Tavin steered her away before the queen could say another word, and Fie felt the stares of the rest of the garden on her back. His shoulders were shaking. When Fie looked up at him, startled, his lips were pressed together, cheeks flushing dark.
“What’s wrong?” she asked. “Did I say—”
“‘Gracious’?” he said, sounding a little choked, and Fie realized he was trying to hold back laughter. “Of all the…”
Play the fool, Niemi reminded her.
“I’ve no notion what you mean,” she said smoothly.
Fie ventured a glance behind her. The queen was watching them go, her cold, pale stare on Tavin. Whether or not she realized it, though, even more of the Peacocks were watching the queen.
And not all of those stares were kind.
Jasimir caught Fie’s eye as he wove past, bearing a tray of appetizers. Somewhere beneath his glamour was a Peacock tooth on a string round his neck. Fie hadn’t wanted to risk it wearing off and revealing the true crown prince of Sabor serving stuffed mushroom caps in a servant’s uniform.
“Hold on,” Tavin said suddenly.
Jasimir stopped dead in his tracks. Then he bowed, face blank, his voice gravelly. “What does His Highness desire of this unworthy one?”
Fie’s pulse rose in her throat. Had she fouled up the glamour? But—
“These are really quite good,” Tavin said, passing Fie a mushroom cap. “Here, try it. That’s all,” he added to Jasimir.
The true prince bowed once more, fingers tightening on the tray. Then his face dropped, eyes widening. He didn’t remember to change his voice as he shouted, “Look out—!”
Fie whirled in time to see Lord Dengor, deep in conversation with a terribly bored woman, walk right into Khoda’s back. Khoda stumbled, a pitcher of wine flying from his grasp.
It shattered at Rhusana’s feet. Red drenched the bottom of her lily-white satin skirts.
The Midnight Pavilion went silent.
Rhusana looked down at her skirts. Then she looked up at Khoda. Even if he’d wanted to pin it on anyone else, scarlet wine had splashed all over his own uniform, ruining even the cloth-of-gold sash. He dropped to his knees, staring at the ground.
The queen cocked her head and somehow made it look like brandishing a dagger. “Manservant,” she said thinly. “How old are you?”
“This unworthy one is forty-three, Your Majesty,” he said, for Fie had given him an older man’s face tonight.
“And how much do we pay you per year?”
Khoda’s mouth twisted. Fie had to give him his due as he paused: even facing down a queen, he kept his guise up, working out the figures like a Sparrow servant who rarely dealt with great sums of coin. “About a thousand naka, Your Majesty.”
Rhusana glided over to him, just the way Niemi had showed Fie, her pet tiger shambling in her wake. She lifted his chin with the tip of one of her silver claws.
“So what you’re telling me,” she said sweetly, “is that you could work in the palace for the rest of your wretched”—she backhanded him across the face, leaving red gashes over a cheekbone—“useless”—another slap, another set of scratches to match—“life and still not make up for what you’ve just done to me.”
Fie heard a faint scuff. A mushroom cap rolled off Jasimir’s shaking tray. Fie glanced out of the corner of her eye and saw the faintest bit of smoke coming from where he gripped the silver.
Tavin had frozen beside her, eyes locked on Khoda and the queen, but Fie didn’t want to count on that holding up. Slowly, she shifted her weight, then tapped Jasimir’s foot with her own. Jasimir blinked. The smoke went out.
“Let’s think of another way you can pay.” Rhusana tapped her lips. “What about an arm? Or an eye? Which would you rather pay?”
Fie heard Tavin’s sharp breath.
Khoda’s face went gray. He opened his mouth, then closed it. “Please, Your Majesty—”
Rhusana raised her hand again, the rings and claws tipping her fingers now speckled red. Khoda flinched. “Are you not sorry, manservant?”
“I—this unworthy one is sorry, Your Majesty, so sorry—”
“Then show me how sorry you are,” she cooed. The queen yanked her tiger’s chain. The great beast lumbered closer, sniffing. “Make your choice, or Ambra here will be happy to make it for you. An arm or an eye?”
The tiger nosed Khoda’s bloody face. A heavy pink tongue lolled out and lapped at the scratches.
