Chapter 19
So if the treasury is here . . .” I murmured, setting down a torn piece of bread upon the map of the palace grounds I was creating with the remnants of my dinner. “That would seem to put the textile workshop there?”
No one responded. I was alone in our vast suite of rooms as I was on most evenings now, Dalila staying late among the court physicians.
It was a bit lonely and rather eerie, but I found that I didn’t mind.
I’m not accustomed to solitude; if I am not on a bustling ship of sailors, I am in a bustling house of relatives.
But this was peaceful and gave me time to work.
Orinth’s words about the temple, a sacred workshop where textiles were crafted, had set my blood afire. I was determined to find this place.
Movement caught my eye, and I raised a hand, ready to “accidentally” knock a goblet over my map. But it was only Dalila, finally returned. Her cheeks were flushed and her hair mussed, as though she’d been running.
“Is everything all right?” I asked, alarmed.
“Better than all right.” She grinned, the excitement radiating off her out of character and concerning in itself—the last time I’d seen Dalila so openly triumphant, she’d learned how to make a fire explosion with her black powder.
She slowed as she caught sight of the table.
“What in God’s name are you doing with your food? ”
“It’s a map of the palace grounds,” I answered, returning my attention to my work. “I have a lead, Dalila. A good one.”
“A lead to what?”
I glanced up in disbelief. “A lead to the spindle. You remember, the Transgression that brought us here?”
Dalila rolled her eyes. “Oh, never mind that now.” She withdrew a stoppered vial from a sash at her waist, cradling it in her hands as though it were a jewel. “I have made you something. A tonic both new and promising.”
Never mind that now? I was about to repeat those very words when Dalila opened the vial and all thoughts vanished. The tonic was the color of rot and smelled even worse. Giving it a careful sniff, I gagged. “Merciful One.”
“I’d advise against smelling it,” she cautioned too late. “But we should get you into bed. I’ve added a knockout potion to help you sleep.”
I stared at her. “And if I do not wish to be knocked out? I was feeling better today.”
“And yet your color is still off, your eyes are yellowed, and you had a hallucination this morning in front of the queen—No, do not deny it,” Dalila warned when I opened my mouth to protest. “I was there. And trust that Lab didn’t buy your ‘sun is in my eyes’ excuse either.”
On that last point, I couldn’t argue. Lab’s entire demeanor had changed after my slip this morning and not for the better. “They are not hallucinations,” I claimed instead. “They are visions.”
“Sure, they are,” Dalila replied, not bothering to mask the disbelief in her voice. “Take the tonic, Amina. Think of it as enabling you to brawl better should our situation come to that.”
By God, maybe Dalila would have made a good doctor, ordering everyone around. “Can it wait until I’m finished?”
“With your map of bread?”
“With my map to a temple workshop where apparently all of Khatti Ugal’s textiles are crafted.
I learned much from Orinth today. No one spins or weaves their own garments here.
Everything is made in the palace and they are considered sacred gifts.
” Not missing the flicker of interest in Dalila’s expression, I continued. “Don’t pretend that isn’t suspicious.”
She paused but conceded. “It’s strange, yes. Do you think they’re using the spindle to spin wool rather than fates?”
“We won’t know unless we find this workshop. So help me and it will go faster. You’ve seen more of the palace, no?”
Dalila sighed but sat down, studying my construction. “I’ve not seen much beyond the healing gardens, apothecary, and a few banquet rooms. And the queen’s chamber, I suppose. But that was only briefly.”
My brows shot up. “You attended the queen’s chamber and did not tell me?”
“It was merely in passing and there was nothing to report.”
I still found it odd, but there was a defensiveness in Dalila’s voice I didn’t wish to prod, not when we were getting along. “Add it. Along with anything else you recall.”
We worked for a bit longer, the food-based map taking shape as I filled her in on the rest of my time in the Chamber of Mysteries. Dalila had always been the true talent when it came to casing, and even half-hearted, her contribution was good.
Finally, she paused, chewing her lip. “I wonder if the workshop might be here,” she suggested, pointing to the garden through which the queen and I had strolled on our first day.
“I don’t recall seeing any structures save the old shrine,” I replied. “Lab said it was the ruins of the first building her ancestors erected.”
