It was an archway built of stones—but unlike everything else down here at the bottom of the lake, it was not crusted over with weed growth. No—these stones were bare and weathered. Stranger still, when I stood before it, I couldn’t see through the doorway. The light disappeared.
The Passage, I thought. Now Drowned.
The spell-chain was near this, in my dream. It must be close by.
I needed air. I shot back to the surface, caught my breath, and dived again.
In my dream, the spell-chain had been close by. It had also let off a glow, and a hum. I strained my ears and heard nothing but my own muffled heartbeat. If I could meditate, perhaps I would hear the singing that would lead me to the spell-chain, but it was difficult to relax and let go when I also had to hold my breath and struggle to keep from bobbing up back toward the surface. A glow. Look for a glow. I saw nothing.
Air. Up to the surface, then down again.
I found nothing. I found nothing. I still found nothing.
I’m going to die here.
No. There’s another option.
I went back to the surface one final time and searched the sky for Zivar’s palanquin. Then I took a deep breath, dived down to the temple, and swam into the darkness of the Passage.
For the space of one heartbeat, I felt absolutely nothing: no water, no light, no cold, no heat. Then I felt a blast of cold air, and realized that I was lying on a smooth stone floor, in complete darkness. I gasped a deep breath—air, there’s air here, I thought with some relief, and staggered to my feet. The chilly darkness reminded me of the bottom of the mine, but I heard no voices—in fact, I heard no sounds at all. I cleared my throat; that echoed very slightly, but there was no other sound.
There was no light. I could see nothing at all, in any direction.
I stretched out my hands and felt around the place where I stood. Each hand touched a wall. I’d expected rough stone, but it was smooth, almost slippery, like glass or polished metal. I felt hesitantly behind me. Could I return to the water? Do I want to? I took a step, another step, and found that the walls curved around and met in a dead end.
Am I trapped? Is this a prison? I turned and took a careful step forward, then another, and another. The hallway appeared to continue. Well. Go forward, or stay here?
Go.
I walked slowly, since I couldn’t see anything. I kept one hand on the wall. In the darkness, I wasn’t sure if I was walking straight or if the tunnel curved. I stopped a few times and listened, but heard only a faint breath of wind. No drips of water; no shrieks from bats. I called out and heard a faint echo, but no voices returned the call. After a while, I began to walk a little faster; I hadn’t stepped on anything but smooth floor yet.
I had no idea how much time was passing, or how far I had walked. At some point, however, I realized that I was not getting tired, and not getting hungry.
Perhaps I’m dead.
This could be the underworld. It’s not exactly what I pictured, but it definitely could be the underworld.
I stopped to sit for a few minutes, even though I wasn’t tired. I thought back over my time in the water, trying to decide when I might have died. The Greeks believed that we crossed over a river after death. Perhaps I’d died when I hit the water, and the time I had thought I was diving and exploring, I was actually in that river, or something like it. I’d found the door, and gone through, and now I was journeying to the city of the dead.
There was that book where I saw the passage—The Passage, Now Drowned—but for all I knew, that was a picture of the passage to the underworld.
That would also explain why I’ve felt cold ever since I’ve arrived, but I’m not shivering…
That would explain why I couldn’t go back, once I came through the door.
After a while, I stood up and started walking again.
Dead or not, I didn’t have anything else to do.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
T AMAR
Like yesterday, the rooster woke me up. I lay in a sleepy haze, listening. There was a weight on my chest, but I couldn’t remember why. I thought back to the night before. Heat rose to my face when I remembered my awkward encounter with Alibek, but that wasn’t it. Then I remembered: Lauria, gone. I rose heavily and moved out of Damira’s way as she went to make porridge for breakfast.
Should I tell the others? In the morning light, I was no longer certain of what I’d known the night before. I might have been wrong. In fact, that seemed quite possible. I decided to say nothing.
“I think I know who the other Tamar is,” I said instead. “She has Lauria’s voice when she speaks. I think—perhaps—that she’s Lauria’s mother. She’s in hiding, just as we are, and calling herself Tamar so that Lauria will find her if she comes back.”
