Chapter 11
Eleven
ARKADI
Arkadi learned that when Rodian set his mind on something, he wasn’t to be moved.
Treason wasn’t anything new in Urova, or any country, for that matter.
Just look at the mess such betrayal had caused with the Infernal War.
Everyone was paying the cost of it across Maricol, and Arkadi was determined that Rodian’s life wouldn’t be added to the sum.
So he had dressed with care that morning for the private meeting Sigurd and the others didn’t know he was also attending.
Gregor was attentive in his duties, having picked out a long-vest and trousers made of the finest wool dyed a glacier-blue and spun thin.
Gregor had modified the tailoring in such a way that Arkadi wouldn’t rip a seam in a fight, and his blades were all carefully hidden away but easily accessible.
He propped his elbow up on the windowsill of the motor carriage, resting his head on his hand as he watched the snowy streets pass on by.
He absently fingered the jeweled tip of a metal hair stick, fingernail catching on the negligible space between the sheath and the stiletto it hid.
Arkadi rarely left his home without his hair up and the stilettos near at hand.
They were a comfort, as were the other blades on his person, and he knew at least one of them would drip with blood before the winter sun had set.
The meeting could play out a hundred different ways. Arkadi only wanted it to end with Rodian safe. If it meant revealing Arkadi’s secret road as a Blade, then so be it. He’d risk never being in Rodian’s good graces again if it meant his Isar would live.
Arkadi closed his eyes, not wanting to think about how Rodian might never speak to him again.
Blades weren’t looked upon kindly by ivoryanin—enough Isar had been murdered by such in the past centuries to make many bloodlines wary of the assassins the Star Order professed to know nothing about.
But the practice of training such assassins had never gone out of favor.
Arkadi was merely one more sharpened Blade in a long history of those meant to keep Urova on the proper road.
He did not want to lose Rodian, either to Sigurd and the traitors or to the truth of what Arkadi was.
He didn’t want to lose the days spent conversing with a man who made Arkadi laugh so easily, who danced with such care as he learned the steps to a song.
Arkadi treasured the moments where they got to touch each other as decorum allowed.
If he dreamed of what it would be like to be kissed by the older man, to be held down and taken with the banked strength in those callused hands—well.
No one knew Arkadi’s dreams, not even the Midnight Star.
They were not prayers, after all.
The motor carriage eventually braked to a stop in front of the palace gates.
The guard on duty chatted briefly with Arkadi’s driver, glancing cursorily at the formally stamped card that granted Arkadi access to the palace grounds without restriction.
Lidiya had not been pleased to issue it, but Arkadi had kept his smugness to himself.
His driver drove through the open gates, the palace’s forecourt cleared of the snow that had fallen last night.
The motor carriage came up to the grand staircase that led into the palace proper and braked to a stop.
A servant stepped forward to open Arkadi’s door, allowing him to get out of the motor carriage.
Even with his furred overcoat on, the winter chill seemed to bite through every layer.
But Urovans were used to cold, and he paid it no mind as he climbed the steps to the palace.
A servant took the overcoat once he was indoors.
These days, Arkadi knew the way through the many halls that would take him to the private royal wing used exclusively by the Isar and their family. The majority of the palace was built for governing. It wouldn’t have been out of the ordinary to meet with a Minister in any of the staterooms.
What was out of the ordinary was Arkadi crashing an appointment thought to consist of only Sigurd and his cohorts.
He swept into the Blue Stateroom with an indulgent smile on his face because he knew the role he had to play. The conversation Sigurd and the others were having around a low tea table broke off, the four of them staring at him in disbelief.
“Good afternoon,” Arkadi said, polite enough. “I see everyone is on time for the meeting.”
“What are you doing here?” Sigurd demanded as the other man stood.
He was dressed splendidly, all russet red and gold.
Arkadi thought it was a decent choice if one wanted to hide blood, but he doubted Sigurd had the stomach to murder someone himself, least of all the Isar.
It was why Arkadi assumed Sigurd had dragged others of like-mindedness into this little treasonous act of his.
