Chapter 2
Two
“And what is his response?” Tallu asked, allowing servants to fasten his robe over his travel-stained clothes, his crown presented on a velvet cushion and placed on his brow, despite the sweat and dust from our hard ride.
Three days to get there and back, and we’d had only an hour of sleep between us.
His eyes were shadowed, cloudy with exhaustion.
“Your Imperial Majesty, he is here,” Quuri said. “He arrived hours after your departure three days ago.”
Tallu straightened, his eyes clearing as he focused on her. “King Vostop is here?”
“Empress Koque has been entertaining him while they waited for your return.” Quuri’s voice was mild, so bland that you could have missed the disapproving flick of her fingers that she quickly hid when she caught my raised eyebrow.
Quuri was usually too formal to express her disapproval in any of the blunter ways a servant might in the Imperium.
“Where are they?” Tallu asked. We’d arrived at midafternoon, the sun just starting to hide behind the walls of the palace, shadows darkening the inner courtyard.
“They are having a picnic in the garden,” Quuri said. She kept her censure stifled with both hands clasped behind her back.
“I should see him,” Tallu said.
“You should take a bath and change,” I said, pointedly looking his clothes up and down. The dark uniform of his Dogs looked imposing, even covered in fine sandy dust from the road. With his maroon cloak and crown, he looked severe, dangerous. “King Vostop is our ally, is he not?”
Tallu huffed a soft laugh and nodded. “He is.”
“Then we should not approach him looking as though you’ve ridden days on a war horse to meet him in battle.” I leaned in, making a point of sniffing Tallu. “Your scent alone might be considered an offense that drives both our nations back to war.”
“Your point is well taken, husband,” Tallu said, low and throaty. I would have told him that I did not mind his scent, that I would happily have spent several days in bed enjoying it with him, but we were surrounded by servants and even I had more propriety than that.
Tallu turned, and his servants swept him away to his rooms, Asahi and Sagam following behind.
I looked toward Commander Rede, unsurprised to find he was already speaking with Quuri, likely arranging rooms for his men and preparations for Saxu and the forces coming.
The Kennelmaster leaned against a wall. Even with his face hidden behind a mask, it was clear the journey had tired him out.
The last Dog, Gotuye, lingered near him.
I hesitated. His obvious weakness made now a good time for an offensive move, but it was almost too obvious.
If the Kennelmaster was playing a game, making a show of weakness only to force me to show my own intentions toward him was an excellent opening play.
If I tried to attack him now or tried to force him to give up his power, he would know I was an enemy.
If I helped him, then we were bound together.
There was also the chance that he was genuinely weak, which raised another host of issues.
I walked away. The strain of the past few days had been enough that I had no interest in playing the Kennelmaster’s games.
In my quarters, I let my servants strip me down, making sure they knew to return the clothes to me when they were laundered. I missed having the clothes that I brought from the north on hand, but the Dogs’ were close enough, even if the fit was tighter at the stomach and ankle.
My mind spun with everything that needed to be done even as the bath maid scrubbed me down in the shower, then led me to the bathtub, already filled with warm water.
At my direction, half of the servants assigned to me had been reassigned to Koque and Hallu, including the maid who had been muted when the Dogs removed her tongue.
Even with only half of my staff, my quarters were still more crowded than they had been in the Northern Kingdom, and the sheer number of servants with easy access to me left me feeling as though a noose were closing around my throat, tightening every time another person came inside a space I could barely call my own.
The bath maid continued washing, and I wondered if we had made the right decision.
Leaving General Saxu alive meant the Imperium would endure. Even wounded, a living enemy was a dangerous one. And Saxu had proved himself an enemy that my parents could only fight to a standstill. The north had never beaten him.
If he wasn’t secretly here to hurt Tallu, he was only our enemy because he wanted the Imperium to survive when we didn’t. Until we revealed that, I had to hope that he would remain our ally. I closed my eyes, enjoying the soak for a moment longer.
Tallu and I had needed to see General Saxu and his forces ourselves. After everything that had happened with General Maki, we could no longer trust that what we were told was the truth. Still, part of me wished we had gotten on our horses after seeing his army and just… left.
