Shadow Scale: A Companion to Seraphina(51)

“Seraphina. Sister. Thank Allsaints I got here in time,” said Od Fredricka, huskily, in Samsamese. “I don’t know how to ask your forgiveness. I was awful. I mocked and abused you. I told the monks you were a monster, and they had you followed.”

I put a hand to my mouth, horrified. Here was the author of Abdo’s heartache.

“I have been alone all my life,” she pleaded, cupping her hands as if I might pour forgiveness into them. “I raised a palisade against the world. It kept hurt at bay, but it gave me no option to let kindness in. I did not—could not—believe in your friendship.

“I see now what a lonely life that was,” said the painter, groveling at my feet. “I don’t want to die alone. I want us all to be together. Forgive me my unjust hostility.”

I looked quickly back at Dame Okra, who raised her hands innocently and said in Jannoula’s voice, “It’s not me animating her. I can’t occupy more than one mind at a time. I can’t even attend to myself while I’m in Dame Okra’s head. For all I know, my body is being eaten by wolves right now.”

I ignored her melodrama. “You did something to her. You changed her mind.”

“I merely opened a few doors and showed her a truth she had hidden from herself. Her loneliness is her own.”

“You did that against her will.”

Jannoula shrugged Dame Okra’s shoulders. “If it was Od Fredricka’s will to be a miserable crank, then her will is an ass. I have no qualms about overriding it.”

Od Fredricka did not understand our Goreddi, but she heard her name spoken. She raised her forehead from the floor and said, “What?”

Dame Okra’s face went momentarily slack, and then she blinked rapidly, clutching the arms of her chair as if she’d grown weak and dizzy. I watched her intently, wondering if this signaled the end of Jannoula’s active possession. It seemed to, but I knew Jannoula’s awareness might still be coiled passively in Dame Okra’s head, observing everything through her eyes and ears.

Dame Okra rose with dignity and strode around the desk. “My dear, dear friend,” she said, taking Od Fredricka’s hands and gently urging her to her feet. “I am so pleased we are together at last.”

They embraced each other like long-lost sisters. I turned away, a nauseous admixture of emotions stewing in my gut.

This is what I’d wanted, the garden, the half-dragons loving each other like family. But how could I possibly want it now?





I quit the library, only to find Blanche and Nedouard haunting the corridor outside, their eyes wide and worried.

“We eavesdropped,” whispered Nedouard.

“She have it voice like donkey!” said Blanche. “How is it ghost in her mind?”

I put my arms around them and walked us back toward the dining room. “Another half-dragon, called Jannoula, has found a way to infest the minds of others,” I said quietly. “Have either of you heard her calling?”

Nedouard shook his head vigorously, but Blanche squeaked in alarm. She reached up and rapped her knuckles on my head. I understood; Jannoula had said she knocked.

Nedouard said, “Is keeping her out as simple as not answering the door?”

“Perhaps,” I said, although I feared not. Jannoula had tricked Dame Okra into reaching out. Could all ityasaari reach out with their mind-fire? How many of us did so without realizing it?

Blanche nestled her head against my shoulder and whimpered. Nedouard said, “What does this Jannoula hope to accomplish by invading people’s minds?”

“She claims she wants to bring us all together,” I said. “Just like me. Beyond that, I’m not sure.” I tried to smile, but didn’t have the stomach for it. I left the pair of them whispering together, and climbed despondently to my room. I had Samsam to prepare for.

I was to leave the next morning; I saw no way out of it. I went through the motions, helping the housemaids wash my clothes and hang them on a line across the carriage yard, but my mind and heart weren’t in it. I fretted.

It seemed futile to protest further against Gianni going to Goredd; Dame Okra was the Ninysh ambassadress, and I couldn’t stop her returning to Goredd with Jannoula in her cranium. Kiggs and Glisselda needed to know what was coming. After hanging the laundry, I returned to my room, pulled out my charm necklace, and flipped the tiny switch on the sweetheart knot.

“Castle Orison, identify yourself, if you please,” said Glisselda seconds later. She must have been sitting at her desk; this was earlier in the day than I usually called.

“Sera—” I began.

“Phina!” she cried. “How lovely to hear your voice. You’re in Segosh? Is Abdo going to be all right?”

Not only had I forgotten to tend my garden, but I’d failed to report to the Queen last night. “He’s having surgery. Dame Okra thinks his hand will be restored, but he’ll need rest. He’ll stay here and return to Goredd in a few weeks.”

Glisselda said, “I’m so sorry. We’ll take good care of him, I promise.”

I was standing at the window, staring down into the street. A troop of Count Pesavolta’s men rode past; I changed the subject. “Is Prince Lucian with you?”


“He’s out making arrests,” she said. “We gave the Sons of St. Ogdo two days to leave town. Most went peaceably, thank Heaven, but a few have decided to make things nasty for our Burrowers—the citizens making our tunnels livable again. The Sons sabotaged some supports and caused a cave-in. A sinkhole swallowed half the apse of St. Jobertus’s Church.”