Master of Crows

  This morning her luck ran out. No sooner had Gurn set the bowl of oranges and a pot of tea out for their meal, than the door opened, admitting the Master of Crows. Surprised by his sudden appearance, Martise gaped at him with her spoon halfway to her mouth. Rumpled and scowling, he didn’t spare her a glance but shuffled to the table where he collapsed on the bench across from her. He folded his arms and rested his forehead on his hands with a groan.

  The proud, stately mage she’d met days earlier was transformed into a man who might have spent the night prowling waterside dives. He didn’t reek of spirits. In fact, his scent teased her nostrils—citrus and tobacco smoke. The long black hair, neatly queued when he first greeted her and Cumbria, spread over his shoulders and across the table in a tangled shroud. He looked like he’d slept in his clothes. The simple breeches and white shirt were one massive wrinkle, and his feet were bare.

  She glanced at Gurn. Unfazed by Silhara’s unexpected and disheveled appearance, he put another cup and an additional pot of tea in front of Silhara and took a seat next to him. Was this the regular morning ritual? One briefly interrupted when she arrived?

  She went back to eating and tried not to laugh, imagining the High Bishop here instead of her, and how affronted he’d be. She suspected the outcast mage would make no special allowances for the cleric. He’d be served the same porridge as everyone else in the kitchen with the manor’s master and his servant.

  “Why are you smiling?”

  Silhara’s question startled her, and she nearly choked on a sip of tea. She snatched the napkin Gurn handed her to cover her mouth and stifle her coughing. The mage’s dark eyes were slitted against the kitchen’s bright, morning light. Hints of a beard shadowed his cheeks, emphasizing a strong jaw.

  She cleared her throat. “I was thinking of the High Bishop, Master. Nothing of consequence. My apologies.”

  A black eyebrow rose, and her gaze fell to his mouth, bewitched as his lips curved in a faint smile. Such a hard face. Such a beautiful mouth. A telltale heat made her ears burn, and she dropped her gaze.

  “I imagine Cumbria would take exception to that remark. He has always believed himself to be of great consequence.”

  She couldn’t resist the temptation to look at him again. The open shirt revealed smooth brown skin and something she’d missed at their first meeting—something hidden behind formal robes. A rope of white, pinched flesh circled his neck, cutting across the hollow of his throat and disappearing behind his nape. A garrote scar. She stared, shocked. Sometime in his life Silhara of Neith had survived a strangulation attempt.

  He rested his chin in his hand. The hint of humor briefly softening his austere features was gone.

  “You are excessively contrite over the mundane, especially for a young woman under the protection of a wealthy household.”

  The casual suspicion, with its leading questions and observations, threatened her composure, unused as she was to such scrutiny. Cumbria had either placed too much faith in her ability in overcoming a lifetime of servile behavior, or he’d grossly underestimated Silhara’s acuity.

  A sly intelligence gleamed in his dark eyes. Had he guessed their game before she and the bishop ever sat down with him and discussed her apprenticeship? Did the mage just wait to see what she might reveal before using it against her? She gripped her spoon and took a slow breath. It was disconcerting dining with leopards.

  “My family was socially prosperous but poor,” she lied. “When I came to live at Asher, I soon learned deference. I am a dependent relation and have no wish to be more of a burden, especially to the bishop and his wife.”

  He reached for an orange, taking his time in his selection. “Ah, the mistress of Asher. Cumbria’s penance for sins unconfessed. I wondered if he was still married to that harridan Dela-fé.” His smirk matched his nonchalant tone. “Were he more intelligent and less avaricious, he’d find a way to murder her. Her riches are attractive. Her madness is not.”

  The statement, so cold-blooded in its matter-of-fact observations, left her speechless. She stared at him as he stripped his orange of its peel with long, nimble fingers. It was true Cumbria’s wife was madder than an imprisoned falina bird, but Martise was startled to hear someone acknowledge the fact aloud. She’d wanted to murder the woman herself, usually after Dela-fé delivered an undeserved beating.

  She glanced at Gurn who winked and went on placidly eating his breakfast.

  “Do you want an orange?”

