by Jane Kindred
With the palace occupied by Helga’s forces, I wondered if the camp had been opened. If so, there would be twice as many demons ready to fight against our Virtues when they arrived.
Lively appeared at last about an hour after dark. With her finger to her lips as she closed the door, she set a lamp on the table and beckoned me to the bedside. “I haven’t done it yet,” she whispered. “The guards are still awake. I just told them I was bringing you some light.”
“And are you going to do it at all?” I whispered back. “Or are you just miserable with your own company?”
Lively glared as she raised the wick. “If I wanted company, I wouldn’t come to you for it. I came to tell you I’ve put together enough sleeping powder to give you and Rita a good four-hour window. But it has to look like you did this on your own. If Helga knew…” Her voice trailed off for a moment, and she looked over her shoulder as if she thought Helga might be standing behind her. “At any rate, that’s what the lamps are for.” She took a pouch from her pocket and handed it to me. “Sprinkle it on the flame, but not too much at once. You don’t want to put the lamp out. Leave one burning here in the room and take the other with you. That way it will put anyone to sleep along your path. And like I said, it should give you about four hours before it starts to lose potency.”
“And how does it keep from putting Margarita and me to sleep as well? Is there actually a charm against it or was that entirely fabricated?”
Lively blushed. “It works by will. You can’t will yourself to sleep.” She shrugged her shoulders. “Oh, I suppose you can, but why would you? At any rate, anyone you do will to sleep…will.”
“So it wasn’t just the warding charms you lied about. You specifically willed us all to be affected.”
“I had no choice. I told you.”
“No, actually you didn’t tell me.” I gripped the pouch tightly in my hand as a surrogate for her throat. “You said nothing about choice. You simply betrayed us. That was your choice.”
Lively’s face twisted as if she wanted to say something else. “You don’t understand. You’ve always been free to do as you please.”
“Nobody owns you anymore, Lively. You left the apothecary and Helga abandoned you.”
“Yes.” Her olivine eyes flashed with anger. “And then you took over where they left off.”
My mouth dropped open. “I took over? What do you mean? That I treated you like a slave? I never forced you to do anything. You said you wanted to help.”
“Oh, yes, and you gave me such a choice, didn’t you, Your Supernal Highness? ‘I’m going to put you to use,’ you said.” Lively’s face twisted again, but this time she seemed to be in pain. She put her hands on her stomach and regarded me with eyes rimmed with red. “Did you think I really wanted to march nearly four hundred leagues with this baby in my belly? To be waddling about with child in the middle of a war?” She moved for the door, but I caught her arm.
“Lively.” The sharp tone of admonishment was prompted by my own guilty conscience. “Are the pains still coming?”
“Don’t you touch me!” She pulled her arm away and stumbled back into the door from the force of her resistance, a protective hand over her stomach and tears springing to her eyes. “What is it to you? Just leave me alone!” She took a sharp breath and caught herself as if stifling a cry, and went out and slammed the door.
As I’d done so many times in the unsuspecting, carefree days of my youth, I waited for the clock on the mantel to strike midnight before beginning my clandestine venture beyond the palace walls. Thinking of my distant cousin Ysael who had been Vasily’s mother, I wondered that I’d been so incognizant of danger then. If Helga’s story was true, it had been Ysael’s own seraphic guard who’d assaulted her, but the opportunity for a similar misfortune to befall me had been all too real and I’d never given it a thought.
The clock struck twelve. I took the pouch and sprinkled some of the scarlet powder into the flame of the oil lamp. A sweet-smelling, pale smoke curled into the air, like the perfume of violets and roses rising from the garden on a hot summer night. I sat on the bed a moment, willing the guards outside our doors to slumber and hoping Lively hadn’t failed to tell me some special incantation. I slipped on the jacket to my uniform and put on my boots before climbing through the passage to Margarita’s room, where she sat waiting with the shackles lying unlocked on the bed beside her.
