on, and Widdershins was grateful that he pretended not to notice the tremor in her voice.
She'd been around corpses before, far too often—had even made some herself—but rarely any that were this mature. Clearly the perfume had been intended to ensure nobody discovered the body early; the floral scent might have been odd, but a rotting cadaver would eventually attract attention even in this rundown pustule of a building.
But it was almost unnecessary. The body smelled more of dirt and dust than decay; whoever this poor guy might be, he'd clearly been dead for well over a year. Little remained but shriveled, parchment skin coating brittle bones. He'd been someone of means, or of import; that the skin remained relatively whole suggested the use of preservatives and embalming agents that simply weren't affordable to any but the aristocracy. Even had she lacked that hint, Shins could tell—as badly decomposed as they were—that the burial clothes had been of the highest quality.
“I don't get any of this,” she confessed to her god, turning her back on the bed and its vile occupant. “I mean, it's some kind of threat. That much is obvious, yes? But what? And…”
Olgun tugged at her awareness, trying to get her attention, but in her preoccupation she shrugged it off without noticing.
“…from who? Most of the people I've pissed off would just try to hit me with something heavy. Or set me on fire. Or…”
The god was all but waving his arms and shouting now, which was impressive for an entity without limbs or voice.
“…hit me with something on fire. And for pastry's sake, how? How did they find this place?! How did they know—?”
A crackle of power raced through the air around Widdershins as Olgun literally dragged her attention over to the bed. It was, as best she might have described, like he had threaded a hook through her senses—not her eyes, but her sight and hearing themselves—and yanked her around by them.
“Ow! Dogs grommet, Olgun, what are you—?! What? No, I think I've gotten as close to that corpse as I'm going…. Oh, for…fine!”
Grumbling furiously, as much to distract herself from the fear and revulsion, Shins moved to the bedside and leaned over, studying the body far more intently than she preferred.
“All right, I'm here. It's…” Something tiny and black, with far too many legs, skittered out from a rent in the leathery skin and vanished behind the bed. “Show me what you think is so hopping important,” Widdershins demanded through clenched teeth and a sudden sweat, “or I am walking out of here.”
With a startling gentleness, given his earlier insistence, Olgun guided her focus to the head.
It meant nothing to her, initially. The rictus grin and gaping sockets were utterly unrecognizable as whoever this might once have been. The face, if face it could still be called, meant nothing.
At this distance, though…at this distance, there was something about the overall shape of the head. Something nagging at her, scratching at a door to awareness that she abruptly knew she did not want to open.
“Olgun…” She was pleading, and she didn't even know what for. Waves of caring, of sympathy, washed over her, and broke against the rock-hard tightness in her soul.
It was then, only then, that she noticed—that she allowed herself to notice—the dull and faded colors on what remained of the corpse's finery. What had once been a deep red, a dark blue, a wine purple.
A scream pierced her ears, so loud it was agony; her throat burned, rough and raw, but Widdershins lacked even the facility to put those facts together, to recognize the cry as her own. Like a madwoman—no, not “like,” for in that moment, she was—she yanked the sheet from the bed, sending it fluttering across the room. She clawed desperately at the corpse's hand. Patches of papery skin flaked off in her fingers, drifted to cling to her clothes, and she didn't care. She was beyond disgust, beyond revulsion, beyond everything but the hunt she wanted so terribly to fail.
It didn't.
The ring slipped from the body with a faint pop, taking the finger with it. And there it was, embossed into the signet, just as she'd known it would be, needed it not to be.
A lion's head in a domino mask.
Trembling violently, spots dancing before her eyes, Widdershins staggered back from the bed. From the bed and from the body of the kindest man she'd known, her adopted father in all but name, Alexandre Delacroix.
She couldn't breathe. Couldn't