Cast in Flame

by Michelle Sagara

  “Mortals don’t sleep that way,” Bellusdeo replied. “They wouldn’t last five days; the dehydration would kill them. What do you know?”

  “Good question. I know—I think I know—that the long sleep is a choice.”

  Bellusdeo snorted. With smoke.

  “You don’t think it’s much of a choice.”

  “If you’re offered the choice between painful, messy death and, oh, anything else, how much of a choice can that anything else be?”

  Having made similar choices in the past, Kaylin found a seat. It happened to be on the table nearest the big chair, but given the furniture at her old home, this wasn’t a stretch of etiquette. She reached out and caught one of Bellusdeo’s hands in both of hers. “I don’t want you to think about the long sleep,” she said.

  Bellusdeo stared at the place where their hands joined. “You don’t even understand what it is.”

  “Then tell me. What I know is that you won’t be here, anymore.”

  “If I’m not here, you’ll be able to find a place of your own. You won’t be subject to these odious, unfriendly guards and the whims of this equally odious Dragon Court.”

  Kaylin lifted her bathrobe and pulled up her sleeve. She was wearing the bracer; Severn had returned it on the way home. “I’m subject to the whim of the Court. The difference is that the Emperor doesn’t care if I live or die. He’d probably be happier with the ‘die’ part. He’s more subtle because—”

  “Yes?”

  “Well, actually, I don’t really know. I’m assuming it’s because of the not caring whether or not I ‘die’ part.”

  “I don’t have that luxury.”

  “It’s not generally considered a luxury,” Kaylin reminded her, “...but I’m beginning to appreciate how it could be. Back to the sleep thing.”

  “It means more or less what it implies. If the sleep is a choice that is forced, there are places in which we might...rest. These places are protected; while we sleep we are at our most vulnerable in almost all ways.”

  “You don’t get visitors in your sleep, clearly.”

  She laughed. It wasn’t a happy sound. “No. No visitors. Perhaps there are dreams. Those who have woken from their long sleep have not said that the sleep is troubled by nightmare or vision; if it is, they don’t recall it.”

  “You’ve spoken to Dragons who have awakened?”

  Her gaze slid off Kaylin’s face, to land somewhere around the fireplace. “Yes. In my youth. I was not, myself, considered fully adult; I had not yet unlocked my second form. I did not understand the desire to sleep—there was so much I wanted to see and do, the idea of great weariness was foreign.”

  “And it’s not, now.”

  The Dragon’s shoulders slumped. “I understand,” she said, looking down at her hand, which was still held tightly in both of Kaylin’s. “I understand why I’m important. I understand what the stakes are. I understand what my role is—and must—be.”

  Kaylin said nothing.

  “Diarmat despises me,” Bellusdeo continued, when Kaylin failed to add words of her own. “I can even understand why. But I—” She stood. “If there was some freedom, some sense that who I am, and not the physical reality of what, made a difference—” She closed her eyes. Opened them. Looked, for a moment, like a drowning girl. Kaylin had never been that girl.

  But she’d been a girl figuratively drowning in different waters, and if the causes weren’t the same, the sensation was. She tightened her grip. “You want him—you want them—to see you as you are.”

  Bellusdeo nodded, looking slightly embarrassed. “They see what I am: female. Dragon. They know that I am the effective Mother of the Race, if the race is to survive. But I could be anyone else as long as I possessed those characteristics. I could be any other person. I could have all the charm and wit of Diarmat. I could be a psychotic killer—is that the right word?—and all would be ignored. Not accepted, exactly, but ignored. For the greater good.”

  “The Arkon sees you as you are.”

  The smile which was almost a perfect expression of humiliation, shifted, softening. “Yes and no. He sees me as I was, but at least that’s part of who I now am. And I’m being unfair. I think he marks the changes, but he hasn’t seen them all.”

  “How much have you shown him?” Kaylin asked.

  Bellusdeo didn’t answer. After an awkward pause, she said, “So why did you enter the Palace sloshing wet?”

