Ranalae smiled knives at Ripka, but she pushed on. She’d already stepped in the quicksand, might as well get a few shots off before she was buried. “He was never a normal sel-sensitive. He was always deviant, and they dug around in his flesh to figure out why.”
“That. Is. Not. True.” The Dame’s cheeks had gone scarlet, her fingers curling into the arm of her chair.
“Why don’t you ask him, instead of this sycophant?”
“He isn’t here!”
Ripka jerked back a step, the anger seeping out of her sails. That was real pain in the Dame’s voice, broken and ragged, and it shook Ripka to realize she’d done that to the woman – that she’d ripped a scab right off a festering wound. While Ripka fumbled for words, the Dame shot a glance at Tibal and said, “Despite my best efforts otherwise.”
“He ain’t a pet to put on a leash,” Tibal drawled and rolled his shoulders. “But.” He hesitated, flicked a gaze to Ripka. “She’s right, you know. Weren’t pleasant little talks they were having with Detan in that tower. Talks don’t make a man scream in his sleep.”
“My nephew,” the Dame grated out the words, “is beside the point. The point is your treason, Miss Leshe, and your accomplices in the act.”
“I pressed them all into it,” she said immediately.
The Dame waved this off with a flick of her fingertips. “Noble of you, but I do not care. You are all quite lucky that the only damage you succeeded in causing was delaying matters by a few marks. If it had been otherwise, I would have you struck down where you stand. Now, out of deference to the friendship you have all shown my nephew, you may leave this place with your lives. But you are leaving this place.”
She snapped her fingers, and the guards brought forward finely made rucksacks and set them at the feet of all four. Ripka picked hers up, flicked back the top, and was unsurprised to see her new clothes stuffed inside.
“But you are not leaving this place completely free. Meet your new friends.” She inclined her head to the guards, none of whom so much as twitched an eyebrow in response. “They will escort you out of the palace and into an inn in the market district. That’s the other side of the city, you’ll note. There you will be given two rooms to split however you please, and I will cover the cost for the duration of your stay. Which will be indefinite, as I will not have the time to figure out what to do with you four until well after Thratia has been repelled from these walls. The rules of your new lives are simple: you may not leave the grounds of the inn without escort, and then only for excellent reason. And you, Tibal.” She swivelled to pin him with her gaze. “You will be watched exceptionally closely, and your flier will remain here for safekeeping until I decide what to do with you.”
He bared his teeth at the Dame, an expression of aggression that shocked Ripka straight to the core. “Wouldn’t want to risk losing your spare heir, would you?”
She drew back as if struck, then pressed her lips together and gathered herself once more. “You are of my blood, though it chafes you so. Whether you believe me or not, I care what happens to you. I will see you safe, even if I must imprison you to ensure that fact.”
“Why not just lock us up? You’ve got a big jail here.” Tibal’s arms came unfolded, his head cocked to the side like he’d scented blood in the air. “Why dress up what you’re doing to us like it’s something better than imprisonment?”
“Because it is most decidedly temporary, and my jail is for persons who have been convicted of crimes.”
And the only crime they could be accused of was treason. Which always, always, came with a death penalty – no matter how enlightened a city claimed to be. Ripka shot Tibal a look, but he must have figured it out for himself, because he shut right up and took a step back, folding his arms over his chest to start a good and proper sulk.
Dame Honding surveyed them all, let her gaze linger on every last so-called traitor she’d harbored under her roof, and a spike of guilt stabbed at Ripka’s chest. Though she had been acting for what she felt was the greater good, still she had betrayed this woman’s trust. This firm, kind woman, who was struggling to keep her city safe while what little was left of her family dissolved all around her.
Though her expression was stern, the Dame appeared so very tired in that moment, and not just due to the late night. In fact, Ripka doubted she got to bed at a reasonable time at all any more. The unsteady lantern light highlighted the crow’s feet stamped around her eyes, the hard lines about her lips where she’d spent her life schooling her expression to careful neutrality. Here was a strong woman, a proud woman, worn thin by time and circumstance, looking for a future – any future with a positive outcome – for the people she had spent her life serving. And now, toward the end of her life, she had nothing at all to support herself with. No family. No army. Just a lot of scared people, and a tenuous alliance with an empire that’d always been hungry to reclaim control of her family’s legacy.
