Page 16 of A Drop of Corruption

“Of course. If the point of all this was the man’s assassination, there would be simpler ways of getting it done! Methods that would have assured his death and still offered safety to the murderer. So—why choose this?” She rubbed her hands together like she was about to tuck into a meal. “I feel akin to the disappointed maiden during her first night in the marital bed—the more I pull at what I find, the more I find to my liking! Let us begin, then.”

—

Ana then askedme many questions. What had been the skin color of the remains? What had been the length and girth of the fingers on the severed hand? How big had the shoulder been? And the jaw? Since I had memorized the sights in the ossuary, I was able to show her the exact size of all I had witnessed, gesturing with my hands as she allowed the barest slice of her yellow eye to peep at me under her blindfold.

She moved on to my trip into Old Town. Had anyone reported seeing anything unusual about Sujedo’s gait, or any other physicalaffectation? What was the color of the mold growing in the vacant room beside Sujedo’s? And what buildings had been around the tower from which he’d vanished?

I answered these to the best of my ability. When I finished, Ana simply sat there, sipping her tea and thinking, one long, white finger still following the threading of the fretvine floor. “So…” she said. “The shoulder had a patch of skin removed. Deliberately.”

“Think so, ma’am. It was a very circular shape.”

“But the Apoths can’t tell us what it was.”

“No, ma’am. They seemed to find nothing unusual about it.”

“Interesting…And they found Sujedo’s piss and blood—but nothing of any intruder?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Yet the man’s clothes had acitrussmell, you say?”

“They did. Signum Malo assumed that was done to cover up the sce—”

“Quiet,” she snapped. “I am thinking! Hm. You say Sujedo also tapped his leg as he went about his business…And he asked the guard about the man’swedding,you say? Despite being an axiom?”

“Yes. I thought that very odd, too.”

“Being as axioms are usually as socially cognizant as a wet fucking brick, yes,” she said. “It is quite damned odd.”

I pursed my lips, for Ana’s own grasp of social decorum was often nonexistent, but refrained from comment.

“I’ve no idea what to make of the tapping bit,” Ana continued. “Unless the man had some kind of affliction. But one last question, Din, to help me build the scene in my mind…The porter saidallthe rooms on the leaning side of the tower were difficult to maintain. Yes?”

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Then,” she said softly, “would that mean there is likely a vacant roombelowthe one you saw, as well?”

“Ah…that is likely, ma’am. But I confess, I did not ask to see it.”

“No matter,” she murmured. “Malo told you she and the other wardens had searched all the rooms and found nothing. It can wait.Now. You couldn’t talk to the rest of the Treasury delegation—correct?”

“Correct, ma’am. They were busy with the king of Yarrow, as Signum Malo told me.”

“So you do not know anything of the dead man’s history or personal nature.”

“Only what the Treasury has already shared.”

“And there is no information,” she asked, “suggesting that Sujedo met with any of his colleagues on his brief day in Yarrowdale?”

“No, ma’am. He was ill and did not have business with them until the next day.”

“But isn’t that also very strange?” she asked softly. “His colleagues were housed directly next door. Even if he was ill, there seems to have been ample time for them to talk to him, or he to they…”

“Don’t know, ma’am. Some did worry what he had was catching.”

Ana sat very still, the fronds of her alabaster hair trembling as a draft rushed through the room. “We shall have to interview his colleagues, then, and soon. Though interviewing the delegation might be tricky, apparently.”

“Yes. This business with the king of Yarrow…”