I nodded to her. “Well, this is it. We should take your lamp with us. I’ve left mine burning with the powder Lively gave me.”
Margarita raised her head, her auburn hair gleaming like garnet in the lamplight. The look on her face told me I wasn’t going to like what she had to say. “I’m worried about Lively.”
“Margarita—”
“I know, but her pains. I don’t think they’re false labor.”
“Lively has made her bed. There’s nothing we can do for her.”
“She thinks the performance you put her up to in order to get into the palace brought it on. A sort of karmic retribution.”
“She’s blaming me for her labor?”
“You have had her on the march for four weeks.” Margarita’s tone was heavy with reproach. “She’s done a great deal for you. More than you know.”
“She murdered every Virtue in our party!”
“She had no idea the demons were going to do that. She was following Helga’s orders.”
“Yes, Margarita. That’s the point. She is following Helga’s orders. She’s aiding our enemy.”
Margarita frowned at me. “I think Helga is forcing her somehow.”
“Oh, for Heaven’s sake!” My outburst was a bit too loud, and I lowered my voice. “That’s the same sob story she gave me and I don’t believe a word of it. She plays her loyalties in whatever direction she thinks will be to her advantage, no matter whom it hurts. She’s playing upon your sympathy.”
Margarita said nothing and I paced toward the window, staring out at the dark world waiting for a ruler. How could I be its queen if I couldn’t even govern my second-in-command when a clever demoness playing damsel in distress turned her head?
I tucked my arms inside each other. “Sometimes I wonder if she hasn’t put some kind of charm on you. She has you twisted around her little finger, imagining she’s some delicate, misused thing.”
“I’m not a fool, Nazkia. I know she isn’t helpless, and I know she’s manipulative. But there’s more to it than that. She seems to want to do the right thing. She kept them from murdering us in our sleep and she’s helping us escape. When she speaks to me, I see her struggling as if the charm is on her own tongue, keeping her from saying what she pleases.”
I’d entertained the same thoughts, but not with quite as much passion and admiration as Margarita seemed to be, like a youth with a crush. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were infatuated with her.”
Her face reddened and I was afraid I’d gone too far. “It’s not infatuation,” she burst out. “I’m in love with her.” The flush in her skin was nearly as red as her hair in the glow of the oil lamp.
“I see.” So Love had been only partially right. I moved the shackles to sit beside her. “Does she know you feel this way about her? Because I don’t mean to be hurtful, Margarita, but don’t you think it’s possible that’s what she’s trying to exploit?”
Margarita focused on her lap and sighed heavily. “Of course I’ve thought of it. And of course you’re right—she probably is exploiting it. I haven’t told her how I feel, but I can’t have been all that subtle.”
“No,” I said with a rueful smile.
“Bozhe moi.” She pressed her hands to her face with a groan. “Am I that obvious?”
“To be honest, I might not have noticed it myself until Love pointed it out. But once she did…”
Margarita groaned again.
“It’s nothing to be embarrassed about.” I put a hand on hers. “There’s no logic when it comes to love. But I’m afraid it’s likely she’
s been taking advantage of it.”
“I know. And I’m sorry. I’ve allowed my feelings to compromise the mission.” She pressed her hands to her thighs with a look of resolve. “But I can’t leave her. I’m sorry, Nazkia. Manipulating me or not, she’s in trouble and she’s frightened. I can’t just abandon her.”
Whether magical or simply the caprice of nature, I’d hoped a little bit of Lively’s spell on her might break by getting it out into the open. I acquiesced with a sigh of my own, seeing no alternative while the timing of the sleeping spell was wasting. “All right, Margarita.” I stood and buttoned the top of my uniform and held out my hand to her. “I understand. But I’m sorry we’re parting ways. If we don’t see each other again I want to thank you for everything you’ve taught me. I couldn’t have gotten this far without you.”
Margarita shook my hand, looking up in surprise.
