Stitching Snow (21 page)

But I also think you’re not ready. I shouldn’t have sprung it on you like that, so I decided to take it at your speed.” 197

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A sudden rush of heat made me wonder if the engine had malfunctioned. No, I was just blushing. Instinct told me to run away from something so foreign, but I had nowhere to go. The whole reason I was going to Windsong was to stop running. I focused on Dimwit’s innards.

“And how exactly are we to know when I’m ‘ready’?”

“I’m not sure. Probably when you fi gure out why you didn’t hit me. You’ve cracked men’s kneecaps for doing less than I did.” True, I had. My instincts usually made pretty solid sense to me, but they should have prompted me to rip out Dane’s throat.

They hadn’t. Instinct failure on all fronts.

I knew one reason I hadn’t: Dane and I were friends again.

I liked that.

That left me with another puzzle. I had no blazing idea what my speed
was
.

Days passed. We trained and prepared. The closer we got to Windsong, the quieter I got. Even when Dimwit rattled on about

“Fly Essie shuttle Essie Dane shuttle flly,” Dane was the one to tell the drone to shut it. I hardly spoke, but I also couldn’t stop watching Dane. Couldn’t stop thinking about what he’d said.

I think I’m in love with you.

He’d followed me out of love. Deep down, I’d let him come because I was selfi sh and wanted to keep him with me—wanted one person I could trust at my side. But I’d created a very big problem.

One of the side compartments had a bolted-down table and bench. I often sat there and lost myself in my number puzzles 198

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when I wasn’t training or fi ddling with Dimwit. The day we would cross into range of Windsong’s sensors, Dane entered the compartment and slid in next to me, his arm brushing against mine.

I scooted away.

“Essie?”

I looked up from my slate and saw the pain in his eyes. It had been ages since I’d moved away from him like that.

“They can’t fi nd out, Dane,” I said.

“Find out what?”

“Who you are.
What
you are. They’ll kill you.”

“That’s why we have the story. We covered all that. Essie, they won’t know.”

His hand had crept back toward mine. I let my fi ngers graze his before pulling away again. “That’s not part of the story. I’m supposed to be above you. If they fi nd out I care . . .” Something lit in his eyes with the shade of a smile. “Does that mean you
do
care?”

A ping sounding throughout the shuttle spared me from answering. I hurried out to the command compartment, Dane right behind me. Windsong had become a discernable blue disk on the viewer. The ping signaled an incoming communication.

“Garamite vessel, you are entering the sovereign space of Windsong, realm of the Supreme Crown, King Matthias. Please state your business and cargo.”

Dane turned to me. “Are you ready for this?”

“No, but don’t let that stop you. You’re the one who has to deal with this part. Remember the security phrase.” He took a breath and touched a panel on the console. “Our business is to enjoy the splendors of the Royal City. We prefer 199

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not to declare our cargo over an open channel, but have heard the Supreme Crown prefers blue skies over fi elds of snow.” A phrase meant to evoke my eye and hair color, and my name besides. At least, it had been eight years ago.

A pause. “Please hold your current course until you receive further instructions.”

We waited in silence. Five minutes, then ten, on into twenty before Dane spoke.

“Are you sure they’ll know what that means?”

“If they go high enough, yes. Don’t worry. Taking a long time is a good thing.”

Less than fi ve minutes later, another ping with a different voice. “Garamite vessel, we are transmitting a course to the Royal City. Be advised that a squadron will be deployed to escort you shortly. This is for your own protection from Exile forces occupying the war zone on the far side of our planet. Please do not deviate from the transmitted course.”

“Understood. Initiating course change.” He deactivated the communication system and grunted. “Exile forces on the far side.”

“He’s convinced the general population for eight years. We’ll have to pretend to believe it, too.”

Six new blips appeared on the tactical display, coming toward us from Windsong. With my hand shaking slightly, I checked the registry signatures. The Golden Sword—the king’s guard.

My father knew I was coming home.

200

19

NOTHING IN THE ROYAL CITY HAD CHANGED.

