The Will of the Empress (34 page)

Berenene did not want to meet his eyes any longer. Something in them made her feel an emotion she had not faced in years: guilt. She didn’t like it. Instead, she turned her gaze to Sandry. “And so like your mother, you abandon your lands and your duty to your people.”

Sandry’s chin thrust forward like a mule’s. “My people are very well cared for by someone who knows them,” she snapped. “How dare you speak to me that way, as if I’d gone roistering and left my tenants to beg? Instead, I am to remain here, where I am nothing more than money bags and acreage? Where I am a
thing
, to occupy a niche in some household shrine, except when my lord husband wants to polish me up a little?”

She doesn’t even realize she’s crying, the empress thought, feeling a quiver of pity which she dismissed right away.
I
managed well enough, she thought irritably, escaping two oafs who thought they had the better of me. Namorn is a hard country. It requires strong women, strong men, and strong children to survive and make it prosper. I learned that from my father, even as he signed my second kidnapper’s execution papers.

Sandry shook her head and dashed her tears away. “I’m going home. I’ve made arrangements so Cousin Ambros
will never be strapped for money again. My friends may stay or go as they will, but I’m going back to Emelan, where I am a person, not an
heiress.
” She spat the word as if it were a curse, stood, curtsied briefly, and limped from the chamber. When Quen raised a hand to stop her with one spell or another, Berenene shook her head. There are other ways to bring a haughty young
clehame
to see things reasonably, she told herself.

She looked at the other two and realized they watched her, eyes intent.

What would they have done if I hadn’t stopped Quen? Berenene wondered. For a moment, she was almost afraid. Those bright pairs of eyes, one gray-green, one gray, were fixed on her with the same unblinking attention with which her falcons watched prey.

You may have power, she silently told them, but I am older and far more experienced. I have true great mages at my side, not accomplished children. She held their eyes for a moment, before she looked at Briar alone. “You may stay,” she told him, thickening the honey in her voice. “I still offer you the empire for your garden. Imagine it, Briar, spice trees from Qidao and Aliput, medicine ferns from Mbau, incense bushes from Gyonxe…”

His head snapped back as if she had slapped him. “And turn a blind eye to this? Wonder what woman scuttling by is with her husband of her free will? Here I was thinking only street rats got treated like roach dung. I’m honored you
think so well of me, Imperial Majesty, but I’m leaving with Sandry.” He bowed to the empress briefly and looked at Tris.

“Coming,” she said, getting to her feet. “The rat hole’s plugged,” she informed Berenene. She fought a yawn. When it passed, she added, “Thank you for the offer of a position, but I’m with Briar and Sandry.” She bobbed a curtsy, took the arm Briar offered, and walked out with him.

The door closed silently.

Berenene sat back in her chair and closed her eyes. She could feel her two great mages waiting for her to speak. In my own palace, she thought, furious. My own
palace
! When dozens of nobles trust their daughters to me, to serve as ornaments to my household!

“Quen,” she said, forcing her voice to be calm. “Send orders down. I want Finlach fer Hurich arrested immediately. Put him in the dampest pit we have. In chains. Throw his servants in with him, also in chains. Check the end of the tunnel Tris blocked, in case any of them are hiding there. I will deal with them tomorrow. Then take a contingent of mages as well as a company of guards and arrest
Viynain
Notalos fer Hurich on the charge of high treason.”

“The head of the Mages’ Society?” murmured Quen nervously.

Berenene opened her eyes to glare at him. “Do you mean to tell me you can’t take a sniveling political games-player like Notalos?” she snapped. “Have you let your skills and those of your people go slack?”

“He means no such thing, Imperial Majesty,” Isha announced smoothly. “It is easily done, my boy. And he has betrayed a trust. Use the jar of ghosts spell.” Isha rested a hand on Berenene’s shoulder. “It will be done as you require.”

The empress closed her eyes. “Then go do it, Quen. I want him in the mage’s cells here by sunset. If the Society whines, send them to Isha.” She listened as Quen’s footsteps receded, and waited for the sound of the door as it opened and shut behind him. Only when he was gone did she say, “Do something about Trisana Chandler, Isha. They will be so much less cocky—
Sandrilene
will be far less cocky—without their little weather mage to safeguard them.”

