“Stop.” Draga held up a hand. “Go back. Fie is what?”
Fie couldn’t make herself answer. If Niemi had heard this, she’d be shrieking with glee at the prospect.
Jasimir wanted to make her a queen. A true queen. He’d raise her to a place untouchable, and through that, she’d raise all the Crows into safety.
Jasimir balled up his fists. “She’s Ambra. You can ask the Black Swans. That’s why they sent Khoda to keep an eye on Fie. And—”
“Can we prove it?” Draga asked. “And I don’t mean by interrogation from a Crane witch. What I’m asking is how we convince the rest of Sabor that Ambra, Queen of Day and Night, was reborn as a Crow.”
“She gets it,” Khoda grumbled.
Fie still couldn’t find words, but Jasimir was not deterred. “We can figure out something. But if I marry Fie, that elevates the status of every Crow. It will be immediate, undeniable protection for the whole caste.”
“Until a few monarchs down the line, when both of you are gone and terrorizing Crows is back in vogue,” Draga snapped. “Then what? The Crows need protection, but this will only last as long as you do.”
“What’s the alternative?” Jasimir fired back. “Because Rhusana’s getting ready to raid every Crow shrine she can. We can’t do nothing.”
Draga shook her head. “Rhusana’s already imploding. She’s emptying the palace treasury on these parties, she’s terrorizing the aristocracy, and she’s asking all of Sabor to roll shells with the plague. We just need to be patient.”
“And how long is patient?” Fie found her voice again, now on familiar ground. “How much of the country’s burning plague beacons right now?” From Draga’s flinch, she knew the answer was too much. “Every day it’ll get worse. It’ll be more to burn. And the queen’s driving the only ones who can stop it into hiding. You tell me how that ends.”
Draga scowled and looked away a moment. “I’ll keep fighting the queen on the beacons,” she said finally, resting her chin on her interlocked hands. “One more thing to keep her distracted. And … she’s throwing that ball three days from now, her biggest yet. I can challenge her there, in front of everyone, on how she’s handling the plague. Either we force her to back off the Crows, which should cost her the support of the Oleander Gentry, or she doubles down, which costs her the support of every plague-fearing citizen in Sabor. No matter what, she’ll be at her weakest.”
“I like it,” Khoda said. “It could be the right moment to reveal the real Prince Jasimir as well. The nobility will be starving for an alternative to Rhusana.”
Draga nodded slowly. “Jasimir can call fire to prove he’s a Phoenix, and we’ll arrest Rhusana for abducting and assaulting the crown prince, and throw in murder, treason, the standard. It’ll be quick, be public, and leave time for the real coronation to happen before the end of Phoenix Moon. I think we have a plan.”
There was a knock at the door. Fie snapped the glamours back into place, and Draga jumped. “Gods, that’s uncanny,” she muttered, then raised her voice. “Yes?”
The same war-witch as before opened the door. “Prince Jasimir is here. He requests a private word.”
The four of them exchanged glances. What did Tavin want with Draga?
Draga swallowed. “Very well. Cat-masters, take your leave. We will make another appointment for later.”
Jasimir crinkled the fish treats and the cats came running, dragging their leashes behind them. Fie picked Barf up again and glamoured her coat to pure black. No sense in risking Tavin recognizing the tabby.
Tavin was waiting in the hallway as they left, knotting his hands together, and he brushed past them without so much as a sideways squint. His escort of Hawks lingered outside Draga’s office, but they paid no mind, either.
The three of them were just passing the archives hall when a handful of people spilled into the courtyard. Some wore Sparrow servant uniforms, but others were in the violet robes of Owl clerks. All of them had one sleeve yanked up, flashing the Sinner’s Brand rash on their arms.
The squad of Hawks behind them seemed to be debating something. Fie caught “—her orders—” and “—no room left!”
“Then take them to the quarantine court for Splendid Castes!” the corporal commanded. “There has to be some room there.”
One pointed to the eastern gate. A curl of black smoke was rising; someone had kindled the plague beacon again.
“Thank the Mender,” one soldier muttered.
