Tower & Knife 03 - The Tower Broken (20 page)

Mesema kept a short silence out of respect for the story, then said, ‘But Empire Mother, no general of Cerana took your people as slaves.’ At this Willa started, and her elbow knocked Mesema’s book of poetry from the side table. It landed upside down and Mesema looked at the words, unrecognisable to her in reverse. As it had been with Banafrit, they appeared as nothing more than a jumble.

As she studied the letters, an idea taking form in her, Nessaket answered. ‘You do not know that your people were taken slaves, either. You have found no evidence for it.’

‘I haven’t spoken to all of the scribes yet.’ Tarub began working a comb through Mesema’s hair and she winced. ‘Nessaket, Mother. Listen – I do hear you, but Sarmin would never displace me, or Pelar.’ She closed her eyes, remembering how Sarmin had kissed her the night before. ‘I think he loves me.’ No man, not Beyon, not Banreh, had ever been so open with her.

‘You had better hope he does not love you,’ Nessaket said. ‘An emperor grants or withdraws his favour. He does not love, for that is a path to disaster.’ With that she stood, preparing to take her leave. ‘But since you have his favour at the moment, I have a request.’

‘Anything, Empire Mother.’

‘Will you help convince him that his brother has truly returned?’

‘Of course.’ In her mind she resolved not to convince him, but to prove it – though she did not yet know how to do that. Govan’s word and Nessaket’s certainty had so far counted for nothing.

‘Thank you, my Empress.’ Nessaket gave a formal bow and left the room. Distracted by her preparations, Mesema only watched the Empire Mother leave in the mirror.

Tarub stuck a pin into Mesema’s hair. ‘I do not think you will be able to see the arrival of the duke, Your Majesty. Already the emperor has closed the doors and the first gong has sounded.’

‘Mm,’ said Mesema, ‘but I will try.’ Several minutes more, and her hair was finished, coiled around her head in an elaborate network of braids. Her face was carefully painted, and her skin carried the scent of jasmine. Willa slipped pretty sandals on her feet and at last she was released from the room. Sendhil and her other guards trailed after her.

‘Come, Sendhil.’ Mesema hurried to the doors and out into the palace, taking the shortest path to the throne room, through the servants’ halls and back stairways. At last she came to the landing overlooking the Great Hall and stopped, surprised to see so many gathered there. So recently the room had contained nothing but broken mosaics – the ceiling above her still showed unfinished timber joists and jagged bits of plaster – but the debris had been cleared away and the floor beneath the boots of the Blue Shields positioned below gleamed in the sunlight.

An old captain stood, with a dozen of his soldiers in formation behind him. Around them swarmed a few men of the court, the priests, generals and satraps who circled the throne
like bees around honey. But one man stood out, taller even than Notheen, with skin as pale as the winter sky and a coat too heavy for Nooria’s climate. The man bent his head towards a Tower mage Mesema did not recognise. So this could be no other than the Fryth duke, Didryk, Banreh’s friend. As she stared down at him he looked up, and recognition flashed in his eyes. He gave a bow so slight that nobody in his vicinity noticed it, so engrossed were they in their own business.

She inclined her head in the way of her people and he returned the gesture as the crowd began to move, sweeping the Fryth, the Blue Shield captain and all the soldiers towards the throne room.

So that was Banreh’s ally. Mesema was relieved the chief had been set free. She turned towards the servants’ stair, but motion caught her eye and she looked back over the railing. In the corridor she saw a woman with long black hair walking towards the temple wing. ‘Your Majesty!’ she called, thinking it was Nessaket, but the woman did not acknowledge her.

She hurried down the stairs and followed the black-haired woman into the corridor, but saw no one.

Sendhil asked, ‘You are not slipping away again, Your Majesty?’ Always he worried. Her own father had never been so protective.

‘Not at all. I hope to join my husband the emperor in the throne room,’ she said, re-entering the Great Hall, but right away she saw Grada approaching.

‘Mirra help us!’ one of her guards said in a fearful voice. Those of the palace viewed the grey-robed, silent assassins as wraiths or demons, not men or women, and Mesema understood that. Once she had feared Eyul, but she had come to understand him. The Grey Service carried out their work with efficiency when
called upon, but they were not ruthless killers. Eyul had borne the weight of his own deeds until his death.

