“All right,” he said swiftly. “We’re not going to panic.”
“We aren’t?” Fie asked, trying and failing to keep her tone from hitting a glass-shattering high.
“No. This is bad, but—we can do … something.” He snatched up a blank parchment and a quill, laying it flat over one of the orders. “I’m going to try to copy her signature and we’ll figure out the seal. We’ll draft an order to cancel those orders, or postpone them, or something. We can’t take the map—Rhusana will ransack the entire palace to find it—but you can move the flags around.”
Fie pulled a flag out, then stopped. “They leave holes. She’ll know where they belong.”
“Then put more holes in,” Jasimir said with a strained kind of calm. “Really, Fie, since when do I need to tell you to stab things?”
“I’m starting to think helping you fake your death was a good thing,” Fie said under her breath. She started with the great shrines, Pa’s and Little Witness’s, poking the flag in a few times before settling somewhere off the mark, then she carried on to the smaller shrines. But it was slower work than she thought, and she’d only scattered a dozen or so flags before Rhusana’s voice carried down the hall.
“Window seat,” Fie hissed, shoving a final flag wildly off its marker.
Jasimir grimaced at his copied parchment. Fie could see Rhusana’s signature was mostly done, but there was no time. He shoved it under the other parchment sheets, dropped the quill in the inkwell, closed the study door, and rushed to join her on the window seat. Fie called the Sparrow witch-tooth back to life a moment before the door slid open.
“—take long. You just need to sign some decrees.” Rhusana breezed in.
Tavin followed in her wake, face stormy. “They won’t be legally binding until after the coronation, you know.”
“I’d rather avoid any unnecessary delays.” Rhusana swept up the parchment slips and handed them over. “Here.”
Tavin scanned one after another, a trench deepening between his brows. “You want to send Hawks to raid Crow shrines?” he demanded, tossing the parchments back on the desk. “What is the matter with you? Why can’t you just leave the Crows alone? They’ve done nothing but their job.”
Rhusana narrowed her eyes, then, surprisingly, leaned against the desk. Perhaps it was the fact that she needed him to sign the decrees; perhaps it was that, with plague swelling in the palace and spies in every shadow, the queen wanted just one person to speak plain with, and Tavin was the one who couldn’t betray her without risking his own neck.
Either way, a forlorn crack wormed through her porcelain façade. “Do you know what my mother told me, when I was old enough to know I was neither a Swan nor a Vulture?”
Tavin stared back, then folded his arms. “Fine. I’ll bite. What childhood trauma do you think justifies mass murder?”
The queen shook her head. “Hardly. I asked my mother how I could be a witch when witches are supposed to be the old gods born into their own caste, but I was born of two. And she told me what I’ll tell you: that just makes us new gods. Do you get it?” She waved a hand glimmering with pearls and white gold. “The old gods are dead, and we’re supposed to keep the caste system they locked us into? Forever? That’s nonsense. Only children look at the world and think twelve little boxes is enough. It’s no way to live.”
“You seriously want to dissolve the caste system?” Tavin asked.
“You can’t tell me it’s working as the Covenant wants,” Rhusana answered. “You can’t tell me it’s rewarding the virtuous by sending them to the Phoenixes. Surimir was proof enough of that. So yes, I want a world where the best person can rule the nation, not just the one who happened to be born to the right family, the right caste. If that means letting the plague take all the sinners it wants, I’ll let it, because what’s left will be the strongest of us. It will be united. I don’t hate the Crows. They’re just the price I’m willing to pay to fix this country.”
Tavin looked at the parchment slips on the desk, then up at Rhusana. “Horseshit,” he said mildly. “It’s miserable being caught between two castes, I know. You don’t belong anywhere, you don’t have the protection from either caste, and the only thing you can do is try to make a place for yourself, make your own safety. But you can tell me this is for some better version of Sabor all you like. I’m guessing your version still has you as queen.”
Rhusana gave an elegant shrug. “Like I said. The best person for the job.”
