Wrath of Empire

by Brian McClellan

  He gave her one last long look and then headed back to camp.

  CHAPTER 49

  Michel was unable to stop thinking about how Ichtracia had the softest, most comfortable sheets he’d ever touched in his life.

  He lay in her bed, staring at the ceiling, watching the late-morning light slowly inch across while he tried to focus on the Blackhats. Where was je Tura hiding? How had he arrested so many Blackhats without a single soul knowing where to find that asshole? How did je Tura keep conducting these bombings?

  The questions kept running through his head, but he kept coming back to Ichtracia’s sheets. She said they were some sort of rare silk from Dynize. Michel had slept on silk sheets once or twice, and he didn’t remember them feeling anything like this. Even when he rubbed them between his fingers, it was like touching gossamer—ethereal, lacking any kind of substance. Like sleeping on the steam from a kettle in that split second after it had cooled enough to touch but before it had evaporated.

  He glanced over at Ichtracia. She, apparently, had no problem sleeping until noon. She was still snoring softly, her face looking peaceful and pleased in that way of a child dreaming of something nice. She was, he’d decided, a genuinely pleasant person who happened to be a Privileged. Maybe not a good person. She spoke of killing and torture with the offhanded manner of someone who is well acquainted with both. But she was quietly charming in a way that almost made Michel forget about the pair of runed gloves in her breast pocket or next to the bed.

  Michel slipped out of bed and headed to the window to watch the afternoon traffic. “You’re letting yourself get distracted because you can’t find the girl,” he muttered to himself, glancing over his shoulder at Ichtracia’s sleeping form.

  “I’m protecting myself,” he answered.

  “And damn well enjoying it in the meantime.”

  “I can mix work and play,” he insisted under his breath. “I’ve done it before.”

  “Not when there was this much on the line. You went off the road the moment you decided that punching Forgula in public was a good idea. You’ve become too exposed here—too known.”

  Michel sucked on his teeth, trying to come up with a rebuttal to his own accusations. Nothing came to mind. Back when he worked his way up through the Blackhats as an informant, he’d gone deep into enemy territory by joining separatist movements and rubbing shoulders with propagandists and gangs. He’d never infiltrated a damned government.

  “Yes, you have.” He laughed at himself quietly. “You’re confusing Blackhat Michel with real Michel again. Your whole damn life is an infiltration. Do you think that the Dynize are any more dangerous than the Blackhats?” He briefly considered Taniel’s warnings about the bone-eyes, but his thoughts were broken by a soft moan behind him.

  He turned to find Ichtracia stretching languidly, giving him that cat-in-a-sunbeam smile that she seemed to use so often.

  “What are you muttering about over there?” she asked.

  “Work,” he answered truthfully. He continued. “I’m trying to figure out where je Tura has gone.”

  “You’re very focused.”

  “It’s my job. I’m not allowed to not think about these things.”

  Ichtracia sat up, the sheets pooling around her stomach. She reached into the drawer of her nightstand and produced a mala pipe, lighting it expertly with a match and taking a long drag before holding it toward him.

  “This early in the day?” he asked.

  She let smoke curl out her nostrils. “One advantage to being a tool of the state is that I don’t think about work. Once in a while I am pointed at something that needs to be destroyed or people who need to die and …” She made a “poof” gesture with one hand, then took another drag of the mala and set the pipe aside. Her tone was careless, but Michel thought he saw a tightness in the corner of her eyes.

  “I’m taking your advice to heart,” Michel said. “I’m going to ignore Sedial and focus on making myself useful to your government.”

  “Our government,” Ichtracia corrected. “Or have you already forgotten your place, Devin-Michel?”

  “Our government,” Michel agreed. “Sorry, it takes some getting used to.”

  Ichtracia watched him with a soft smile, eyes half-lidded, and for a moment Michel harbored a fear that she could see through him into his secrets—that she’d caught all his tiny verbal mistakes and considered ulterior motives and already suspected him of being something more than either a Blackhat or a turncoat.

