Burning Glass (22 page)

If the guards thought me strange, they didn’t show it. Neither could I sense it from their auras, though mine was too clouded to judge them properly. The darkness inside me seemed to pulse with its own heartbeat. It grew more and more urgent with every passing moment.

A Riaznian guard furrowed his black brows in concentration. “That way?” He pointed to the right.

“No,” his neighbor replied. “It was Count Rostav who went that way.”

They went in separate directions?

One of the Esten guards, blond-haired with droopy green eyes, chuckled under his breath at the Riaznians. “Do you know where the prince went?” I asked him.

“Oui.”
He smiled crookedly.

I gritted my teeth with impatience. “Will you tell me?”

He swept a gaze over my body that made me feel naked. From his penetrating eyes to Floquart’s pointed comments, it was clear Auraseers in Estengarde held no respect whatsoever. “
Le dauphin négligé
took that corridor.” He nodded to the one farthest left.

I didn’t bolt straightaway. The guard’s name for Anton made my feet stick to the floor. “
Le dauphin négligé,
” I repeated. “What does that mean?”

He licked his lips, his grin catching the other corner of his
mouth. “The neglected crown prince,” he answered past his thick accent.

I frowned. “Neglected?”

The guard nodded. “So we called him in my village.”

“And where is that?”

“Montpanon. At the eastern base of the Bayacs.”

Nothing was adding up. So why was my stomach tightening like I was about to be kicked? “Are you telling me the prince lived in Estengarde?”

“That’s a matter of debate.” He leaned on one leg. “I would say yes. The Riaznian farmers would say no. There
is
a reason we fight.” He shrugged like it was an unavoidable fact of his life.

“And you
knew
he was the prince?” I asked, still bracing myself, still confused. What was the point of Anton being raised in secrecy if an entire Esten village knew about him?

“No,” he admitted. “Not until the prince left and his brother was crowned. But I will say our
king
knew of him. We were commanded that Trusochelm Manor was never to be touched in our wars. We avoided it like a river snakes around a rock.”

Understanding took seed inside me.
Dauphin. Crown prince.
“The king thought he was protecting the future emperor,” I said, voicing my revelation. Perhaps the king thought he could make peace with Izia’s successor. But then Valko took the throne and Anton remained the neglected prince. The Estens hadn’t given him a happy name.

“I suppose your king wasn’t too pleased Anton’s brother
lived,” I baited the guard. It would have injured the king’s pride to realize he was thwarted after all the protection he’d offered.

“Who can say?” The guard jutted out his lower lip in the quintessential Esten shrug. “I can only tell you that after the prince left, we raided Trusochelm—and we weren’t reprimanded for it.”

I took a step back as the blow crashed into me, an icy gale tearing through the wrong season. The force of it chilled me with misgiving and made my gut fold in cramps.

I turned the guard’s words over in my mind. Why had they provoked such an ominous feeling? If the Esten king hadn’t protected Anton, he would be dead. Was the darkness inside me casting everything in a sinister shadow, when in reality there was nothing amiss? Or was Anton’s life still somehow in danger?

I became aware of every guard in the lobby, their perplexed eyes locked upon me, the all-too-inquisitive Auraseer.

“Thank you,” I muttered to the Esten guard and walked briskly to the far left corridor. Once I was out of sight, I broke into a run. My weakened legs threatened to snap like bird bones, and my breath came thinly, but on and on I fled.

Everything I’d just learned spun around in my mind, along with the mystery of where Anton had gone. He was the most notable of his party. Surely, he took a detouring, less obvious route to where his men were meeting—if they
were
meeting at all. I slid to a halt upon approaching an intersecting corridor to the right. Down that direction and up a flight of stairs was the
council chamber. I couldn’t imagine Anton going there. But past the stairs were more branching hallways, and beyond them a library—a place no one would be lingering on the night of a ball.

With no better plan, I took the corridor to the right. As I sprang forward, my headdress fell to the floor. I snatched it up, not bothering to fasten it on again, and kept running. The pearl ropes stung my palms. I felt the faint song of their mother oysters’ deaths, their agony at being ripped open for the jewel in the cradle of their shells.

What torture had the dowager empress also suffered when she was torn from her young children? What had those little boys endured when they were severed from their parents to be raised in hiding?

How had that estrangement altered them?

And what of the Esten king? When Floquart journeyed home, what report would he give of the Riaznian emperor, who in the king’s eyes should have been Anton?

