The Councillor

by E. J. Beaton

  Holding the paper up, she looked over what she had written.

  “Make sure you have won Prior over by the ball,” she read. “All will be ready.”

  Three said nothing in reply. He stood up and walked to the window, and Lysande grappled with the message, telling herself to breathe. “Win me? Why in the Three Lands would the White Queen want her servant to win me over?” she said.

  Three was gazing at the lotus pond below. She had the impression that his thoughts were far away from the flowers.

  “Perhaps she has guessed that the ‘heatstroke’ that laid you up in bed was not quite what it seemed. Or perhaps she has discovered that you are working with the Shadows.” He walked back to the chair and sat down. “Perhaps she thinks that because you are new and inexperienced, you can be killed in some manner that will shock Elira. Only one thing can be assumed. Whatever she has in mind for the Sapphire Ball, it will revolve around you.”

  A wave of disbelieving laughter rose in Lysande’s chest and subsided again. She had just discovered that she was elemental, and the Council would be within their rights to have her killed as an enemy—and now their real enemy, the White Queen, wanted to kill her too. It was a play without an end.

  “Well, I may not be Dante Dalgëreth, but I can defend myself. And I will have two hundred elite guards waiting for my word.” She could feel her jaw tightening. She would not give in to Mea Tacitus, not yield to a woman who refused to take form, to a hand that moved others into the line of attack. Whatever Mea had endured as a servant to her cousin, it did not weigh against murder. Not in the reckoning of Perfault and other ethicists . . . and not in her own, for she had devised her own standards since Sarelin died. “Even if the Umbra leaks the positions of the Lyrian guards to the White Queen, they cannot know about my troops.”

  As she spoke, it occurred to her that there was no means of absolving Three from suspicion of being the Umbra, or absolving the rest of the Shadows. She held the thought, for a moment, before shelving it in her mind.

  “I expect you are right. Hand me those papers, Signore Prior.”

  Lysande passed him the letter and the translation, and he folded them up and tucked them back under the brim of his hat. He pushed a lock out of his face, and as the Lyrian sun streamed in and fell on the strand, she saw the pure white shade of it against his cheek: the tress starved of color. It took her a second longer to notice his frown. “You’re not telling me something. Do you think two hundred of the best Axium soldiers will not be enough?”

  “What is defense, after all, but putting up walls? You use an army to erect a wall between yourself and another army, or a shield as a barrier against a sword. Mail, weapons, personal guards: they all provide walls with which we hope to keep out death. But can you put up a wall around your own mind, Signore Prior?”

  She was silent. Charice risked death, she thought. The bone people faced death each morning.

  “Consider that if she seeks to win you over, she may work to gain your trust; few of us have a fortification against our emotions and our anxieties, and the Umbra may have been working on yours already. We have analyzed her deceit against Bastillón and Royam. We have scoped out the building of her armies. Perhaps we should have looked at a different kind of campaign, though. I know that no chain mail or armor plating can protect you against what she will do to you if she breaks into your head.”

  “Do I have your assistance?”

  He looked at her for a long moment, his hands folded, his eyes crinkling at the edges and lending him a manner that was both kindly and sad. “The Shadows will do what they can from the margins. Your Axiumite friend is lending us some very unusual medicines, which I hope we will not need. I make no promises, but if things look grim, Six and I may even step into the light. In the end, however, we rely on you.”

  “Then I must not disappoint you. I must set about putting up the best wall I can.” Dante, Luca, Jale, even Cassia: none of them could be trusted until the ball was over. Why did she feel so heavy inside? “I will be impermeable.”

  “Impermeable.” Three straightened his hat. “I thought I was impermeable, too, until she shattered me. Very well. Sleep, my dear, and you should be recovered enough to go over the defenses tomorrow. Send word if you feel a stirring.”