No one moved. Not even Tavin.
There were Phoenix teeth on her string, Fie knew, and there was steel in the blade beneath her skirt, and Jasimir could call fire down, but there were Hawks all around them, and it was a long way to the palace walls.
She didn’t know if she could stop this. Not without giving up everything they’d worked for here—not without giving up her chance of stopping Rhusana.
Here she was, garbed in all the power of a dead aristocrat, on the arm of a prince, and she couldn’t even save one servant.
What good was any of this?
“Choose,” Rhusana ordered in a singsong voice, eyes dancing. She curled her fist. The tiger shuddered, its tail lashing faster. Its whiskers flicked back in a snarl.
“Your Majesty, if I may…” The woman Dengor had been nattering at stepped forward and spread her hands in apology. “I’m afraid this was all an accident, my brother wasn’t looking and—”
Rhusana’s nostrils flared. Her tiger lurched forward, swiping a massive paw. It caught the gray-haired older woman across the arm and thigh. Her scream rebounded through the assembled Peacocks, but no one moved. She crumpled to the ground. The beast’s jaws closed on her wrist.
The queen dragged at her tiger’s chain again, and it let go with a muffled roar, shaking its head. A hand fell out of its jaws, only to be snapped up again. Droplets of blood flecked its fur and Rhusana’s skirts alike. The woman below her moaned, sobbing but still alive, clutching the stump where her hand had been. Blood bloomed all across her side. Not even Lord Dengor stirred to help her.
Rhusana smiled serenely at the assembly. “Would anyone else care to contribute their opinion?”
No one said a word.
Fie had seen that lost, unsteady look before, on the faces of Splendid Castes and upper Hunting Castes, when there was a rare case of the Sinner’s Plague among their own. She’d seen it on Geramir’s face, when she reminded him of the dead girl whose face she now wore.
They had not thought themselves in danger from a queen who’d come from Swans, someone whose lot in life it was to sing sweet songs, dance sweet dances, and perhaps bring sweet pleasures to their beds. They thought they knew the rules: the Peacock aristocrats paid and the Swan courtesans did what they were asked. Even if Niemi had accidentally slipped into the Well of Grace … Well, that was an accident, and it was to be expected at the hands of a Phoenix prince.
Rhusana was the Swan Queen, and they would tell themselves she was more style than substance, easily manipulated, a puppet monarch. So long as she only savaged servants, and only murdered challengers to her crown, they figured themselves safe. Their money and their rank and the promise of their support—that would protect them above all else.
And not a one of them knew what to do with a queen who cared for none of it.
Not even Tavin, who had not moved once from Fie’s side.
“Remove this mess,” Rhusana said, waving a hand, and Fie felt a knot in her spine slip loose. Khoda would likely have scars, but compared to Lord Dengor’s sister, those were a light price to pay. Hawks emerged from the shadows to hurry both Khoda and the wounded Peacock out.
The glint of red on Rhusana’s diamond-tipped claws caught her eye, and she pursed her lips.
“Do…” Tavin cleared his throat. “Do you want me to send for a new gown, Your Majesty?”
Rhusana wiped the blood off in a slow, deliberate movement, leaving a trail of rusty stripes across her skirt.
“It already has red on it,” she said flatly.
<
br /> Fie looked around the Midnight Pavilion, almost desperate. She found hesitation in the faces of the gentry. She found calculation. She found cold, quiet triumph.
She also found fear. Anger. Helplessness. Horror. This wasn’t the way it was done. This wasn’t how highborn were supposed to behave in the open.
But no one moved.
No one moved.
No one moved.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
REAL ENOUGH
“I’ll admit,” Tavin said, “that was not what I had planned for the evening.”
His tone was light, but there was a measured clip to his words, and Fie knew it was due to the Hawk guards who had joined him in escorting her back to the guest quarters. She’d held out for a few minutes after Khoda had been hauled away, but once it wouldn’t be terribly conspicuous, she’d claimed a “poor constitution” (Niemi’s words) and asked to retire.
Even now, for the life of her, she couldn’t manage to sort out how she should answer as the guest quarters drew nearer—was she supposed to flirt after that? Niemi’s spark surged at the opportunity, and for once Fie was grateful for it. “And what did you have in mind for the evening?”
