Gameboard of the Gods

CHAPTER 27 KOSKINEN DECORUM

They had to hire a car. Her mother lived outside of the city, and no public transportation ran out to it. Mae looked like she was going to her own funeral as they sped by the wheat and corn fields, which were green and growing now that spring had moved in. The castes had been founded by families who already had personal fortunes that could help the fledgling republic, fortunes they used to buy themselves out of the mandates. Over time, those families had ended up turning to enterprises that were suited to their land, such as the expansive growing of crops that fed the RUNA. Dark clouds gathering above the fields threatened a storm, which Mae remarked was fitting.

At first glance, the Koskinen house seemed as though it had ridden the success of Nordic farming. The estate—because there was no other word for it—was like something out of a movie. A huge pillared porch with etched-glass double doors welcomed guests with grandeur and intimidation. Identical wings extended from each side of the entrance, beautiful in their symmetry. The house had two floors, and the second one had balconies extending from many of its rooms. There were even a couple of turrets. It was set on sprawling grounds, some of which were obviously just for show and not practical use. Looking beyond the house, Justin could see vast fields dedicated to farming. There the symmetry ended. Half the land showed that green haze of new growth. The other half was bare and neglected.

Walking toward the house told more tales. The tan paint was worn and chipped. Bushes and hedges were messy and overgrown, while weeds poked through the flower beds. It was all subtle. The house wasn’t in ruins, but it definitely showed signs of disrepair.

A plebeian woman wearing a black uniform let them in, murmuring a deferential, “Miss Mae.”

Mae smiled and gave her a small hug as they entered, something that seemed to embarrass the other woman. “Hello, Phyllis.”

The central part of the house was the tallest, and the foyer took full advantage of that. A huge chandelier hung from the vaulted ceiling, and Justin counted seven tiers of crystals. He also noticed that some of the lights had burned out. Dusty art displaying Norse knot work adorned the walls. To the side of the room, a spiral staircase with a wrought-iron railing stretched up to the second floor. Within moments of their entry, Astrid Koskinen descended the stairs with a showy, measured stride that made him think she’d been hovering at the top, waiting to make this grand entrance.

“Maj,” she said, pausing to kiss Mae on each cheek. “How lovely to see you.”

There was no warmth in the greeting or in Mae’s answering one. “Mother, this is Dr. Justin March and Tessa Cruz.”

At a glance, Justin knew this was no time for, “Mother? Really? I would’ve guessed sister.” He opted for pleasant—but not too pleasant—formality. “Mrs. Koskinen, thank you for your hospitality.”

“Yes, thank you,” said Tessa, a bit cowed by this introduction to the castal aristocracy.

Astrid frowned. “Could you repeat that?”

“I said ‘thank you,’” repeated Tessa more loudly.

“Ah. Well, I could hardly turn down the opportunity to host Maj.”

“You shouldn’t have gone to any trouble,” said Mae.

“Come,” said Astrid, ignoring her. “Everyone’s seated for dinner. Normally we eat at seven.” There was an accusatory note in her voice. An old-fashioned grandfather clock proclaimed that it was 7:10. “Thank you for dressing up, Dr. March, Miss Cruz.”

She was absolutely serious, the unspoken message being that Mae had not dressed up. He’d worn a navy suit and silk tie, typical for official visits, and Tessa had impulsively put on a dress purchased on her outing today. Meanwhile, Mae was in black slacks and a green tank top. It was elegant and refined, like everything else she wore, but he supposed it might have been considered casual next to Astrid’s calf-length taffeta dress. Though he scoffed at Cynthia’s “label whore” accusations, Justin had made a quick study of the fashion trends he’d missed in exile. It was a leftover habit from when he was younger and had tried to hide his lower-class background. Mae was at the height of style, as always, even when casual. Her mother’s dress was from last year. A small detail, but notable among castals.

He wasn’t entirely sure who “everyone” was. Astrid led them to a dining room with heavy wainscoting and wallpaper adorned with a swirling blue design. Two women and two men sat at a long table, along with a boy a little older than Quentin. All had the blond hair and blue or green eyes typical of their caste. Erratic signs of Cain marked the group, and Mae stood out from them like some star in a cloudy sky. If not for scattered shared features, Justin wouldn’t have guessed they were related.

Introductions named the other guests as Mae’s siblings and their spouses. The boy, Mae’s nephew, went by his Nordic name, Niklis. Aside from Mae’s mother, everyone else used a Latin or Greek name from the National Registry, which was telling. It suggested they were more progressive. Maybe they were, but one thing soon became clear: They hated Mae.