  She eyed the fruit Silhara held out to her, wondering what deadly deception an innocent-looking orange might hold. He watched her with an unrelenting regard.

  Bursin’s wings, she was becoming as suspicious as Conclave. She clamped down on her paranoia and plucked the orange out of his hand with a murmured “My thanks.”

  “You don’t like oranges?” He sounded more curious and amused than offended. “My grove produces some of the sweetest.”

  “You don’t seem like a farmer,” she said, failing to keep the doubt out of her voice. She still found the idea strange—this mage, notorious for snubbing Conclave and delving in the dark arcana, pursuing a livelihood so mundane and laborious.

  His eyes widened. Even Gurn paused in drinking his tea.

  "It's how I keep us fed and this hulk from crumbling around us." Sarcasm sharpened his tongue. "What? Did you think I lounged on my couch all day, reading tomes and muttering incantations while Gurn fed me grapes?”

  She knew better. Twenty-two years of servitude should have kept her silent, made her apologize for her impertinence, but some small demon goaded her to respond in a like manner, despite her upbringing and every instinct warning her otherwise.

  “It would explain the dust.”

  Gurn choked into his cup before setting it down on the table with a thump. His face and bald pate turned an impressive shade of pink, and his eyes brimmed with tears. Martise didn’t know if they were tears of laughter or asphyxiation and was too mortified to care. Humiliation scorched a path from her chest to the back of her neck. She bowed her head, staring at her now congealed porridge as if it carried all the secrets of the ancients.

  Outside, the screeching cries of crows punctuated the silence in the kitchen. She sat stiffly, waiting for a stinging slap or the vision-blackening pain of a cuff to her head for her insolence. What was wrong with her?

  Her heartbeat thundered in her ears. Silhara was a dangerous unknown. He might not touch her at all, just transform her into a fat, juicy worm for the crows nesting in his trees. He did neither. When she braved a glance, she found him eyeing her with a speculative gaze.

  “You have done an unwise thing, Martise of Asher,” he said softly. “You’ve caught my interest.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  She was no more winsome in the morning than at day’s end. Silhara’s new apprentice looked much as she had when he first met her, dressed in a tunic and skirts too large for her, her hair bound in a tight bun and coiffed with torn spider web. When he stumbled into the kitchen, half-blinded by the morning light, he was startled to see her. And then he remembered. Conclave’s answer to his request for help. He didn’t know whether to laugh or curse. What in Bursin’s name was he supposed to do with a helper who couldn’t perform the simplest spell or lift a basket of oranges?

  He sipped his tea and regarded her over the rim of his cup. Damned priests. Couldn’t they have saddled him with someone pretty? A woman with generous curves and breasts to smother in? Someone he could tup in the hallway while she searched for secrets and schemed of ways to betray him? Instead, they sent this ordinary, diffident, untalented girl. At best, her presence was a nuisance; at worst, a dangerous impediment.

  Still, she wasn’t as colorless as she first appeared. She’d caught him by surprise with her retort about the dust, revealing a flash of wit followed by an impressive blush. She made him wonder—and smile. That alone gave him pause.

  Silhara couldn’t remember the last time he’d found something worth smiling about that did
n’t involve mockery, yet in the last ten minutes Cumbria’s little spy almost coaxed a laugh out of him with her comment and the way she eyed him when he offered her the orange. He didn’t think her expression could be more suspicious or fearful if he’d held out a live pit viper.

  “Are you going to eat it?” He pointed to the orange, untouched next to her bowl.

  She stiffened, as if bracing herself for something unpleasant. He noted her hands as she reached reluctantly for the fruit. Her knuckles were red, chafed—like his. Like Gurn’s. This was a woman who labored in Cumbria’s household. No pampered ward here, but one who did menial work.

  There was a meticulous grace in the way she peeled the orange and something entrancing in the way she ate it. She bit into the segment slowly, either from caution or enjoyment, and her actions riveted his attention. He shook his head. Gods, it’s been too long since I’ve had a woman. He smirked when her eyes widened after the first bite.

  “It’s so sweet!”

  “’Twas no empty boast when I said we harvested the best fruit here. Neith’s oranges always sell out at market.”

