Oh, he had to be careful. “This is not the best time to ask me,” he said, gesturing at his arm. “My thinking is not as clear as it might be. Do we need to do this now?”
“Between the mob and your brother’s disappearance, there is no better time for me to leave the Citadel. I don’t want to be in Doru’s reach when he finds out.”
“He’ll expect you in your rooms tonight, surely.”
“He won’t come to bed, not with what’s happened in the city. He’ll want to take part in any interrogations and direct the search for Prince Tevin. I ask that you not tell him until as late as possible tomorrow. If you grant it, that is.”
The precision of her words reminded him that she had been educated at the College. Like Mirovian, like Anza. Anza, who had been her lover.
He said, “I’ve shut down the search for my brother.”
“That won’t stop Doru. Not when he’s on the hunt.”
“Have you got a secure place to go?”
“Yes,” she said. “And I’ve already sent most of my money to a bank in Traband. I just need enough hours to get out of Karegg before he knows.”
The hours Mirantha had not had. He said, “I think you’ve already answered this, but I must ask. If your only grounds were those of cruelty, would Doru oppose it?”
“Yes. Out of spite and habit and possessiveness. I have proof aplenty.”
“Need we reach the other grounds?”
“That rather depends on what you want for yourself, my lord. If you want the opportunity to get rid of him, I can provide the evidence.”
“That’s more likely to end in a beheading than a divorce. Which would mean all his property is confiscated by the Crown and you are left with nothing. Do you want to risk that? I can’t have you change your mind partway through.” He would dearly love to prove Doru a traitor, but the evidence had to be unassailable. If Esvar misstepped, he would find himself in Lukovian’s position.
“If you grant me a divorce, he has to make a settlement on me before the Crown confiscates the rest.”
“He can invoke a husband’s right to keep you quiet about what happened in the marriage, even if it’s over. Is there evidence other than your word?”
“Yes. But can’t you use a Truth Finder?”
He had learned his lesson from his brother. He said, “I can’t. Doru would be tried by Karolje. If the king doesn’t want Doru to be found guilty, he won’t be. The Truth Finders can be bribed, you know. They’re just men. And some of them might lie for Doru on their own accord.” His arm ached.
“He’s a traitor,” she said.
He drank his water slowly, making her wait. If she was going to crack at all, better do it now than later. She matched him sip for sip, which almost amused him. He and Thali had never liked each other much, but neither had they underestimated each other.
“Cruelty first,” he said.
She told him. He made a written list. Any single incident was inconsequential alone; taken together, they gave good reason for her to be afraid.
“You’ll get your divorce,” he said when she had finished. “I have two questions before we advance to the other matter. If he goes on trial for treason, you can’t leave Karegg until the trial is over. Are you prepared to take that risk?”
“I’m prepared, my lord. My life is already at risk in being married to him.”
“And why accuse him of betrayal at all? I did not, to be frank, think you had any special loyalty to the Crown. I would have imagined that you sought your own advancement.”
“You’re right. I have no loyalty to Karolje. That’s why I’m here, asking you. Lord Prince.”
“That’s very thin ice you’re stepping on now, my lady.”
She looked steadily at him over the rim of her cup. “I know. Who doesn’t? But the king is too ill for me to trouble him about so minor a matter as a divorce, is he not?”
“A divorce from the spymaster isn’t minor,” he said. “Doru will demand a hearing from the king.”
“Who would be glad to try him on grounds of treachery. I don’t think he’ll chance it. Even if we say nothing, he’ll know what could happen. I made a mistake when I married him, my lord, but I’ve never had reason to think he’s stupid. That was one of the attractions.”
Esvar turned a chess piece on its rim against the desk. Round and round. He wished his head was clearer. Was it the moment to bring Doru down, with his brother unaccounted for? If the lord’s followers aligned themselves with Goran, Esvar would be alone.
