Spirit's Oath (3 page)

“I am,” Miranda said, holding out her gold ring so he could see.

Martin didn’t even look, but his polite smile fell to a distracted frown, like he was doing math in his head. “I suppose it makes no difference,” he said at last. “Why don’t you come inside?”

Their carriage was blocking the way, so the whole Lyonette family piled out and followed their host into his enormous house. A head of the family and the highest ranking noble, Lord Simon should have walked first, but Martin led the way, and Miranda walked beside him when her mother wouldn’t let her walk anywhere else. Miranda didn’t pay much attention to that after the initial shock, though. She was too busy gaping at the house.

It really was like a palace. Every inch of it was a work of art. Antiques and collectibles from all over the world were arranged to their best advantage throughout the rooms. The lamps hung from enormous rings of antlers cut from animals she’d never seen before. The paintings on the walls were from a broad variety of styles and schools, and the floor alternated between polished stone and some kind of yellow wood she didn’t recognize. Every room was painted a different color, and through the windows Miranda could see a garden filled with plants she couldn’t even name.

“Your house is very impressive,” she said after they’d walked through the third room that would have been at home in a king’s treasury.

“Thank you,” Martin said. “Our company deals mostly in metals and timber, both of which have been booming since the Council lifted the tariffs. We have offices all over, and most of my year is spent traveling among them. I try to bring things back from wherever I visit, but since I’m gone so often, this house is more of a museum than anything else.”

“You’re in trade?” Miranda regretted the words the moment they were out of her mouth. She sounded as snobby as Alyssa, but she just couldn’t believe her parents would go to a party thrown by a tradesman. Her mother didn’t even answer letters from anyone who couldn’t prove at least three generations of noble blood.

“Yes,” Martin said, glancing at her. “Does that bother you?”

“No,” Miranda said. “I think it’s very impressive.” Always nice to find someone with money who’d actually earned it. Nice, and rare, though getting less rare as the Council’s influence grew.

Martin left them in the ballroom, which had more windows than walls and looked large enough to act as a formation field for an army. There were close to a hundred other guests there already, and Miranda was starting to worry where they would all sleep when she caught sight of a beloved figure in the crowd.

“Tima!” she cried, louder than she’d meant. Across the room, a beautiful blonde woman looked up and smiled indulgently as Miranda ran over and enveloped her in a huge hug. Trintima was her older sister and the only member of her family Miranda actually liked. Tima might look just like their mother, but her graceful-lady routine wasn’t an act.

“Miranda,” Tima said, looking her sister up and down when they finally broke apart. “You’re looking well.”

“Don’t let Mother hear you say that,” Miranda said. “How have you been? Mother said you got married.” Actually, Tima’s marriage had been the only thing Alma had talked about all the way through lunch and into the carriage. Tima, with her gentle manners and lovely looks, had married into the Whitefall family, a great triumph for minor nobility like the Lyonettes. Of course, Alma was distressed that Tima’s husband was only a second cousin to the Merchant Prince, but a Whitefall was a Whitefall. They had to be good for something eventually.

“Yes,” Tima said. “He couldn’t come, but he sends his love. He wanted to meet you.”

Miranda found that hard to believe, but she was willing to let it lie for Tima’s sake. “I’m sorry I missed the wedding.” No one had bothered to tell her about it, but Miranda wasn’t going to bring that up, either. “I’m so glad you’re here. If I had to live through four days of this with no one but Alyssa and our parents, I think I might actually go crazy.”

Tima glanced over her shoulder at their youngest sister, who was standing at the center of a growing circle of admirers. “Alyssa’s energy can be tiring,” Tima said in that gentle way of hers.

“
Alyssa
is tiring,” Miranda corrected. “She’s a spoiled flirt and a featherbrain.”

“Now, now,” Tima chided, but she was smiling. “Don’t you like the house?” she asked, deftly changing the subject.

“It’s certainly impressive,” Miranda answered. “Especially for being this close to Zarin.”

“Mr. Hapter’s family has been very fortunate,” Tima said. “He’s one of the richest men in Council.”

“Which explains how a man in trade managed to get all these Zarin blue bloods to come visit his little museum,” Miranda said, snagging a cup of punch from one of the passing waiters. “Poor Hapter. He can dazzle this crowd with money all he likes, but unless he suddenly uncovers a noble relative, all he’ll ever be is an oddity so far as the Zarin nobility is concerned. They’re snobs to the bone.”

