Ally of the Crown

by Melissa McShane

  11

  When the moon finally rose, Fiona removed her bright robe and turned off the lamp. She crept down the hall in the darkness, feeling her way to the stairwell. Moonlight illuminated it faintly, enough to keep her from tripping and rolling all the way to the bottom, which would hurt and leave her in an embarrassing position if she broke something. She heard nothing, sensed nothing but the smell of cold stone and, as she descended, the tang of garlic and tomatoes from supper.

  The door to the eating hall was ajar. Fiona pushed it open slowly and slipped inside. A bluish glow from near the ceiling revealed tiny windows she hadn’t noticed before. Moonlight barely illuminated the tables, which looked even more like funeral biers in the gloom.

  A shadow detached itself from the wall and came toward her. “Miss Cooper?”

  “Sebastian,” Fiona said, feeling unexpectedly relieved at the sound of his voice. “Were you waiting long?”

  “Not very.” Sebastian still wasn’t more than a shadow, even right next to her, a shadow with gleaming teeth and eyes. “They shut everything down a few hours after sunset, and the priestesses go into the temple for prayers. This is as safe a room as any to meet, but we probably shouldn’t take too long. How was your day? The other attendants, the ones who’ve been here before, say everyone has visions, but I couldn’t tell if that was true or metaphor.”

  “They give you a drug that induces visions, yes. But I don’t know what it means.”

  “Does it have to mean something? It can’t be real if it’s drug-induced.”

  Sometimes your mind can tell you truths the waking world can’t manage. “I’m not sure it matters. What about you?”

  “Complete waste of the day. They put us to work cleaning and doing laundry and preparing food because all their regular servants are busy preparing for the Election, which happens a couple of weeks after the festival. We never got a chance to go into the Jaixante.”

  “What did you intend to do?”

  “The foreign trade ministry has offices in the Jaixante. I’d planned to say you needed something Tremontanan, something they might reasonably have imported, and go there to collect it. That probably wouldn’t gain me access to Gizane’s private rooms, but it would tell me where to look when Holt and I make the actual snatch later. But it doesn’t look like I’m going to get the chance.”

  “So you need a different plan.”

  “I do.”

  The doors of the Jaixante are open to you. “Maybe I can go,” Fiona said.

  “I doubt it. You’re watched even more closely than we are. No, Holt and I will have to sneak out later tonight and hope we aren’t caught and hung up by our ears, or whatever it is Veriboldans do to sneak thieves.”

  “It’s too dangerous. And I have a better idea.” It was coming to her slowly, like the rising tide. “Tomorrow we’re meant to meditate on our visions. We each have these jade pendants to use in our meditations. Suppose I tell them my vision specifically showed me something different I need to focus on? Something Tremontanan? I can ask them to send you to find it, and you can go to Gizane’s offices to get it.”

  “Like what?” Sebastian sounded skeptical.

  “A watch. A Tremontanan Device. Veribold doesn’t make their own Devices, and their watches are all mechanical. The only place in the Jaixante likely to have watch Devices is the foreign trade office. That should get you in the door, at least.”

  “What if one of these priestesses has one?”

  “Then we’ll have to make a different plan. I know it’s a stretch, but it’s no more foolish than you and Holt sneaking in with no idea of where you’re going.”

  “It’s a measure of how desperate I am that I’m willing to try it.” Sebastian sighed. “This was always a fool’s errand. I’m sorry I dragged you into it.”

  “Hardly that. I volunteered, remember?”

  “You did.” He favored her with his sardonic smile. “So I’m not the only fool.”

  “I don’t know that it’s foolishness to want to protect your family, even if you don’t like your brother much.”

  “Sometimes I wonder if he’s worth protecting. But I suppose it’s really the rest of the family I’m doing this for. Typical of D—of my brother, that he’d get himself into trouble that will spill over onto the rest of us.”