Maybe “hated” was too strong. “Resented” might have been more accurate.

It wasn’t so obvious at first. Everyone was so, so polite. A written transcript would have shown nothing untoward, but listening to it in person was a different matter. Every comment contained a barb for Mae and occasionally Justin and Tessa as well.

“Well, Mae,” said her sister, Claudia. “It was nice of you to come by. I know Mom appreciates it. I know she especially appreciates you bringing your friends.” She peered over at Tessa as the housekeeper set down chipped bowls of yellow pea soup. “Do you guys use silverware in the provinces?”

“Of course they do,” said Mae, the outrageous question breaking even her composure. “For goodness’ sake, Claudia. She’s from Central America.”

Claudia sniffed at the rebuke. “Well, it’s not like I have that much time to study the provinces.” She fixed her attention on Justin and gave what he suspected was meant to be a seductive smile. “So, Dr. March. What do you and my little sister do together exactly?”

Cyrus and Claudia’s husband snorted in amusement. Astrid blanched. “Claudia!”

“What?” asked Claudia innocently. “I want to know about their work.” She fluttered her eyes at Justin. “A servitor’s life must be fascinating.”

She’s so bitter and jealous of Mae that she can barely sit there, Justin observed.

Can’t you see why? asked Horatio.

Justin could. Claudia was short and dumpy, with none of the beauty and grace of her younger sister. Cain had dulled Claudia’s hair, and judging from the family’s finances, she wasn’t able to afford any treatments. That, and she had the drained look of someone who’d never left her hometown and had little to occupy her time. From the sharp looks she also gave her nephew, Mae wasn’t the only sibling Claudia envied.

She’s jealous of you too, said Horatio. You’re unsuitable by their standards, but you represent another thing Mae has that she doesn’t: dashing, exotic, good-looking.

Are you trying to take me home? Justin asked.

You know what I mean. And look who she’s with.

Justin couldn’t fault that logic either. Claudia’s husband was a lump of a man, with a thick jaw and soup running down his chin. He mostly communicated through grunts. A lowly plebeian might have been preferable to that. In fact, recalling Mae’s story, Claudia did have a thing for plebeians. With her airs, it wasn’t that hard to imagine her giving away a baby to save face. It especially wasn’t hard to imagine Astrid encouraging it.

“My job’s not that interesting,” said Justin, fully in public relations mode. “Mae just comes along to make sure no zealots get out of line. She keeps me safe. You never know what they’ll do.”

Mae’s eyes rested on him briefly, and Justin realized she was mentally assigning him to the zealot category.

Niklis brightened at Justin’s words. “Aunt Maj, do you have a gun?”

“Of course she doesn’t,” answered Astrid. “Maj would never bring a gun into this house.”

“I have two,” Mae told her nephew.

Astrid gasped. “Why would you do such a thing?”

“Because I’m on duty, Mother.” Mae had simply been stirring her soup and now pushed it away. Her face had on that emotionless mask she excelled at maintaining.

“More exciting than being Kris Eriksson’s wife, I suppose,” said Cyrus. He wasn’t exactly antagonistic toward Mae, but he definitely had a mocking attitude. It was one he dealt out to his entire family, so at least he was fair. He topped everyone’s wine off without asking. “Mae ever tell you about all the proposals she turned down? She could’ve made this family’s fortune.”

“Mae’s always done what she wanted,” grumbled Claudia. “Gone where she wanted. Run around with who she wanted.” She gave Justin and Tessa supercilious looks as she spoke.

That, more than anything else, cracked Mae’s tough exterior. She snapped some sharp Finnish retort to her sister, earning snickers from Cyrus and his wife, who seemed to think this was dinner theater. Claudia responded with something that must’ve been equally venomous, judging from Astrid’s scandalized expression.

“Show some manners!” she scolded. “Our guests are more civil than you are.” The subtext, of course, was that it was a huge embarrassment to be shown up by a plebeian and a provincial. “Remember that our family is built on principle and decorum.”

Awkward silence fell. Mae’s face became blank once more. Claudia glowered, and Cyrus kept pouring more wine than even Justin could drink. Glancing over at Tessa, he saw that the girl looked like she wanted to be anywhere but here. He couldn’t blame her. Surprisingly, it was Claudia’s dull husband who resumed some sort of civil discourse.

“So,” he said. “Did you hear that the Comets made it to the playoffs?”

