Ghosts in the Snow Read online

  She shuddered and drew her knees closer.

  "Please. I cannot catch him if I do not know why she left. What do you know?"

  She shook her head again, glancing at the other two girls before covering her face.

  Dubric took a calming breath. "Did either of you hear where she was going or who she intended to see?"

  "No," the girl on the left said. "We weren't here."

  "Maybe we shoulda been," the girl on the right said, sniffling, "but, see, Clemeth and I, we…" She blushed.

  "And Mathern, he was getting upset, not seeing me and all," the left girl said. "So we went together to meet our fellas."

  "Down at the Dancing Sheep," right added.

  Left nodded. "And when we came back first thing this morning, Rianne was gone and Zur was hiding in the corner."

  Dubric touched the middle girl's arm. "What happened? Why did Rianne leave you here alone?"

  She took a deep breath, clutching the blanket close, and raised her eyes to look at Dubric. They were clear and blue, the color of cornflowers. She swallowed, flinched, and whispered, "She said she was meeting someone."

  "Did she say who it was?"

  "A man. I told her not to go, that it was dangerous, but she wouldn't listen."

  "Was she seeing anyone specific? Did he come get her?"

  She shook her head and said, her voice cracking as her hysteria broke, "I begged her not to go. She left me here all alone, in the dark." She took a deep panting breath and her shaking lessened. She took another breath, squeezed the blanket, and seemed to calm herself.

  "Is that what scared you? Being alone?"

  She nodded. "Rianne didn't care; she just left anyway."

  Dubric looked at the three girls. "Did Rianne talk about her suitors? Did she mention any names?"

  The girl on the left rolled her eyes. "Ri? Maybe to Zur. She barely talked to us at all. She saw lots of fellas, though. Too many, if you ask me."

  "Definitely," Right said. "She sometimes teased us about sticking with one guy, but I know Clemeth would never hurt me."

  "Neither would Mathern."

  Clemeth and Mathern were apprentices of the village miller and were well-regarded young men. They often brought flour to the castle kitchens and Dubric noted their names in his book. "You were with Clemeth and Mathern all night?"

  "We are betrothed," Left said, raising her chin. "We've stayed at the Dancing Sheep before."

  Right nodded. "We're not allowed to bring fellas to our room, even if we're betrothed. They have to wait in the hall."

  "Is that where most young women go to meet suitors? The Dancing Sheep?"

  Left shrugged. "It depends. Some do, some don't."

  "What about Rianne?"

  Right clamped her mouth closed, but Left said, "She went there, yeah, but not with a steady. We'd see her there sometimes."

  "Did you see here there last night?"

  Right blushed and Left stammered before saying, "We weren't exactly in the tavern, milord. She was here when we left and I don't know where she went after that."

  Visible from behind her fingers, the middle girl's face had turned a deep vermillion. Dubric looked back at Dien. The ghosts stood all around him; five servant girls drenched in blood. Slashes covered his latest ghost, and each cut oozed splatters onto the floor. Through the ghosts, Dien nodded and reached for the latch, his hand slipping through Fytte's belly. Dubric's stomach lurched.

  Before he shuddered, Dubric turned his eyes away and returned his attention to the girls. "I'd like the two of you to wait in the hall," Dubric said.

  Left gaped. "But why?"

  "What did we do? Why do we have to go to the hall?"

  Dubric smiled reassuringly and said, "Please. For a few moments. Mister Saworth will be more than happy to escort you."

  They both shook their heads. Dien opened the door and said, "C'mon girls. Let's go."

  "But—"

  Dien seemed to grow more imposing as he grumbled his uncompromising words. "You weren't here when your friend left and you said you barely talked to her. Your testimony is finished." He pointed to the door. The girls looked at each other, shrugged, and rose to their feet.

  Dubric watched the girl with the blanket, feeling the ghosts remain in the room with them as a constant reminder of his duty. As soon as the door closed, he asked his witness, "What is your name?"

  "Zurinn, sir."