But she wasn’t alone, though she didn’t quite understand that fact.
“Time to go,” Ripka’s guard said. Mechanically, she swung her pack over her shoulder, unable to take her gaze from the Dame.
Halfway to the door, she called, “You know how to find him. Write to him. Please.”
The Dame’s brows lifted, and then Ripka was ushered out of the room, and the door clicked shut behind her.
Chapter Twenty-Three
When Aella had finished wringing his will down to nothing, Detan stumbled free of the arena and stood, bent over and panting, in the hallway. While he was busy trying to figure out how to make his feet work again, a grey-haired man in the livery of Thratia’s household staff passed down the hall, took one look at Detan, and halted.
“Is my lord all right?”
Detan squinted up at him. Though the man was a bit stooped with age, he held himself with a stiff grace, wiry grey hair slicked back into a perfect, cloud-like swoop. Detan’s first instinct was to tell the man off – he wasn’t much in the mood for company after Aella’d put him through his paces – but something in the man’s manner reminded him of New Chum and put him instantly at ease.
“Can I ask a rather stupid question?”
The man’s expression twitched, hiding whatever his knee-jerk reaction would have been – probably a joke at Detan’s expense. Detan grinned. Yes, he could get along well with this man.
“I will do my best to answer, sir.”
“Do you happen to have any idea where my room is?”
The man’s brows lifted. “Do you have a head injury, sir? I can take you to the apothik straight away, or bring one to your side.”
He forced himself to stand, leaning his back against the cold stone of the wall, and threw him a lopsided smile. “Whatever damage’s been done to my head was done ages ago, my good man. No, I just arrived yesterday morning and I – ah – have yet to spend an evening in my own bed.”
“That I can assist with. This way please, sir.”
Detan regained some semblance of dignity by smushing his hair back down, and followed. The servant kept a crisp pace, but the moment he heard Detan’s breath rasping in his chest he slowed without a word. Detan was so starved for kindness that simple act very nearly made him weep with joy.
“What’s your name, grey-fox?”
The servant’s steady steps faltered at this nickname, and he turned his head to hide his expression – but not quickly enough. A little hint of a smile peeked through. “I am Welkai.”
“Been here long, Welkai?”
The man threw him a bemused glance. Seemed most servants weren’t used to having to do any part of the talking that wasn’t yes sir-ing and no sir-ing. “I have been with the commodore a year, but I’ve lived in Aransa all my life, sir. As did my parents.”
Ah, a proper Scorched native. A son of a family who’d set down roots in one of the Scorched’s rapidly growing cities, who identified not as Valathean but as Aransan first and foremost. He thought of red-cheeked Jeffin, the young lad’s anger boili
ng over at the thought of allowing someone who was not Scorched to partake of the safety of Pelkaia’s ship. Such pride could be a dangerous thing. Could draw lines in the sand that could be exploited.
And if he were a proud Aransan, he may not be too keen on Thratia’s transformation of the city, and that was something Detan could use. But first he’d have to let the man know he was sympathetic to civic pride.
“Nice to have that sense of history. Not many in the Scorched get that pleasure nowadays, with people migrating here and there for work.”
“Indeed, sir. My brothers and I were lucky our parents chose Aransa to settle down in, as there are a wide variety of opportunities in this city that cannot be found elsewhere. Begging your pardon, my lord, I am sure such opportunities also exist in Hond Steading, but Aransa is big enough for our needs.”
He waved off Welkai’s social stumble with a smile. “My old homestead can be a bit too big for its britches sometimes. Aransa’s a good city, a nice size and full of possibility.” He’d once thought it was big enough for him to roam through without notice, to play his cons and ramble the streets free as the man he wished he could be. But he’d soon learned that the world was slow to forget him, and not even Aransa’s shadows cast far enough to hide the fire in his past. “Your brothers work at the compound too, then?”