  He didn’t share in her appreciation. Oranges were a staple of his diet, and he loathed them. He conquered the urge to gag each time he ate one. But eat them he did, always with the thought that some day he might grow to like them and rid himself of the memory tied to them.

  Martise finished the orange with more enthusiasm but refused his offer of another. She complimented Gurn on his porridge, and the two shared a warm smile. Their immediate camaraderie puzzled Silhara. This wasn’t the mating dance of man and maid, more a recognition of long-separated friends finally reunited. He’d noted Gurn’s immediate attachment to the girl. Martise appeared to return the servant’s affections. His eyes narrowed. They knew nothing of her save what Cumbria told them. There was more to Martise of Asher than nervous blushes and a melodious voice. She had an agenda or she wouldn’t be here. He’d grind her into the dirt before he let her use Gurn to get to him.

  He was tempted to tell her of Gurn’s origins—how Silhara found him rotting in a Prime prison for literally breaking a man in half across his knee—but thought better of it. He didn’t relish the idea of an irritated Gurn tearing his head off his shoulders and throwing it across the courtyard for revealing private things to a stranger.

  A snide remark on their attachment hovered on his lips, stopped only by a foul scent rising up from beneath the table.

  “Bursin’s wings! What is that smell?” He raised an eyebrow at Martise. Her eyes widened.

  “Not me. I bathed this morning.”

  Gurn nudged him and pointed in the direction of his feet. He bent to peer under the table and almost gagged. Cael lay stretched out on the floor, reeking worse than the shambling, half rotten dog that invaded Neith at Corruption’s command. He shoved Cael with one foot, and the hound growled a warning.

  “Out of here, Cael. Now.” He shoved harder this time. Cael snapped half-heartedly at his toes before abandoning his spot and slinking out the open door leading to the bailey.

  Silhara watched him go before turning his attention back to Martise. “Gurn told me my mage-finder verified Cumbria’s story. You are Gifted.”

  She paled and lowered her eyes to mask their expression. “Yes. Gurn introduced us.”

  Her extraordinary voice had gone flat, hiding a wealth of emotion in the same way her downcast eyes did. He wasn’t fooled. She was angry he’d used Cael in ascertaining the truth.

  “Cael is a valued member of my household, Martise. I trust his judgment more than I trust most anyone else’s. Regardless of Conclave’s wishes and Cumbria’s generosity in sending me his ward as an apprentice, if Cael didn’t approve of you, you wouldn’t stay.”

  She met his gaze, her copper-coin eyes unflinching and resolute. “The bishop paid you for four months of my upkeep.”

  Anger shot through him, incinerating the last vestiges of drowsiness. She dared to challenge him! He bared his teeth at her, barely placated when she flinched. Still, she refused to lower her eyes.

  “Aye, he did,” he said. “And when I send his insolent ward back to him, I’ll include a note stating the exorbitant cost of porridge and a Neith orange has made it necessary for me to recover my expenses by keeping all his coin.”

  The tension in the kitchen was thick enough to cut. Silhara’s temper rose with it until Martise exhaled a defeated sigh. Her voice was even, her gaze carefully blank and tranquil as she focused on a point over his left shoulder.

  “I’m being impertinent. I am sorry, Master.”

  “Somehow I doubt that.” She shot him a surprised look. “But I think we begin to understand each other.”

  He watched as she toyed with her spoon and traced patterns in her congealing porridge. “You have spider webs in your hair.”

  She patted her hair, grimacing when her fingers touched the remnants of spider web dangling from her hairpins.

  “It’s no matter, Martise. Such primping isn’t necessary. Your appearance is of no interest here.”

  A hint of hurt or embarrassment danced across her features before she lowered her gaze. He'd cut her, unintentional though it was. No one at Neith stood on ceremony. He and Gurn dressed no better than the lowest servant in a rich household. He hadn’t even bothered to shave his beard or put on shoes before stumbling down to breakfast this morning. His remark about the webs in her hair had been idle chat. She’d interpreted his statement as an insult. He chose not to explain himself.

  “Gurn,” he said. “You’ll have to do without her for a time. I’ve delayed in teaching my new apprentice her lessons. And I’m curious what Conclave taught her.”

