The Kraken King Part VII: The Kraken King and the Empress?s Eyes (A Novel of the Iron Seas)

by Meljean Brook

  His clever wife, redirecting an answer to remind them all why Ariq and she were here to begin with. But Lady Nagamochi would not be so easily diverted.

  “Yet you knew your husband was reading it. That he was reading it even as he crossed through the gate at the Red Wall. You didn’t warn him?”

  Lady Nagamochi had been watching them even then? Beside him, Zenobia stiffened. By the stillness of her face, Ariq thought that the same realization must be racing through her mind—that it was probably not all the captain of the guard knew, and the understanding of how easy it would be for Lady Nagamochi to catch them in a lie.

  Ariq didn’t intend to lie. But to protect herself, Zenobia often did.

  Now she didn’t attempt to. “It didn’t occur to me,” she admitted.

  Lady Nagamochi’s gaze remained sharp, as if pinning Zenobia at the end of a blade. “I suppose that even if you had told him of the ban, your rebel of a husband would have disregarded it. But why did it not concern you? Her majesty is the heavenly sovereign. Are you so disdainful of her laws?”

  “No.”

  “Yet you disregarded them. Do you think the ban is foolish?”

  Zenobia’s grip became a vise. “I suppose that I find it difficult to imagine the story as seditious because I know too well the origin. It was only an adventure based upon the travels of my brother and his wife. So when I saw my husband reading them, I didn’t think of how they might be illegal. I only worried about whether he enjoyed the story.”

  “I did,” Ariq said. Especially the end.

  “As did many others.” Her posture easing slightly, Lady Nagamochi seemed to soften with amusement, but Ariq knew an iron heart and steel will when he saw them. The captain of the guard might feel that amusement, and might even be predisposed to like his wife. But she had a purpose here and she would see it though. “One of her majesty’s attendants was the first to bring your work to the attention of other women within the palace. You have a devoted following among the ladies there—especially after a woman began to lead the adventures. But her majesty only read them after the grumblings from the ministers began, because she wanted to judge for herself whether they posed any danger.”

  Zenobia frowned. “What danger?”

  “Among those who would create disorder, this story is being read as a call to arms.”

  “It isn’t.”

  “Perhaps that is not the intention. But who can control how someone reads a tale?” The other woman’s hands lifted and spread as if to say What can one do? before folding to her lap again. “They read into it what they want to read. You presented a tyrant who destroyed anyone who didn’t conform to his customs. There are those who would say the same of her majesty, but they would not dare speak of an overthrow. Yet your story spoke of it quite loudly and motivated them. Any other story might have done the same. Yours was simply the one that arrived at a critical time, when the discontent over halting the war with the Golden Empire and the opening of the Red Wall was at its sharpest. Now tell me what you are thinking, Governor.”

  He was thinking that Zenobia’s story had arrived at the right time. “That any answer I give couldn’t be read any differently than how I intended it, so I should be silent.”

  Lady Nagamochi smiled slightly. “And what if I told you that the nobles are stirring most of the discontent? You have encountered many of them. Now you are not so sympathetic to their cause, I think.”

  Ariq wasn’t, but he didn’t say so. He didn’t need to.

  “Yes, you are as easy to read as this tale,” she said. “I see why it appealed to you. Some call you barbarian and rebel, as if you are a warrior adrift without a master—and I think it is true that you do not have any loyalty to your superiors. But you are loyal to your people, just as, in the story, Lady Lynx is loyal to no one but her crew and the people she helps. It is the same.”

  Maybe it was. “So it wouldn’t appeal to you?”

  Her smile sharpened. “It did, though for different reasons. If I compare Lady Lynx to myself, I find her situation pitiable, for I am nothing when I do not serve her majesty. Yet if I read Lady Lynx as an empress . . . ? There is more of interest to me. She keeps absolute order aboard her airship, protects her crew and her friends, and destroys everyone who would harm them. That is a woman to be admired.”

  “Some airship captains inspire mutinies,” Zenobia said softly.

