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CHAPTER
Hanish’s secretary returned to the chieftain’s offices in a whirl of motion, a sheaf of papers pressed to his chest, the royal stamp and wax sticks prickling from the fingers of his hand. He did not even acknowledge the man waiting for his return until this person cleared his throat. He paused, set the papers down, and sighed, as if Rialus Neptos had sorely tested his patience just by semivocalizing his presence.
“He ca
The ambassador knew that he would regret anything he said in answer to this, but he could not help himself. “But Calrach himself asked me to put a proposal-”
The young Mein partitioned the air with a motion of his fingers, as if he were spreading out a fan between himself and the ambassador. “I said everything Hanish asked me to. You may leave now.”
The arrogant twit, Rialus thought. The twit! Don’t direct me out with a raised arm! Don’t you lay a hand on me and don’t you dare shut the door when I’ve not yet agreed to leave! He said none of this, of course, and the man did direct him out with a raised arm, did touch him at the elbow, and did shut the door firmly behind him.
A moment later he stood in the hallway outside the office in the company of a brutish guard who looked down on him from beneath a cornice of golden eyebrows. The man u
Well, Rialus thought, that was a complete failure, one that was sure to cause him grief. Calrach had not just sent him to Hanish on a mundane assignment, or to clarify the details of how and where the Numrek would fight. He had charged the ambassador with broaching the subject of the Numrek receiving Quota payments. As far as Rialus was concerned, this was an absurd idea. The Numrek lived as freely as they wished. They regularly hunted the hill people who lived in the Teh Mountains. They used the captured peasants for the same purposes they would use Quota slaves. So what was the use of demanding yet more from Hanish, who had already been, to Rialus’s mind, quite generous to them?
But there was no reasoning with Calrach. He had gotten the idea into his head and none of Rialus’s subtle attempts to dissuade him from it had worked. Now, however, the relief he might have felt about not having to speak to Hanish about this filled him with dread. He’d have to return with nothing for Calrach. Maybe he could pretend that he had spoken to Hanish. The chieftain was thinking it over, he could say. He’d have an answer when he returned, something like that. But that was a dangerous deception. For all he knew Hanish would summon Calrach personally, instead of going through Rialus. He’d done so before. They would meet and in the first few seconds the Numrek chieftain would know he’d lied. If that happened, he would not put much value on his own skin. Why did it seem that every situation in his life sat squarely at a convergence of several dilemmas? Always had, he thought, and perhaps always would.
He stood there for a few minutes more-trying to remember a time when this had not been his fate-before he realized he was being watched. One of the shapes standing down the hall was not one of the life-sized statues he had assumed it was. It was a woman’s form. When she peeled away from the wall and motioned to him, he knew exactly who it was.
“Princess Cori
She did not answer. She turned and led him down the hall, off into a side corridor, and through a small door. It all happened quickly, and it took Rialus a moment to recognize the large, jumbled chamber they had entered. It was the library, rank with book smell, lit by floor-to-ceiling windows. Judging by the silence and stillness of the air, it was empty.
Cori
Rialus inhaled the citrus scent of her breath. He had not actually spent very much time in her presence. He could not even have said for certain that she knew his name. The fact that she did and the perfection of her features stu
“Then tell me,” Cori
“With longing, Princess?”
She studied him a moment. He had the feeling she was sizing him up, measuring whether or not she could say what she wished to. Despite himself, he hoped she would find him to her liking. “I mean,” she said, “do you regret the fall of the Acacian Empire? You turned on your own people, Rialus.”
“I had reason to,” he said defensively. “You have no idea what-”
Cori
Words failed Rialus, but he managed to shake his head. He did not understand what she was trying to do, but what she was saying could not-could not-be true.
“You don’t believe me?” she asked. “How would I know of the letters you sent him? How would I know you were unhappy in the north? I was close to my father, Rialus. I loved him very much and he loved me. He often spoke to me of the things that troubled him, including you. And I’ll tell you this-there is a reason I remembered your name. It is because just a few weeks later you were decried as a traitor. I thought, No, that ca
Rialus could not figure out just how to respond. Her words were insulting. He should lash out at her for them. He certainly had more than enough to say about how he had been slighted. But there was no condemnation in her tone or in her gestures or in her face, which seemed all ope