Tavin let out a tense, short laugh. “Let’s just leave it at … not that.” They came to a halt outside the entrance to the guest quarters.
Don’t let him follow you in, Niemi warned. It would be unseemly if you were to take him to bed so soon—
Oh, been there, done that, Fie told the dead girl, tired. Repeatedly. Reckon it worked out real well.
“Perhaps tomorrow you’ll allow me to make it up to you.” Tavin slid his arm free of hers but let his fingers run along the inside of her arm, up her palm, lifting her knuckles to his lips. “Just the two of us. Wherever you’d like to go.”
Home. The thought was a dagger, sudden and sharp.
She’d learned better, though. There was no home for a girl like her.
“When?” Niemi asked for her, breathless.
“Midmorning. I’ll send a messenger.” He let go and spun on a heel, then threw a too-familiar grin over his shoulder. “Don’t worry, I won’t make you wait.”
Both their smiles faltered the slightest bit. Niemi kept Fie’s face iron-still, but inside, Fie was screaming. The last time he’d said those words, he’d called her the girl he loved, he’d sworn he would find her no matter how long it took. And from his flinch, he remembered.
It just didn’t matter anymore.
She waited until Tavin and his escorts were gone, then sank into the shadows, trying to swallow down the tears burning in her throat. Then she called a Vulture tooth, found Viimo’s charm-bead, and traced its path.
Viimo was still in her cell, pacing west, east, west, east. She stopped in the west. That meant Return to home base.
Fie switched to a Sparrow witch-tooth, the one near burned out from her trip to the royal quarters two nights earlier. Once it had wiped her from sight, she hiked up her skirts and sprinted across the palace grounds.
“I can’t believe,” Khoda was saying as Fie burst into the sick rooms, “that she named the damn—ah—tiger Ambra.”
“Sorry.” Jasimir paused from dabbing a sharp-smelling green paste onto the gashes on Khoda’s face. He looked up at Fie with a strained smile. “We have a code word for the door, you know.”
Yula closed the door behind Fie. “We’ve put out word that the people in here have a very contagious fungus. You won’t get many folks barging in.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t stop her,” Fie blurted out. “I didn’t—I couldn’t—”
“You shouldn’t,” Khoda said so sharply that Barf sat up from where she was curled in his lap, ears flattening until he gave her a pat. “You both did exactly what you needed to, which was to keep your cover. You”—he pointed at Fie—“have the ability to assume disguises at will and to memorize and reproduce so much information, it’s not even funny. If you ever get tired of working for the Crows you should talk to me about a career in espionage. And you—” He turned to Jasimir just as the prince was reaching to dab more paste on a scratch. Instead, it smudged over the tip of Khoda’s nose. “Er.”
“Sorry,” Jasimir mumbled, and handed him a rag.
Khoda waved it off, then wiped his nose. “As I was saying, you are literally the only person who has the training, the temperament, and the lineage to take the throne. You, Tavin, and Rhusomir are the only living descendants of Ambra now who aren’t sworn to the Phoenix Priesthood.” He scowled and muttered, “I still can’t believe the tiger. Of all the gall.”
“And you thought I was joking about Jas being named for his pa’s dog,” Fie said.
“That would have been preferable,” Khoda scoffed. “The point is, you’re the best candidate for the throne. It’s my job to keep you alive at any cost.”
“Not any cost,” Jasimir said, suddenly irate. “I asked that of Tavin once, and I have never been so ashamed as when I got it.”
Khoda shrugged. “Get used to shame. You’re going to be a king. Anyway, neither of us needs to be spying in the parties anymore. Fie, you may have to keep going as Lady Sakar if we can’t get you an excuse, but they’ll be useless for scouting for defectors now. No one in their right mind will do anything but blow smoke up Rhusana’s”—he coughed—“face. Yula, is there any particular role that will give us free run of the palace?”
She frowned at the ceiling, then snapped her fingers. “Oh!” Her face fell. “But it … it’s beneath His Highness.”
“I’m willing to test that,” Jasimir said, grim. “Chamber pot duty?”