Justin didn’t care much for sports, but he’d learned long ago that other people did, making it an excellent topic to build rapport with. So, he kept up with all the latest headlines, something that came in handy now as he engaged the men in conversation. They warmed up to the subject and seemed to forget they were talking to a plebeian. The Koskinen women, however, remained quiet and sullen.

When dinner mercifully ended an hour and a half later, Mae offered to show Justin and Tessa around the house.

“Remember that this house isn’t a museum,” her mother warned her.

“Yes, yes,” said Mae. “We’ll stay out of your bedrooms.”

Maybe the house wasn’t a museum, but it was certainly dusty enough to be an artifact. Justin had always hired cleaners to do his housework but was on the verge of asking for a broom to lend a hand now. He found out that the family had once employed a large staff to maintain the house, though their numbers had dwindled as the Koskinen finances did.

“What happened to your family’s money?” asked Justin as Mae paused in front of the doorway to what looked like a cluttered office. A moment later, she kept going and showed them into a conservatory that could’ve been straight out of an old movie. He’d asked her a personal question, but Mae seemed too preoccupied with her own thoughts to reprimand him for it. That, or maybe she’d just accepted there were few secrets between them now.

“I don’t know. I think my mother just mismanaged it after my dad died.”

Mae ran her hand along the top of a piano, her fingertips leaving trails in the dust. Justin had a sudden and startling memory of that night in Panama when Mae, wet and bedraggled but still dazzling, had sat down and played Saint-Saëns. It certainly wasn’t an erotic image, but it triggered a reminder of that initial, burning attraction, when he’d looked at her and thought she was the most amazing woman in the world.

She still is, said Magnus loyally. You could have her, and your world would change.

Justin felt a pain in his heart and made no response.

Tessa joined Mae at the piano. “This is pretty. Nicer than ours.” Tessa played a few lines of something Justin didn’t know, reminding him that she too had taken lessons. He supposed it was something upper-class young ladies did.

“Where did you learn to play?” asked Claudia incredulously, standing in the doorway.

Tessa took her hands back. “At my house.”

Claudia’s face said she couldn’t have been more surprised if a cat had learned to play. “Mae, Marius and I are leaving.”

Something in Mae’s face sharpened. “I’ll walk you out. And I’ll show you guys my room.” She led Justin and Tessa down the hall and pointed to a doorway at the top of the stairs. “Right there. Probably hasn’t changed since I left. I’ll be there as soon as I talk to Claudia.”

Justin was astute enough to pick up that there was more than a good-bye involved, but he left Mae to her own affairs. Besides, he quickly became consumed by her old bedroom. It was another piece of her to collect. Like every other room, dust reigned. The décor was a mix of the two worlds that had always pulled on Mae. All the furniture was ornate and expensive, the kind of stuff a mother would pick out, not a child or teen. The partially ajar closet was filled with old evening gowns that made Tessa ooh and ahh. Juxtaposed with that glamour were old poster screens that, when turned on, displayed images of various athletes and teams. He even found what must have been a canne stick leaning against a corner. He really needed to look that crazy sport up.

Tessa found an open jewelry box on the dresser and couldn’t resist the curiosity of looking through it. “Wow.” She lifted a bracelet encrusted in sapphires that still glittered. “Mae left so much behind.”

“You see any engagement rings in there?” he asked. He smiled at Tessa’s startled look. “Never mind.”

“They’re awfully mean to her, though. I guess I’d abandon a lot to get out of here too.” She swapped the bracelet for a pearl choker. “Did she leave in a hurry?”

“How would I know?” he asked lightly.

Tessa glanced away from her treasures, giving him a wry look. “How could you not know? You used to watch her with this look…it was hungry. Like you were going to die if you didn’t get inside her head.”

“Used to?” he asked.

She shrugged and returned to the jewelry box. “You’re still alive. I figured you must know everything now.”

Justin laughed in spite of himself. “You know, if I’d realized back in Panama that you’d—” He stopped speaking when he saw her next find. “What is that?”

Tessa lifted a silver necklace with a large pendant hanging on it. The pendant consisted of elaborate silver knot work shaped into a bird. “It’s pretty,” she said. “Looks like a raven.”

It’s a crow! exclaimed Horatio indignantly. Can’t she tell the difference? Some prodigy.

Crows are stupid, said Magnus. I hate crows.

“It’s a crow,” Justin told Tessa, stepping closer.

“Same knot work they’ve got all over the house.”

“No…it’s a very slightly different style.” He frowned. “I’ve seen this before. Where have I seen this before?”

