by Amy Raby
“A shroud mage has no power to remove a death spell.”
Iolo looked at the ground. “Oh.”
“If I could, I’d free all of you,” said Janto. “You work in the Imperial Palace, do you not?”
Iolo nodded. “The Imperial Garden.”
“If you want to help me, teach me to pass for a slave myself, and get me into the palace,” said Janto. “It may not be enough for me just to sneak around and overhear things. I need to be able to talk to people, interact with people—other slaves and maybe even Kjallans. There are things I must learn quickly if I’m to have any chance of finding Ral-Vaddis and discovering what it is he knows.”
“I can do that, Your Highness,” Iolo answered with a smile.
2
As Rhianne crawled on hands and knees through the hypocaust, the palace’s underground heating system, she simultaneously cursed and blessed its existence. It was hot and cramped and ridiculously uncomfortable, yet without it she’d never be able to sneak out of the palace without her escort tagging along after her and reporting her every move to the emperor. Her poor, naïve guards believed her to be taking a nap in her bedroom right now, just as they had every other time she’d sneaked out. They must think her a prodigious sleeper.
Brushing a cobweb from her hair, she counted the massive heat-glows spaced at intervals along the floor. Forty-five, forty-six, forty-seven . . . This was where she turned left into the narrow passage. Good thing she wasn’t frightened of small spaces. The hypocaust was sweltering even with only one of every five glows activated, but tempted as she was to deactivate them, she interfered with nothing down here. She would leave no evidence of her passing.
At the end of the narrow tunnel, the crawl space opened vertically into a passageway, allowing her to stand and walk normally for a few steps until it ended at a door, the hypocaust’s lone service entrance. It was guarded, but as long as the guards possessed no magic, Rhianne had nothing to worry about. She opened the door and stepped through it, throwing first a confusion spell and then a forgetting spell over the guards who turned in her direction. She continued on her way.
She proceeded from there to the palace stables and then, on horseback, down the switchbacks to the Imperial City of Riat. When her journey was complete, she led her white mare into a tiny stable adjoining a modest home in the merchants’ district.
“Who’s there?” called a gruff voice as she dismounted and pulled the reins over the mare’s head. The huge figure of an old palace bodyguard appeared in the doorway that connected house and stable, casting a shadow over the straw-filled stall. The voice softened. “Oh, it’s you. The boy will take your horse.”
A Riorcan slave slipped into the stable and took the mare’s reins. Rhianne climbed the stairs and trailed the big man into the house. “How are you, Morgan?” she asked.
“Getting by.”
“I brought your pension.” Rhianne pulled the thirty tetrals from her pocket.
Morgan turned and rocked on his feet, frowning at the coins. Finally he extended a hand, and she poured them into his palm.
“You don’t have to do this,” he said.
“Someone has to,” said Rhianne. “Are you doing those exercises the Healer recommended?”
Morgan nodded. He puttered around his kitchen, searching for a pair of clean mugs. “I don’t know where that boy puts anything,” he groused, reaching for a high shelf but grunting when his arm wouldn’t straighten.
“He puts things away,” said Rhianne. “If you’d just look where they’re supposed to be—I’ll get those.” She pulled two mugs off the high shelf. “You’re not doing the exercises.”
Morgan didn’t answer. He took the mugs and poured a reddish drink from a pitcher into each.
“Do I want to know what that is?”
Morgan grinned. “Try it. You’ll like it.” He gestured at the sitting room. “Have a seat. Catch me up on the palace gossip.”
Rhianne perched on a settee and sipped her mystery drink. It was sweet and fruity and strongly alcoholic. She coughed discreetly. “It has a kick.”
“Fig juice, honey, and gin.” He settled onto a couch across from her.
“Disgusting.” She took another sip.
“So, what trouble has your cousin gotten into lately?”
Rhianne rolled her eyes. “He spoke out against the war in Mosar during a council session. Now Florian’s ready to mount him on the wall.”
Morgan laughed. “Wish I’d been there.”
“It’s not funny,” said Rhianne. “Florian struck him, and it’s not the first time.”