  He scratched a note and looked around the little room. Deep in the bowels of the castle, it was no more than ten lengths on a side, windowless, and cold. Four beds, little better than cots, with frames of ancient iron pipes and strung with oft-patched cloth, were bunked in pairs against the stone walls. The girls stored their belongings in crude wooden boxes on the rough stone floor. The servants' quarters were spartan, crowded, and dreary; this room seemed typical. "Just the four of you?" Dubric asked in an attempt to loosen her tongue.

  She shivered beneath her blanket. "Yes, sir."

  "Where do you work?"

  "With the chickens, sir. We care for them and gather eggs, mostly."

  He nodded as if he understood anything at all about chickens. "Do you like your job?"

  She shrugged. "It's money."

  "How about Rianne? Did she like her job?"

  She looked at him for a moment and shrugged. "I don't know. Not really, I guess. Who wants to work around chickens all day?"

  He added to his notes. "Did she complain often?"

  "No more than anyone else, I suppose."

  "What do you think about the other two going to the Dancing Sheep last night?"

  She blinked and lifted her head. "It's all right. I told them to go. They've been courting for a long time—Bet and Mathern nearly two summers now. Sometimes I wish I could go, too, maybe listen to a minstrel or have a tonic, but it wouldn't be right."

  "Why?"

  The girl blushed. "Because Edgew isn't here. I can't go without him."

  "Edgew?"

  She smiled, her fear forgotten. "He's back home, in Oakfield. He comes up to the castle to see me every moon or so when the weather's decent. We're hoping to get married this autumn, once he's a journeyman."

  "Why, child, are you here when he is a half-day's walk away?"

  "Money, milord. My father died last spring from consumption and my brother lost his sight from a fever when he was small. My mother takes care of him, but she can't do that and earn a wage. Edgew doesn't make enough yet to feed and shelter everyone, but once he's a journeyman, I can go back home."

  Dubric rubbed his eyes. "How old are you?"

  "Fifteen summers, milord." She shrugged. "That's what I kept thinking in the dark. I'm too darn young to die and have too much to live for."

  "What about Rianne? Did she have a lot to live for?"

  She chewed her lip. "I don't know, milord. Not as much as some. More than others, I guess. She was always looking for the easy way, but that doesn't get you anywhere."

  " 'The easy way'? What does that mean?"

  Zurinn sighed. "She was nice enough, truly she was, milord, but sometimes she expected other people, especially men, to do things for her or pay attention to her. She thought she deserved it, and the less she had to do, the better."

  "Of these men, was there one she met frequently?"

  Zurinn bit her lower lip as she considered his question. "No. I'm sorry, milord, but they were right. She saw lots of fellas and some weren't very nice."

  He took a deep breath and watched her cornflower eyes. "Who? Do you have any names at all?"

  She frowned, leaning back. "I tried not to know, milord, truly. It wasn't any of my business, but sometimes she'd come back with bruises or her clothes ruined. She'd have some coin or a shiny ribbon in her hair, so that must have made it all right. Twice she went to the village midwife. I went with her the second time, trying to be her friend even though I didn't think it was right, but her screaming… It was horrible, milord, hearing the midwife cut the baby from her.

  "After
that last time, she found a man to help her stop the babies from growing. He's the only one I ever knew of for sure. I guess they made a trade. I don't know his name, but I know she laid with him from time to time, when she couldn't find anyone else. He was nasty, though."

  "Who?" Dubric asked, his pencil poised over the page.

  She shuddered. "I saw him once when we went to the village to get the packet of poison. Disgusting man, filthy and oozing. Like a warty toad. He kept looking at me and offering me his medicines. Said they'd relax me or make me feel 'like a woman.' Ri laughed and teased me, offering to share him, all three of us together." She shuddered, shaking her head. "I left and never went to the village with her again."

  "Who?" Dubric asked again. "Have you any more details?"

  "I was only there a few minutes, milord, but I've seen him in the castle now and then, so you might know him. He's about my height, broad and stronglooking, but scarred and dirty. Scabby. He's missing part of his nose and it's—"

  Dubric lurched to his feet and laid his finger on his nose. "The nostril is gone? On this side?"

  "Yes, with snot dripping out. You know him?"

  "I am afraid that I do." Dubric closed his notebook and bowed slightly. "Thank you, miss, for your help."