Arkadi frowned lightly at Sigurd, playing dumb. “The Isar invited me to a Minister meeting. Is that not what this is about? I am a Minister as well as Steward of the Crown.”
“This should have been a private meeting,” Sigurd snapped. He was perhaps an inch or two shorter than Arkadi but was more broad in the shoulders and thicker in the waist. He was always a heavy hand with cologne to hide his vice of tabac, and the smell wafted through the air between them.
Arkadi smiled sweetly. “It can’t be too private if you’ve brought friends.”
Sigurd glared at him as Arkadi swept across the room to take a seat opposite the others on the sofa there, intentionally leaving room for Rodian. He stared across the table, mentally matching faces to the voices he’d heard in the teahouse.
Sigurd and Kaja made strange bedfellows, but he supposed their desire not to give up their children to tithes was what had drawn them together. The other two weren’t so much a surprise, more like Arkadi should have expected them to be part of such a folly.
Ivoryan Vissarion and Ivoryan Demid were newly elevated Ministers of older bloodlines.
They held their legacy in high esteem, Vissarion more than anyone, as his family had distant ties to the old Isar’s bloodlines.
Arkadi figured the other man probably felt betrayed by the Midnight Star to have thrown his lot in with the others.
The crown had bypassed Vissarion’s bloodline completely when it should have, by Urovan law, gone to whatever bloodline was close enough to claim it.
But the Midnight Star had chosen otherwise, and these four had seen power slip from their grasp.
Rodian cared nothing for the favors ivoryanin offered, preferring to rule in a way that was best for the people, not just the ivoryanin.
It’s what was earning him praise in the broadsheets but causing dissent in the royal court.
The four wouldn’t have been able to bring weapons into the palace, nor were any of the four magicians capable of magic. Arkadi didn’t know how they would attempt to harm Rodian, but he knew they would try. Why else would Sigurd be glaring so balefully at him?
Arkadi met the other man’s gaze with a lazy smile of his own. “Do sit, Sigurd. I’m certain the Isar will be along momentarily. He should be finishing up his briefing with the fisheries Minister.”
The weekly meetings Rodian had with the handful of Ministers who weren’t ivoryanin but who were instead heads of the various merchant guilds within Urova were something even the last Isar hadn’t sat for.
But Rodian, Arkadi knew, cared about the people under his rule, not just the ivoryanin.
It was what made Arkadi care for the other man, that selflessness so few had in the royal court.
“You seem quite close with the Isar, if the rumors are true,” Kaja said, eyeing him through narrowed eyes.
Her dark blonde hair was braided in a crown around her head, the style drawing attention to the jeweled earrings and necklace she wore.
The gown she wore was certainly fancy enough for a private meeting with the Isar.
Arkadi thought it odd she still wore a pair of cream-colored leather gloves best suited for the outside, her jeweled rings worn over them.
He didn’t let his gaze linger on her hands, instead letting it track lazily from one ivoryan to another, letting them believe the facade of his social stature he’d so carefully cultivated over the last few years.
It had left him with few true friends but a wealth of information.
Many of the surviving ivoryanin still knew his bloodlines held their secrets.
“And what do the rumors say about me?” Arkadi asked, despite already knowing the answer. He’d started half of them, after all.
“That your advice to the Isar has steered him down the wrong road.”
Arkadi couldn’t help but laugh. “The Isar is not one to be swayed once he sets his mind to something. If you had paid any attention in the recent Council sessions, you would know that.”
It was why the four had asked for this meeting, after all, whether they wanted to admit it or not. Rodian was Isar and could rule as he liked, but he tended to err toward what was good for the nation as a whole and not for the ivoryanin in particular.
Before Kaja could reply to that verbal barb, the door to the Blue Stateroom was pushed open by a servant.
Arkadi rose with the others as Rodian stepped inside, nearly having to duck his head to keep from hitting it on the top of the doorframe.
If he’d been wearing his crown, he would have needed to.
He’d settled for a thin golden coronet for today’s meeting, and it shined around his head and dark hair.
“Isar,” the four of them all echoed as they pressed a fist over their hearts. Arkadi bowed with the other men while Kaja executed a flawless curtsy to the exact royal degree and no more.