Janiya raised an eyebrow. “You said she was with Lauria. How do you suppose they got separated?”
“Maybe Lauria left her behind when she fled,” I said.
“Should we make contact with her?”
“No,” Alibek said. “I heard stories of Andromeda when I was still in Kyros’s harem, though I never met her—she’d been freed years earlier. Kyros had slaves who were loyal, but Andromeda was more than loyal. She truly loved him.”
“Lauria truly loved him once,” I said. “And she turned against him.”
“Andromeda is in hiding,” Janiya said. “Would she hide from him if she were loyal?”
“Maybe she was sent out to look for Lauria,” Alibek said.
“Lauria is long gone,” Janiya said. “Or she would have found us.”
Except that she was dead. My stomach lurched at the thought. But I couldn’t be certain. There was a lot about the borderland I didn’t know.
“Maybe she isn’t fully loyal to Kyros now, but that doesn’t mean we can trust her,” Alibek said. “We’ve revealed ourselves to enough people in Penelopeia already. If she is in hiding, she’s not going to be able to get us into the Koryphe, and if she’s not in hiding, she’s a threat to us.”
Janiya looked at me. “Do you think we should seek her out?”
I still wanted to, but only because she had a link to Lauria. “No,” I said. “Alibek is right. If we think of some way that she could help us—maybe.”
We ate our morning porridge, then tied our scarves over our faces and stepped outside to go dig. I couldn’t see well in the bright sun and almost ran into a woman outside Damira’s door. Janiya and Alibek stepped away, like they might make a run for it. I squinted. It was my companion from yesterday, the other Tamar.
“Tamar,” she said. “You’re Lauria’s Tamar, aren’t you? What are you doing here?”
I glanced at Alibek. He shrugged. “Let’s talk inside,” I said, and we went back into Damira’s house.
Damira glared as we came back in, then picked up the empty rice sacks and stalked out—to dig or do other work, I wasn’t sure.
“I was right,” Andromeda said as we sat down. “What are you doing here?”
“I could ask you the same question,” I said. “I thought you lived in Elpisia.”
“I did. I do. You know Lauria was here, though—Kyros and the Sisterhood of Weavers were holding her in the Koryphe. She became very ill for a while, and Kyros brought me here to nurse her back to health.”
“So why aren’t you still in the Koryphe?” Janiya asked.
Andromeda glanced at her, at her scarf-covered face, uncertainly. Janiya pulled off the scarf and said, “Tell her who I am, Tamar. I don’t see much point in games now.”
“This is Janiya,” I said. “She was the leader of—”
“Janiya. Yes. I know who you are.” Andromeda gave Janiya a wary look, and then sniffed, dismissing her. “And him?”
“Alibek,” I said. “Another member of the Alashi.”
“Alibek,” Andromeda said. “Oh, yes.” I realized that she knew him for Kyros’s little bird, even if they’d never met. Alibek’s face went pale, and he gave her a curt nod.
“How did you end up dig
ging out the collapsed temple in exchange for sacks of rice?” I asked Andromeda. “Surely they didn’t throw you out of the Koryphe.”
“No.” I saw a flash of humor cross her face, and then she grew sad. “Kyros held Lauria for quite some time, not really sure what to do with her. She has a power over aerika that makes her a threat—alive or dead. Finally, they decided they could kill her, but only if they had an aeriko perform the execution. They gave her a drug to make her sleep—a great deal of it—so she wouldn’t be able to resist the aeriko. I knew what they were doing, but there was nothing I could do but stay with her.” Her face became guarded. “Perhaps I should have tried then to resist, I—I don’t know. I saw no way out, for either of us. I didn’t want to upset her when there was no hope.”
“What happened then?” Janiya asked.
“Our guard, Xanthe, decided to get us out,” Andromeda said. I looked at Janiya. Her jaw was tight. “We had to half carry Lauria, but thanks to Xanthe’s knowledge of the Koryphe—and her friends among the Sisterhood Guard—we made it out. We hid with Xanthe in a cave but then they started searching, and Xanthe realized they were near…”
“And then?”