  He bowed and rose. As he stood up, Cursora came flying back through the window, landing on his wrist as naturally as if she were a part of him: her feathers shone the same unnatural white as his hair. He placed the dove on the desk and left her to peck among the papers. Lysande watched him walk across the room.

  She thought she caught a hint of consternation as he regarded her, like a man weighing up his odds and finding them longer than he had hoped, before he turned the handle and walked out. The pendant disappeared beneath his cloak.

  Only when the door had clicked shut did she realize that, in the shock of the maturation, she had quite forgotten to tell him that she had stood on a hilltop in Rhime, gazed down at the sheer drop below her, and agreed to form an alliance with Luca Fontaine.

  Twelve

  It took nearly a half-hour for the palanquins to navigate through the pleasure district of Lyria. Lysande stared out at theaters, salons, and academies of dance, all decorated with gold statues that resembled spearfish and seemed to protrude onto the street. In the western quarter, a less-refined range of establishments promised “prize fights” and “exceptionally skilled dancers,” and the signs disappeared altogether once they passed into the southern quarter.

  Lyrians beckoned to her from doorways, dressed in clothes that revealed more than they covered. A little further along, a man sauntered into the street, clad in what seemed to be a scrap of silver cloth suspended by a multitude of strings, eyeing the palanquins over the top of his goblet. Lysande could not help blushing. The Axiumite in her was too strong to stare, but she allowed herself an occasional glance. It was hard to tell whether there was any point in observing propriety in Lyria, when minutes ago, a doorwoman had invited them to “better connect the flesh with the divine power of the sun.”

  A jolt of the palanquin made her wince. She put a hand to her chest, rubbing the flesh where a tenderness remained, and thought of writing, of her quill, of anything but the caress of blue liquid on the back of her throat.

  In the quarter marked pleasure district south, the buildings gave way to a wide, open area where groups of Lyrians chatted. Sweet-rice carts trundled between groups of card-players, and smaller carts distributed pepperwine and iced dragoncherry juice. The palanquins jerked to a stop, and her gaze swept the plaza, finding its object on the edge of a fountain.

  Luca sat, reading, clad in an unadorned shirt and trousers. If the shimmering coil of Tiberus had not rested on his knee, he might have not have attracted so many glances from the crowd. He shut his book as she walked up to him, and its spine shone like a ribbon in the sun.

  “At last,” he said. “I was beginning to think you’d never find time to converse.”

  “That was no excuse to pelt me with doves. Why here, of all places?”

  “Why else but to delight in the Fountain of Southern Cheer?” He gestured to the bubbling water behind him. “Of course, that’s not its real name . . . like so many historical terms, it was mistranslated. In the ancient Lyrian, it was fontaine de vivre. The water of life.”

  “Throw a coin into it, and it brings you glory. Dip a hand in the water, and it heals the illnesses that plague you.” Lysande had not forgotten the cramp in her palm from the hours she had spent translating the section on Lyrian myths in the Silver Songs, so many years ago, when Sarelin had presented Ariane Chamboise with a copy for each of her mistresses.

  “Perhaps you should dip a hand in it, Prior. A heatstroke that lasts for ten days—that must have been a very tenacious ailment.”

  She ignored the remark and led her guards past; he followed her, lifting Tiberus up onto his arm. At the rail around th
e circular area, they stopped. She waited a few seconds, inspecting his face before turning back to the fountain.

  “I opened your gift, Fontaine.”

  “And did you get so far as forming an opinion?”

  “I find it repulsive.”

  “I see. You don’t know how to use it.”

  “I understand perfectly how it works, thank you. I simply do not find it amusing.”

  In front of them, a group of girls tossed coins into the water. An old man stooped down beside them to tip a bag full of brass shavings in, and shook his offering out bit by bit.

  “Speaking of gifts,” Luca said, “those coins and trinkets don’t stay in the fountain. At night, a member of the royal staff comes out and trawls through the water with a net, to catch coins and smaller pieces that may not look valuable: chips of gold, gems, slivers of copper.”

