Lesbeth didn’t remember it that way. She remembered a cruel game, played with a servant, a game that went further than it ever should have. And she remembered knowing that Robert meant for it to go that far, from the very start. After that, she hadn’t wanted to know what Robert was thinking anymore.
But she nodded again, as if agreeing with him. “I cannot speak of this,” she said again.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I’ve spoiled our outing. That was not my intention. There are years between us we cannot repair, I know. Silence has worked on us like poison. But we are twins, Lesbeth.” He stood suddenly. “May I show you something?”
“What is it?”
He smiled and for a moment looked like the boy she remembered. “A wedding gift,” he replied.
“Up here?”
“Yes.” He looked a little embarrassed. “It’s something I worked on with my own hands. It isn’t far.”
Lesbeth smiled tentatively. There was so much hurt in Robert, so much broken. She did love him, though. She took his hand and let him pull her up, and followed as he led her into the mostly wild gardens around them. When they had been young, these had been well-tended, but over the years this spot had fallen out of fashion, and the roses and hedges allowed their own way. Now, in places, it was as dense as a true forest.
Robert did not lead her far. “Here it is.”
Lesbeth could only stare in dull shock. The sun was shining, flowers were blooming. She was going to be married. How could he do this?
He had dug up Rose. Her little bones—she had been ten— lay in the bottom of a yawning hole in the earth. Her clothes had gone to rotten rags, but Lesbeth recognized what remained of the blue dress she had last worn.
“By all the saints, Robert—” The horror choked off anything else she might have said. She wanted to run and scream, and bawl her eyes out. Instead she could only gaze into that hole, into that terrible crime of her past. She had never known what Robert did with the body. They had told everyone Rose had run away.
I’m sorry, Rose, she thought. Saints of grief, but I’m sorry.
“I love you, Lesbeth,” Robert said softly. “You should have asked my permission. Mine, not Wilm’s. Mine.”
And as she turned to face him, he struck her in the breast, so hard she staggered back and sat down, her skirts billowing around her. She stared up at him, more perplexed than hurt. Robert had never hit her before, ever.
“Robert, what—” As soon as she tried to speak, she knew something was very, very wrong. Something inside her was all twisted, and her breath hurt like fire. And Robert, standing over her—his hand was still a fist, but there was a knife in it, the narrow bodkin he always wore at his belt, the one Grandpa had given him when he was eleven. It was red to the hilt.
Then she looked down at the front of her dress and saw the wet redness over her heart. Her hand was sanguine, too, where she had pressed it without thinking against the wound. As she watched, blood actually spurted between her fingers, like a spring bubbling from the earth.
“Robert, no,” she sighed, her voice high and strange. “Robert, do not kill me.”
He bent over her, his dark eyes glistening with tears. “I already have, Lesbeth,” he said, very softly. “I already have.” And he kissed her on the forehead.
Shaking her head, she crawled away, trying to get to her feet, failing. “I’m going to be married,” she told him, trying to make him understand. “To a Safnian prince. He’s coming for me.” She could almost see Cheiso, standing before her. “I’ll give him children. I’ll name one for you. Robert, don’t—”
Sheer panic swept through her. She had to get away. Robert had gone mad. He meant to hurt her.
But there was no strength in her arms, and something closed around her ankle, and the grass was sliding beneath her, and she was leaving a broad trail across it, like a giant snail, except that the trail was red.
And then a moment like floating, and Robert’s face before her again.
“Sleep, sister,” he said. “Dream of when we were young, and all was well. Dream of when you loved me best.”
“Don’t kill me, Robert,” she begged, sobbing now. “Help me.”
“You’ll have Rose,” he said. “And soon enough—soon enough, you’ll have company aplenty. Aplenty.”
And he smiled, but his face seemed very far away, retreating. She hadn’t felt the fall, but the empty sockets of Rose’s little white skull were right next to her.
Lesbeth heard the music of birds, and a whispering she ought to recognize, words she half understood. They seemed very important.
And then, suddenly, that was all.
12
Spendlove
When Stephen Darige awoke from the grips of Black Mary for the fourth time in one night, he cursed sleep, rose, and crept from the dormitory. Outside, the night was clear and moonless, with a feel like early autumn in the air. He walked a small distance, to where the hillside started its roll down to the pastures, and there sat gazing up at the stars.
The stars eternal, his grandfather had called them.
But his grandfather was wrong; nothing was eternal. Not stars, not mountains. Not the saints, nor love, nor truth.
“Saint Michael,” he murmured. “Tell me what truth is. I don’t know anymore.”
He felt as if there was something spoiled in him, something he badly needed to vomit up. But he feared if it came out, it would take a life and form of its own, and devour him.
He should have told the fratrex what the scroll was as soon as he understood. He shouldn’t have translated it. By the saints, he shouldn’t have.
Now it was too late. Now he had those evil words in him. Now he couldn’t get them out.
A faint brush of shoes on grass told him someone was behind him. He was sure he knew who it was, and didn’t care.
“Hello, Brother Desmond.”
“Good morning, Brother Stephen. Taking some air?”
Stephen turned enough to see the shadow of the man standing against the stars. “Leave me alone or kill me. I don’t care which.”
“Don’t you?” It sounded strange, the way he said it, almost like a lullaby. Then a fist knotted in Stephen’s hair and yanked him down flat. Desmond dragged him a few feet and then crouched, brought the edge of a broad-bladed knife against Stephen’s throat.
“Don’t you?” he whispered again, almost in Stephen’s ear.
“Why?” Stephen managed. “Why are you doing this to me?”
“Because. I don’t like you. You’re going to walk the fanes next month. Did you know that?”
“What?”
“Yes. You’re done with your translation, aren’t you?”
“What? How did you know that?”
“I know everything that goes on around here, you little pissant. Why wouldn’t I know that?”
“I haven’t told anyone.”
“Don’t worry. I took your notes to the fratrex for you, after I read them.”
The knife came away, and Brother Desmond stood. Stephen expected a vicious kick, but instead, to his surprise, Desmond sighed and sat next to him on the grass.
“Wicked stuff,” Spendlove said, almost whispering. “Spells to turn men to jelly, prayers to the Damned Saints. Blood rites, deformation of children. First-rate wicked. Is that why you can’t sleep?”
“You read it,” Stephen said dully. “Can you sleep?”
Desmond growled up something like a laugh. “I never could,” he replied.
“Why did you steal my work?”
“Why not?”
“But you gave it to the fratrex.”
“Yes. Believe what you might about me, Brother Stephen, but I do serve my order.” His voice dropped even lower. “Very well I serve it.”
Stephen nodded. “Well, you’ve done me a favor. I didn’t know if I would have the courage.”
“What do you mean?”
Stephen suddenly wished he could see Brother Desmond’s eyes. For the first time since they had met, the other man sounded puzzled.