“Like I said.” Tavin returned her shrug, cold. “Safety. You think you can get rid of the labels but keep the hierarchy and call that united. I’m also guessing your Sabor has no room for a king.” Rhusana’s mouth twisted. Tavin didn’t wait for an answer that wouldn’t come. “I figured you’d only let me live long enough to win over the Peacocks. I’m not wasting any of my time signing any of your garbage. Besides, you already broke your side of the deal with whatever you’ve done to Fie.”
Jasimir’s hand found Fie’s and held it tight.
Rhusana straightened up, and, even in the full clutch of midsummer, a frost seemed to roll through the room. “Whatever I’ve done,” she repeated, slow as her white tiger stretching. “Why do you think I can’t do worse to her?”
“Because if you could, you’d make me watch,” Tavin returned, so matter-of-fact it sent ice through Fie’s gut.
Rhusana didn’t smile, didn’t frown; her face was an eerie sort of blank. She picked up the parchment decrees, then held them out to Tavin once more. “And what makes you think I can’t do worse to your newest little conquest? What was her name again … Niemi?”
It was Fie’s turn to clench Jasimir’s hand.
“Do you think they teach their daughters about poison in the north?” Rhusana asked gently. “The ones that take a full week to kill you, so you can watch your fingers and toes fall off one by one? The ones you survive, but every breath is torture for the rest of your life? Do you think the Crows would give her mercy—”
Tavin tore the parchment slips out of the queen’s hand.
She smiled and handed him a quill. “Remember to sign as Jasimir.”
Fie wanted to scream, she wanted to throw herself at Rhusana and claw her eyes out, she wanted to curse Tavin all through the twelve hells for signing the Crows’ deaths into law. She wanted to burn this study down, burn the royal quarters down—she would burn the palace down with all of them in it if it meant bringing this sick mummery to an end.
Tavin’s hands were shaking as he signed, again and again and again. It brought her no comfort.
He reached the bottom of the stack and paused, blinking at the page. Rhusana wasn’t paying attention, frowning at her map of the shrines, but Fie could see it was the blank parchment Jasimir had forged most of Rhusana’s signature on.
Tavin nudged it back under the stack so only the signature line was showing. “You forgot the seal on one.”
Rhusana pointed to a drawer, then pulled one of her finger-claws off, still studying her map. “The wax is in there.”
Tavin removed a stick of golden wax and flicked a flame to its end until it dribbled onto the page. “Done.”
The queen had extracted a signet ring from her jewelry apparatus. She pressed it into the wax, swift and firm, then yanked it back as if waiting for Tavin to snatch it from her grasp. Tavin rolled his eyes. Rhusana turned back to her map, fiddling with her claws.
Quick as a flash, Fie saw Tavin fold the blank parchment and slip it up a sleeve. Her heart skipped a beat.
“Are we done here?” he asked, stiff.
Rhusana collected the stack of orders and nodded, sweeping past him and out of the study. “Thank you for your assistance,” she called back, a twinkle in her eye. “You ought to go work off that stress with the Sakar girl. You’ve certainly earned it. And who knows when you’ll have another chance?”
Tavin watched her go, glowering. Then he patted his sleeve, which gave a crinkle of parchment, and strode out, shutting the door behind h
im.
Neither Jasimir nor Fie moved for a long breath, not until they heard the door to Rhusomir’s room open and close. Then Fie let the Sparrow witch-tooth go.
“Are you all right?” Jasimir asked immediately.
It was jolting, being asked that by someone who wasn’t her own kin. But they’d been through enough, she reckoned they’d grown close enough for him to know the signs. “Not really,” she croaked. “We need to tell Khoda.”
Jasimir nodded. “Let’s finish the map, then we can get out of here.”
“It won’t be enough,” Fie said. “She can find them again.”
“Nothing’s going to be enough while she’s still in power, but we can make her waste her time.” He got up and pulled a flag out of the map. “Come on, it’ll go faster with the two of us.”
If all she could do was vex the queen right now, that was what she’d do. Fie went to help. After a few flags, she said, “I’m glad you’re here.”
He bumped her shoulder. “I’m glad you’re here, too.”