Ishabal nodded. “I will see to it,” she replied softly. “It is easy enough.”

“Subtly.”
Berenene knew it was insulting to imply that Isha did not know how to wield a proper curse, but she no longer cared. “I want her for our service even more now. When she swears to us,
you
will bind her so she knows who is her mistress, Isha.”

It took a while to treat Sandry’s hands and feet—she was in such a fury that it was hard to make her sit quietly. Briar had sent Gudruny for mint tea to calm Sandry down, but Sandry threw the cup into the hearth.

Gudruny looked at the mess, her mouth twisted to one side. “You don’t need me if you mean to have a child’s tantrum, my lady,” she said, sounding like the experienced
mother that she was. “Wake me when you come to bed and I’ll help you with your nightgown. I’ll clean up whatever else you throw in the morning.”

Briar hid a smile and went back to wrapping clean linen around one of Sandry’s feet.

“I am
not
a child,” Sandry muttered.

From long experience with his sisters, Rosethorn, and Evvy, Briar knew when to keep silent. Instead, he tried to remember if he had ever known Sandry to be in such a towering rage. Even her anger when pirates had attacked Winding Circle was not the same as this. A lot of it’s fear, he thought, drinking the other cup of tea that Gudruny had poured for him. But she’s just not used to being treated like she’s of no account. I only wish she could see that she’s treating her Landreg people the same way, but I can tell it’s not worth talking to her about it right now.

Tris had left when Gudruny fixed the tea, but Chime stayed behind, chinking at Sandry with worry. It was Chime who finally calmed Sandry down. The dragon simply curled up in Sandry’s lap, chiming in a low, clear tone that penetrated the young noble’s rage. The more Chime sang, the slower Sandry’s hands petted the dragon, until Sandry finally smiled ruefully.

“I’ll be fine,” she assured Chime. “Truly.” Sandry looked up at Briar. “I don’t need nursemaids.”

“Then it’s me for bed,” said Briar with a shrug. “You know
Her Imperial Majesty will put obstacles in the way, right? Neither you nor she knows how to leave well enough alone.”

Sandry blew out a windy sigh. “Did I ask you?”

Briar propped a fist on one hip. “Since when do I ever need you or anybody to ask?”

That actually got a thin smile from her. “You’re Rosethorn’s boy, all right. You sound just like her.” She kissed the top of Chime’s head. “I really will be fine,” she whispered.

Chime voiced one last sweet note, then took flight, shooting through an open window. They didn’t have to worry about where she would go: Tris had developed a disconcerting habit of sleeping with all of her windows open.

“Then I’m off, too,” Briar told Sandry. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

Sandry’s voice stopped him with his hand on the latch. “You don’t have to come. I can’t offer you an empire to garden. And you’re still my brother, even if you choose to stay here.”

“For your information,
Countess
,” he retorted without turning around, “I ain’t going ’cause of you.” As always when he was truly angry, Briar lapsed into the thieves’ cant that was his original language. “I’ve a mind of my own and I can make it up without you sticking
your
neb in. In case you didn’t notice, if someone of rank like you don’t have safety here, nobody does. Nobody, from the biggest noble to the
smallest street rat. If
you
ain’t safe, where does that leave folk like Gudruny, and Zhegorz? I’ll tell you where—crated up in a secret chamber somewhere. Or just dumped off a cliff.” He slammed the door behind him when he left.

He used the familiar routine of meditation to calm down after he had brushed the dust and dirt from his magic-woven party clothes. Finally he clambered into bed and blew out his candle. Beds on the road won’t be so soft as this, but they’ll be an ocean’s worth of safer, he thought. The night’s weariness swamped him, and he slid into sleep.

Armies moved in his dark dreams, killing and burning. The flames of the towns they had set alight formed bright spots on the mountain horizon. This was the rocky hidden road into the heart of Gyongxe. The villages that burned were as much Yanjingyi as Gyongxian.

They’re burning out their own people! the dreaming Briar thought in panic. He was small and rabbit-like, fleeing the army as if it were a pack of wild dogs, growling and snapping at his heels. With him stumbled Rosethorn and Evvy and Evvy’s friend Luvo, snug in Evvy’s arms.