The blow struck my gut again, this time with piercing directness. I stopped short as dizziness assaulted me.

Floquart.

The king’s mouthpiece. The man who came here so readily at Valko’s request, despite all our conflict with Estengarde.

I’d felt the emissary’s greed. He wanted to share in our wealth. He knew his
king
would. But which brother would that king wish to forge an alliance with? And which brother could be done away with by some cunning means?

The lurking serpent inside me took form, its fangs seeking blood. I put my hand on the wall for support.

Floquart was behind the darkness I was feeling—maybe even some of his men.

Before the night was through, the Esten emissary meant to have Valko murdered.

O
N INSTINCT,
I
SPUN AROUND AND RAN IN THE
OPPOSITE
direction—back to Valko. I gave myself horrible names.
Slow-witted. Blind. Incompetent.
I’d left the emperor with Floquart—twice. I prayed the emissary hadn’t already taken his opportunity and poisoned Valko while they were together in the treasury. He could be dying this very moment, and there would be nothing I could do to save him.

I’ve failed in my duty. I’m going to be executed. They’ll bury me beside Izolda. Dasha and Tola will be next. They’ll fail and die, as well. I’ll have more blood on my hands.

I stopped again, realizing where I was. Backtracking the way I’d come would be a slower route to the ballroom. I’d be closer to the main corridor leading there if I kept on in the direction I’d been going. I kneaded a stitch of pain in my side, turned around once more, and forced my legs onward.

My vision flecked with stars. I tried to breathe deeper past
the pounding of my heart. Looming ahead were two marble pillars, which marked the crossroad with the spacious main corridor. I slowed when the pillars’ shadows touched me, partly because I was on the verge of fainting, but mostly because my mind seized on Anton as I considered “the neglected crown prince” in a whole new light.

What if, together with his other followers, Anton was also in league with Floquart? What if collectively they’d planned Valko’s assassination and the alliance to Estengarde? Anton wouldn’t have told me, of course. Beyond any distrust, he knew I couldn’t betray Valko. If the assassination failed and I’d known about it and hadn’t warned the emperor, I would be executed, though now I’d surely be killed anyway for sensing the danger too late.

I reached one of the pillars and leaned against it with my shoulder. My chest rose and fell. I stared ahead, past the main corridor, to the path leading to the library.

Would Anton really kill his brother—or allow him to be killed?

When I’d told Anton he should be emperor, did I think he could achieve it without Valko’s death? Had I only encouraged him in a plot he’d devised months ago?

I’d accused the prince of not having the stamina to attain his potential for greatness. Without so many words, I’d called him a coward.

In truth,
I
was the coward. And that was a name I was willing to own if it meant Valko lived.

I set my jaw and inhaled a great breath of air. I would return to the ballroom. I would warn the emperor. As it turned out, I was not prepared for the cost of greatness.

I rounded the corner past the pillar and prepared to run. But as I launched myself, I collided with someone rushing toward me. My headdress was knocked from my hands and slid down the main corridor, the pearl ropes skittering along the marble. I moved to retrieve it, but a girl caught my arm.

“Sovereign Auraseer?” she said. Her r’s rolled in a heavy accent.

I snapped my gaze to her—the Esten Auraseer. “What are you doing?” I blinked as panic flashed through my veins. It might have been hers. In the darkness, I saw the whites of her eyes. She hadn’t removed her trembling grip from my arm.

Through our heightened connection, I confirmed my earlier instinct—she
had
been abused by Floquart de Bonpré, and in more ways than I cared to imagine. I felt a hint of his foul aura inside her, as if it was imprisoned there and she’d forgotten how to let it go.

“
Ne pas lui faire confiance!
” she pleaded.

“Pardon?”

She leaned nearer. “Do not trust him!”

My heart pounded with misgiving. “Who?”

“Sonya?” a man called, a stone’s throw away down the main corridor.

The Esten Auraseer flinched and darted into the darkness behind me. “Wait!” I hissed, but it was no use. She had
disappeared, as well as her frightened aura.

Footsteps approached. “Is that you?” the man called again. This time I recognized his voice, felt his signature energy.

“Valko?” It was the first time I’d addressed him by name. I didn’t apologize. I was too relieved to see him.

He came forward into the light of a glowing candle sconce. In his hands was my headdress. “Did you drop this?”

I nodded. “I—I tripped and it fell off.” I didn’t wish to implicate the Esten Auraseer since she clearly hadn’t wanted the emperor to see her.

