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Malachus’s hand brushed across her knuckles, and he abandoned his scrutiny of Gharek to give Halani his full attention and a smile that verified everything Gharek assumed of this pair.
“Even if you offered, I’d convince you otherwise,” Malachus told Halani. He gained his feet and motioned for Siora to join the two of them. “Come. You can bring back supplies to tend him.” He nodded his chin toward the wagon wheel that kept Gharektethered. “You run, cat’s-paw, and we won’t chase you. We’ll herd you. Right into Midrigar.”
Everyone except Malachus flinched at his casual utterance of the name. The draga rested his hand on the small of Halani’s back and left to return to the camp.
Siora rose to follow. “I’ll be back with food and something to take care of the cut from the trap shadow.”
“It’s just a scratch. What about you? The trap shadow targeted you first for its fury.”
She smiled. “Halani saw to me. Scratches like yours but not so deep, only more of them. I didn’t bleed like you did.” Her expression turned somber. “They aren’t ghosts. Souls, yes, but they linger as vessels of distilled madness. Nothing of who they once were remains.” A shiver shook her small frame, and she retreated to trail after Malachus and Halani.
Gharek studied her back, admiring the grace of her walk and the curves of her body hinted at beneath her clothing. Admiring her kept his thoughts from staying too long on her words.
He’d always found such sorcerous items to be of the darkest sort of magic and repulsive beyond measure. They were the work of necromancers, and while Siora denied possessing that kind of power, he suspected she had within her the ability to wield it. She’d recoil if she heard his thoughts and vehemently argue with him. She was a compassionate woman motivated by a moral code he was just beginning to understand and would never fully embrace himself. She’d never do anything remotely as horrifying as enslaving a soul, especially as a trap shadow.Unless she was made desperate enough, the cynical part of him countered.
“Gods forbid she ever find herself in such straits,” he said softly.
They lived in a world where life was hard, brutal, and often very short, and even death didn’t guarantee peace or an escape. He wanted to believe that another person beyond his own daughter might retain the one element snuffed out in him and so many others: hope.
She returned alone, carrying a loaded tray, and set it down next to him. Gharek scowled. “No one offered to help you?”
Siora paused in unloading a covered plate, a small pot of ointment, and another flask of what he hoped this time might be wine or ale. She left the stack of neatly folded cloths, a second flask, and a basin in the tray. Her eyebrows climbed toward her hairline. “Of course they offered, though it wasn’t necessary. I’m no delicate aristo woman. Asil was the first to offer help. I declined.” She handed him a spoon and whipped away the cloth covering the plate to reveal a few pieces of cured meat, roasted squash, a hunk of bread, and a generous wedge of cheese. “I don’t need someone to carry a supper tray for me.” Her chin went up. “I’m stronger than I look, lord.”
“No argument there,” he said. “But stop calling melord.”
Darker shadows stained her cheekbones. “What shall I call you then? I’ve heardbastardandarsewipeused a number of times by those who’ve spoken of you.” She winked at him and resumed her seat beside him. The odd look of cautious wonder he’d seen dance across her features at his disapproval that no one helped her with the tray reappeared before she hid it behind a studied mask of casual interest.
He gave in to a half smile at her teasing. The answer to her question might seem obvious to some, but he’d never allowed the use of his given name by those whom he employed or those withwhom he did business. Most didn’t even know his name. He was the cat’s-paw. “Gharek,” he said. “Just Gharek.” He was no longer the cat’s-paw, though the stain of that title would mar his soul throughout his life and beyond death. But he’d been something other than splinters and bitterness once, something better than a mad sovereign’s henchman.
“Gharek then.” Siora tucked her legs under her. “I’ve always thought it a good name.”
“Just not for a good man.”
“Your words, not mine. I don’t believe a person is irredeemable.”
He snorted. “You obviously never met the Spider of Empire.”
They sat in companionable silence while he ate, and when he finished, she took his plate and returned it to the tray, trading out dish and spoon for cloths and washbasin. She handed him the smaller of the two flasks and kept the larger one for herself. “Yours has plum wine. Kursak swears it’s the drink of the gods.”
Gharek opened the flask and took a sniff of fruit and strong alcohol fumes. This was the kind of wine that kindled a fire in your gut with the first swallow. He’d have to be sparing and not drink too much. No doubt when Siora was done coddling him, Malachus or one of the other free traders would fetch him for a friendly interrogation. He refused to endure the ordeal cupshot. “Who’s Kursak?” He took a drink from the flask and gasped.
Siora poured water from the larger flask into the basin and dipped a cloth in it. “One of the wagon masters for this free trader band.” She wrung the cloth until it was just damp and pressed it to the scratch the trap shadow had inflicted. Gharek hissed at the sting. “I spoke with him and Malachus and the others while you were... sleeping.” Once more a smile curved her mouth; herhands were gentle on his face as she tended what he guessed was an impressive new bruise decorating his cheekbone. “You’re still handsome,” she teased.
He stilled under her touch. There was about her an honesty that cut deep when she judged, and she judged him often since they’d become allies in this endeavor. Yet her simple compliment, so casually offered and without any coyness, cut deepest of all. He clasped her hand and stole the cloth. “I’ll finish. Did they tell you why they were right outside the gates of the cursed city?”
If he didn’t know better he might have believed hurt flickered in her eyes when he took the cloth. Trick of the lamplight no doubt. She didn’t offer to apply the salve to the scratch and passed the jar to him in silence.
“They told me a little,” she finally said. “They were retrieving Asil, who’d tried to follow her brother into Midrigar.” Shadows flitted in her eyes. “She said it looked like someone was pulling him toward the gate with an invisible rope. Asil has a dog who barred her from following. Thanks to the dog, the free traders were able to save her. It was too late for the brother.” She paled. “Like you, he was compelled by the eater of ghosts. But why?”
A sick feeling settled like a stone in the bottom of his stomach, and the rising nausea made him wish he hadn’t eaten. Other living people enchanted and forced to answer a dark summons. Somehow the Maesor was connected to Midrigar. What if the living that were forced to answer the ghost-eater’s summons were those who’d visited the Maesor? Did business there? Even lived there for months? Was this why it was an empty place now? Did those people try to resist and escape through the gate to the safety of Domora only to find themselves in Midrigar? Or had the faceless huntersdescended on the market and ravaged its population without warning? Gharek didn’t think the second scenario occurred. The market would have been made a shambles by fighting or even by the stampede of terrified people fleeing the creatures with their bloodred mouths and jagged teeth.
He took another swallow of the plum wine and passed it to Siora. “I don’t know, but I have a suspicion.”
She accepted and, like him, gasped after swallowing. “Obviously the gods enjoy strong nectar,” she managed to wheeze, and wiped her watering eyes.
“Careful how much you drink,” he said. His tolerance for strong spirits was high but already the fuzzy creep of languor threatened to dull his senses. “Once more you kept the wolves from my door. I don’t much care for a long sojourn in the cursed city, even if the free traders plan to stretch my neck from the nearest tree.”
“You aren’t in good standing with them as you well know, but I don’t think they plan to kill you. Yet.”