Trumpets blared. In his dreams the armies were always right over the next ridge, moving rapidly. Briar and his companions always seemed to crawl along the ground. Awake he knew they had made better time, but in sleep they were on the army’s heels, doomed to warn the inland
temples too late. The trumpets blared, the hunter dogs of the armies howled, and Briar tried to run.

He stumbled on the bottom of a heap. One hand pressed against a face, another against a naked leg. Now there was light enough to see what he had found: people, grandparents to babies, all stripped naked, all flung together like discarded dolls. There was blood on his hands.

He screamed and woke at the same time, gasping for breath. As always, he had sweated through his sheets. Sweat stung in his eyes. He got up and wiped away the worst of it with a water-soaked sponge, then changed to casual clothes.

No point in going back to sleep, not when I’ll just dream again, he thought as he fumbled with his shirt buttons. Guess I’ll gather up all the stuff and the
shakkans
I took from her imperial majesty’s greenhouse and carry them back. I don’t want her thinking I’d take so much as a pair of shears.

It was hard to open the imperial greenhouse with a miniature willow in one hand and a basket full of tools and seedlings in the other, but Briar managed it. Once inside, he pocketed the paper that acted as a magical key and returned each item to its proper location. On each of the seedlings he set a good word for growth and immunity to plant problems. He also left the copper wire wrapped around the willow’s new shape.

I don’t have to punish the plants because my mate’s cross with her cousin, he told the willow, which he had
spelled for health and proper growth when he’d first taken it into his care. Even if I feel curst irritable with the empress myself, I won’t let you return to the world without all the protection I can give you.

The willow clung until he coaxed it to release him. You’ve all kinds of mates here, he scolded gently. You don’t need one human who’s just going to vanish, anyway. Aren’t I right? he asked the others, the pines and the maples, the fruit trees and the flowering ones. The greenhouse sounded as if a breeze had blown through as they shook their branches in reply.

His good-byes said, Briar took the paper key from his pocket and crossed into the orchid half of the greenhouse. He meant to place his key by that door to the outside, so Berenene would see it. Instead, he found the empress herself, wearing a simple, loose brown linen gown over her blouse, slumbering with her head pillowed on her arms as she sat at an orchid table. She blinked and stirred as Briar came in. His heart twisted in his chest. She was beautiful even with her unveiled coppery hair falling from its pins and a sleeve wrinkle pressed into her cheek. She smiled at him.

It’s like being smiled at by the sun, Briar thought. Being warmed and a little burned at the same time. No. No, she’s Namorn itself, the land folk inhabit. She values the rest of us because we’ll water her, plow and plant her, keep the bugs and the funguses off her, harvest…but in the end we are as important to her as ants.

She stretched out a hand. “I cannot persuade you?” she asked, her voice husky with sleep. “You know that you would be happy in my service, Briar.”

Briar sighed and rubbed his head. Sandry would argue, trying to convince her to change the way she did things. Daja would put on her Trader face, say polite nothings, and mention schedules where she’s needed someplace else. Tris would refuse in some tactless way and apologize without pretending she meant it. And me? he asked himself. What can I say? I escaped one emperor that wanted to put me in an iron cage, and from where I sit, her gold one looks no better?

He stepped forward and placed the paper key in her beckoning hand, bowed, and walked away.

D
aja was tying her braids into a tail when Rizu came back from dressing the empress. Usually Rizu had some witty imperial remarks to share, but not today. This morning she was silent.

“Is something wrong?” Daja asked as she straightened her tunic. “You look, I don’t know, concerned.” She ran a finger down Rizu’s forehead, still amazed at the good luck that had brought her to the point at which she could touch this vivid woman. “You’ll get wrinkles,” she teased gently.

“It’s Her Imperial Majesty,” Rizu explained softly. “Something’s happened, something that’s made her angry. She treated me all right, so it wasn’t anything to do with me, but when I asked her what was going on, she said that I ought to ask
your
friends.” She looked at Daja in confusion. “What do you suppose she meant?”

Daja shrugged. “Let’s go to breakfast and see—if they are even out of bed.”

As Rizu led the way out of Daja’s rooms, she looked back over her shoulder to say, “I did talk to the servants. Finlach fer Hurich was arrested sometime after we left the ball, and some men he had hired with him.”

