their backs strapped so generously with them, that they resembled porcupines. Their armor was fanciful, created with swirls of metal, turtle shells, some kind of scales the size of saucers, and webs of woven gold and something black that looked like lace made of spiderweb, but could have been broken dreams for all I knew.
Some rode on lizards like the men who had surrounded Coppertomb before the hunt for the Hounds of Heaven and all watched us pass through their midst in owlish silence.
“What was the point of the Hounds of Heaven?” I asked Grosbeak. “They showed up, raging and howling and shredding, and then were quickly dispatched. Why come at all?”
“They’re a portent. Portents must portend. They can’t very well remain sleeping comfortably beside the fires of hell when there are warnings of the end of the world to give, now can they?” he snapped.
“I thought they were Hounds of Heaven, not hell.”
“Heaven, hell, what difference is it to me?”
“As a dead man who may eventually find himself in one or the other, I would have thought a great deal.”
“And there you would be wrong, for I have bet all the coins of my soul on this one afterlife with you and I will not taste either of the other options. Don’t die, or you’ll make me regret that.”
“I’m dying already,” I said grimly. My racing heart stuttered as if to emphasize that. The tips of my fingers were numb.
“For now. Unless you can talk your way out of it.”
“You can’t talk your way out of death by poison or it wouldn’t be used so reliably on unwanted government ministers.”