“What is the betrayal?” he asked, not bothering to correct her assumption that Karolje would want treason squashed.
“There are a great many. The most urgent one is this: when Karolje dies, Doru planned to accuse Tevin of poisoning Karolje. Now they probably will turn it on you. They intend to wait until you’ve gone to see Karolje’s body, and Karolje’s guards will take you on the way out.”
“Has he acted at all against the king?”
By Thali’s account, Doru had been loyal to Karolje, albeit corrupt; it was in his acts against Tevin that charges of treason could lie. He had ordered spies and soldiers killed, stolen and forged letters, and threatened people who would have been Tevin’s allies. The arrest of Lady Jeriza had been the most blatant of such actions, not the first.
But the evidence itself was scant: two letters that Thali had managed to steal before they were destroyed, money in the wrong place, and what she had been told or overheard.
“This won’t work,” Esvar said reluctantly, refolding the letters. “It’s too easy for him to explain everything away. I can’t accomplish anything with it except angering him. I believe you, but Karolje won’t execute him on it. He’s not providing aid and comfort to any enemy of the state, and he hasn’t willfully disobeyed any direct orders. It’s all against my brother, and may have Karolje’s countenance.”
“If things were reversed, Doru wouldn’t hesitate.”
“My lady. You gave me this information to do with as I chose. Don’t question my actions.”
“If someone had questioned Doru’s actions, we would not be here,” she said, and for the first time he saw how frightened she was. Her posture reminded him of a nervous cat. He realized that his disappointment in the weakness of the evidence was nothing compared to hers.
“You’re quite right,” he said. “But you’re asking now why I don’t murder him. An execution isn’t going to happen while Karolje is king.”
“Doru’s murdered hundreds of people.”
“You didn’t come to me about them. You came to me about yourself.”
She put the empty cup down. She said, “And if someone else were to murder him?”
“Don’t do it, Thali. I can’t look the other way when a man is murdered by his wife.”
“Even if she was defending herself?”
If he had not been wounded and drugged, the question might not have been the blow that it was. It caught him cold. He thought he might faint. The world hazy before him, he bent his head and felt the rush of returning blood. His hand went to the injury, an excuse to Thali and to himself.
When he was steady, he said, “Doru won’t want to settle anything on you. Will you contest that?”
“My lawyer will. Amil Vasanian.”
“I’ll do the divorce as a separate decree then, and the two of you can argue out the money before a magistrate.” He inhaled deeply, trying to recover some of his vigor. “I’ll send Vasanian the decree. Good luck, my lady.”
“Thank you, my lord.” She stood. “I know there are political considerations that restrain you. I wish a woman’s life could weigh the same.”
“So do I,” he said. It was the best he could do.
He showed her out and waited until he could not distinguish her footsteps to shut the door. He bolted and locked it, which made him feel even more of a coward. But one prince missing and the other injured might prove too great a temptation. Where are you, Tevin? he thought.
MIRANTHA
Tevin is twenty, and there are stories of him. He is said to be more moderate than Karolje, sometimes fair. He is much adored by young women, and his patronage is sought after by young men. Like Karolje, he rarely appears in the city. All she learns of Esvar is that he is training as a soldier and is healthy. She wonders what her sons have done to survive this long.
Her hatred of Karolje has not abated, but it has become a cold thing, nestled in her soul where she scarcely notices it. She sees the city through the eyes of its people. In the narrow, crooked streets, the dingy public houses, the stinking wharf district, the broken courtyards, she hears the voices she never heard in the Citadel. The note that sounds in all of them is fear.
Karolje’s soldiers are everywhere. In the market, walking the streets, watching as barges are loaded and unloaded. She is afraid too. Not for herself but for her sons. She hears whispers of a resistance but does not pursue them. If the king is overthrown, the princes will die with him. Nothing will bring her to raise a hand against them.