  “Yes. But not if that captain is well respected. Then even her most difficult decisions and commands are respected, as well, even if they are not to the crew’s liking.” All pretense of ease dropped away from Lady Nagamochi’s posture. “That is what I need to know now. Madame Fox, I believe that you meant no disrespect to her majesty with your writings. Did you?”

  “Of course not. I didn’t think of her at all.”

  Ariq stiffened. Though obviously unintentional, that was disrespect of another sort, but Lady Nagamochi didn’t pursue it.

  She looked to him. “And you, Lord Rebel? Will you show her majesty any disrespect?”

  “Is disagreement considered disrespect?”

  “It is not.”

  “Then I’ll trust she understands that I serve my people as best I can. I understand that she is serving hers, as well—and that we might not agree on what is best. At this moment, her fleet is threatening my people.”

  “As response to a threat against hers.”

  “But that response doesn’t serve Nippon. It only serves the interests of Ghazan Bator and Admiral Tatsukawa.”

  “So you have claimed,” Lady Nagamochi said. “If her majesty hears you out, know that her decisions might not be to your liking.”

  “And my decisions might not be to her liking,” Ariq said. He knew they wouldn’t be. “But they will not be made out of disrespect.”

  She studied him for a long moment before signaling to one of the nearby guards. “We will prepare for her arrival, then.”

  Her arrival? Dregs and hell. He had begun to assume that they would be taken to the palace instead. Yet she was coming here and, clothed as he was, Ariq would show disrespect. “I will prepare, as well.”

  Amused again, Lady Nagamochi nodded before looking to Zenobia, whose expression was both stunned and disbelieving. “And I will inform your wife of the expected etiquette.”

  The etiquette of a khagan’s palace was not the same as the etiquette in front of an empress, so Ariq listened to the instructions from behind the screen as he dressed. Do not approach the empress or presume to look her in the eyes. Speak only when spoken to, and never directly to the empress, only to Lady Nagamochi. Show the deepest humility.

  He would. But beneath the calm his dread was rising. This didn’t make sense. Why would the empress come here? And no matter how polite Lady Nagamochi had been, this was still an ambush—though he suspected that the first arrows hadn’t yet been loosed. He needed to make certain Zenobia was safe when they were.

  Finished dressing, he emerged from behind the screen. An airship hovered silently outside the balcony. A silk cloth created a path from the balcony to a red dais that had been placed in the center of the chamber. Upon the platform sat a gold throne softened with red cushions.

  Guards flanked either side of the path. Farther back, Lady Nagamochi stood with Zenobia. “Governor. We await the heavenly sovereign.”

  He went to Zenobia’s side and took her hand. Though tension still held her in a stiff grip, her palm was warm and dry now; the clammy fear had receded. He saw her gaze shoot to the notebook abandoned on the table. This time, he could not get it for her. Scribbling notes while the empress entered would not be showing the proper humility.

  She caught his glance toward her notebook. Her lips pressed together, as if to hold back a smile—perhaps imagining herself scribbling, too. Then her smile faded, her jade gaze became earnest, and beneath the echoing announcement of the empress’s entrance, she murmured, “I was coming to find you.”

  After he’d left her in anger. None of that mattered now. He sque
ezed her hand, then they bowed with the others, and over the rustle of cloth came a faint click. And another.

  Not the device by the balcony. Not the empress’s shoes. The empress herself.

  He saw Zenobia’s startled glance upward before she caught herself and lowered her gaze again. Ariq didn’t need to look—and he should have realized what was coming. Of course the real empress wouldn’t risk her safety by visiting this tower or deign to meet with them in person.

  An automaton.

  But they would not be bowing to a mere machine—the most finely wrought duplicate that he’d ever seen. The long black hair looped and styled beneath an intricate headdress was undoubtedly real. Embroidered silk robes hid the machine’s body and long sleeves covered its hands. If the automaton’s back had been turned toward Ariq, he wouldn’t have been able to decide whether it was machine or human. But the face, though perfectly sculpted and painted, was too still to be real and too fine to be a mask, and the eyes didn’t resemble a human’s. Unmoving and blank, they stared sightlessly, as if dark glass orbs had been inserted into the sockets.

