It was a skull — a very small skull. A very small, human skull. In his years at Winding Circle, Briar had studied anatomy, animal and human, as backup for his lessons in healing. He knew a human skull, however small, from a monkey’s.
One by one, he picked up other bones thrown to the surface by the deodars’ surge. A thigh bone, an arm bone, ribs and back bones, all child-sized, old enough that no tissue remained to keep them attached to one anther. He also found a ball, and a silk scarf. Who had buried a child’s remains under the deodars? How long had the child been dead? Was this one of the murders which the mutabir had mentioned, or something more ordinary? Cemeteries, particularly the small ones attached to most nobles’ houses, were sometimes dug up for new buildings, the bones placed elsewhere. Or perhaps a servant’s child had died. Briar knew that if he were dead he would rather be buried under trees than in Chammur’s hard sun.
All the same, he didn’t order the plants to cover the bones, or the trees to open a hole so they could be tucked back into the earth. Some instinct made him place them a little way from the still-growing pines and draw a cypress oil protective circle around them. Only then did he wipe his fingers on his handkerchief and continue his walk.
15
The stench of rotting meat grew as Briar approached the back of the house. It was particularly strong in the corner where a stand of almond trees grew by the wall. The trees, like every other green thing on the grounds, were doing their best to outrace their proper growth, pitting slender trunks and roots against the wall. It was giving way, pushing into the lane behind the house. Inside the small grove, thrown from the ground by clamoring trees, was a bloated, reeking body. The clothes were blackened rags; a deep cut passed all the way around the neck, separating it into two parts. The swelling was so great that it was impossible even to guess the sex of the body. About a yard from it Briar saw another corpse, this one so far gone in decay that only scraps of skin clung to the bones. A knotted cord hung around the neck.
The stench of rotten flesh was so bad it made his stomach roll. While he hadn’t been sure the child’s bones were a sign of murder, it was harder to think of legal reasons why these newer bodies would be here, among dainty almond trees, rather than in a proper burial yard. Most gardeners didn’t like the thought of walking on the dead when they did their work.
Briar retreated from the six-tree grove. He turned straight into another pocket of stench, wafted into his nostrils by the mild breeze from the east. There were more dead to be found in this largest of Lady Zenadia’s gardens, he realized. He wiped his sweaty forehead on his sleeve.
Suddenly he froze. His connection to Evvy pulsed: she was angry, furious. A surge of magic rolled through their bond, leaving Briar without breath in his lungs. He sent his power back, as if she were one of his foster-sisters, but it was no good. She couldn’t even feel it, let alone use it. Her magic was too different and not mixed with his. Briar had the feeling that it was only because he had a little earth and metal magic in him that he could sense anything more than where she was.
From inside the house he heard the thunder of falling stone. It went on for a breath, then stopped. A puff of dust rose in the air over the roof like smoke. Briar forced a query to Evvy through their bond. What he got back was savage satisfaction and a calming of her rage. Whatever had taken place, she was pleased.
A fresh series of rumbles began in the house as green voices called a warning to Briar. The lady’s mute certainly was silent in his movements, but the grasses on which he walked were not. The mute had come around the house to take Briar from behind. Using his right hand the boy slid a cloth bundle out of his kit, a special mix he had worked on for a long time. In his left he already grasped a wrist knife.
The bowstring settled around his neck, then wrenched cruelly tight, cutting off Briar’s air. He tossed his small bundle behind him, where he guessed the mute’s feet to be, and slid his knife under the strangler’s cord. The knife bit into his neck as it cut the bowstring — Briar didn’t mind a little blood if it meant he could breathe again.
He smashed a booted heel into the mute’s bare foot, hearing bone crunch, then lunged away. Turning to face his attacker, Briar coughed, his throat aching from the pressure of the cord. Now he gripped knives in both hands.
“How many of ‘em did you do that to?” he snarled when he could speak again. “Did you like it? Did you have fun choking them and burying them as fertilizer?”
The mute bent over, trying to massage his foot. He didn’t even look at Briar.
The second assailant didn’t try to be quiet. Behind him Briar heard the hiss of a drawn sword. With his power he tapped the bundle he’d left between the mute’s feet, and faced the swordsman. The man leveled his weapon. Sharp metal gleamed in the scant light cast out here by indoor lamps. Another sullen rumble came from inside the house, drawing closer to them. Neither the man nor Briar risked a look to see what caused it.
Instead the swordsman laughed when he saw Briar’s knives. “I have the advantage of you, boy,” he told Briar smoothly. “I have reach and expertise.”
The mute shrieked, his tongueless mouth freeing a sound more animal than human. He screamed a second time; the third cry broke off in the middle. After that the only sounds were the rattle of branches growing rapidly, tearing flesh, and a slow, wet drip. The swordsman could see it over Briar’s shoulder. His eyes widened in horror.
Briar didn’t turn. He and Rosethorn had once defended Winding Circle from pirates, using mixed seeds of thorny plants; the girls had given him use of their magic to make the plants extra lethal. A similar mix of seeds had been in the packet he’d tossed at the mute. Now Briar told the swordsman in a chatty tone, “Four years ago it took me and my three friends to work this bit.” He had to raise his voice to be heard over the crunch of falling stone in the house. “The trick is to make this stuff grow so fast it just goes clean through anybody on top of it.” He grinned, showing teeth. “I’ve learned a lot since then. I can do it by myself.”