Lamentation (33 page)

Today would be no different.

He heard Isaak’s approach beyond the partially closed door—the clicking and clanking of his gears and motor, the heavy footfalls and the slight hiss of escaping steam preceding the metal man’s tinny voice. He poked his head into the room. “Father?”

“Hello, Isaak,” Petronus said. “Come in.”

Isaak walked into the room. In one hand he held the cage containing the golden bird that Petronus had asked him to investigate, and in his other he carried a small stack of paper.

“I’ve finished my work with the mechanical bird,” Isaak said. He placed the golden bird on the corner of the desk, and Petronus noted that he set it in exactly the place he had picked it up two or three weeks earlier.

Petronus stared at it. Isaak had wanted to repair it, but Petronus had not wanted to take that step until they knew more about it. The bird lay in the bottom of its cage, its head twitching and its one good eye rolling loosely in its socket. One of its charred wings still lay bent and sparking, and its metal talons opened and closed mechanically. He forced his gaze back to Isaak. “Did you learn anything?”

Isaak’s eye shutters flashed. “Its memory and behavior scrolls were significantly damaged by fire. Any more recent instructions are beyond retrieval, but it is indeed the property of House Li Tam. I found an inscription from Pope Intellect VII, gifting it to Xhei Li Tam.”

Surprised, Petronus looked from Isaak to the bird. Intellect had been Pope centuries before the Order had begun its research in Old World mechanicals. “It’s not Androfrancine work, then?”

“No, Father. It is a restoration, not a reproduction.”

Petronus chose his next words carefully; Xhum Y’Zir’s spell was a sensitive subject for the metal man. “Is the damage consistent with the . . . 
events
 . . . at Windwir?”

Isaak’s eyes darkened, first one and then the other. He turned away. “Yes, Father.” A gout of steam whistled, and his mouth flap opened and closed. Petronus had learned early on how to read these behaviors. Isaak was troubled. Finally, the metal man spoke again. “I do not understand it, though. It is certainly of durable design, and it was significantly damaged.”

Petronus nodded. “Yes.”

Isaak’s voice lowered. “The other mechoservitors and I were on the ground in the midst of the Desolation. Why weren’t we damaged?”

The old man shrugged. “Your leg was damaged.”

Isaak shook his head. “Sethbert’s Delta Scouts damaged my leg. The spell itself did not damage me or the others of my kind. I do not understand this.”

Petronus felt his eyebrows raise. He hadn’t realized the injury was not a result of the spell, and he wondered why he’d not thought about this sooner. There were fourteen mechoservitors in total, and all but Isaak were in the library when Windwir fell. He’d seen the blackened wreckage, the ruined remains of the few Androfrancine artifacts the gravediggers had collected in the wagons. Very little of it would be salvageable. And yet the metal men had emerged unscathed for the most part. “I do not understand it either.”

Isaak placed the stack of paper on the one remaining bare surface of Petronus’s desk. “That brings me to the other matter you asked me to investigate, Father.”

Petronus rubbed his temples and tried to remember. His head felt full and he could feel the ache behind his eyes. “Which matter?”

“I have reinventoried the Order’s holdings regarding magicks and mechanicals adaptable for military use. My process and findings are in this report.”

More paper.
Petronus looked at it but did not pick it up. “Can you summarize your findings for me?”

Isaak nodded. “Certainly, Father. In short, there are none remaining.”

Now Petronus reached for the report and scanned the first page. “None?”

“No, Father. Though it should not be a surprise. Brother Charles was very careful to remove the most sensitive knowledge from his mechoservitors.”

Petronus sighed. That part of the light was now lost, but perhaps that was a buried blessing in all of this. If it weren’t gone, they would have been forced to make hard choices. After seeing what the worst of that war-making magick could do, he could not bring himself to grieve the loss of that darker light. His stomach sunk, suddenly, and his head snapped up. He fixed Isaak with a hard stare. “What about the Seven Cacophonic Deaths? What has become of it?”

He’d expected a reaction, but when it played out before his eyes, Petronus jerked backward in his chair. Isaak’s entire body started shaking, his jeweled eyes rolling as his mouth flap whistled. His long metal fingers opened and closed, and his helmetlike head rolled on his slender neck. A low whine grew in pitch, and a gout of steam shot from his exhaust grate. Water leaked from his eyes and mouth. His chest bellows pumped furiously. “Father, do not ask me—”

Petronus felt a desperation edge into his voice, lending it an angry tone. “Under Holy Unction, Isaak, I compel you: What has become of the Cacophonic Deaths?”