Andromeda lifted her chin and swallowed hard. “Lauria and Xanthe had to flee. So I sent them on without me.”
“You sent Lauria away?” I blurted out.
Andromeda narrowed her eyes. “More than anything else in the world I wanted my daughter to survive. Her best chance was without me. So yes. Yes, I sent her away. Because that was all I could give her.” Her hands were shaking.
My own hands were shaking as well. “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I didn’t…Well. What happened then?”
“Lauria warned me that if Kyros found me, he would use me as a hostage against her. I believed once that Kyros would never do that, but…I have come to believe otherwise. So I waited until they were gone, then slipped out and came here to hide. I think Kyros believes that I am with Lauria still, because no one has come looking for me. Oh, and Lauria caused the temple to collapse and escaped in the confusion. I can certainly understand why the Sisterhood wants her dead. If all my power in this world rested on the aerika, and someone came along who could free them with a touch—I’d want her dead, too, at least if she meant nothing to me otherwise.” She looked up at the ceiling for a moment, swallowed hard again, and gave me a twisted little smile. “So. That’s what I have been doing here in Penelopeia. What are you doing here?”
I looked at Janiya. She gave me a very small shrug. Apparently it was up to me to decide what to tell her.
“The Greeks are moving against the Alashi,” I said. “We need to stop them.”
“The three of you.”
“Three can accomplish a great deal. Or two. Or one.”
“Yes, but you’ve been digging rubble. Whatever your plan, I can’t imagine that was part of it.”
“No,” I admitted. “But…The Empire rests on a shaky foundation. If we can turn the army and the Weavers against each other, that will distract them.”
“No doubt,” Andromeda said. “But how are you going to do it?”
“Uh,” I said. “We’re open to suggestions.”
Andromeda shook her head and laughed. “Good luck to you,” she said.
“Let me ask you another question,” I said. “Who is really in charge of Penelopeia? It’s supposed to be the high magia, but there are four of them. And the army acts for them, but against them. Who rules here?”
Andromeda turned her palms up. “How would I know?” she asked. “Kyros brought me here, and I lived in Lauria’s prison. I saw Lauria, Kyros, Xanthe, and a handful of servants.”
“I was once a slave, too,” I said. “If there was one thing I always knew, it was whose voice mattered. Always. There are some things you never forget to pay attention to.”
Andromeda smiled slightly and met my eyes. “You were one of Sophos’s concubines, weren’t you? I heard bits and pieces of what happened, after Lauria first left on her mission.”
“Yes. I was.” Andromeda didn’t look a great deal like Lauria, but I saw the same struggle in her face that I’d seen a few times in Lauria’s. When Lauria had wrestled with her loyalty to Kyros, I hadn’t known what I was seeing, but now I did. If I could take Andromeda to the steppe for the summer, I knew I could win her to our side. With an hour in a closed room…it was still worth a try.
I stood up, took Damira’s teakettle, and made a cup of tea for Andromeda. There wasn’t enough to make tea for everyone else. I hoped Damira wouldn’t be mad.
“Andromeda,” I said. “You used to love Kyros, didn’t you? Before you realized that to him, your daughter was just a tool, that could be used and discarded.”
“Not just a tool,” she said quietly. “Or rather—not a tool that would be thrown away lightly. Because she was very, very useful to him. But I came to understand, finally, that he did not love her, even though she was his daughter.”
“But you love her,” I said.
“Of course.” Andromeda stared down at her tea. “I am her mother.”
“I love her, too,” I said. “She is my sister.” Or she was…I pushed that thought away.
Andromeda looked up again and half smiled. “Kyros has been making plans for a long time. When he sent Lauria on her mission, I believe that he was hoping to use her to take control of the steppe through treachery. That failed when Lauria was expelled, but he had made other plans, just in case. Lauria’s turning up again—well, first I think he kept her alive simply because here was a tool, back again, and possibly useful. Then he had to keep her alive because the Weavers were afraid of what would happen if she died. If the magia gives an order, it is obeyed, no matter what Kyros says. But when Kyros speaks, all four listen. And when the army takes control of the steppe, Kyros plans to be there. And when everything is over, he wants to control the steppe. That’s been his plan for decades—this is why he arranged to be posted to a backwater like Elpisia. He wants it very badly, for all that it’s mostly desert…”
Desert, and karenite. I caught my breath.
