The Adorned (11 page)

Yana stopped the carriage; Tallisk did not wait for her to descend and let us out, but burst out of the carriage and went to knock on the door. I threw Isadel a questioning glance.

“Deino Meret,” she said, in a near-whisper, “is Tallisk’s craft-master. He’s showing you off.”

I felt an obscure pride at this, though I’d done nothing to deserve pride—not yet, at least.

I saw movement at the doorstep, and Isadel stepped down, snapping open the parasol. “Well, come on,” she said. “The sooner you get this over with, the better.”

I stepped into the parabola of shade. By long tradition, no Adorned would enter another’s house uncovered, save when they were on display. This meeting would be on the threshold. Yana and Isadel stood beside me like an honor guard, shielding me from prying eyes.

In front of me was Tallisk. He took a deep breath before knocking at the door; there was barely a few seconds’ wait. It would seem we were expected.

No housekeeper or key-master greeted us; Deino Meret, it seemed, opened his own doors. He was not as old as I had expected. I had supposed any man who had been master to Tallisk would have been a wizened gnome, but he looked a vigorous sixty-something. He leaned against the doorframe, stroking his prodigious grey beard. Hidden in it somewhere, I saw a smile. “Well, well, Roberd,” he said, “I was beginning to wonder when you’d next choose an Adorned. Is this him, then?”

Tallisk took my elbow and steered me toward him. “Master Meret, this is Etan writ-Tallisk.”

I had not heard my new name spoken aloud before this. I swallowed my shock at it and looked at Meret with what I hoped was a smile.

He bent to peer at me closer. His eyes were wide set and dark, with wild brows, and they were merciless in their scrutiny.

“An interesting theme,” he said after a moment. “A new direction for you, Roberd?”

“Yes,” Tallisk said.

Meret nodded. “I look forward to seeing you completed, young Etan.”

“Thank you, sir,” I murmured.

“Now.” Meret drew himself up. “I am sure you have other visits to make.” He brushed his fingertips against the ivory square at my throat. “Good luck to you. In all things.”

With those words and no more, Meret turned away from us, back into the shade of his house. Still holding me by the elbow, Tallisk guided me back into the carriage. He sat back, eyes slit in my direction—they were like a surveyor’s tools, sharp and critical. I felt, for a moment, a stranger to him once more.

“Do we go to the Count, now?” There was a note of anticipation in Isadel’s voice, I thought. Was she so eager to see him again?

“Yes.” Tallisk sighed. “I suppose we had best introduce you to our patron at last.”

I looked up at him with knitted brows. If Isadel was eager, Tallisk sounded nothing if not reluctant. “Sir?”

He leaned out to get Yana’s attention, ignoring me. “To Count Karan’s, then.”

Yana spurred the horses, and we were off once more.

Chapter Fifteen

The Blooded had pride of place in the city. Their houses were laid out in a garland around the old palace, where the Council of Blood ruled in place of ancient kings. Their servants roamed the wide white streets, bright as peacocks in their outfits, and their bloodguards stalked around, proud and territorial as wolves, their rifles slung across their backs.

In architecture, the manors of the Blooded were not so different from the houses on Nightwell Street. They were larger, finer, and set apart from each other rather than crammed end-to-end, but one might believe they belonged to some rich merchant family or well-rewarded Noble of the Sword.

There was one difference, though, that made them impossible to mistake. Most city houses had no gardens, and those that did hid them behind their backs, like Tallisk’s, narrow little patches of earth where only the toughest plants did not struggle to grow. The gardens of the Blooded were their entrance halls, forests in miniature, ringed with fences of delicate iron. Their houses wore them like Adornments.

I gaped. I had seen engravings of them, these gardens of privilege, but to see them with my own eyes was a different matter. There were trees of all shapes and sizes, a bewildering profusion of flowers, waist-high grass. I saw, between the gaps of one fence, a white rose the size of my head.

“
Always shall we put beauty before us;
beauty shall precede us like a herald.
”

I turned to Isadel. Her smile was thin and serene. She was quoting, I thought; I did not know what. Tallisk’s own expression was sour.

The house we stopped at was not the largest, though it seemed, to me, the finest. Its garden looked like a forest at dawn. Birch and willow and trees I could not name, smaller than they would grow in the wild, had been arranged to form paths and bowers. Some of their leaves had an unnatural glow, an almost golden touch to them.