  Ichtracia patted the bed beside her, and Michel took two involuntary steps forward before his ears caught the sound of a carriage coming to a stop in front of the townhouse. He backpedaled to the window and looked down to find a carriage with the red and black curtains of a Dynize dignitary. There were a dozen soldiers on horseback surrounding the carriage, and it didn’t take long for Michel to find out why: A footman opened the door, and Ka-Sedial stepped out, knuckling his back while the footman ran to Ichtracia’s door.

  “Ka-Sedial is here,” Michel warned, just two seconds before there was a hammering down below them.

  “Shit.” Ichtracia stashed the mala pipe and leapt from bed, snatching a silk robe from the floor. She threw it over her shoulders as she joined him at the window, looking down on her grandfather, and Michel was surprised to hear real venom in her voice. “I sent the damned servants away so I could enjoy you.” The pounding continued, and she swore again. “Stay here, and don’t you dare get dressed.”

  Barefoot and in just a robe, Ichtracia ran from the room. Michel listened to her footsteps down the hall and then the stairs. A moment later, he heard the door open underneath the bedroom.

  He pressed himself against the wall, watching the group in the street outside. Sedial’s bodyguard remained in their saddles while the footman returned to Sedial and gave a half bow. Sedial seemed to hesitate, and Michel couldn’t help but think that if he had a rifle in hand, he could do more damage to the Dynize with a single bullet from this angle than all the work he could possibly do for Taniel for the rest of his life.

  To his surprise, a second carriage pulled up behind Ka-Sedial’s. There were no bodyguards, but Sedial gestured to the carriage as if it was expected. A Palo woman emerged, perhaps nineteen or twenty, and joined Sedial in the street. Taking her arm, cane in the other hand, Sedial walked toward Ichtracia’s door.

  Curious, Michel slipped on his pants and crept into the hallway, eyeballing the distance between the joists beneath the floorboards in an effort to avoid the creakiest parts of the floor. He could hear Sedial and Ichtracia speaking, but it wasn’t until he was nearly at the top of the stairs that he could hear their conversation well. They spoke in quick-fire Dynize, making it a little hard for Michel to follow.

  “… not to come here yourself. If you want me, send someone for me,” Ichtracia was saying.

  Sedial’s voice was a little quieter, but there was a tone of irritated dismissal in his tone that sounded nothing like his public persona. “I’ll visit you whenever I want. Are you worried I’ll walk in on you with whatever slut you’re riding lately?”

  Michel nearly gasped at the strength of the language—he couldn’t imagine anyone speaking that way to a Privileged.

  Sedial continued. “There’s no one here now, is there?”

  “No, there’s no one here,” Ichtracia spat at her grandfather. “You’re the one that’s brought a stranger into my home. Who is this?”

  Michel heard someone pacing. It was too slow and deliberate to be Ichtracia, and the sudden rap of a cane punctuated the footsteps. “I’m hearing rumors, Ichtracia, that you’ve taken in that Blackhat spy. I’ll give you one chance to deny them, and all will be forgiven.”

  “Forgiven?” Ichtracia mocked. “You have absolutely no say over who I take into my bed.”

  “I do when they’re enemy spies.”

  “He is a member of Yaret’s Household.”

  “Even worse.”

  Ichtracia continued as if Sedia
l hadn’t interjected. “He’s handed most of the city’s Blackhats over to us in a matter of weeks.”

  “He forced one of my people to commit suicide in public. Forgula was valuable to me.”

  Ichtracia barked a laugh, and Michel briefly entertained himself by imagining Sedial’s face at being mocked openly. “You’re pissed because he outmaneuvered her. Forgula was a bitch, and it was cathartic to finally see her get her dues.” Ichtracia paused briefly, lowering her voice. “You were using enemies of the state to destroy your enemies within the state. You would execute anyone else for trying to do the same.”

  “My enemies weaken the state,” Sedial growled, rapping the floor again with his cane. “Clumsy, foolish ministers like Yaret slow down our progress here.”

