“You may think me amusing, Mansa,” she said, “for I must suppose you are now thinking I am a fiery little lass ripe for plucking by a strong man in his prime. But I do not find you amusing, nor do you awe me, you and your cold magic. You would have murdered my dearest cousin just for the sake of getting hold of my dreams.”
“I do what I must,” he said, with a frown at her rebuke. “You do not understand the consequences.”
“I do not understand the consequences? My dearest cousin is the one who would have died, had your command been carried out. I would have been forced to marry a man against my will, and been cast into your House as a prisoner. You couldn’t have protected me from the Wild Hunt regardless. I would have been dismembered and my head thrown in a well. So don’t tell me that I am the one who does not understand the consequences.”
Rory had moved halfway up the stairs, while I stood on the first step. Bee unlaced the basket and pulled out the skull. There was a struggling silence, broken at last by Lord Marius.
“Whose skull is that?”
“This?” she asked with a flutter of eyelashes. “This is the skull of my mother-in-law.”
“Did you smite her dead with a scolding lecture?” the soldier asked with a laugh.
“Married!” Amadou Barry’s face was cut with a look of sheer jealous rage. He took a step toward her, but Lord Marius fastened a hand on his arm, halting him. “Who married you?”
Bee ignored him. “I did not smite her. I rather liked her, and I believe she rather liked me, although we did not have the leisure to come to know each other well before the unpleasant incident in which she died. I show this to you, Mansa, to let you know that legally you have no grounds to force me to your will. I am a nitaino—a noble woman of independent means—in the Taino kingdom. No court and not even my family can use the threat of legal possession over me now. I have standing under Taino law.”
“How did your mother-in-law die?” I asked.
“Why, thank you for asking, Cat.” She swept them with a combative gaze. “The Wild Hunt killed her on Hallows’ Night. They dismembered her and threw her head in a well.”
“Bright Jupiter!” muttered Amadou Barry.
When she pressed a hand to her delicate throat, they all flinched.
“Cold mages are themselves at risk of being hunted down on Hallows’ Night. I understand it is the reason mage Houses are reluctant to rise to positions of political power in the world. Power draws the Hunt as scent draws hounds.”
Amadou Barry and Lord Marius gave each other startled looks. They had clearly never known there might be a hidden reason the mage Houses did not set themselves up as princes and emperors in their own right.
The mansa had not gained control of Four Moons House by being impulsive, thoughtless, crude, or impatient, but even his temper had its limits. “These secrets are not yours to share.”
“Who is to stop me from sharing them?” exclaimed Bee. “Will you kill me right now with your magic? Crush me with cold? Shatter me like iron?”
Ice crackled across the tabletop. Bee smiled so gloatingly that had that smile been turned on me, I would have slapped her; it had happened, on one of the rare occasions when we fought.
“I would have you stop and consider one thing before you act, Mansa,” she said.
“What we thought was a log has revealed itself as a crocodile,” remarked Bakary.
“I expect you mean to tell us, Maestressa, for you have quite the storyteller’s gift,” said Lord Marius appreciatively.
“My thanks,” she said with a pretty courtesy. “Queen Anacaona died because the Wild Hunt must take blood on Hallows’ Night. Because I was hidden from the Wild Hunt, Queen Anacaona was taken in my place. Isn’t that a thing you would like to know how to do, Magister?”
“Die in your place?” said the mansa.
Bee laughed with genuine amusement at his jest. “Would you willingly die in my place, to spare me?”
His smile flashed. Its easy charm shocked me. One could never look at the mansa and see him as anything except a man of exceptional status and self-confidence, because he lived at the pinnacle of rank and wealth. I had not known the man had a sense of humor, or was able to laugh at himself. The obvious had blinded me: All along Vai had modeled his arrogant behavior on the mansa’s, because Vai had been trying to be like the man who commanded his life.
“You intend to trade the secret of how you hid from the Wild Hunt in exchange for your freedom,” said the mansa. “How like a Phoenician!”
“I have not relinquished my claim to her!” cried the legate.
The mansa looked Amadou Barry up and down in a way that reminded me of Vai at his most obnoxiously cutting. “Legate, I mean no offense, but to offer to make a woman your mistress is not a claim. I will offer her a legal standing within Four Moons House while you are merely demanding she gratify your sexual desire for her.”
“I will marry her! She belongs to me!”
“I do not belong to you, Amadou!” cried Bee so indignantly that a suspicion flowered that she still retained a partiality toward the man. “Perhaps I do not want to marry any man. Perhaps I no longer see marriage as a contract that can benefit me. Look at my poor dear cousin, chained to a man against her will. Is this all I am to be allowed to hope for? I have decided it is not.”