The carriage halted at the gate. Two groomsmen, bowing, took over care of the horses, freeing Yana to precede us as key-master. We were expected. The gate was opened for us, and a servant in white led us down a gently sloping path.

Near the bottom of it was a pond, and a stone bench. A man reclined there; I could see no more of him than white clothes and a suggestion of dark hair. The bench was flanked by two burly bloodguards, and servants went to and fro with silver salvers. One, a dark-skinned Southern woman, played a harp. A willow swooned over the scene.

“Give me that,” Tallisk said to Isadel under his breath. He grabbed the parasol, and his other arm he reached out to me, like a suitor asking for a dance. I blinked at it. “Take my arm,” he said. “And walk with head held high.”

So we proceeded.

The Count did not rise as we approached, though his servants did, with bowed heads. The harpist paused her song, hands held taut above the strings.

“The household of Master Roberd Tallisk,” Yana said, with a quick bow.

“Maestro Tallisk.” The Count had a low, musical voice; laughter seemed to lurk in it. “You are welcome here. I have been expecting you.”

The harpist resumed her play, though softer, and the servants moved toward us, offering treats from their silver tray. Tallisk’s hand, hard on my arm, told me to demur.

“Your Grace,” he said, releasing my arm. “Allow me to present Etan writ-Tallisk.”

Now he did rise. I had not before met any of the Blooded, but I would have known it of him had I seen him in beggar’s rags. He was tall, and beautiful in a sharp, remote fashion, like a fox or a bird of prey. His hair was black and silk smooth, and his eyes had the telltale opalescent cast of his kind. They were grey gold, like old jewelry.

“Very nice,” he said, circling us. His long fingers almost brushed my bare back, and I shivered. “This is a new direction for you, Maestro. You must be taking inspiration from the fine spring.”

“Indeed.” The harshness of Tallisk’s voice startled me.

The Count smiled. The teeth at the corners of his mouth were sharp. “Isadel, my dear,” he said, “I have a notion.”

She curtsied to him. “My lord?”

“Haqan—Lord Loren, that is—has his natal day soon. I plan to throw him a feast.”

“Yes, my lord?”

He laughed. “Loren’s colors are green and red. How fine would it be for you and your writ-brother both to attend at his feast? An auspicious first contract for him, wouldn’t you say?”

“Auspicious indeed, my lord,” she said, though her tone was dubious.

Tallisk stood impassive, holding the parasol above me, as the Count hatched his plan. Patron or not, I thought, Tallisk seemed to have little love for him.

“Yes,” the Count said, “I think so. I shall have Geodery come to draw up a contract for the boy. Isadel shall once again be displayed on our agreed terms, I trust?”

Tallisk shifted his shoulders. “Of course, Your Grace.”

“Very well.” He looked at me once more, smiling. The fox in his features was clear in that smile: he looked
hungry.
“Oh, and I will make sure the boy—Etan, was it?—has a proper display-costume made up, as well. I trust you have his measurements? I will bear
that
expense, of course. Haqan will be pleased, to have himself celebrated thusly.”

“I am sure,” Tallisk said, “he will.”

“Well then,” the Count said. “Only one thing remains to be done.” He showed the edges of his sharp teeth in a smile. “Come here, Etan.”

I glanced toward Tallisk, automatically, and the Count laughed. “Tell him I am nothing to fear, Maestro Roberd.”

“Go to him,” Tallisk said, his voice low, almost strained. “You’ll understand. Go.”

I took a halting step toward the Count, then another. He smiled, but his golden eyes were unreadable—the eyes of a beast set in the face of a beautiful statue. “Kneel, Etan,” he said, and I did. He stepped closer. His hands were raised like claws. I warred with the impulse to shut my eyes; I wanted to see what was coming. Then he laid his hands on my shoulders.

His touch was cool, almost cold, and very gentle—yet there was a strength in it that I could not have struggled against even if I wanted to. My breath caught in my throat. The cool touch of his fingers seemed to creep under my skin, and there was a feeling of something almost like pain: the remembrance of a needle, perhaps. For one dizzying moment I felt the beat of blood in two hearts; I saw myself, a pale and frightened youth, and felt my hands strong on my own shoulders.