“Miranda!” Tima gasped, looking around to see if anyone had overheard.

Miranda just shrugged and drank her punch. It was the truth, and she wasn’t here to be polite. At least the punch was good.

Around this point, the servants brought in card tables, and the crowd began to break into teams. Since the Lyonette family was five, that left an odd player, but Miranda was more than happy to duck out. Card playing was one of those noble time wasters she’d never understood. Honestly, the whole concept of wasting time for pleasure struck her as stupid. Why would you ever want to waste something that you never had enough of? Of course, this whole trip was a waste of time, so far as she was concerned.

But the card game would keep her mother off her back for at least the next hour. That was a gift in itself, and one Miranda was determined not to waste. She was about to sneak off and find something constructive to do, like letting Eril out to work with him on control for a bit, when a voice spoke right beside her.

“Don’t care for cards?”

Miranda managed to keep from jumping at the last second. She turned to see Martin Hapter standing at her side, looking out over his guests like a foreman surveying his crew.

“I’ve never cared for them, either,” he said. “Dreadful waste of time.”

“If that’s how you feel, why did you set up a tournament?” Miranda said, edging down the wall to put a bit more distance between herself and her host.

Martin shrugged. “It’s the sort of thing they expect from a house party.” He glanced at her. “But since card games don’t appeal to you, Miss Lyonette, perhaps you’d like a tour of the rest of the house?”

Miranda frowned. A tour did sound much more interesting than watching a bunch of overdressed snobs play cards. However, “Why are you asking me?”

“Because you look bored,” Martin said with a confident smile. “And because I feel it best that we get to know each other a little.”

Miranda didn’t like that answer at all, but she couldn’t think of a polite way to say no, which was how she ended up walking with Martin Hapter through the rest of his ridiculous house.

It wasn’t boring, at least. Every corner was a treasure trove of interesting things, though Martin’s apparent fascination with trophy hunting left a bad taste in her mouth. Each room seemed to have a dead animal as its crowning feature, and Martin would always stop to tell the story of how he’d acquired this pelt or that head. The first couple weren’t so bad, but by the time they exited to walk through the gardens, Miranda was very happy to be outside where the weather made displaying taxidermy impossible.

Martin’s gardens were as eclectic as everything else, a vibrant mix of plants from all over the Council Kingdoms as well as a hothouse full of tropical plants from the pirate isles in the far south. Miranda would have slowed down for a better look, but Martin hurried her past the flowers toward a building at the garden’s edge.

“I think you’ll really like this next part,” he said as they left the garden. “The rest of the stuff is just curiosities. I keep my real collection in here.”

The side building was one story, long and low as it wrapped around the edge of the garden. It was white like the house, but there was no glass in its windows. Instead, they were high off the ground and laced with ironwork so artistic, you almost didn’t notice the bars. The walls were very thick as well, and the doors were heavy wood held closed by bolts set into the stone floor. A servant undid the bolts as Martin approached, holding the doors open for his master, who in turn held out his arm for Miranda. That was a step too far even for politeness, and Miranda walked right past him only to stop at the threshold.

The first thing that hit her was the strong smell of animal and hay, but this place wasn’t a barn. It wasn’t the docile smell of horse or cow, but the sharper, bloodier smell of creatures that lived on meat. The building was divided into cells with a wide, straw-strewn hallway down the middle. The cells were walled in with stone and the same lovely iron bars from the windows. Low growls drowned out the gentle wind and birdsong from outside, and Miranda caught her breath.

“Don’t be afraid, Miss Lyonette,” Martin said.

“Spiritualist,” Miranda corrected, giving him a wary glare. “Spiritualist Lyonette.”

Martin smiled and started walking down the hall. “As I was saying, the cages are quite strong. It’s perfectly safe. Now”—he smiled at her—“come see my jewels.”

Against her better judgment, Miranda followed. Not surprisingly, considering the smell, the cages held exotic predators. The first contained a pair of silver foxes panting miserably in the heat, their dark eyes dull and reproachful as they glared at their captor. The moment Miranda and Martin stopped in front of the bars, Martin launched into the grand story of how his hunters had trapped the mated pair. The tale itself wasn’t so different from all the other stories he’d told walking through the house, but here in among the cages, Martin was like a different man. He was animated, his eyes bright with life, especially when he got to his plans for the kits his foxes would produce.

