The Theft of Sunlight

by Intisar Khanani

  She closes the distance between us and her hand wraps around mine, her fingers cool. “Let me see, Amraeya.”

  She lifts my hand, and I let her slide back the sleeve to show the ring of bruises just above my wrist. For a long moment she looks at it, her expression hidden from me by the tilt of her face.

  “Who did this?”

  I don’t know what will happen if I tell her, but at the same time, she ought to know that the royal guards are more than capable of bullying others. So I say, finally, “A soldier. He wanted to know . . . about the grave. About what was in the second grave. I didn’t tell him.”

  Alyrra lets go of my hand and steps back. I tug down the sleeve again.

  “I see.” Her voice is soft and shaky. “I am sorry, Amraeya. It won’t happen again.”

  How can she be sure of that?

  “Come, let’s go out to Mina.”

  When we reach the outer sitting room, Mina rises to greet us once more.

  “Please check at the guard room and ask Captain Matsin to wait on me,” Alyrra says. “You may go to your own quarters after that, and take a rest. I’ll ring for you when I’m ready to go to dinner.”

  “As you wish.” Mina hurries from the room. I watch her go with a sinking sensation.

  “Come sit,” Alyrra says, and seats herself stiffly on a sofa. I sit down as well, wondering how this can possibly come right with Alyrra as upset as she is. Or perhaps as princess she can demand things of captains and expect to be fully obeyed.

  A confident tap-tap sounds on the door. I rise, knowing it is my duty to open the door and hoping against hope it will not be the captain from this afternoon. If it’s another captain—or his superior—this whole conversation will go much easier.

  “Stay,” Alyrra says. I turn with a sense of relief, only to find Alyrra watching me sharply.

  As I sit down once more, the knock comes again. This time, Alyrra calls out, “Enter.”

  It is him. He steps in, closing the door behind him and then bowing to Alyrra. He flicks a single glance at me, an acknowledgment that merely places me as present in the room. I can’t read his emotions at all. My stomach tightens into a knot, though I know he can’t possibly pose the princess any danger. And if she establishes he’s to leave me alone, he will, won’t he?

  “Captain Matsin,” she says. “I asked a favor of you this morning.”

  I look at her sharply. What?

  “Zayyida.”

  “I trusted you to see to it in an honorable manner.”

  He stiffens, and so do I, a dreadful realization creeping over me. Surely not—I must be mistaken.

  “Why does my attendant have a bruise around her wrist?”

  He pales slightly beneath the brown of his skin. His gaze flicks to me again. “Forgive me, zayyida. I did not intend to cause harm. I did not think I was that rough.”

  “You—” I glance between them, trying desperately to understand.

  “I am sorry, Kelari Amraeya,” Alyrra says with careful formality. “Zayyid Kestrin and I requested Captain Matsin to test your trustworthiness. As my attendant, you will be privy to a great many things that must not be shared. I needed to be certain that you would keep my confidence regardless of who approached you, or how. I did not intend for you to see into the grave this morning, but once you did, it seemed as good a test as any.”

  I stare at her, willing her words back into her mouth. Willing them unspoken, unheard. She asked Matsin to corner me? I shake my head, as if I could undo this whole day by refusing it.

  “Kelari Amraeya,” Matsin says quietly, “I beg your forgiveness. I meant to frighten you, and then only in order to test your honor. I did not mean to harm you.”

  “I see,” I say, and have to swallow to wet my throat. “Well, I am not sorry that I kneed you and shoved you.”

  His lips twitch. “It was well done, kelari. You protected yourself, and kept the princess’s confidence.”

  Oh, indeed. I don’t need his praise to know that.

  I push myself to my feet, anger and a sickening sense of betrayal warring for dominance in my breast. “Zayyida, I have had a long day. Permission to retire.”

  Alyrra winces. “I am sorry this played out as it did, Amraeya.”

  “I understand,” I say, although I don’t, really.

  “You will attend me in the morning?”

