Kushiel's Mercy

but for the figure of the dead Amazigh. It was a dreadful thing to know how easily men died, fierce warriors or no. I didn’t doubt the Amazigh’s skills, but Bodeshmun had been right. They had no head for intrigue. I daresay Astegal had chosen them for their imposing and mysterious appearance, the very thing that had allowed me to deceive them.
    There was a fire burning in the hearth beyond the antechamber, bright and merry. I thought about appearances and deception and drew my sword, approaching with care. A few paces before I reached the room, I paused and unwound my scarf.
    I remembered Phèdre’s training.
    Leander’s memories of my mother’s training were with me, too.
    I could smell wood-smoke and beeswax. Traces of a familiar aroma, sweet and faintly spicy. Perry brandy, doctored with herbs. An unexpected smell of soap.
    And a sour odor beneath it.
    Vomit.
    I stepped into the salon, the blade angled before me. The fire crackled. Two chairs had been drawn up before it, a table between them. An open flagon of perry brandy sat on the table, two empty cups.
    Sidonie was slumped in one of the chairs, her head draped over one arm, a loose coil of hair dangling dangerously close to the fire. My heart leapt into my throat at the sight. I couldn’t even tell if she was breathing.
    As Bodeshmun would have planned.
    He was slumped in the other chair, his bearded chin resting on his chest. One hand lay loose on his knee. The other arm hung at his side, fingers curled. I took a sharp breath, my thoughts racing like quicksilver.
    “Sidonie!” I whispered.
    There was the merest sliver of a glint beneath Bodeshmun’s eyelids.
    I hurried to her side, stooped over her, and tucked the fire-heated lock of hair behind one ear. Felt at her throat for a pulse and sighed with genuine relief when I found it. Only then did I take a deep, surreptitious breath and hold it, turning toward Bodeshmun.
    He was already rising from his chair, one palm cupped and raised, eyes glittering with triumph.
    Lungs full, lips pursed.
    But I was ready, and I blew first.
    I’d always been quick.
    Dust and ashes, a handful of gritty grey matter. What it was, I couldn’t have said.
    Ptolemy Solon would have known. Bones of an innocent man hanged for a crime he didn’t commit, mayhap. Gathered under a full moon, burned in a furnace fueled by heartwood, ground to dust by virgins with a mortar and pestle. It didn’t matter.
    Bodeshmun expelled his breath in shock and gasped for air.
    One gasp.
    I didn’t. I stepped backward with alacrity, wrenching Sidonie’s chair out of the way. I held my breath until the dust settled, and then I watched Bodeshmun die.
    He knew me.
    Even dying, he saw through the semblance. I watched his face darken with recognition, fury, the onset of death. I waited, sword at the ready, until I was certain he carried no antidote to his own poison. Then I smiled.
    “You know me, don’t you?” I said to him. “You know who I am.”
    Bodeshmun glared, his chest heaving impotently.
    I stooped over him, rummaging in his robes. I found it. It . The talisman, hidden in an inner pocket of his robes. A stiff piece of lacquered leather, wrought with an image. A whirlwind sprouting horns and claws. A word inscribed beneath it in Punic script.
    A word I couldn’t read.
    Bodeshmun saw it; Bodeshmun knew. I read the bitter satisfaction in his dying face. I leaned down close to him.
    “Don’t worry,” I whispered. “As it happens, Sidonie’s been studying Punic. You’ve only yourself to thank for it. And in case you wonder as you die, she was the architect of your downfall, not me.” I settled onto my knees, my Amazigh robes puddling around me. “If you take no other thought into your next life, my lord, take this. It is not wise to meddle with D’Angelines in matters of love.”
    Bodeshmun’s eyes rolled into his head.
    Bodeshmun’s heels drummed.
    Bodeshmun died.

Fourty-Nine

    The sleeping draught was a problem.
    “Wake up, love.” I patted Sidonie’s cheek gently, then not so gently. Nothing. I called her name sharply, as loudly as I dared, but she didn’t respond. When I grabbed her shoulders and shook her roughly, her head only lolled in an alarming manner.
    Her breathing was even and her heart beat steadily. Girom had said his draughts were potent. Elua willing, she would awaken; that I had to believe. But for the moment, she slept like the dead, and I was fearful that if I rolled her in Bodeshmun’s carpet