Daja, who had been admiring the sway of Rizu’s hips, halted. “Fin, arrested? Whatever for?”

A footman hurrying past overheard. He paused, then came over to them. “There’s more, Lady Rizu,” he said quietly. “Word just came:
Bidis
Finlach’s uncle,
Viynain
Natalos, was just arrested by Quenaill Shieldsman and a crew of mage takers. No law-court papers, only by imperial order.”

“Does anyone know
why
?” asked Rizu.

“Only that the charge was high treason,” whispered the footman. He bowed and scurried on his way.

“It must be serious,” Rizu murmured. “To arrest the head of the Mages’ Society for the entire empire? It has to be high treason, indeed.” She and Daja hurried to Sandry’s rooms.

Gudruny let them in, but there was no meal set out on the table. “What’s going on?” Daja wanted to know. “Where are Briar and Tris?”

For a moment Gudruny looked shocked. “You don’t know? Oh, gods—you must ask my lady. She’s in her bedchamber, if you’ll follow me.”

They obeyed, to find Sandry busily folding clothes. Trunks stood open on the floor.

“Sandry?” Daja asked, confused. “I feel like you started a forging without me.”

Sandry looked up. Her face was dead white under its gold spring tan; her blue eyes were hot. “Ask her,” she replied in a husky voice, jerking her chin at Rizu, who stood behind Daja. “Or were you two so wrapped up in each other that neither of you has heard yet? It should be all over the palace right now.”

Daja sighed. “If she knew, why would we be talking to you?” she inquired reasonably. “Where were you last night? You didn’t even come to say hello to us. And now there’s a story going around the palace that Fin’s been arrested.” She kept her voice soft. She knew this look of Sandry’s, though she had only ever seen it a handful of times. Whatever had brought Sandry to her boiling point, she required careful handling, or she would explode.

Sandry threw a gauzy overgown to the bed. “Fin crated me up for shipment last night. Crated me up like a, a
cabbage
, only you don’t need unraveling spells to keep a cabbage from misbehavior. I got this”—she rubbed her throat—“from screaming for someone to let me out. She had him arrested? I thought she would applaud his boldness. He certainly thought she would, or he never would have dared try.”

“Not in her palace!” cried Rizu, shocked. “Not when there are so many women who look to her to keep them safe inside her walls. Sandry, how could you even say such a thing?”

“Because Fin kidnapped me inside these curst walls!”
cried Sandry. She turned on Daja. “I tried to call
you
for help, but you were occupied.” There was a cruel tone in Sandry’s voice that cut Daja like a whip. “Luckily there are others who don’t shut me out of their new lives.”

“That’s not fair,” retorted Daja, her eyes stinging.

“Isn’t it?” demanded Sandry, hugging herself around the waist. Her eyes dripped tears onto the discarded overgown. “Maybe not, but it’s true all the same. Well, I’m not staying in this oversized cage one night longer. I’m not staying in this festering
kaq
cesspool of a country for so much more as a week. We’re going back to Landreg House today. Briar, Tris, and I are going back to Emelan as soon as we can pack up. You do as you like.” She glanced at Rizu and looked away. “You may come with us, Daja, and anyone who chooses to accompany you is welcome, but you had best decide fast.” She wiped her eyes on her sleeve. “You’ll always be my sister-
saati
,” she added more softly. “You’ll always be welcome in my home, wherever the trade winds take us both. But just remember: They won’t care if you prefer women to men if they can still isolate you and force you to sign a marriage contract written to bind a mage.” She glared at Rizu. “And since you’re a foreigner, Daja, I suppose you wouldn’t even have a liege lord to appeal to. You’d be trapped until the end of your days.”

Daja heard the door slam. Rizu had left the room.

“She didn’t know,” Daja said, defending her lover. “You didn’t have to be nasty.”

“Then I’ll apologize later,” Sandry replied. “If she comes.”

“Of course she will. I suppose she’ll take forever to pack,” Daja whispered, hoping that if she said it, it would be true. She looked at Sandry. “Would you
please
tell me what happened?” she asked, taking a load of folded scarves from a chair so she could sit down. “And don’t insult me anymore, Sandry. I didn’t turn Namornese just because I fell in love.”