I took the pouch from my pocket. “If I can just put some of the powder into your lamp so I can take the other with me…”
She nodded and I sprinkled some into the flame.
“Good luck,” we said together.
Margarita stood to salute me and my eyes filled with tears. “It’s been an honor to serve you, Your Supernal Highness.”
“Well, that does it.” I pressed my palm against the corner of my eye to keep the tears from falling. “Now you have to hug me.”
She laughed and we embraced, and as we stepped apart, the door flew open.
Lively stood on the threshold, one hand cupped beneath her heavy belly and her face twisted with pain. Her mousy hair was wild as if she’d been grabbing at it, and her olive skin was pale and dotted with sweat.
“Rita,” she gasped. “Please help me.” She took a step forward, and a gush of fluid rushed from beneath her skirt and splattered onto the floor.
Dvenadtsataya: Alliances
There was still no sign of Love by the time full dark approached. Belphagor had spent the afternoon and evening asking around in the neighborhood. Though one employee at the Internet café remembered seeing her early in the day, no one else had seen anyone matching her description.
They couldn’t keep the Night Travelers waiting. Belphagor left the Virtues outside the cemetery to wait for his signal and used the only method he could think of to get inside without a fuss: he flew.
It had been a long time since he’d stretched his wings. He drew his opaque radiance around himself like a movable darkness that bent the light of the night sky if one happened to look at it straight on, flinging the wings of solid air out upon the stream of the more natural air around it. Like a warm current, he rose and let the flow take him, careful not to go too high where he might be noticed. He circled the cemetery twice, not seeing any sign of Night Travelers, but on the third revolution he spied them. Dressed in dull gray tones, they blended in like the tombstones of the dead among the crowded statuary of angels and reclining souls.
Belphagor descended smoothly, if a bit reluctantly, shrugging his wings back into place in the unseen plane between Heaven and Earth.
An elderly man stepped forward from the shadows. “You are Belphagor of Raqia.” He spoke as if informing Belphagor of an indisputable fact.
“I am.” Belphagor bowed slightly, uncertain of the protocol among this group. These were no ordinary contacts in the gypsy underground, but the leaders of the secretive sect itself. “Thank you for agreeing to meet with me.”
“We didn’t agree to meet with you.” A woman stepped out from behind a crypt, slipping back the hood that covered her silver-streaked ebony hair as she approached. “We agreed to meet with Lyubov Andreyevna Ivanova.”
It took him a moment to realize she meant Love. “And I would very much like for her to be here to meet you, but she was unable to join me.”
“This is precisely what I warned you about.” A younger man scowled beside her. “You can’t trust a demon.”
“Pyotr,” the older man scolded, waving his hand dismissively.
“And I suppose you think you can trust the Malakim?” Belphagor tried to keep his temper in check. “They’re the very ones who’ve stirred up the recent antiziganist sentiment against you. They’ve been doing it for centuries.”
Pyotr regarded him with disdain. “They are the messengers of the queen of Heaven. The Night Travelers have long awaited her coming. She is destined to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to the world of Man.”
“Oh, for the love of the devil,” Belphagor swore. “If you’ve been waiting for the queen of Heaven, it’s Anazakia Helisonovna you’ve been waiting for, not Aeval.”
“Bloody Anazakia?” Pyotr scoffed. “Yes, we see how well she’s received by Heaven. And is she not the one who left your Romani friend Knud to bleed to death when he came to rescue her?”
“Where did you hear that?” demanded Belphagor. “She did no such thing.” He was allowing the Travelers to set the tone of this meeting and letting his emotions get the better of him. If this were a game of cards, he’d have lost his shirt by now. He breathed consciously for a moment to center himself. “Listen. You say Queen Aeval is going to bring Heaven on earth. That may be so”—Pyotr raised a triumphant eyebrow at him and the woman folded her arms with a look of resignation—“but it isn’t the Heaven you’re thinking of. Since you seem to know so much about me, you must know I’m well acquainted with Aeval. While I was her slave, she boasted about some of her plans. One of the ways she gained the cooperation of the Second Choir was by promising the Seraphim she would abolish human immunity.”