  He was smiling, but his hazel eyes were dark and serious. Fiona said, “Was it that bad, what he did?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t actually know what hold the blackmailer has on him. Just that she’s slowly bankrupting my parents on his behalf, and at some point, when the money’s gone, she’ll reveal all.”

  “Then why don’t they call her bluff now? At least then they’d still have something.”

  “I’m told that’s impossible. My older brother pretends none of it is happening, my younger brother acts like he’s done nothing wrong…they’re both stupid in their own special way.”

  “So how did you end up the way you are?”

  Sebastian chuckled. “Stubborn, secretive, and independent?”

  “The kind of man who’d risk his freedom for the sake of people who don’t respect him.”

  “Meaning the Veriboldans are likely to lock me up if I’m caught pilfering their most important city? You have a knack for turning a reprimand into a compliment, Miss Cooper.”

  “Fiona,” Fiona said. “I think you should call me Fiona. Since we’re likely to be locked up together.”

  He smiled. “I certainly hope so. I’ll want your perspective on the proceedings when we’re hauled up in front of whatever Veriboldans have for courts. I suppose you know what that is.”

  “I do, but it won’t cheer you up if I tell you.”

  “Of course not.” Sebastian sighed. “I don’t know what made the difference between me and my brothers. Possibly being sent away to school during my formative years. The influence of my Great-Uncle Sebastian, who’s as good a man as you can be without actually entering heaven. I’d like to think I’m inherently prone to see things from the other fellow’s side. School gave me a different perspective.”

  “I can imagine.” Her inherent magic certainly made her see the world differently. “Your brothers are lucky you’re not like them. I’m guessing if you were the one in trouble, they wouldn’t be so ready to put themselves out.”

  “Oh, they might, if they thought it would protect the family name.” Sebastian paused, then added, “Which I still can’t tell you.”

  “You know I’ll eventually guess, if they’re politically prominent enough to be worth blackmailing.”

  “It’s a risk I’m willing to take.” He sighed. “I suppose I should be grateful this hasn’t happened to my family before, but my stores of gratitude are running low. Mostly I’m imagining going back to Tremontane when this is all over. What do you plan to do?”

  The question, so abrupt, startled her. “I…suppose I’ll continue on to Dineh-Karit.”

  “As you’d planned, I remember. You never said whether there was something waiting there for you.”

  “It was supposed to be an adventure. Somewhere entirely new.”

  “That certainly qualifies. I’ve never been that far south. Went to Umberan, a few times, for the holidays.” He leaned against the wall. “I hear Dineh-Karit’s nearly as rich in lines of power as Tremontane.”

  “Maybe you should visit, and find out.”

  “Maybe I should.” He smiled. “Maybe our paths will cross again, after this.”

  We should travel together almost escaped Fiona’s lips; she managed to smile and nod. Had she nearly invited him to go south with her? What was she thinking? He was a friend, true, but that had felt…almost intimate. “You’re not so bad, for a filthy kidnapper,” she said with a friendly wink, and he laughed, then covered his mouth as if he could hold back the sound.

  “I have to say I’m really glad I failed to kidnap Lucille,” he said. “She was a chatterbox and not nearly so interesting as you.”

  “Well, for my part, I’m a
lmost glad to have been kidnapped,” Fiona said.

  “You are a strange woman, Fiona Cooper. When this is all over—”

  “What?”

  “Nothing. I promised I wouldn’t pry, much as I’d love to know your secrets.” He took a step closer, bringing him near enough that she could feel his breath on her cheeks. “Tell me something. One thing you haven’t told anyone else.”

  He was close enough to touch. “Why should I do that?” she asked, feeling unexpectedly breathless.

  “Because I want to know you better. Just one thing.”

  There was only one thing she was hiding from him, and it was the one thing she dared never tell anyone. “If you’ll tell me your family name,” she said, stalling.

  “That’s not my secret to tell.”

  “Neither is mine.” It made no sense, and she regretted her words. What was it about the darkness, and his nearness, that had lowered her reserve? She waited, holding her breath, for whatever he might say next. But he was silent.

