* * *
“So you have taken a lover,” Henrick drawled. He sat upon his too-tight throne with his too-tight crown, Safi seated in her own throne beside him. Their daily session at court had not yet begun. “It took you long enough.”
Safi choked. Then shook her head. She must have misheard. “Forgive me?”
“It took,” he repeated impatiently, “you long enough. Everyone was expecting it—though I doubt they were expecting it with my nephew.”
Safi wet her lips. Of course Henrick knew of her affair with Leopold. He’d suggested it. Nonetheless, she had not expected him to discuss it so directly. Her fingers tapped against her lap. At the opposite end of the room, supplicants and sycophants lined up. Some were tattered, some were opulent. Henrick would listen to each of them equally.
“Is the imperial prince … a problem?” she asked eventually.
“No. Having an affair will give you something to do.” Henrick offered a bland sideways smile. “Perhaps if you are physically engaged, you will look less…” A sniff, a wave at her face. “Sullen.”
Safi’s fingers tapped faster. Do not punch him, do not punch him. Not that she would leave much damage before he reached that glistening chain at his waist and rained frozen hell upon her.
“Speaking of physical engagement,” she said, as elegantly poised as any domna, “I was hoping perhaps I might train with the Hell-Bards. I have heard they practice in the lower levels of the new wing.”
Henrick shifted in his throne and stared at Safi. She stared right back, while on the floor, the first Cartorran was rushing forward to speak.
She knew there was great risk in her request. Her noosing was not public knowledge, and training with soldiers was hardly the thing empresses did. But ever since Caden had said those words to her in the entryway, Toward death with wide eyes, and each Hell-Bard had replied …
She couldn’t get the notion out of her head that she needed to train with them. How else was she going to understand this chain around her neck? Besides, her muscles would atrophy if she did not use them soon. She was a swordswoman who hadn’t touched a sword in weeks.
“A lover,” Henrick said quietly, “and training with Hell-Bards. If I did not know better, my Empress, I would think you intended to overthrow me. Fortunately…” His lip quirked sideways, his tooth jutted out. “I do know better.”
He stroked the chain on his belt, and cold lanced through Safi. Down her spine, into her abdomen. It took all her self-control not to chatter her teeth or curl into a quaking ball. But he would not cow her. He would not win.
“Yes, my Emperor,” she gritted out. “You … do know better.”
He nodded, seemingly satisfied with her words—and with her pain. Then he released the golden chain and turned his attention to the man now kneeling before him. “Ah, the blacksmith from Haemersmeid. I remember you. Is the dam still hurting your forge?”
* * *
They rode for hours. Owl sat with Evrane on Lady Sea Fox; Iseult on Lord Storm Hound with Aeduan. His Threads never veered from concentration. The Aeduan Iseult had saved from death at the Aether Well was gone. And just as shadow birds winged across Evrane’s Threads, the same shapes now galloped across his.
Iseult had no idea what they meant.
Aeduan was a stranger now. He did not notice that Iseult shivered against him—still so wet and so cold from the river. He did not notice against the wool scraping the roof of her mouth, or when she choked and her eyes streamed.
Or perhaps he did notice, but did not care.
They followed the river west, Aeduan leading the way until they reached a spot where the water was shallow enough for the horses to cross. Iseult’s earlier search had been such a waste. Such a pointless, stupid endeavor by a foolish girl who never seemed to learn. If only she and Owl had never stopped to rest. If only she’d never crossed that river.
If only, if only, if only. She had enough of them to fill an ocean, and not a one could actually help her.
Except she wasn’t totally alone. The weasel was still out there somewhere. Iseult had seen no sign of the creature, and each of her attempts to reach the weasel’s mind had yielded no results. Which surely was a good thing—it had to be a good thing.
Owl’s Threads meanwhile had been trapped in white terror, pure and unchanging for hours. Iseult did her best to comfort the child by twisting around to look at Owl, but it was a useless endeavor. Owl would not meet her eyes, and Aeduan always shoved Iseult’s head forward again.
To think that only yesterday Iseult had been the Puppeteer, reveling in her own strength. Now she was nothing except a prisoner to people she’d once loved. She would’ve laughed at that, if wool did not gag her, for this was how it always went: she ruined everything around her. She hurt whomever came near.
When at last the sun was setting, the horses carried them into a small clearing surrounded by old growth. Here, Aeduan called a halt. He pulled down Iseult, rough in a way the true Aeduan never was, and tied her to an ancient ash. Moments later, Owl was bound beside Iseult, and while Evrane and Aeduan built a cooking fire, the child pressed in as closely as she could. Her collar bumped Iseult’s hip bone. Shivers racked her tiny body.
Which was why the first thing Iseult said when at last Aeduan removed her gag was “The child needs a blanket.” Her voice was rusted, her mouth painfully dry. Still she repeated her words: “The child needs a blanket.”
It was the first clear thought she’d had all evening: Owl is too cold. And it carried with it the first streaks of anger. She clung to that. “She is freezing and must be warmed.”
Aeduan glanced at Owl, his Threads calculating. “Yes,” he said at last. Then he grabbed Iseult’s biceps and pushed her toward the campfire, where Evrane stirred halfheartedly at an iron pot and watched Iseult from across the flames. “Sit,” Aeduan ordered before turning back to untie the child.
“You look worse than when I saw you last.” Evrane grinned, a hateful look that did not belong on her face. “And you were quite broken then, surrounded by monks who wished you dead.”
Iseult didn’t react, even as she stoked the fire in her chest a bit hotter. “Who are you?” she asked as Evrane approached with a bowl of soup.
The woman smiled again, her eyes crinkling this time and her Threads pink with pleasure. “Ask the little one.” She waved at Owl, who sank clumsily to a cross-legged seat beside Iseult. “Do you remember us, Saria?” Evrane looked at Owl as she asked this. “Do you remember what you did?”
“Leave her.” Aeduan’s voice was low but commanding. “She’s just a child.”
“That is no child.” Evrane stepped closer. The bowl steamed in her hand. “How many lifetimes have you had since that day? How many lifetimes have you enjoyed while we lay trapped in darkness?”
“You talk too much.” Aeduan nudged Evrane with his boot, and the older woman did not resist. Her expression smug, her Threads satisfied, she offered Iseult the bowl. Iseult tried to accept it, but she was awkward with her wrists bound. Oily liquid sloshed.
And Evrane laughed. A hideous, brain-scratching sound while she returned to her place beside the fire.