An hour later, Daja slowly walked to Rizu’s rooms. She felt as if she had aged a hundred years. Suddenly all of the elegance around her looked like a mask for some cruel beast. She had to eye every man who passed her, asking herself if he had ever kidnapped a woman—or if he would, given the chance. Were all men like this?

No, she told herself firmly. Never Briar. Or Frostpine. Or Tris’s teacher Niko, or our sometimes teacher Crane, or Duke Vedris, or Dedicate Gorse, the temple cook. She doubted Ambros or Zhegorz would consider it, either. No, Daja, don’t be a fool. You know plenty of men who would never even think of pulling such a vile trick.

But here, well, I can’t be surprised at Fin. He’s always had the air of a horse fighting the rein. Some of the others I’ve met might do the same, if they dared to kidnap a mage. But they wouldn’t do it in the palace, for fear of the empress. Though somehow Fin thought she might actually turn a
blind eye to it, if he succeeded. Who is a bigger idiot than the man who believes the lies he tells himself?

Quen might try such a kidnapping. He’d succeed if he did, but I don’t think we have to worry, because he’s obviously in love with Berenene. Jak, maybe? No, Jak’s too good-hearted at bottom. What a heap of ash this court is, and most of it clinkers at that. I guess Rizu’s too close to the empress to have ever looked over her shoulder for kidnappers.

Her heart thudded in her chest. It’s trying to drown out that question in my mind. I thought I’d have all summer to work on her before having to ask. I thought we could build something solid in that time, when all we have is something new. I wish we’d had more time to fuse together!

Wishes are toys your mind plays with while pirates sneak up behind.
That had been one of her aunt Hulweme’s favorite sayings, ghost words from an aunt seven years dead.

Daja shook her head to clear it. I never liked Aunt Hulweme, she thought as she rapped on Rizu’s door.

“It’s open,” she heard her lover call.

Daja bit her lip and entered Rizu’s room.

As Mistress of the Wardrobe, Rizu had two of the tiny rooms set aside for those in the empress’s service. Only imperial guests actually have room to breathe, she had joked on the ten-odd nights she’d spent in Daja’s suite. Now Rizu sat at the desk that took up a corner of the sitting room,
writing something. She looked at Daja and tried to greet her with her usual sunny smile. Her lush mouth quivered at the attempt.

Daja looked into the bedroom. It was neatly made up. There were no signs of packing. She went in and sat on the bed, smoothing wrinkles out of the airy coverlet with fingers that shook as much as Rizu’s mouth had.

“You could stay.” Rizu had come to stand in the doorway. “Stay here, with me. Be a jewel in the imperial crown. All your work with living metal would earn you a place among the great mages. I want you to stay. I
need
you to stay.”

“Why won’t you come with me?” Daja asked, her voice cracking. For the first time in her life, she understood all the love poetry, all the passion that described a lover’s kiss and a lover’s touch. I always thought magic had burned that kind of excitement right out of my veins, she thought as she traced an embroidered rose with a fingertip. I always thought that was why boys’ kisses left me feeling odd, not faint, and boys’ hands didn’t make me feel anything but distant. Now I know I wasn’t looking at the right people. Now I’ve found someone who’s right for me, and that’s her. “How can you feel this way and not want to come with me?” she asked. “Don’t you love me?”

“I do,” whispered Rizu. “You’re so strong, and sweet. You make beautiful things, you sing me songs from distant places… I do love you.”

Daja looked up and saw the rest of the answer in her friend’s averted eyes and pale lips. “You love the empress more.”

“Not the way you mean,” Rizu protested. “Not in bed. I would never feel that way about her. But don’t you see? She is all that is bright and beautiful in Namorn. She saved me from a marriage I didn’t want. She made me a gift of lands and income of my own, so I didn’t have to rely on my family—or obey my family’s wishes for me.” Rizu sat next to Daja and took her metal-gloved hand in both of hers. “I have power in her household. I’m part of something splendid. She builds bridges, hospitals, libraries, dams, you name it and she has built it, for the glory of the empire. How can you not want to belong to that?”

“She does all these things, and yet she lets the empire’s women be preyed upon,” Daja replied, yanking her hand free.