Then the beacon was doused in a puff of steam.
“This is absurd.” The soldier planted his spear butt in the ground. “These people aren’t sick and we can’t—”
“Enough! The last time someone spoke out against the queen, they left without a hand,” the corporal snapped, then realized they had an audience. “Move along, Sparrows. This isn’t your concern.”
The prince, the spy, and the only Crow in the palace traded looks. It was, in fact, very much their concern.
That didn’t mean there was aught they could do about it now.
“Of course, sir,” Khoda said, and hurried them away.
Behind them, Fie heard the squabble continue as the sinners huddled in the courtyard, wide-eyed and afraid.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CROWS IN THE GARDEN
In her dream, Fie walked the burning streets of Karostei, fire on every side. At her feet lay a long, long line of bodies: young, old, Sparrows, Owls, Hawks, Peacocks, Lakima, Khoda, Yula, Jasimir.
The line stretched far as she could see. All their eyes were open. All their eyes were on her.
“Mercy,” they whispered as one. The Sinner’s Brand climbed up their throats like strangling vines. “Give us mercy, Ambra.”
“That’s not my name,” Fie answered. “That’s not who I am!”
The fire roared around her, the sea roared below, they were falling into black, bottomless water and there was no way out—
Fie woke with a start. Barf leapt off her chest.
“Sorry,” she heard Khoda whisper. He eased himself back through the door of the guest quarters with a basket on one arm that was giving off a heavenly aroma. “It’s just me. No—scoot, Jasifur.”
“Mango,” Jasimir mumbled from the couch. The orange cat left off rubbing on Khoda’s ankles and went to go sniff the prince’s hand.
“You have terrible taste,” Khoda informed the cat. He set the basket on the table and opened the window drapes to let in drastically more sunlight than Fie expected.
Jasimir sat up and cringed. “Why in Ambra’s name—er. Why is it so bright out?”
“The sun’s been up for about three hours now,” Khoda answered. “But I figured you two could use the rest, and I could use the opportunity to get my rounds in without having to worry about you running off to assassinate the queen. And I’m afraid I got some … disturbing news.”
Fie rolled out of the bed and shambled over to the basket, where she found a heap of fresh panbread and stuffed rolls. “All of this mess has been disturbing.”
“The quarantine courts are empty,” Khoda said. “No sign of the sinners, no blood, not even a blanket. They’re all gone. And the queen’s only statement is that the situation has been addressed.”
After a moment, Fie shoved a roll in her face, then went back to bed.
“You’re right,” she said, spraying crumbs everywhere. “I hate it.”
“Can Viimo find them?” Jasimir suggested, helping himself to a roll.
Khoda shook his head. “She needs a possession to track the owner, and the Hawks are burning anything the sinners had with them in the palace. We can try to look if we have time, but … there are two days until Rhusana’s ball. We’d be better served focusing on what’s in our control.”
“You say that, but you won’t be the one to cut all those throats,” Fie said sharply. “How many do you think we’re up to now? Two score sinners?” Khoda’s nostrils flared, and she knew the count was higher. “Are the beacons even burning?”<
br />
“The last anyone saw the sinners, the only symptom was the Brand. I don’t like it either, but two days from now, Rhusana will be at her weakest, and that may very well be our only real chance to unseat her before it’s too late. After that we’ll have a new king, and no one will fight Jasimir on lighting beacons then.”
“I still think Fie should be queen,” Jasimir said abruptly.
Fie’s scathing retort died in her throat.
“I know—I know what you and Aunt Draga said, I heard it the first time.” Jas held up his hands. “But we can all see it, can’t we? The crows all over the palace, the, the half plague, the fact that the real reincarnation of Ambra is here now. The Covenant wants something.”
Khoda started tearing panbread into even strips, slow and methodical. “I didn’t want to bring this up in front of your aunt for obvious reasons, but there’s another … consideration. You’ll need an heir.”
Jasimir looked to Fie, nervous. “I’ve considered it. I meant what I said earlier. I could pardon Tavin, and—”
“We’ve been through this,” Khoda started.
