Marilyn Todd - Dark Horse

Before the sonofabitch struck again.

Lying on his blanket in the alcove of his master's bedroom, Ajax snored. His ancient, callused paws twitched with pleasure as he raced once more across the open plains of his youth in pursuit of bristly boar and panting stags, bounding over streams and hurdling obstacles, leading the pack by a mile.

In his dreams, his keen nose scented spoor, but in Volcar's bedroom, he didn't even pick up the draught when the door swung quietly open on its hinges. Deaf old ears failed to catch the sound of conversation and laughter out on the terrace, much less soft footfalls on the newly laid mosaic.

Ears flapping in the wind of his dreams, Ajax closed the distance on his quarry, unaware of the pillow being slid from underneath his master's head. So close, so close, Ajax could smell the stag's fear now and, whimpering with pleasure in his sleep, knew nothing of the pillow pressed down on the wizened walnut face.

Of the moment when the thin chest ceased to heave.

Of the pillow replaced under the lolling head.

Of the door closing quietly once again.

The demon rubbed its hands. How exciting, how thrilling, to be in a position where it could exert this amazing power over human life. To slip away in full view of everyone. To stand over someone while they sleep. To then decide whether that person should rise to greet another dawn — or be sent to meet his ancestors in the Kingdom of Decay. Inspirational. Truly. inspirational. Resuming its place at the dinner table, the demon rejoiced. Who among these people had even the faintest inkling that one old man had begun his watery journey across the River of Lamentation? Hell, it wouldn't mind betting that even old Volcar wasn't yet aware of what had happened to him!

Oh, yes, truly inspirational, this power to decide who should live and who should die. But Volcar had been merely a diversion. A small sport taken on the spur of the moment, one which could be repeated, admittedly, but then forgotten. For memories that lingered, however, the demon had planned an entertainment which would make Leo's torment look as quick as a throat being slit. As the candied fruits were brought out, along with nuts and sweet honey cakes laced with wine, the demon set its mind to imagining the torture and agony to be faced by its next victim. Genius. Sheer bloody genius! Medea and her aunt would be so proud of the way their skills had been honed. Indeed, as a celebration of its illustrious female ancestry, the demon decided there and then to bring its schedule forward.

What a thoroughly enjoyable party this was turning out to be!

With Qus keeping a watchful eye on Lydia, the mistress he'd never stopped serving in his heart, Claudia felt there was no better time to investigate the crystal which had been such a bone of contention between the big Ethiopian and his master.

'Curiosity killed the cat,' she whispered to Drusilla as she slipped behind the laurels, but the blue-eyed, cross-eyed, dark Egyptian feline had no interest in proverbs. Now that the mice had been driven from their nests beneath the grain store by the fire, Drusilla felt it incumbent upon her to make their short lives even more miserable. With one fluid movement, she slipped between Claudia's ankles to fuse with the shadows.

There was no sound from the slave quarters save that of creaking bedsteads, breaking wind and snoring. Hardly surprising. Those who weren't required in the kitchens tonight would be rising at the first hint of dawn. On the mainland, farmhands would be busy turning straw into haystacks and bringing in the end of the harvest. Cressian soil was too thin for wheat, but there were still thistles and goose grass to weed out of the vegetable crops, vines to be watered, animals tended and figs to be pollinated. Claudia tiptoed silently past the snoozing porter to the bailiff's quarters, plucking a torch from the wall along the way. I ask you. What could possibly be so sinister about a bit of glass that it's considered capable of bringing on a miscarriage in a healthy young worn 'Janus bloody Croesus!'

The torch fell from her hand. Holy Mother of Mars, the Fiend must stand six feet eight! Black like Qus, the same five parallel tribal lines stood out bone-white on its forehead. The Fiend was leaning against the wall before a meal of apples, wine and honey-roasted crispy duck. Its blue eyes bulged in delight at its glamorous midnight caller, and its teeth bared in a bloodcurdling smile.

'Don't move,' Claudia said. At least, she hoped she said. Her teeth seemed to have a mind of their own. 'You just stay where the hell you are. Don't come any closer.'

'Speak to him firmly enough,' an amused baritone suggested in her ear, 'and he does exactly what you tell him.'

Orbilio. Thank Jupiter! Because if Qus has been hiding this… this thing in his quarters, there had to be a bloody good reason. 'This must be the man who killed Leo,' she hissed under her breath.

'Who? Qus's brother?'

'I don't care if he's the bloody Emperor. He found out that Leo wanted him out and he killed him out of revenge. Now if I'm wrong,' she said, 'I'll be the first to make it up to the boy, I swear. But to be on the safe side, Orbilio, I suggest you clap him in irons.'

'You don't mind if I put the fire out first?' Orbilio picked up the fallen torch and proceeded to stamp out the flames, which were now licking their way up the cotton coverlet on the bed. And still the Fiend kept on grinning.

'Orbilio!'

'Don't worry. You're safe enough with Qus's brother,' he said, and it was impossible for him to contain his laughter any longer. 'He's dead.' He crossed the room and held up the torch. 'In fact, he's been that way for over three months.'

'D-dead?' She peered at the creature standing against the far wall. 'Dead?'

Under the light, she could see that the smile was a death rictus, drawing his lips back over his brilliant white teeth, and that the eyes, those bulging delighted eyes, were coloured glass inlaid in empty sockets.

'The rest of him, though.' I mean, those hands.

'The muscular demeanour is down to padding inside his clothes,' Orbilio explained. 'And the lifelike appearance owes much to skilful body paint, but much of it's due to Ethiopian embalming techniques.'

The Egyptians didn't have the monopoly on corpse preservation, then. 'What about the meal?'

'I rather suspect that's Qus's supper,' he said, helping himself to a sliver of duck. 'The custom, you see, is for the next of kin to keep the body in their house for a year before it can be buried, head facing east.'

All right, all right, body paint, glass, and padding I understand. But — 'What's keeping him upright?'

'This.' Orbilio's knuckles rapped against something Claudia could not see.

She peered closer, and as she did so, she realized that there was a sheen around Qus's brother. Glass? Surely not? Glass is too opaque, too reflective. Then, of course, she understood. 'Crystal!'

The body had been sealed inside a tube of hollowed out crystal from the Ethiopian mines. Which, when placed against a white wall, became… invisible! Leo had been taking no chances when he insisted on a no-shock rule for his new bride. The question was, did this change one damn thing?

Saunio was standing in the doorway of the atrium gazing into space as flutes and lyres made sweet music on the terrace. Grey faced and hollow-eyed, the maestro had pushed himself to the edge of his physical limits, and even though he had still managed to create the definitive Judgement of Paris, it was about time, Claudia thought, that someone told him that grief cannot be expunged in work. That he can run all he likes, but he can't hide, that fate catches up with everyone in the end.