Valko accepted my poor explanation without question. He seemed to have something of more importance on his mind. He guided me around the corner from where I’d emerged and placed my headdress on a table set between two doors. As he turned back to me, his aura shifted in intensity and made my nerve ends tingle. “I was worried about you,” he said, his gaze searching my face. “Are you feeling better?”

I shook my head. I didn’t know where to begin. I was still rattled from my mysterious encounter with the Esten Auraseer. Had she meant to warn me of Floquart? Or was she more practiced than I was and sensed the danger emitted from Anton? Did it matter? Both men were likely co-conspirators.

I tried again to speak again, to form the words to condemn the prince, but they caught in my throat. I had no real proof of his betrayal, and my suspicions alone might be enough to have him harmed. Perhaps worse. I couldn’t send Anton to his death just as surely as I couldn’t send Valko to his.

The emperor came so close our noses brushed. I released a quivering breath. He studied me. “You feel it too, don’t you, Sonya?”

“What?”

“
This
,” he replied. “The deep bond between us.” His fingers trailed up my wrists to my shoulders and slipped along the silk of my sleeve. My head spun as my chest expanded with a surge of overruling rapture.

“I feel it,” I whispered. How could I not? His aura was so powerful, and, starved as I was, I felt so weak. Weak against my own attraction to him. I tipped my head back and leaned closer. I shivered with anticipation of the press of his lips. I bared my teeth and prepared to bite.

I gasped and pulled back, shocked with myself, at the darkness still reigning inside me. I fought to quell it and collect my thoughts. Valko was in danger. I had to warn him. But I didn’t need to mention Anton. I could simply caution him about Floquart.

“What is it?” Valko stroked my face like a child’s. He was so patient with me, so tender. But why? Why on the night he’d committed to marrying another?

“We can’t do this.” I batted his hand away. “Floquart—”

“Is that what this is all about?” He laughed. “Are you worried about the emissary?”

“You’re in peril, My Lord.”

“Floquart knows I do not love Delphine. I’ve never even met her. Love is not a factor in a royal marriage. Monarchs
must look elsewhere for that.” He came at me again, so quickly I couldn’t deny him. Our lips met. His kiss stoked a fire in my belly. The scalding was so sweet, it took me several long moments to break away.

“Please, listen,” I said. Then, hearing footsteps coming from the ballroom, I took Valko’s hand and pulled him deeper down the narrow corridor. I stopped where the hallway broadened in a circular area surrounded by four doors—perhaps servants’ apartments. “I feel a darkness inside me.”

He grinned. “This isn’t darkness, Sonya.” He grazed my lips with a brief but tantalizing kiss. “This is abandonment. Of everything that seeks to repress us. This is
life
, to fully know each other. It is glory.” His zeal for what he believed we were equaled his passion for expanding his empire. “Together we share acceptance and understanding—both of us born into power and with great destinies. Those things are uniquely difficult to endure.”

I frowned and shook my head in amazement at him. Did he really think I’d been born with a beautiful gift? That I was taken from my parents to live in a whitewashed convent by the sea? He didn’t know anything about my life of hiding with the Romska, that they had to rope me to trees until I’d stop screaming from the pain of all their auras inside me. He didn’t know my parents were killed when it was discovered they had a “blessed child” they’d given away before the empire could take her. He had no idea how hard-pressed my life had been.

Valko didn’t understand me, but on the other hand, did I
truly understand him? How did it feel to live a lie for so long, to pretend you were someone else because the person you really were had been declared dead? When his mother came to visit, did she tell him of Anton, that his brother lived and thought himself heir? How many years of bitterness could that breed in a person? And after all that time, only to return to the palace and be met with suspicion, rumored by some to be an imposter?

We didn’t have as many things in common as Valko thought, but we had enough. And it made me feel true pity.

I let him kiss me again. I
would
tell him of Floquart, but for the moment I could not cause him more suffering. We were safely tucked away from anyone seeking to do him harm. For the moment, and after such a life, he could taste a form of beauty that had nothing to do with wealth and power. And I could surrender myself to the exalted way he made me feel.

Our kisses deepened. His breath came in rasps. He held both sides of my face like I might vanish if he slackened his grip. Candles flickered in sconces along the wall and cast us in a pool of light. The darkness swirled inside me, but I kept it at bay by offering more of myself to the emperor.

