Lady Smoke

by Laura Sebastian

  I lift the cup to my lips again because it would be rude not to, but I only take a small, tight-lipped sip.

  “Better?” she asks me.

  “Better,” I lie. “Have there been any developments with the truth serum?”

  “I’m afraid not,” she says, though again she doesn’t sound apologetic in the least. “With all the excitement yesterday, there was no time to work on it.”

  Excitement. I resist the urge to hit her, but only barely.

  “It’s more important to me than ever that Søren is released from prison,” I say, trying to think up a lie that will appeal to her. “Søren was very close with Ho…with the Ojo.” I can’t say Hoa’s name—it sticks in my throat.

  “I’m sure he’ll be quite upset,” she agrees.

  “Not only that. Do you know why the Kaiser kept her alive for as long as he did? Even after he left Goraki behind?”

  “I’ve heard rumors. They say she was quite beautiful, once,” she says.

  Once. The dismissive way she says it rankles me. It’s true that Hoa’s youth had left her, that she looked older than her years, that the Kaiser had left his mark on her in too many ways to count, but I think of how Hoa looked in the refugee camp and I think she was more beautiful than Coltania with her painted lips and feline grace.

  “I don’t think the Kaiser is capable of love, but obsession is a whole other thing,” I say, forcing myself to continue. “When the Kaiser finds out she was killed instead of her son, he’ll be furious. It’s important that we settle this marriage business as soon as we can and leave before the Kaiser attacks Sta’Crivero. I know I alluded to it earlier, but now let me make myself quite plain: once Søren is free, I will choose your brother as my husband and we—all of us—can get out of this place before the Kaiser arrives. I think that is in all of our best interests.”

  Coltania considers this for a moment. “I couldn’t agree more,” she says before nodding at the cup still cradled in my hands. “You ought to finish your tea before it goes cold.”

  I look down at the green liquid. The aftertaste from my first couple of sips still lingers in my mouth, like twigs and rust. This time, when I lift the cup to my lips again, I seal them against the bitter liquid.

  “See? It’s growing on you, isn’t it?” Coltania asks with a smile.

  The riser jerks to a stop, causing some of the tea to slosh over the rim of my cup. It falls to the floor of the riser, staining the cream-colored carpet an ill yellow. What I wouldn’t give for a cup of strong, sweet, spiced coffee instead.

  “Come,” Coltania says, tugging my free arm and leading me out of the riser. “Some fresh air will do your heart good.”

  * * *

  —

  The garden is deserted this time of night, which makes the hair on the back of my neck stand on end. Danger aside, though, empty and dark, it feels straight out of a fever dream, full of smoky, subdued color and fragrances so overwhelming I feel drunk on them. It’s enough to make me dizzy. I grip my teacup tighter. There’s still half left and I don’t want to drink any more, but Coltania’s attention is so focused on me that I’m not sure I can refuse. She still holds Søren’s fate in her hands. I meet her gaze and take another tight-lipped pretend sip.

  “Delicious,” I lie, but that earns a smile from her.

  “The flowers are beautiful in the moonlight, aren’t they?” she asks me as we walk down the path. Her fingers trail along the top of a bush full of white buds that almost seem to glow. “Most flowers are loveliest in sunlight, but a few thrive at night—like these. Bolenzas—it translates to ‘night blooms’ in Yoxian. There’s a natural compound that coats their petals and makes them glow like this. Isn’t it something?”

  “It’s lovely,” I tell her, even though I don’t want to talk about flowers.

  “Lovely,” she echoes. “But that same compound can be stripped from the petals and boiled to a concentrated liquid that can be lethal if ingested.”

  She says the words casually enough, but they knock the breath from me. Pieces slide into place. A picture becomes clearer.

  “You were never worried about your brother,” I say slowly. “Even when the Czar said another one of the suitors had been killed. You already knew who the target was.”

  Coltania doesn’t deny it. She languidly blinks at me like she’s already bored of the conversation.

  “Why, though?” I ask her. “Why work for the Kaiser?”

