Scholar of Decay (8 page)

“People,” he said at last, falling into the lecturing tone Natalia had tried unsuccessfully to break him of, “are not always what they appear to be. You’re in a new place where the rules might not be what you’re used to. Think twice before you believe someone is a friend.”

“Like you care,” Dmitri scoffed, closing his eyes. “Go away before I puke again.”

“I just want you to be careful.…”

“And I just want you to leave.” His throat convulsed, and he grimaced as he swallowed. “I’m not kidding about the puking.”

Closing the door to Dmitri’s bedchamber softly behind him, Aurek wearily reflected that, at least for the morning, he’d know exactly where his brother was. He didn’t understand why the boy was always so angry, why their meetings always ended—if they didn’t begin—with Dmitri snarling and snapping at everything he said. Natalia had understood, but Natalia—his sweet and loving Natalia—was no longer able to explain.

“You’re in a good mood this morning.”

Louise slid into her seat at the scarred table that nearly filled the morning room, and smiled beatifically at her sister. “Why shouldn’t I be?”

“No reason.” Jacqueline took a long, slow swallow of coffee and studied Louise over the gilded rim of the cup. While she hadn’t yet been to bed, it was obvious that her twin had just risen. “Your fits of pique usually last longer.”

Greedily heaping her plate with an assortment of food, Louise shrugged. “I found a diversion.”

“How nice. Will he be joining us for … breakfast?”

Louise swept a critical gaze over the full platters, a laden fork halfway to her mouth. “I don’t think that’s necessary. There’s plenty here now.”

The burly servant carrying the body out of the west wing heard the twins’ shared laughter and suppressed a shudder. As bad as it could be at the Chateau when they fought, it was worse still when they got along.

The house, or what remained of it, was on the east shore of Souris Island. Only the third story, gray-green lichens flaking off its blackened stonework, showed over the almost leafless branches of the thorn trees. Aurek scanned the empty windows and picked a careful path toward the door through what had once been an attractive courtyard, years of dead and decaying leaves squelching under his feet.

Braided rope straps cut painfully into his shoulders as his oilskin pack snagged on a six-inch thorn. Muttering under his breath, he reached back and snapped it off the tree.

There was power here. It lay like an oily film over the house and grounds. He could all but taste it in the air.

The remains of the door hung from a single, twisted hinge. He checked that the floor beyond the threshold was solid and stepped onto it without pausing to inspect it for arcane protections. The level of power he could sense deep in the abandoned building was far too slight to be a threat. The danger was greater that the house might collapse around him.

The entryway held only a staircase that rose in a graceful spiral to the second story. Although it remained essentially in one piece, the stairs had long since rotted past safety. Fortunately, the artifact he searched for was below, not above. Eyes narrowed, senses extended, Aurek moved through the ruins of a formal dining room and out the narrow door the servants had once used to bring food from the kitchens. Stairs to the lower levels would be at the rear of the house.

Webs hung like tattered shrouds from every corner, and he was increasingly conscious of being watched. Breathing shallowly, for every step stirred up noxious clouds of dust and mold, he made his way cautiously to the kitchens.

Spiders, he thought, ducking under the first intact web he’d seen. Large ones. A floorboard cracked under his heel, and he flung his weight forward barely in time to prevent breaking through. Fully confident of his ability to deal with anything he might meet, he still had no desire to find himself buried under a ton or two of rubble.

Vines growing over kitchen windows long empty of glass filled the room with flickering shadow.

Something skirted the outer edge of his vision.

Shrugging off his pack, Aurek pulled out a small enclosed lantern and quickly lit it. Insects scurried in the walls all around him, above him, below him—it was impossible to tell where the sounds originated. Holding the lantern over his head, he slowly turned in place. The shadows rearranged themselves but didn’t entirely flee.

In the far corner, he found what he was looking for: a flight of stairs, leading down.

