There were other ways he could productively spend his time. The Zahra housed a library famous—or notorious—for its profusion of texts in all languages. Yusuf Evrayad had sought to build the greatest library in all the west, and had not always used the most exemplary means to achieve his end. Ships and merchant caravans, upon arriving in Kahishi, were ransacked for books and manuscripts. These were duly dispatched to the king’s copyists. Eventually, the texts’ owners would receive copies—most of the time. The originals stayed in the Zahra.
He knew this from Aleira Suzehn, the bookshop owner with the gold ibis mark on her shoulder blade. He had not seen the mark for himself, but Lin had told him of that, and all the rest. Lin wanted him to find out if Aleira had news of the prophecy, which she was studying. The woman struck Ned as lovely and oddly ruthless for a bookshop owner. She was short with him, until he told her the name of his wife. The name Gelvan, which long ago had been Gelvana and thus more obviously eastern, and Galician, was like a signal to the fierce-eyed merchant; her manner had visibly relaxed. Eventually she’d told him of the lush and ill-gotten library of Yusuf Evrayad. Envying Ned’s access to that hoard, despite her contempt for the man who had acquired it.
That particular assignment had given him much time with his thoughts. There was the long trek down the mountain through the gardens at daybreak, where breezes kept petals and leaves in a constant state of motion. He had felt borne on the warmth of that breeze. Later, the upward climb as the sun sank behind the mountain made his calf muscles burn, his heart fill with amazement at the prospect of that rising tower that ignited with the sunset.
The dialogues in his head might have started that day, in the long walk down the mountain, through the city gates, and onward to the Way of Booksellers. And the long way back. They had certainly been happening by then, interpersed with long internal silences, when his consciousness seemed merged with the rhythms of leaves and petals on the breeze. Rhythms, sensations of warmth ruffling his hair, no words. Ned thought he’d never been so entirely alone. Not even years ago when he’d thought Rianna lost to him, was himself lost to sea.
There were reasons for this. He avoided holding these to the light. Nonetheless, he knew that what isolated him, more than anything else, was culpability.
I have a plan for Nitzan.
Even now, he had only an intuition what this could mean. Had been given only a snippet, his miniscule part to play. In the life of Rihab Bet-Sorr, Ned’s role was that of the servant who existed for a single purpose—he knew this. Saw their games, their exchanges in a new light: she’d been guiding them, every step, from the beginning. Even when he’d thought he had the upper hand. But even if he didn’t know her plan, Ned could well recall her glowing exaltation as she’d revealed her dress for Nitzan; and a contrast, her eyes like shadowed pools that night in the pavilion. These contrasts, these contradictory moods, were joined—two sides of a coin. Almost as if … I am free.
He recalled too much, was too aware of the shades of mood that molded Rihab’s features and lit the dark of her eyes. He was an idiot, and there would be consequences. He knew this, but awareness was buried under the pure sensations of a breeze, the fragrant garden; beneath conversations in which Ned reached out in his heart, if not in fact, to the people nearest him in life.
The dialogue with his father was predictable enough. It concerned disappointment. In lighter moments Ned Alterra told himself it was the fate of sons to disappoint their fathers one way or another, so he had at least taken an efficient route. But even this wasn’t true: he had not always disappointed his father. In the past year he had risen at court, in the service of the most powerful figure in Tamryllin—in fact, if not in name. It was Ned who had spearheaded the search for the poet Lin had wanted imprisoned three nights; he acted not only as her eyes and ears, but as her sword arm. It was a role that gave him pride—he was helping her build something; a court which had before been founded on ignominy, murder, corruption, now took orders from a Court Poet who led with honor. For the first time, Ned’s father saw that his son did not always have to be inept. Much of Ned’s awkwardness had become deliberate—people spoke freely before a fool. With time, as he learned to use his awkwardness, Ned paradoxically felt himself attain a quality of grace.
Perhaps, Ned had thought as he took a path that cut through a hedge of white, fresh-smelling roses, this had been his undoing. This new, ill-founded confidence.
Birds called raucously in the trees, welcoming the sunset, as Ned reached the third and highest level of the imperial gardens. There were orange trees, an overpowering sweetness. Such scents had a way of wrenching at Ned’s emotions, made him acutely aware of where he was and the beauty he was, moment by moment, failing to appreciate. He already could imagine that in later years, the scent of orange blossoms would return him to this time … this strange between-time in his life. And he would grieve as if the wounds—for he foresaw wounds already—were fresh.
It was a between-time, that seemed beyond doubt.
His conversation with Rianna was, in truth, a monologue. It had not occurred to him, before, that much between them was unsaid. In some ways their bond was stronger for that. It was with actions that Ned had proven himself to her. Until now, that had been enough. But since the night in the pavilion, familiar ground had vanished. In this new state of affairs, he would have liked to clarify some things to Rianna. Such as, for instance, that she was the beacon fire he relied upon, the reason he had resisted the temptations of a queen’s shadowed eyes. Years ago she’d saved him from being dashed on the rocks of his own self-loathing; each day, continued to save him.