“I mean I wish I’d been at the council meeting. Florian’s not used to having anyone call him on his horseshit, and Lucien’s just enough of a pissant to do it. The problem with those two is that they have only two things in common—stubbornness and pride—and everything else about them is different. Florian’s such a hothead. You know—act first, think later. But Lucien’s so controlled, he can stare at that Caturanga board of his for an hour just contemplating the moves. The two of them don’t value the same principles or see eye to eye on anything. I’ve never seen a father and son who are such opposites.”
“Lucien suffers,” said Rhianne. “He puts a brave face on it, but Florian’s hatred torments him.”
“Of course it does,” said Morgan. “But wait and see. If Lucien survives these years under Florian’s thumb—and I know they are not easy—he will make a fine emperor someday. One of the best.”
Rhianne leaned back in her chair. “You say this, having served his elder brother?”
A shadow crossed Morgan’s face. “I’d have saved him if I could. You know I would have. But Sestius would have made, at best, a mediocre emperor, and the same goes for Mathian. I know it was Riorcan assassins who did it, but . . . sometimes I wonder if the Vagabond may have meddled with us, just a bit.”
“Calling on the gods now? You’d better keep those treasonous thoughts to yourself,” said Rhianne.
“Well,” said Morgan with a twisted smile, “I don’t work in the palace anymore. To treasonous thoughts!” He raised his mug, apparently with no expectation that Rhianne should raise hers, and drank deeply.
Sometimes Morgan frightened Rhianne with his bitterness and plain speaking, but at least he came by his faults honestly. He was former Legaciatti, once the personal bodyguard of Sestius, Lucien’s eldest brother, who had been heir to the Imperial Throne. Assassins had attacked the pair of them, killing Sestius and leaving Morgan for dead. Morgan survived, but his injuries were crippling; he could not continue in his duty as a Legaciattus. He was entitled to a lifetime pension, but Emperor Florian had been so furious at his failure to save Sestius that he’d dismissed Morgan from the service empty-handed.
Morgan, during his service, had always been kind to Rhianne. He’d tipped her off a couple of times when Sestius was in a rage so that she could stay out of his way, and he’d always seemed to be conveniently blind when she and Lucien had played their childhood pranks. She and Morgan hadn’t been close back then, since in his service he’d been attached to Sestius. Nonetheless, she’d perceived him as family, as a sort of distant uncle. He had no real family, of course; none of the Legaciatti did, and after his disability, he would have been destitute had she and Lucien not come up with the scheme to support him with their personal spending money.
“You tell your cousin to keep his head down,” said Morgan. “Florian is not a man to be crossed. He bears grudges.”
“You would know, I suppose,” said Rhianne.
“Lucien’s goal right now should be to sit back, quietly learn as much as he can about governance, and survive. He’ll have his turn to run the empire, in time—if his father doesn’t kill him first.”
“Lucien’s afraid there won’t be an empire left for him if Florian governs so recklessly.”
“Such dramatics,” said Morgan. “He’s, what, seventeen? A difficult age.”
“I have news too,” said Rhianne. “Apparently
I’m to be married.”
“Are you?” Morgan sat up straighter. “Who’s the lucky fellow?”
“Augustan Ceres.”
Morgan’s eyebrows went up.
“I didn’t choose him,” Rhianne added quickly. “Florian simply informed me I was marrying him. He’ll have the governorship of Mosar when it’s conquered.”
“Mosar? You’re leaving, then.”
“Yes, but don’t worry,” she said. “I’ll find another solution for your pension. Maybe Lucien can deliver it. Or I can send it from overseas.”
“You’re a good woman,” said Morgan. “But don’t involve Lucien. The poor boy’s got enough to deal with.”
Rhianne swallowed. “Do you know anything about Augustan?”
Morgan shook his head. “Seen him around the palace a few times, but he wasn’t there much—always out on assignment. A great legatus, I’ve heard. Handsome fellow.” He smiled tentatively.
Rhianne waved a hand. “I don’t care if he’s handsome.”
“Sure you do,” said Morgan. “You wouldn’t want an ugly old man like me.”
