Page 7 of Embrace the Serpent

Galen smoothed back his hair and rose. “Gladly.”

My body was frozen. I had the distinct feeling of watching a dog being led to its execution. Perhaps the dog barked too much,

but it didn’t deserve what was coming.

The servant moved like a ghost through the gathered nobles, silent and untouchable. Galen followed with a jovial, swaying

gait, finishing his drink before pressing it into the hands of a random footman.

I kept my distance as they made for the central palazzo and climbed wide stairs up to the shadowed second story. The air grew

thick with incense smoke.

I could see everything from here. The finishing steps of Mirandel’s dance. Nobles shooting longing looks across the room.

The Serpent King’s huntsmen, in their darkly glittering serpent-scale armor, arrayed around their king. The greater number

of Imperial Guards watching each of the huntsmen.

The nobles up here were of a different type—most were older than those below, and they were more controlled, more serious of expression.

I eavesdropped. Many were parents negotiating the weddings of their children, their bride prices and dowries, their alliances and common enemies.

Some were here to negotiate a young spouse for themselves.

They turned a curious eye on Galen. I kept to the shadows, following.

Lady Incarnadine was leaning against the banister, watching all that happened downstairs. She was draped in pure white silk

that bared her back, and her long black hair was braided and piled on her head like a crown.

I had expected the white armor she wore the first time I saw her. Stained with blood and guts.

As she was now dressed, any blade could find its way between her ribs.

At her side was a thin man wearing black gloves. He peered at Galen over his golden spectacles.

“My lady,” Master Vyalis said, “Master Galen has arrived.”

She turned. Through the smoky incense haze, her eyes glittered like diamonds.

“Master Galen,” she said in a low, amused voice. “Come closer.”

He did. I did not.

“The Emperor has heard of your prowess, your prodigious talents. He regrets that he has not given you a challenge worthy of

your ability. He wishes to rectify this.”

To everyone else, Galen would’ve seemed to have merely puffed up, but I saw in his eyes a spark of surprise followed by quick

calculation. “I am willing and ready for this honor.”

She crooked her gold-tipped fingers, and an attendant rushed over with the quick, tiny steps of one who wanted to unobtrusively materialize. The attendant knelt and, hands raised above her head, presented a wooden jewel box.

Galen startled. I guessed that from his perspective, a jewel box had appeared from thin air.

Lady Incarnadine opened the box. On a bed of velvet sat a dark yellow jewel of an old-fashioned cut. Beside it was a mangled

mess of pale yellow metal. Probably a gold and silver alloy of some kind.

The jewel caught the light, and there was something... beckoning....

Incarnadine’s voice came. “The gemstone alone induces a moderate hypnotic effect. But the setting was of a singular design....

It was last worn by the Lady Delphina. All whom she spoke to were compelled to obey her.”

At her prompting, another attendant unrolled a scroll. A drawing. A woman with medium-brown hair, eyes, skin. A plain face.

Save the gleaming jewel at her throat, set in a necklace worn like a collar.

I’d never heard of a piece that could do what Incarnadine claimed. It seemed more fairy tale than truth.

“She was shot through the throat by an archer with the foresight to seal his ears with beeswax. Alas, that damaged the setting.”

Damaged? It was a knot of metal, half melted. No arrow did this, not even a flaming arrow, unless Lady Delphina happened to

fall into a fire hot enough to be a jewelsmith’s forge and was then trampled by an elephant. But no one corrected Lady Incarnadine.

No one dared. Perhaps that was why she didn’t need the armor—she knew we all remembered her blood-spattered and victorious.

Or perhaps everyone was too busy watching Galen. Master Vyalis wore a smile as spare as his designs.

It began to dawn on me what she was asking.

“The Emperor desires that this necklace be restored to its original state. But alas, even Master Vyalis was unable to do so.”

Master Vyalis’s smile dimmed. It did little to soothe the horror rising in my throat.

“If you succeed, then we must all agree that you are the foremost jewelsmith in the Empire. However, should you fail, should

your words here today be proven falsehoods... you will be stripped of your title and your place on Gem Lane.”

Galen smiled like a cat. I couldn’t imagine why, unless he had suddenly developed a zest for living on the streets.

“My lady,” he said, “I have spoken no falsehoods. I request one additional boon upon my success.”

Lady Incarnadine’s brows rose into her hairline. “Yes?”

“When I succeed,” said Galen, “I wish to be granted the workshop currently belonging to Master Vyalis.”