  Finally, he said, “You’re easily the most interesting person I’ve ever met, Fiona. I don’t want to intrude on your privacy.”

  “Thank you.” Her heart was beating a little too rapidly. “I’m making myself seem more mysterious than I am.”

  “That seems unlikely. And now that we’re both profoundly uncomfortable, shall we call it a night? I’ll wait for your summons tomorrow, and if we’re lucky, they’ll let me into the foreign trade office.”

  It felt like a release. “Of course,” Fiona said. “And it will work. Trust me.”

  “After what I’ve seen, I’d believe you could talk birds out of the trees. Veriboldan birds, who are so snooty they only whistle in three-quarter time.” Sebastian grinned at her. “Good night, Fiona, and good luck.”

  “To both of us,” Fiona said.

  She hurried back up the stairs, conscious of how exposed she was—there was nowhere to hide on the long flight, not even a window casing—but met no one. Probably Sebastian was right, and the priestesses were all within the temple, praying.

  Back in her room, she went to press her face against the cold window. She felt uncomfortably warm. It was the exertion of hurrying up the steps that did it. That, and the warmth of her clothes. Nothing more.

  Oh, you great liar, she told herself. Even now, remembering the conversation with Sebastian left her warm and muddled inside. All those years of anger and resentment of her husband had left her vulnerable to the first man who came along—the first friendly, clever, attractive man, because she wasn’t this forthcoming with Holt. She could not tell Sebastian the truth about her inherent magic, and yet she’d come right up to the edge of what she dared say just minutes before. She was a fool.

  She lay down on her pallet and closed her eyes. They would retrieve Gizane’s information, Sebastian would pay her, and she would bid him goodbye and head south. End of story, end of relationship. Anything else was chimerical, a delusion born of, she could admit to herself, loneliness. She wished to be back in that vision, to have just five minutes’ conversation with her mother, who had always been good at seeing to the heart of a problem. Five minutes’ conversation with herself would be almost as good.

  Despite her mental turmoil, her body began to relax. Sleep would at least give her some respite from the confusion she couldn’t seem to shake. Sebastian could be a friend without her spilling all her best-kept secrets to him. She had plenty of experience with that kind of friendship. I don’t need any other kind, she thought, and drifted off to sleep.

  Snow sifted down from the sky, covering the cobbles with white, slick flakes. Fiona’s steps left no trace in the drifting snow. Houses rose above her on both sides of the street, tall enough to extend into the sky past the limits of her vision. She was alone on the street, and the houses were dark, without the gleam of candle or lantern that might indicate inhabitants.

  Something was wrong. She didn’t know what, but a sense of urgency crept over her, a need to stop something from happening. Her feet moved faster, and then she was running, slipping on the cobbles and catching herself before she could fall.

  Ahead, a short, ramshackle house crouched at the end of the street, its windows dark and blank and its door ajar. She pelted toward it, threw the door open fully, and stumbled into the dark hall beyond. It was her childhood home now, with a small entry chamber off which three doors opened. Her father stood opposite her, his left hand holding a shovel, his right hand holding a bucket. Fiona didn’t stop to puzzle this out. She lurched forward, and just as fire blossomed on her father’s wrist, she closed her hand over it, extinguished it—

  and she pulled herself out of the dream, gasping and sweaty. That had been close. She curled in on herself, shaking with the intensity of the dream. She’d stopped the fire. He hadn’t burned. She hadn’t woken to find her bed in flames. How careless she’d been, letting her daydreams about Sebastian distract her from performing her nightly ritual. Tears spilled over her cheeks that she didn’t wipe away, feeling obscurely that they were a penance of sorts, a reminder that she had to be constantly on guard if she didn’t want to give herself away.

  She couldn’t change the past by saving her father in dreams, she knew, but the dreams indicated that some part of her believed otherwise. If only life were that simple. She closed her fists as if daring the fire to return, and eventually fell asleep.