“You’re not ugly, and thirty-six is far from old,” said Rhianne. “It’s nice if a man is handsome, but that’s not the most important thing. The most important thing is what sort of person he is. Is he kind? Is he generous? Is he loyal?”
“Those are the second most important things,” said Morgan. “The first most important thing is how big his cock is.”
“Oh, be quiet,” said Rhianne. “So, what’s the news from your corner of Riat?”
“Nothing of import,” said Morgan, but he filled the next hour with tales of the crazy widow next door and the fortune-tellers across the street, plus a story about a donkey that sat down in the middle of the road and refused to budge until someone scared it off with a squealing pig. For that hour Rhianne managed, at least for a little while, to forget her own worries.
3
Infiltrating the Imperial Palace as a garden slave turned out to be easier than Janto had expected. There were a couple dozen such slaves, and when Janto joined the horde at the back gates of the palace in the morning, dressed in a single-belted gray slave tunic so that he blended in with the group, no one remarked on his presence. The head gardener, a creaky Kjallan fossil, didn’t know the slaves by name or even seem to regard them as individuals, so the biggest problem Janto faced was having no gardening skills, nor any experience with manual labor. That and having to hide Sashi, whom he concealed with his invisibility shroud and instructed to stay close while disturbing as little ground in the garden as possible. He could see Sashi himself, since the shroud was his own creation, but the ferret looked faded, almost ghostly, behind the veil of his magic.
He took instruction from Iolo as he went. The garden itself was stunning. Janto had never seen such a variety of trees and plants in one place. Most of them were leafless, which he found creepy and strange. Mosari trees never lost their leaves while they lived, and walking through a forest of bare trunks made him feel as if he were walking through an arboreal graveyard. But he understood they were only dormant, waiting for the spring, and as he spread mulch around the tree trunks, he tried to imagine what each tree would look like when it came to life again.
This is a terrible forest, complained Sashi, scampering invisibly at his heels and keeping to the dirt paths, where his passage would not bend grasses or stir leaves.
How so?
No rats, no voles.
Are you certain? asked Janto. It seemed plausible that rodents might find places to nest in the thicker ground foliage.
Can’t you smell? Sashi drawled with a look of condescension.
Janto smiled. His ferret loved to lord his superior senses over Janto when he could. I’ll take you hunting later. In a real forest.
As he wrestled a wheelbarrow of mulch from one section of the garden to another, with Iolo trailing after him, he discovered the garden was divided by country—here were Inyan plants, there were Sardossian ones—and he was astonished when he arrived at a Mosari section. It was warm, wonderfully so, with heat-glows strategically placed to simulate Mosar’s tropical climate. He recognized many trees and plants. There was an avocado tree, fruitless and pruned rather strangely, but he recognized its distinctive leaves. He spied a Poinciana and a lemon tree, along with other familiar plants whose names he did not know. Most of them looked a bit odd, and some were unhealthy. He felt as if he were looking at a copy of a copy of a Mosari garden, recognizable but not quite right in its essentials.
This forest is sick, fussed Sashi.
You’re quite right. I wish we were at home.
Sitting on a bench beneath the Poinciana tree was a woman—a Kjallan noblewoman, no doubt, since a uniformed bodyguard, female but substantial-looking, stood watchfully at her side. The noblewoman was perhaps twentyish, of average height, pretty, with walnut-colored hair that hung in ringlets. She wore the feminine version of the syrtos, which flattered her figure, and over it was draped a loros, a thin band of jewel-encrusted brocade. At the sight of the loros, Janto adjusted his estimation of her rank upward by several degrees. In all likelihood, she was a member of the imperial family.
“Who is she?” he whispered to Iolo.
“Don’t know,” he whispered back. “Very high rank. Stay away.”
Janto pushed his wheelbarrow closer to the woman. He’d come here to spy on the imperials, and here was an imperial, although he doubted a sheltered Kjallan princess knew much about the war.