Jasimir plowed on. “—and if he and Fie reconcile and decide to have children, I’ll name one to be my heir, and if not, we’ll find another way, but—”
Fie swallowed. Jasimir might be able to pardon Tavin, but even the softest parts of her had tried to forgive him for weeks and failed. It was one thing to near rut Tavin on her own grave; it was another to make him father of her child.
And that wasn’t the only issue. “It’s not enough for me to be queen,” Fie said. “Ambra swore to give up the crown.”
Khoda laughed in disbelief. “Hear that? It’s not enough to be queen! And pardoning Tavin will only give your enemies an alternative—”
“Rhusana is extorting him,” Jasimir insisted. “He said to her face he knew she’d kill him. Tavin only signed those orders because she was threatening to hurt Niemi.”
“But he still signed them,” Khoda said, cold.
Jasimir looked ready to throw a roll at him. Patpat slunk off the sofa to hide under the low table beside it. “He’s my brother.”
“We need to be consolidating your power, not dividing it,” Khoda snarled, “and you’d see that if you weren’t too busy trying to save a traitor.” He turned to Fie. “You tell me, Fie. How do you feel about raising a child with the man who—”
Something snapped in Fie. “I KNOW WHO HE IS!” she bellowed. Even Barf looked taken aback at the outburst.
Fie ran her hands through her hair, then reached for her slippers. “I’m going for a walk.”
“Take a cat and a badge,” Khoda said immediately.
“I’m just going to use a Sparrow witch-tooth.” She stood and headed for the door.
Fie heard the frown in Khoda’s voice. “I thought you only had three of those. You should save them for the ball.”
Fie sighed and leaned her head on the doorframe. “Well then, here’s one more sign the Covenant wants aught from us. I should’ve burned out the last one days ago. The sparks keep coming back. Can’t tell you why.”
She called the witch-tooth to life and slipped out.
By now Fie had committed enough of the palace to memory that she felt safe in the gardens, or as safe as she could feel on palace grounds. She saw crows in nigh every tree, but they only tilted their beaks as she passed, blinking curiously, chortling a croak or two in her wake. If they saw through the refuge the witch-tooth gave her, she couldn’t say.
Through the leaves she saw the Hall of the Dawn and the upraised hands of the Mother of the Dawn’s statue, holding the rising sun. Fie found herself walking toward it. Jasimir had sworn it marked a god-grave, and she could have sworn it marked no such thing. Endless riddles chased themselves through Fie’s skull now; she could at least lay one to rest.
It was easy enough to tell once she drew near. To either side swept the curving wings of the Divine Galleries, and from below them she felt the sleepy hum of god-graves. No such hum rumbled from below the statue.
Jasimir had suggested the grave might lie under the thrones. Fie rounded the pedestal and eyed the iridescent panes of glassblack making the back wall of the Hall of the Dawn. They were still streaked with dribbles of gold from when she’d melted their ugly golden sun sculpture, but from what she could tell, most of the wreckage had been cleared away in preparation for Rhusana’s ball. The twin thrones sat less than a pace behind the panes.
Fie picked her way over, even creeping into the hedge that bordered the wall, and held her breath.
She could feel not so much as a murmur.
Wherever the Mother of the Dawn was buried, it wasn’t here.
Fie’s puzzling was interrupted by rising screams from crows. She sank into the hedge on instinct, peering from between the leaves.
The cries grew louder, and a small parade came into view. Sparrows, Owl clerks, a few bewildered Hawks, all were marching toward one of the quarantine courts. Fie’s heart sank when she recognized a face: Ebrim was walking with them, shoulders slumped.
Then she recognized an indignant sputter. “This is simply unfathomable! When the queen hears of this, you—you’ll all be imprisoned for this outrage!”
Lord Dengor was prodded, blustering, into sight at spear-point. The Sinner’s Brand had framed his face like an elaborate collar.
The half plague, as Jasimir called it, had reached even the Peacocks.
“Look on the bright side,” one of his escorts said sardonically, “there’s plenty of room for you in the quarantine court now.”