Then it was over. The Count lifted his hands from me; once more I breathed. I blinked up at the Count. He favored me with an indolent smile and held out his hand so that I might rise.

I did, stumbling slightly. Tallisk was behind me, his hand on the small of my back, steadying me. I looked back at him and caught the motion of leaves on my shoulder. It was ever-so-slight, but it was
there
, undeniably—no trick of the eye, this. I looked to Tallisk. “What—”

“Blood calls to blood,” the Count said. “I have awakened it. Ah, speaking of which...” He reached inside his coat and took out a small silver vial—and a thin, sharp knife. I sucked in a breath as he pierced the tip of his own finger and let thick, rich drops of blue-black blood slip into the silver.

Blood calls to blood
—I understood, then, what Tallisk had inked into me. A trickle of gods’ blood ran under my skin.

The Count tossed the vial to Tallisk as if it were an apple, or a coin tossed to a beggar; Tallisk caught it neatly in his fist.

The Count turned to Isadel and smiled. “Come here.” He beckoned her closer and leaned to kiss her, lightly, on the cheek. “As always, it is a pleasure to see you.”

“As always, my pleasure is the greater, my lord.”

“Etan.” I thought perhaps he would lean in to kiss me, as well. Instead he touched a leaf upon my shoulder, lightly, and I shivered. A rushing echo of that strange doubling—two hearts, two sets of eyes—passed over me and was gone. “I shall see you again very soon.”

I bowed to him. “Your Grace.” With effort, I kept my voice from shaking.

“You may take your leave now,” he said, waving us away. He took his place on the bench once more, lounging like a cat.

Tallisk took my arm again. We were led back up the path, Yana now our rear guard. The sound of the harp faded to a plucked whisper. A breeze whisked the grass. I heard birds whistling sweetly in the shrunken trees; their songs were clear with careful tones, nothing heard in nature.

All in all, I thought, I was not unhappy to leave the Count’s pleasure garden.

Once we were settled in the carriage, Isadel sighed heavily and gave me a dark look. “You had better not displease the Count,” she said, “or his guests. We can’t afford that.”

“Isadel,” Tallisk said sharply.

“All that I’m saying is—”

“It is not your place to say it.”

She sat back, sullen. There was a moment’s silence.

“Count Karan
is
our patron,” Tallisk said, with obvious reluctance. “And the niceties of display are more Isadel’s territory than my own. You would do well to follow her example. And not to displease him.”

Isadel snorted. It was the least elegant thing I had ever seen her do. “None of us can afford to displease him. He heads the Council, you know.”

“I know,” I said in a whisper. I thought of his hands on me. Hands that had signed pardons and declarations of war.

“Still, there would be better men...” Tallisk said. We looked at him, me and Isadel both; he barely seemed to notice our eyes on him. “There would be better men,” he repeated, “to grant your first display.”

“He served well enough for mine.” Isadel’s voice was soft and cold.

I shifted in my seat, caught between them. Then Tallisk chuckled.

“Never mind.” His eyes were strange and hooded. “Never mind.”

Chapter Sixteen

As the Count promised, he soon sent Geodery Gandor to negotiate my contract.

He was shown into the parlor by Yana, and Doiran was sent to fetch drinks. I peered down from the landing at him; Tallisk had told me I was not required to attend, but I wanted to see him, and if possible, the gold that he had brought. Of course it wouldn’t be so openly done, the exchange. Still, I wondered how much a night of my display would cost. Would it be more than the fee Tallisk had paid for me, already? Or would an Adorned come at a discount for the patron whose Blood created them?

I sat down on the stairs, plucking at my sleeves. Since my Adornment had proceeded, Tallisk had given me a robe much like Isadel’s. Though hers no longer quite hid all her Adornments, mine still covered the burgeoning greenery on my skin. Tallisk had not touched needle to me since our outing, though. He knew the Count would want me soon, and it would be improper to display unhealed ink. The little silver vial had gone into his ink-box. In Lun, I thought, there would be more than a few who’d make a relic of it.

The library door creaked, startling me out of my thoughts; Isadel stepped out, brushing dust from her sleeves. “Is he here?”

I nodded.

She touched me lightly on the shoulder. “I’m sure it will all be well.”

I shrank away from her. “That isn’t what you said before.”