Leopold offered Safi his hand when she reached the end of the dais, but she glided past him, head high, and claimed a spot on the floor, front and center where her husband could watch. She even flung Henrick a little smirk while she waited. She controlled this space; Leopold had to come to her.
He did come to her, right as the strings began thrumming from the shadows, and he offered Safi a curt bow when the dance began. It was not a difficult dance—there were more complex arrangements popular in Cartorra—and Leopold was comfortable with the steps. He moved gracefully because there was no other way he could move. A series of steps and twirls, hops and spins led them in a wide circle around the room. On their second turn past Henrick, hulking upon his throne, Leopold asked, “Why tonight?”
“Because your uncle commanded me.”
“I see.” A pause while Leopold and Safi briefly parted, briefly looped. Then: “I heard what happened this morning.”
Of course he had. Leopold’s spies had spies. Like Henrick, he had fooled her into believing he was nothing more than a fop. A well-dressed, well-spoken fop, but a fop all the same. In reality, he was even better at cultivation and performance than his uncle was.
“I will kill you,” Safi replied, offering one of her daintiest smiles. “Once I kill Henrick I will kill you.”
“Well, as long as you do it in that order,” Leopold replied smoothly, “I shall not interfere.” Again he paused as they separated. “Any other order,” Leopold resumed once they were together again, “and I will not be able to free you.”
“Lies,” Safi said, and she waited for her magic to confirm. But nothing came back because there was nothing to come back and there never would be for all the rest of her days. Nonetheless, she had absolute certainty as she added, “Everything you say is a lie, Polly.”
“Not everything.” His eyebrows rose. “For example, in your left pocket I have dropped a device you made. A lens that can tell truth from lie.”
Safi stumbled a beat; Leopold caught her. Glided her into a flourishing spin.
“How do you know about that?”
“Careful,” Leopold murmured. “You look upset.”
I am upset, she wanted to snarl. Instead, she laughed. The most twinkling, delighted laugh she could conjure.
“Mathew sent it to me,” Leopold replied, as if this somehow explained everything. “And I would have given it to you weeks ago, had you only agreed to dance.”
“Lies,” she repeated, though this time she was not so sure. “You betrayed me. You betrayed Iseult.”
“Check your pocket” was all he said in reply, and moments later, Leopold’s footsteps—and Safi’s too—slowed in time to the music. As he drew her in for a final parting twist he whispered, “I am on your side, Safiya, and always have been.”
The strings and winds softened to silence. Leopold released Safi directly before the throne. Henrick inclined his head at his nephew, and Leopold bowed in return. Before Safi could hurry back to her own throne, though, or even pat her pocket to see if the Truth-lens had indeed been dropped there, a command sliced through her.
Cold, but not bone-gripping. Clear, but not overly loud. Again, the Emperor said in her mind. You will dance again.
Safi bobbed a curtsy, her teeth grinding, her rage rekindling. Moments later, she turned to the pretty young domna now approaching her and she slid into the next dance.
Four Days After the Earth Well Healed
Furry and lithe, silent and feral, a weasel, dressed in its white winter cloak, scuttles over the forested earth toward Iseult. Clasped in its teeth are pages.
Iseult is too stunned to react. She has left the Hasstrel castle while everyone sleeps. Only Safi knows, and she would never reveal. Still, Iseult must be careful. Fon Grieg has placed guards throughout the Hasstrel lands. He does not trust that Safi’s surrender is real, and he certainly doesn’t trust the Nomatsi girl at Safi’s side. Cahr Awen or no, Iseult is not to be trusted. She is different, she is other, and she has a power linked to the Void.
The weasel reaches Iseult. It drops the papers from its mouth. Worn, dirtied, and flattened, they are pale against the frozen soil. No moonlight beams down, but the stars shine and Iseult has been in the darkness long enough to see. To her left are the knotted roots of a winter-bare oak. To her right, a stretch of evergreen hedges that rustle on an icy breeze.
The pages rustle too as the weasel stares at Iseult and Iseult stares back. There is something in the creature’s glinting eyes that is more than mere animal. This is no trained pet sent on an errand; this animal is sentient. And this animal is waiting.
“Who are you?” Iseult asks, though part of her—a deep part, like the veins of ore inside a mountain—already suspects the answer.
Then it comes, like it had in the castle: images to suffuse Iseult’s mind and drape over her thoughts.
Poznin. The Wind Well surrounded by six oaks, surrounded by Cleaved.
A tower workshop with rounded walls decorated in dead flowers and bits of dangling felt.
Iseult’s face, tired and haggard inside a forgotten ruin in the Contested Lands, where Esme had asked, “Are they owls or are they rooks?”
And lastly, a worn diary from which the weasel rips out pages.
Iseult’s breath hisses. Everything inside her has gone cold—colder than the winter against her skin. Cold as the certainty of death and Trickster’s endless games. Because it cannot be. It simply cannot be.
Then another image plays through Iseult’s mind, and she knows it’s true. So very, terrifyingly true.
A knife stabs Esme in the back, thrust by a Northman who used to be her Cleaved. The Prince of Nubrevna has betrayed her. This Northman has betrayed her, and now blood, blood everywhere. Now the world’s Threads fading away.
“Esme?” Iseult whispers, and the weasel purrs. “But … how?”
The weasel does not answer, but instead slithers over the pages. Paper crackles, and Iseult realizes Esme wants her to look at them.
“It’s too dark.” Iseult motions to the empty sky. “I’ll have to take them inside—”
The weasel squeaks, an emphatic no, and stamps across the pages again. Here, she seems to say. These can only be read here.
Iseult glances toward the castle. It is nothing more than pale lights between branches from this distance. No Threads approach, and it will be some time before Safi worries. After all, Iseult has taken nightly walks for several days now.
Her bones need movement. Her soul needs silence.
“Yes,” Iseult says at last, and she takes up the top paper. It is torn in places and slightly damp in the center, where tiny tooth marks pucker. After several moments of squinting, she is finally able to detect a diagram: crude figures on one side, a solo figure on the other, lines stretched between them. Words are scribbled in neat handwriting around the picture, but it takes Iseult a moment to recognize Arithuanian—strange Arithuanian, as if written a hundred years ago …
Or a thousand. Understanding pitches over her; the cold inside her deepens. “This is Eridysi’s diary,” she says, and Esme nods her weasel head.
Suddenly, the night’s darkness means nothing to Iseult. Suddenly, she cannot stop reading. Devouring each word, each illustration, each stroke from a pen wielded a thousand years ago. Here is a description of cleaving. Here a description of releasing Threads so they do not become ghosts to haunt the mind. Here is an explanation of how to hold Severed Threads and control them, and here is an introduction to cleaving from afar.