How could he love her more? Yet he did. It filled him until his chest burned, and a long moment passed before he could tell her, “Marry them, then. They’ll never have you in bed.”
“Will you fight them all?”
“I won’t need to. If their cocks are bigger than mine, they’ll never get into you.”
She sucked in a strangled gasp, then hid her face against his chest as she laughed. He grinned, then caught her chin and kissed her.
But this was something she should know, too. “Never,” he said softly. “I will never touch another.”
“I wouldn’t, either.” She looked up at him, her fingers idly tangling in his hair behind his ear before her chest lifted on another sigh. “Helene said she’ll visit today. You’ll be out?”
“Yes.”
“Should I remind the ambassador that you can’t eat with the mask on? Or will you come back at midday?”
He’d gone longer than a day without eating. But he kissed the top of her head and promised, “I’ll try to come back.”
To see her, if for no other reason.
She nodded, then asked, “Is the war machine so very terrible? The Horde has so many. I can’t believe that one machine is so important that the admiral and the general would risk all this. Is it big?”
“Yes.”
“How big? This tower has twenty levels. If the machine stood next to it, which level would it reach? The tenth? Eleventh?”
“If it stood beside this tower, you could look out that window and still only see the machine’s base.” At her gasp, he said, “They called it the Skybreaker because my father wanted a machine that could tear Khan Tengri from his seat in the Eternal Blue Sky.”
“Good heavens,” she whispered.
“Yes.”
“How did such a thing remain secret?”
“When my father was killed, most of those who knew of it were killed with him.” And their heads mounted on pikes. “If there were any aside from my mother who lived, they must have decided to stay quiet as well. You don’t ask me where it is?”
He’d thought she would. She asked about everything else.
She shook her head. “I know what it is to have lives depend on the secrets you keep. I do wonder. But it’s dangerous knowledge, isn’t it? Your town is threatened because of it. The whole western coast. So although I’m curious, I don’t need to know.”
If she ever did, Ariq would tell her. He gathered her closer.
Head nestled under his chin, she slid her hand over his ribs and up to the back of his shoulder. “When do you expect word from Krakentown?”
“Within two days. Blanchett should arrive this morning.”
“So they’ll know all that has happened here.” When he nodded, she said softly, “Did you see the Empress’s Eyes when you were visiting with the clans? Are they truly everywhere?”
The clockwork devices. Tension stiffened his body. “Yes. Do they bother you?”
Ariq wanted to smash every one of them.
“Yes. But what can be done?”
Nothing. Now.
As if sensing his frustration, she smoothed her hand down his back. “What do you think they are?”
“They watch people. Or make the people think they are being watched.” Which could be just as effective. “Dissidents wear the plague masks.”
She looked up at him. “What?”
“One of the men we met with said he wasn’t surprised to see a rebel in a mask. It was a joke. But it told me why there’s still a quarantine. If dissidents use the masks to hide from the Empress’s Eyes, the masks could become a symbol of rebellion.”
“But instead a mask still means that someone is an outsider,” she said slowly. “A foreigner.”
And so it would seem that any trouble or uprising was started by outsiders, too. Potentially diseased outsiders. Not her own people.
With a sharp little breath, Zenobia rolled out of his arms. She reached for her notebook.
Ariq laughed and waited for her to return. When she did, he pulled her close. “Will you be able to sleep again now?”
“Yes.” Her voice was already heavier. “Though I want to watch the sunrise.”
“I’ll wake you,” he said.
She nodded against his arm. “Are you worried?”
Ariq didn’t need to ask about what. He stared up into the dark. Two wars to win. His town was no safer yet. At least he’d made progress in the battle for his wife’s heart. But nothing was certain.
“Only that I’ll fail,” he said.
***
Two hours later, Zenobia stood at the edge of the world. Ariq had kept his promise to wake her, then accompanied her to the east terrace, where she leaned back against his broad chest and watched pink and orange become gold.
Ariq was solid behind her. Gulls floated on the warming air. The ocean roared quietly below.
It was, she decided, the perfect way to greet the day.
Except that beneath the whisper of the breeze and the gulls’ strident cries, she still heard the soft click of the Empress’s Eyes.
Part VII
THE KRAKEN KING AND THE EMPRESS'S EYES
The Imperial City, Nippon
June 6
My dear fearless brother,
I’ve finally done something that you haven’t, despite all of your travels: Today I crossed a coral bridge in the Living City. You should applaud me. It was a terrifying endeavor. The bridge traversed the river between two of the city’s tallest towers, and was high enough that an airship flew beneath our feet as we walked its length.
So please applaud me. Because I am wretched and cannot congratulate myself.
Oh, Archimedes. There have been times when I unexpectedly received from you long letters that were more revealing than any of your other messages. I came to recognize that those letters were written while you faced some mortal danger—such as when your spark lighter died in the mountains and an ice storm closed in, when you were trapped while zombies battered a crumbling door in Venice, and when you were courting Captain Corsair. So many letters. And each time, I believed that you wrote them as a farewell, so that there would be nothing left unsaid if you weren’t lucky enough to escape the danger. But I was utterly wrong, wasn’t I? I didn’t realize it until now, when it is my turn to write a longer letter.