“That would seem to indicate some sort of symbolic importance,” Dalila pointed out. “Perhaps the workshop was built below it. Or maybe you missed something?”
“Perhaps,” I admitted. “The weather was poor, and getting hit in the head by a ship the night before didn’t leave me at my sharpest. But it gives us a place to search.”
“A shame a spindle is so small,” Dalila remarked. “Even if we find this workshop, the spindle itself could be hidden very easily. If the queen knows of its worth, it could be in her bedchamber, upon her body—”
I yawned. “Maybe we should have brought Raksh. He could have seduced her.”
Dalila made a face. “I don’t see her falling for him. Also . . . recall how you promised not to overly scheme until you were recovered? Even now I can see you struggling to stay awake.”
I scowled, but it was hard to refute her words. I despised this weariness I couldn’t shake; the unreliability of my eyes, my very mind. “I wish I could walk this entire palace undetected. Perhaps the spindle would resonate in the Unseen Realm.”
“Has anything here?”
The entire kingdom. But that was both true and false, the beginning of a fable. Khatti Ugal’s dreamy unreality was but a vague shadow of the pulsing, overwhelming energy of the Unseen Realm.
“In a different way. I don’t know; when I have these visions . . . they feel real, truer than anything else around me,” I said, realizing it as I spoke. “But this is all so far beyond my comprehension.”
“Well, we’re not figuring it out tonight and as I have assisted you, it’s time to take my tonic. Come,” Dalila said, pulling me to my feet.
“It’s not from that lethal flower you were eager to fondle, is it? Griffin’s whatever?” Standing up made the headache worse, my strength sapped as I let her lead me to my bed.
“Griffin’s claw. And no, not yet. I want to experiment a bit more with it.”
I shuddered. “You’re going to be the death of me.”
Dalila’s grip tightened. “Don’t say such a thing,” she lectured. “But you do need to sleep when you’re ill. You are not a youth anymore to be traipsing about so.”
“I’ve been blessed with supernatural strength,” I muttered, collapsing into my pillows. “Haven’t you heard?”
“It seems to be lapsing.” She handed me the tonic.
I took a sip and gagged. Whatever she had brewed was gray and thick, with frothy bubbles floating on the top that somehow tasted even worse than they smelled. “What is this?”
“Complicated. But drink it. All of it,” Dalila commanded when a second sip left me dry heaving. She loomed over me until I had finished the disgusting concoction, like a disapproving mother.
“Water,” I gasped, drinking down an entire cup to wash the taste from my mouth.
Then I lay back down, kicking off the embroidered coverlet.
I found myself constantly both feverish and freezing in Khatti Ugal, its climate driving my humors mad.
Or perhaps menopause beckoned, a prospect that made me even more exhausted. “I cannot get comfortable here.”
There was a cool press against my clammy brow, or at least I thought there was. But it was gone the next moment and Dalila was never one for reassuring gestures. Even so, she seemed to hesitate, like there was something she wanted to say and couldn’t. Or maybe I was just losing my mind.
“Sleep, my friend. I shall check on you later,” she promised. And then said something else more quietly, but I was already drifting off.
* * *
If Dalila checked on me during the night, I had no memory of it, but the next morning, there was a fresh pitcher of water and more of the foul gray paste.
I forced it down, gagging, and then drew to my feet.
I felt lighter, the room quieter, and it took me a few moments to realize it was from the absence of pain.
The pounding in my head, the inflammation in my joints .
. . It had all been so relentless since I had awakened on this island that its lifting made the entire world seem different.
By God, maybe Dalila should train as a physician.
And maybe you should tell her that. A not small amount of guilt snarled me.
In retrospect, I’d been too dismissive of Dalila’s donning a medical mantle, fearful that feigning so would blow our cover.
Instead, the role was ingratiating her with the queen and healing me to boot.
She was throwing herself into it with a bit too much fervor, yes—to the point she seemed to occasionally forget the actual quest that brought us to Khatti Ugal—but maybe after her tangle with Sheikh Sasan, Dalila needed a win.
Stretching my limbs, I dressed and prayed.
But there was no sign of either Dalila or my usual escort; maybe Dalila had told them I needed to rest. And perhaps I should have done just that.
But impatience seized me. I’d not yet found the chance to slip away and explore the palace alone and this might be my best opportunity.
But where to start?