  “I sense a metaphor in the air. What is the net, Fontaine? Justice? Power?”

  He moved closer to her. “We Rhimese are different from you. Axiumites learn to gather news when their backside touches the throne; in Rhime, we do it to survive. I’ve been marshaling spies since I was eight, Prior. I caught two of the Ursinis plotting to slit my throat on my sixteenth gift-day. Now, like that net, nothing slips past me.” He fixed his stare upon her. “Even when I’m sitting in Lady Pendici’s courtyard, I catch every whisper in the inns . . . and if pilgrims are lodged near Lyria by my colleague, well, I catch that, too.”

  Lysande pretended to study the peaks of water as they rose and dissolved.

  “You may be surprised to hear it, but we Rhimese have pilgrims of our own.”

  “How many?”

  “One hundred and fifty. Specialist pilgrims, you might say. They have a very good aim with their . . . blessings.”

  They looked into each other’s eyes. Lysande weighed the desire to avoid disclosing a secret plan against the risk of crossing Luca Fontaine. Something always held her back from walking away whenever he was near, and there it was, again: a certain brightness in his eyes when she moved a little too close. She thought of the touch of her fingers against his neck, on the ship; of the way he had looked at her as she pressed them against his throat, his pupils widening ever so slightly. It was impossible to forget.

  “I have a hundred pilgrims,” she said.

  “Good. Perhaps we could arrange a gathering, to coordinate our hymns.”

  A man with a pierced ear in the style of one of the Periclean States’ fashions wandered past the fountain, and she caught something odd about the man’s garb, but her mind was still working out what Luca had discovered. Had he followed her to her meetings with the Shadows, too? Could he tell she was lying about the number of guards? And what of the bigger secret—the transformation that had wracked her body and mind?

  Something warm and heavy on her wrist prompted her to look down. Tiberus had wriggled his way off Luca’s arm and was wrapping himself at a leisurely pace around her own. “Fontaine,” she said, through gritted teeth. “I am not a pillow for a snake.”

  “Some would consider his attentions an honor.” He reached over and lifted Tiberus up. The cobra gave Lysande a reproachful look, resettling himself on Luca’s forearm.

  The Periclean walked past them again, and she realized at once what had niggled at her: the man’s outfit draped him, the thick cloth hanging all the way down to his boots. It looked like an advisor’s robe, except that this man did not have a learned manner, and she thought that his shoulders exhibited the bulk of a soldier. As she watched, the man shot a glance at them.

  “As a matter of fact,” Luca said, patting Tiberus’ head, “I was wondering—”

  Lysande’s mouth opened, but before a warning could form on her lips, the Periclean lunged at Luca, smallsword flashing in the sun. The blade went through Luca’s shirtsleeve and drew blood. Luca moved, and she saw a blur, a whirl of linen and flesh, the prince pulling his rapier free of the sheath even as he turned. Tiberus hissed and reared.

  It was Luca who struck, though not by thrusting. The attacker advanced, pushing his way to Luca, and the prince appeared to receive the blow—it was an art, Lysande thought, to kill by taking an impact instead of giving one, yielding like water. The man had not spotted how Luca had avoided the edge, and where he had positioned his own blade, close to his body.

  A red stream leaked from the Periclean’s chest. He tottered, a stunned look in his eyes, and clutched Luca’s arm. Luca pulled the rapier out and let him fall.

  “Not a bad effort,” he said, looking at the man. “But far too hasty, for an assassin.”

  He stepped back from the body, ignoring the shrieks around them—people were running, some fleeing back into the street, others hurrying over to gawk at the dead man. The fluid that had burst from the man’s heart spread and soaked the ground. Lysande felt a crackling in her stomach that had nothing to do with scale.

  Luca ripped a strip of cloth from his sleeve. Binding his arm, he stared down. “Let’s see if our friend wears his allegiance under that ugly collar.”