Fie sat down hard and buried her face in her lap. She stayed that way even after the crows had gone quiet.
Khoda might think they could last two days more, but this … this was beyond Fie’s ken.
All of it was beyond her.
It was a terrible, welcome thing, that thought scurrying across her mind: it was too much. All of it was too much. It had been too much for weeks, maybe moons, maybe centuries.
She’d spent so much of the last few days dashing through sparks and lives and memories in teeth, and she’d seen hardship and pain, but not like this. She’d seen girls like her in Hawks and Gulls and Sparrows and Peacocks and Pigeons, in nigh every other caste. They were weaving crowns of grain and vine for the harvest dances. They were lying on the decks of their mothers’ boats, reading the stars. They were sneaking off to share sweets with sweethearts. They were cleaning their armor and trading stories from its stains by the fire.
They got to be young, and not careless, but not care-worn either. They got to measure the distance from girl to woman in years, not scars. It was such a simple thing to want for herself, for every Crow girl.
Yet here Fie was, hiding behind thrones, trying to call a Money Dance with the queen, with the boy who’d broken her heart, with the Covenant itself, simply to keep the Crows alive.
It was too much weight. She didn’t know how she was meant to carry it alone.
You think that’s how it works? Bawd’s voice echoed in her head from what felt like lifetimes ago. If you fall, we carry you.
Fie’s breath caught.
If you need us, we carry you.
She was a chief. And Pa had told her himself: chiefs couldn’t always wait for a call.
A crow alighted on the shoulder of the Mother of the Dawn to watch as Fie found the one tooth on her string that could not be replaced. She pulled it free, rolled it between her palms, called the spark.
And then she opened her hands and brought them close to her lips.
“Pa,” Fie said softly. “Can you hear me?”
* * *
The sun set, rose, set again. Rose again.
As it did, they planned. If any Hawks thought it strange how the master-general’s office had had such a terrible outbreak of mice, they kept it to themselves and let the cat-masters in.
As the sky wheeled through day and night, Fie let Niemi Navali szo Sakar stay in hiding, claiming a passing illness, while invitations to tea,
breakfast, salons, and more stacked up. Lord Dengor was not the only Peacock taken to the quarantine court. The rest were rabid for distraction.
And Tavin—she would not make herself face Tavin. Not until she had to.
As the sun rose each day, it was on darker and darker spires. Crows gathered thick as rumors, and every effort to scare them off was undone within an hour. The Hawks thrust spears into the trees only for the crows to return minutes later. The Hawks left poisoned meat, but they did not eat it. The Hawks displayed dead crows in the gardens as a warning. Even more crows gathered above, screaming their judgment.
The plague beacons lit, went out. Burned, smoked, went cold. Hawks kindled them on Draga’s orders and put them out on Rhusana’s, and with each hour, the strain between the two grew more palpable.
The sun set, rose, set, rose. Fie did not think on being Niemi if she could help it. She did not think on Tavin. She did not think on becoming Jasimir’s queen.
Instead, she worked on her teeth, knotting them into a collar, a bracelet, an armband, earrings. She worked at her base gown so she could carry her swords, and so her Phoenix teeth could be stashed in a satchel hidden beneath a draping cape. A glamour would turn the teeth into gold, the satchel into sashes, the swords into the ends of a jeweled belt, the base gown’s linen into finest silk.
And in the middle of the afternoon, one week before Swan Moon, Fie donned Niemi Navali szo Sakar’s face for the final time, and went to a ball.
* * *
Queen Rhusana had elected to precede the ball with a reception in the Tower of Memories, a broad, graceful tower adjoining the Hall of the Dawn. It would have made sense in a colder time of year; the tower was practically a monument to the Phoenixes, stuffed with sculptures of great conquerors, treasures they had claimed, armor they’d worn into battle, sprawling vivid murals of their triumphs, and on and on.
But at midsummer, even with every window screen thrown open, the late afternoon was sweltering simply from the glut of bodies. Not even chilled wine cut the misery of the gentry crammed into the tower.
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