Page 72 of Mistress of Bones
“Right.” De Gracia took the hoop and ran it up and down his finger like a ring. “Take me to your employer.”
A masked woman flanked them after they left the building. They took no horses, no carriage. They didn’t go far.
The Countess de Losa awaited in one of Cienpé’s innumerable parlors, this one resembling a prison cell rather than the airy rooms De Gracia was accustomed to. It didn’t bother him, since he spent many of his days underground at the ossuary anyway.
The woman stood by the grated window in a gray stone wall bereft of paintings or tapestries. The old, heavy furniture in the room added to the effect—that of De Losa seeking to treat him like a fortress owner might have treated their peasants a few hundred years before.
She waited for the heavy door to close.
Then sputtered when De Gracia ran her through with his rapier.
The problem with rooms made to look like cells, he mused, wiping the blade with a cloth before returning it to its sheath, was that there was nobody to hear you die.
He knelt by the woman. De Losa lay in a pool of skirts, a trickle of blood running from her gaping mouth and another from the puncture below her breast.
De Gracia scowled. That might be a problem. The wound was toolow, the dress too light a color. He cleaned the blood with the same wipe, then placed a hand against her collarbone.
Power thrummed from his chest, down his arm, into the bones under his palm. Like lightning arching from cloud to cloud, it spread from bone to bone.
And the Countess de Losa opened her eyes.
XXVTHE OTHER NECROMANCER
De Gracia sat back on his ankles and watched the woman stand slowly with the help of a nearby chair.
The situation wasn’t optimal, and he would have to keep her away from the emissary as he had done with the others, but he couldn’t risk Azul being used as a pawn again—next time, he might receive a bloody ear instead of an inept attempt at covering her escape.
He watched De Losa stumble around, her eyes filled with a familiar vacancy. It greatly entertained him, how nobody had noticed the lack of real thought in his studies yet.
How annoying, to have to keep up with yet another one of these. Back in his early teenage years, it had seemed like a grand idea to make a game out of the court, learn everything about everyone. Soon, he had discovered that he had a greater calling than simply playing with puppets, and had deeply regretted the idea. He had kept them around, though, since theyhadcome in handy a time or two, and he wasn’t above watching for sport. Still, an annoyance.
But he needed De Losa to convince her group to leave him and Azul alone. Her kidnapping plot most certainly had something to do with the Anchor mining ban. Such a nuisance—what need did he have of Anchor? Frustrating, that his father’s title meant belonging to the court. He’d rather spend his days choosing bones to build his great project.
Unbecoming of him, possibly, to abandon his sire to permanent death, but it wasn’t as if they had shared any real bond. The previous Marquess de Gracia had done his duty by his son—fed him, clothed him, allowed him to learn the ropes of the title—and little more. Still, Sergado de Gracia hadn’t jumped overeager into a new study as he had in his teens. He had carefully considered every angle and concluded that it was time for his father to retire from life.
So, His Grace had ceased to be. And then a year later, someone had come around and killed him again.
It had helped in a way, this ironic turn of events, even if De Gracia had hoped for one or two more years to complete the transition into his sire’s official role. It alleviated the small, sorrowful part of his conscience—it had obviously been his father’s destiny to end prematurely dead, and for Sergado to take his place.
De Gracia stood and searched the desk and its drawers. He found a vow supporting the mining cause waiting for his signature, no doubt the price for Azul’s freedom. Very well, he would grant it.
After signing his name with the ink and quill ready on the table, he met De Losa’s unfocused gaze. It became somewhat sharper when he allowed her instincts to return. Much better. It was lucky that his studies kept their memories, their bodies going through the motions, unaware that there was no depth to them. No, it was simply the regurgitation of things they already knew how to do.
Lucky, and still something he fought to correct. For in his great project, there must be nothing left of the original owners. His great project must be hollow, his, and wholly his.
For a moment he saw himself through De Losa’s eyes: young, tall, handsome, a slight smile teasing a dimple out of his cheek.
“Go now,” he told her, although he didn’t need to.
And De Losa went—to her home, to her room, to stitch closed the small hole between her ribs with a thread from her embroidery basket. To clean the smear of blood and order her ruined dress be cut into rags. To send a message to those in her circle that De Gracia and his family were no longer a threat and should be left alone.
For his part, Sergado took his time to return home to Almanueva. Now, here was a fitting name for his house, full with the hopes of rebirth. Perhaps that’s what he’d call his creation once it was complete.
As soon as he’d stepped inside, he sensed the presence of the deathling.
The emissary stood in the shadows by the stairs, his pale hair set free around his shoulders and chest rather than in its usual tail, his gold-and-violet eyes fixed on him.
The temptation to kill him was nearly overwhelming.
