House of Cards

CHAPTER 32

Mist and shadows. Malik had become mist and shadows, and had failed to return to Janx’s side. He’d gone north instead, the corundum head of his cane quietly pulling Alban’s attention. The gargoyle circled the island reluctantly, staying closer to its southern end than he ought to have, as though he could draw Malik back that way through willpower alone.

Amusement flashed through him. It was of little enough use to ferret out bits and pieces of sapphire, except as a way to earn money now and then. If he could draw those who wore or carried the stone to him, now that would be a talent. One he’d never confess to: the idea of what Janx would do, knowing Alban could command those who were enamored by sparkling stone, didn’t bear considering. The dragonlord would find himself an enclave of gargoyles, each tuned to the stone of their family name, and wreak havoc with his influence. With that skill, a thousand years past, when Aztec priests sacrificed their subjects to the gods with obsidian knives, a gargoyle of Hajnal’s line might have made herself an immortal queen to an eager people.

Oh, but Margrit was a bad influence. The world was a bad influence; Alban had never, in all his long years, entertained such thoughts, much less found entertainment in them. Bad company, as he’d told Janx, but he couldn’t find it in himself to regret it.

Malik had settled wherever he was; a low thrum of contentment was coming from the stone. Even long accustomed to being moved, it seemed more comfortable, somehow, when at rest-or perhaps that was Alban bending his own perceptions to suit an object. No matter; the point was Malik could be found easily enough, and watched over whether he liked it or not.

It would take a little time for Alban to wing his way there, but the church was only moments away. A few seconds to glimpse Margrit from above would mean nothing in matters of Malik’s safety.

It might compromise Alban’s own, though. Enough people were still gathered at the church that he sailed away and found an alley, transforming as he landed. Humans might not look up as a matter of habit, but soaring above an open space would be taking an unnecessary risk.

Leaving the alley behind, Alban hesitated at Trinity’s gates, his pale hand curled around wrought iron as he looked beyond it at what had been his home for so many decades. The hidden door was still there, less of a secret now, but it would take no time at all to slip through it and visit the room he’d abandoned hastily and never since returned to. Yet there was no reason to do so. He had his belongings, and the deep vault was no longer a safe haven.

All unconsciously he was moving, intent bringing him where wisdom would avoid. He knew the dark graveyard intimately, had no need to watch his feet as he whispered greetings to those whose tombs he’d slept beneath. A few more steps would have him hidden below them again.

"Alban?" The unfamiliar voice was curious and friendly. Alban went still for the briefest instant, resisting the urge to allow stone to sweep him and hide him from prying inquiries. But that would be suicide, where facing his questioner would be nothing more than a brief delay. He turned, wondering who knew his name when he didn’t recognize the voice.

A priest with an untamed white beard stood a few yards away, his solemn expression and dark cassock suggesting he’d just left the mourners who were dispersing from the church’s front walkways. "It is Alban, isn’t it? I must have startled you. I’m sorry. I’ve never had the opportunity to say hello before."

"Before?" Even to his own ears, the word grated dangerously, though less from threat than surprise.

The priest’s beard shifted with a wry, hopeful smile. "You’re a subtle creature, for all your size. This has been my parish for years. I’ve…caught a glimpse of you, now and then." He nodded toward the hidden door, and Alban looked that way as well, half expecting it to stand open, as if it had somehow betrayed him. "From the days when you slept beneath our church. My name is Ramsey. I spoke with Margrit Knight about you once. She promised me that I was right to believe you were one of God’s creations."

A chuckle rumbled from Alban’s chest before he could stop it. "And not from your imagination born?"

Ramsey’s eyebrows wobbled up. "Or anywhere more dire. I’ve been watching for you, since January. I hoped to tell you that you still have a home here. Maybe not as discreet as that hidden room, but the church is a sanctuary, and you’re welcome to use it whenever you need."

Surprise struck Alban silent, too many questions coming to mind for any of them to be spoken. "I would love to hear your story," Ramsey said a bit wistfully. "Miss Knight made it clear it wasn’t hers to tell, but perhaps someday you might want to share it with an old man who loves this church and its secrets. Not tonight," he added more briskly. "You look like a stoned ox just now. I imagine you’re not used to being noticed."

"Or accepted." Alban rumbled, and Ramsey dipped his head in acknowledgment.

"God is much more creative than I am. Why should I refuse what he’s seen fit to give life to? Someday," he repeated. "Perhaps someday…I should get back to my parishioners. Good night, Alban." He strode away as though the conversation had invigorated him, for all that most of it had been on his side. Alban remained where he was for long moments, staring after him in pleased astonishment before reminding himself of his purpose.