  It’s a question rather than an order, and in it I hear Alyrra’s concern that she has pushed me too far. Perhaps she has. I don’t know—I did not think this day could get any more unsettling. Now I don’t know what to think.

  “With your permission, zayyida, I require some time to reflect.” I move past Captain Matsin toward the door, careful not to meet the princess’s gaze.

  She nods. I let myself out at once. Unfortunately, Captain Matsin follows me, closing the door behind us.

  “Kelari,” he says as I walk quickly down the hall to the attendants’ access door, my uneven gait loud in my ears.

  I turn. “What do you want?”

  “I—I asked your forgiveness,” he says, coming to a stop a few paces away. “Will you grant it?”

  For a long moment, I consider him. He claimed he didn’t mean to harm me, and I can believe that—the bruise is no doubt because of how forcefully I yanked my hand out of his grip. But he did mean to frighten me, to bully me, depending on Alyrra to explain his actions away. All to assure themselves I would be loyal to her. It is a strange thing to realize, as I meet his gaze, that I can forgive what he has done, but I won’t forget it. “Yes,” I tell him.

  He dips his head, but his eyes still watch me. Perhaps he’s as aware as I am that forgiveness does not mean everything. “And the princess? You will continue to serve her?”

  “That is no concern of yours,” I say, and turn on my heel. He watches me in silence as I hobble to the attendants’ door, his gaze like a burr against my skin.

  Halfway down the inner hallway toward my bedroom, I come to a halt. Mina will be there, and she’ll want to know what just transpired. I don’t want to talk to her. I don’t want to talk to anyone, really.

  I turn around and stump back to the hall door. When I peek out, Captain Matsin is no longer in sight. No doubt he’s returned to the guard room. Well, then, I’ll just have to leave via the grand staircase and hope no one is standing at the bottom to watch me limp my way down.

  My hopes are sadly unfounded, for when I am halfway down, a group of young noblemen appear, proceeding toward me from the hall below. Of course.

  I keep my head bent and they pause at the bottom of the stair to allow me passage. It’s only as I reach the bottom that I realize the party contains Zayyid Kestrin, his attendants, and what appears to be another nobleman or two.

  I step aside and curtsy, my cheeks burning.

  “Is all well, Kelari Amraeya?” the prince asks, no doubt because I shouldn’t be using this stair without the princess. Or maybe because I look as upset as I feel.

  I dip my head further. “Zayyid.”

  He gestures to the man beside him as I rise. “Allow me to introduce my cousin, Verin Garrin of Cenatil. Garrin, this is Kelari Amraeya, attendant to my betrothed.”

  “Honored,” the man says, bowing. Garrin is handsome in a damning sort of way, his midnight hair falling just past his shoulders, his high cheekbones accenting the shape of his eyes and the length of dark lashes that are, no doubt, the envy of half the young women at court.

  “And my remaining attendants, whom you have not met,” Kestrin goes on, and introduces them one by one.

  I smile and nod and dip small curtsies, and find the prince watching me narrowly, his smile pleasant and his eyes sharp as onyx. He knows. He knows what Captain Matsin was ordered to do—he was part of the whole plan to test me—even if he doesn’t know about the bruises as yet, and he must see in my face that I don’t want to be here. He’s trying to show me some favor now, assure me of my place and establish it in the court, so that I would neither want to leave my position
nor dare risk the embarrassment of walking away from it now.

  Except I don’t care about the court. I would much rather have my horses and forget all this—this ugliness, and the otherworldly reality of undead horses, and the indisputable truth that even those one means to serve can betray, whether intentionally or not.

  I dip a last wooden curtsy to the prince. As they start up the stairs, I turn to finally make my escape.

  “She doesn’t seem pleased to be here.” Garrin’s voice floats down toward me.

  “Let us hope we can convince her yet,” Kestrin returns.

  I clench my jaw and keep walking. So many games. I can’t even tell whether I was meant to overhear that or not, but it seems likely. Why did I ever think such a position would be a good idea for me?