Someone cleared her throat, and I opened my eyes to see Irad?o standing in the doorway, Na? perched on her shoulder with a nearly smug expression on her face.
I held in a sigh, trying to keep my expression as neutral as Tallu’s when I told the bath maid that that was all.
She said nothing, keeping any opinions she had about my meeting with my cousin in secret to herself.
When she was gone, I raised my eyebrows, and Na? deigned to climb down off of Irad?o’s shoulder and check that we were alone.
Returning, she perched at the edge of the tub, raising one paw above the water.
“Have I murdered some children recently? Poisoned some village well? Unless you can prove I did, if you freeze this water, I will make sure that you never receive the choice slices of meat you think I don’t know the chef keeps for you.
” I glared at the dragon, glancing over at Irad?o where she chuckled.
She sat down on the seat abandoned by the bath maid, tossing her braid over her shoulder.
In Northern, she said, “I don’t know what you expected.
She was very angry at being left behind, and I’ve spent the past two days trying to entertain her so that she would not tear down the castle in her irritation.
If anyone deserves choice cuts of meat, it is me. ”
“Has it been that bad?” I frowned at Na?, who had the temerity to raise her paw to her mouth, licking it and cleaning her crest like a cat.
“You went off to see the Imperium’s military without me. Leaving me here with these fools.”
“These fools who dote on you,” I said pointedly. “Would you prefer to have ridden hard for a day and a half only to speak with General Saxu for a few minutes before turning around and coming back?”
“I would prefer to be anywhere else. The fire dragon pesters me. The heat from the mountain works its way under my scales. I am sure that I will melt from it.”
Glancing at Irad?o, I felt worry tightened my throat. I thought she was exaggerating, but part of me wondered. She was an ice dragon being forced to stay next to a fire dragon at the peak of his rage.
Although the mountain itself had stopped exploding, lava still flowed, reshaping the mountain that had once been home to the dwarves.
“You are welcome to sleep in the cold storage,” I said. “Or return with Irad?o to the north.”
Na? almost hissed in disapproval. She huffed a breath and then raised her chin. “I will stay.”
“Do not endanger yourself for whatever obligation you feel between us,” I said.
“An obligation between us?” Na? straightened, and raised her paw again threateningly over the warm water in the tub.
I held up my hand, shaking my head. Turning to Irad?o, I asked, “Anything else?”
“The dwarven king? I imagine Quuri already told you.” Irad?o stretched, her eyes going slightly distant.
“He came with three of his men when Emperor Tallu was gone. I believe that either they were watching the palace, or the empress has some way of communicating with him that we don’t know about. The timing is too specific.”
“It was dangerous for him to come when Tallu wasn’t here,” I observed.
“Quuri and the rest of the palace staff could have thrown him in prison. I understand that the dwarves believe four is a sacred number, and that he believed he would be offered hospitality, but the word has a much different meaning in the Imperium than it does in Krustau.”
“Emperor Tallu’s absence would have offered other benefits,” Irad?o observed.
“Meaning?” I asked, too tired to try and make the connection myself.
“Meaning he could speak with Empress Koque by himself, without Tallu’s interference.
” Irad?o reached out, nudging my shoulder until I leaned forward.
She took a small pitcher from the side of the bath and began rinsing out my hair before pouring oil from a small bottle into her hand and carefully working it through the strands.
“He’s trying to sway Empress Koque to come back with him.” I wrapped my arms around my knees, holding them against my chest as I observed the water, cloudy with scented oils and soap bubbles. “The dwarves must be going further into the Krustavian Mountains soon, and he wants her to go with him.”
“That’s what I believe.” Irad?o found a bone comb and began working the knots out of my long hair.
I bit my lip, watching some of the soap bubbles float across the water. Tallu was not going to let go of Prince Hallu, clinging to him as a chance for redemption.
“Any other news?” I asked.
“Nothing but whispers,” Irad?o reassured me.
She finished with my hair and held out a towel for me as I stepped out of the bath. Turning away, Irad?o offered me privacy as I dried myself.
“Whispers?” I asked.