The hour-bell began to chime. Fie called a Vulture tooth to see what Viimo had to say and found the skinwitch pacing north-south, pausing in the north. “Khoda wants to meet.”
Jasimir stuck a last pin in the flag. “We can bring Patpat with us to the Mother of the Dawn’s grave.”
Fie blinked at him. “It’s a god-grave?”
“Yes?” He said it as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
“I just … didn’t feel a grave there.” Fie’s mouth twisted. “Why’s it outside? Doesn’t it throw off the … the symmetry?”
Jasimir spread his hands like matched wings, thumbs touching to make a head. “Well, the statue’s outside, but the grave itself could be right under the thrones. Twelve on each side of the Divine Galleries, then the Mother of the Dawn at the middle.”
Fie could have sworn Pa had said there were but two dozen dead Phoenix gods, but Jasimir would know best.
They snuck back to the foyer of the royal quarters, where Jasimir was able to summon Patpat with the crinkle of a wrapped fish treat. The Hawks on guard barely acknowledged them as they left.
Khoda was waiting at the statue for them, scrubbing a marble pedestal that at this point shone like a second sun, so clean it was. He looked to be sore irked with them but tilted his head to the back of the pedestal.
“We have a game changer,” he said once they had huddled.
Jasimir made a face. “So do we.”
“The queen’s mapping our shrines, Crow shrines, with skin-ghasts,” Fie said in a rush. “We fouled up her map, moved the markers around, but she’ll find them again. She and Tavin have signed orders to start Hawk raids—”
“It won’t get that far,” Khoda interrupted. “Until they’re crowned, they need the master-general’s approval on any Hawk actions. And that’s where my game changer comes in.” He allowed himself a weary grin. “The plague beacons weren’t just lit by panicking Hawks. The guards were commanded to ignore the queen and light them. And the one who gave that order … was Draga.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
PATIENCE
“At this point, I feel like I should just give up on trying to tell you two to stick to any kind of plan.” Khoda was doing his best to look severe as the three of them headed to the wing of the palace that housed the Hawks and their generals, but the effect was rather ruined by the fluffy orange tomcat attempting to stand on his shoulder, his magnificent tail waving like a war banner. His leash draped like a garland over Khoda’s head. “What else do you want to do while you’re here? Steal the crowns?”
“It was a calculated risk, and it paid off,” Jasimir said primly. Patpat was walking beside him on a leash fastened to his harness, chirping at the prince every so often as if to hurry him along. They’d stopped by the guest quarters, collected three cats and one of Yula’s preapproved requests to send in cat-masters, filled in the relevant information for Draga’s office, and set off before the next hour-bell.
Fie had found that Barf liked the leash even less than her harness; she’d flopped on her side and refused to budge, making Fie carry her in her arms. “Granted, if they’d gone near the window seat, they’d have found us. But they didn’t, and we’re all the better for it.”
Khoda cocked an eyebrow. “I’ve heard stories about the prince and that window seat.”
“Please, no.” Jasimir covered half his face with a hand.
Fie stared at him, both delighted and wary. “What kind of stories?”
Khoda shook his head, his smirk making the red lines on his face look all the more like whiskers, and gestured to the prince.
Jasimir let out a long sigh. “I … may have … engaged in certain activities, for the first time, on that window seat last year.” Khoda coughed. “And I was not aware Father would be giving a tour of the private gardens to the new ambassadors.”
Fie recalled the lovely view the study had had of those very gardens. The windows were crystal, not glassblack; that view definitely went two ways. She let out a gleefully outraged cackle. “You rolled your first lad on those cushions? Why didn’t you say anything?”
“What with all the mass murder plotting, it didn’t seem like the time!” Jasimir’s cheeks flushed darker. “Besides, he was my languages tutor and Father had him dismissed by the end of the day, so it was only the once. He’s our age and very charming, so I’m sure he had no trouble finding someone new. I’d rather we all forget about it.”
“The tutor certainly didn’t.” Khoda swung the orange tomcat off his shoulders and set him on the ground. “Come on, Jasifur.”