  Grimacing as he reached through Fytte, Dubric opened the door and looked at Dien. "Have you finished? I want to check with the physicians before we ride to the village."

  "Of course, sir," Dien said, walking with Dubric down the hall. "Why the village?"

  Dubric glanced at Dien. "Inek knew the missing girl. Intimately."

  "Why am I not surprised?" Dien muttered a low curse and held the door open for Dubric.

  * * *

  "Mirri, calm down!" Nella said, stroking the other girl's hair. Her friends had all run back to their room after Dubric flew past, and they were going to be late for work if they didn't hurry. Nella felt time slip by and the instinct to get moving slammed in her veins. Tardiness was unimaginable. In Pyrinn, being noticeably late meant a whipping or a broken arm. She did not want to find out what it meant in Faldorrah. Mirri, however, was too scared to do more than tremble and frantically babble.

  Mirri blubbered and tugged at her curly hair, her hands shaking and damp with tears. "But what if…"

  Nella tried to keep her voice calm and sure. "There's nothing to worry about. Dubric is going to catch him and everything will be fine."

  "Goat piss, Nella," Stef muttered. She sat on her bunk beside Ker and frowned. "Dubric isn't doing a thing and you know it as well as I do."

  Nella stroked Mirri's hair. "He's doing everything he can."

  Stef rolled her eyes. "I still think it's Dubric himself."

  Mirri made a small, terrified squeak and her dark eyes flicked to Nella.

  "I'm all for staying in here all day." Plien lay on her bunk above Stef and Ker, buffing her fingernails with a scrap of bark.

  Stef nodded. Ker shrugged.

  "You're willing to lie about every day," Dari said, frowning with disgust. She leaned in the open door and watched the others. "Some of us need to work so we'll get paid."

  Nella smiled at Dari. Dari smiled back.

  "Just because I'm not supporting a house full of brats back home doesn't mean I don't need money, too," Plien said as she examined her fingertips. "I'd rather be breathing tomorrow than risk my life out there today. Whether it's Dubric or not."

  "But what about tomorrow?" Nella asked. "Or the day after? Or next phase or next moon? When will it be safe to work?"

  Plien shrugged, buffing out a rough spot and examining her nails again. "Don't know. Don't care. I'm staying right here."

  "Do we hafta go? I don't wanna die," Mirri said.

  "None of us want to," Nella said, "but if we hide, he wins." She wrapped an arm over Mirri's soft shoulders and said, "I won't let anyone come near you, all right? Dari won't, either."

  Stef snickered and kicked Nella's bed. "Look at you! You're barely as tall as my shoulder and skinny as a twig. How are you going to protect yourself, let alone anyone else?"

  Nella gave her a warning glare, but before she could respond, Dari snapped, "Oh, shut your yap. You know she escaped Pyrinn. She's much tougher than she looks." Dari motioned toward the hall. "Let's get our butts to work while we still have jobs."

  Stef kicked the bed again, shifting it on the floor. "Lord Risley dragged her here to keep her as a pet. She didn't escape."

  "Believe whatever you want." Nella stood, ignoring Stef s attempts at goading her into an argument. "You coming, Mirri?"

  "We'll make the beds, you can do the towels," Dari offered.

  At last Mirri nodded. She took a deep, shaking breath and the three girls left the room. Ker followed them.

  Dari closed the door. "All four of us, then?"

  Hands locked together, they hurried from the servants' wing.

  * * *

  After he turned the corner, Dubric blinked at what he saw written in blood on the outer wall of his office. He froze for a moment, his head hammering, until, beside him, Dien slumped against the wall. Dubric read the message again and a cry bubbled and grew from within him, finally breaking free. Screaming, he spun around and ran through the back hall to the west tower, sword clenched in his hands. Noble and commoner alike fled at the sight of him. Dien followed, his sword also drawn. They ran from the office hallway, past the servants' wing, past the northern doors of the great hall, past the workshops, accountants, seamstresses, storage, past even the entrance to the temple wing, the one place in the castle Dubric avoided. Dubric screamed a long mournful wail as if his heart would burst, and a group of altar boys and nuns froze where they stood.