  No reason, but that I felt sorry for the princess, to have attendants who would misguide her, to have come through such a harrowing experience and find herself alone yet again. It didn’t occur to me she might play her own games.

  But that’s not altogether true. I had some strange, irrational idea that I might be able to influence things here in the palace, bring attention to the snatchers. And the princess did mention them up on the palace walls. But what do I actually know about palace life? How did I think for even a moment I could navigate a place like this and influence people so far above me? And not get caught up in games and manipulations and—and the outright ghastliness of the dead horse’s head. Though I don’t suppose anyone could have expected that. But I don’t want anything to do with it, not with the horse’s head, or the clever princess, or her scheming attendants.

  I wend my way out of the palace, pausing only to ask a servant for directions, and keep going until I’m facing the wide cobbled space outside the palace walls. I turn slowly, unsure what I’m doing. There is West Road leading down to the stables where the princess once worked, the cobbles still damp from the rain earlier today. And in the opposite direction is East Road heading toward the merchant center, where Melly and I went shopping. Where I saw the boy with the Darkness.

  I stand a long moment looking toward the road, and then I start walking. I don’t understand how politics work, or the palace, and I’m not sure I want anything to do with either. But at least I can ask questions here. The people of the city are bound to know more than we do in Sheltershorn. If I can learn anything at all, perhaps there might be some hope of tracking down Seri. Or keeping the snatchers from visiting Sheltershorn again.

  Chapter

  14

  It takes me three-quarters of an hour to reach familiar streets, and another quarter of an hour after that to find the shop where the boy sat, the bowl of peas before him. Today he sits at the back of the shop, lost in the early evening shadows, a cat on his lap and a faint, gentle smile on his face.

  “Can I help you?” the shopkeeper asks. She is a small woman, her bearing confident, her hair braided back to reveal attractive features and an intelligent gaze.

  I should buy something. I look around uncertainly as she waits. Her store is filled with lace and beaded trim, tassels and corded knots pre-fashioned into buttons. My fingers brush my pockets, but I don’t have my purse with me. No, I walked out of the palace in my attendants’ clothing, looking rich and without a coin to spare.

  “Is something wrong?”

  I look up with some embarrassment. “I seem to have left my purse at home. I’m sorry.”

  She laughs, a kind sound that makes the boy look up, the smile on his face growing wider. “I’ve done the same before.”

  “Do you mind if I sit down a moment before I go back? I didn’t think I’d be walking so much today.” I didn’t think at all, or I would have realized that my foot only felt so good because of that salve the healer gave me. With its numbing effect long since dissipated, I can tell my skin is not happy beneath the bandages.

  “Of course,” she says, and offers me a seat on a small, round cushioned stool. “Have you been in before? I don’t know that we’ve met.”

  “We haven’t,” I agree. “I passed your store the other day and decided I wanted to come back and see it.”

  “But you’re not from the city? You have a bit of an accent.”

  My cheeks warm. No doubt everyone I’ve met in the palace has noted it. “I’m from Sheltershorn. I’m visiting my cousin for the summer.”

  “Ah! You’ve come for the royal wedding.”

  We pass a comfortable few minutes chatting about the upcoming wedding and how business has been good for her given how a good half of the city’s population is dedicated to having new clothes for the celebrations. She sits by her counter, winding up reels of lace and sorting them into the appropriate baskets.

  “Will there be celebrating in your town as well?”

  It’s the opportunity I’ve been looking for. “There were some festivities planned,” I say slowly. “But no one’s thought about it the last week or two.”

  “Whyever not?”

  “We lost another child,” I say quietly.

  She sits back slowly, the lace forgotten before her. “The snatchers.”

  I nod. “We don’t lose children very often—we’re a small town. Does it happen more here?”

  “Every day.”

  “Surely someone is trying to stop them,” I say, as if my wishing it would make it so.

  “The snatchers are brutal. They kill or take those who discover them. And those who escape—you see what happened to my Andril.”

  My eyes flick to her son. He is watching the cat again, but even now, as present as he is, there is an absence to his gaze.