  At that, she laughs, taking a step toward me. I take a step back, a bush scratching my legs even through the skirt of my dressing gown.

  “In Oriana, there’s a story we tell children about a grotesque monster who will snatch them out of their beds and eat them if they misbehave—the Kaiser is your monster. Just the mention of him is enough to frighten you. I needed you frightened because I thought it would push you to make a decision faster. The Kaiser was just a story to nudge you along.”

  “But the servant girl said it was the Kaiser,” I say. “She’d had the truth serum. Or was that fake?”

  Coltania lifts a shoulder in a shrug. “She told the truth as she knew it and she only knew what she had been told—that the Kaiser was behind it and she would be well compensated for assisting him.”

  I remember the girl falling to the floor, her body convulsing as she died, and I feel sick.

  “Why the Archduke, though?” I ask, my voice rising in a vain hope that there is someone in this garden who will hear. Someone who will help me.

  She shrugs. “I heard you talking to Prinz Søren in this very garden, telling him Archduke Etmond was your first choice of the suitors. King Etristo had promised me that you would choose Marzen, but I feared he didn’t have as much control over you as he thought.”

  If she heard that, then she must have heard the conversation that followed. The one where Søren told me he loved me. That’s why she’s been so sure there’s something between us.

  “And that’s why you framed Søren for it,” I say. “It’s why the truth serum is taking so long. You never started brewing it, did you?”

  She shakes her head. “I didn’t want you distracted. I didn’t want you to actually consider his proposal,” she says. She takes another step toward me but there’s nowhere for me to go this time. My vision blurs and suddenly there are two of her before she sharpens back into a single figure with bright, alert eyes. A predator. And I was too blind to see it until now.

  I need to keep her talking so I can get a hold of myself.

  “We were poured the same wine, though,” I say, forcing myself to focus even though my mind is a blur. “How did you know I wouldn’t be poisoned? Was it the cup?”

  “No, not the cup,” she says. “Too many things could go wrong that way; there are so many servants in this palace. I couldn’t control all of them. No, I didn’t poison the wine, but I did lace it with a touch of strawberry juice. Not dangerous to you, but the Archduke was allergic.”

  I remember Archduke Etmond’s face swelling up and turning red, him grasping his throat. Coltania breathing into his mouth in an attempt to save him—or so it appeared.

  “You weren’t trying to save him, were you?” I ask.

  “I was making sure no one else could. He might have recovered on his own, if I’d let him,” she says.

  “The poison was on you,” I guess.

  She smiles, red lips stretching over white teeth. With my vision blurring as it is, for an instant I swear she has fangs.

  “Clever girl. My lip paint is mixed with distilled bolenza—not the first time I’ve used it for that purpose. I’ve built up a tolerance over the years.”

  The rumors, I remember—the mysterious deaths of her brother’s political rivals. His clear path to the chancellorship.

  I open my mouth to ask her another question to buy a little more time, but before I can, blinding pain shoot
s through my head and I cry out, dropping the teacup. It shatters against the stone-paved path, spilling the rest of the tea over the stones. In the moonlight, the liquid glows.

  Coltania watches me for a moment, curious, until the pain passes as quickly as it came on. I gasp for air, struggling for a coherent thought.

  “Sorry about that,” she says. Again, she doesn’t sound sorry at all. “A side effect of the poison. Don’t worry, though. Once it knocks you unconscious, the pain will cease.”

  Another wave of pain hits. It feels like my head is being cleaved in two. I double over, hands on my knees to brace myself. I let myself scream as loudly as I can. Someone must be here, someone must hear me.

  “Why poison me?” I ask her when the pain recedes again to a dull throb. “What could you possibly gain by this?”

  “Oh, it won’t kill you,” she assures me. “It’ll just…make you easier to handle. Now that we know Etristo’s deal with Marzen and me wasn’t exclusive, I’m not taking any more chances. It won’t be easy to smuggle you out of Sta’Crivero if you’re kicking and screaming.”