The woman unfolded her arms with a small gasp of surprise.
“He’s lying, Elena.” Pyotr was unmoved. “They don’t call him the Prince of Tricks for nothing.”
Belphagor ignored him, addressing the woman. “They were to be given the freedom to ‘purify’ the universe as they saw fit. And trust me when I say you do not want their purifying hands upon you.”
Elena addressed him reproachfully. “We have all dealt with the Seraphim. It was one of the arguments for breaking the alliance with the Fallen. We’ve grown tired of having to serve as go-betweens for those unpleasant creatures and yourselves. The Malakim promised if we allied ourselves with Heaven we would never again have to deal with the Seraphim. And they’ve been gone from our world ever since.”
“They’ve been gone because Aeval changed her mind and bound them to the Empyrean for secretly helping the Social Liberation Party in a conspiracy against her.”
She studied him mistrustfully. “Why should we take your word for this?”
“Because the conspiracy the Seraphim were involved in was the plot to take my little girl from me. She was stolen so Aeval and her Malakim wouldn’t get to her themselves. So thanks, in no small part, to the alignment of the gypsy underground with the Malakim, I haven’t seen my Ola in eleven months.” He struggled to keep the anguish inside him from rising to the surface. “Why would I want to lie about any of this? I’m all out of tricks. You’ve seen to that.”
Even Pyotr looked a little ashamed.
Alexei spoke after a moment of respectful silence. “That is why some of us have objected to the alliance with the Malakim from the beginning.” He looked at Pyotr and Elena. “No good can come of doing harm to a child.”
“What about the other heir?” Pyotr said, changing the subject. “The Malakim have told us the demons intend to use him as their puppet. Do you deny that?”
“Of course I don’t deny it. The madwoman at the head of the Social Liberation Party has abducted both Anazakia’s daughter and her nephew to the same end. The SLP is no more a friend to the Fallen than Aeval is. Anazakia is the rightful queen of Heaven. Beneath her, angels, demons, and the creatures of this world alike will receive justice.”
“So now Bloody Anazakia is Saint Anazakia. Does she also drip honey from between her thighs, as your kind like to say?”
Belphagor resisted the impulse to punch the little prick square in the jaw. “She will at least make an honest attempt at ruling justly, rather
than lying to you as Aeval does to get you to do her bidding. As for honeydripping,” he added dryly, “you’d have to ask Grand Duke Vasily about that. Our relationship isn’t quite that open.” This last seemed to be lost on Pyotr.
“I apologize for my son.” Alexei scowled at the younger gypsy. “You may be a voting member of the Parliament of Night Travelers, Pyotr Alexeyevich, but racial slurs are not welcome in our negotiations.”
Pyotr continued, somewhat subdued. “You may not have noticed, but no one is behind Anazakia Helisonovna’s bid for the throne. It’s one thing to say she’d be the better ruler, but the Roma have no desire to be on the losing side of this celestial war. If we decided to re-ally ourselves with the Fallen, we’d have to support whomever they support.”
Belphagor took this as a positive sign that at least he was making some headway. “It might surprise you to know who’s behind Anazakia. She isn’t alone. There’s a significant faction of the Host at her side in battle even as we speak.”
Elena raised an eyebrow. “We’ve heard nothing of the kind.”
Belphagor smiled. “If you’ll indulge me a moment.” From his pocket, he slipped a prepaid cell phone he’d purchased this morning and dialed the number of the companion phone. Along with certain tones, he’d been using the vibrate function as part of Loquel’s training. Some technological innovations in the world of Man were really quite ingenious. “It’s time,” he said brusquely when Loquel answered, and snapped the phone shut.