It was the queen’s agony rather than her allure that he couldn’t resist; it bent him double inside. Her grief at being trapped, at causing harm to Eldakar with no more than the fact of their marriage. Ned didn’t know the particulars of her plan for Nitzan, but he was sure of one thing. Her little digression about missing her father had surely not been a coincidence. She wished to return to her people. To vanish from public life. Almost any other woman he would have cautioned against such a course of action. The streets of Majdara were no place for a woman on the run, let alone an unpopular queen.
He was not concerned about Rihab Bet-Sorr’s ability to fend for herself … not at all.
He could still change his mind. In Ned’s pocket was a small vial, green glass, that he had obtained from the Zahra’s pharmacy. The old man who mixed ointments, medicines, and scents had eyed Ned with suspicion. “I’ve been sleeping poorly,” Ned had said. As he had been instructed to say. It was all too plausible, given how little sleep he’d had of late. Exhaustion had become routine, between late-night chess and Kahishi’s politics. No doubt it had served Rihab’s purposes well, to pry at his defenses when he was tired.
The man had made Ned a mixture, of pennyroyal, poppy, valerian … who knew what else. Ned didn’t plan on touching a drop.
It was his nature, Rianna would have said, to allow himself no quarter, no succor. She would have mocked his aversion to scents and massages. “You need not be constantly punished,” once she had said to him. And then, with a grin, “Not unless I do it.”
None other knew him as profoundly, yet still, somehow, she loved him. That had amazed Ned from the first and still did.
Since he was genuinely wracked with exhaustion what he’d said to the herbalist was not, in the strictest sense, a lie. There was always the possibility, unlikely but still extant, that Ned would succumb to temptation and use the potion to help himself sleep. That he’d perhaps quietly ignore the queen’s plan, let Nitzan pass without taking action.
Strictly speaking, it was the dawn of Nitzan when Ned told his first lie. He sent word to Lin that illness would prevent his joining their party. His first time lying to her, and doing so had made him feel sick in truth. But he had committed to his course. There was no other way. Ned needed the freedom to roam the palace that morning, something he couldn’t do if he was bundling himself into formal clothes for a journ
ey into the city.
The queen was closely watched, her possessions scoured by female attendants constantly. So much so that even a small glass vial would have been discovered among her things if Ned had given it to her too soon before time.
It was forbidden for the queen to indulge in such substances, when all hopes were pinned on an heir. As it was, the delay of her pregnancy was as much a danger to Eldakar as the fact of their unfortunate marriage.
Ned told himself he was aiding Eldakar, rescuing him from his fatal mistake. Another lie? He was not even sure.
He thought—in fact assumed—that the delay of the queen’s pregnancy was no accident. There was little she left to chance, he was convinced.
The halls of the palace were clamorous with preparations. The servants made ready for the night’s festivities. There was a bustle of cleaning, the waft of tempting smells from the kitchens. Even the path through the courtyard of the pool, usually quiet, was rife with activity: gardeners trimmed hedges with the chink of shears, servants busily polished the marble sculptures. Ned felt as if his walk to the queen’s chambers, once a solitary ritual, had been spoilt somehow. And by evening she’d be gone.
For a change it was she, not one of her attendants, who opened the door to his knock. She was laughing at something one of the women had said, seemed hardly to know him at first. Then her face smoothed and her smile altered, became less open. Her face was painted a waxen white, cheekbones rouged, lips a dark shade of red. Eyebrows penciled to arches above thick-lashed eyes. For the one day of the year Rihab would be allowed out in the city, she had been made to look like someone else.
She was wearing the ritual dress, all gold and gems and massive skirts. Gold around her neck, at her ears. Too much that glittered, it seemed to him; unnecessary ostentation. Rihab Bet-Sorr needed no adornments at all. The dress was cut low; he kept his gaze averted. When he gave her the vial, she tucked it into her skirts with a quick darting gesture no one saw.
“It was kind of you to visit,” she said in a prim register, as if to caution against impropriety. He supposed that for a man to visit her now, as she dressed, appeared improper. Yet she contradicted her own manner with the next request. “Ned,” she said. “Will you tie my sash? It’s come undone.”
It was a wide length of brocade, clasped at the front with rubies set in the shape of a flower. With a rustle of skirts she had her back to him. Her hair gathered, just then, over one shoulder. The dress dipped to reveal her shoulder blades. Ned reached forward, as in a daze, to tie the sash. Trying not to look, but nonetheless: his eyes grazed her exposed back. Caught a glimpse of gold. A shimmer, subdued, that was not jewelry.
A mark, engraved in the skin.
She turned to face him again. “I wanted you to know. I don’t know why.”
Ned opened his mouth. Couldn’t seem to form words.
She looked unspeakably tender, regretful. Rose on tiptoe to kiss his forehead. Her lips cool and dry. “Farewell,” she murmured. “My Knight.” And he was out in the hall, the door closed behind him. With no idea how he’d gotten there. She hadn’t exactly shoved him, but deftly she’d separated herself from him and he’d ended up outside with the door shut. Just as Ned scrambled to think what he might do, guards emerged to escort him away from the queen’s chambers, back to the courtyard of the square-cut pool.
