It’s cold on that street where the palms whisper in the dark and no one walks. Grada shivers against the breeze and against a deeper chill woken in her bones. In the garden below her the bushes seethe, stirred by the wind in the blackness of night. The dogs are dead or dying. She slips from the high wall and drops among the shrubs. Rising from her crouch-that brings back a memory, a man dropping behind her, rising with knife in his hand-she pulls her own blade from the sheath at her side. It’s an old knife, ugly, cutting a glimmer from starlight, a thing made for killing and not for show.
She walks from the bushes and from the muted sounds of dying beneath the rustle of leaves. The ground is soft beneath her feet, springy. Plants cover every square foot, all of them the same, their leaves like short black blades. The water it must consume to keep this garden green in the desert sun! The weight of the knife draws her back to her purpose. She would rather wander, but the knife pins her to the moment. Ahead the tall house, silent, its many windows dark. She is here to do murder.
The house looms, pale stone reaching skyward as she passes the ground-floor windows one by one. She tests the shutters on each then moves on. This is memory. In some lost corner of her mind she has been passing by these windows forever, hoping never to stop.
She tries another shutter. She strains to see the hands testing that smooth wood, prising those long slats, tries to see if they are her hands, Grada’s, or if she is carried rather than carrying. Carried at least the blood will not stain her skin, though the stain will be more than skin-deep in either event.
Another window, fingers wedged once more between the slats, muscles straining, and with a soft schnick something vital surrenders and the shutter comes loose. She climbs in, heart hammering louder than her footfalls. Even passing through she notes the quality of the timber, the extravagant thickness of it, shipped down the Blessing in the great barges of trade princes like Jomla and Honnecka. These people throw gold about as if it were nothing while in the Maze children starve, babies are stillborn. She tries to kindle a fire within her, anger to burn away guilt, but the sparks die. The desire to kill can’t be manufactured.
She’s in a corridor now, padding her way, the heavy knife held out before her to test the darkness, so thick you might better call it blindness.
Footsteps, just a whisper, bare feet on thick rugs, a snuffle, someone making their way by habit. Grada steps back against the wall and waits. She draws a deep slow breath but it hurts. For no reason her lungs are full of broken glass, a hot rivet driven between her ribs. She bites down on the cry that demands escape.
“Herzu’s member!” The curse started as a scream but died in a whisper on her lips.
“The mouth on her! Labourers on Tuvaini’s tomb shout that when they hammer their thumbs by mistake…you’re sure she’s the emperor’s chosen one?”
“Just finish stitching.”
“Gods damn you, Rorrin!” Grada managed a louder whisper. She couldn’t unscrew her eyes yet but she knew his voice.
“Rorrin?”
“Stitch or I’ll give you something bigger to sew up!” Rorrin’s voice again.
“She’s done. I’ll go see to my other patient.” Something being wrapped around her chest and ribs.
“I wouldn’t bother. If he wakes he’ll only die of shame. Taken out by a Maze girl…”
Meere? She tried to curse again but her lips felt too dry. Whatever might be wrapping her ribs something thicker and more velvet seemed to wrap the rest of her, pulling her down into black and dreamless sleep. Meere?
Mazarkis Williams
Knife Sworn