Page 13

Engagement

A lthough people from every conquered land live and work in Moonshadow—people of Bes and Sarenpet, of the old Pir tribes, Sarians, Urs, descendants of the Bow, Mirithian, Reskik, various migrant peoples from the coast, merchant cult-clans pressed into Silence, even rare earthbound Cloud Kings and ruby-cheeked northerners—although so many call Moonshadow home, can rise to lead their neighborhoods by democratic or draconic methods, can become small kings, it is the mirané council who are the true rulers of Moonshadow, and the empire at large.

These sixty-four princes of mirané descent compose the body of folk who advise the Vertex Seal, debate policy, philosophy, and law, and oversee slices of land or business or both. One must be born into the council, through direct family lines, and visibly mirané in every way.

The leader of the mirané council rotates, theoretically, but for most of Moonshadow’s recent history the position has been traded among three families.

At the time of Iriset’s tenure in the palace, the seat is held by Beremé mé Adora, a forty-year-old woman whose father and grandmother both had spent nearly as much time as she at the mirané pulpit.

Beremé is overly thin, but uses it to her advantage with harsh paint slashing her cheekbones and darkening her eyes into vivid pools.

Her smile doesn’t soften her face but brings her features into a predatory alignment.

Iriset finds her fascinating, an ideal example of unique architecture used with purpose.

Amaranth clearly agrees, allowing Beremé to flirt openly, and even share a kiss when no others but her handmaidens might witness.

Amaranth doesn’t take lovers publicly, for she’s devoted to the Moon-Eater, but Iriset is certain the two women have done more than kiss. She wonders sometimes which of the women takes more advantage of the other in their political games.

This is the only of Amaranth’s connections wherein Iriset is aware of Sidoné’s deep disapproval.

At first she imagines jealousy, but learns eventually that it’s the popular grudge of assimilation cutting between her and Beremé: Sidoné, though mirané, has the bone structure and obvious nose of the Bow, Iriset noted upon first meeting, and is the granddaughter of the last famously defeated Bow warlord.

The one Amaranth’s grandfather stripped and lashed to the nose of his river barge to die of exposure and thirst on the return home from conquest.

Beremé had liked, in the early days of Sidoné’s work as Amaranth’s body-twin, to point to her as the ideal outcome for conquest and the laws of assimilation.

When followed to the letter, a conquered people could, within merely a single generation, achieve not only Aharté’s favor but that of the Vertex Seal.

See! Sidoné mé Dalir is living proof. Once, Beremé attempted to parade Sidoné through the Flow Steeple Shadow precinct in the wake of a violent rebellion by the Reskik in that neighborhood, as a sort of mascot.

That had been quashed by Amaranth herself, newly the Moon-Eater’s Mistress at the tender age of fifteen, with the support of her brother, Lyric, whose distaste for flagrant displays of power already was well known, despite his not rising to the Vertex Seal for several more years.

(When his hand is forced, Lyric prefers a precise, sudden violence with little in the way of collateral damage, but very much in the way of terror.)

Sidoné never forgave the mirané prince for the attempt.

It’s Sidoné’s face this morning that gives Iriset her only warning that Beremé is already with Amaranth when Iriset is ushered inside Her Glory’s personal chamber.

This octagonal room rules the women’s petal like the pistil of a flower.

It’s larger than the petal rooms and thrice as tall so that where its honeycomb dome lifts high, there’s space for massive windows latticed with delicate star shapes.

Its star-eye hole is immediately at the pinnacle of the dome, and paned with thin crystal tinted slightly blue.

Beneath it is a glorious blue mosaic star, caulked with real gold.

The rest of the floor repeats blue-green-white patterns of waves pushing away from the star toward the pure white stucco walls.

Amaranth’s raised bed sways on a trundle, her bed’s veil spilling in white and pale blue and peacock green like a voluptuous skirt.

Amaranth herself lounges on a low sofa, a bowl of soup cradled in her hands halfway to her mouth, as she teases Beremé mé Adora about Beremé’s lack of interest in marriage alliance. “—and can’t imagine giving yourself to the romance of the design seed.”

“I like my inner design the way it is,” Beremé sniffs, flicking invisible motes at Her Glory.

Sidoné turns away from the whole room.

“You like stringing everyone along that maybe someday they’ll be able to have you.”

“Yes,” Beremé drawls. “I’m so very desirable.”

Amaranth touches the rim of her bowl to her lips and drinks, eyes on the mirané prince.