The desiccated body of a rat hung wrapped in spider silk in the exact center of the doorway. Its condition seemed to indicate it hadn’t been hanging there for very long.

Aurek studied the situation for a moment, then picked a piece of dry and insect-eaten kindling from a half-empty box by the rusted stove and lit one end in his lantern. When the flames caught, licking hungrily toward his hand, he torched the web.

Almost instantly, a sheet of flame filled the doorway and, just as quickly, it was over. The body of the rat fell smoldering to the floor. Nothing remained of the web save an acrid smell that scraped at the back of his throat. Aurek coughed, sucked another shallow breath through his teeth, and froze in place.

A sound … above and behind.

The weight of the spider dropping onto his shoulders flung him to his knees. Biting back an involuntary cry—the last thing he needed was to attract more attention—he rolled, dislodging the
huge arachnid as mandibles clattered like knives beside his ear. Regaining his feet, he whirled and barked out a word that tore into the already-abraded surface of his throat, the first three fingers of his left hand extended toward the attacking spider.

The oval body of the creature thumped onto the floor as all eight legs collapsed under a sudden increase in weight. Pedipalps whipping frantically from side to side, it dug pairs of hooked claws into splintering boards and dragged itself forward, its prey reflected in each of the eight gleaming black eyes on the top of its head.

Carefully setting his lantern on a dirt-encrusted sideboard, Aurek flipped the table in the center of the room over onto its side and, bracing his foot against the bottom boards, tried to rip off a heavy, carved leg. Soft and punky from the omnipresent damp, the wood crumbled under the pressure. Instead of pulling the leg from the table, Aurek began to kick pieces of the table off the leg.

Inch by inch, the spider advanced.

Finally holding a reasonably solid club, Aurek turned, took a deep breath, and methodically beat the nearly immobile spider to a pulp—its chitin smashed like an eggshell. When its legs had stopped thrashing and the bloated body was no longer recognizable, he flung his dripping weapon aside, grimacing with disgust. He hated the brutality implicit in killing such a creature, even when he admitted the necessity.

Brushing futilely at the moist stains on his clothing, he retrieved his lantern and started down the stairs, irritated by the delay.

The shadows were thicker on the lower level, the air damper, the floors more thoroughly decayed. Even the spider webs appeared to have been long abandoned. Pallid colonies of fungus sprouted in cracks and, in spite of moving with extreme caution, Aurek’s foot broke through the floor twice before he crossed the first room. The second time it happened, he pitched backward, arms flailing
wildly. Although he managed to keep his grip on the lantern, the flame went out.

Except for a gray rectangle marking the floor at the bottom of the stairs, the darkness around him was absolute. Hair rising off the back of his neck, ears straining to hear anything approach, Aurek fumbled the lantern open, found his focus, and spoke a word of power.

The light, once restored, showed he was still alone but, as he cautiously moved around piles of trash toward the artifact, he suspected that couldn’t last. While the ruins of Pont-a-Museau held nothing he considered an actual threat, there would, no doubt, be a number of minor, annoying battles remaining to interfere with his search.

Up on the floor above, the vines covering the larger of the two kitchen windows parted, and a pointed, ebony snout poked over the sill and into the room. Whiskers twitching, it wrinkled at the lingering smell of burned web and singed fur, then swung around toward the entrance to the lower level. The notched right ear flicked forward as it listened to sounds from below. Long ivory teeth flashed briefly in what was surely the equivalent of a satisfied smile as it withdrew. A moment later, curved claws found a grip on the ledge, and a sleek, black wererat dropped into the kitchen, landing almost silently in spite of its size. Green eyes gleaming, it padded over to the dead rat on the floor and batted it out of the way.

The remains of the spider held its attention for a moment longer. It sniffed at the pulped body, ears flat against its skull; then, rising up on its hind legs, it stared thoughtfully at the entrance to the stairs.

Smoothing long whiskers back off its face, it watched as a dozen giant rats swarmed into the room and disappeared into the shadows.