Water everywhere, in fountains and in canals with glittering granite bridges spanning them. Planters lined the causeways with the fi nest fll owers, rainbow orchids pointing the way to the palace. Citizens walking through the city made as much a rainbow as the fll owers did, with hair of every color, including some as white as mine. When I was a child, everyone had worn bright patterns. Now, the clothes were bold colors with fll ared hems, decorative collars, and jeweled accents. The fashion of Windsong was alive and well. Like Candara, the buildings were stone, but much more intricate, with carved pillars and statuary, or inlaid with gleaming, smooth marble.

As we passed lower over the city, people looked up and pointed. They saw the emblem of the Golden Sword on the escort fi ghters and they cheered.

It was a good thing. They might not have known yet that I’d returned, but they knew
something
had happened. A full escort S T I T C H I N G S N O W

wasn’t something they saw every day. There would be gossip and questions everywhere. All I had to do was make sure a few palace servants saw me and news would spread quickly.

The fi ghters guided us to the military spaceport at the edge of the city, and Dane landed the shuttle smoothly. A contingent of Golden Sword guards and a single woman—not in uniform—

approached right away. Just from the purpose in her walk, the pride in how she carried herself, and the way the guards followed her, I knew she had to be important.

Dane and I got up and went to the hatch. “Remember your role,” I said. “Don’t slip.”

“Same to you, Princess. Come on, Dimwit.” Dane walked out of the shuttle fi rst, and I followed only when he turned back and nodded. Once out, I faced the assembled group. I recognized the red-and-gold trim on the woman’s sleeve—a senior aide. Not one I remembered, but that didn’t mean anything. My father had no tolerance for mistakes from his aides, so they changed often. She looked me over, one eyebrow slightly raised, but was careful to keep the rest of her face expressionless.

“Please follow me,” she said. “We will take you to the palace.” No questions or introductions. Another good sign. I’d enjoy them while they lasted.

We followed to an armored transport—Dimwit managed not to lag behind—and formed a convoy to the palace. The sun hovered at the horizon, bathing the city in an orange-red glow.

Seeing the walls, turrets, and towers, the gardens and fountains, caused a pounding in my chest that echoed through my head. It was real. I was back. My father and Olivia were somewhere within those walls, and I would face them within minutes.

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You can do it, Essie. Just like Mother.

Mother had faced them both almost every day—her husband and the woman he used as his tool to control the masses. She’d never shown fear. I wouldn’t, either.

The aide led us through the entrance hall and into the confusing maze of corridors I could map in my sleep. Dane kept a step behind me—always behind, but never more than the one step. Dimwit trailed along, its metallic feet clicking against the tile.

As I’d hoped, servants peeked at us from rooms and hallways as we passed. When they were in pairs, I heard faint whispers behind us. I just hoped those whispers spread quickly beyond the palace walls.

I knew the path, winding around behind the throne room to the private chamber where more delicate matters were discussed. My heartbeat doubled as we approached, tripled when the door opened, and quadrupled when we entered.

My father stood behind a desk, leaning against the mantle of a large fi replace. As tall and broad-shouldered as I remembered, but with more gray in his hair and beard. He didn’t look over even when the door closed and locked behind us.

“Is it she?” he asked.

The aide stepped forward. “We need to verify your identity.” I’d expected this, so I turned my back to her and pulled my sleeve down over my shoulder. She took a small black light from one pocket and a high-dose injector from the other. Dane seemed to move a sniff or two closer, but there was nothing he could do. If the aide declared me an imposter, I’d be dead before the words reached my father’s ears. She ran the black light over the tattoo, and I held very still. A slight gasp escaped her throat.

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“It is, Sire.”

“Then you are dismissed, Margaret.”

The aide left. The door closed and locked again. My father fi nally looked at me. A string of emotions fll ashed through his eyes—shock, then hunger, fear, and warmth. Only when they settled on the last did he speak.

“Snowfl ake?”

“Father.”

My voice trembled, but the emotion causing it was nebulous enough to bring him across the room, his arms outstretched.

“Darling, you’re home!”

Every muscle wanted to tense; I wanted to back away, to run, to hit him. I couldn’t do any of it. Instead, I had to step forward.

He enfolded me, pulled me close, kissed the top of my head.

Touching me . . . too close . . .

