Chapter 8

8

Quil

Married.

The word rang in Quil's ears like a screech of a dying wraith. It was only a lifetime of court training that kept him from grabbing Mater Andricar by her silk-clad shoulder and demanding to know what in the skies she was talking about.

"Mater, Pater," he managed through numb lips. "Whatever the Empress has arranged for me will be for the best. Her only concern—and mine—is the prosperity of the Empire. If you'll excuse me." He offered an anodyne smile as he moved away, fingers tingling from the sheer effort of appearing unruffled.

A few others approached him, but he begged off, scanning the room for his aunt. He needed to find her, talk to her, get answers out of her.

Usually, he'd rue the height that made him stand out in a crowd. Now he was grateful. He spotted a flash of silver-blond hair. She was surrounded, but she must have sensed his anger because she looked up, directly at him.

For a moment, they were the only two people in the room, bonded as blood often is. She nodded toward a back door that led to a private balcony, and lifted her hand.

Five minutes.

Quil nodded and turned away. The room spun.

Though he tried to stop it, his magic, leashed like a rabid beast at the back of his mind, rose up. He took a shuddering breath and shoved the magic down. Not now! Not here! The effort of it was immense, and for a moment he thought that he'd pass out and drop straight onto his face, humiliating himself, his aunt, his entire Gens.

Then Sufiyan was at his side, shaking Quil's shoulder, and the magic receded.

"You look like someone's yanked your knickers around your neck." Sufiyan pulled him to the edge of the party, shoving people out of his way.

"Talk," Sufiyan said when they'd gotten clear of the crowds. "What's happened? Is it Tas?"

Quil shook his head. He'd forgotten about Tas entirely. "The Empress arranged a marriage. Mine."

" What? " Sufiyan nearly shouted, and the partygoers nearest them turned to stare, scandalized.

"Shut it," Quil hissed. "Mater Andricar told me. Maybe she's mistaken."

"She's a meddlesome old bat, but she's not usually wrong," Sufiyan said.

"Maybe Aunt Hel was going to tell me," Quil said. "Maybe she didn't get the chance."

" Get the chance? What about when she was shouting at you last week for saying the word abdicate in public?" Sufiyan said. "I hope you'll tell her to stuff it."

Quil sighed. "I'm not going to tell her to stuff it."

"Why the hells not?" Sufiyan stared at his friend like he'd agreed to marry a cabbage. "You might have to marry someone you've never met. She could be exceedingly violent. Or stupid. She might have an unnatural obsession with goats. Don't you care?"

Ilar's smile flashed in Quil's head, the song of her laughter. "Of course I care." Quil pushed her memory away. "But an arranged match was always a possibility. For the stability of the Empire."

Sufiyan put his hand to his temple, as if to call on untapped reserves of patience. "I'm not saying the Empire isn't important. But you do realize that I'm heir to one of the most powerful Gens? Yet my parents aren't demanding that I marry some horse-faced Illustrian to keep the line going."

"Not all of us have three siblings to carry on the line if—"

"Two." Sufiyan's voice was soft as he glanced away from his friend.

Quil flinched, realizing his mistake. Of course. Ruh was Sufiyan's baby brother. And he was dead. "Oh skies. I'm an idiot."

"Look, there's Arelia."

"I'm sorry—"

"Stop." Sufiyan shoved his hands in his pockets and looked down, dark hair obscuring his eyes. "Makes it worse. It's fine. Really."

Quil cursed himself for not thinking before he spoke, thankful when his cousin appeared. She wore a narrow-waisted gown that was a riot of green, her curls loose down her back. Quil glared at the knot of besotted fellows trailing her, scaring them off. He didn't need anyone eavesdropping.

For her part, Arelia ignored her admirers. Her gaze had snagged on Sufiyan, half in shadow, his dark gold eyes glittering appreciatively. He nodded a greeting.

"Nice dress," he murmured.

Arelia's skin flushed ever so slightly. "I hate it. It doesn't have pockets. But the dye is quite rare. Stone-ground from Ogfaso shells and left to dry for three months before it can be mixed with squid ink to form a dye this pigmented. Smells like rotting eggs."

Sufiyan nodded with bemusement or perhaps mockery. It was hard to tell. Arelia huffed in annoyance, likely assuming it was mockery.

"Mater Andricar says she upset you." Arelia turned to Quil. "She wouldn't tell me more than that."

"Ah…well…" Quil considered what to say. As a court engineer, Arelia went all over the city, and heard things others didn't. But if she knew about his betrothal and hadn't told him—

Sufiyan let out a sound of impatience. "Mater Andricar told Quil he's going to be betrothed and I'm trying to persuade him to tell the Empress to stuff it."