A twitch of the shoulders, a subtle hunch forward quickly hidden by turning down a rug-lined hall. “My brothers work the selium mines, sir.”
“Ah,” was all Detan could manage. The night he’d escaped from Aransa, he and Pelkaia had burned the mine’s Hub to the ground – and with it Aransa’s economic stability.
Welkai stopped. He stood perpendicular to the wall, his body stiff all over with repressed emotion – emotions Detan didn’t even want to guess at. Welkai knew who he was. And even though Thratia had made it clear as a blue sky to all of Aransa that Detan Honding hadn’t actually been responsible for the fire at the Hub after all, it’d been the doppel… well. That hadn’t been the story she’d spread originally. Originally, she’d let the truth fly through the streets, had let the people of Aransa learn to hate him. Didn’t matter what she said now. Rumors were rumors, and anger was a real hard thing to let go.
“Sir.”
Detan flinched. He’d braced himself subconsciously, preparing for a strike – physical or verbal – that he knew, really knew, that he deserved.
“I – I’m sorry,” he stammered. He knew he owed them all an apology. Knew words weren’t really sufficient.
Welkai shifted his weight, lips pressed hard together as if he were holding something back. Probably he was. Probably his family couldn’t afford to lose one more source of income due to Detan fucking Honding.
“Your room, sir.” Welkai unlatched the door that stood between them, let it swing open. “If that is all you need…?”
He hesitated, hating to ask this man for any more than he’d already taken from him. But if he were going to see Hond Steading safe from Thratia, he needed to leverage everything he had. Even if that meant leaning on a man he’d already taken far too much from. With a false smile plastered over his face, as if they were old friends and not potential enemies, Detan leaned on the door frame and tried to look abashed.
“Thank you for the escort, my good man. Tell me, I docked here with two other companions – Forge and Clink are their names. What rooms did they end up in?”
Welkai’s brow furrowed in legitimate confusion. “I’m sorry, sir. Only yourself, Aella, and her staff took rooms here. If there were others, they may have sought rooms in the city. Perhaps the Oasis hotel.”
Detan forced his smile wide to keep from grimacing. “Thank you, I’ll check for them there.”
Welkai bowed, all rigid formality, which was somehow more hurtful to Detan than outright anger. Anger he knew well. Polite indifference was another weapon altogether.
He let himself into the room and shut the door, hands shaking from more than exhaustion. Welkai. Renold Grandon. The faces of the havoc he’d wrought the last time he’d blown through Aransa haunted him. One he’d targeted simply because he hadn’t liked his manner, the other an innocent casualty of his desperation to escape.
But not just to escape. He’d been trying to do some good. Trying to save deviants, if he at all could, from the same horrors he’d experienced locked up with the whitecoats. Trying to get his friends clear of the terror, too. How many people had he harmed, trying to set things right? What right had he, to decide what was best for a city?
He’d failed Aransa. Failed this city in a variety of ways he was now certain he wasn’t finished discovering. But he wouldn’t fail Hond Steading, too. Wouldn’t let the city his mother had loved and his dear auntie protected fall under Thratia Ganal’s control.
No matter her so-called reasons – and he wasn’t yet convinced he believed her – she was a woman who couldn’t be trusted. A woman who traded lives into torturous ruin just to reach her greater cause. A woman who let Bel Grandon bleed out at her feet, just to make life more difficult for Detan.
No. Thratia may think she was doing the right thing, but she was no salvation. Not for Hond Steading. Not for the Scorched. Not for anyone. He’d stop her. He had to.
And he was going to have to convince her he was willing to marry her to do it.
When he’d stopped trembling, Detan stripped off his dusty, sweaty clothes and pitched them to the floor, scarcely taking in the room he’d been appointed for his stay here. Bed, rug, wardrobe, window, wash basin. Wasn’t too much different from Thratia’s room, save the lackluster view looking out on the dusty warehouse district, but it was plusher than a lot of hovels he’d spent his time in. And still, somehow, more oppressive than the stinkiest jail cell he’d ever been locked in.
