Chapter 25
Twenty-Five
Two shadows melted out from behind trees, and I recognized them instantly as Emperor’s Dogs.
One was Sagam, his movements quick and unhesitating.
Both shadows paused, freezing when they recognized us.
Sagam dropped first, going to his knees.
I knew what was coming and cut him off before he could beg forgiveness for abandoning the emperor.
“We need to get inside the palace,” I said. “And we need to alert Quuri that we have found Empress Koque and the crown prince. They will need rooms and servants.”
The drawbridge squealed loudly, the sound emphasized by the boom of the mountain across the lake.
We turned toward the bridge. Tallu led the way, his posture straight, dust and ash falling from his cloak in a swirl that dogged his steps.
When we passed over the moat, the water churned, the serpents panicked and writhing.
Irad?o frowned down at them, and I felt her worry echo in my own stomach. What did they know that we didn’t?
I dropped back to speak with Sagam as the other Dog stood at Tallu’s shoulder, Irad?o keeping close to me. Her yellow clothes wouldn’t hide her now. She was too visible, too exposed. I had to keep her close.
Empress Koque held back, walking behind me. Of all of us, she knew how important visuals were, how important it was that no one saw her as taking my place.
“How is Asahi?” I asked Sagam.
“Recovering. He is asleep, as he has been since we got to the palace.” Sagam’s eyes cut to Irad?o.
“This is a personal guard. My cousin, sent by my mother as a gift for returning her daughter to her,” I said, stretching the truth. “And the Kennelmaster?”
“Alive. One of the new servants was a midwife, but there are no doctors of Dr. Jafopo’s caliber here.” Sagam looked away.
“As soon as we are settled, we will find a doctor.” I looked at the mountain again, only the very peak visible as we crossed the drawbridge and the walls of the palace blocked the rest out. “If there is any food or blankets we can spare—”
“Your Highness?” Sagam asked.
“Krustau is our ally, is it not? And its king has been killed, its capital destroyed. Should we not offer aid?” I looked at him, and he hesitated only a moment before dropping his chin in a nod.
On the other side of the drawbridge, Quuri stood behind a phalanx of servants, her eyes widening only a moment before she began shouting orders. Sagam went to her, speaking quietly.
Her eyes went from Tallu to Koque and back again. After a second, she snapped a few quick orders. Koque straightened as three servants approached, the lead one gesturing with her hand in invitation.
“Your Majesty,” the servant said.
There was a moment of hesitation, and Koque turned to Tallu, managing a bow, even with her sleeping son still cradled in her arms. What she said now would be important, a setting of expectations.
“Your Imperial Majesty,” she said, letting her smoke-hoarse voice rise to be loud enough over the bustle of movement.
Everyone stilled. “I am so grateful to have my son, your heir, once again in your custody. Our time in Krustau has helped my son understand our allies better, but I am ever grateful to be back on imperial soil.”
Tallu watched her, and the courtyard seemed frozen, waiting for his response.
“We are also grateful to receive you back into our household, Dowager Empress. You are to be commended for having the foresight to protect the heir of the Imperium by fleeing to Krustau instead of recklessly crossing the Imperium, when you could not be sure whether the assassins had also taken my life. Our heir could not be in more protective hands.”
Somehow, Koque managed to lower herself further, the politeness of the gesture making it clear that she was beneath him, that her station was lower than his. Tallu nodded in acknowledgement and Koque straightened, letting her new servants lead her away.
Tallu’s servants took hold of him, and I knew I was about to watch him disappear, be taken from me as efficiently as only a trained imperial servant could manage. No. Not now.
I followed behind him, ignoring my own trailing servants. He was a star in the night sky, leading me home.
I turned, finding my own coterie of servants trailing me like ducklings, trying to get my attention with gentle calls of, “Your Highness?”
From among them, I chose the bath maid and another servant who I knew was gentle and attentive. “This is Irad?o. She is my personal guard. She risked her life to save His Imperial Majesty. Please help her bathe and find her clean clothes.”
The two women hesitated only a second before drawing Irad?o away. My cousin went silently, frowning reproachfully, but I shook my head. The servants might tolerate me in Tallu’s inner sanctum, but a stranger would be left behind.