  12

  There was breakfast the next morning, thank heaven, not drugged tea but bowls of unsweetened porridge Fiona tried to feel grateful for. She sat in the same seat in the eating hall next to two silent women, one of whom smiled at her when a brown-clad servant took their empty bowls. The only light came from the tiny windows high above, and the room was mostly in shadow. Fiona covertly examined the other women, wondering what had brought each of them to the Irantzen Temple. Some sat with their eyes closed, their lips moving slightly, probably in prayer. Others looked around as curiously as Fiona did, though more openly. It would be interesting to speak with them, possibly during the great feast at the end of the festival—no, they might not even be there for that. She’d never asked Sebastian whether his plan involved sneaking away in the dead of night or walking out openly.

  “This is a day of purification and meditation,” Hien said, and a rustle of fabric went up as every woman in the room moved to face her. “You will be washed clean, and then you will meditate on the vision you received yesterday. Remember Haran, how she came to an understanding of her vision after many days. You may not receive a full understanding in this day, but as Haran taught, the act of meditating is itself a blessing. Return to your cells, and someone will call for you.”

  The words were repeated in Tremontanese and Eskandelic, but Fiona was off her seat the moment the third speaker finished. She pushed past brightly-robed women to where Hien stood on the circling platform. “I have a request,” she said.

  Hien looked down at her. “Yes?”

  “My vision,” Fiona lied. “In it, I’m holding a watch Device and I can see source—magical power—spiraling into it. I feel strongly that I need that watch as a focus for my meditation.”

  “You have the toan jade,” Hien said. “We cannot make exceptions.”

  “I’m not asking for an exception for me, but for my vision. And it’s such a small thing. It’s just…” Fiona cast her eyes down as if embarrassed. “It was so hard for me to see a vision yesterday, I don’t want to disregard any of its instructions. Please.”

  Hien glanced at Sela, who’d drifted toward their conversation. Fiona kept her expression calm and respectful. Sela was starting to annoy her. “I’m sure my attendants can find a Device somewhere in the Jaixante,” she added.

  “You should go to your cell and wait,” Sela said. “You do not need a Device.”

  “We have many watches here in the temple,” Hien said.

  “No, it has to be a Tremontanan watch Device,” Fiona said. “Though Veriboldan mechanical watches are superior in many ways.” Too much? She watched
Sela out of the corner of her eye and saw her lips thin.

  “You’re not seriously considering this,” Sela said to Hien. “We don’t need to coddle the foreigner. She can meditate like the rest.”

  “She made a great effort to come here, and to stay here,” Hien said. “It’s a small thing. We’ll send someone to find a Device for you,” she told Fiona. “Go to your cell and wait.”

  “You shouldn’t inconvenience your people,” Fiona said. “My attendants can go. Besides, they’ll know to pick the best one. I feel strongly that it should be a well-crafted Device.”

  “No Veriboldan will treat with a foreigner,” Sela said.

  “Don’t you have an office of foreign trade?” Fiona said, going for cheery helpfulness. “They must be used to dealing with foreigners. Please, I really don’t want to inconvenience any of the temple attendants. They must be busy. Isn’t the Election coming up soon?”

  Hien regarded her with a long, cool look, and Fiona felt she might have overplayed her hand. Then she said, “We will send one of your attendants. But if he is turned away, you will meditate like the others.”

  “That’s fair. Thank you.”

  “You’re too soft,” Sela muttered as Fiona turned away.

  “She has something more in mind than meditation,” Hien replied, and Fiona slowed her steps, trying to listen. “Why insist on her own man running the errand? We should…” and then Fiona was too far away to hear any more. She ran up the stairs to her cell and dropped to her knees on the pallet. She might have just exposed them all to greater scrutiny. Well, it wasn’t as if she’d had much choice. Everything depended on Sebastian or Holt entering the foreign trade office instead of a Temple servant. She’d just have to be a model of decorum from this time forward, allay their suspicions, and hope Sebastian figured out a way to retrieve the documents quickly.