  Out of Sta’Crivero. She isn’t killing me, but kidnapping me isn’t much better. And if no one came after that last scream, no one will come at all.

  I still feel the dagger at my hip, but if I have trouble wielding it when I’m in perfect health, I certainly can’t do it now, in this state.

  Another wave of pain hits, stronger this time. So strong that I would vomit if there were anything in my stomach, but empty as it is, I only retch until the pain ebbs again.

  “If you’d had more of your tea like I told you to, it would have done its job by now,” Coltania says with a heavy sigh, as if my pain is inconveniencing her.

  I slump down onto the ground, my vision swimming with black spots. Part of me wants to give in to the darkness and let reality slip away to save myself from another wave of pain, but I fight through it. I force myself to hold on to what is happening around me. The sharp edges of the stones beneath me, the scratch of the branches at my back. Coltania’s face looming above me, watching me like I’m a most peculiar specimen that she can’t quite figure out.

  The pain comes again and I dig my fingernails into my palms to anchor me here—a trick I used during the Kaiser’s punishments as well to keep from passing out. I scream again, trying to scream even louder.

  “No one will hear you,” Coltania tells me, but even as she says it I hear footsteps coming toward us. My heart leaps but whatever hope there was disappears when Chancellor Marzen appears, looking between his sister and me in shock.

  “Coltania,” he says, bewildered. “You said you were only going to talk to her.”

  “We’ve put too much money into this ploy to risk it failing because of one girl’s indecisiveness. Favoring you one day, the Prinz the next, the Emperor another. Who knows who she will favor tomorrow?” she says, never taking her eyes off me. “I did what I had to do, Marzen, just as I always do. Once we get her away from her advisors and her guards, she will be far more amenable. But you were right about one thing, Theodosia—the Kaiser will come when he does actually learn where you are—and I imagine the Czar will be alerting him soon in a vain attempt to curry favor. We’ll be long gone by the time he comes, though. We’ll keep you safe, isn’t that right, Marzen?”

  The Chancellor doesn’t look at her, though. His eyes are on me, wide with shock as his mouth hangs open.

  “This isn’t what we planned,” he says, more to himself than to either of us.

  “Plans change, Marzen,” she snaps. “You never complained about the way I handled things in the past; I don’t see why you should start now. The pain will end in a moment and then she’ll be out. I’ll stay with her; you go make sure everyone in our entourage is ready to leave immediately. If anyone realizes she’s missing while we’re still here, there will be no escaping.”

  For a moment, Marzen doesn’t move. He stays rooted in place, his eyes stuck on me. Another wave of pain washes over me, sending spasms through my body. I scream again, less out of hope that someone will hear and more in order to elicit some amount of sympathy from him.

  Whatever sympathy he has, though, it isn’t enough. Tearing his gaze away from me, he looks at his sister and nods.

  “Hurry,” he says. “If anyone finds out about this, they won’t let us leave this city alive.”

  And then he squares his shoulders and hurries away without a backward glance.

  My mind blurs around the edges. The dark spots grow larger. The pain gets worse. I can’t hold on much longer, but I must. I will not be made into someone else’s prisoner again, I will not be played like someone else’s pawn. The next time the pain hits, I hunch forward and scream again, reaching into my dressing gown for the hilt of my dagger. I find it, but my grip is weak. I can barely hold it, light as it is. I don’t know how I’m going to summon the strength to wield it.

  I have to, though. There is no other choice. I hold the dagger as tightly as I can before sitting up. I roll my eyes back in my head and let my body go limp, sagging against the bush.

  “Finally,” Coltania mutters. I hear her footsteps grow closer and feel her crouch down next to me. I tighten my grip on the dagger, hidden in the fold of my dressing gown. My heart thunders in my chest, all that is keeping me awake and alert now. One chance is all I’ll get.

  I remember Artemisia’s lessons, how to hold the blade, where to aim. I remember her stoking my anger, but I don’t need her petty taunts now. Coltania killed Hoa. I see her body in my mind as I last did, the image of her that will never leave me. Coltania killed her, and that knowledge is all the fire I need.

