Knife Sworn (38 page)

“What is it, girl?”
What more could happen?

“Something happened in the empress’ room, Your Majesty. The emperor is there, and…” The slave scrambled aside as Nessaket moved forwards, her feet sure and quick on the path to the Tree Room, her thankfulness for Daveed’s health transformed into anger. So her older son’s night was not finished. She would know the cause his strange behaviour, learn why he had taken her boy. In her fury she imagined even the ghosts slipping out of her way like fog.

A single lantern lit Mesema’s room, giving the tree-paintings a sinister look, tall giants waiting to crush everyone below. The empress stood by a pillowed bench, tearing at her hair, dark kohl running in long streaks down her face. “This was you!” she screamed at her husband the emperor, “This was you!”

Both of them circled the bed, or what was on it: Pelar, pale, withered, hair gone white. Like Gala, Irisa, and all the others. But where Pelar lay the covers began to fade and crumble, as if they were a hundred years old instead of newly made. “Mirra save him!” Nessaket brought a hand to her mouth. She had never wanted him born, had wished he was a girl, but to see him like this…

We should have fled, after Dreshka died. Too late, too late.

Sarmin had done this to him. He had taken both the boys this night, and Pelar… She looked at her emperor son, who spoke in an even voice, his eyes distant. “This is the nothingness, the illness that devours,” said Sarmin.

“Don’t tell me what it is!” cried Mesema. “You fix it!” She rushed forwards, meaning to pick up the boy. “You fix it!”

Sarmin held out a hand. “Carefully.” Mesema’s hands slowed, and she gathered Pelar as if he were made of the most delicate glass, hissing as if it hurt her hands. “My sweet boy,” she said, “my darling boy.”

“I will make him well,” Sarmin said, “I will fix it.” The last he said more quietly: a promise to himself, or an edict.

Mesema said nothing. Nessaket wondered if he truly had the power to cure the boy. She watched Mesema’s arms and the child within them, fearing he would break if held too tightly.

Sarmin left the room, his sword-sons trailing him, gone without another word. He would leave the room bereft, no Pelar cooing in his cradle, no sweet smell from his skin. Only a colourless shell remained of the child. Nessaket chased after Sarmin, treasuring the feel of her own healthy baby, the weight of him in his sling. “I would have a word with my son the emperor,” she said.

Sarmin stopped and turned, his gaze far away, his mind on patterns and magic.

“Why did you take the boys? Where did you take them? Why would you do such a thing to Pelar?” As she spoke his eyes copper eyes cleared, focusing on her own, so that she knew he listened.

He laid a hand on her shoulder, an intimate gesture from a man she had not touched in years. “It was Beyon.”

“What?” She took a step backwards. Had he learned that Beyon was Pelar’s father? Would that make him kill the boy?

“It was Beyon,” he said again, his eyes growing distant once again. “Rising up from the Many.” He turned towards the great room, his sword-sons behind him.

Or had Sarmin gone mad—was it the Cotora family curse come upon them? With no real answer from her son Nessaket returned to Mesema. “Come,” she said, nudging the girl, “Let us go and honour Mirra in Siri’s garden. Mirra might help us.”
She helped me earlier. It is possible.
Awkwardly she put an arm around the horsegirl and guided her into the hall.

Women crowded around, trying to catch sight of the stricken prince. Spies might be among them, but Nessaket found it difficult to care. Pelar drew her gaze; she could not discern where his skin ended and his white silks began. Mesema stumbled along, her face nearly as pale as her son’s now, allowing herself to be led. Guards followed them, six, a dozen, and once they reached Farra’s room Nessaket bid them guard the door. Grief was a private affair and they would keep anyone from entering. Farra was absent. They climbed the stairs. Each of them held a bundle, Nessaket’s olive-skinned and kicking, Mesema’s drained and still.

They sat on the bench in Siri’s garden, surrounded by bare flowerbeds. The sun began to set, casting an orange light over the city below them. Their view beyond the palace walls looked out over the river and the long barges that carried fruit and nuts from the groves into Nooria.