“Their fur is softer than anything you’ve ever touched,” he said with a wistful sigh. “I could make a fortune if we could get a farm going, but they don’t breed well in the heat this far south. Such a pity, but these two were more of an experiment, anyway. No real harm done, and they make such a nice addition to my collection.”

Miranda bit her tongue. She didn’t approve of caging anything, but while the foxes looked hot, they had food and water and seemed generally healthy. So she kept her comments to herself as Martin led her to the next cage, which held a pair of black armored pigs. After that there were grass lions, a forest panther, some sort of feathered lizard from the southern rain forest, and an enormous red-golden stripped cat that Martin claimed was some kind of crossbreed that had never been successfully created until now.

“I’m the only one in the world to own one,” Martin said proudly. “I’m thinking of naming it Hapter’s Cat; what do you think?”

“It would certainly be a telling name,” Miranda said, not bothering to hide the bite in her voice. She was getting awfully tired of this tour. “Is that all, then?”

“One more,” Martin said, his smile morphing to a secretive grin. “I’ve saved the best for last.”

They were at the end of the building, so Miranda didn’t know where this “best” would be until Martin turned down a little hall behind the last cage she hadn’t noticed until that moment. The short hall led into a room that was taller than the rest of the building. It was obviously a new addition, built of much thicker stone. The sides were a foot thick at least, and a great wall of iron bars ran straight across the room’s middle, dividing it neatly in half. On Miranda’s side, the floor was tiled and set with padded benches; on the other side, inside the bars, the floor was covered in a thin layer of straw that had been worn to chaff by the enormous creature pacing the cage’s edge.

Miranda had never seen anything like it. At first glance, it looked like a dog, but no dog was ever that huge. The creature was enormous, fifteen feet at least from the tip of its broad, black nose to the point of its tail. Its eyes were orange as pumpkins and nearly as large, and they followed her with murderous intent, but most amazing of all was the creature’s coat. Its fur was as long as her index finger, and for the most part, it was a cloudy silver, but streaking across its pelt in curling patterns was a lighter, pure silver that moved as Miranda watched, the color drifting across the animal’s fur like dappled moonlight. The moving patterns sped up as she got closer, the silver marks flashing so quickly they reminded Miranda of a snowstorm, an impression that was only heightened by the beast’s swift, graceful movements as it stalked back and forth along the bars of its cage, its head down, ready to strike. When its orange eyes met Miranda’s, the creature lifted its lip, showing a wall of foot-long yellow teeth.

She took a step back on instinct and ran straight into Martin.

“No need to be afraid,” he said, catching her shoulders. “The bars are reinforced. I had them specially made so that even the ghosthound’s famous strength couldn’t break them.”

“Ghosthound?” Miranda whispered.
That
was a ghosthound? She’d heard of them, the enormous monsters that ruled the snowy continent at the top of the world. In the stories they were slavering beasts, huge and ugly, all claws and teeth for eating bad children, but the creature in front of her was beautiful. Beautiful, graceful, and deadly as the blizzard it resembled. Looking again at the swirling patterns, she understood for the first time why they were called ghosthounds. The shifting silver-gray made the dog look otherworldly.

“No other man in the world boasts a living ghosthound,” Martin said, his voice quivering with pride. “I have a few skins in the gallery upstairs, but it’s not the same. Their patterns stop moving when they die, so you don’t get the full effect. The only way to truly appreciate a ghosthound is to see one yourself. Took me almost three years to get a live one. Isn’t he magnificent?”

“He is,” Miranda said, though not for the reasons Martin mentioned. The ghosthound’s eyes were on Martin now, and they shone with such hatred it took her breath away. Unlike the other animals, which had looked hot or uncomfortable or simply bored in their cages, this animal looked furious. Usually, a spirit’s intelligence and power were directly related to its size. Animals were different, though. With the exception of humans, animals tended to be relatively less intelligent than their size said they should be. Spiritualist scholars postulated this was because they had to use some of their power maintaining a living body. It was a trade–off—a horse tended to be markedly less intelligent than a rock of the same size, but where the rock was stuck in one place and spent most of its time asleep, the horse stayed awake and could go where it pleased. Looking at the ghosthound’s eyes, though, Miranda couldn’t help but see the intelligence shining behind them. Whatever this ghosthound was, he was no simple animal like the others. The deep hatred in his eyes could only grow in a thinking mind.