Chapter 2 - Let The Blood Fall Thick
The noble family of Accipitri who ruled over the state of Desmelas in South-Tal all wore masks shaped like birds with strongly hooked bills.
My target wore a mask of cast silver highlighted with thin threads of yellow gold. It was shaped like a hawk with wings outstretched. The hawk's body ran down the bridge of her nose with its talons curving the shape of her nostrils. Its head and open beak, positioned in the centre of her forehead, was inlaid with two violet amethysts for its eyes.
By any measure, it was a beautiful piece. I admired the details of feathers in the body and wings. The mask-maker's technique was utter perfection. A hawk meant this girl was of the Tvereman family, the leading branch of Accipitri. However, amethysts and silver told me that the girl wearing the mask was perhaps the lowest ranking in her family.
That would explain why she was here, in Klesei. The Accipitri Lords didn't marry north of the Tal. The fact that they sent one of their daughters here meant she was expendable, a necessary evil to gain influence with the Fel or Rosace families.
She stood apart from the group. By the look of it, she wouldn't have minded the noble pens.
I continued my journey through the crowd, keeping a steady pace. Finally, I passed the group of nobles entirely, without sparing them a glance, heading for the first alley that broke away from the square.
Twice a week, my mistress, the Mask-maker sent me to market to purchase cloths, dyes, leathers and, on occasion, precious metals. Some of the best cloth and leather merchants of Kelsei, those who sold to the artisans, kept shop off the market square. I knew this web of alleys on this side of the square as if I were the spider that wove them. My feet took me to the narrow, shadowed alley that opened up onto the square right behind my mark.
I approached her, but kept close to the wall of a building and its shadow.
A collective intake of breath rose up from the entire square when the spectres descended.
Spectres came for those unmasked for a fatal embrace. At first, when drifting towards the ground, they looked like a veil of mist. But the closer they came, the more the details of human features became evident. Willowy arms, long silken hair that fluttered behind them in a sheet of white, heavy, round breasts, beautifully sculpted faces. All spectres resembled youthful women, naked, sorrowful and pure.
They descended slowly, slowly. They would pass through my mother and father.
And take away their souls.
Everyone watched, in total silence, with bated breaths.
Everyone, except for me.
I wouldn't look. Above all, this was the distraction I needed.
I moved in close behind the noblewoman, pulling out the knife in my pocket, and pressing it to the side of her neck.
"Make a noise and I'll kill you." It almost didn't sound like my voice that whispered in her ear. It wasn't me.
She stiffened, emitting the faintest squeak which no one could hear amidst the gasps and cries of those gathered in the square when the spectres went for their prey. I pressed the knife against her soft skin, enough for her to feel its sharpness, and she let me pull her back into the shadows
She shivered as I guided her into a nook created by an odd angle between two crookedly built buildings that were all but leaning against one another. My chest was stony, there was no turning back. I had to go through with this.
When in the alcove, I kept my knife pressed to her neck but withdrew my other hand to take out the coin purse.
I turned her around so she would face me.
Her copper eyes danced inside her mask, her skin void of colour.
I extended the purse towards her. "When the steward asks if anyone would pay for the burial of the convicted, you give this to him."
She said nothing.
"You use this to pay for the burial, " I pressed the purse into her hand. "Understood?"
Her lips parted in astonishment. "You're not robbing me?" she asked, slowly. Her voice was high and the rising tones of her Desmelasian accent grated on my nerves. "You're holding me at knife point to give me money?"
"I ask that you do this," I stated, making my voice as cold as I could, but I pulled the knife away, slipping it into my pocket.
Now that I made it clear that I not only wouldn't kill her, but that I needed her help, her body relaxed and she watched me like a child examining a trail of ants. "Why can't you do it yourself, merchant?"
"The steward didn't state their crimes."
"So?"
"When no crimes are stated, it's either a secret matter of state or a Lord's personal grudge. Either way, anyone of the People who shows sympathy will be apprehended."
"Then you expect me to—"
"You're a Lady. You're above suspicion. If you hand that purse to the steward, my pa—that man and woman will get the burial they deserve, no questions asked." I fought to be patient. I had to convince her. But the growing scorn on her face was making me uneasy.
"The burial they deserve?" The girl's mouth twisted to show her front teeth. Her voice was unpleasantly sweet. She took the purse from me with dainty fingers and loosened the string that held it closed to look inside.
Then she turned it over, and spilled its contents. The small round gold dels and rectangular silver lors rattled when they hit the stone floor. "What they deserve is to rot on the pillars," she said, a smirk souring her expression. "And what you deserve is to join them. HEL—"
I couldn't let her finish that scream. Her friends were nearby, they would alert the guards and if they'd catch me, no one would be left to find Marin.
I stopped her the only way I could, by clasping one hand over her mouth and digging my fingers into her throat to close off her air and voice. She tried to move back, forcing me to come forward and as I did, my feet slipped over the fallen coins. The full weight of my body crashed into her and we both fell against the rough stone of the outer wall of the nearest building.
I heard a crack. Briefly, I worried that her beautiful mask had been broken. An unwarranted fragility happened occasionally with cast silver masks, especially when the alloy contained zinc instead of copper.
The mask worried me.
Her eyes rolled back in her head. I felt the breath leave her body and pulled back, startled.
She slid down the wall leaving a streak of bright red over the sandy beige stone in her wake.
When she reached the bottom, she tipped to the side, blood soaking into her long dark hair and pooling around her head.
For a moment, all I could do was stand there and stare stupidly at the place in the wall where an uneven stone had broken, leaving a jagged point now dripping with blood. It had been positioned to meet the back of her skull. I reached down, down to her throat, searching for the pulse that would tell me her heart still beat.
I found only stillness.
She was dead.
I killed her.
I looked at her crumpled body, at the blood pooling at my feet.
I killed her.
I couldn't feel surprise, or disgust, not even horror at what I'd just done. I murdered a young woman. I stole her life.
And yet...none of it touched me.
Because I was a mask with nothing behind it.
With trembling hands, I removed the hawk mask from the noble girl's face, leaving her only with a silk under-masksimilar to the one I wore. All nobles wore masks like these to protect their skin from the discomfort of metal.
I told myself that I just wanted to have a closer look at how the mask-maker had gotten the joints of the bird's talons so accurately. Even up close, the hawk was life-like, as if any moment now it would flap its wings and fly away.
I wiped away specks of blood from the gleaming silver. Sometimes, it was as if the masks spoke to me. And this hawk mask was calling my name.
I turned it over and held it up to my face, placing it over my own silk mask. The noble girl's nose and forehead were wider than mine, but the mask fit.
I released a shaky breath as I undid the satin ribbons and then tied them behind my head, fixing the mask in place.
Then I undid my hair. It fell in wavelets of crow-black down my back.
I threw a furtive glance over my shoulder before I began to strip out of my dress.