“What?” Andromeda asked. She narrowed her eyes when I didn’t answer right away. “I have been very honest with you,” she said. “I expect the same courtesy.”
“The steppe has a great deal of karenite. Soul-stone. The rock that the sorceresses need to bind djinni.”
Andromeda raised an eyebrow. This was not a complete surprise to her, but I could see her fitting the pieces together in her mind. “Ah,” she said. “That explains quite a lot.”
“What would happen if Kyros went missing?” I asked, thinking of the plan that Alibek had proposed yesterday. We’d joked about it, but with Andromeda’s help, maybe we could try.
Andromeda turned her cup around and around in her hands. “I don’t know. Surely there are others in the army who know about soul-stone and seek the power the steppe would give them. If the sword were knocked from Kyros’s grasp, someone would pick it up. But if he were missing, rather than dead…I don’t know. Do you aim to kill him?”
“No,” I said.
“But you aim for him, at least. I’m right about that.”
I tried to guess from her face if she’d help us. “I would love to aim for Kyros, but he’s a distant target. Can you help us get closer? Would you help us get closer?”
“I would, but…” Andromeda’s voice trailed off. “I don’t know what I can do. I’m hiding from him, it’s not as if I can just knock on the door and ask if I can bring a couple of friends up to chat. Or rather, I could, but I don’t think any of us would like what would happen next.”
I nodded.
“But into the Koryphe,” she said, a few moments later. “Perhaps—it’s possible I could think of a way to get all of us into the palace. Would that help?”
“Will you do that?” I asked.
Andromeda lowered her eyes to her own cup. “Yes,” she said, finally. Her hands were shaking. “Yes.”
We followed Andromeda across the r
iver, then around the square with the ruined temple. Down one narrow street, I glimpsed a white tower rising like an ivory needle from the Koryphe. Then we turned the corner and it was hidden from sight again. We passed through a narrow alley and came out onto a wide, busy street.
“People wait here to find day work,” Andromeda said. “Some of it is delivering things to the Koryphe. If we wait here, we might get lucky.”
We stood for a bit, then were hired by a man who seemed really pleased to see us. Apparently almost everyone was working in the temple square because the pay was so good. This man would pay in barley, not rice. He wanted us to carry furniture. He was a craftsman and had just finished a set of carved and cushioned chairs for a Weaver in the city. Not, unfortunately, inside the Koryphe, but we couldn’t very well turn down the work, so we each strapped a pair of chairs to our backs and carried them across town. We lowered them carefully to the ground, then carried them in one at a time, arranging them in a line in the courtyard. The housekeeper inspected them for damage and paid the chairmaker, who in turn gave us each a small sack of barley. We returned to the craftsman’s row to wait again.
The second person to hire us also had us make a delivery to the home of a Weaver—metal pots, this time. Then the third had us carry tanned hides to the workshop of another craftsman. At least we’d be able to feed ourselves at the end of the day. I wiped my sweaty face on my sleeve, frustrated.
“Sooner or later,” Janiya said. “This is a good idea. If we’re carrying in a delivery of pots and pans, or new chairs, no one will look at us twice. It will be easier to slip away once we’re inside the walls.”
“Are we really going to try this?” I whispered.
Janiya shrugged. “If we can get in…Well, if it seems suicidal, we’ll go back out.”
But no one hired us to carry anything to the Koryphe. At dusk we returned to Damira’s house with the barley and Andromeda. Damira barely glanced at Andromeda, raised a pleased eyebrow at the barley, and cooked it up for dinner.
Andromeda sat quietly when we were done eating. Damira had bought more tea that day and gave each of us a cup of it. Andromeda turned the cup around in her hands again. “If you only want him dead, I could turn myself in,” she said. “Kyros would not expect treachery from me. I could strike when he least expected it.”
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