Page 73 of Deadly Maiden

“What?”

*Ha. She has you there…big boy.* ID snickers.

“Bad boy.” Crap. Said that out loud. I widen my eyes and put on a stiff smile. “You are definitely okay?”

Wyntre spins then dances in a circle while humming a tune. “I feel better than ever. Excited?Hmmm.” She frowns at me. “I guess I am a little crazy right now. Make a note. Inhaling gheist gets a necromancer high.” She giggles.

“High as an eagle.” I gather her into my arms, enfold her and slightly squash her until she squeaks. “Bad girl. You have to tell me before you do anything that crazy next time, or else.” I try to look disapproving but likely fail.

“Next time?” She peers up at me, raises an eyebrow.

“No. Do not get more ideas. One heart attack is enough. You’re sure that is etharum now?”

“Yes. All we have to do is pour it onto the crystal, so you had that part right.”

“Great.”

Great, except for the need to visit grave sites to get more.

Chapter 22

KrollKrasten

“We are done here.” I stab the knife into the side of the cart and one of the painted-on books.

The woman sags against the cart, whining in pain. The contrasts between the pain and the naïve art are almost artistic in themselves. The several crossbow bolts fastening her to the painted side of this cart, the blood, her skinned breast and stomach, and her grotesquely strained expression, the bruises on her naked body—these add up to a macabre but perfect tableau.

A person in agony in the middle of a pretty painted scene of books and blue flowers, on her own cart.

“Bring the novice.”

“Yes, Ser.” The man hurries off.

I dip my hands into the water in the white enameled tub to rinse off the blood, catch a glimpse of my reflection and the peak of my white hair. The folding table beneath the tub shakes. With my elbow, I nudge aside the etharum pen’s ruby leather case. Although water won’t harm it, it would be sacrilege of a sort. Thered eddies in the clarity of the water, forming circles of thinning blood, until I begin to scrub. The tubful turns pink.

“You’d no doubt prefer me to release you, Miss Bethy, but I see you as a lesson to be learned. The people need to understand one cannot defy the king and the law.”

I go to her, wiping my hands on a cloth.

She’s not stirred except to bleed and pant. Her eyes are dull, and the strands of her hair drape over her face, wet with sweat and also blood. Her face carries smudges of it.

“We’ve exhausted you. Tsk.”

I let my gaze drift past the book cart to where her partner lies on the ground with three bolts in her back. Trying to run did not help her. Now I have no one to question further. It’s a problem.

“Ser?” The enforcer has returned with the novice.

A young woman dressed in the purple robes of the Sisters waits with the man. She’s seen the body, is clearly shocked. It doesn’t matter, of course.

“Strip off the gown. I need to send a message to the king.”

“Of course, Ser.” With shaking hands, she lets the gown fall to her waist then turns so I can write the message on her back. Or so she believes I will do.

After retrieving the etharum-powered pen from its small case, I cock my head. “No, this won’t do. I need your front to write this.”

“Oh.”

I can see her swallow, but she does as I ask, presents me with the bare canvas of her stomach and breasts. I lean in and lift one breast, holding it as I begin my scribing on the underside, using the Sisters’ spidery notation. In my head I hear my words:

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