Fanuilh by Daniel Hood (ebook reader with highlight function TXT) 📗

He had a suspicion that Coeccias was not the man to find Tarquin's murderer, unless it could be done easily. And he feared it would not be easy. Honest and competent as the Aedile might be when it came to keeping sailors in line and patrolling the streets at night, Liam did not think he could pry secrets out of Tarquin's corpse.

Which, he further thought, was a shame, since there was no one else in authority to pursue the matter, and he already liked the blunt Aedile.

Southwark had no wall; the steep inland sides of the rise on which the city sat and the jagged Teeth seaward had always been considered protection enough. So it had no gates to speak of, but the beginning of the track to the east that led past Tarquin's cove was marked by two standing columns of worn gray stone, and this was called the city gate.

Liam arrived there before Coeccias and waited on his mount beside one of the pitted stone columns, watching the traffic of farmers' carts and horsemen that straggled along the muddy track.

He had waited far longer than he thought necessary, and. for the tenth time was about to go back into the city to look for Coeccias when the Aedile's voice called to him.

"Liam Rhenford! Hark, man!"

Coeccias now wore a tabard over his black tunic, gray linen emblazoned with the Duke's three red foxes, and he rode a mare that looked worn down beside Liam's snorting roan. Two mounted Guardsmen carrying upright spears flanked him, the Duke's foxes on gray badges sewn to the shoulders of their boiled leather cuirasses. Behind them, astride a walleyed pony, was an ancient woman bundled in shapeless, faded robes, her face wrinkled as an old apple.

"The ghost witch," Coeccias said, when he noticed Liam's glance. "Mother Japh. This is the man who found the corpse, Mother."

The old woman snorted and mumbled.

"More like the fool saw the master in a trance; he isa wizard, all said." Her voice was no more than a whisper, but Liam caught it.

"It may well have been a trance, Mother," he said politely, "but I was not aware wizards cast spells with daggers in their chests."

The woman sniffed indignantly, and Liam arched an eyebrow at the Aedile, who, it seemed, could not decide whether to laugh or frown. He settled for taking charge.

"We'd best to't, then."

He booted his mare into a walk, and the Guardsmen followed suit.

Chapter 3

"NO SPIRITS," THE wrinkled old woman announced in a soft voice, returning to the entrance hall, where Liam and the Aedile waited.

They had waited for her judgement for over an hour while she wandered around the house, humming a little tune to herself, her bright, birdlike gaze darting here and there. She passed through the entrance hall several times, each time favoring Liam with an unpleasant look.

After Liam had satisfied Coeccias that Tarquin was indeed dead, the Aedile had drawn him out into the entrance hall and nodded to Mother Japh, who began her work.

"We mustn't disturb the witch while she searches for spirits," he whispered.

"How does she do it?" Liam whispered back, wondering. The Aedile shrugged and spoke nonchalantly, his hand resting lightly on the hilt of his shortsword. "Truth, I don't know. But if Tarquin's sprite's here, angered or hot on revenge, she'll feel it, and it may be she can learn something from him."

Liam had never heard of a ghost witch, and the idea interested him. If she could speak with Tarquin's ghost, she might be able to find his killer. He studied the witch closely whenever she appeared.

The two Guardsmen stayed on the stone veranda despite the chill wind off the sea, which the watery sun did nothing to relieve. Coeccias had grumbled irritably when they silently took up their posts, but he did not argue with them.

"And as no ghosts haunt the pile," the witch went on, "and no sprites linger, angry or the like, it follows that the killer's not here."

When the witch had rendered her judgement, she suddenly offered Liam a warm smile, and Coeccias scowled. Liam started and flushed red. He turned on the Aedile.

"You thought Idid it? You thought Ikilled him?" Coeccias scowled fiercely at the old woman, who offered him a placid smile. "I suspected, but—"

Liam cut him off angrily. "Then why would I fetch you? Why would I tell you, if I did it?"

"Easy, man, don't rate me. Many's the man's covered his deed thus, and I was only making sure. And y'are Liam Rhenford, are you not?"

"So?" He could not believe the man had suspected him. He prepared to revise the friendly opinion he had devised of the Aedile.

"Truth, it's known that you had traffic with the wizard, more traffic than anyone in Southwark ever had, and who else was there to suspect? And you'd never've known what I thought, if this foolish old woman had kept a still tongue!" He scowled again at the witch, and Liam stalked away, fuming.

A touch on his arm brought him around, and he glared down into Mother Japh's wrinkled, beaming face.

"Take no affront, boy. I thought you'd done it, too. You've an innocent visage," she said, "and that's the worst mark against a man that I know."

Liam did not reply; Tarquin had once said something like that to him. They had been discussing a question of history; Liam had made a point he felt was particularly telling, and the old wizard had begun to laugh. "Get you a beard, Rhenford," he had said. "None'll believe so innocent a face."

"And now, Aedile Coeccias, it likes me to go home, if you can spare one of your frightened soldiers to take me there."

Coeccias shook his head and dispatched one of the Guardsmen to escort the ghost witch back to Southwark. When he returned to the entrance hall, Liam was still thinking over what Mother Japh had said, and how it echoed Tarquin's words.

"She hit the mark, Liam Rhenford. Y' are