If you could see the bridges, you would be all amazement. From the moment I spotted similar walkways in the Fox Den, I wanted to run across them, yet they are nothing compared to those in the imperial city. Were a sunset to be poured into the shape of a building, it would resemble the towers, and the bridges are filaments stretching between them—appearing so thin and unsubstantial from a distance, but upon drawing nearer, the strength of the structure reveals itself. Sunlight glitters over the coral as if it had been fashioned of crushed crystal. The flowering vines winding through the balustrade create a parade of blossoms in the loveliest pinks and red. The roadway is rough-textured, so there is no danger of slipping, and wide; a steamcart rolled past us with room to spare for a buggy on its other side.
Yet from the moment I stepped onto the bridge, the urge to flee back to the tower flattened my courage. I could barely force myself to cross it, even though our destination was the most splendid temple I’ve ever seen. If Mara and Helene weren’t with me, and the thought of revealing my distress hadn’t been so unendurable, I don’t know that I would have ventured more than a few paces.
I felt certain, utterly certain, that as soon as I began to cross it, the bridge would fall out from under me.
And I can’t account for the fear. There are so many things I’m afraid of, yet great heights has never been one. It was nothing to look over the side, even as I walked. But not a second passed that I didn’t feel the terror of the bridge dropping from beneath my feet. It makes so little sense. How many balloons have we jumped from together with gliders strapped to our backs? I didn’t feel the same fear then.
I don’t know when I became this woman. My dist
rust of people is a sensible one. How many have given me reason to be cautious? Yet now I’m distrusting even solid structures. What will be next? Will I stop eating, fearing that I’ll choke because I won’t trust my teeth to properly chew my dinner?
No doubt you are laughing at me as you read this. You are pointing at what I’ve written and shaking your head because the true source of my fears is all so obvious. Laugh all you like, my brother. I’ve written far too many stories to be incognizant of how one fear represents another . . . and I have just been married.
I love him. More than ever I believed possible. Never did there exist a man more suited to both my heart and my mind. And despite the turmoil surrounding us, these past few days have been the happiest I’ve ever known.
So I’m terrified that it will drop out from under me. I’m utterly certain that it will—and my heart has no glider to break my fall.
But I did cross the bridge. And I understand these longer letters now. They are not farewells, are they? Because what use would it be to write a good-bye that would be lost in the ice or a zombie’s teeth? None at all. No, those letters were to remind you of every reason you had to escape the danger you were in, to fight past any hopelessness or despair. Because what good are the words you’ve written if they are never delivered? They would be naught but ink staining a paper clutched in a dead hand. They only mean something when the letter is read, and if you didn’t fight, those words would never be said.
So I will battle my fears. And when you arrive, I hope to meet you on the other side, smiling.
Always,
Zenobia
XXV
When Zenobia had begun sketching out her new story in the jellyfish balloon, the outline of a plot had almost written itself: a tinker would topple a tyrant.
So simple. And no wonder. She’d written it so many times before.
Sometimes the antagonist had been less of a tyrant and more of a villain, yet still Archimedes Fox had been there, fearless and charming, defeating the oppressor with his charm and his sword. He’d been followed by Lady Lynx, with her fearless swagger and perfect aim. Now Zenobia was writing about a tinker girl who would build a machine that could toss a despot from his throne. It was the same. Exactly the same. The girl was smaller and weaker than Archimedes Fox and Lady Lynx, but she was just as fearless, with a sharp tongue and brilliant mind—and with no real doubts about whether she would win.
Zenobia had gotten it all wrong. Every step her tinker took needed to be an act of courage—not just the final step, surrounded and protected by a mechanical suit. Her tinker needed to fear defeat. If she didn’t, the victory would be too easy. Perhaps even meaningless.
Blast it all to hell. Every word she’d written, pure rubbish. Nothing to do but start over.
“Did you still intend to join us— Oh.” At the chamber door, Mara took a step back and spread her hands, as if in surrender. A bathing basket hung from her elbow. “I’ll come back when you aren’t as murderous.”
Murderous? Probably. But Zenobia had reason.
Pure rubbish.
She ripped the paper from beneath the typesetter and slapped the machine closed. “I’ll come.” A bath had to be better than soaking in the foul dregs steaming from the pages in front of her. “Let me gather my things.”
As she stalked toward the screen shielding her dressing area, Mara came into the room and reached for the shredded page that had fluttered to the floor. “The work isn’t going well?”
“I ought to burn it all.”
Like Ghazan Bator had burned Zenobia’s last manuscript. Oh, he’d done her a favor. He’d done the world a favor, sparing them the offal dripping from her pen.
“I’m glad that you’ve been giving Helene duplicates to take with her, then.”
“I learned my lesson.” Zenobia belted the long, wide-sleeved robe that she’d purchased the previous day specifically for this purpose. There wasn’t a single tub on their tier of the tower, and a bowl of warm water simply wouldn’t do any longer, so she would traipse two levels down and frolic in a public bath. “There’s always some rebel general waiting to throw my work on a fire.”
Though maybe it hadn’t been such a favor.
