“Do I wear your shirt and trousers or not?”
A hissing breath escaped beween his teeth. He released my arm and hobbled to the chair in the corner.
“I didn’t hit you that hard,” I said.
“No?” He sat down and pulled up his pant leg. Just above his boot, an egg-sized knot was already swelling. I knelt and looked at it. It was nasty. I had struck harder than I thought.
“Kaden, I’m—” I shook my head and looked up at him, searching for words to explain.
He sighed. “Your point is made.”
I still wasn’t sure that he understood why I was angered or why I attacked him. It wasn’t just about clothes. “Kaden, I’m trapped in a city with thousands of people who hate everything about who I am. The Komizar demeaned me in front of your entire Council last night. The one thing I can’t bear is that same derision from you. Haven’t you learned anything about me yet? Yes, royals know how to do things beyond counting our twelve toes. You’re all I have here. You’re my only ally.”
His eyes narrowed at the word ally. “What about Rafe?”
“What about him? He’s a conniving accomplice to a prince who’d probably like to see me dead more than anyone—a prince who’s betraying my kingdom by proposing deals to yours, and Rafe is brokering the deal for his own benefit. Whatever I thought may have passed between us is exactly that. Past. He was an unfortunate distraction for me too and certainly not an ally. He’s nothing to me but an ugly wart on my good judgment.”
He studied my face and finally grinned. “And your judgment had a decidedly sharp aim.”
I looked back at his growing knot. “Is there an icehouse in the Sanctum?”
He snorted. “This isn’t Berdi’s tavern, Lia.” He limped over to the trunk and rummaged through it, pulling out some trousers and a wide leather belt. “These should do for now,” he said, and he threw them on the bed.
As a precaution, I gathered up the sack dress from the floor, opened the shuttered window, and threw it out. “Jabavé,” I grumbled after it. I brushed my hands with finality and turned back to him. At least one matter was settled—I would never again be wearing the dress of thorns.
I peeked in the basket he had brought. “What’s so important that the Komizar has to see us this early?” I asked as I began eating the hard rolls and cheese. The memory of public executions in Morrighan surfaced. They had always taken place just after dawn. What if the Komizar hadn’t believed Rafe’s story after all?
“He’s leaving to check on Balwood Province in the north. The governor didn’t show, which likely means he’s dead,” Kaden answered. “But the Komizar has some matters here to settle before he goes.”
Leaving. The word was like music—the best news I’d heard in months. Though I did worry what the matters were that needed settling. I finished eating, and Kaden stepped outside while I finished dressing. I noticed again the splintering cry of the hinges when he opened the door and wondered how I had slept through the noise when he left earlier.
It felt good to put my boots on again, clean. With clean socks to wear too. I would bless Eben for this tonight when I sang my remembrances. I said them every night now, almost as if I was saying them in Pauline’s stead, as if she were here with me and we were on our way to Terravin about to begin a great adventure instead of me being here alone at the end of this one.
* * *
We walked to the Council Wing Square. Again we passed through a maze of hallways, open courtyards, and narrow windowless paths with one lantern barely lighting the way to the next. Kaden told me the Sanctum was riddled with abandoned and forgotten passageways after centuries of being built and rebuilt, some with dead ends and deadly drops, so I should stay close. Many of the walls told stories of their ruin. The stacked rubble sometimes offered up the macabre, like a sculptured arm or a partially visible head of stone blankly staring out from the wall like an ageless prisoner, or a piece of engraved marble block with a note from another time, the letters dripping away like tears. But they were only stone, the same as any other, repurposed to build up the city, an available resource, as Kaden called them. Still, as we entered another dim passageway, I sensed something else and stopped, pretending to adjust the lace of my boot. I pressed my back against the wall. A beat. A warning. A whisper.
Was I simply spooked by a ghoulish hallway?
Jezelia, you’re here.
I stood abruptly, almost losing my balance.
“Coming?” Kaden asked.
The thrum disappeared, but the air was cold in its wake. I looked around. Only the scuffle of our movement filled the passage. Yes, spooked, that was all. Kaden moved forward through the passage again, and I followed him. He was in his element, that was certain, as comfortable walking through this strange city as I was disoriented. How foreign Terravin must have been to him. And yet it wasn’t.
He had easily fit in. His Morrighese was flawless, and he had sat back in the tavern ordering an ale like it was a second home to him. Was that why he thought I could just slip into this life as if my old one never existed? I wasn’t a chameleon like Kaden, who could become a new person just by crossing a border.
We walked up a winding flight of stairs and emerged in a square similar to the one we’d arrived in yesterday, but of course it wasn’t square—nothing in Venda was. On the far side, I could see stables with horses being led in and out by soldiers. Loose chickens scratched and strutted, feathers ruffling as they skipped to avoid the horses. Two spotted hogs rooted in a pen near us, and ravens twice the size of any in Morrighan squawked from their perch high on a tower overlooking the square. I spotted the Komizar in the distance, directing some wagons that were rolling through gates as if he were a sentry. For the leader of a kingdom, he seemed to have his hands in everything.
I didn’t see Rafe, which brought me some uneasy relief. At least he wasn’t here with a rope around his neck, but that didn’t mean he was safe. Where had they put him? All I knew was that he was somewhere near the Komizar’s quarters in a secure room. It might be no more than a barbaric cell. As we approached, the guards, governors, and Rahtan saw the Komizar stop and turn toward us. They turned too. I felt the weight of the Komizar’s scrutiny. His eyes rolled over me and my
new attire. When we stopped at the edge of the crowd, he strolled over to give me a more critical inspection. “Maybe I didn’t make myself clear last night. Certain luxuries, like clothing and shoes, have to be earned.”
“She earned them,” Kaden said, nearly cutting off the Komizar’s words.
There was a drawn-out hushed moment, and then the Komizar threw his head back and laughed. The others did too, boisterous guffaws, one governor punching Kaden in the shoulder. My cheeks burned. I wanted to kick Kaden’s other shin, but his explanation kept the boots on my feet. Just like soldiers in a tavern, the governors enjoyed their coarse entertainment.