N. Jemisin - The Broken Kingdoms

I stiffened. Madding scowled. “Nemmer.”

“I meant no insult,” she said, shrugging, still smiling. “I like killers.”

I glanced at Madding, wondering whether it was all right for me to tell this kinswoman of his to go to the infinite hells. He didn’t seem tense, which told me she was no threat or enemy, but he wasn’t happy, either. He noticed my look and sighed. “Nemmer came to warn me, Oree. She runs another organization here in town—”

“More like a guild of independent professionals,” Nemmer put in.

Madding threw her a look that was pure brotherly annoyance, then focused on me again. “Oree… the Order of Itempas just contacted her, asking to commission her services. Hers specifically, not one of her people.”

I picked up a big pillow and pulled it against me, not to hide my nudity but to cover my shiver of unease. Madding noticed and went to his closet to fetch something for me. To Nemmer I said, “Not that I know much about it, but I was under the impression that the Order could call upon the Arameri assassin corps whenever they had need.”

“Yes,” said Nemmer, “when the Arameri approve of, or care about, what they’re doing. But there are a great many small matters that are beneath the Arameri’s notice, and the Order prefers to take care of such matters itself.” She shrugged.

I nodded slowly. “I take it you’re a god of… death?”

“Oh, no, that’s the Lady. I’m just stealth, secrets, a little infiltration. The sort of business that takes place under the Night-father’s cloak.”

I could not help blinking at this title. She was referring to one of the new gods, the Lord of Shadows, but her term had sounded much like Nightlord . That could not be, of course; the Nightlord was in the keeping of the Arameri.

“I don’t mind the odd elimination,” Nemmer continued, “but only as a sideline.” She shrugged, then glanced at Madding. “I might reconsider, though, given how much the Order is offering. Probably a big unexploited market in taking out godlings who piss off mortals.”

I gasped and whirled toward Mad, who was coming back to the bed with a robe. He lifted an eyebrow, unworried. Nemmer laughed and reached over to poke my bare knee, which made me jump. “I could be here for you , you know.”

“No,” I said softly. Madding could take care of himself. There was no reason for me to worry. “No one would send a godling to kill me. Easier to pay some beggar twenty meri and make it look like a robbery gone wrong. Not that they need to hide it at all; they’re the Order .”

“Ah, but you forget,” Nemmer said. “You used magic to kill those Keepers at the park. And the Order thinks you killed three others who’d been assigned to discipline a Maro man, reportedly your cousin, for assaulting a previt. They couldn’t find the bodies, but word’s going around about how your magic works.” She shrugged.

Oh, gods. Madding knelt behind me, putting a robe of watered silk around my shoulders. I slumped back against him. “Rimarn,” I said. “He thought I was a godling.”

“And you don’t hire a mortal to kill a godling. Even one who’s apparently goddess of chalk drawings come to life.” Nemmer winked at me. But then she sobered. “It’s you they want, but you’re not the one they think is behind Role’s death, not ultimately. Little brother, you should’ve been more discreet.” She nodded toward me. “All her neighbors know about her godling lover; half the city knows it. You might’ve been able to save her from this otherwise.”

“I know,” Mad said, and there was a millennium’s worth of regret in his tone.

“Wait,” I said, frowning. “The Order thinks Madding killed Role? I know a godling must have done it, but—”

“Madding is in the business of selling our blood,” Nemmer said. Her tone was neutral as she said this, but I heard the disapproval in it, anyway, and heard Madding’s sigh. “And I hear business is good. It’s not a far stretch to think he might want to increase production, maybe by obtaining a large amount of godsblood at one time.”

“Which would be a fair assumption,” Madding snapped, “if Role’s blood had been gone . There was plenty of it left in and around her body—”

“Which you took away, in front of witnesses.”

“To Yeine! To see if there was any hope of bringing her back to life. But Role’s soul had already gone elsewhere.” He shook his head and sighed. “Why in the infinite hells would I kill her, dump her body in an alley, then come back to fetch it , if her blood was what I wanted?”

“Maybe that wasn’t what you wanted,” Nemmer said very softly. “Or at least, you didn’t want all her blood. Some of the witnesses got close enough to see what was missing, Mad.”

Madding’s hands tightened on my shoulders. Puzzled, I covered one of them with my own. “Missing?”

“Her heart,” said Nemmer, and silence fell.

I flinched, horrified. But then I remembered that day in the alley, when my fingers had come away from Role’s body coated thickly with blood.

Madding cursed and got up; he began to pace, his steps quick and tight with anger. Nemmer watched him for a moment, then sighed and returned her attention to me.

“The Order thinks this was some sort of exotic commission,” she said. “A wealthy customer wanting a more potent sort of godsblood. If the stuff from our veins is powerful enough to give mortals magic, how much stronger might heartblood be? Maybe even strong enough to give a blind Maroneh woman—known paramour of the very godling they suspect—the power to kill three Order-Keepers.”

My mouth fell open. “That’s insane! No godling would kill another for those reasons!”

Nemmer’s eyebrows rose. “Yes, and anyone who knows us would understand that,” she said, a note of approval in her voice. “Those of us who live in Shadow enjoy playing games with mortal wealth, but none of us needs it, nor would we bother to kill for it. The Order hasn’t figured that out yet, or they wouldn’t have tried to hire me, and they wouldn’t suspect Madding—at least, not for this reason. But they follow the creed of the Bright: that which disturbs the order of society must be eliminated, regardless of whether it caused the disturbance.” She rolled her eyes. “You’d think they’d get tired of parroting Itempas and start thinking for themselves after two thousand years.”

I drew up my legs and wrapped my arms around them, resting my forehead on one knee. The nightmare kept growing, no matter what I did, getting worse by the day. “They suspect Madding because of me,” I murmured. “That’s what you’re saying.”

“No,” Madding snapped. I could hear him still pacing; his voice was jagged with suppressed fury. “They suspect me because of your damned houseguest.”

I realized he was right. Previt Rimarn might have noticed my magic, but that meant little in and of itself. Many mortals had magic; that was where scriveners like Rimarn came from. Only using that magic was illegal, and without seeing my paintings, Rimarn would’ve had no proof that I’d done so. If he had questioned me that day, and if I’d kept my wits about me, he would’ve realized I couldn’t possibly have killed Role. At worst, I might have ended up as an Order recruit.

But then Shiny had intervened. Even though Lil had eaten the bodies in South Root, Rimarn knew that four men had gone into that alley and only one had emerged, somehow unscathed. Gods knew how many witnesses there were in South Root who would talk for a coin or two. Worse, Rimarn had probably sensed the white-hot blast of power Shiny used to kill his men, even from across the city. Between that and what I’d done to the Order-Keepers with my chalk drawing, it did not seem so far-fetched a conclusion: one godling dead, another standing to profit from her death, and the mortals most intimately connected with him suddenly manifesting strange magic. None of it was proof—but they were Itempans. Disorder was crime enough.