Seraphina(88)

“Waiting for you,” said Orma lightly. “I only wonder that it took you so long.”

“Your wench led me here,” said Basind greasily. If he was hoping to get a reaction from Orma, he was disappointed. Orma’s face remained completely empty. “I could report you,” said the newskin. “You’re having trysts in roadside shrines.”

“Do,” said Orma, waving a dismissive hand. “Be off. Scamper and report.”

Basind looked uncertain how to respond to this bravado. He pushed his limp hair out of his eyes and sniffed. “I’m charged with seeing you report to the surgeons in time.”

“I gathered that,” said Orma. “But you will recall that my niece—yes, my niece, daughter of my nameless sister—wished to bid me farewell, and wished to do so in private. She is half human, after all, and it pains her that I will not recognize her when I see her again. If you would but give us a few more minutes—”

“I do not intend to take my eyes off you again.” Basind bugged his eyes to underscore the point.

Orma shrugged, looking resigned. “If you can endure human blubbering, you have a stronger stomach than most.”

My uncle shot me a sharp look, and for once we were in perfect understanding. I began to wail noisily, giving it everything I had. I howled like a banshee, like a gale down the mountainside. I bawled like a colicky baby. I expected Basind to stubbornly stand his ground—this seemed a very silly way to drive him off—but he recoiled in revulsion, saying, “I will stand guard just outside.”

“As you wish,” said my uncle. He watched until Basind had turned his back to us, then closed in, speaking directly into my ear: “Continue to wail, as long as you can.”


I looked at him, sorrowing in earnest, unable to say any words of parting because I had to expend all my breath on loud crying. Without a backward glance, Orma ducked behind the altar and out of sight. There must have been a crypt under the shrine, as sometimes happened; the crypt would surely connect with the great warren of tunnels under the city.

I wailed, for real and for true, staring down St. Clare, beating on the hem of her robe with my fist until I was hoarse and coughing. Basind glanced back, then looked again, startled. I could not let him work out where Orma had gone. I looked past Basind, over his shoulder, pretending to see my uncle’s face in the shuttered alley windows behind him, and I cried, “Orma! Run!”

Basind whirled, perplexed at how Orma could have reached the alley without his seeing. I rushed him, shoving him into a pile of firewood, causing a little avalanche of logs. I took off running as fast as I could. He recovered far more quickly than anticipated, his flat-footed gait echoing behind me, his silver bell ringing out a warning.

I wasn’t much of a runner; each step seemed to drive a spike into my knees, and the hem of my gown, sodden with dirty snow, clung to my ankles, nearly tripping me. I ducked left and jogged right, sliding on bloody ice behind a butcher’s. I climbed a ladder onto someone’s work shed, hoisted it up after myself, and used it to climb down the other side. That struck me as clever until I saw Basind’s hands grip the far edge of the roof. He was strong enough to pull himself up; that was unexpected. I jumped off the ladder and crash-landed, causing a ruckus among the chickens in someone’s little yard. I sprinted through the gate into yet another alley. I turned north, then north again, making for the crowded river road. Surely the crowd would stop Basind—not just slow him down, but restrain him. No Goreddi could stand idly by while a saarantras chased one of their own.

Basind’s breath rasped close by my neck; his hand hit my swinging satchel but couldn’t quite get a grip on it. I burst out of the alley into bright sunlight. People scattered before me, crying out in surprise. It took a moment for my eyes to adjust, but what I saw then stopped me short. I heard Basind stop running at almost the same moment, arrested by exactly the same sight—we’d emerged in the middle of a cluster of men in black-feathered caps: the Sons of St. Ogdo.





I did the first thing that occurred to me. I pointed at Basind and cried: “He’s trying to hurt me!”

It’s possible he was; I’m certain he looked guilty, chasing me out of an alley like that; and I knew, in my heart, that I was maligning one dragon to save another. But I should never have said such a thing, not to the Sons of St. Ogdo, who needed little enough excuse to harm a saar.

They mobbed him, slamming him up against the side of a building, and I knew I had started something far larger than I had intended. There must have been forty Sons in this cluster alone; their numbers were growing daily, with the Ardmagar here.

My eyes met those of one of the Sons, and with a shock, I recognized the Earl of Apsig.

He was disguised—homespun clothes, a cobbler’s apron, a squashed hat holding his black feather—but nothing could alter those arrogant blue eyes. He’d surely seen me when I dashed from the alley; he tried to conceal himself now, ducking behind his fellows, averting his face while they chanted St. Ogdo’s Malediction Against the Worm: Eye of Heaven, seek out the saar. Let him not lurk among us, but reveal him in his unholiness. His soulless inhumanity flies like a banner before the discerning eyes of the righteous. We will cleanse the world of him!

I looked around desperately for the Guard and spotted them approaching from the north, riding toward us in a unit.