Page 66 of This Monster of Mine

His shoulders shook with a low huff of laughter. And for the first time, she allowed herself to grin back, to fool herself that they weren’t enemies, that Sidran Tower had been a bad dream. They stayed atop the balcony watching the partygoers congregate and part like waves. Watching as they danced far above the lives they ruined.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Sleep came and went. Brightly lit ballrooms and men who’d drugged her abounded in her dreams to the tune of stormfall pounding against the window. Nursing a headache, Sarai came downstairs to find an equally tired-looking Cato.

“This storm was an ugly one.” He stifled a yawn. “Kadra will be at the Aoran Tower Gate. He wanted you to know that he’s found Petitor Livia’s mother.”

Her appetite vanished, dread and anticipation taking its place. “I see.”

If there was any evidence incriminating Kadra in Livia’s death, then this dance of theirs would end. She’d go to Aelius, and her vengeance would be complete. It was everything she’d hoped for only a month ago before entering this tower. So why couldn’t she summon any joy?

Feeling unanchored, she barely noticed the reek of smoke and mud in the air on her walk to the Aoran Tower Gate, where Kadra conversed with his vigiles. Faint lines of weariness bracketed his mouth, and she took a deep breath, emptiness sweeping her at the thought of this solid, malevolent man rotting away in the mines.

She hid her perturbation throughout their journey, but couldn’t mask it upon reaching the outskirts of Edessa. Left to fend for themselves, the poor clustered in makeshift structures—brick walls and roofs of corrugated metal—or rickety apartments, ill-maintained by the landowners.

“This is Arsamea all over again,” she said, dismayed. An hour and a half’s ride back into the Quarter and she’d be among the lavish domii of last night’s partygoers.

“Edessa has many faces.” Kadra dismounted, leading his horse onto a narrow road between insulae. “You won’t find a town without poverty.”

Spotting a glint of gold some yards away, she squinted. His vigiles hefted steaming pots toward an insula, ladling soup to a group of exhausted people.

The emptiness she’d felt earlier intensified. “You do what you can.”

His mouth curved cynically. “I do what my coffers allow.”

They approached the border of Kadra’s Quarter with Cassandane’s, an outward line of crimson-painted cobblestone with an inner line of black stone. Scores of people darted across, making a beeline for Kadra’s vigiles, faces hopeful for soup. She wondered if Cassandane knew. The Corpus provided that the Tetrarchy couldn’t interfere with each other’s governance of their Quarters, a law evidently set in place to impede the creation of a dictatorship, unimpeachable on its face. Yet, in effect, it had discouraged cooperation as much as it had tyranny.

Kadra tilted his head toward a rocky trail tucked behind a hut. It ended in a brick shelter, tiny even by the outskirts’ standards. A white-haired woman shifted open the planks that served as a door and moved them back when she saw him.

“Get lost,” she snarled. “I don’t need another lying Tetrarch.”

Another?Sarai edged past him. “We’re here to talk about Livia.”

“You’re herenow, are you? Didn’t bother a year ago when I needed help. Ibeggedyou lot to avenge my girl, and you gave me excuses.” She spat in the dirt.

Sarai glanced at Kadra, who shook his head. She believed him. Kadra was many things, but she’d never seen him turn away a petitioner.

“We think Petitor Jovian may have been murdered,” she said tentatively. “Are you saying your daughter was as well?”

The old woman went quiet. She shuffled the boards and emerged, stooped over. “You won’t do anything, just like the others. But I’ll give you the damn story if you want it so bad.”

“What happened to her?” Kadra kept the doorway in his line of sight. Sarai tracked his focus to an oblong shape within the cramped dwelling, wrapped in cloth.

“Death.” Her mother shrugged. “One day, she’d stopped by for a meal. The next, she’d fallen into a vat in one of the Metals Guild’s forges.”

The Metals Guild again. Her heart sank. “How?”

“That’s what I asked.” The woman crossed her arms. “Apparently, the Guildsmen came in to work and found her arm sticking out of the molten metal. Of course, she’d been murdered! But Guildmaster Helvus denied everything, offered his condolences, then slapped me with a bill for the metal she ruined by dying in it.” She laughed bitterly. “Cassandane paid but said there was no way of telling if a Guildsman was involved or which one. Only Jovian knew that something was wrong. Came to Livia’s wake and kept muttering that he saw something he shouldn’t have. Died a week later too.”

Sarai’s blood turned to ice.The Sidran Tower Girl must have seen… Jovian’s burnt letter had said. “Did Livia seem afraid before her death?”

“I barely saw her.” Livia’s mother snarled. “She was worked to the bone. Only came home twice in those last weeks. For a final meal and to get rid of all our scuta. I don’t know why,” she added when Sarai made to ask just that. “But if Livia wanted it gone, then I’d toss the house itself. I just figured it was because she didn’t like the Metals Guild.”

Odd.“Forgive me,” Sarai began hesitantly, “but did you happen to see Livia’s body?”

“See it?” The woman’s laugh went eerily off-kilter. “She’s always with me.”

Sarai’s head whipped toward the shape within the hut. Still laughing, the woman plodded inside and returned with it. She drew the cloth away with a flourish.

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