  With a series of ratcheting clicks, the machine pivoted on the dais and sat on the throne. A deep hum emerged from beneath the automaton’s heavy robes—or from the chair beneath it. The eyes filled with sudden flickering light, as if a snowstorm had been trapped within its metal skull.

  The lips parted slightly and a feminine voice projected from its mouth, vibrating as if spoken down a long, tin tunnel. “You may proceed, Captain.”

  Beside him, Zenobia’s entire body seemed to jolt in astonishment before she stilled again, quivering. Ariq was not so surprised. He hadn’t seen a device like the automaton before, but he’d heard speculation that the same radio signals the Khagan used to control populations in the labor colonies by influencing the nanoagent machines in their blood might also be used to communicate over long distances and influence larger machines. Apparently the Nipponese scientists had found a way to link an automaton to another device in the empress’s palace.

  “With your permission, your majesty.” Lady Nagamochi’s bow deepened before she rose. “The writer, Madame Fox, has promised that no disrespect was intended with her story.”

  “As we suspected. And her new tale?”

  “Is only partially complete and follows the adventures of a tinker, your majesty.”

  “Will this tinker also overthrow a king?”

  And what if the tinker did? Ariq’s jaw clenched and he glanced at Zenobia, who looked back at him with her brow furrowed in confusion. She hadn’t understood a word, he realized. The empress and Lady Nagamochi had been speaking in Nipponese.

  Now the captain of the guard addressed Zenobia in French, repeating the empress’s question.

  His wife frowned a little, then said, “I originally intended to write that ending, but I’ve written it too many times before.”

  “So what will the new ending be?” Lady Nagamochi pressed.

  A spark of irritation lit Zenobia’s jade eyes. She suppressed it before answering, “The ruler is a young man with good intentions, but is surrounded by nobles who serve their own interests and seek to manipulate him, and who have dragged his kingdom to the brink of ruin. While in disguise as a commoner, he will befriend the tinker, and together they will destroy the corruption surrounding the throne.”

  An even more fantastical tale than her previous ones. Ariq bent his head to hide his grin as Lady Nagamochi translated her response for the empress. Zenobia’s gaze caught his, her eyes flashing fire again.

  Yes, he laughed at her. He’d never known anyone so sensible and so utterly fanciful all at once.

  So practical that she planned for every eventuality, such as raising a child alone. And yet Ariq could shatter her heart by saying he would let her go.

  By the eternal blue heavens, how he loved her.

  The empress’s tinny, echoing voice filled the chamber again. “I see no danger in that ending as described. When it is finished, we will determine whether the story is acceptable. Until then, she may proceed with her writing.”

  Zenobia nodded when Lady Nagamochi translated, but by the tautness of her lips and the narrowed set of her eyes, Ariq thought his wife must be biting her tongue—probably stopping herself from saying that she would write and publish it with or without the empress’s approval.

  “Continue to the other matter, Captain,” the empress said.

  Lady Nagamochi looked to Ariq. “Admiral Tatsukawa has been a loyal friend to her majesty and to her majesty’s mother. The accusations you have made against the admiral are disturbing. You claim that he facilitated the marauders’ attacks on several airships, including passenger ferries and a French naval vessel. You also claim that he abducted you from the home of the French ambassador.”

  So the real battle had now begun—his word against Tatsukawa’s reputation. “That is what happened,” he said.

  “You claim that the admiral intends to reignite a war with the Golden Empire against her majesty’s wishes, and that he has allied himself with Ghazan Bator to that end.”

  “Not to reignite a war. The admiral said his purpose was to destroy the Khagan before the Golden Empire could strike against Nippon again.”

  “But the attempt would reignite a war.”

  “Most likely.” Not a prolonged war. The rebellion had leeched the Khagan’s strength and power. But still, many would die. Ariq hoped that the empress wanted to avoid that as much as he did.

  “You also claim that the marauders’ attacks on the western shores were orchestrated to direct her majesty’s attention there.”