Now his heir came towards her, her dark eyes taking in the men behind her, the broken stair and all corners of the room. She stopped a child’s length away and looked her empress up and down, measuring. Though Mesema knew Grada intended her no harm, she felt spiders crawl over her skin. Nobody could – nobody would – stop the Knife if she decided to make a cut. ‘I came too late to meet with the emperor,’ Grada said at last.

‘The Fryth duke has arrived to discuss an alliance,’ said Mesema. ‘You may speak to the emperor afterwards, heaven bless him, if you wait.’

‘I must go and watch Lord Nessen’s manse.’ Grada’s face betrayed that she thought herself of better use elsewhere. She held up a scroll, capped at both ends with shining brass. ‘This letter was taken from one of the lord’s staff as he entered the city.’

‘Lord Nessen? So is he in Nooria, then?’ She was pleased to know there was news about the Mogyrk sympathiser at last.

‘No, he never arrived.’

Mesema frowned. ‘And yet it appeared they were preparing for his arrival. You said great amounts of food had been carried inside.’

‘Just so.’ Grada tapped the scroll-end thoughtfully, and Mesema could not help but look at it, fingers itching.

‘What does it say, Grada?’

Grada shrugged. ‘I cannot read it.’

‘I can read it for you.’ Mesema reached out for it, but Grada held up a hand. ‘No. This is for the emperor, heaven bless him.’

‘Well then, give it to me and I will make sure he receives it.’ Grada hesitated, and Mesema sighed and added, ‘Unopened.’

‘Very well.’ Grada dropped it into her waiting palms.

A young Cerani man wearing white mages’ robes stepped through the doorway. He blinked at the height of the Great Hall, then stopped in alarm at the sight of so many guards. He looked from Grada to Mesema as he spoke, his voice uncertain. ‘Has anybody seen the high mage?’

‘I have not.’ The Knife assessed the man. ‘Perhaps he is in the Tower?’

‘Of course!’ His eyes went round when they fell on Mesema and her silks, and she smiled to herself, because he did not know her for the empress.

‘I am very happy to see a new mage in the Tower,’ she said. ‘We have great need of you.’

‘Thank you, miss,’ he said with a bow. Over his head she and Grada shared a secret smile.

‘I will walk with you,’ said Grada to the mage, ‘for the Tower is on my way to the Holies.’

‘The Holies! I never …’

As Knife and mage passed through the doorway to the temple wing, Mesema looked at the missive in her hand. She could not carry a secret letter into the full court; she would have to take it to Sarmin’s apartments. Back up the stairs she went, Sendhil and the other men behind her, down one hall and then another, until Sarmin’s guards bowed and opened his doors. She went through to the desk and set down the scroll, feeling relieved now it was out of her hands and the temptation to open it had passed.

She looked out of Sarmin’s window. He had a better view than she, for his room faced the Blessing and beyond it, the plateau of the Holies, which was high enough to obscure her view of the Storm Gate and its path into the western desert. Directly below lay the courtyard where nobles and generals
often arrived in their coaches, and as she looked down she saw the dark-haired woman again, walking towards the gate. Mesema gripped the window-screen. The woman would never hear her if she called out from up here. Instead she stared, trying to determine whether it was truly Nessaket. This woman had the same long hair and the same golden skin, but the white covering wrapped around her did not look like anything Nessaket owned. ‘What—?’

Mesema turned to Sarmin’s desk and found the spyglass he had lent her the other day. Stretching it to its full extent she focused on the dark-haired woman and gasped. She was wearing her own white cloak, the one her mother had embroidered with red and blue flowers – the one she had thrown to the floor when Nessaket visited her room the other day.

The guards did not attempt to stop Nessaket as she passed through the gate – they did not appear to see her, and neither did Nessaket take any notice of them as she walked in a straight line, each movement measured and even. Outside the gate she turned and vanished from Mesema’s view.