The place was abandoned. Gardeners and servants had gone. There was no one to see as Ned Alterra approached the edge of the pool and looked down. His own reflection, crisp and pale, stared back.
* * *
THE fountain of wine had stopped. At first, milling with courtiers in a suddenly tense atmosphere, Lin hardly had a chance to notice. All was chaos; in the streets, in the palatial rooms where the court had gathered. Eldakar had retreated to privacy with his Magicians. Last she’d seen him, he had looked as if he were borne upright on Zahir’s arm, boneless and, suddenly, much older. The lady-in-waiting who had impersonated Rihab in the ceremony was still unconscious; the king’s physician judged it a sleeping drought of extreme potency, administered in wine. Once hearing that, Lin had ceased to think it could be a plot against the royal couple. Rihab must be at the heart of it. Everything Ned had said comprised a portrait of a woman who was brilliant, strategic, profoundly discontented.
And, too, there was the exchange Lin had witnessed in the imperial gardens. Those strange, accusing words. “It has cost me.”
Rihab had pleaded with Eldakar to leave the Zahra. He’d refused, so she had gone on herself. A betrayal of breathtaking scope, and yet. It made sense now.
The only thing Lin could not be sure of was motive. She felt a vague annoyance with Ned. Surely he could have foreseen this—else what had been the point of all those games? Could he not have found out what Rihab had meant by those inexplicable words to the king? What had their love cost her—other than the demeaning life of a slave?
Of course Ned was probably a little bit in love with the queen—any man would be—but loyalty to his duty, first and foremost, had always been something Lin thought she could count on. Some days, the only thing.
This arising disquiet kept her from noticing, at first, a new flutter of raised voices finding its way around the room. Lin’s gaze darted about as she tried to find someone, anyone, she recognized. She felt relief when she spotted Garon Senn in the crowd. He was cutting a path through to her side. His smile triumphant. “I’ve been looking for you,” he said. “The morning’s distractions were useful. It’s done.”
“What’s done?”
He edged closer, lowered his voice. “I saw Tarik’s correspondence. He’s been exchanging letters with the king of Ramadus himself.”
She bent towards him. “And?”
“It’s as we thought. Tarik solicits the Ramadian king’s support against Eldakar. Promises that the Zahra is weak and—once attacks in the north intensify—close to undefended. There is only one thing he says might impede their plans.”
Lin waited. “Well?”
Garon’s eyes made a calculating circuit of the room again. At last he said, “Tarik believes magic is at the root of all this. Dark magic. Not just from the north. Here. Possibly even…” He glanced around again. “Well, he speaks of the king being blinded by love.”
“The queen?”
“It sounds that way.”
“And now she’s vanished. Humiliating Eldakar, who was already thought weak.” Lin shook her head. “But Rihab? Magic? She was—before she was queen, she was no one.”
“True,” said Garon. “Almost—too true, you might say. Nothing is known of her. Not even the land where she was captured. She refused to speak of it. Of course, Eldakar made sure she had her way.”
Just then they were made aware of what the new wave of murmuring was about. Garon’s eyes widened momentarily. He helped himself to another sip of wine. “You hear that?”
“The fountain stopped. So…?”
His eyes, meeting hers, dark with bright pinpoints at their centers from the lamps lit for evening. “That fountain was Tarik’s enchantment.”
“You don’t think—”
That crafty, unwholesome glitter in his eyes became more pronounced. “If Tarik was trying to weaken the court from within, what better way than aid the queen in her escape? My guess is, we won’t see him again.”
* * *
HE was right: Tarik Ibn-Mor could not be found. As evening unfolded into night word began to go around that the Second Magician had aided the queen’s escape—that they’d run away together. That all along his dislike had been feigned, a concealment. He’d used his powers for the most unimaginable treason.
And why? Well, that did not even need to be said. Anyone who had met Rihab Bet-Sorr would know why. He was bewitched.
Lin thought of what Garon had told her. It was her duty as a friend—if not as Court Poet of Eivar—to relay the information to Eldakar. That his Second Magician worked against him with Ramadus. She had the proof. But tonight didn’t seem like the time.
Search parties had been sent out for Rihab. The idea made Lin shudder. If the queen were caught … Lin didn’t know what the punishment for such a thing might be. She did know it was something Eldakar was unlikely to want to administer, even if he was angry. He’d have no choice, now that she had insulted the throne.
She was thinking of this, remembering the melancholy pipe-player she’d come to know in the palace gardens, when a shock of cold ran through Lin. She suppressed a gasp. Then came another, worse than the first, as if a wall of ice water rammed into her. Her brow was clammy. She rose, slowly, as she felt another wave approaching; with a forced smile she excused herself, tried not to run.
Lin thought it was the hardest thing she’d ever done, compelling her arm to move slowly, with apparent nonchalance, as she reached for the door handle. She grasped it, and another shock hit. She nearly fell to her knees.
I’m dying, she thought. It’s finally happening.
She was in the antechamber to the dining hall where servants bore trays of food. They did not seem to notice as she shakily planted one foot in front of the other to reach the hall. It would have helped to have Ned here. Even if there was nothing he could do.
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