  Because this was neutral ground, Kaylin answered. Given the color of the Dragon’s eyes, she figured nothing she could say was going to make things any worse.

  * * *

  “Well,” the Dragon said, when Kaylin was done—which, given the usual interruptions, took longer than it should—“your Teela was right.”

  “First of all, she’s not my Teela, and second, about what?”

  “You are never going to be boring. You might even make boredom seem appealing.” She glanced down at their joined hands, squeezed briefly, and then gently extricated her fingers. “Even if I chose to sleep rather than serve, I’m not sure it would be allowed. And I understand why, Kaylin. If you’re fomenting rage against the Emperor, don’t bother; you can’t come close to the rage I feel whenever he opens his mouth.”

  “What did he decide?”

  “He decided that perhaps my complaints had some small value.”

  “Which means he’ll interfere less?”

  Bellusdeo snorted more smoke.

  “It means Caitlin won’t be vetting apartments before you view them. Emmerian will. You won’t be humiliated by the Dragon Court because unless the accommodations meet with Imperial preapproval, you won’t be speaking with any landlords.” She swallowed. “If I choose to remain in the Palace, you will of course not be subject to this procedure.”

  Silence.

  Kaylin could, at this moment, say two things and mean them both. The first: she didn’t want a roommate. She was, and had been, happy living on her own. Yes, she had lived in a small space, and yes, it was a mess. The mess didn’t bother Kaylin, but it annoyed the Dragon.

  But the second: that she couldn’t just walk away and leave Bellusdeo here. Kaylin didn’t have a lot of friends, and because she didn’t, she clung to them ferociously. Bellusdeo had none.

  None, if you didn’t include Kaylin, and Kaylin wasn’t certain that she wasn’t assuming too much; desperation wasn’t exactly friendship. If Bellusdeo had been Queen in Elantra the way she’d been Queen on the world that she’d lost, she probably wouldn’t have had the time of day for Kaylin. And to be fair, Kaylin would have avoided her like the plague; she had too much money, she had too much power.

  But all her money was secondhand, and all her power was theoretical.

  “I’m not leaving the Palace without you,” Kaylin told her, and meant it. “And I’m not living here one minute longer than I have to.”

  The Dragon’s smile was wan. “I don’t understand you.”

  Kaylin shrugged. “Welcome to the club. Most days I don’t understand myself—but I don’t let it stop me.”

  “Maybe you should.”

  “Maybe. Not starting now, in case you were wondering.”

  Bellusdeo closed her eyes. “I feel so pathetic.” She spoke in Elantran, which made sense—Kaylin wasn’t certain there was a word for pathetic in Barrani that didn’t mean mortal.

  “Me, too—on the same ‘most days’ I don’t understand myself. Go to sleep. Tomorrow will be better.” She turned toward the bedroom and then turned back. “After my shift, I’m taking Annarion to visit Tara in Tiamaris, if you want to come.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Mandoran did not appear in the Halls of Law the following morning. Neither did Annarion. Tain had taken a temporary— paid; Kaylin checked—leave of absence, which couldn’t
possibly be a coincidence. Teela did show up on time. For a member of a race which didn’t consider sleep a necessity, she looked a lot like she could use some.

  Then again, Bellusdeo looked about the same.

  The Dragon wore simple clothing—for Court. The Barrani wore her uniform. They gave each other the heavy once over; it was Bellusdeo who broke first. “I hear you had an interesting evening.”

  Teela glanced at Kaylin, who shrugged. “Interesting is the most politic choice of word for it, yes. I hear you had a less eventful evening. But not less enraging.”

  “Rage is useful. It’s often overrated, but it’s useful.” She smiled; it was edged.

  Teela returned the smile, sharpness for sharpness. Kaylin decided that today was a day for good behavior, just to be on the safe side.

  * * *

  There was an absence of safe sides on the trip to Elani, because Teela joined them. This was not the usual arrangement of patrol beat; the Barrani Hawks tended to be given the rougher sections of town. The better sections bored them more.