  He ripped the man’s robe upward, exposing a mark just below the collarbone. An image discolored the flesh, the skin tainted black as if from some disease, but surely this could only be a brand. The shape was unmistakable. If someone had copied it from an illustration in a history book, the winged beast could not have been clearer.

  At Luca’s whistle, two Rhimese guards appeared beside them—they must have been hovering nearby all along, Lysande realized—and the soldiers dragged the dead man through the group of spectators, a smear of red following the body along the ground.

  With brisk strokes, Luca wiped his hands on his shirt. The Rhimese hefted the body and disappeared into the traffic. Just a second ago, a man had come out of nowhere with a sword; Luca’s sleeve had been slashed, his arm bloodied, and yet he did not seem troubled.

  “It’s a late request, Prior but I have to ask . . .” He wiped his hands on his shirt again, daubing more red onto the white.

  Lysande’s mouth felt dry. She could see the dark lake on the ground out of the corner of her eye. “Yes?” she said.

  “Would you lead me into the dance at the Sapphire Ball?”

  * * *

  • • •

  Possibilities, probabilities, and likelihoods ran through her mind as the palanquin jerked its way back to Rayonnant Palace. She recognized a familiar yearning, and without the warm, golden glow of scale to still her anxieties, she considered who she could turn to.

  The upper dining room was nearly empty, its open windows allowing the sun to pour over the table, illuminating bowls of blush-melon and plates of spiced noodles. The court of Lyria was putting on a comedy in the grounds; Jale had dedicated the performance of The Merry Sword of the North to Dante, to sniggers from the Lyrian nobles; but as she had hoped, a familiar figure sat by the left window, a ray of light blessing the poetry book on his knee.

  “Better to sit, for what I have to tell you, my lord.” She raised a hand as Derset made to rise. “In fact, better to drink, too.”

  He bobbed his head, with an ease proportionate to that which Lysande had felt around him ever since they fell together onto the ship’s deck. It was not the time they had spent in her bed that had changed things most, desire moving between them like the swell of water at high tide; it was the moment he had rushed to knock her out of the path of a fireball that had eased them into a state of nearness—the kind of nearness that could be felt.

  The sight of the poetry book reminded her of the line she had glimpsed Derset reading on the ship. Jolted by the visual, she remembered the rest of the verse:

  If ever I should choose to hunt

  A poor shot would I be—

  But I would gladly lay before

  The one who hunted me

  A fragment of the fourth sonnet in Inara’s Courtship of the Blackfoot Tree—was it not? One
of the poet’s lesser-known works, Lysande knew, perhaps because the sequence of sonnets was so long and was known to be more romantic than respectable. She was one of the few who cherished Inara’s musings above the moralizing poetry of the Steelsong Era, and she was proud of the eight hard-bound volumes containing her personal translation of the sonnet sequence, stored in her chamber in Axium Palace. To see Derset reading such a poem, however . . . a sonnet about wishing to be pursued and pierced . . . was it inappropriate for the acting leader of Axium to be deeply intrigued?

  She took a jug and two goblets from the table and poured the wine. “Before we speak of plots, let me say that I should like to request your company again, this afternoon. In my chamber. Provided you feel that it would be beneficial to you, of course . . .”

  Derset looked down, smiling, and when he met her gaze again, it was with the kind of agreement that could not be mistaken. If ever I should choose to hunt. Lysande took a long sip of her drink.

  Over the Lyrian white, she recounted her organization of the secret guard, beginning with the day that she had learned of the possibility of an attack at the Sapphire Ball—though leaving out the meeting with the Shadows, attributing her intelligence to Raden’s range-riders. She detailed the selection of two hundred special fighters, the disguise and dispersion through inns, and the plan to bring them to the palace. It was strange how secrets layered: once you had one, you had another, and then before you knew it you were buried by them, struggling for a lungful of air. This was her chance to breathe.