Page 33 of Betrothed to the Emperor

“Be serious,” Tallu said. “We need a plan.”

“If they are on the other side, then we risk the river. I have half a spear and hope that I’ll survive this. What weapons do you have?”

Tallu tensed, his back muscles tightening, and I could feel him turn his head to look at me, the muscles shifting under my fingers. “None.”

“So we risk the river. Agreed?” I waited, and the darkness seemed to close around both of us. There were no lights on the other side of the cavern, no indication of anything other than the trembling sway of the rope we both held on to.

“We risk the river,” Tallu agreed.

He began walking again, slower this time, and I followed behind, dragging one foot along the solid rock to make sure I was never off-balance. Ahead, Tallu stepped down onto the riverbank, and I followed behind him.

We didn’t wait long. With a guttural scream, something launched itself at us in the darkness. I slammed the hilt of the spear across its head, and there was a grunt, the sound of metal hitting metal. I’d missed his face, hitting instead the helmet made from the same material as the hilt I bore.

Tallu grabbed my wrist, sliding his hand down until his fingers wrapped around mine. Then he pulled us, and we both fell backward into the water.

It was colder than I expected. My entire body seized up from the chill, and I struggled to find my footing, but there was none to be found. The water pulled me off-balance as soon as my toes touched anything. The only thing I had to hold on to was Tallu’s hand.

We tumbled, slamming into each other and hitting rocks, going underneath a series of bridges, each lower than the last. The merciless river dragged us underground, the darkness inescapable, and all I could do was feel, feel the tight walls carved by eons of water rushing past rock, feel the impact as my body hit the hard surfaces, but too fast to grab hold. Blind, using only one hand, I desperately tried to seize anything, but the walls were too far to reach sometimes and so close others that I was sure we would bash our heads against them.

I gasped in mouthfuls of sweet water, struggling with one hand, the other clutched tight to Tallu. Finally, when my muscles ached and my back strained from keeping my head above water, the river slowed.

I got my feet under me. The water was still as high as my neck, but I was able to push across, grab hold of one of the walls.

My fingers were entirely numb, and I struggled to grip the slick stone. I yanked with my other hand, bringing Tallu close. In the dark, I couldn’t see his face, and his body was slack.

Had I been holding on to a dead man? I remembered bodies in the ocean, the white corpses disappearing under the crests of waves as sea serpents and whales tore into the dead flesh.

When I put my face close to his, I felt uneven breaths on my cheek. The emperor lived.

Slowly, I began to loosen my fingers. If I let him go, if I let the water take him, would it pull him under?

What a terrible death. Shaking my head, refusing to think about it, I dragged us both along the wall until I found a crevice, a small raised bit of rocky earth, flat enough that the water still lapped at it but high enough that we were no longer pulled along by the flow of the river.

Just as I got him out of the water, only his legs dangling in, Tallu rolled over, coughing violently.

I slapped my hand on his back, something like relief blooming in my chest as cold river water flowed out of his mouth. When he stilled, he leaned against my legs, his free hand wrapping around them tightly, desperately.

“Do you know another way out of here?” I asked.

He shook his head. “Just the entrance on the mountainside and a second exit through the monks’ quarters.”

I nodded, closing my eyes, and then I leaned back against the wall. “We’ve gone too far downriver to make our way back. We need to follow the river. It exits the cavern somewhere.”

We needed to move before my muscles froze up entirely, before we both died here in the middle of the dark, impossible to find. When I opened my eyes, colors floated in front of my face, lights in the darkness. I blinked rapidly and realized it was in my head. Somewhere along the way, I had hit my head hard enough to do damage.

“If you die here, what happens?” I asked suddenly.

The answer was important. If he died here, without the Emperor’s Council to pick at the bones of the Imperium, what would happen? Would it be enough to let us both die here?

“Rute Sotonam would become emperor,” Tallu said. “He’s in the pocket of General Kacha, and he already has a child by one of his consorts. The war of imperial expansion would begin immediately, and as long as his grotesque appetites were fed, he would be happy to let General Kacha control the Imperium.”

“Why is he your heir?” I asked. “He’s House Sotonam, not House Atobe, like you.”

“He is the closest cousin I have on my mother’s side. With my younger brother’s death, House Atobe is just me. I had to choose from all my cousins, and I thought perhaps I could win him to my side. However, I underestimated his loyalty to General Kacha.” Tallu coughed again, and I felt the splatter of liquid on my hand. I turned my palm, and he rested his cheek against my fingers.

A shiver tensed up my arm. I thought of Rute, the gleam of amusement in his eyes, how easily he came to heel at General Kacha’s short word. The way he’d wanted Piivu to himself for private entertainment.

“Loyalty, or perhaps General Kacha provides some benefits that you are not willing to.” Because that had to be it. If Tallu was willing to provide Rute with whatever grotesque entertainments he wanted, then he would have him.