  Dubric shoved through the horde of astonished altar boys, ignored the startled gasp of the nuns, and the shocked stare of Friar Bonne. Still screaming, in his heart, his mind, he ran. He dared not look at his ghosts, not yet, not ever, not when the message said: NEVER send a boy.

  * * *

  The first glints of sunrise flickered on the crenellations of the west tower as Lars staggered through the mud with his bloody hands tied in front of him. His face and his chest were covered in blood, as if he had rolled in it, and he repeatedly tried to spit away the foul taste polluting his blood-smeared mouth.

  He was relieved he hadn't puked over whatever putrid thing had been used to gag him. It lay discarded somewhere beneath the coop, surely a horror that he did not want to contemplate or see. After facing the thing in the dark, and finally managing to spit the noxious gag away, he had decided that his life was truly a miracle, even if it was over.

  He fell to his knees beside the body of the egg maid, and he muttered a curse as his shoulders slumped in shame. His shortsword had been thrust into the back of her head and it stood there jauntily, the hilt dripping with blood. Dubric was going to have his ass, that was as sure as the coming dawn, and not only because he'd let himself be seen.

  Whoever had killed the egg maid had hacked apart her body with Lars's sword, shot her with a bolt from his small crossbow, and stolen his dagger. Lars had ruined the murder scene, ruined it by his presence, and any clue the killer might have left had been compromised. He was covered in her blood, with the stink of her death, and he was in deep trouble.

  "Oh, dammit!" he cried, his face turned to the brightening sky. He prayed for a moment and looked back at the body. At least he was still tied, with a length of intestine that had been knotted and cut. Dubric would know he did not kill her and he would not be found guilty of murder. Stupidity, perhaps, but not murder. He breathed easier and settled his backside into the cold mud to wait for Dubric.

  Moments later, a group of milkmaids opened the west tower door and he cursed again. He should have stayed stuffed beneath the coop.

  One girl screamed, and all five pairs of eyes lit upon him, each flickering with murderous fire in the dawn. They ran toward him. "You bastard!" one screeched.

  They had him outnumbered. "Oh, curse it!" His bound hands fumbled to his thighs as he t
ried to shove himself to his feet, but his balance was off and they would be upon him before he—

  His eyes darted to his sword and he lunged for it, stretched over it. "Forgive me," he whispered as he ripped his hands toward the blade and pulled, slicing through the slimy binds like a hot knife through soft cheese. In a blink he ruined both the scene and his alibi, again, but what choice did he have?

  The sections of intestine fell into trampled mud and he pulled his sword and stood, all in one fluid movement. "Back off!" he snarled. "This is an official investigation!"

  "You sneaky, lying bastard!" a milkmaid snarled. "You did this! Dubric's horse-raping page!"

  The girls surrounded him as he stood over the dismembered torso of the egg maid with his bloody sword in his hands. "Go to work, go back to bed—I don't really give a damn—just get away from here!"

  "He's just a boy. We can take him," one milkmaid said, her eyes flickering fire.

  "I didn't kill her! Now go away before I drag you all to the gaol." He stumbled over a severed arm but didn't fall.

  "Little pissant boy. Think you're a hot bastard now?"

  "You like cutting us up?" Two girls slipped behind him while the other three still paced in front.

  Oh, Goddess, this was bad. "I didn't cut her up! Now, please, go on before I—"

  The girls moved closer and Lars braced himself, his eyes resting on one girl who stayed in front of him. He didn't want to hurt them, but he had no intention of dying, either.

  "If we move together, we can take him, sword or not," the one directly in front of him whispered. She stood over a hand and a hunk of meat that might have once been part of a thigh. Her face was hard and deadly. The other girls looked at her and nodded. Lars swallowed and blinked as he tightened the grip on his sword. He'd drop her first.

  "Perhaps, but I wouldn't recommend it," a man's voice said to Lars's right, and all the girls turned to look.

  Lars watched the girl in front of him. He knew better than to get distracted.

  The girls jumped back, startled, murder fading into uncertainty in their eyes. Risley stood beside the next coop with his gloved hand on the hilt of his sword and his cloak fluttering in the chilly morning wind. "You all right, Lars?"