Suddenly, Isaak stopped shaking and his shoulders went slack. When he spoke, his voice was flat and reedy, as if far way. “That portion of my memory scroll was damaged in the casting of the spell, Father.”

Petronus leaned forward, his voice more calm. “Damaged beyond
any
possible recovery?”

Isaak nodded. “Yes, Father.”

Petronus nodded, relief flooding him. Still, it broke his heart to bring it up. Over the months he’d worked with Isaak, he saw more and more how that deep wound within shaped the metal man’s soul. “I’m sorry to be so forceful, Isaak. But some things should never have come back from the Churning Wastes. Some parts of the so-called light should stay in darkness.”

Isaak looked away and said nothing. Petronus couldn’t tell if the metal man looked relieved, troubled or both. He decided to change the subject. “So has there been any further news on Lord Rudolfo?”

Isaak shook his head. “No, Father. Lady Tam has heard nothing. First Captain Aedric and the Gypsy Scouts have sent birds back—they’ve made inquiries along the coastline, but have no news as of yet.”

Petronus nodded. The Gypsy King surprised him, abruptly vanishing after Sethbert’s capture. Rudolfo was a wily one, but like his father, his sense of duty anchored him. When he concluded with whatever private matter he attended to, Rudolfo would be back to finish the work he’d started here, because like Petronus, he would do what he was made for. “I’m sure he’ll turn up,” Petronus said.

“Yes, Father.” Isaak turned to the door. “If that is all, I have a meeting with the bookbinders to discuss logistics.”

Petronus forced a smile. “Thank you, Isaak.”

The metal man left, and Petronus relaxed in his chair. Outside he heard a child laughing, and for the briefest moment his nose filled with the smell of salt water and freshly caught fish as the laughter evoked unexpected memory. His feet could nearly feel the warm wood of the boat docks slapping at them as he raced a young Vlad Li Tam for his father’s waiting boat.

The sudden image of his friend as a boy flooded Petronus with sadness. Beneath that sadness, he knew, lived a terrible wrath toward someone he once loved as a brother.

“I was made for this,” Vlad Li Tam had told him long ago when Petronus had asked him if he ever wondered what his life would’ve been if he weren’t Lord Tam of House Li Tam. Afterward, they’d gone fishing together for the last time, and it had almost touched the magic of earlier days, before destiny had found and chained them.

I should go fishing, he thought. Surely one of the servants or Gypsy Scouts could point him toward rod and tackle. The river that cut through town was not very wide, but he’d seen deep patches of green beneath the shade of the trees that lined its edge, and he knew that trout rose in it, their brown backs rippling the water as they fed.

But in the end, Petronus stayed at his desk and worked until his eyes blurred and his hand ached, unshackling himself from the desk long after the sound of frogs filled the forest-scented night beyond his window.

“What I was made for,” he said quietly to that dark.

Jin Li Tam

Jin Li Tam awoke in the middle of the night to commotion in the halls, and crept to the spyhole in her suite’s sitting room to look out over the stairwells and landings of the seventh manor. She saw servants and scouts rushing about as quietly as they could up and down the stairs, in and out of the doors.

She’d slept lightly these last two weeks, apprehension growing inside of her. It was unlike Rudolfo to simply vanish without a word. He’d turned Sethbert over to his Physicians of Penitent Torture, then ridden off without escort and without letting anyone know where he went or why.

One of the Gypsy Scouts had brought word back of Sethbert’s capture, and she’d practically interrogated him. The Overseer had surrendered personally to Rudolfo.

Sethbert said something to him. But what? Something about Windwir? Something about the motive for his terrible crime?

Whatever it was, Rudolfo had left without a word and without the Gypsy Scouts whose sworn duty was to protect their king at all times and all costs.

And now, she surmised, he had returned. She slipped into a light silk robe and went to the door that led to the bathing room. She could hear movement in the suites beyond her. Low voices whispered hurried instructions as his room was readied.