The time to dally had been eaten away. He turned from the hidden doorway reluctantly, searching the scattering crowd for a glimpse of Margrit. He found her embracing an older woman, and when he might have taken a step toward her for a brief greeting, Janx arrived at their sides, his outrageous flirtation visible across the distance.

Rueful annoyance pulled Alban’s mouth out of shape. Janx would be most displeased to find him there, and Alban didn’t relish a confrontation with the dragonlord. There would be time later, he promised himself; they would have time later. Sufficiently convinced of it, he slipped back around the gates, casting one last regretful glance toward his onetime retreat.

Tony Pulcella emerged from the hidden door, a briefcase in hand.

An unexpected breeze in the evening air chilled Margrit’s skin, and with it her throat constricted. Panic bloomed within her, adrenaline spurting through her system. She wanted to run, to fling herself at the djinn, knock him away from her mother-anything, so long as it was action. But she had only one weapon on hand, and terror wouldn’t leave her mind clear enough to remember whether its use might save or condemn Rebecca. Tremors were all Margrit could allow herself, a tiny outlet for outrage and fear. "Let her go."

"Or you’ll attack?" The djinn moved subtly, closer to Rebecca. "I think not."

Her mother gasped, a tiny cry of dread and pain. Margrit recognized the sound too well, though it’d been her throat, not her heart, that a djinn had sought. Tears had scalded Malik’s hand, making him pull away, but Margrit could not recall whether he’d released her before salt water had stung him. There was no way to act, nothing more to offer than a shaky promise: "It’ll be okay, Mom."

Daisani shifted at Margrit’s side, touching the curve of her back in reassurance. Margrit swallowed hard, trying to keep herself in place, and caught a hard glance shared between vampire and dragonlord. Janx shook his head, a jerking of motion that, had it not been so graceless, she might have imagined it. Daisani’s answering nod was equally short and harsh, an acceptance that Janx disavowed responsibility. God help him, Margrit thought with icy clarity. God help the charming dragon if he lied.

With no further communication, Daisani and Janx moved in tandem, casually placing themselves so that passersby couldn’t easily see the impossible: that the djinn stood with his arm half folded into Rebecca’s back. Daisani broke the silence, his voice so low Margrit strained to hear it from only a step or two away. "Release her and you may yet survive the night."

Sneering laughter curled the djinn’s mouth. "Had the glassmaker made that threat I might heed it." He threw the jibe at Janx, who tensed and relaxed again so faintly that Margrit looked twice at him. There was nothing in him to read, but certainty made her cool: they were acquainted, the djinn and the dragon. But the djinn didn’t pursue it, turning his attention back to Daisani. "You voted to stay your hand within our peoples."

"So did Malik." Margrit’s voice broke on the accusation and brought the djinn’s gaze to her. His eyes, like Malik’s, were crystalline: amber, the color of sand. Malik’s were aquamarine, both startling, Margrit thought, in a people born of the desert. A heartbeat later she understood; they were the colors of their world, sky and sand. Maybe a few djinn had jewel-green eyes, the color of an oasis.

"Malik." The djinn drew out the name as if it tasted of mud. "Malik was wise in voting conservatively, but his choices did not necessarily reflect the will of our people. He does not, as yet, hold the rank to speak for us."

"Margrit." Rebecca’s voice faded with pained exhaustion. "Margrit, I love you, sweetheart."

"Mom-" Margrit jolted forward, but Daisani lifted a hand to stop her, such confidence in the gesture that she froze.

"I will be fascinated to hear the details of that admission," Daisani breathed. "But now you have a choice. Let Rebecca Knight go, and survive, or die with her within the circle."

"Circle?" Disdain broke over the djinn’s face. "I see no salt water to make a cage with."

Daisani whispered, "Look down."

A thin river of blood glistened around the djinn’s feet, around Rebecca, wet ring on the stones. The scent of copper rose up and made Margrit gag, now that she knew to breathe for it. She wiped her hand across her mouth convulsively, her gaze jerking to Daisani.

He lifted his right hand to tidily fold a torn coat, a torn sleeve, to reveal a still-weeping crimson gash down the length of his arm. It closed bit by bit, visibly healing even in the brief moment Margrit took to understand.

The djinn grasped its portent before Margrit did. He howled in pure outrage and lashed his free hand toward Daisani. Scarlet flashed in the air, surge of power that for an instant turned the djinn to mist.

Another breeze stirred Margrit’s hair, and then Rebecca was outside the circle, free of the djinn, caught in Daisani’s arms. For a few bewildering seconds, Margrit felt as though she’d come upon two lovers who were otherwise hidden from sight.