Methodically, he washed and dressed again, trying not to think too hard about the fancy clothes that’d been stuffed in his wardrobe. Trying not to think too hard about how well they all fit him, and how they’d been tailored in shades of ash and stark carnelian. Flame and smoke. Thratia knew what he was, what he could still become. And though she claimed she did not need his deviant sense to gain control of Hond Steading, she was no fool. She’d let her enemies know, through whispers, that little Lord Honding was all grown up, and hadn’t lost his sel-sense at all. No, he’d been forged into something else. Something dangerous. Dangerous enough that not even the empire – though skies knew they tried – could keep him on a leash. He’d never be able to hide from the fire in his veins again.
Which meant he must own it, must truly master his own temper, to survive what was coming next. For Valathea would be coming for him in force, now that the secret was open, and he had no doubt that the simple fact of his existence would create for him enemies he’d never dreamt of. And worse, never see coming.
As he dressed, he recalled old lessons his mother had drilled into him before her death. Thought long and hard about duties he’d promised to uphold long before he’d blown the selium pipeline he worked to cinders and found himself a guest of the Bone Tower.
Power is no gift, she’d told him as her breath rattled in her chest. Power is a burden that must be leashed, always, to the good of those who do not hold it.
He’d never questioned her. Never dared to press her for deeper meaning. Everything she told him he absorbed like a sponge, hoarded it greedily in the vaults of his memory. His mother had never been well, not in his living memory. The bonewither took her early, set her trembling and pale and fragile. He’d used to hug her by circling his arms around her waist, and marveling how he could touch his hands behind her without ever touching her at all.
And now, dressing in the formal clothes she might have picked for him had she lived to see him through to adulthood, he wondered: did she know? Was she as prone to fire as he, though she hid it a thousand times better?
Pelkaia had intimated as much. Had claimed that his bloodline was meant to be extinct, that the only possible reason for his existence was a Catari exile who must have end
ed up in Valathea, fleeing those hunting them for the strength of their sel-sense.
What secrets haunted his family? What had his mother been trying to tell him, in all her quiet lessons on power? He had thought she meant the rule of Hond Steading. And she had, at least on the surface. But… But his auntie had never given him such lessons, and certainly never in the tone of voice his mother had used. And his auntie had not a hint of sel-sense in her body.
Detan stared up at the sky through his sliver of a window and asked the smeared clouds, “Did you know?”
He’d pushed himself away from her lessons after he’d escaped the Bone Tower, assuming he’d never take his old family throne. But now he faced it, faced that future, and wondered if he’d ever really known his family at all.
He shook himself. One thing was as certain as the pits were molten, his mother would have slapped him upside the head for ever allowing Thratia Ganal to get within a step of Hond Steading’s reins.
He needed a better lay of the land, a clear look at all his possible options. He needed to find Clink and Forge, and he knew damned well they weren’t lounging around in a posh hotel like the Oasis. They were dead, cast off by Aella for running out of usefulness, or else the more likely reason Welkai hadn’t even heard of them: they’d never left the transport ship at all.
Detan drank from a cold cistern that some poor sod like Welkai had left in his room, wondered briefly if Welkai might ever consider poisoning him, then shrugged. If he kept on jumping at every little fear, he’d never get anything done at all. And skies knew, he had as much to do as there were grains of sand in the Black Wash. And very, very little time left to do it in.
Chapter Twenty-Four
No one could ever accuse Dame Honding of treating her prisoners to cheap accommodations. The guards saw them settled in the upper floor of the Hotel Cinder, a quaint building of grey stone in the shadow of the city’s second largest firemount. The smoothness of the carved walls spoke of quiet pride in the city’s selium miners, who moved selium from the belly of the firemounts at just the right pace to keep quakes from rumbling their footing. The Cinder was a monument to those miners: crafted fully of stone, not a single wooden support beam to absorb an errant shake, and so very close to the firemount itself.
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