  “Ministers like Yaret keep the state together.”

  “I am the state!”

  Michel was once again surprised to hear something like that so boldly stated, but he’d begun to get the impression that this conversation was a continuation of many more just like it. He heard Ichtracia give an angry sigh. “You’re an old man hoping to leave a legacy of something other than blood before death finally claims you.”

  “You speak as if a legacy of blood is a bad one.” There was a long silence, and Sedial continued in a softer tone. “I didn’t come here to fight.”

  “Then what did you come for?” Ichtracia demanded.

  “I came to tell you that you’re needed down south. We have every Privileged in the city working on the stone, and they’ve made very little progress. Your help is sorely needed.”

  Michel shifted a half step closer to the stairs, listening carefully as the voices lost some of their heat. Ichtracia replied to her grandfather after a moment’s hesitation. “I have told you before, I will not go near that thing.”

  “Even if I give you an order?”

  “You are not the emperor, and the emperor made it very clear that I would not be forced to touch the godstone unless it was absolutely vital.”

  “It is vital.”

  There was another long pause, and Ichtracia laughed again. It was a bitter, venom-filled sound. “You can’t undo what she did, can you?” Sedial did not answer, so she continued. “You have no idea how delicious that is,” she said.

  “Watch your tongue.”

  “Or what, you’ll pack me off to be tortured? I know what pain is, you old lizard. I’ve had to stand next to you for more than ten minutes at a time, haven’t I?”

  Michel lay his head against the wall, eyes wide, wondering if Ichtracia had gotten so angry that she forgot Michel was up here. Surely she had to know he’d be listening? Even if he’d stayed in her room, he would have heard some of this.

  Sedial took a measured breath and finally responded. “We will undo her sabotage. It’ll take time, admittedly, but she is not as powerful as she thinks. Her sorcery is fumbling and amateurish, and when I catch her, I will teach her exactly what a bone-eye is capable of.”

  “Good luck with that.” Ichtracia’s tone told Michel that she wished Sedial anything but luck.

  Another measured breath, taken with the long-suffering air of a man enduring untold indignity. “It doesn’t have to be like this,” Sedial said.

  “Doesn’t it?”

  “No. You know I love you. You know I’d do anything for my Mara.”

  Michel felt every muscle in his body tense at the name. His breathing came short, and he tried to think. It was a name, he was certain. Wasn’t it? A pet name? A reference to something else? It was the first time he’d heard the word used in any way in the Dynize language, and he wondered if perhaps he had just misheard a similar word.

  Sedial continued. “I brought you a present, just like I did when you were a little girl.”

  Ichtracia snorted, and Michel suddenly remembered the beautiful young woman still standing down there in the room with them. “What is she, a slave?”

  “Slave? No, we don’t have slaves in the empire anymore.”

  “Then why would she be here by her own will? Surely she’s figuring out right about now that you wouldn’t allow her to live after listening to a conversation like this. Unless she’s one of your spies, of course.”

  “Oh, come now. I didn’t purchase her. I purchased the enormous debt that she owes some very bad people down in Greenfire Depths. She has agreed to be your plaything for as long as you want her around, after which you may send her back to the Depths or set her free or whatever you please. She is just your type, isn’t she?”

  “You think I want a plaything? How old do you think I am?”

  “You always want a plaything. You’ve gone through dozens over the last few years. This one isn’t allowed to talk back to you. I thought you’d find that quite satisfactory.”

  “What’s the catch?” Ichtracia sounded like she was considering this offer, and Michel couldn’t quite suppress his horror.

  “Must there be a catch?”

  “I know you better than anyone, you old lizard.”

  Sedial gave the amused harrumph of any elderly relative dealing with a difficult child. “Get rid of the Blackhat. Keep this girl as a gift, and I won’t force you to go help with the godstone.”

  There was another long pause, this one nearly a minute, and Michel could hear someone walking around. He imagined Ichtracia doing a circuit around the “offered” woman, examining her like a man might examine a new horse. Ichtracia sniffed. “Do you want me to kill him?”