He must have caught them unawares
. She chuckled. He’d probably used one of the many concealed halls, and now they were scrambling to dress out his room, despite the fact they had done so each and every morning in expectation of his return. Of course, he would’ve never asked for such a thing. But they knew their king.

The commotion quickly dissipated, and after a few minutes of silence, she heard soft footfalls in the hall. They fell in a measured stride she’d grown to anticipate over the months, and she listened as Rudolfo paused by her door before continuing on down the hall. She heard a door open and close, and she waited another ten minutes.

Quietly, she slipped through the bathing room and into Rudolfo’s bedchamber. He wasn’t there.

Jin Li Tam moved from room to room, not finding Rudolfo in the den or the sitting room. She went to the main door of his suite and opened it onto the wide hallway that encompassed the row of children’s rooms and the main entrance to her own suite.

Of course, she realized. She walked to the door of that first room, the one that had belonged to his brother. She raised her hand to knock and then lowered it. Gently, she turned the knob and pushed the door open.

Rudolfo sat on the small bed. He was wearing nondescript clothing, his curly hair framing his face. He looked younger without the green turban of his office, despite the salt and pepper of his beard. He was holding the small sword in his hands, and he looked up at her.

I will not ask him where he’s been
. “I’m glad you’re home.”

His eyes met hers for a split second and then darted away. They had been angry eyes, she saw, and he had not wanted her to see them. “I am glad to be home.”

I will not ask him where he’s been.

But he started talking as if she had asked him. “I’ve been to the Emerald Coasts to speak with your father,” Rudolfo said. “I’ve had a lot of time on the way back to think about what I would say to you, the questions I would ask.”

More than the words, the very tone of his voice struck her like a fist. It was flat and distant, almost devoid of emotion. She’d heard it before, but only during the worst of his grieving over Gregoric. And those times, it was not so calculated.

He knows now.
Some part of her had hoped she was wrong about her father. Some part of her that surprised her, that had never existed before meeting this man.

Before, she would have left no room for flights of fancy. But now she realized how desperately she’d hoped she’d been wrong about what her father had done to Rudolfo to make him the man he was.

She didn’t know what else to say. “I’m sorry.”

“How long have you known?”

She stepped into the room and pushed the door closed. “I’ve pieced it together since I’ve come here.”

Rudolfo nodded and stroked his beard, his eyes again meeting hers. “And would you have ever told me?”

She shook her head. “I would not.”

“Did you know that your father is leaving the Named Lands?”

“I wondered when I saw his library arrive,” she said. “I am no longer in communication with my father.”

Rudolfo looked away again. “They are loading the iron armada with livestock and goods. There is another library—a secret library—and your father has burned all of its books.” He looked back to her and his eyes narrowed. “You should know that I have vowed to kill him if I see him again.”

Jin Li Tam blinked and nodded. I might help him, she realized. She felt anger and sorrow on Rudolfo’s behalf, and anger and sorrow of her own. She did not see how her father wasn’t involved in the Desolation of Windwir. He had used Sethbert in the same way that the mad Overseer had used Isaak—dancing him on a string. She believed it with all her being.

The flatness in her own voice surprised her when she spoke. “I think he was behind Sethbert’s genocide.”

Rudolfo looked up, his eyes slightly wider. “You believe your fathe‹€eve yourr brought down Windwir?”

She nodded slowly. “I do.”

The Gypsy King stared at the child’s sword in his hands, then sheathed it and hung the belt back over the peg on the wall. Finally, he looked up at her. “I do not think he did. But he has done enough.”

Jin Li Tam swallowed. “What does this mean?”

Rudolfo stood. “Nothing. The Androfrancines will hold their council. We will plan our nuptials. We will rebuild what we can and we will safeguard it.” He touched the small turban, tracing his finger over it. “I have another question,” he said.

“I will answer it if I can.” She shifted, her feet suddenly eager to move.

His eyes were hard and his jaw clenched. “Your father claims you denounced him. He says it is because you have love for me in your heart. Is this true?”

The directness of his question tangled her tongue. She felt small and naked suddenly. Finally, she found words that she had never imagined saying. “It is true,” she said in a quiet voice. “I do love you.” His silence told her that he could not say the same, but she laid that aside. “What my father did to you is wrong,” she continued. “I see this very clearly. But the man you became—he is formidable and strong. He is able to ruthlessly pursue what is right and appropriate.”