Then one of Karolje’s soldiers rides down a boy who did not get out of the way in time. The boy’s parents are hanged for not teaching their son obedience. It is not the worst thing Karolje has done, but every time she thinks of the boy, she imagines her own sons at that age.
Days later, she wakes weeping from a hideous dream, and she realizes she cannot go on as she is. If she is to stay in Karegg, she must fight. Her sons are no longer children. Moreover, they are princes, born with a duty to their people. If they died in battle against the Tazekhs, that would be a grievous thing, but she would accept it. The same is true of a battle against a tyrant king. For the first time she understands how her parents must have felt when they married her to Karolje. She had been sacrificed not for the power and prestige the marriage brought her father but as an attempt to give Piyr another way to control his son. It is no one’s fault the attempt failed.
She still remembers the names Nihalik gave her, and one afternoon in late summer she opens the door of a lawyer named Radd Orescu. She has to begin by trusting someone. He looks up, polite, no sign of recognition on his face. She has a scarf tied around her head to keep the dust off her hair.
She sits in the chair he indicates and says, “I won’t tell you my name, sir. It will be better for both of us if I don’t. All you need to know is that I am a friend of Nihalik Vetrescu.”
His glance goes to the window, which is open to let in air. There is enough street noise that no one can hear them without being visible. “Lock the door,” he says.
She does. Her plan seems impossible. She licks her lips and says, “Nihalik told me there were people in Karegg who stood against the king.”
His eyes are a striking green in a brown face, under a shock of thick, slightly curly black hair. She wonders what has happened in his life to make him willing to take the risks he does.
“There’s another man you need to talk to,” he says. “Not me. I can get a message to him to expect you. His name is Ivanje Stepanian. He is a steward for Yenovi Galik. You will need to appear richer to be admitted to see him, though.”
It is a kind way of telling her what she knows, that she looks poor and exhausted. “I have money,” she says.
He writes the address down on a scrap of paper and gives it to her. It all seems so easy. Is Nihalik’s name that powerful? Or is she being trapped?
Outside, people walk past in their light summer clothing, their heads bent even if the sun is at their backs. Their pace is perfectly steady, neither rushed nor dawdling. It is the pose of daily submission.
“Can I buy you dinner?” she asks.
* * *
For the occasion she finds a seamstress, who makes her a simple dress of pale green linen and silk. She touches the silk almost as a child would. It is six years since she has worn anything pretty, anything soft, anything new. In the mirror her face is thin and sharp and belongs to someone wearing a sword, not a dress.
Her other attempts to appear more feminine only make things worse, so she goes as she is. They eat at an inn on a veranda framed by vine-covered trellises. The grapes hang in full bunches, rich with color. In the center of the veranda, water pours ceaselessly from a stone pitcher held by a stone woman. Her sculpted legs are bare from mid-thigh down. It is an old statue, pocked and cracked and lichened, but the noise is even and pleasant.
They are served a different wine with each course, beginning with pale gold and moving through pink and deep red. The last is blue-black, sweet and heady. It tastes good with the sharp, crumbly cheese served at the end of the meal. They have greens, onion soup, seasoned lamb, melon, something creamy and icy and sweet. It is the best food she has had since she left the Citadel, and she worries that it will be too rich for her stomach.
They carefully avoid speaking of anything dangerous. Radd tells her about his work, his children being raised by their grandparents, his time as a boy spent fishing on the river. She tells him about her neighbors, about hunting, about her favorite flowers. He is a good listener.
He won’t let her pay. When they have finished eating and the fireflies are out, a musician starts playing in a corner. Sunset is a violent, glorious reddish-purple. Without discussion, they leave the table and go up to the room he has taken for the night. The windows face north, toward the Citadel, and Radd closes the wooden shutters. A single oil lamp spreads warm light over the room.
They kiss. He is careful. She thinks that he senses how long it has been since other lips touched hers. With the windows closed, the air is hot, and their bodies are soon slicked with sweat. Clothes go to the floor. She expects she will be nervous, quick to jerk away, but the wine has made her skin less sensitive and her body more relaxed. When the time comes, she is ready.