The scent of orange blossoms wafted toward him as he neared her. The princess’s voice was soft and liquid as honey, and she was speaking Mosari! Reading it from a book, it appeared. She was misprouncing most of the words, and she had the most atrocious accent he’d ever heard. Poor woman—nice to look at, but it seemed she had dandelion fluff for brains. He listened anyway, mesmerized.
* * *
Rhianne could see that the Mosari travelogue she’d found in the library wasn’t going to be much use. It had a single page of helpful phrases for travelers, but if she was going to spend the rest of her life in Mosar, she needed to learn the whole language, not just a few helpful phrases. Still, it was all she had, and until she found better, she’d make the most of it.
“Cona oleska,” said Rhianne to Tamienne, her bodyguard. “Means good morning.” She repeated the phrase under her breath, trying to commit it to memory. “Cona oleska, cona oleska.”
“Cona oleska,” echoed Tamienne.
She sighed and looked up from her book. She noticed the slaves were now working near her in the garden. She wanted to learn the Mosari language, and here she was, surrounded by Mosari men, every one of whom spoke it fluently. The problem was that none of these slaves spoke more than a few basic words of Kjallan. Still, perhaps she could practice a “helpful phrase” or two on them.
One slave was quite close, shoveling mulch. “Cona oleska,” she called to him.
The slave raised his head and, to her astonishment, spoke in fluent submissive Kjallan. “With respect, great lady, you just wished me a ‘good mountain.’”
Tamienne was instantly in motion, cuffing the slave across the face. “Your Imperial Highness,” she growled.
“Leave him be, Tami!” cried Rhianne.
“I beg your pardon, Your Imperial Highness,” said the slave.
Tamienne retreated, glaring balefully at the slave.
“Come closer,” Rhianne ordered him.
Wordlessly, he did so.
Rhianne could not help thinking that there was something distinctly unslavelike about this man. Though not especially tall or imposing, he stood before her with the carriage of a warrior, and his comfort in addressing her suggested his rank in Mosar had once been high. He couldn’t have been in Kjall long because his coloration was still sun touched, his golden hair a shade lighter than his skin but cut short, unlike the Inyans, who braided theirs down their backs. His sea-blue eyes regarded her with more amusement than fear, and she found herself wanting
to know his story and maybe touch that lovely bronze skin—not that she was the type to consort with a slave. “What’s your name?”
“Janto.”
“I wished you a ‘good mountain’?”
“You put the stress on the wrong syllable. You said oh-LES-ka. It’s OH-les-ka.”
“OH-les-ka,” she mimicked. “Cona OH-les-ka. Is that right?”
“Yes. But your accent is atrocious.” He smiled, and she was taken aback by how beautifully his features lit up.
She smiled back. It was so funny to hear him speak words in the submissive grammar that weren’t submissive in their nature at all. Perhaps since he was a foreigner, he was not aware of the irony. “I would fault your Kjallan accent if I could, but I’d be lying. It’s perfect.”
“Thank you,” said Janto. “I had an exacting tutor.”
“I have a feeling you weren’t a gardener back on Mosar.”
“No, Your Imperial Highness,” said Janto. “I was a scribe in the Mosari palace.”
“You’re literate, then?”
“Yes.”
And he spoke with such confidence. If he’d truly been only a scribe, he’d been a valued one. “How did you come here?”
His eyebrows rose. “To the Imperial Palace?”
“Yes. To Kjall.” She realized as soon as she’d said it that it was a stupid question. Obviously he’d been enslaved, and whatever had happened to him, it had been recent, so the pain would still be raw. And he was young—around twenty-five, she guessed, which made his situation sadder still. She was curious, but she should not satisfy her curiosity by poking at fresh wounds.
With a wry smile, he looked around the garden. “Imperial Highness. This is a beautiful place, and you are a beautiful woman. I don’t think you wish to hear my tale of woe.”
Rhianne did, in fact, want to hear his tale of woe, but she accepted this as Janto’s polite way of saying he preferred not to talk about it. Still, if she got to know him a little better . . . but he was a slave. He could be transferred anywhere at any time, at the whim of the overseers. “Your talents are wasted hauling dirt. I would like to give you a new job.”