Mesema lurched forwards and knelt before the statue of Mirra, hunched over Pelar in prayer. Nessaket understood. She had knelt for hours, pleading with Mirra, before Ta-Sann returned Daveed. They sat in that way for some time, Nessaket watching the night fall along the edges of the city, Daveed asleep in his sling. It was then that she noticed a seedling poking its head from the cracked soil. She leaned over it, brushed her finger against the green leaves. A sign from Mirra, surely.

Footsteps sounded on the stairs, light and quick.
Rushes?
Nessaket did not know why the girl came so quickly to her mind. But it was not Rushes; white-blonde hair appeared above the stairwell, followed by smooth shoulders tied with blue silk. Jenni. Nessaket pulled Daveed closer, crushing him against her chest, and glanced at Mesema who remained unaware, lost in her prayers. How had the concubine got past the guards downstairs? Then she realised—Jenni had been in the Old Wife’s room already, waiting. Was Farra dead, then?

Jenni reached the top of the stairs and turned in a slow circle. “I have not seen this roof before, Majesty.”

A lie. “Leave us,” said Nessaket.

“May I see Prince Daveed, at least?”

“No,” said Nessaket, “Leave us.” But the girl moved her hand, and steel gleamed there, catching the sun’s last rays. Where had she kept that knife? Now she moved forwards, holding the blade in a way that showed she knew how to use it.

Jenni slashed. Nessaket barely had time to raise her arm up to protect Daveed. The knife sliced her arm, bouncing off bone, leaving a bloody trail between wrist and elbow. A sharp hot pain, no more than that.

Nessaket held her son close, his face crushed against her chest, blood pulsing over fingers clamped across her wound. Mesema looked around from her position at the statue. “What…”

Jenni danced backwards, keeping them both within their sights, as Mesema pushed to her knees, a flowerpot in each hand. She threw the first; Jenni ducked easily out of the way. Quickly Nessaket picked up another flowerpot and threw it, but the woman was trained, a fighter and an athlete. Two unarmed mothers with flowerpots were no match for her.

“When the emperor laid with me, he told me the truth.” Jenni held the knife held low, Nessaket’s blood dripping from its edge. “That he is mad, and the empress is a whore.” She moved forwards, twisting, light on her feet, a dance almost.

Something dark broke from the stairwell.
Rushes!
Arms extended, she shoved Jenni, palms to shoulder blades, pushing, steering her to the garden’s edge. Three quick and stumbling steps and Jenni hung in that moment of unbalance, arms flailing. The knife fell, and she followed it, her scream not sounding until her tumble took her from their sight. An instant later and a dull thud cut the cry short.

Nessaket said to Rushes, “Don’t look down!” She remembered seeing Siri from the same angle; she did not want the girl to see it too. Rushes stood, stunned, not looking at anything in particular, then she finally focused on Nessaket and fell into her obeisance. Mesema looked, though. She went to the edge and looked down, nodding to herself with satisfaction.

“Rise, Rushes.” Nessaket looked to Mesema, her arm beginning to hurt now, a long ache in skin and muscle. “How is Pelar?”

The child lay before the statue where Mesema left him. “The same.” Mesema pressed her lips together in fear.

The same was better than worse. Daveed stirred and began to fuss when Nessaket put him on the bench and unwound the silk from her neck for a bandage. She quieted the boy, feeling guilty. She remembered when illness had swept through the women’s wing, leaving Beyon as the eldest. She had felt guilty then too, even as she offered thanks to Herzu.

“She brought the snake, and killed the envoy, too,” said Rushes, motioning towards the edge.

“Yes, child; you have done well,” said Nessaket. She hissed as she pulled the silk tight around her wound. Assar would need to look at this.

The girl shook herself, as if waking. “Your Majesty! The Mogyrk slaves are going to do something. They said fire was the signal. When they see it, they’re supposed to go to the courtyard behind the Little Kitchen.” She kept talking, faster now, as if time itself would run out on her. “They are looking for precious things to take with them. I—”

“Mogyrk slaves?” Nessaket blinked with confusion. How long had Mogyrks been fixing her food, carrying her silks? The world shifted under her feet. At least the ghosts and spies she could see. The concubines had surrounded her, but the slaves surrounded everyone.

“The Mogyrks,” growled Mesema, stalking forwards, “This is all their fault! Show me this courtyard!”

