Page 11 of Embrace the Serpent

My foot slid on cobblestone, and I caught myself on a stone wall, scraping my palm. The street was wet with drizzle, and now

that I was paying attention, I found the damp had worked its way into my hair, droplets beading on my neck, sinking into the

collar of my cloak. Rane’s cloak.

I didn’t know how long I’d been walking, or where I was. Grimney’s head poked out of my pocket, and his beseeching gaze was

fixed on me.

“I’m fine,” I said. “Also, I don’t want to talk about it.”

The past went in a box that got bolted shut and shoved deep where I never had to think about it ever again. Those were the

rules.

“And besides,” I said, “we need to find Rane.”

Grimney’s head disappeared, and I felt him rummaging around in my pocket. He resurfaced with a silver rectangle: Rane’s card.

One corner had been gnawed on, by the looks of it, by someone with stones for teeth. But the address was legible.

Going to see Rane was something of an impulse, but the more I thought about it, the smarter it seemed. He needed a jewelsmith, and I needed to do something other than cry and wait for Galen’s workshop guards or Lady Incarnadine’s Imperial Guards to hunt me down and sentence me to marriage or death.

The address took us back to the city, to a shabby little corner of the Merchant District, where a green door stood squashed

in between two sprightlier buildings. The paint was peeling off in strips, and someone had long ago pried the jewel out of

the large brass doorknocker that now hung crookedly.

I knocked anyway. There was no sound from within—I leaned closer, straining my hearing.

A wretchedly sewer-like stench wafted from my side, followed by a tug at my sleeve. “What’cha doin’ that for?” said a grubby-looking

kid who seemed to have materialized from the gutter. Snot dripped down from his nose, leaving a streak that was clearer of

dirt than the rest of his face.

“It’s not really your business, is it?”

He sniffled. “Tha’ door is my business, lady.”

I glanced at Rane’s card and then to the number painted above the door. They were the same.

“Where’d ya get tha’?” Lightning quick, he grabbed it out of my hand and danced away.

I stalked after him. “That’s mine.”

He peered at me over the top of the card, which now was covered in dark fingerprints. “Yer not a jewelsmith.”

Very casually, I asked, “Why do you say that?”

“Yer too young. And yer dressed wrong.”

“How would you know?”

“I seen the others.”

“What others? Other jewelsmiths?”

He shrugged.

“Do you know Rane?”

He shrugged again, this time shiftily.

“Will you take me to him?”

“Only s’posed to take jewelsmiths.”

“But I am a jewelsmith. Look.” I dug out a few of my tools.

Fast as a viper, his hand darted out, and I yanked them out of his reach. Thwarted, he stuck his finger in his ear and dug

around. “Yer no jewelsmith.”

“But if I was, and you didn’t take me, wouldn’t Rane be mad?”

“Rane’d be mad if I took ya and ya weren’t, too.”

I held his gaze; he didn’t blink. But a smirk spread across his cheeks once my eyes began to water. “Fine,” I said. “I’ll

prove it to you.” But I didn’t have jewels or ingots. I should’ve thought to nick some from the storeroom.

Grimney poked his head out of my pocket.

I had an idea. “Grims, could you spare a stone? The smallest you have should be fine.”

He thought for a long moment and then in a frog-like manner, spat out a small amethyst flake. The boy laughed delightedly.

Good. Grimney crept down my skirt and rolled around on the street for his entertainment, distracting him.

I unspooled a bit of gold thread from the dress, from a discreet part of the skirt that hopefully wouldn’t keep me from getting

a good price for it.

I had no fire, so I braided the thread until it was thick enough and used it to encircle the amethyst in gold like lace. It became a small necklace. The amethyst had little to no power, at most it might give the smallest of protections from intoxication.

“There,” I said, holding it out to the boy. “Believe me now?”

His eyes were wide. He reached for it.

I pulled it back. “It’s yours, once you bring me to Rane.”

He sniffled thoughtfully. “Fair ’nuff, lady.”

He took off. I pulled my hood tight, scooped up Grimney, and set off after him.

We made our way to the parade grounds right outside the Palace Quarter, where a miniature city of tents had sprouted up for

the Season. These were great tents, grand ones, made to house nobles who were too minor or too paranoid to stay in the Rose

Palace. And then there was the support staff, the maids, the cooks, the bodyguards that rode with each visiting noble from

their lands to the capital city.

Imperial Guards mingled with personal guards wearing the colors of near every noble house.

I made sure my hood covered me well. The boy led us deep into the colorful, narrow lanes made by the backsides of the tents.