‘No—!’ Mesema folded the spyglass and ran to the corridor, pushing past Sarmin’s guards, and for once Sendhil asked nothing; he only ran after her as she hurried to the old women’s wing. Without a word he helped her to pull open the heavy doors, and once inside, she ran through the old bedrooms to the garden stairs. On the roof at last she put the spyglass to her eye and searched for the Empire Mother, but though she peered at one street after another, examining every person she saw, Nessaket was nowhere to be seen.

‘No!’ She sat on the bench and twisted the brass spyglass in her hands, wondering how long it would be before Sarmin was finished with court.

At last she gathered herself together and stood, looking out once again over the city, Sarmin’s city, glinting in the full sun. The Blessing caught her eye, sparkling as it did at this time of day, and she followed it south, towards where Pelar had gone. And then she followed it north, to the Worship Gate and beyond, where the Great Storm threatened. Sarmin had told her that by staring at the emptiness too long she too would be emptied, but she could see nothing to the north but the gate and the wall.

She sat among Nessaket’s flowers and looked at the statue of Mirra. ‘Where has she gone?’ she asked the stone, but the stone did not answer.

Sarmin leaned back in the Petal Throne and looked out over the gathered court. The politicking of his lords and generals defined Cerana for those who lived and worked within the palace, but it was these meetings between himself and foreign rulers that defined Cerana for the outside world. It happened so rarely that it was of the utmost importance to get it right. Anticipation and dread together set his skin tingling. To strike the right balance, to be welcoming and yet demand the respect the Son of Heaven deserved, was to walk on a knife’s edge. When Marke Kavic had arrived in the court, Govnan had been here to help him through a difficult moment in diplomacy, but he did not expect the high mage to be present today.

Within minutes or hours the Storm would touch against the Blessing, and all things hinged upon that moment, for if Govnan could not protect the river, they would have to leave their great city, just as Notheen had long recommended. The desert headman was also missing from the assembly, as were many others – the softer men who might talk of war but shivered at hardship. The earthquake had been the final straw for them, and he wished them well on their way downriver or across the sands. He and Mesema might soon be joining them – but first he would find his brother, and to do that he needed
Duke Didryk’s help. His fingers wandered to the butterfly-stone he kept in his pocket to remind himself how much that seemed impossible was not.

General Merkel and Lord Benna remained, and with them an assortment of brave courtiers, all of them energised by the news that the Fryth duke had arrived. Some wore grim expressions – any alliance with Fryth would curtail their dreams of conquest – but others showed nothing but curiosity. Sarmin himself was looking forward to discovering who would be standing with him in the coming days, and who would oppose him. Dinar would be the man to watch as an alliance with the duke moved forwards. Now the high priest stood in the midst of a group of old warriors, his expression closed, his words few. Though he thirsted for power, the man was always careful; he chose both his allies and his battles well. He would not speak against the alliance unless he saw a better opportunity.

He watched the side door, but Mesema did not step through. He was surprised she would miss this. He remembered the feel of her, the way their bodies had joined together, and he pressed his palm against the carved metal roses of his throne to still his desire. He had always cared for Mesema and he had always wanted her, but something had changed, beginning with the day Chief Banreh had arrived and he was poisoned by jealousy. He knew his mother would not approve; in the
Histories
he had read many a tale of rulers thrown upon the rocks of their own passions. An emperor must always remain above such human foibles.

And yet still he looked at the door again, wondering where she could be, longing for the sight of her pointed face, the feel of her gentle hand against his shoulder.

The herald claimed Sarmin’s attention, announcing the duke
and his two noble guards in his sonorous voice. Courtiers gaped and whispered at the sight of the tall Fryth, and struck various poses of disapproval or acceptance, though Sarmin set no tone to guide them. He kept his own face blank, though Duke Didryk looked so like his cousin Marke Kavic that he found it difficult: the duke looked out from the same deep blue eyes.

Sarmin’s last memory of Kavic was filled with blood, for it had been his own hand that killed the marke, though not his own mind.

Moreth had slipped in and stood now at the back, his grey eyes watchful. Sarmin did not see Grada but Herran stood in the shadows, his face betraying nothing. Other than Azeem, all of his closest advisors were absent. His mind went in a dark direction.

‘Do you see General Arigu here?’ he asked Azeem in a low voice. He did not know what the man looked like.

‘No, Your Majesty, I do not. I was told Chief Banreh escaped and the general went after him.’