“With the wealth of Lady Sky’s dowry, Ven would have been a problem for you,” commented Lady Tirra icily.
Sham looked at the bitter woman and saw, unexpectedly, the same strength in Lady Tirra that characterized her son. It might have been the resemblance that made Sham stop her; it might have been the white-knuckled grip Kerim’s hands had on the arms of his chair.
“Lady Tirra.” Sham watched as the other woman hesitated, as if she wanted to ignore her son’s mistress.
Stiffly, Tirra turned to her. “I see you have continued in your attempt to win attention by the strangeness of your attire.”
Sham looked at the black shirt and pants, grey with dust and smiled, but when she spoke, it was not a reply to the lady’s challenge. “Kerim has reasons for his actions, Lady Tirra. He has chosen to keep them from the rest of the Court, but I think you have the right to know the whole,” or, Sham thought, as much of the whole as I choose to reveal.
Without giving Kerim the opportunity to stop her, she continued. “As you said, there have been a number of murders of which your son was but the most recent victim. My lord has been utilizing some of my—” she cleared her throat gently, “—unusual talents, to trap the killer. In the last several days, we have become convinced that the killer was not what he appeared. The discovery of Lord Ven’s body last night merely confirmed those suspicions.”
Sham carefully met Lady Tirra’s eyes. For some inexplicable reason, people always thought that meant you were being honest with them. “Lady, Lord Ven was not killed last night; he has been dead for several days.”
The Lady stiffened and her eyes flashed and when she spoke her voice shook with a repressed emotion Shamera couldn’t put a name to. “You are mistaken. I talked to my son yesterday.”
“As did we all, Lady,” agreed Shamera, not ungently. “But all of us in this room saw Lord Ven’s body when it was found last night. He had been dead for several days.”
The Lady’s hands clenched, but her face remained cold. “Master Talbot, saw you this as well?”
Talbot bowed. “Yes, Lady. It is as Lady Shamera has spoken. I am passably familiar with death.”
“How do you purport to explain this?” Lady Tirra asked, finally addressing her son. The flare of anger had dissolved, leaving only a very tired woman who was no longer young.
He rubbed his hands on the smooth-sanded armrests of his chair and said bluntly, “Demons.”
His mother stared silently at him.
“Lady Tirra,” said Sham, “I assure you that there are such; ask any Southwoodsman of your acquaintance—perhaps the magician who keeps shop on the Street of Bakers and supplies your maid with the cream she rubs into your hair. Demons live among people and prey upon them. We have reason to believe that this one is living among the courtiers, looking as human as you or I. It has killed more people than just your son, but we are hopeful that Lord Ven’s death may lead us to it.”
Lady Tirra whitened a touch further. “Just what are your special talents that Lord Kerim would call upon you for aid?”
“Magic,” said Sham softly, and, with a gesture, snuffed all the candles and the fire in the fireplace, bringing shadows to the room, now lit only by skylights.
She waited a long breath then raised her hand and pulled a ball of magelight out of the shadows. Small at first, she manipulated the ball of light until pale illumination seeped from an oval source as tall as she was and twice as wide.
From the items Sham had found littering Kerim’s mother’s private rooms when she’d searched them several days previously, Lady Tirra was fascinated by the possibilities of magic. If Sham was convincing enough, Lady Tirra would leave here with the belief that Ven had been killed by a demon and Kerim was doing his best to find it. For Kerim’s sake it was important that Lady Tirra didn’t think he had killed his brother.
“I have heard that there is no magic in the East,” she said softly, “but here there is magic aplenty, and other things beyond the common ken. Selkies dance in waves of the sea, howlaas wail in the northern winds, Uriah skulk in the Great Swamp and here, in this Castle a demon walks the night.” As she spoke, she caused the surface of her magelight to flatten and shimmer with illusions to illustrate her words.
Sham had never actually seen any of the creatures that she spoke of, except possibly the selkie, but she’d heard stories since she was a child. From these childish images she drew lifelike pictures that filled the illusionetic mirror. The demon was particularly impressive. Sham let its image hang in the air for a moment, allowing the full impact of silver-edged claws and six eerie yellow eyes before calling the illusion back into the simple magelight as big around as a man’s fist.
She waved, and the candles relit themselves. The fireplace was harder, as some of the fodder still contained remnants of magic and didn’t want to burn, but it caught finally and sputtered to life. Sham dismissed the magelight.
Kerim’s mother swayed and would have fallen, but for Talbot’s quick support. Kerim tried to push his chair over the mound of disassembled bed that trapped him, but one wheel caught in a hole and the chair tipped precariously.
“Talbot’s got her, plague it. If you don’t stop it, you and the chair are going to be on top of me,” grunted Sham as she grabbed at the corner of his chair and braced herself against it until it stabilized.
“She’s fine, Lord,” said Talbot promptly, as he earned his burden to the couch and arranged her comfortably. “She’s a delicate Lady, unlike some here. The sight of that demon was enough to cause a grown man to faint, much less a gentlewoman.”
Reassured, Kerim helped Sham back his chair into the cleared space.
“I’m sorry,” apologized Sham. “I guess I got carried away with the demon.”
“You were able to remove the rune beneath the bed?” asked Kerim, bending to heave one of the dark boards aside to clear a path through to the couch where his mother rested, deliberately refraining from commenting on her decision to tell Lady Tirra about the demon.
Sham nodded and took one end of a heavy bedpost and rolled it aside. “That should be the last of them. I’m afraid that it has left you rather short of clothing ...”
The Reeve grunted as he managed to collapse the rest of the boards into a relatively flat pile that he muscled the chair over. Sham winced at the scratches the sharp edges of the narrow metal wheels left in the finely polished wood.
Talbot stepped away from the couch as Kerim coifed near his mother and hovered over her, holding her hand. In a voice designed to carry no further than Sham’s ears, Talbot commented, “Considering the poison she’s always spewing at him, he’s very concerned with her well-being.”
Sham glanced at the Kerim near the prone figure of Lady Tirra. “She’s all the family he has,” she said finally and turned to begin the task of rebuilding the bed.
Without a word Talbot helped her to lift the heavy baseboard and shift it into position. The bed was an old one, slotted and carved so it was held together like one of the intricately carved puzzles that were sold in the fairs. Sweating and straining, the sailor and Sham managed to slide the first of the four heavy bedposts into position. Long before they were half-finished rebuilding the bed, Lady Tirra opened her eyes and struggled to sit up, pushing Kerim’s restraining hands away impatiently.
“You believe that demons killed my son?” Lady Tirra’s gaze was focused on the ground so that she might have been addressing anyone.
It was Kerim who chose to answer. “Yes, Mother. Furthermore, I believe that it is still here, waiting to kill someone else. I don’t know what it looks like, or how to destroy it—but it must be done before it kills again.”
Lady Tirra raised her dry eyes to meet Sham’s. “Why did you tell me this? I assume Kerim would have kept it to himself.”