Tessa obviously didn’t know. She started to put it back, but he took it from her, trying to dredge up an image from the files of his mind. Suddenly, his breath caught. He took out his ego and pulled up the video that still continued to baffle the RUNA’s best technical minds. The display was smaller than a true screen, so it was more difficult to make out the details as he watched the red-haired Erinian woman take off her jewelry for the night. But there it was—he was certain of it. The necklace she removed was the right size and shape, and he knew if he looked at a larger screen, he’d see a replica of the one Tessa had found.

“It’s Celtic knot work, not Norse,” he murmured.

“Why would Mae have Celtic jewelry?”

“Why would Mae have this at all?” he asked. His mind was reeling, and for all his cleverness, he couldn’t find a way to make this work into any of his theories. It tore them open.

Mae entered just then, her angry expression suggesting her parting conversation with Claudia hadn’t gone well. “Are you guys ready to go?”

Justin held up the necklace, still stunned. “Where did you get this?”

“I don’t know. Half that jewelry’s been around forever. Heirlooms and stuff.” She did a double take, picking up on his state of shock. “Why?”

“The Erinian woman in the video had one just like this.”

“What? I don’t remember that.”

“Well, I do, and I just replayed it to check. Why would you both have this?”

Mae shook her head, nowhere near as blown away as he was. “I don’t know. Because it was mass-produced by some designer that castals like? Coincidences like that happen all the time.”

“But it’s Celtic! Why would you have Celtic jewelry?”

“Because sometimes we visit other castes. My mother has Celtic friends. It’s probably from one of them.” She was starting to get irate. “What are you getting at here? Because obviously, there’s something.”

“‘Something’ is that you’re part of this!” He set the necklace down and began to pace as he organized his frantic thoughts. “We were wrong. Somehow we were wrong. You’re tied to them, Mae. The other eights and nines. I knew it was too big of a coincidence.”

She looked aghast. “We already went over this, and Leo told you I wasn’t a match. I wasn’t worked on.”

“You were,” he said slowly, fully realizing his next words might cause considerable damage. “He…he said you showed signs of genetic manipulation. It wasn’t the same kind as the victims’, but it definitely wasn’t natural.”

Wide-eyed, she opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out right away. “He never told me that. You never told me that.” It was a small detail, but Justin noticed she had a greater expectation that he would tell her the truth than that the person who’d actually run the test would. “There’s a mistake. I wasn’t part of any illegal genetics.”

“Were you not there at dinner?” he asked. “Do you seriously think you came out of that bunch without some sort of serious intervention from science?”

“I’m not a match,” she said through gritted teeth. “Leo said so.” He could see the panic rising in her, a panic that wasn’t so much just about illicit practices. It was the fear of being part of something she’d had no say in, a future that others had chosen for her. If he wanted to keep any of her regard for him, Justin knew he should back off…but he couldn’t. Not when he knew he was right.

“Maybe you were a trial or something. I don’t know. But look at the facts! You have the right score, the right age. You had some kind of work done. And now there’s this ‘coincidental’ necklace, which I’ll bet anything you want has some sort of religious meaning—and which I also bet we’ll find with some of the other victims.”

“Which is it?” she demanded. “A vindictive geneticist or a crazy cult?”

“I think it’s what Callista said: both.”

“Right,” said Mae, scoffing. “Because she’s an authority. Don’t drag me into your fanatical theories of—”

She stopped abruptly when she saw her mother standing in the door. Judging from her shocked expression and Tessa’s paleness, he and Mae had gotten pretty loud. He’d been too caught up to notice.

“Is everything okay?” Astrid asked.

“Everything’s fine,” said Mae. “I apologize for the disturbance.” She was the ice princess again, but there was fire in her eyes.

“Everything is not okay!” Justin said. “You guys are so caught up in your polished images and passive-aggressive comments that no one ever comes right out and says anything. Well, I’m going to.” He stared Astrid straight in the eye, uncaring if she thought he was a plebeian savage. “Mrs. Koskinen, was there or was there not genetic manipulation used when Mae was conceived?”

Mae gasped, probably as much from someone actually speaking openly in this house as from the topic itself. He kept his gaze on Astrid, looking for any telltale signs of lying in that impassive face. She was clearly someone who’d perfected controlling what she revealed to the world years ago. Her whole life was built on appearances, and while Mae was good, she was a novice compared to her mother. As it turned out, though, Justin didn’t have to read through any lies.

“Yes,” said Astrid. “Yes, there was.”