She’s wearing loose morning robes barely tied over her body, and has yet to spend her daily allotment with the Moon-Eater.

Iriset is learning this makes her volatile the longer she puts it off, as if it takes her communion to settle her forces into place after a long night of dreams.

“Ah, here’s the little criminal.”

Iriset blinks at the brusque charge and finds herself the center of Beremé’s skull siren gaze. She touches her eyelids and holds herself in a shallow bow.

Amaranth says, “Kitten.”

It should be condescending, but Iriset only feels quiet arousal at Amaranth’s slow tone. She shouldn’t—it’s her own father’s pet name for her. But there’s nothing Iriset can do against the sensual flow of the Moon-Eater’s Mistress.

“Your Glory,” she murmurs.

“Tonight is Nielle’s engagement dinner, and Beremé thinks you should attend at my side.”

Amaranth has been working toward the engagement for months, according to Nielle herself.

It’s not the inevitable ending for one of Her Glory’s handmaidens to marry out of Amaranth’s petal, but for the ones who desire it, Amaranth is happy to oblige as long as the handmaiden in general doesn’t mind being used for political maneuvers.

“I’m the way I am, so it’s only to my benefit to have someone like Amaranth backing me—I come with power and the ear of the Moon-Eater’s Mistress: Who wouldn’t overlook a few things?

” Nielle had said. At Iriset’s expression, she’d laughed.

“It’s not just my face, Iriset. Plenty of people can look past that, or even like it, but I truly struggle to be less than blunt.

I say what I think. Trust me, if it could be beaten out of me, my parents would have. ”

She’d said it with such joking grace, but Iriset had been offended on Nielle’s behalf. Too bad she couldn’t do anything about it.

In the end, Amaranth had settled on Sian méra Sayar, the young small king of the Ecstatic Steeple Shadow precinct.

He was younger than Nielle by a year, younger than the Vertex Seal by five, and inherited his crown through an archaic system of so-called voting by the merchant guild and holy temple attendants in his mother’s precinct.

Each small king had their own internal arrangements for inheritance, you see.

But Sian was well liked, and had a significant stake in several mines along the southern edge of the crater, as well as some scattered down toward the sea.

His cousin ran the Osahar shares of the ribbon network, several of his grand-aunts toe-dipped in everything from public gardens to the Ecstatic School of Architecture.

Nielle claimed Sian was sweet, glowed with mirané eagerness, had tried to kiss her almost immediately, and she wasn’t worried about getting anything she—or Amaranth—wanted from him.

(Nobody told Iriset that Naira mé Rinore, the seventh prince on the mirané council, had wanted to marry her niece to Sian, but in the wake of the two-years-long grappling to secure the marriage of the Vertex Seal to Singix Es Sun, Amaranth had decided that she would do anything in her power to keep Naira from getting what she wanted ever again.

Naira and Amaranth’s mother, Diaa of Moonshadow, had been united in their dislike of marrying Lyric to a non-mirané foreigner, but while Diaa argued based on laws of Silence, Naira had allowed her disdain for non-miran to show like roots on an otherwise perfectly dyed head of hair.

Regardless, Naira had built an alliance of several other mirané princes in an attempt to thwart Amaranth, and Amaranth repaid that sort of thing in full.)

In Amaranth’s bedroom, Iriset sinks to her knees, eyes lowered. “Whatever Her Glory commands,” she says.

The sounds of sweeping robes whisper toward Iriset. She does not glance up at Beremé. “Oh, Amaranth, she does seem tame.”

Iriset goes rigid, ecstatic force tightening muscles and spine with little pops. She breathes through flared nostrils as slowly as she can, drawing flow through her blood.

“No need to be rude,” Amaranth says lightly.

“I’m impressed. Did we settle on a wager after all?”

It’s impossible for Iriset not to grind her teeth. A pointy finger tucks under her chin and lifts her face. Iriset trembles with the effort of lowering her eyes—she is domesticated, isn’t she?

“That’s mine, Beremé,” Amaranth says much less nicely.

Beremé releases Iriset’s chin. “Well, I know, Your Glory. And you, Iriset mé Isidor.”

Iriset raises her eyes just to Beremé’s mouth.

“Can you think of a way you can play a role for Amaranth?”

“Tame,” Iriset murmurs.

“Naive. Trusting. Obedient.”

“That’s hardly what I want.” Amaranth’s robes swirl in front of Iriset’s face as she kneels, nudging Beremé aside. “Get out, Beremé.”

With a brief sigh, Beremé sweeps away. “See you tonight, Your Glory.”