“I’m not preyed upon,” Rizu said. “Not me, not Caidy, not Isha, not any of the women of her household. You would be safe, too, Daja. And we’d be together.” She leaned forward and kissed Daja, promising love with the kiss.

Daja got to her feet. “Do you know, I even believe I’d be safe in her household,” she told Rizu. “But Sandry isn’t. She won’t ever be, as long as the empress wants her bound to Namorn. And Sandry is my sister. We are closer than you can begin to imagine—Sandry, Briar, Tris, me. We are the same person in a way you have never heard of.”

Rizu looked up, reaching a hand for Daja. “It doesn’t have to be settled like this. Persuade Sandry to finish the summer, at least. Then we’ll all understand one another better.”

I understand well enough, thought Daja. I understand as much as I need to. So I should talk Sandry into staying—if I even could, which I doubt—so that other men may have a chance at binding her to a marriage contract? Biting her lip so she would not cry in front of the
kaqs
who walked the halls, she went back to her bedroom to pack.

The news that Sandry meant to leave for Emelan within the week made Landreg House buzz like an overturned beehive. The servants soon learned that when the normally kind Sandry was this angry, it was best simply to get out of her way. Ambros and Ealaga were made of sterner stuff. Their discussion with her ended in a shouting match that drove Briar out into the rose garden. He had little to pack now that his things from the palace were bundled up. He placed his personal
shakkan
on a stone bench so it could soak up sunlight while not moving and proceeded to give the garden a last inspection.

Ambros found him while he strengthened the roses against parasites. “I had thought she would finally see it is her duty to stay and represent her people,” Ambros told Briar without preamble. “To represent them in the Noble Assembly. You must reason with her.”

“She’s in no mood for reason, or didn’t you notice?” Briar asked, viewing one rose’s leaves and stems from every angle. “Besides, she’s got duties at home, too. Didn’t she tell you? She’s one of His Grace’s two top people. She keeps his castle for him and advises him as he governs the country. If he goes out of Summersea, she stays there in his place. There’s rumors he’s going to make her his heir. She doesn’t believe that one, but I do. His Grace’s heir is bleat-brained.”

Ambros sat hard next to the
shakkan.
“She never mentioned it.”

Briar gently fed the rose a little extra power. “Probably because she doesn’t think he’ll disinherit Franzen to put her in his place. The rest of it she calls ‘just helping Uncle out.’ His own
seneschal
gets her signature for plenty of things, rather than pester his grace. But just because she talks it down doesn’t mean she doesn’t think it’s important. She loves Emelan. Maybe she could’ve loved it here, but there’s no chance of that now. Once Sandry hates something, she puts all she’s got into it.”

Covering his face with his hands, Ambros groaned. “The Landreg women all have this mulish streak,” he said, his voice muffled.

“Do you think?” Briar asked a little too innocently. Moving to one of the trees, he called, “This is the last year you’ll be getting apples from this old woman. She’s tired.” He stroked the tree’s trunk. “But let her stand, will you? She’s got plenty of good years as a tree left.”

“I wouldn’t dream of cutting her down,” Ambros said, dropping his hands. “I’ve had plenty of good apples from her, and hid out from my relatives in her branches. I only wish you’d had time to go over all our fields at Landreg Castle.”

Briar looked at him. “There’s no saying I might not come back,” he informed the man. “But on
my
terms. Without all this glitter and flash. I’m just a plain lad at heart.”

Ambros’s grin made him look like a boy for a moment. “Well, plain lad, you’re always welcome in my home, wherever I make it.”

As soon as they reached Landreg House, Tris abandoned her packed trunks and bags to the care of servants. Saying the briefest hellos to Sandry’s cousins and to Zhegorz, she went to her room to lie down. She had expected that playing with storms would give her a sound night’s sleep. That was always a treat for a light sleeper like her. Working with the Syth to block up that hidden entry to the palace would have been a guarantee not just of sound sleep, but of late sleep. Doing both, then waking at dawn to pack, left her feeling as if someone had put gravel in her joints and plaster in her skull. She needed to rest for a while, to ease her aching limbs. That took longer than she had expected. It was late afternoon when she opened her eyes.