Page 4
"Liliana. "
Reaching out, Jissa pinched Liliana's wrinkled and blood-encrusted dress. "I am not a good cook, but I keep this place clean. You are not clean. "
"No. " Embarrassed, Liliana scratched at her hair. "A bath would be much appreciated. "
"You'll have to be quick, quick indeed, if you are to cook a meal," Jissa warned, shaking a rolling pin at her. "The lord will not wait past the early dinner bell before consigning you to the dungeon again. " The brownie was moving as she spoke, waving at Liliana to follow with quick, birdlike motions. "Noon meal he will not eat today. Not in the castle, he isn't. "
Running after her, Liliana found herself led to a small bathroom where Jissa was already working the pump to fill the tub. "I'll do - "
The brownie shook her head. "Take off your clothes and get in, in right now. " Impatient words. "I'm sorry but it must be cold, so cold, for we have no time to heat the water. "
Glad for the chance to be clean after spending days in her father's dungeon for the infraction of refusing to slit a man's throat, and then last night here, she gave up any attempt at modesty and stripped away her clothing to step into the frigid bath. Shivering, she picked up the bar of rough soap on the ledge, and dipping her head under the pump, wet her hair.
As she lathered it, Jissa said, "You are not very well put together, you aren't. "
From others, it may have been an unkind statement. From Jissa, it sounded like simple fact, so Liliana nodded. "No. " Her breasts were so small as to be nonexistent, while her ribs stuck out from beneath her skin. Her behind, by comparison, was rather large, and one of her legs was shorter than the other.
"You will fit in very well here, yes, you will," Jissa said with a sudden smile that gave her a quixotic charm. "For he is the only creature of beauty, and even he turns into a monster. "
Laughing, Liliana ducked her head under the water and washed off the suds before repeating the soaping process. Jissa stopped pumping to give her the chance to lather up her entire body, leaning against the pump as she recovered from the exertion.
"Where do you come from, Jissa?" Liliana asked, running the soap down her arms with a bliss even the cold couldn't diminish. "You are surely not a denizen of the Abyss. " There was no evil in the brownie - on that Liliana would stake her life.
Jissa's face grew sad. "A mountain forest far from here, so far," she whispered. "The Blood Sorcerer came to our village and stole our magic. Stole and stole. I survived, but he said he couldn't stand the sight of me, so he enspelled me beyond the kingdoms, beyond the realm. This is where the spell stopped. "
Liliana's stomach curdled. She knew Jissa would hate her if she learned of the murderous blood that ran in her veins, but Liliana needed her friendship. So she bit her tongue and stuck her head and body under the pump as Jissa began to work it again.
I'm sorry, she whispered deep inside. I'm sorry my blood is responsible for the spilling of your own.
Chapter 3
Bath finished, she got out and rubbed herself down with a rough little towel while Jissa disappeared - to return with a black tunic that hit Liliana midthigh, black leggings and soft black boots. "I think these were meant for footmen," she said, holding out the garments, "when there were men of foot. There have never been any in the years I have lived here. Never, ever. "
"Thank you, they look very comfortable. " The leggings fit well enough but the tunic was baggy, so she was grateful for the thin rope Jissa found for her to use as a belt. "Do you have a comb I could - Thank you. " Brushing it through the knotted mat of her hair, she pulled the whole mass severely off her face and tied it using a smaller piece of rope. She didn't look in the mirror. She had no wish to see the face "that would frighten even a ghoul into returning to its den. "
"Can you truly cook?" Jissa asked as they made their way back to the kitchen.
"Yes. I spent many hours in the kitchens of the castle where I grew up. " In spite of his cadaverous frame, the Blood Sorcerer liked to eat, and so he didn't brutalize the cook. As a result, the man had been the only one of the castle's servants unafraid to offer a little kindness to the child who clung to the shadows so as not to attract her father's attention.
"What raw ingredients do you have?" she asked Jissa, shaking off the memories. That child was long gone, her innocence shattered into innumerable shards. The woman she'd become would let nothing stop her - not even the monster who was the lord of this place.
"Oh, many things. " Moving to the bench where she'd been working, the brownie waved a hand and the mostly empty surface was suddenly overflowing with plump red and orange peppers, carrots, cabbages, ripe fruits of every description, a basket full of dark green leaves that would taste nutty when cooked, and more.
Liliana picked up a pepper with a wondering hand. "Where does this come from?"
"The village," Jissa said in a matter-of-fact tone that was already familiar.