“Be my mistress, Sonya,” he said. “Share my life with me. I may give my hand to another, but my heart will be yours.”

My skin prickled with warmth. A lightness flowed through my limbs. I felt weightless, buoyant.

Mistress.
The word took on new meaning. It sounded like an honored title.

After all my years of hiding, after my parents sacrificed
their lives to give me freedom, was this what I was to become? Burning beneath my breast, I felt the tender flame of Valko’s adoration. Could it be my parents were wrong? Was it such a very bad thing to be owned by the empire?

“Say yes,” Valko prodded, as if this were a secret proposal and he had asked me to elope.

The loveliness of the life the emperor painted for us began to warp like a water-damaged canvas. Harder questions began circling my mind.

What had prompted Valko to care for me in the first place? Did his affections begin because he saw Anton’s interest in me first—or, more accurately, my interest in the prince? Would the emperor have fallen for me without the rivalry of his brother?

And what about Valko’s Esten bride? Would she give us peace and accept our relationship?

I stared into the emperor’s achingly beautiful gray eyes and realized what he wished for us could never be. “I believe you’re wrong about the Estens, My Lord.” I had traveled near the border enough times to understand the frame of their culture, and I didn’t see how I could be Valko’s mistress while he was married to Delphine. “They require fidelity in marriage, whether or not there is love . . . and, I daresay, whether or not the match is royal.”

Someone gave a sardonic laugh. Valko and I whipped around to find Floquart in the corridor shadows. His posture indicated he’d been listening to us for a long time. I tensed and searched for his dark aura within me. Would he now seize his
moment to kill the emperor? Would he kill me, too?

“Your Auraseer is very insightful.” He stepped forward into the candlelight. It caught the planes of his face at an odd angle, making him appear gaunt, no longer the prim gentleman his clothes dictated him to be. “But, I suppose, that is her occupation.”

Valko smoothed his hair in a rush. I’d done a fine job of disheveling it. “Monsieur de Bonpré, this isn’t what it seems.”

“No, I believe it is far more.” He wrinkled his nose in distaste at me. “I’ll be taking my leave in the morning.”

The emperor’s astonishment struck my chest and made my ribs contract, as if my bones welded together. “You misunderstand,” he said. “I am devoted to Delphine, to a union with Estengarde.”

Something in Floquart snapped. “Delphine is my goddaughter!”

I blinked. Had Valko known this?

At the emissary’s heated exclamation, a clamor sounded from a nearby room, as if a chair scraped the floor.

“She was not raised in gentility to be defiled by you!” he went on. “Your Riaznin may be grander in wealth, but your savage ways”—he sneered, darting his gaze between us—“are deplorable. I’d hoped at least the monarch of this empire to be above such shameful relations, but I was wrong. We will not stoop to align ourselves with
whoredom
.” His eyes settled on me, ripe with derision. “Your kind,” he spat, “is sold in my country. And if the nobles find your talent unworthy of a bid,
you take to the gutters where your filthy breed can scavenge upon any lowlife who will toss you a coin for your virtue. Often enough, you give it away for no money at all. Such is the quality of the Auraseers you Riaznians so prize.”

My mouth fell open at his brazenness. The emissary’s endearment to his goddaughter must have fueled his contempt, but that didn’t excuse his blatant hatred of me. His insults tumbled inside my chest as if caught in a whirlwind. I couldn’t contain the fury. I became the storm.

“Don’t treat me as if you are my better!” I lashed out at him. “Don’t pretend you are not above reproach yourself. I’ve seen the Auraseer in your company and sensed the telltale signs of the abuse she has suffered at your hands.” I was sure now that she’d meant to warn me of him. “How dare you speak to the emperor about defilement when you have absolutely no respect for humanity!”

Floquart’s face mottled to purple. A vein spasmed at his temple. I met his enraged expression without batting an eye, justified in all my accusations. Surely Valko shared in my vindication. I looked at the man who’d just rained affection on me, promised me a life of adoration . . . but that man was gone. I felt it in the absence of warmth in my breast. In the ice crusting over my heart.

As if he hadn’t heard a word I’d just spoken, Valko said to Floquart, “You are right.”

My eyes flew wide. At the worst, I’d expected the emperor’s silence, not his
agreement
with the emissary. Did he want
Estengarde so badly he would suffer his pride—and my dishonor—after such a vicious attack? “I will end this here.” He jutted out his chin. “She will not tempt me again.”