  Michel’s blood ran cold.

  “I should make you do it yourself for being such a petulant little bitch. But no. Send him back to Yaret. I’ll deal with him myself in time, but until then I don’t need you mocking me by parading him around on your arm at the clubs and games.”

  “I’ll consider it.”

  “You’ll take it.”

  “Until you are my emperor—may all the heavens prevent that from ever happening—I will not follow your orders. I will consider this offer of yours.”

  “Give me an answer soon.”

  “Leave the girl.”

  Michel imagined the two staring angrily at each other until Sedial suddenly rapped on the floor twice with his cane and left through the front door with a stride that seemed far too strong for a man of his age. Michel waited for just a moment before turning to creep back toward the room. He was stopped by the sound of a sigh.

  “Can you talk?” he heard Ichtracia ask.

  A frightened voice answered in Palo. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Is what he said true? Did he buy your debt?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “That goddamn pig. Don’t flinch away. I’m not going to take you to bed or kill you. Do you know where the army camps are to the west of the city?”

  “I do, ma’am.”

  “Take this note to the guards at the camp of the Falcon Third Regiment. There is a man there named Devin-Cathetin, who I trust. He’ll give you a job. Nothing you don’t want to do, hear me? Go directly there, and don’t use any of the carriages in the city, and don’t go back to Sedial. I suggest you change your name and forget your friends and family if you don’t want to end up dead. You can leave by the back door. Go!”

  Footsteps fled down the hallway beneath Michel, and he heard the back door open and close. In the sitting room below him, Ichtracia dropped into a chair with a sigh. He slowly backed away from the stairs, heading back to the bedroom, where he found his shirt and boots and quickly began getting dressed.

  He wanted to ask Ichtracia a thousand questions, but two burning bits of information kept his heart racing in a near panic: Would she put him out to please her grandfather, and was she this Mara person whom he’d been looking for this whole time?

  He finished lacing his boots and looked up, only to find Ichtracia standing in the doorway with one arm up on the door, her robe open, another hand on her hip. Her eyes were puffy and red, her mouth turned down at the corners. Michel got to his feet and took a step toward her nightstand, with the Privileged’s gloves sit
ting on them, wondering if she’d come up here to take her anger out on him.

  “How much did you overhear?”

  “Some,” Michel said as innocuously as possible. “It was quite loud.”

  Ichtracia sniffed. “You were eavesdropping.” She walked past him quickly, but instead of her gloves she retrieved her mala pipe and flung it at the far wall. It shattered, sending bits of glass, ash, and mala across the room. “You’re a damned spy. If you weren’t listening from the top of the stairs, I would think less of you. Well, out with it! What do you want to ask? Am I going to turn you inside out and hand you to Sedial?” She scoffed and crossed to the window, where she glared out into the street as if to be sure Sedial was gone. “Do you want to ask why I hate him? Come, I can see the damned question on your lips.”

  Michel tried to work some moisture back into his mouth. “Who is Mara?”

  “What?” Ichtracia blinked at him, looking genuinely confused. Perhaps he had misheard the word. His inexperience with the language had defeated him, and now he’d asked a question that could arouse her suspicion. Too damn late now.

  “Who is Mara?” he asked again. “I heard Sedial say the name.”

  Ichtracia still seemed baffled. This was certainly not the question she’d expected him to voice. “It’s not a name.” Michel’s mind began to turn faster, trying to fit pieces into place in the hope that this new information might help him find Taniel’s informant. Until Ichtracia continued. “It’s not exactly a name. I’m Mara. It’s an old word—a pet name that Sedial has used for me since I was a little girl.”

  Michel began to pace immediately, the near panic of earlier blowing into a full panic now. She was Mara. The goddamned nickname of a Privileged, and Taniel hadn’t thought that either of those bits of information were important? Did he think that leaving out the Privileged bit was the only way to convince Michel to take the job? That otherwise Michel would have gotten out of the city as fast as his feet could carry him?