Yula shook her gray-streaked head. “Pest control. There isn’t a corner of this palace that mice won’t get into, and the tabby there seems to have a shine for you. We’ll round up a few more mousers, and then you can be our new cat-masters. Well, one of you is cat-master. The others are deputy cat-masters.”
Khoda gave a resigned sigh. “Brightest Eye help me, if these scar over”—he gingerly tapped a cheekbone between the scores and winced—“I’ll have the whiskers for it. Cat-masters it is.”
“Deputy cat-masters,” Fie corrected. “Jas is obviously the ranking cat-master.”
Khoda scowled at her but was interrupted by a knock at the door.
“Food for the sick,” Ebrim grunted outside.
“See? Password,” Khoda hissed at Fie, then called, “Come in.”
Ebrim slid in, then caught the door before Yula could close it. “Hold on. We have a visitor for the patients.”
A man slid in behind him. He was a lanky fellow, looked to be in his late thirties, wearing Pigeon grays with surprisingly long sleeves. He was sweating, and from the way he fidgeted with those sleeves, Fie reckoned it wasn’t just from the heat.
Ebrim closed the door, then motioned for them all to huddle in the middle of the room, as far from the window and the hall as possible. Barf mewed in protest as Khoda moved her from his lap, then curled up on his pillow instead.
“This is one of our missing Sparrows,” Ebrim said in a low whisper. “What do you want us to call you?”
The man’s mouth wobbled. “Just … just Sparrow will do.”
Ebrim patted the man on the back. “Sparrow here sought me out. He still remembers what happened when the qu—” Sparrow flinched, and Ebrim stopped. “When she called for him. Will you tell them, or should I?”
Sparrow took a deep breath. “I’ll do it. It was just yesterday, after the solstice, around noon. I was working on the retiling project in the west wing of the archives, on the fourth floor, you know the one.” Ebrim nodded. “Her Maj—Her footman said she needed assistance at once. I … My sister, she, she was called more than a week ago, just like that. Doesn’t remember a thing. I thought I could find out what happened to her.”
“Brave man,” Khoda said. “What happened next?”
“I was taken to the royal catacombs, near the well. The footman gave me a torch and told me to go to the Tomb of Monarchs and wait until I was called back. The hour-
bell was ringing when they sent me down, and I-I think it rang again right around when they called for me. The—she was waiting at the bottom of the stairs, with a man in an Owl robe. They asked if I heard anything, and I said no. Then she said if I told anyone, she’d—” He covered his mouth and shook his head. “The man also said he could make me forget everything, everyone I ever loved, all of it. I swore I wouldn’t tell. They let me go.”
“She had you there for an hour,” Jasimir said. “For … nothing?”
Sparrow gnawed at his bottom lip, then shook his head again. “I lied,” he whispered. “I heard … something. It came and went, and I couldn’t tell where from, and I knew if my sister heard it too, she would have told them, so I lied.”
“What did you hear?” Khoda asked.
Sparrow shuddered. “It sounded like someone weeping. Like … like a soul in torment.”
A cold hush fell over the room, prickles dancing over Fie’s arms. It only broke when she said, soft and slow, “What the fuck?”
Jasimir reached over and gripped the man’s shoulder. “I know what it’s like to feel powerless against her,” he said. “Like everything you hold dear can just be taken from you, if she feels like it. It was incredibly brave to come back. I won’t forget it.”
Sparrow nodded, eyes on the ground.
“Look at me,” Jasimir said, and waited for Sparrow to meet his gaze. “Thank you.” He let go.
“I’ll get you back into Dumosa.” Ebrim took a step toward the door as Sparrow fussed with his sleeves once more. “If you’d like, we can try to get you farther.”
“I just want it all put right,” Sparrow said hoarsely. “The way it was.”
I don’t, Fie thought but didn’t say. I want better.
Once Ebrim and Sparrow were gone, Khoda started pacing. “So. Now we need to figure out how to break into the royal catacombs.” He looked up to Yula. “I don’t suppose you get a lot of cleaning requests down there.”
She shook her head. “They also need to be unlocked by a member of the royal family. They’re the only ones with the keys.”
The Faithless Hawk Page 23