Breathe, Essie. Pretend he’s someone else. Anyone else. Everyone
you’re doing this for.

I defi ed every instinct I had and returned his embrace.

A memory crashed in.
Father tucking me into bed, telling me
stories.

Blazes, where had that come from?

After a torturous eternity, he pulled away, taking my face in his hands so his eyes could more easily devour it. “My little girl. We’ve searched for you, the whole system.”

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Father. I thought I’d never get home.” Before we said anything else, a hidden door to one side opened, admitting Olivia to the room, and Father fi nally released me.

Unlike him, Olivia didn’t appear to have aged a bit in the past eight years. If anything, she looked younger, likely thanks 204

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to the revita-tech she always pushed the Garamite doctors in the Royal City to improve. Dark hair pulled back in a sleek, complicated twist; a fi tted burgundy gown with a vaguely militaristic cut, its luxurious fabric offset by a chain looped about her waist and the metal latticework of her heeled boots and headpiece; everything meticulously in place. None of the opulence mattered, as my eyes were drawn to her face.

Olivia had as many masks as she had gowns, but her eyes couldn’t hide the truth. Those eyes set the public quailing even as they shed tears of gratitude for her miraculous “healings” as royal theurgist. Those same eyes pierced into me, demanding to know how I dared remain alive.

I couldn’t breathe. Nothing had changed.

“Snow! I didn’t dare believe Margaret was telling the truth.

Let’s look at you.” She took my hands, holding them out so she could take me in. “So grown-up. I just can’t—What magic has returned you to us?”

Magic. Right.

“Yes, tell us everything,” Father said. “I must know how you were kept from us so long. The last we knew, one of Olivia’s guards escorted you as planned to the orchid festival.” Time to weave a tale as intricate as any code I’d ever written.

I cast my mind back to that day eight years ago, reaching for a few details to bring truth to the lies.

“It was so confusing. We barely made it into the festival, just enough to see an arrangement of crimson orchids. Then the crowd went mad—I think some people were fi ghting—and I was separated from the guard. I thought it would be okay; I’d disguised myself like you always told me to. But before I could 205

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fi nd him, someone held something to my face, and I blacked out.

When I woke, I was on a shuttle bound for Thanda.” My father didn’t bother to hide his surprise. “Thanda? Who would take you there?”

“A band of Thandans and Garamites who fancied themselves separatists. Once on the planet, infi ghting over how to ransom me broke out, and I took the chance to escape.”

“The guard who lost you,” Olivia said, her eyes shrewd, “he wasn’t part of the plot?”

I put on my best look of surprise. “No. I never saw him again.

He didn’t return here to alert you?”

“No, he did not.”

I shook my head, helpless and confused. “Perhaps he ran, fearing punishment.”

“Darling, if you escaped so early,” Father began, “what kept you from us?”

“My own fear. I couldn’t trust anyone on Thanda, so I didn’t dare tell anyone who I was. I tried hiding among the peasants in the Bands, but then they became dangerous. So I wandered north to the wild territories beyond the mines and found the Umbergild Ascetics. They took me in, and eventually I trusted them, but of course, they couldn’t do anything to help me return home. I’m sorry, Father. I should have been braver and more clever.”

Father hummed thoughtfully at my story. “Little wonder the Midnight Blade we sent didn’t fi nd her.” The Midnight Blade. If Olivia’s guards handled the search, it explained why they’d never found me in Forty-Two. I was certain there’d been no search at all.

Even if there had been a search, my father was right—they 206

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couldn’t have found me among the Umbergild Ascetics. It had been sharp of Dane to think of looking for me there, but succeed-ing would’ve been tricky. For one, the Ascetics were isolationists, forbidding any tech that could communicate beyond their borders or anything allowing them to travel faster than a man could run. For another, they were notorious liars to outsiders. Thus the trick of our story, holding a sniff of truth. I’d come across the Ascetics just before settling in Forty-Two, and their leader had been friendly with me due to my age. But if either my father or Olivia went to the trouble to send someone out to the Ascetics to verify my story now, Gildon would acknowledge knowing someone of my description, tell them three different stories, and advise them to pick whichever they liked best.