Nessaket held out a hand to stay her. “I know you have the will for it, but not the strength. Stay here with Pelar.” She motioned towards Rushes. “I am going to send the guards up now. You watch Daveed.”

Rushes held the baby tight, her blue eyes round over his dark curls. “Where are you going?”

Nessaket looked again at Pelar, Beyon’s son. Tahal’s death had changed her, and Beyon too. Neither of them had even been what they could have been, not while the grief and anger held them.
I will be a better mother this time
. It was too late for Beyon, but she could protect his child. “I am going to talk to that austere,” said Nessaket. “I am going to stop this.”

Nessaket found two guards in the dungeon’s anteroom, two of the four who watched over three hundred Fryth prisoners. It was Sarmin, she knew; Sarmin had emptied the dungeons completely, assigning the soldiers to other tasks. Now that the dungeons were full, there were not enough men to manage it. Both men fell into obeisance at the sight of her and her four guards. “Rise,” she said, “and tell me where to find the second austere.”

A grizzled guard stood, his jacket too small for his fat belly, his eyes both curious and kind. “I will take you, Majesty.”

Nessaket followed him between the crowded cells, looking at the faces of the Fryth behind the bars. They called to her in their language, begging for water, perhaps, or for their freedom. Mogyrk worshippers as they were, she should not feel sorry for them; and yet she felt drawn by their hungry eyes, the desperate tone of their calls. She quickened her step, as one hurries past a bad odour or a cloud of smoke.

The guard indicated the austere’s cell and she dismissed him. Adam stood inside in his red robes, straight, shoulders square, as if he had been expecting her.

“Austere Adam,” she said, “I am sorry to meet you again under such conditions.” She looked past him at the bare cell.

“Treachery is as treachery does,” he said, with a lift of his right shoulder.

She made to argue, then put it aside. To admit they had not actually meant to kill Kavic might be worse than to let him think they planned it. “I come about the disease that spreads nothing into a person,” she said, “I understand Mogyrk has done this to us.”

“The Pattern Master Helmar is responsible,” he said, “not Mogyrk. Mogyrk is nothing but love, safe harbour, protection.”

“I am a woman of the world,” she said, “and you do not need to speak such platitudes to me. Tell me how to cure the illness.”

He laughed. “There is no cure. You will be eaten slowly, your colours, your memories, your feelings, and then your body, piece by piece. It is foretold. There is no way that it can be prevented.”

“Lies!” she said, grabbing the bars, “I will have you tortured until you tell me!” Shouting rang out at the guards’ station. She heard metal on metal, quick movement. Fighting. Who attacked? Slaves? Yrkmir? Her guards stepped away to investigate, hands on their sword-hilts. She had brought only four, and left the rest to watch over Rushes and Daveed. She turned back to Adam, and he smiled. He stood in his red robes, straight, shoulders square, as he had on the night she met him.

“You should find somewhere to hide, Your Majesty,” he said, “for my people have come to free me.”

Her guards rushed around the corner, meeting some threat she could not see; she let go the bars and walked to the edge of the corridor, peeking around the bend. Six slaves were fighting the guards with kitchen knives, lanterns, clubs.
Slaves.
She had not heeded Rushes’ warning. This was the Longing. This was Mogyrk. Nobody understood how things should work any more. For a slave to fight a guard… The five who had attacked were quickly defeated, but more slaves came, running down the stairs with whoops and jeers. The room became a jumble of movement to her eyes, but it seemed there were five slaves for every guard, holding fire pokers, wooden bats and kitchen knives, their faces lit with a determination she had never known was there.

A young man stepped out from the fighting, calm, as if taking a morning stroll along the banks of the Blessing. He held a key in his hand and with it he opened the cell doors. He had a lovely face, the colour of tea, and his hair curled round his forehead with a soft gleam. The freed prisoners ran, towards the fighting, the stairs and the palace, but the young man looked down the long row of empty cells and saw her. He smiled, moving close, and when he spoke, his voice was like honey. “Empire mother,” he said, “this is the will of Mogyrk.”

So entranced was she that it took her a moment to process his words. “Mogyrk?” she asked, as he raised a club in his hands. “What—” The wood came down, and all went dark.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE