Page 76

The assassin

D eep in the night, Iriset wakes to the urgent chimes of their private alarum.

She sits up just as Lyric jolts out of bed and grasps for trousers.

Garnet’s arrival is announced by footsteps leaping up the spiral corridor from the greeting chamber below; the moment he appears, he says, “Sian méra Sayar is dead.”

It’s Nielle’s husband, the small king of Ecstatic Steeple Shadow.

Lyric keeps dressing. “Has Beremé summoned the privilege council?”

“No.”

“It’s not necessary until the sun is up. I’ll go to her, and have General Bey brought, and Menna. Do you know what happened?”

“He was assassinated at the fourth ascent, in his Steeple Square, while your command rang out.”

“The army will have to go into Saltbath today instead of waiting for the fourth day.”

Iriset draws her knees to her chest, watching her husband and his body-twin plan. Because she’s naked, she remains in the bed, wrapped in the sheet. The perfect excuse not to speak.

“It will go against the command,” Garnet says.

Lyric pauses, eyes on the tiled floor. “I know that, but the murder of one of my small kings must be met with clear fury, not ambivalence.”

“Yes.” Garnet puts his hand on Lyric’s shoulder. Compels eye contact for a moment. Then Lyric nods, and they turn to go, but Lyric suddenly spins and kneels beside the bed.

“I…” The Vertex Seal stares at her, frowning, something pressing to be said, but he doesn’t say it.

She kisses him. This is the very last time, and she can’t even relish it. “Go,” she whispers.

Iriset huddles alone when they’ve departed, the sheets pulled over her head. She squeezes her eyes closed, curled in a ball, wishing she could cry.

But it’s not grief nor fear that pounds clear through her blood. It’s resolution.

If he’ll be meeting with his mirané council, that is a perfect time for her to enact her plan. She has to start now, even if Bittor’s deadline hasn’t struck: The army is going to surprise the insurgents, and Iriset will trigger her graffiti and warn them.

She throws off the blankets and pulls on a robe, then goes down to ask for coffee and for the night attendant to wake Huya.

When the coffee arrives, she drinks it on Lyric’s balcony with his herb garden as if he were there with her.

And when Huya appears, she tells him that she’s going to go into Moonshadow City to comfort her friend Nielle, whose husband is dead.

At his protest, she makes it a command, and if he doesn’t like it, or her Seal guards think they can’t keep her safe, they need to make the Vertex Seal himself tell her she can’t be friend to her friend—and then they’ll all be fired.

After Huya vanishes in a flurry, Iriset dresses in Lyric’s clothing.

His priest-red trousers, shirt, his sleeveless red tunic.

Over it she throws a layered Ceres mantle that falls from her shoulders in waves of deep blues and greens, with streaks of silver and pale cream-orange.

The chest piece that flattens her breasts is simpler than most, encrusted with lines of milky glass and black embroidery.

By then the sun has arrived, and Iriset hurries into her study to gather the craftmask and the strips of silk that will hang over her shoulders like a cloak until they are charged into ecstatic power.

She also needs her weaponized stylus, which she keeps stuck to the bottom of the desk if she isn’t wearing it as a comb in her hair.

And the resonance pill for dissolving the marriage knot.

She doesn’t notice Diaa of Moonshadow awaiting her until Her Glory clears her throat.

Iriset stops cold. How did Diaa get in without permission from Huya? Except… Diaa lived in this tower when her husband was the Vertex Seal. Iriset does not let her eyes slide toward the secret door. But her blood chills in tiny ecstatic pops.

“Diaa,” Iriset says, acting surprised.

The older miran lifts her brow in mutual surprise, offering no explanation of her mysterious arrival. “It is barely dawn and you already are dressed to depart?”

“My dear friend Nielle was bound in marriage to the small king murdered last night, and I go to comfort her.”

“How good of you.” Diaa smiles with genuine warmth. “You are sinking into your role admirably. I suspect my son already believes he could not live without you.”

Iriset lowers her eyes politely.

After a moment, she looks up. Diaa studies her with a peaceful expression. “My bound-daughter”—she uses an old mirané word that means such—“are you sure you should leave the palace complex at such a time? Perhaps your friend can be sent for, and comforted in the bosom of safety here?”

“That is my thought, as well, Your Glory,” Iriset says carefully, “only to go myself and bring her back. I do not think she will come alone; she will want to remain where her husband is. The marriage binding is so intense, you must remember.”

Diaa hums her agreement, glancing away sorrowfully.

“I have some coffee, in the front room, if you would like. Though it may have grown tepid.”