  “Yes.”

  “To what purpose? Sending a fleet to the western shore is not an attack against the Khagan. What does he hope to gain?”

  So they’d come to it. Ariq hadn’t mentioned the Skybreaker in his talks with the ambassador and the nobles. Too many of them had only been concerned with their own interests. He hadn’t wanted their interests to turn toward the machine.

  He could lie now. But he suspected the empress and Lady Nagamochi already knew of the Skybreaker’s existence. There was no other reason to take this route of ambush. If the empress believed him, she would withdraw her fleet. If she didn’t, she wouldn’t. There would be no negotiation, only an interview. But if the empress wanted the Skybreaker, she would come in as she had, with the clear upper hand—and the power to make him give it to her.

  “The admiral hoped to gain a war machine,” Ariq said. “He and Ghazan Bator believe that if my town is under imminent attack, I will reveal its location to them.”

  Lady Nagamochi’s gaze flicked to Zenobia. His wife had been watching them, listening silently though she couldn’t understand the language.

  “Only if your town is threatened?” the captain of the guard echoed softly.

  “The admiral and the general held my wife for ransom, as well,” Ariq said, “yet I didn’t give up the location.”

  “They just held her?”

  Rage from the mere suggestion of doing more to Zenobia threatened to burst through his calm. With effort, he banked the anger. He couldn’t let his response be mistaken for bluster. “They knew that if she was harmed, my cooperation would end and I would do everything in my power to destroy them, even if it meant my own death.”

  A narrowing of her eyes said that the captain of the guard understood his message perfectly. “Where is this war machine?”

  “Hidden,” he said. “And that is where it will stay.”

  Lady Nagamochi looked to his wife and asked in French, “Do you know the location of the war machine?”

  Zenobia’s lips parted. Eyes widening, as if in realization of what he and Lady Nagamochi had been discussing, she glanced at Ariq. “I don’t. I didn’t want to know, so that I couldn’t be forced to tell.”

  Her gaze held his as the captain of the guard relayed her answer to the empress. He read the question in her jade eyes. Were they in danger?

  They were. But he wouldn’t see her
frightened. Not yet. He shook his head.

  From the automaton’s throne, the empress spoke again. “You are aware of my objectives, Captain. Do what you must to come to an agreement with the governor, but know that the ladies of my court now anticipate the tinker’s story.”

  Relief opened up within Ariq’s chest. Zenobia would be safe for now. His wife’s stories had found favor in the palace and they wouldn’t hurt her unless all other negotiations failed.

  Lady Nagamochi bowed. “As you command, your majesty.”

  The shimmering light behind the automaton’s eyes went dark and its mouth closed. The deep hum from beneath its robes quieted, leaving the chamber in sudden silence.

  “Governor,” the captain said softly in Nipponese, “do you want your wife to take part in our discussion?”

  “No.” He wanted Zenobia as far from this chamber as possible. “Let me speak with her alone for a moment.”

  That Lady Nagamochi so easily agreed told Ariq what he would see even before he led Zenobia out to the balcony. Three imperial gunships hovered around the tower. Submersibles floated in the ocean below, their copper hulls visible through the clear turquoise water. The captain of the guard had cut off every avenue of escape—and she wanted him to know it.

  Zenobia recognized the implications, too. With her arms tightly folded over her chest and her face pinched by worry, she asked, “They want the Skybreaker?”

  “Yes,” Ariq said.

  “Will you give it to them?”

  “No. I’ll offer a compromise.” Though he didn’t believe they would take it. The empress had her objectives, and Lady Nagamochi would only accept one conclusion: fulfilling those objectives. “But it will take time and I prefer that you are in another chamber.”

  She frowned at him. “Why?”

  “For the same reason I wanted you to stay at the embassy after I left.” Because she might be used as a weapon against him. They would use her, eventually. But if she was with him in the chambers, a weapon in plain sight, they might resort to that option more quickly.

  Though obviously unhappy, she must have understood his reasons. She nodded and looked to the hovering gunships. “You are due at the embassy soon.”