Afterward, shutters reopened, they lie together in the dark. The night cool moves in. She realizes she has never slept with another person in the bed; Karolje always left. It is odd to have this sense of another body beside her, to stretch out her hand and make contact with flesh.
* * *
In the middle of the night she wakes, disturbed by some dream or the unfamiliarity of the place. She gets up and walks to the window, looks out. The city is dark, a few roads dotted with lamps. The Citadel is a sleek blackness. Tevin is in it somewhere. It is hard not to think of him as a child.
When he was a child, she did not resist Karolje, did not confront Goran, in part because she wanted to be sure the throne remained for her son. She stares painfully at nothing. Guarding the throne for Tevin was a mistake. He is a man now, and if he is not fit to be a king, she will have to stand in his way too.
Radd is ready for her when she comes back to bed.
* * *
They make love one more time, in the morning, knowing it is the last. She washes and dresses. She is about to leave when Radd says, “I can get a message to your sons if you want.”
Tears well in her eyes. There is no point in denial. She dashes the tears away and says, “Thank you. It’s not worth the risk. Don’t try. I won’t come see you again either. Forget all this, Radd. Go back to Osk and your children, and be safe.”
His hands come to her shoulders. He lowers his head and kisses her lips. For an instant she clings to him, wishing she could have this comfort.
Then she steps back. “Goodbye,” she says.
* * *
She goes to Ivanje Stepanian. When he asks her name, she lies. The questioning is long and sometimes painful. Her story is simple: her father was a loyal officer who was captured in the Tazekh war. Karolje refused to ransom any of the captives, and he executed their commander when the man argued for them. The events are real.
Do you have children? she is asked, and she lies. They were born and died. It happens to too many women to be remarkable. She thinks of her lost sons and struggles with pain she thought she had put aside. What about their father? She says, He left me a long time ago. I haven’t seen him for years.
Ivanje Stepanian is a good leader. He is prudent without being overly cautious, patient, and knowledgeable about how power works. She discovers in herself a genius for organizing. All those years of listening to her father talk about military strategy have paid off.
Karegg has an undercity. She supposes all cities have many selves. There is the public self, the shops and markets and craft halls, where money and goods pass from hand to hand and voices mingle in dozens of different accents. There is the domestic self, which encompasses both the quiet tree-lined streets where the wealthy merchants and guildsmen live and the crowded houses of the laborers and clerks and gutter sweepers. There is the ruling self. There is the revelrous self, the taverns and theaters and rings for games, performances, and races. There is the self of thieves and murderers. These are all known, all seen by anyone who walks through the city, all closely watched by Karolje’s soldiers and spies.
But there is also the city that he cannot see, because it has no buildings and has no patterns. It is a city of color and movement and language, which shifts constantly and is not observed because it is too big and too close. It is a city of secrets and transgressions and obscure defiances, of shifting and bubbling ideas of what could be and pokes at what is, of both betrayals and confidences, of hidden things.
Slowly they build a thin tissue of resistance, connections wound and woven across each other like fishing nets. They find the people who remember Karegg as it was decades ago and have no strength or will for arms but can provide a place to meet, the booksellers who now lay bricks and will carry messages, the stable hands who will hide a few weapons in the straw, the occasional merchant or wealthy man who can go unquestioned to the docks and observe the changes of watch. The merchant knows the wagon driver who knows the baker whose sister works in the Citadel. The old herbwoman knows the candlemaker who knows the perfumer who sells things to the lords’ wives. The carpenter has a cousin whose wife’s brother is a locksmith for the soldiers in the barracks. Because she knows which kinds of people in the Citadel are never noticed, who learns things under the lords’ gazes without being seen, she knows what kinds of tendrils to extend within Karolje’s inner domain.
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