“Then the mushrooms wither,” said Ephinas quietly.
“Correct,” said Ana. “Which is exactly what happened as Uxos—very quietly and stealthily, to his credit—removed the door from its sliding tracks and replaced it. Something he did very commonly, as the groundskeeper. He probably would have replaced the ones in the bathing chamber, too—if Blas himself hadn’t been sleeping in there as the poison spread in his body.”
There was another tense silence. All eyes slowly turned to look at Uxos, who was still paralyzed, eyes wide, brow blooming with sweat.
“I suspect you were paid well for the job,” said Ana. “And you might think that we don’t have any evidence. But…dappleglass is very resistant even to normal fires. It’s a contagion, after all. A normal fire would actually make the spores float about on the smoke, though it does delay their bloom for a little while. But your hut is made of fernpaper as well, isn’t it, Mr. Uxos?” She cocked her head, smiling. “So…when the two Iudex soldiers I sent to the estate review your hut where you burned those doors, I wonder…What colors shall its fernpaper b—”
Then Uxos screamed, stood up, and dove for Ana.
* * *
—
I’D TOLD MYSELF to be prepared, but I had not been ready for this. Uxos had seemed a timid man; yet in one second, he changed into a snarling, furious creature.
I watched as his hand dipped down to his boot; and then, as it came up, there was a glitter of silver in his fingers.
A knife. In his boot. Where I had not searched.
Then I moved.
I hadn’t really intended to move. There was no conscious thought: it was like the muscles in my arms and legs had minds of their own, and they all woke up and hauled me along with them. The next thing I knew I was drawing my practice sword—the big, dull blade wrought of lead and wood—then stepping forward in front of Ana and slashing out with it.
My sword cut across him horizontally, smashing into Uxos’s arm with the knife, and then clipping his chin and splitting his lip. Out of sheer momentum, he kept hurtling forward and crashed into me.
I fell backward with Uxos on top, landing on the floor beside Ana. I managed to keep my sword up, using it as a barrier between myself and Uxos, who was clearly stunned by the blow but still frenzied. He screamed and raised his knife, intending to plunge it into my throat, perhaps; but I held my practice sword like a stave and shoved the pommel up, smashing him in the face again, this time far harder than the last blow.
He fell backward, stunned, and dropped the knife. The whole room seemed to be screaming: me, Gennadios, Ephinas. Then I was on top of Uxos, grabbing his hair with my left hand and pummeling his face with my right fist, again and again and again.
“Din!” said Ana.
I hit him again, and again, and again.
“Din!”
Uxos’s eyebrow split. His nose broke. His mouth was brimming with blood. My knuckles were aching, but I couldn’t stop hitting him.
Then something struck me on the side of the head—not enough to knock me over, but enough to stun me. I blinked, flustered, and stared stupidly as a copy of Summation of the Transfer of Landed Properties, Qabirga Canton, 1100–1120 landed on the floor next to me with a thud.
I realized Ana had thrown a book at my head—how she’d managed to land the hit despite being blindfolded, I didn’t know—and I looked up at her, outraged. “What the hell?” I snarled.
“Din, I don’t mind your violent appetites,” Ana said. “But I would very much prefer it if you didn’t beat the one man who knows anything about Blas’s assassination to fucking death! Especially not in my goddamn house!”
I looked down. Though I’d barely been cognizant of my actions, I had pulverized Uxos’s face to the point of being unrecognizable. He lay on the floor, bloodied and weeping.
My senses returned to me. I grew dimly aware that Ephinas and Gennadios were sobbing in terror.
“You two,” said Ana to them. “Outside. Now. And stay there. Otherwise I’ll send Din after you, and he’ll render you as pretty as Uxos.” Then she sat back in her chair. “Din—get your sword and get this idiot upright. We’ve some talking to do.”
* * *
—
WEEPING, Uxos gave us the full spill of it.
Someone had approached him two months ago, he said, when he’d gone into town to buy more gardening grafts for the plants. This person had told him that Commander Blas was a traitor to the Empire, and had been slated for assassination, and Uxos could either participate in his assassination or be brought up on charges himself. Uxos had been tempted to walk out on such an outrageous claim—until this person had told him of the reward involved. For if he participated, he would be made a rich man.
“Who was this person?” asked Ana. “They didn’t give a name?”
“They didn’t,” he said, sniffing.
“Didn’t mention an Iyalet they worked for? Didn’t show you any documentation of their authority?”
Uxos shook his head.
“What did they look like?” asked Ana.
“He had…had some kind of disease,” said Uxos. “His clothing was very fine, but his face was swollen, disfigured. I could barely understand what he said at first.”
“You’re sure it was a man, though?”
“I…think so. His voice was high. I suppose it might have been a woman.”
“Fuck’s sakes,” snapped Ana. “Can you even tell me what race the person was, you fool?”
“I think…Tala?” said Uxos, terrified. He gestured to me. “Like him?”
“And no residence? No method of contact information?”
No, Uxos said. All Uxos knew was that he would be paid half of the reward money up front when he agreed to help the assassin; then he was to visit the northwest corner of the grounds first thing each day. If he were to find a yellow wooden ball waiting for him, that would mean the assassination would take place that night, and he should return to that very spot at midnight to help the assassin enter the gates.
“And this assassin,” said Ana. “Was it the same person who contacted you?”
“They were all in black,” said Uxos. “Even…even wore a mask, a…an odd one. With a strange nose…”
“A warding helm,” said Ana quietly. “The kind the Apoths use to prevent themselves from breathing in contagion.”
“They didn’t even talk to me.” Uxos sniffed. “They didn’t have a sword or anything. Just a little wooden box in their hands. They walked in, then walked right out. It wasn’t until later that I saw the fernpaper rotting from where they’d touched the door. I panicked and…” He dissolved into tears. “I shouldn’t have taken it. Shouldn’t have taken the money. But I’m so old. They won’t keep me forever. And after that I’ll…I’d have nothing.” He dissolved into tears, head bowed.
“Din,” said Ana quietly. “Your bonds, please. I believe now is the time for their first use.”
I fumbled at the bonds at my side, then knelt and placed them on Uxos’s hands with a click. He kept weeping, as if unaware of what I did.
Too old to be groundskeeper by half, I’d thought when I’d first seen him. Maybe I should have known then.
* * *
—
AFTER I HAD submitted Uxos to the Arbiters at the Iudex office, I picked up some food and returned to Ana. We lunched in her little house, eating fried bean cakes and sipping aplilot tea.
“Sanctum’s sakes,” she muttered. “Next time buy flesh, Din. I require blood and organs to function, the less cooked the better. Offal. Blood pie. Anything but these roots and legumes…”
“Noted, ma’am,” I said, wrinkling my nose. “How’d you do it, though?”
“Do what?”