Page 26 of Mistress of Bones

Tearing her gaze from the painting, Azul found her brother watching her, clad in his nightshirt and a robe.

Was he looking for a reaction to the decor?

No, he was waiting to see why she was in his room this late at night, still in her shirt and breeches but otherwise prepared for stealth.

She went back to the door and closed it carefully.

“Gruesome, isn’t it?” he said with a conspiratorial smile, nodding toward the flesh-to-bone painting. “Unfit for a gentleman’s chamber.”

Azul shook her head. “It’s what we are inside. Flesh and bones. It’s good to keep a reminder so we don’t believe ourselves indestructible.”

“I wish I had hidden it, then. It’s my duty as older brother to appear indestructible, isn’t it?”

She smiled at this. “I wouldn’t know. It seems my fate to remain the younger one.”

He crossed his arms and studied Azul from amused, half-lidded eyes.

“I’ve had time to grow into my role, willingly and eagerly, even if I wasn’t able to lure you back home.

So, tell me, Sister, what is it that you need my help with?

Does it have something to do with this sudden urge to come visit me? ”

Azul was relieved at the direct question.

Sitting by his side on the long trunk, she met his stare.

“I need help getting into the ossuary. The rooms where they keep the bones. I tried to gain access today but was unsuccessful in securing an appointment. You’re a marquess now; I’d hoped you’d have some influence over these kinds of matters. ”

He didn’t seem shocked or surprised by the request. Perhaps , Azul thought, he was used to people asking his help to enter otherwise inaccessible buildings .

“The Temple…?”

“Dean Eneres was not available.”

He nodded solemnly. “Too many people with strange requests, no doubt.” Then, so cautiously Azul grew nervous for the first time, “Why the ossuary?”

She fidgeted with her hands, hoping to appear young and lost and in need of a hero’s help.

“I wish to pray to my sister’s bones—one of my sisters’ bones.

She was brought here years ago after her demise near Monteverde.

” She suddenly feared his next question—why not pray in the Temple, since the deceased’s soul now belonged to the gods?

—so she rushed her next words: “It’s something we promised each other, that if we happened to die before the other, even if the Lord Death claimed our souls, we’d leave a part of us behind in our bones for the times when we’d need the other’s love and comfort.

I know it’s strange and against the Temple’s teachings, and it might seem silly that the Lord Death would allow such a thing to happen…

but it’s so important to me. It would bring me so much peace to see her remains one more time in case part of her is still somehow there.

I must do it without Sirese Enjul or his shadow knowing. ”

“So, the shadow is his,” Sergado said. “Why the secrecy? Are you sure you don’t want me to do something about this shadow or Enjul?”

The no-nonsense edge to those last words reaffirmed his need to protect her as she had meant to protect Isadora.

Hopefully , she thought wryly, with better results .

“I’m helping Sirese Enjul with some matters, but I know he won’t return the favor.

You know how strict Valanjians are about the Lord Death.

Sirese Enjul doesn’t approve of my plans.

He doesn’t think I ought to visit my sister. ”

“Then allow me to kick him out,” Sergado said earnestly. “I can deal with whatever keeps you beholden to him. Stay here at Almanueva with me. It’s your right to live here as much as it is mine. I meant to settle an allowance for you, but I’ve been busy taking care of Father’s position.”

“An allowance?”

“As is your due as his daughter. I’m not sure why he didn’t do it while he was alive. He has always been strict about these sorts of things.” A wince. “Was.”

“He offered to take charge of me,” Azul told him, “but my mother refused.”

“Still, strange he didn’t do it anyway and kept it secret until you were of age. There might still be such an account, hidden among all his others.”

Azul would be lying if the thought of free-given money wasn’t a welcome relief.

Newly fourteen-year-old Isadora would need to be hidden from their mother.

She would need food, clothes, another start in life.

To have the matter settled, so speedily and easily, was nothing short of an answered prayer.

“How did he die?” she asked. “Our father.”

“A matter of the heart, I’m told,” Sergado answered, focusing on the empty fireplace across the room. “It was sudden and without warning. He was a good man. Strict in his ways, but with a sense of duty. I wish you had met him.”