“Thank you, no.” Diaa draws back her shoulders. Her mirané-brown face is painted with spiral blossoms like a pink chrysanthemum. The color makes her lovely mirané eyes seem slightly more reddish than usual.

Iriset bites her bottom lip. “I wish to gather some materials from my worktable to take to Nielle.”

Diaa nods casually, and Iriset walks calmly, as if nothing is wrong, to her table. Her mask-working materials are in boxes and woven baskets, with the sheaves of parchment and pencils on the table itself. As Iriset chooses a basket, Diaa moves behind her.

Rising force lifts up her spine and Iriset freezes just as a knife touches her throat.

Diaa grips her from behind; the blade presses beneath Iriset’s jaw. “You are so beautiful, Singix. It is such a pity you aren’t mirané.”

Iriset breathes shallowly, taking great care with her neck, as fear skitters along her flesh. “I… That is what you’ve come to say? Is that why you dislike me?”

“I don’t dislike you, child. I simply cannot risk my son’s children being born without Aharté’s most important blessing.”

“Not mirané,” Iriset says. This has never been about politics, not the way Iriset thinks of politics. Not about alliances and empire. Or proving Lyric’s devotion or Amaranth’s schemes. It’s only about race. Iriset, for a moment, thinks she might laugh.

“You believe I’m pregnant,” she says. “Lyric told you, he said. That is why you tried again after so long.”

Diaa shrugs, and Iriset imagines she feels the knife heating against her skin.

Iriset says, “But everyone—even the mirané council, even Beremé herself, and—and Lyric!—decided this marriage was good. Necessary. If Aharté blessed it, which she did, she will bless our children, too. There is nothing for you to worry about, bound-mother.” As she speaks, Iriset grips the edge of the worktable before her, searching blindly for the stylus stuck to the bottom with friction-buttons.

Diaa says, “Do you believe in Aharté at all, Singix? You have other gods; you cannot argue to me any faith in She Who Loves Silence.”

Ecstatic force continues to pop in Iriset’s blood, and hot rising force burns up her body in a flare of panic. “And so you—you’ll just murder me here?”

“Unfortunately, the investigator-designers have those berries.”

“What?” Iriset’s fingers pause in surprise.

“I told you they made a good tea, but you didn’t drink it. Now they’ll know, and you’re the only person who knows I gave them to you.”

“They’re poisonous?” Iriset sounds appalled even to herself.

“Merely abortifacient.”

Iriset does laugh now, high with disbelief.

“These used to be my rooms, Singix. There is a third door to this study, did you know? It is hidden in the architecture and leads down through the petal to a rendezvous chamber. I am unsurprised neither you nor my son are aware. He fell in love with you so very quickly.”

Silk. She needs Silk’s cold focus. Iriset takes a deep breath, enough that the blade presses sharply to her skin. She says, “You will break his heart.”

Just then, her finger brushes against the charged comb.

Diaa says, “He will mend. And be stronger for it and marry a mirané girl.”

Iriset considers screaming, but Diaa continues quickly, as if sensing it, “I’ve known Huya since he was a baby. His mother was one of my first attendants. Did you forget how long this palace has been mine ? They will never suspect me. None have yet. Not even you.”

“Diaa,” Iriset whispers, stalling. “Please. Please let me live. Let me go.” She must be careful as she unsticks the comb not to drop it, or move too fast, for Diaa has but to slice.

Iriset can’t save herself from a spurting artery with any kind of architecture.

Her heart pounds so hard she wonders if Lyric can feel it—but he’s so tense and stressed himself, he’ll think it’s his own pulse.

“Please,” she says as she strains, lifting her chin. She can’t—quite—reach the damn thing.

“Be still. Begging is no use. You are bound; the only way to undo the marriage is your death.”

With nothing to lose, Iriset hisses sharply, shoving ecstatic force out through her skin: Her hair raises, she shudders with the static charge, and Diaa gasps, and her whole body jerks in surprise.

Iriset kicks back, twisting to try to free her neck.

The blade cuts, but shallowly, and Iriset spins free, grabbing the stylus and brandishing it before her.

It’s plain pink quartz, thin enough to be delicate as a princess’s hair comb, and gleams like a shard of the moon.

Diaa stares at her in shock, her hands rigid and empty: Her knife clattered to the floor. “How did you do that?”

Holding Diaa’s gaze, Iriset steps forward. She lets her accent crumble, shaking it off bit by bit, word by word. “You don’t know anything. Singix died in your first attempt. You poisoned her before her wedding, but I took her place.” Iriset bares the teeth that have always been hers.