  The giant glowered at him and rose abruptly from the bench. Silhara wasn’t fast enough to stop him from snatching the teapot off the table and the cup out of his hand. The servant stalked to the dry sink and dropped the dishes in with a clatter.

  Silhara might have reprimanded him had not Martise sat across from him. She straightened to rigid attention, her pale features even more bloodless as she waited for his instructions.

  “Have Gurn take you to the great hall. I’ll meet you there. You’re Conclave-trained, yet powerless. Let’s see what might awaken your magic.”

  Guilt wormed a path into him. He didn’t lie. If she didn’t run screaming back to Asher as he hoped, he had every intention of finding her Gift and forcing it to manifest. She just might not like his methods.

  He left her with Gurn in the sunlit kitchen and returned to his chamber to dress. A part of him wished to stay, to bask in the morning warmth and savor the smell of rising dough as Gurn prepared his daily baking. The kitchen was a sanctuary of sorts, much like his bedroom once was. With Corruption’s rise, his chamber was less a retreat and more a battleground between him and the fallen god. He needed sleep, real sleep; not the brief catnaps in which he half-slumbered, braced for the god’s inevitable invasion into his dreams.

  Corruption’s touch was bewitching and lush, luring him with promises of immeasurable power, of respect, of revenge, even as it made him bleed and convulse. He was no longer the bastard get of a wharf prostitute but a ruler of empires, an immortal mage. With those promises came demands. Complete subjugation to another’s will, absolute obeisance to the vilest whoremaster. Could he revile the second enough to resist the temptation of the first?

  Silhara closed his door and strode to the open window. The star pulsed in the distance. “Still here?” he asked softly. “Don’t you have something better to do? Plagues to cast? Cities to destroy?”

  A sharp burst of pain behind his eyes made him wince. Corruption’s amusement jittered down his bones. I only await you, Avatar.

  He slammed the shutters closed, plunging the room into darkness. Fragile wood never kept out nightmares, but the illusion hid the god’s reality lurking on the horizon.

  “Not yet,” he muttered and cast a spell that flooded the chamber in witch light. His fingers fluttered along the scar encircling his neck. Ah, to
return to simpler times. At least then his executioner had been a dock council with no mercy for a starving thief. Now he had Conclave in his kitchen and Corruption on his doorstep, each wanting to destroy him in their own unique and horrific way.

  He had no time for either annoyance. There were oranges to harvest and get to market, bargains to negotiate with the Kurmans and buildings to repair. An honest man’s work was never done—not that he was a particularly honest man.

  Martise was waiting for him near the hall’s cold hearth, surrounded by the flickering sparkle of dust motes. She looked almost ethereal, standing so regal and poised—a pallid queen adorned in spider web and brown wool.

  She bowed. “Master.”

  Silhara half expected a complaint about his delay, but none was forthcoming, and her face remained serene as he circled her, breathing in her scent—sleep and spring mint. “What is the incantation for levitation?”

  “Which one? Mysanthanese or Hourlis?”

  He halted in front of her, intrigued. “Both.”

  Her invocations were flawless, her accents in perfect placement, voice intonation correct. The Mysanthanese levitation should have lifted her above his head; the Hourlis one to the rafters, yet her feet remained planted firmly on the ground. If not for Cael’s reaction to her, Silhara wouldn’t believe her Gifted, only educated.

  She must have seen his doubt. “Maybe your mage-finder was wrong.”

  “The dogs are never wrong, especially not my dog,” he snapped.

  He continued circling her. She was a small woman, lightly made. Articulate and well-read, she had the hands of a scullery maid and the knowledge of Conclave. What Gift lay hidden in this contradictory creature?

  His version of the Hourlis spell, a silent gesture, took her without warning. Her feet swung up, a rush of air spinning her to her back as Silhara raised his arm and sent her flying to the ceiling.

  Her frightened screech reverberated through the hall. Martise flailed, suspended high above the floor. He caught a glimpse of slender white legs and tangled linen as she kicked her feet and lunged for one of the roof joists. Her hair tumbled free of its pins, the long braid swinging in the empty air.