Azul caught the wishful edge to his voice and felt the bond of true kinship, for she, too, was starting to wish he had met Isadora. “I wish I had.”

They sat in contemplative silence for a few minutes. Then, snapping out of it, Sergado smiled and patted Azul’s hand. “I will help you gain entry to the ossuary, of course. But it might take a few days.”

“A few days…,” she said, crestfallen—this she didn’t have to fake.

“Things move slow in Cienpuentes. Slower sometimes for me. I am new and unproven. My position opens doors, but others are in no hurry to unlock them.” He winked. “For now.”

This elicited a burst of laughter from her. He would do this for her, she was sure of it. The look in his eyes, the honesty in his open face. She had asked, so he would try his best. Wouldn’t she if Isadora had asked it of her?

Some guilt surfaced at her attempts at manipulating him, but they were easily dismissed—she hadn’t asked him to risk anything but a few minutes of his time. She took her brother’s hand and squeezed it tightly. “Thank you, Brother.”

He smiled, brought her hand to his mouth for a fast press of his lips.

“Stay, Sister. I mean my offer. You will enjoy Cienpuentes. You will make new friends, new conquests. You will lack for nothing and you will become whatever you want to be. You can visit your mother and your other sister at will, stay with them for a little while, and they will be welcome to travel here as well. This is too big of a house. It needs a family to feel content.”

Would he be so obliging if she asked him to take care of Isadora in her stead? Azul wondered. She might be bound by duty to return to Valanje after this affair was over, but it did not mean Sergado must be left without a younger sister to look after, even if not of the same blood.

He said no more, and there was nothing else she could say, not until she had her hands on Isadora’s bones, except for her thanks and a good night.

Enjul was waiting in the far corner of the hallway.

Heart in her throat from the shock of his presence, Azul finished closing her brother’s door and made her way to the emissary, feet silent on the cool tiles.

He loomed against the wall, also barefoot, also in shirtsleeves and breeches, his hair also tumbling free over his shoulders and back.

They weren’t so different, Azul thought, she and he in the soft shadows created by the stray silvery light of the moons.

A sense of familiarity unfurled in her chest, as if some part of her recognized this moment of strange symmetry.

As if in another time, another life, they might be well matched, soul to soul and heart to heart.

Then, of course, he had to speak:

“Did you have a good talk?”

“Did you hear enough from your man?” she countered in a whisper. “Enjoyed his report, made notes on how to improve his efficiency for tomorrow?”

“He earned his coin and he is glad to have the job.”

“It must have been easy,” she said dryly. “You knew I wouldn’t be allowed into the ossuary, didn’t you? You knew I would waste my time there.”

His smile was slight, but it was there, strange in the shadows of the corner. “You were so endearing in your pursuit, going around town wasting my man’s time. Now, tell me, did you warn your brother about what you are?”

She glanced over her shoulder. Her brother’s door remained closed. “Why should I? I mean him no harm.”

“I wonder about that.”

His certainty rankled. “What do you mean?”

“Did you ever ask your sister if she wanted to be brought back?”

The question took her aback. “She was already dead. How could I ask?”

He took a step forward, and she took a step backward, until they were around the bend in the corridor.

“Not the first time, but after.” A pause while she couldn’t find anything to say. “No, you never asked. Because you are selfish and were scared of her answer. Scared that there was a chance she would say no, that she didn’t want to become an affront in the eyes of the gods.”

Azul kept ahold of her anger, but it seeped through in her harsh whisper. “Isadora would never think that. She didn’t believe in the gods and—”

“Ah, but you must. Otherwise, why come to Valanje? Was it not because you were curious about the Lord Death, about what you could do? Did it never occur to you that others might not want to blemish their souls under his eyes?”

“I don’t want to go, Azul.” Isadora’s reticence, such a contrast with her usual carefree self, back to haunt her. “Isadora was all that is life,” she told Enjul, hands fisted tightly, nails digging into her palms. “She would never accept death.”

“How are you to know, when you never bothered to ask?”

She gave him a small mocking bow. “You are right. I shall do that next time.” Turning on her heel, she stalked toward her room.

“Miss Del Arroyo.”

She paused, well aware that she had gone too far.

His words betrayed no emotion when they came: “I gave you a day. Tomorrow, you shall do as I say.”