“You didn’t have Helene post this?” Mara asked, and Zenobia peeked around the screen. The mercenary had found Zenobia’s letter to her brother, sealed and still sitting beside her typesetter.
“I wrote it after we returned from the temple walk this morning.” Though if Zenobia had written the letter earlier, she still wouldn’t have given it to Helene to send. “And I didn’t know where to have it posted. Archimedes must be on his way, don’t you think?”
“Probably.”
“Then I’ll wait to give it in person. Or have you do it. That would be best.”
“Why best?”
Because although Zenobia had the courage to give it to her brother now, she wasn’t certain if she would when he arrived. Exposing so much of her heart—even to Archimedes—was difficult. Terrifying.
One step at a time.
She emerged from behind the screen. “It’s best because I would probably burn it first.”
“Why would you— Oh. No. Don’t tie that sash in the front. You might as well hike the hem up around your waist and hang a vendor’s sign around your neck.”
Blast it all. Zenobia tugged the wide belt free. On their walks and in the Fox Den, she’d noted that most women wore it with the knot at the back, but there had been some who didn’t. “I assumed it was just to make their stomachs look flat. And that those who tied it the other way were pregnant.”
Mara’s brows shot up. “Are you?”
A prospect both wonderful and terrifying—but unlikely. The timing wasn’t right. It had been almost a month since her menses and they were due again soon.
But it was possible. “If I am, I suppose I will know it before long. But I only knotted the sash in front because I couldn’t figure out how to tie it behind my back.”
“You could have tied it in front and twisted it around to the back.”
And of course she told Zenobia that after she’d untied her knot. Snarling a little, she started over. “Why are these so impossibly wide? It is like tying a ship’s sail around my waist.”
Grinning, Mara watched her struggle with the sash for another minute. “You’re making a mess of that. Let me help.”
With a sigh, Zenobia let the mercenary do what she could. Her gaze landed on her typesetter, but she couldn’t dredge up any irritation again. Instead her chest tightened with the same heavy and breathless anxiety that had filled her as she’d written Archimedes’ letter.
These past few days had been so wonderful. Every moment with Ariq. These explorations through the city with her friends. Even the rubbish she’d written seemed better than anything she’d created before.
Dare she hope that it might endure?
Behind her, Mara said softly, “Helene didn’t look very well when she left.”
“No.” Pale and ill, her friend had returned across the Red Wall shortly after they’d completed their trip to the temple. “I don’t think the mask agrees with her.”
Or rather, the fear of what would happen if they were outside the quarantine and she was forced to choose between removing it or being sick in it.
Zenobia didn’t know if Mara had guessed the truth of Helene’s condition. Most likely, the mercenary had. But Zenobia wouldn’t mention her friend’s pregnancy; better to blame it wholly on the masks.
“I don’t think they agree with anyone,” Mara said.
No. Not the people who wore them or the unmasked people who tried not to stare. “Perhaps we will stay in this tower on her next visit. As we can tolerate the masks better, you and I can go out alone.”
“You never ventured out so often in Fladstrand.”
“No.” Zenobia had liked that town well enough. There hadn’t been as much to see, that was true. Yet that wasn’t why she went out so often now. “I didn’t care to go out. But
even if we were back home, I couldn’t be content staying in my parlor now.”
Even though she had just as much to write. Because the world had always been so small, and that had been her escape. But now . . . she wouldn’t be content until the world around her felt as big as the one in her head.
“Well, I won’t argue,” Mara said. The sash pulled tighter before loosening again. The mercenary huffed out a little breath and started over. “I can never tie the complicated ones. I’ll have to use the same knot the men do. You’re a foreigner, so no one will care.”
Zenobia didn’t either. She would be untying it as soon as they reached the baths. “Why won’t you argue? Did you and Cooper suffer such severe boredom in Fladstrand?”
“No. At first, perhaps, we wondered if we’d made a mistake. It was a drastic change for us. So quiet. We wondered if we should take on smaller jobs in addition to yours. Then the kidnapping attempts started. So it got better.”
“How fortunate for you, then, that so many blaggards were trying to abduct me.”
Mara laughed. “It was. It still is.”
“But . . . you wanted a quiet situation. To start a family.”
“Yes. But we don’t want to sit and rust, either.”
And Zenobia had been worried they wouldn’t renew their contract because of the danger she’d put them in? No wonder she liked writing stories so well. She would never understand real people. “Do you prefer being here? Aside from the masks—and the Empress’s Eyes.”
Which were unavoidable. The clockwork devices watched them on every street, on every level of every tower. Only their personal chambers boasted any real privacy.
“Those are impossible to put aside,” Mara said before sighing. “I don’t know whether I enjoy being here, or if I just enjoy the things that remind me of when I was a girl. Such as hearing the clack of the women’s sandals. I’d forgotten that. But I used to hear it whenever my mother and I would walk through the Nipponese enclave in the Ivory Market. I don’t have many memories of her. Mostly just of how she would lift the lid from a cooking pot and waft the steam to her face, and how beautiful her smile was when it smelled as she hoped it would. So it’s . . . pleasant to be reminded of more.”
The Kraken King Page 42