"There is a village in this realm?" She'd always assumed the Abyss was a baleful place devoid of all life - but that didn't explain the servants she'd seen.
"Of course. " Jissa gave her a look that suggested Liliana was being very dim. "We are the doorway to the Abyss. The doorway only. "
"Yes, I see. " The Black Castle was still part of the living world. "Is the village close?"
A shake of her head that sent Jissa's braid swinging. "You must pass through the gates of the Black Castle, and then you must walk through the forest to the settlement. Dark, whispery forest. Whisper, whisper. But not bad. " An intent look, as if she wanted to make certain Liliana understood.
She continued at Liliana's nod. "I walk quick and fast with Bard when we need supplies, and buy from the merchants using the lord's gold. This and that and this, too. " A sudden dipping of her head that hid her expression, but her words were pragmatic enough. "Bard carries everything back for me. Always he carries. "
"He has gold?" The furnishings Liliana had seen were functional, but aside from a few grim tapestries, there was nothing of beauty, nothing to speak of wealth. All was black and hard and cold.
"It is the Law of the Abyss, first law, always law. " Jissa began to stack the vegetables to the side to clear part of the bench. "Do you not know?" She answered her own question without waiting for a response. "Evil gold and evil treasure comes to the Black Castle with the condemned. " A baring of those sharp, pointed teeth. "Only if an innocent, an innocent, you see, would be harmed by the taking, only then it does not. "
Liliana thought of her father's coffers, knew this law was yet another reason he sought to live forever, though they, too, were part of a race that lived centuries. He had taken her into his vault after bleeding poor Bitty to nothingness. Gold in innumerable piles, jewels twinkling from necklaces still stained with their last wearer's lifeblood, rings on skeletal fingers, it had been a glimmering nightmare.
"This," her father had said, his arms spread wide, "this is what you could have if you aren't weak. " Picking up a necklace of tear-shaped diamonds splattered with flecks of brown, he'd placed it around her neck. "Feel it, feel the blood. "
She had felt it. And it had made her choke on her own vomit. Her father had backhanded her so hard for her "weakness" she'd ended up resting on a mountain of gold coins. When he'd wrenched off the necklace, he'd made her bleed. She carried the scar on her neck to this day - it was a constant reminder of the vow she'd made as a defenseless child. Never would she be like him, no matter what he did to her.
And he had done things he didn't do even to his enemies.
"Dungeon you'll go to if you don't cook. "
Snapping back to the present, Liliana nodded and chose an assortment of fruit vibrant with color and fragrance. "Will you chop these, Jissa?"
The brownie picked up a knife as Liliana hunted out the flour, butter and milk, and began to roll out a pastry on one corner of the massive bench. "The village," she said as they worked, "do you live there?"
It would make sense if Jissa did - the Black Castle was a gloomy place full of watchful ghosts and shimmering darkness.
"I cannot. " Jissa's sadness lingered in the air, settled on Liliana's skin, permeated her very bones. "I tried when I first came, and I. . . died, was all dead, after two days. The lord brought me back here and I lived again. "
Liliana's heart caught, for she understood now. No matter her memories, Jissa hadn't survived the massacre in her village. The Blood Sorcerer had a spell he called Slumber. Such an innocuous name for such an evil thing. He used it on those magical creatures who were pure of blood and yet rare. Rather than murdering them when he might already be swollen with power, he broke their necks but whispered a spell at the moment of death that kept them breathing and slumbering.
Liliana had been locked in a room with her father's victims once, but it hadn't horrified her as he'd intended. She'd been grateful, her magic telling her the beings no longer possessed their souls. They had escaped. But not Jissa. Whatever her father had done to her, it had trapped her in this borderland between life and death. "I'm sorry. "
"Why?" Confusion. "You aren't the Blood Sorcerer. No, you're not. "
Knives in Liliana's chest, the lies of omission choking her up.
Jissa spoke again. "There are meats in the cold box. I can - "
"No. No meat on the table. " Her own blood would be the only blood she would ever spill. Her father had delighted in forcing her to watch as he took his time torturing and mutilating creature after magical creature. It was when she was six that he'd begun to whisper spells that forced her to do the same vile acts even as she screamed and screamed and screamed.
Four more years it had taken until she'd grown strong enough to block his spells with her own. That was when he'd started to hurt the servants who dared to speak with her, to offer her any small kindness - all except the cook. So she had learned to remain silent.