  “Why are you coming with us?”

  “Because Tain is on leave, and Bellusdeo is with you. Apparently the Imperial Court has decided she’s safer with me here.”

  “I don’t believe you,” Kaylin replied, voice flat.

  Teela met her gaze and held it, before finally cracking a smile. “You win. I’m sure I could have sold you on it before the assassination attempt.”

  Kaylin shrugged; it was true. “Why are you tagging along?”

  “I need to speak with Evanton.”

  * * *

  Evanton was at home. Which is to say, the shop was actually open to the public. For someone who had a storefront, Evanton kept inexact, verging on inhospitable hours; for the most part he was closed to custom.

  He seemed to be expecting theirs, today. Grethan answered the door. The best thing about the introduction of an apprentice was that he could answer the door quickly. Evanton creaked his way toward the sound of the bell at a speed that made snails look fast—if he decided to answer the door at all. If you made the mistake of ringing the bell while he was already on the way, he got angry. Kaylin had learned this early.

  On the other hand, if he’d actually failed to hear the door when she was expected, and she failed to ring the bell a second time, he also got angry. It was very much lose-lose, with hope wedged in to add anxiety.

  Since Grethan had appeared as apprentice, the stress of standing on the outside of this particular closed door had lifted. He smiled hesitantly as he opened the door.

  “Is he in a bad mood?” Kaylin asked, voice low.

  “Not so far.” His tone added, please don’t change that, although he was too politic to put it into words. She could hear Evanton’s voice as she stepped across the threshold. If he wasn’t in a bad mood, he didn’t sound like he was in a particularly good one.

  “Is that Kaylin?” he shouted.

  “Yes, Evanton. Kaylin, Bellusdeo, Corporal Handred and Teela.”

  The sound of something hitting the floor a room away wasn’t entirely unusual—but it did mean Evanton had decided to hurry. He appeared in the door on the other side of the long bar in his customary apron; his hair looked like it had been exposed, when wet, to a lot of wind.

  He offered Bellusdeo a bow. It was an almost perfect bow, something Kaylin could only appreciate after sessions with Diarmat, one of which was due to start in two days. The best thing about the West March had been the utter lack of Lord Diarmat. On the other hand, Diarmat was an oblique and unstated death threat; many, many things in the West March had been less diplomatic.

  Bellusdeo offered him a perfect bow in response. Teela folded her arms and waited. Whatever respect Bellusdeo felt for Evanton—all of it genuine—was lost on the Barrani Hawk. Probably because she had vastly more experience with the curmudgeonly Keeper, who had never offered a similar respect to Teela.

  “My apologies for the mess you find us in.”

  Since it was more or less the exact same mess it always was—which the cobwebs with their inches of gathered dust attested to—Kaylin’s jaw momentarily unhinged.

  He caught it, of course. “I’m willing to bet that you live in far more of a mess than I do, Private.”

  “You’d lose if you made that bet now.”

  He raised a brow, which changed the fall of lines across the better part of his face. “A poor choice of phrase on my part, but a fortuitous reminder of why I hoped to see you. You are, apparently, looking for a new domicile.”

  She frowned.

  “A new place to live.”

  Ugh. “I haven’t recovered from the last landlord interview.”

  “No?”

  “We had a Dragon Lord as escort. Emmerian. He was almost actively insulting.”

  “Unfortunate—for the landlord.”

  “To be fair, Lord Emmerian is the least in-your-face Dragon I’ve ever had tag along.”

  At that, he smiled. It was slender.

  “You know Emmerian.” It wasn’t a question. Kaylin’s eyes narrowed.

  “I have some acquaintance with him, yes. He shops here. And no, don’t ask for what. I have some pride as a merchant.”

  “You work on Elani,” she countered, with all the inherent criticism of long experience.

  “The venue does not make the man. You are distracting me, and if you are going to do that, drink some of the deplorable tea I’ve made.” He turned, turned back, and to Kaylin’s annoyance, offered Bellusdeo his arm.

