Page 50 of Mistress of Bones
“Then allow me to kick him out,” Sergado said earnestly. “I can deal with whatever keeps you beholden to him. Stay here at Almanueva with me. It’s your right to live here as much as it is mine. I meant to settle an allowance for you, but I’ve been busy taking care of Father’s position.”
“An allowance?”
“As is your due as his daughter. I’m not sure why he didn’t do it while he was alive. He has always been strict about these sorts of things.” A wince. “Was.”
“He offered to take charge of me,” Azul told him, “but my mother refused.”
“Still, strange he didn’t do it anyway and kept it secret until youwere of age. There might still be such an account, hidden among all his others.”
Azul would be lying if the thought of free-given money wasn’t a welcome relief. Newly fourteen-year-old Isadora would need to be hidden from their mother. She would need food, clothes, another start in life. To have the matter settled, so speedily and easily, was nothing short of an answered prayer. “How did he die?” she asked. “Our father.”
“A matter of the heart, I’m told,” Sergado answered, focusing on the empty fireplace across the room. “It was sudden and without warning. He was a good man. Strict in his ways, but with a sense of duty. I wish you had met him.”
Azul caught the wishful edge to his voice and felt the bond of true kinship, for she, too, was starting to wish he had met Isadora. “I wish I had.”
They sat in contemplative silence for a few minutes. Then, snapping out of it, Sergado smiled and patted Azul’s hand. “I will help you gain entry to the ossuary, of course. But it might take a few days.”
“A few days…,” she said, crestfallen—this she didn’t have to fake.
“Things move slow in Cienpuentes. Slower sometimes for me. I am new and unproven. My position opens doors, but others are in no hurry to unlock them.” He winked. “For now.”
This elicited a burst of laughter from her. He would do this for her, she was sure of it. The look in his eyes, the honesty in his open face. She had asked, so he would try his best. Wouldn’t she if Isadora had asked it of her?
Some guilt surfaced at her attempts at manipulating him, but they were easily dismissed—she hadn’t asked him to risk anything but a few minutes of his time. She took her brother’s hand and squeezed it tightly. “Thank you, Brother.”
He smiled, brought her hand to his mouth for a fast press of his lips. “Stay, Sister. I mean my offer. You will enjoy Cienpuentes. You will make new friends, new conquests. You will lack for nothing andyou will become whatever you want to be. You can visit your mother and your other sister at will, stay with them for a little while, and they will be welcome to travel here as well. This is too big of a house. It needs a family to feel content.”
Would he be so obliging if she asked him to take care of Isadora in her stead? Azul wondered. She might be bound by duty to return to Valanje after this affair was over, but it did not mean Sergado must be left without a younger sister to look after, even if not of the same blood.
He said no more, and there was nothing else she could say, not until she had her hands on Isadora’s bones, except for her thanks and a good night.
Enjul was waiting in the far corner of the hallway.
Heart in her throat from the shock of his presence, Azul finished closing her brother’s door and made her way to the emissary, feet silent on the cool tiles. He loomed against the wall, also barefoot, also in shirtsleeves and breeches, his hair also tumbling free over his shoulders and back. They weren’t so different, Azul thought, she and he in the soft shadows created by the stray silvery light of the moons. A sense of familiarity unfurled in her chest, as if some part of her recognized this moment of strange symmetry.
As if in another time, another life, they might be well matched, soul to soul and heart to heart.
Then, of course, he had to speak:
“Did you have a good talk?”
“Did you hear enough from your man?” she countered in a whisper. “Enjoyed his report, made notes on how to improve his efficiency for tomorrow?”
“He earned his coin and he is glad to have the job.”
“It must have been easy,” she said dryly. “You knew I wouldn’t be allowed into the ossuary, didn’t you? You knew I would waste my time there.”
His smile was slight, but it was there, strange in the shadows of the corner. “You were so endearing in your pursuit, going around townwasting my man’s time. Now, tell me, did you warn your brother about what you are?”
She glanced over her shoulder. Her brother’s door remained closed. “Why should I? I mean him no harm.”
“I wonder about that.”
His certainty rankled. “What do you mean?”
“Did you ever ask your sister if she wanted to be brought back?”
The question took her aback. “She was already dead. How could I ask?”