  When Coltania reaches under my arms to hoist me up, I take my chance and thrust the dagger into her stomach.

  It is not the best place to strike. It is not the heart or the throat or the thigh, any of which Artemisia told me would cause a quick death. Those places are difficult to reach at this angle, difficult to accurately pierce in my current state. The stomach is easy, even if it will be slower. The blade slides in, slicing through skin and muscle like they’re nothing but air.

  Coltania gasps in my ear, pulling away from me. Her eyes go wide and panicked as they search my face, struggling to make sense of what I’ve done. I stare right back at her as she slumps to the ground and I fall beside her.

  It takes a long time for the life to leave her eyes, but I don’t look away until it has.

  I DON’T KNOW HOW MUCH TIME passes. I am paralyzed, sitting beside Coltania’s body. Her poison lingers in my veins, blurring my sight and making me dizzy, but the pain at least has stopped. I thank the gods that I didn’t drink more than a couple of sips. I imagine waking up in Oriana, or en route there, alone. Would my Shadows have figured out where I was? I like to think so, but I can’t say for sure. I’m glad I won’t have to find out.

  A stick crunches behind me and I whirl my head around, making myself dizzy in the process. There’s no one there, though, only flowers and trees and—I see it now, a telltale shimmer in the air.

  “Heron,” I say, bringing my hand up to my heart to slow its frantic beat.

  Heron comes into focus, his eyes wide as he takes me in, my bloodstained dressing gown and Coltania dead at my feet, my knife’s hilt still protruding from her belly. I see him piece together what must have happened, though he can’t possibly understand why.

  “She was the assassin,” I tell him. “Not working for the Kaiser, though, only for herself and her brother. To make sure I chose him. They grew tired of waiting, so they were going to kidnap me and make me marry him. I…” I trail off. “I did what I had to.”

  Heron’s eyes are still wide as the moon overhead, but he nods.

  “Come on,” he says, reaching a hand out to me, which I take. His hand envelops mine, an anchor I desperately need right now. “This changes things.”

  It’s such an und
erstatement that I nearly laugh out loud. I’d spent days looking over my shoulder, thinking that the Kaiser had found me. That I would never be safe from him. That might still be true, but it isn’t right now. It was never the Kaiser—just a brilliant woman with more ambition than sense. Just a dead woman. A woman I killed. I’m not sure how I feel about that yet—when I think about what I did, I go numb. So I won’t think about it now.

  “King Etristo will have to let Søren out, at least,” I say. “And then we’ll leave, just as we planned.”

  Heron leads me back inside and to the riser, where the same attendant is waiting. He takes in my bloodstained clothes and what I’m sure must be my half-wild expression without a word, though someone will be alerted any moment. Then they’ll find Coltania’s body and…

  “They won’t believe me,” I say, more to myself than to Heron.

  He replies anyway. “I think there’s plenty of evidence to support your story,” he says.

  I shake my head. “There was plenty of evidence to get Søren out of the dungeon as well, but King Etristo didn’t listen to it because it didn’t fit the story he needed to tell. He needed Søren imprisoned to use as a bargaining chip,” I say slowly. “And he’ll have an awful lot to gain by arresting me as well now, especially since most of the suitors have fled. He’s losing money.”

  I’m thinking out loud, but I stop there, glancing at the attendant warily. My heart thunders in my chest even harder now than it did with Coltania standing over me. Heron glances at the attendant as well and the color drains from his face. His eyes meet mine and I know the same thought passes between us.

  We need more time than we have and there is only one way to fix that.

  Heron acts so swiftly I nearly miss it, aided by his Air Gift, no doubt. Before the attendant can even react, Heron has one arm around his neck, crushing the attendant’s windpipe. As the man struggles, he lets go of the crank, which causes the riser to come to a sharp stop that makes my stomach flip. The attendant is bigger than Heron and he fights against him hard, but a measure of peace comes over Heron’s face and he holds on tight until, finally, the man’s eyes close and he goes slack in Heron’s arms.