  Since Bellusdeo hadn’t been raised in Imperial Courts, this gesture might not mean much. But she was a student in Diarmat’s despised class; she took the offered arm without even a whiff of hesitation or confusion. If it weren’t for the rest of Bellusdeo’s life, Kaylin would have envied the ease with which the Dragon fit into it.

  * * *

  “I hear you had some difficulty last evening,” Evanton said, as Kaylin took the rickety chair she considered hers. She felt Teela’s sudden glare as she reached for a cup—a full cup—of cooling tea. Since she had sensation in her mouth, she vastly preferred tea that didn’t scald her tongue.

  “I didn’t tell him,” she said, reaching for a cookie, as well. “I haven’t had the chance.” To Evanton, she added, “Is there some kind of supernatural flyer that the rest of the world sees that bypasses the Halls of Law?”

  “Of course. You wouldn’t read it; it would look too much like paperwork to your untrained eye.”

  “Very funny.” The best thing she could say about Nightshade at the moment was that she’d gone there on her personal time and wouldn’t be required to file an official report. “What did you hear?”

  Teela cleared her throat. Loudly. This implied that she was sitting far enough away that stomping on Kaylin’s foot under the table would cost too much dignity. Kaylin ignored this. She trusted Evanton. She didn’t trust his mood, which could be changeable and unpredictable, but she trusted what he would do with said mood.

  “That there has been an inexplicable change in the configuration of what was previously known as Castle Nightshade.”

  “I’m not sure the change will remain in force.”

  “Ah.” Evanton cleared his throat and helped himself to a cookie. If he didn’t care for tea—except when drenched and chilly—he did like the cookies. “The changes were not made by the fieflord.”

  Kaylin stopped eating. Notably, Severn did not. Then again, Evanton rarely grilled Severn. “No.”

  “Does he remain fieflord?”

  “That’s the question, isn’t it?”

  “I assume you have more ready access to answers. He will not, however, hear the answers you choose to share—not while you are here.” He glanced at her cheek.

  “He’s still fieflord, for now.”

 
; “Good.”

  “Good?” She didn’t ask whether or not he knew Nightshade.

  “If he is not a man of whom you would otherwise approve—and he is not, I am not a fool—his reign has been stable. He is not Barren.”

  Kaylin stilled; she always did, when Barren was mentioned. But she didn’t freeze, and the pause in conversation went unremarked upon. “No.”

  “An’Teela,” Evanton continued. “You had something you wished to say?”

  “To ask.”

  “Ah. From the cast of your expression, I’m going to guess you don’t want to ask it of me.”

  “No. I want to speak with the elemental water in the Garden.”

  Kaylin inhaled crumbs, which made her cough. “I’m not going in there with you,” she said. “I’m done with being a drenched, soaking sponge for at least a day.” Frowning, she turned to Evanton. “The water told you.”

  His smile was indulgent. “Very good. Grethan. Grethan!”

  Since Grethan had started moving practically the minute the first syllable of his name had left the old man’s lips, Kaylin thought the shouting could have waited. Grethan appeared instantly in the narrow door frame.

  “Take Teela to the Garden.”

  He froze.

  “Is there something on my face, boy?”

  “N-no.”

  “Good. She wishes to speak with the elemental water, and I have a few words to say to Kaylin and Lord Bellusdeo. I am willing to allow this, and you are perfectly capable of entering the Garden on your own. Teela doesn’t,” he added, “have all day.”

  Kaylin glanced at Teela, who shrugged in response. Her eyes, on the other hand, were the shade of blue-green that implied casual suspicion. She joined Grethan, who lead her away.

  * * *

  “How bad was it?” the Keeper asked, after the space of five minutes had passed. He was, of course, staring straight at Kaylin.

  “Severn was there,” she replied, throwing Severn under the carriage.

  “Corporal?”

  “It was, as you suspect, difficult. The water did carry us to the exit.” Severn liked tea that was both bitter and hot. Evanton hadn’t poured a cup for him, so he did this for himself as he spoke.