“You’re not calling him Jasifur,” the prince said immediately. “His name is Mango.”
“That’s the objection?” Fie muttered. Khoda and Jasimir didn’t seem to hear, embroiled in impassioned debate. She noted with interest that the flush on Jasimir’s cheeks still lingered. Khoda might not have been her type, but she could hardly fault the prince for his tastes when she’d just watched her last lover sign death warrants for her kin.
They passed the Hawk training yards, the armory, and finally reached the administrative offices, where they presented the slip calling for cat-masters and were sent up three flights of stairs. A small line of Hawks waited at the far end of the hall before massive twin mahogany doors. One wore the badge of a war-witch.
“I know the witch,” Jas said under his breath. “They were one of my mother’s closest friends.”
“Authorized visitors only,” the war-witch called down the hall. “Anyone entering this floor must have their caste verified, by order of the queen.”
Jasimir straightened his shoulders. “I have an idea. Let me go first.”
“You’re the ranking cat-master,” Fie returned.
Jasimir strode down the hall, Patpat trotting at his side. “We have a work order for the master-general’s suites,” he said, holding out a wrist. The Hawks looked taken aback at a Sparrow speaking like a commander, but the war-witch stepped forward and laid their hand on Jasimir’s forearm.
A moment later, their eyes widened. They gave Jasimir the slightest smile, then nodded to Khoda and Fie. “Your associates, too?”
“Deputies,” Jasimir said. “They’re my deputies.”
The war-witch only briefly clasped their wrists, looking from Jasimir to them and back. Then they took the work order slip and said, “Let me verify this with the master-general.”
They ducked through the mahogany doors. After a minute, they emerged and held the door open. “The master-general says now is an acceptable time.”
“Thank you.” Jasimir bowed and led them in.
Draga was on her feet, face strained, but she waited until the door shut to ask, low, “Is it really you?”
Fie let the glamours go. Draga dropped into her chair, then motioned for them all to come closer. “I—I thought you’d all be long gone. How?”
Barf squirmed in Fie’s arms until she set the tabby down. “When all this is over,” Fie
said, “we’re having a long talk about palace security.”
“Like I said, the queen underestimates everyone else,” Khoda added dryly. “Including a Crow witch with a grudge and a bag of teeth. Do you think Rhusana’s lost her hold on you?”
Draga nodded. “Obviously, there’s no way to be certain, but it felt like a … a hand was on the back of my neck, and an hour or so after the coronation broke down it was suddenly gone. But it was too late by then.” She sent a rueful look at Fie. “I should have figured the mess with the ceremony was your doing.”
“And the plague beacons last night were yours,” Fie returned.
Draga winced and leaned back. “Something’s wrong here. The crows, the Sinner’s Brand, the outbreaks … We’re in uncharted waters. At least it looks like there’s a way out.”
“You’ll help us against Rhusana and Tavin, then,” Khoda said.
“I can fight the queen for the beacons. I can’t—” Her breath hitched. She coughed, but it didn’t cover the wobble in her voice. “Taverin made his choices. I won’t delude myself about whether he can survive them. But it won’t be by my hand.”
“I could pardon him,” Jasimir offered.
Both Khoda and Draga shook their heads. “You’d be leaving an opening for the Oleander Gentry,” Khoda said. “They’ll take up arms in his name, claiming he’s the rightful king.”
“I’ll support you for monarch, Jasimir,” Draga said. “And you’ll have my help taking on Rhusana. That’s what I can offer.”
Jasimir’s eyes darted around the room, nervous. He took a deep breath, licked his lips, and asked, “Will I still have your support if Fie is my queen?”
There was a heartbeat of perfect, stunned silence. Then the eruption of noise sent all three cats bolting under Draga’s desk.
“ABSOLUTELY not,” Khoda half bellowed, while Fie, jaw agape, could only manage a “What?”
Draga herself was staring at Jasimir as if he’d grown another head. All she asked was “Why?”
“She’s Ambra reborn,” the prince said in a rush. “It would only be a formality, and—”
The Faithless Hawk Page 27
