Blood & Tears

Chapter 1-2

“No, Lana.” His voice came as a rough whisper.

Sady took her arm. It was barely still warm. There was no pulse. The room blurred before his eyes.

Lana, and her cheerful jokes. Lana, who would not go to bed before he came home. And he’d been eating in the kitchen, maybe even while she was bleeding to death and he could still have saved her.

The silence of the room, the smell of blood and the staring eyes of four bodies made him dizzy.

He breathed slowly through his mouth, trying to think. He needed to get guards out here, to comb the grounds to find out who had done this.

Where were the southerners? The pregnant woman and her family. There was no sign of them, although a fur cloak lay draped over the back of the couch.

He said, as loud as he dared, “Hello? Where are you?”

There was a sound in the garden.

Sady froze. The killer might still be out there. For all he knew, the killer might be one of the southerners.

He pushed himself up, picked up the gun and went to the broken window, walking over the carpet so that his footsteps didn’t make any noise.

The bushes in the garden looked like big angry trolls against the dim sky. Old Eseldus was like the king in their midst.

The sound came again, a snort, from somewhere in the yard.

He c****d the gun, once, twice to fill both barrels.

Click-click. Loud in that heavy silence.

“If you’re out there, give yourself up. I have a gun.” His voice echoed in the courtyard.

There was no reply.

He slowly stepped through the broken window, avoiding shards of glass, into the garden. His boots crunched more glass. A couple of bushes had been ripped out of the ground, their stems broken. A trail of dark spots led down the paved path, but stopped before they reached poor Eseldus.

There was that snort again. He raised the gun, holding his breath, his finger on the trigger and stood like that, as quiet as he could, until the need to breathe overwhelmed him. Nothing moved.

On the other side of the garden was a pavilion which the architect had probably intended as a garden room, but which, in absence of the large family that would normally live in a house like this, the staff used as storage.

The door stood open.

The door was not normally open.

He crossed the yard and looked inside, but it was far too dark for him to make out anything.

“Hello? Anyone in here?”

Something moaned softly in the darkness. It wasn’t an angry or a dangerous sound, but the sound of an animal in pain.

Clutching the gun, he stepped into the pavilion. Years of accumulated dust crunched under his feet. It was so dark in here. There were stacks of unused furniture in here somewhere but he hardly ever came in this room, and couldn’t remember where exactly they strood. And if only he was looking into the light, he might have been able to see some silhouettes. Still holding the gun poised, he waved his left hand about and shuffled forward, feeling where he went.

“I’m here. I have a gun. Don’t try any funny business.” He hoped it sounded confident, because he didn’t feel confident. Somewhere in the back of his mind, it occurred to him that it was probably an exceedingly stupid idea to pursue this alone, and that he should go and find Farius or Orsan.

The sound came again. This time, it was clearly a human voice. A woman. He couldn’t make out the words, but she sounded distressed.

He found the owner of the voice in the far corner behind some garden furniture. He remembered the garden table, the big one from Milleus’ house that had a candle well in the middle. He could see the table in his mind the last time he’d come in here, and remembered that there was wax in the well which no one had bothered to clean out. He ran his hands over the table, found the well and lit the wick. The paltry smoking and sputtering flame revealed that his quarry was the southern woman, legs pulled up against her chest, hugging herself.

She blinked against the light, her eyes intense blue. Her cheeks were wet with tears. She said something in her language.

“Hang on, I don’t understand a word you’re saying. Do you speak any Chevakian?”

She only responded to that by crying.

“Come, let’s get you some place safe.”

He clicked the safety back on the gun, looped the strap around his shoulder and bent down to help her up.

Her hair felt wet and the naked skin on her shoulders cold and clammy. The muscles in her arm shivered when he pulled her up. Her belly was blotched and bruised, but floppy. Her thighs were smeared with blood and she left a puddle of it on the floor. She almost fell and he put a steadying arm around her waist. She was completely naked, and her arms had multiple scratches as if she’d crashed through the bushes.

“Where is your baby?” Because clearly, the child had been born. He made a cradle of his arms and pretended to rock an infant, but he’d never had children, and maybe they didn’t rock their infants in the south, in any case, she didn’t understand him, and his first priority should be to get her out of here.

“Can you walk?”

He pulled her towards the garden. She stumbled and said some more words in her language, crying. Rivulets of blood ran down her legs. It was clear that she couldn’t walk. Not well, anyway. Also, she wore no shoes and there was glass in the courtyard.

“Come.” Sady looped his arm under her shoulders, put his other arm around the back of her legs and lifted her up.

Carefully, he walked through the garden to the guest pavilion. She was heavy, and her legs were wet and slippery with blood, but she clung onto him like she was a little girl. Curly hair tickled in his face.

He made his way back into the guest pavilion, past the bodies still on the ground.

When he entered the corridor, Orsan came the other way in big strides, carrying a torch.

“Proctor, what has—” He stopped. Looked at the woman and the broken furniture in the living room. “What happened here?”

Sady explained quickly, to Orsan’s increasingly horrified expression. “Did you hear the window break?”

“No, but I thought I heard the side gate open. What has happened to her?”

“No idea. Have you seen her baby?” Sady asked. “Have you seen the rest of the family?” There should be two other women, and a man.

“No. I was at the front gate.”