They might have been gargoyles caught by sunlight, so sculpted and motionless did they seem. Rebecca was slightly taller, but Daisani held her weight, her hands on his chest as she leaned into him. Margrit could see the pulse in her mother’s throat, and how near to Daisani’s mouth that fluttering beat was. His attention, though, was on Rebecca’s eyes, and all Margrit could read in their locked gazes was an intensity that embarrassed and enthralled her. She strained for a memory she didn’t have, as though trying hard enough could call up Alban’s recollections of Hajnal, or perhaps of Sarah Hopkins. As though her own regal mother, standing so close to Eliseo Daisani, had somehow taken on a leading role in a tragedy played out over centuries. Margrit’s throat and heart tightened, fear of losing her mother tangling with a weightier loss of years, so heavy she could barely comprehend it.

Daisani drew breath to speak, breaking the stillness. Rebecca put a fingertip against his lips, a sharp, smooth movement. Daisani froze again, the pair standing together for another impossibly long moment with an intimacy that made Margrit look away in discomfort.

Her gaze found Janx, who watched Rebecca and Daisani with avarice, unfathomable calculations visible in his jade eyes. His expression was harder to look upon than theirs were. Margrit dragged her attention back to her mother, as much to escape Janx’s solitude as from morbid curiosity.

It was Rebecca who disengaged from Daisani’s grasp, gently, as if she suspected the man who held her might somehow shatter if treated shabbily. Tears stung Margrit’s eyes, and she choked on a breath when her mother turned to her.

Rebecca drew herself up and faced her with eyes still bright from anguish. A constricted squeak broke from Margrit’s throat and she stumbled forward to pull her into a hug. Rebecca drew in careful breaths, as if assessing her ability to do so. Margrit wanted to cry out with sympathy, but words caught in her throat. Even shared experience left a barrier between them, one that she couldn’t break.

Rebecca stroked her hair, strength returning to her breathing and her touch. "It’s all right, sweetheart. Everything’s all right now." Then she put her hands on Margrit’s shoulders and smiled. "I’m glad to have seen you tonight, Margrit. I’ll tell your father you acquitted yourself well at the service, and I hope you’ll come out to see us next weekend as we’d planned." She kissed her cheek, then walked away with quick, precise steps, leaving Margrit and the Old Races behind.

Margrit made a protest, her voice nothing more than a croak as her mother hurried away. It seemed impossible that she could do so, impossible that she wouldn’t stand and face Daisani, or even Margrit herself. Loneliness rose up again. Every hope of sharing the incredible world she’d discovered seemed to be swept away with her mother’s departure.

"Forgive me." Daisani spoke from beside her, his approach too quick or too quiet for her to have noticed. "Forgive me, Margrit. I said I would protect her. I’d hoped danger wouldn’t come so close. Forgive me for my carelessness."

"Why?" Margrit clenched her fists, turning miserable eyes on Daisani. Janx stood a few feet behind him, his own hands knotted loosely and his head turned to the side, gaze cast downward. Only the djinn, who’d fallen silent after his first shout of protest, looked pleased. "Why does she do that? Why does she leave without answers? Why-?"

Profound regret slid across Daisani’s thin face. "Because she prefers not to know them, my dear. You are very like your mother, but not in this regard. I like to imagine she refuses answers because she prefers the world to have mystery in it."

"Not my mom. Not-"

"Shh." Daisani echoed the gesture Rebecca had used with him, fingertips not quite touching Margrit’s lips. "Be so kind as to leave me my illusions, Margrit. Let me imagine that mysteries are sweeter unsolved, rather than know that I’m too fearsome to be investigated."

Margrit swallowed, trying to make room for words in her throat. "So we do matter," she said hoarsely. "I mean, I knew Vanessa did-of course she mattered. But the rest of us. We’re here and then gone again so quickly. I wondered if you even noticed, if you made friends, or mourned us when we’re gone. Do you have to decide who’s worth it and who isn’t in the space of an instant, because taking time to decide will waste all the years of our lives?" Her heart beat slowly and tears stung at the back of her eyes, high emotion brought by the audacity of her questions and the weight of their answers. Humans wanted to live forever. Only in asking did she realize that immortality was a dangerously lonely business.

Daisani met her gaze evenly a long time, then lowered his eyes a moment before lifting them again with all the grace of age. Behind him, Janx looked toward her even more steadily. Unable to bear the answers in their silence, Margrit nodded jerkily and turned toward the djinn, making a rough, human gesture intended to bring the men back to the topic at hand.

The djinn spat as their attention turned back to him. "You can do nothing to me. I have no answers for you."

"Perhaps not." Alban’s voice cut across the nearly empty courtyard, stony with assurance. "But I think I do."