Turning, I ignored the pleas of the servants to return to my rooms and strode after Tallu, feeling him get farther away with each step. I needed him more than I thought possible.
The hallway looked longer than it had on our first night in the palace, stretching too far ahead. I just barely caught up with him before servants closed the doors of his rooms. When I slid between them, there was a moment of hesitation, and then the servants moved about their tasks.
As they undressed him, plumes of ash and dust floated into the air with each layer they removed. When he was fully naked, three servants led him into the shower room. I started to follow, then hesitated.
I pulled at my clothes, my hands getting gritty, palms even more filthy when I finally struggled out of my coat.
A servant bowed in front of me before I could begin the grimy chore of removing my shirt.
Helplessly, I held out my arms and let him gently loosen the high strips of cloth that acted as a belt to get it free. Then my boots and pants.
With each layer, I felt even more exhausted. Weariness landed on my shoulders heavily, nearly fixing me in place. Only the sound of the water splashing on tiles prompted me to move once I was freed of my clothes.
I followed Tallu into the shower room, the white stone stained gray and black as Tallu leaned back, letting the water rinse the filth out of his hair. He opened his eyes, catching sight of me. His chest expanded in a deep gasp.
Rivulets of water trailed down from his neck to chest, washing away blood and sweat and grime.
A servant used a cloth to rub the granules of sand into his skin, the suds trailing down his muscled chest to his flat stomach, past his cock to his legs.
His thighs jumped and trembled with the effort of standing.
Two servants exchanged a glance, but they might as well have had their own tongues cut out. They said nothing.
I turned my head without looking away from Tallu.
“His Imperial Majesty will need food before his bath,” I said.
I wondered how close he was to passing out. His lips were pale, clenched together, and he turned his face into the spray, his chest laboring with breath.
When his servants were finally satisfied that he was clean, they helped him out of the shower, and I stepped in.
The water felt incredible, pounding down on my skin.
I let it rinse over me at first, washing away as much as it could, opening my eyes to find that the water had caked the ash onto my skin.
One of my servants reached out with a washcloth, hesitantly, and I extended my arm, letting him begin scrubbing at the tips of my fingers and working up my arm, persistent and thorough. I closed my eyes when he came to my face, working under my jaw and up my cheekbones.
It was relaxing, and after the day we had had, I nearly fell asleep with the water pounding on my skin, the warmth loosening the tension that had pulled my back tight. When he finished washing me, the servant murmured that he was going to start on my hair.
There was a moment of hesitation, and then I agreed, closing my eyes and turning my face into the water again. Dexterous fingers loosened my braids, starting at the bottom and gently untangling the plaited hair.
Wet, it fell halfway down my back, and the fingers returned to my scalp, gently massaging, loosening all of the thick grime from our eventful journeys in and out of Krustau.
The touch felt intimate, and I shifted uncomfortably, opening my eyes to see which of the servants dared to touch the emperor’s consort with such familiarity.
Tallu stared back at me, his russet gaze fixed on his work.
“Hold still,” he coaxed.
I turned back to the spray and let him work soap through the strands, combing them with his fingers first, then with a bone brush when the strands were finally clean. The servants stared, and I didn’t need Lerolian to tell me that they were going to be whispering of this throughout the palace.
“There,” Tallu said.
I reached forward, turning off the water and stepping out, dripping on the tile floor. Tallu was wearing a thick robe, his hair damp and skin rosy. A servant rushed forward, drying me first with a towel and then presenting me with my own robe.
I couldn’t look away from Tallu, fixed on his hungry gaze.
“Is His Imperial Majesty’s food ready?” I asked.
“Yes, Your Highness,” one of the servants murmured.
“Shall we eat, my lord?” I asked. “Because the kind of hunger I see in your eyes needs fuel to satisfy.”
Tallu’s lips twisted up, and he nodded. A massive spread of food had been set on one of the tables in his bedroom, and Tallu sat down too heavily on the longest of the couches. I watched him for just a split-second, seeing the weakness that he would never want to show anyone else.
“Get out,” I ordered the servants, hearing myself sound exactly like an imperial.
The room froze, and one of the higher ranked servants, his clothes a darker yellow to indicate his status, cleared his throat. “Your Highness, we are here to serve—”
I turned to him, knowing that my gaze blazed with anger. “Get out. All of you.”