Fabric flew in my face—someone’s laundry—and I learned to duck. Conversations filtered through the air, in all dialects and

twangs. The smells of cuisines from all across the Empire mingled and made my stomach growl.

Tents of all colors and styles; the squat style preferred by the desert nobles, the tall steepled type for withstanding heavy

rains, the ornate multipeak styles preferred by the rich nobles of the plains.

The boy stopped at a small beige one-room tent that looked like it was trying to shrink in on itself, lest anyone notice it.

Inside was a small table with two chairs.

“Wait here,” he called over his shoulder as he darted back out.

Waiting in a room that had all the personality of a holding cell took more trust than I was capable of. Or maybe I didn’t

like taking orders from a kid. Anyway, I followed him. He turned down a corridor of three tents: sandy beige, faded navy,

maroon. Turned right. Pale white, splotchy green, deep blue. Dusty orange, goldenrod yellow, faint pink. My head spun with

colors, with patterns.

For having such small legs, the boy sure could run. Each time I turned a corner, his grubby little head disappeared around

the next.

My shoulder ached with the weight of my bag, and with every stride some tool jabbed at my thigh. I would surely bruise, but

I was more worried about my tools jangling against each other. I hated that I had run out without wrapping them properly in

leather—it was so stupid—and then my mind conjured an image of Galen looming over me—

No. The past is dead.

A stitch in my side slowed me down. I was lost. I turned a corner, and there he was, standing before a dead end. The tents

on either side made a corridor the color of desert sand, and at the end, cutting off the path, was a tent the dark bluish-green

of an oasis.

A massive tent, impressive even from the backside. It had four domes, each flying a thin silver flag, like a serpent.

My heart thudded. This was the tent of the Serpent King.

The boy had pulled the edge of the tent up enough to shimmy his head and shoulders in. He shouted, “I got one!”

A muffled bit of cursing came from inside. Then a man’s voice: “This isn’t a good time, Pod.”

“But she’s a real jewelsmith! She’s waiting!” The boy wriggled himself back out from under the tent.

A seam appeared in the blue-green tent, and a tall figure slipped out of it. They were clad in a heavy cloak that shadowed

their features.

Shock had turned me to stone. I thumbed my mother’s ring, but instead of finding comfort, I found the jagged edges of the

crack. Anyone could see me very, very clearly.

Oh, crowfeathers. I gathered my remaining wits and backed away.

“Saphira?” The tall figure pulled his hood down to reveal dark waves and amused eyes.

Pod stammered, “I told her to wait!”

“Hello, Rane,” I said faintly. It seemed a bad idea to be rude to the Serpent King’s men, but I had to get away. “I just—I

came to say... Galen can’t take the job. He’s so sorry. I’ll just be going.”

“Wait!” shouted the boy named Pod, sprinting and cutting off my exit with his hands thrown wide. “You promised, lady.”

“Oh, yes, right.” I dug in my pocket for the gold and amethyst necklace.

Pod wiped his nose, smearing his snot in a line across his cheek, and held out that same hand to me.

I lowered the necklace into his grubby palm. “There you go. I’ll just—”

Rane plucked the necklace out of his hand. “What’s this?”

Pod scrambled up his leg, reaching for it. “She made it fer me!”

“You saw her make it?”

Pod, the betrayer, nodded.

“Suddenly, so much makes sense,” Rane said, closing the distance between us. He returned the necklace to Pod and followed

it with a coin. “Go on, then.”

“Thankee, sir,” said Pod, bowing as he backed up and disappeared around the corner.

“I offered him a bath once,” Rane said. “He took my coin, went to the bathhouse, came back gleaming—his hair’s a light brown,

actually—and the next day he was like that again. It’s ash, I think, from firepits. Mixed with a bit of grease from who knows

where.”

“It’s smart,” I said.

He raised a brow. “Why?”

“Makes him invisible enough. And the smell probably makes guards hesitate, for just a second, when they try to catch him.

That second’s enough to slip away.”

“It makes sense,” he said, and he was looking at me with a curious smile, as if we were sharing a joke. “That you’re the jewelsmith.”

A tense pause. “Ha,” I forced, “funny. No, I’m not. That necklace was something an apprentice can make.”

“And you knew so very much about my little pendant.”

“Any assistant knows that much,” I said feebly.

“You didn’t come here to tell me Galen wouldn’t take the job. That was quite evident from his manner. No, you came for the

job yourself. But you’re afraid of who you might end up working for.”

I dragged my gaze down from the silver flags flying beyond his head. “I don’t know anything. I mean, who do you work for? Actually, don’t tell me—I don’t need to know. I’m going.”

“You know who I work for.”

“No,” I whispered. “No, I don’t.”