"Betrothed?" Arelia's gasp was so genuine that Quil knew she'd been as ignorant as he. "There must be some explanation. She wouldn't ask you to do anything that wasn't within the scope of your duties."

"You Martials," Sufiyan muttered, "and your bleeding duty."

" May I remind you that you are half Martial yourself." Arelia's pale eyes flashed, a rare show of temper.

Quil caught a glimpse of his aunt's armor. She was heading for the balcony.

The prince left his friends to their argument and edged through the crowd, keeping his face stony to discourage further conversation.

Once outside, he wished for his cloak. Winter's chill had penetrated even this far south, and Quil shivered. The palace gardens stretched beyond the carved stone of the balcony, lit by hundreds of tiny lamps.

Quil knew three ways into the gardens, four ways out, two of which only he and the Empress used.

Back when they were close, she'd shown him. That was when she told him everything. He'd enjoyed his visits to Navium, Serra, Antium—all the cities where she had residences. The Empress moved constantly. Quil used to think it was because she got bored.

It's because every city has ghosts , she'd told him once, when they walked along the shores of the River Rei. If I stay too long, they grow angry, and bother me.

He'd not understood how his fearless aunt might be bothered by a few ghosts. After all, she'd taught him how to escape a room with one door and a dozen guards blocking it. How to traverse a city's rooftops and disappear in a crowd, height be damned. How to navigate by starlight and raise a sail and shoot a bow and ride seventy-five miles in a day without killing himself or any horses.

Your best and most reliable protection is this. She'd tap his head when he was a boy . And these. She'd take his hands, so much smaller than hers. Never depend on anyone else to keep you safe, nephew. You keep them safe instead.

Together with Elias, she'd made him into a Mask without him having to spend a day in Blackcliff Military Academy.

Yet she still had guards trailing him. She made decisions for him. She didn't talk to him. Not anymore.

"Nephew." Aunt Helene appeared out of the darkness. "What troubles you?"

She was so calm. It made him want to scream. When Sufiyan and his sister Karinna were bickering incessantly a month ago, Laia lost her temper and told them that if they didn't shut it, she'd put a nest of Ankanese jumping spiders in their boots. Would that Quil could shout at his aunt without caring who heard, and she could threaten him with poisonous beasties, the way normal people did.

"Were you going to tell me that you're marrying me off?" he said.

His aunt stared at him with her mouth half-open, and Quil was briefly hopeful she would laugh and ask him where he'd heard such a ridiculous rumor. Then she did the oddest thing. She glanced first to the doors of the balcony, and out into the lamplit shadows of the garden. Her mouth hardened.

"Indeed, I received a dispatch from the Kegari Triarchy. One of the Triarchs has a daughter who—"

"Were you going to tell me?" Quil cut her off. "Or drag me to meet my bride the day I was to marry?"

"You're being dramatic. How long have you known?"

"I— That's what you ask me? After planning this behind my back?"

"I am asking," the Empress said, each word edged in exasperation, "because the Kegari stopped responding to us in the fall, and we can't get any information about what's going on. Tas was trying, but—" She shook her head. "How long?"

"I found out today," Quil said. "Mater Andricar mentioned it. Of all the people you could choose from, Empress, why the Kegari? All we know about them is that they enjoy internecine massacres and stealing their neighbors' grain."

"Zacharias." Aunt Hel's voice was low, urgent, and she stepped closer. "This isn't what you think. The Kegari—"

"How did we get in touch with them? No one knows their language, Aunt Hel, because there are hardly any texts to reference. How will I communicate with my future wife?"

The Empress ran a hand over her crown braid. "I do not wish to discuss this with you. It is not the time or place."

More secrets. "Then when is?" Quil asked. "Tas said that the Kegari—"

"Tas cares more about you than he does his duty as an agent of the Empire."

Quil took in his aunt's words. "Tas defended me." He felt a surge of gratefulness for his friend. At least someone cared about what Quil wanted. "Because not everyone is like you, Aunt. Willing to throw their family members to the wolves for the sake of duty."

The Empress stepped back from him, the scars on her cheeks livid white against her already pale skin. Quil opened his mouth, words at the ready, waiting to explode out of him. Years of things he'd wanted to say. Years of fear and anger and frustration. Years of hiding what was inside him because that was what his aunt taught him to do.

The air shifted. The songs of the night creatures tripped, the breeze slowed.

Aunt Hel stiffened as a drumbeat echoed across the city, sudden and frantic.

Attack—

The sound cut off and Quil met his aunt's eyes. All was silent.

And then the sky burst into flame.