The woman moaned. Her face was wet with tears.

Orsan said, “Give her to me. I’ll take her to the domestic wing.”

“No. Take her to the second bedroom.” The one next to his. “She needs a physic. She’s bleeding.”

Orsan took the woman from Sady and his arms thanked him. He was no athlete.

“Sady!” Fast footsteps in the corridor announced Merni. She came into the room, skirt flapping. Her hair was messy from bed. “What happened? I can’t find Lana—” She stopped. Her gaze found the booted feet of the surgeon. Her eyes widened. She clapped her hands over her mouth to stifle a scream. She stumbled about, her eyes popping wide and dropped onto a bench, where she sat, panting. “They’re dead, they’re dead, they’re dead.”

Sady sank down next to her and put a hand on her shoulder.

She jerked towards him, her eyes still wide enough for the whites to show on all sides, and let out a scream.

“Shhh, calm down. It’s all right.”

“No, it’s not all right There’s dead people in there. How can you call that all right?” She screamed again, and clawed at her face. Her eyes were so wide, he wasn’t sure if she even saw him.

“Shhh—screaming is not going to help them, or the guards looking for the killer.”

“You mean there’s a killer still out there?” Her voice spilled over, hysterical. “You mean he’s going to come back and kill all of us, too?” She screamed again, shrill. Her nails left red marks on her cheeks. Sady felt like clamping his hands over his ears.

“Quiet!” he shouted, perhaps a bit louder than he’d intended, but the screaming jangled his nerves. He grabbed her hands, so she couldn’t scratch herself again. The muscles in her arms were tense and fought him. “They’re dead. They’re dead!”

He tightened his grip. “Merni, stop it!”

She looked at him, breathing fast. Tears tracked over her cheeks. He mouth quivered. “But . . . but they’re dead.”

“I know, but screaming is not going to help anyone.”

Her chest moved in rapid expansions, as if she’d burst out screaming any moment. But she kept her mouth shut.

“Calm down, breathe slowly, that’s it.”

She was young, much younger than Lana, and had started working at his household last year at Lana’s recommendation, but Sady had found her excessively formal and nervous.

Her breathing slowed somewhat. “That’s it,” he said, trying to sound as soothing as possible, even though he didn’t feel that way at all. “Now, follow Orsan and look after the poor woman.”

“Yes,” Merni said, and she nodded, clamping her lips to stop them trembling. “Yes, certainly.”

She rose and ran off, leaving Sady with the bodies. He slumped on the bench. What now?

Where was he going to get a physic and an interpreter at this time of the day during a level one sonorics warning? The physics held emergency clinics, he’d heard, but he had never been to one. At the hospital, he assumed. He had to—

There was a sound behind him. He whirled around to see that the door to the guest wing’s bedroom had opened and three people were coming out. There was a man, a hairy, unshaven fellow in a woollen robe, a middle-aged short and squat woman and a teenage girl, presumably their daughter, cradling an infant in a sling. Ah, that solved the issue of the missing baby.

The girl advanced into the room, her grey eyes wide. The baby started crying, and she patted it on the back.

“You . . . live here?” she said in heavily accented Chevakian.

“I am the owner of this house.” He couldn’t believe it. He’d spent all day looking for someone who spoke Chevakian, and all the while such a person had been in his house? “I sent you here. What happened here? Is that the baby?”

She backed away when he pointed at the child in the sling, putting a protective arm over it.

“I only wanted to know if the lady’s child was safe.”

“Is my child.” She stuck her chin into the air.

At her age? No way.

“Mine,” she said again. Her grey eyes blazed with protectiveness.

“Then where is the lady’s child?”

He had to repeat the question before she understood.

“You not see it?”

“No. I found the lady, but not the child. Where is it?”

She shrugged. “We go in.” She pointed at the bedroom door. Her mother said something and the girl replied in a sharp tone.

“You didn’t see any of what happened?” he tried again.

“We hear . . . Whaaa . . . Whaaa.” She waved her arms presumably to mimic screaming and panic. Her mother again commented. She returned another sharp reply.

“Didn’t you go and help?”

She spread her hands. “I . . . not . . .” She rolled her eyes at the ceiling.

Sady struggled on for a bit longer, but clearly her Chevakian was inadequate to tell him the full story. He did get that her name was Myra and that Dara and Ontane were her parents. The pregnant woman’s name was Loriane, and he didn’t think she was related to the family.

Orsan returned, carrying a plank and a hammer. He leaned the plank against the couch and put the hammer down on the seat.

“For the window,” he said when Sady raised his eyebrows. “I just spoke to Farius at the gate. He says he heard the side door, too. I’m going to take a light into the yard and see if we can find out where the killer went.”

“You may need to find a newborn baby.”

Orsan nodded, his face grim. “I thought it was the child the girl carries, but it’s too old. Merni showed me.”

“What would someone want with a newborn baby?”

Orsan shrugged. “We’ll have a look if we can find the bastard.”

Sady made a decision. “I’m coming.”

“Do you think that’s wise? It could be dangerous—”

“I’m coming. I’m not letting you go out there by yourself.” His voice was definite. Better in danger than sitting inside grieving over Lana’s death. There would be time to get the family’s story tomorrow, or whenever he located a translator. “It could be a while before the guards are here. The trail will be long cold by then.”