“Why, you—” Master Vyalis took a single step before a raised finger from Lady Incarnadine stilled him.

“If you succeed,” she said, “then the workshop will be yours.”

Galen bowed. “Fear not, my lady. It will be done.”

“I can’t do it.” I said to my knees. I was curled up at the bottom of the workshop stairs. Three days had passed since the

party, since Galen’s drunken boast, and every passing hour made it only more clear that it couldn’t be done.

“Of course you can,” Galen’s voice said from somewhere above and to the side. “You must. You know what’ll happen if you don’t.”

“It’s not that I don’t want to— I can’t .”

His footfalls came closer. “You will, Saphira.”

His voice was so sure. I looked up at him through the mass of my hair. How did he know? What did he see in me that I couldn’t

see in myself?

Galen knelt before me, a strange, possessive look in his eyes. “The gods sent you to me, Saphira. They would not have if you

couldn’t do this. It’s that simple.”

My heart fell. I knew Galen appreciated me, but sometimes I felt like what he appreciated was the gods, and I just happened

to be the middleman. Though, this time, I wouldn’t have minded if the gods cut me out and did the work themselves.

Galen patted my knee. “Just keep at it.”

I nodded. What else was there to say?

“You just need a little motivation,” he said. “Let me show you.”

The second-floor rooms were Galen’s. At the back was a vast bedroom with a dressing room, and at the front was a sitting room

that held various jewelsmithing odds and ends.

The drapes were drawn. He beckoned me to look through a gap in the curtains.

“Look at them,” he said. “All those people.”

They had started to gather the day after Galen’s boast, on the patch of Gem Lane between our workshop and Master Vyalis’s.

The first day, the bravest of the bunch came into the shop with prying questions and not much interest in buying anything,

until Galen had closed up and put a sign on the door that read “Closed for Very Important Business.”

Still they came to gawk. Folks from all corners of the city, most stopping for just a few moments. If I opened a window, the wind carried in voices telling the story of what they called the task , with Galen’s boasts growing wilder each repetition.

I didn’t have the faintest idea what they expected to see from the outside. Were they reading signs in the smoke coming out

of the chimney? Watching for a flicker of the drapes?

“Do you see?” Galen asked from my side. “Our fame is being made, Saphira.”

He thrust the drapes apart and unlatched the window. I ducked away.

Screams of surprise came from below.

He leaned out and waved. Not a hair was out of place; he had shaved and dressed for this role. Sunlight glinted off his squarish

jaw—had he oiled it?—and no matter how the wind blew, his hair stayed in its dramatic pouf.

They shouted questions at him until he raised both hands. “Thank you for your well-wishes. This is a delicate piece—you have

heard how Master Vyalis gave up? Well, I will not give up. I am close. But the art takes great concentration, and I cannot

be disturbed.” He paused dramatically. “Many of you wish to commission a piece from me. I understand, so please leave your

name and the deposit with the guards. Thank you, my dears.”

Someone applauded, and then they all did. Galen shut the window and drew the curtains. He winked at me. “We’ll have Grimney

stoke the fire, eh? Give ’em some fun.”

I didn’t know how this was supposed to help, and I didn’t really know what to say, so after a long moment of silence, I gave

him a thumbs-up.

I climbed up to the third floor, to my rooms. Well, room, singular. It was once the attic, and a fireplace bisected the space. All the chimneys in the house were connected by the flue, which meant that sometimes, when it was quiet, I could hear Grimney singing to himself in the kitchen.

Toward the back was my bedroll, and beside it was a trunk that held my three dresses and my violet-and-gold servant’s livery.

Rane’s cloak was folded on top—I needed to return it. And then there were the things I’d gathered over the years.

Childish things. A feather that seemed black until it caught the light, and then it shimmered purple and green. A wooden toy

man, missing his arm, that I’d rescued from the gutter. When I held it, warm flashes of memory came to me, of being small

and playing with someone whose face was only an impression.

There were several dried daisy chains, each braided in different patterns. Two dozen leaves of all different sizes and shapes,

pinned to the wall in a neat line. Stuff that made something inside me spark with ideas, with designs. Stuff I’d have to toss,

once we were kicked out of the workshop and were living on the streets.

The other side of the fireplace was where I spent most of my time. A round window that faced Gem Lane bathed the space in

soft light. My worktable sat under it, my tools neatly arranged to one side.