  “I—I’m sorry.”

  “It is no fault of yours. He escaped them but didn’t make it to the Speakers in time. Eventually, word reached me of a boy who had been found and was being kept at a temple a day’s ride downriver. So my prayers were answered, and I had my son back.” She clears her throat. “I am grateful every day that he is with me, but I wish—I wish it had not cost him so much.”

  “Did you ever learn how he escaped?”

  She shakes her head.

  I take a slow breath. “Are there others who have escaped? Whose families might have some idea how the snatchers work, or how they might be stopped?”

  “Oh, child. These are dangerous questions. No one speaks of the answers. To do so is to invite the snatchers’ attention, and that is death, or worse.”

  “Death?” I echo.

  “You are perhaps protected from such realities in your town, but here . . . if the snatchers get word that someone is trying to bring attention to them—perhaps that they have some small detail gleaned from a child before their Blessing—the reprisals are quick and brutal. I have a friend whose daughter escaped. It was after those terrible days following the queen’s death.”

  That had been bad news, certainly, but it hadn’t felt so terrible to us. “She was a good queen,” I say rather lamely.

  The shopkeeper shakes her head. “She was, but I meant the spate of disappearances that happened over the course of the days of mourning. We must have lost near two dozen children in those three days.”

  Two dozen children? That’s—I realize the city could easily hold ten thousand people and still have space for more—but over twenty children lost in a handful of days is almost beyond comprehension.

  “My friend’s daughter was the only one who got away,” the shopkeeper continues. “She told the whole of her story before being blessed, and my friend’s husband went to every guardhouse he could find with her story. Somewhere between one and the other, he was set upon and beaten to death.”

  I stare at her, horrified. “But—but how could they have known?”

  “He was not quiet about what he intended. If they knew from the rumors spreading through his neighborhood, they could have easily tracked him.”

  “Did the guards do nothing?”

  “What were they to do with a dead body?”

  That’s not what I meant, but it’s answer enough. They took no action with th
e girl’s story either. I rub my arms, chilled. Here is all the answer I need: acting on my own, seeking the truth on the streets, I will be able to stop the snatchers no more effectively than this man. And might lose my life in the attempt as well.

  “So you see that you must be careful too,” the woman says, her voice kind. “I understand why you spoke to me, but do not ask anyone else lest you become a target yourself.”

  I dip my head, but I can’t help asking, “Do you remember the girl’s story?”

  “Whether I do or not, I won’t be sharing it. Didn’t you hear me, child? The telling of it could spell your death, or mine.”

  “I understand,” I say, although I don’t. Surely she doesn’t think I’m allied with the snatchers? She’s trying to protect both herself and me, but that leaves all the rest of the children of our land at risk. Still, I doubt I can press any more answers from her.

  Outside, the streets have dimmed, evening settling in, and I have a long walk ahead of me to the palace. My feet hurt, and I’ve no doubt the blisters along the bottom of my turned foot have burst. They will be a mess beneath the healer’s bandages. Well, there’s no need to go back to her. I know what to do with blisters. I’ll just go to Melly’s apartment and take care of them myself.

  I bid farewell to the shopkeeper and start the trek back to the palace. The streets are just as busy as earlier despite the lengthening evening; apparently the city doesn’t go to sleep with the sun as Sheltershorn does. I’m grateful for the bustle; with so many folk around it feels safe enough to walk the main streets. But, unlike home, no one pauses to ask if I am all right, and those who note my limp look away almost immediately.

  A man barrels around the corner not three paces from me, his shoulder slamming into mine. “Watch it,” he growls as I stumble to the side, arms pinwheeling out—and then my foot slides in a patch of mud and I come down hard on my knee.

  I bend over, my breath hissing between my teeth, aware that the man has already hurried off. In Sheltershorn, everyone on the street would have hollered at him, told him to go back and make amends. My skirts are splattered with mud, but at least that was a softer landing than the cobbles that start up not twenty paces on.