Chapter 31 #2
“Did the doctor not tell you?” When my expression grew only more baffled, the steward sighed, never one to conceal his opinions about the shortcomings of foreigners.
“Her Resplendency is holding a ceremony to celebrate Dalila’s initiation into the Khatti Ugalan faith tonight.
It is apparently important that you attend. ”
“Dalila . . . is being initiated into your faith?” I asked, struggling to conceal my shock.
I would’ve more readily believed Dalila was becoming Raksh’s second wife.
My friend was more Christian than half the priests I’d met, the only part of her identity she clasped more closely than being the Mistress of Poisons.
And being “initiated” . . . surely that didn’t mean she’d be accepting rites, the ritual that seemingly ended in death and soul slavery while wrapped in a resplendent cloak?
“Yes,” Mitanni said shortly. “Please do as the handmaids ask. Tonight is very important for Her Resplendency and the doctor. If you are truly a friend to her, you will be supportive.” He wrinkled his nose. “Might I suggest abstaining from the wine?”
If one more person accused me of drinking, I was going to smash another of their precious bottles. “Understood. May my husband join me?”
“No.” The steward’s reply was firm. “It was the doctor’s express wish.”
That sounded like Dalila even if the rest of this farce didn’t. But she’d warned me not to disrupt her plans and if a fancy ceremony kept the queen distracted for one more night, all the better.
I bowed my head. “I would be honored to attend.”
* * *
It was not particularly pleasant to do as the handmaids suggested.
For one, they didn’t speak, instead silently and somewhat forcefully dressing me in the first set of tailored garments I’d laid eyes on since arriving in Khatti Ugal.
The clothes were a near perfect mirror of the outfit in which I’d been shipwrecked: a knee-length dress, embroidered pants, and outer robe—but in wondrously soft undyed wool, the same shade as human bone.
A matching scarf had been laid out for my hair along with jewelry: bangles of creamy carved conch shell, a long length of pearls, and silver earrings shaped like bells and encrusted with moonstones.
My skin crawled as I’d swear the neckline of the dress briefly tightened around my throat.
When I first arrived, I might have seen the thoughtful garments and lovely adornments as a gift.
But now I saw a trap. A game whose rules and strategy I did not yet know.
It reminded me of the Lab who’d sent me to battle griffins for her amusement.
I’d be a pale shadow of a nakhudha, one loyal only to the queen, serving over her similarly hued ghosts of sailors.
One of the handmaids reached for a tray of cosmetics and my agreeability ended. If the clothes came from the wool of humans turned into livestock, God only knew where the eye paint did.
“I would rather not,” I said, holding up a hand as she dipped a thin copper brush into an alabaster dish of pigment.
Whether or not she understood me, I had no idea.
Instead, the other woman simply stared, unblinking.
Her eyes were gray, so pale they appeared clouded over, and her cloak was old, a faded rose with visible holes, that tightly wrapped her body, knotted in a dozen different locations.
Suspecting what these cloaks signified now, it was impossible not to see it as a shackle.
I wonder if this is the fate that awaits those who would rather stay dead?
It was impossible not to see a far bleaker story in the multitudes of obedient servants that filled the palace: from the laborers who tended the textile workshop and its living tapestry to the servers who filled cups.
Lab said she’d been here for centuries—had some of these poor castaways been made to serve her that entire time, not allowed even the release of death?
I couldn’t imagine the horror of being stranded here for the rest of one’s life, only to learn you’d be denied seeing your family again in Paradise.
“Can you speak?” I asked the handmaid softly. “Can I help?”
There was no reaction from the other woman.
Instead, as though an unspoken command was passed between the two servants, she relented, setting aside the cosmetic case and straightening up.
The other reached for the last of the painted boxes they had brought in, removing an ivory waist sash at the same moment I reached for my more familiar weapons belt.
I scowled, but her frown grew more pronounced, such an eerie mirror of Queen Lab’s that it was hard not to shudder.
“Fine,” I muttered, relenting as the gray-eyed handmaid tied the sash in place. But then—and with obvious intent—she herself picked up my weapons belt. Removed the meteor blade and leopard-headed khanjar.
I stilled, watching her carefully. Was this curiosity? A mild assassination attempt? But I stayed put as she slipped the weapons into a fold of the waist sash, nearer to my back where they couldn’t be as easily spotted. She pulled the robe close, hiding them completely, and then stepped back.
That was a response even if she couldn’t speak.
“Thank you,” I whispered and for a moment, there seemed a glimmer of tears in her cloudy eyes, before it was almost immediately replaced by a rictus smile so forced and false it made me sick.
Maybe I should go set that tapestry ablaze, I thought as I followed my escorts.
What had started as a ploy to weaken the queen so that I could escape with my crew was starting to feel like more, like I’d cracked a foundation I didn’t realize was so rotted.
When Arno had told me of the fear sweeping over the city, I’d felt guilty.
I hadn’t intended to cause his people harm when launching my harebrained scheme.
But if thousands of souls truly were enslaved here . . .
You shall what? Kill yourself and your people in some sort of revolution? Had I not been the one to criticize Dalila for forgetting we came here on a con? Setting aside my disquiet as best I could, I continued walking.
Dalila’s ceremony was in a part of the palace I had never been to: what appeared to be an outdoor temple beneath the stars.
Rows of carved marble columns stretched as tall as a minaret, holding up a roof so distant that it melted into the sky.
Enormous braziers of blazing aromatic woods filled the vast space with a heady smoke that threatened to send me swooning, the madly dancing flames making it seem as though a hungry wildfire threatened to devour the dreamy attendees.
No sooner had I arrived than I felt vastly out of place.
The audience was neither intimate nor grand, perhaps a hundred or so souls, but they were drawn from the queen’s most devoted: her cupbearers and boon companions, devoted ministers and personal guards.
Accordingly, all wore dyed cloaks, among the most brightly colored and intricately patterned that I had seen in the kingdom.
Garbed entirely in ivory, I stood out like the outsider I was, the foreigner, the weapons-toting barbarian.
And maybe one of the only people alive. It was difficult not to shudder as I stared at those beautiful cloaks, not to shy back when I accidentally brushed one.
Surely not everyone here was dead, I tried to tell myself, watching as the attendees laughed and drank, swayed to the music and gossiped with their neighbors, jewels glittering from their hair and fingers.
Soon I reached the queen and her guest of honor.
From upon a wooden dais draped in flowers, Queen Lab sat, almost casually, surrounded by the laughing retainers I had met when she feasted my crew.
Her Resplendency was just that: stunning in a fiery gold-and-saffron gown embroidered with glittering citrine and quartz ornaments.
A royal purple sash draped her shoulders, trailing down her body like a carved statue of a forgotten goddess.
At her side, Dalila was dressed in white as was I, but the sleeveless tunic suited her, her hair styled in local fashion.
She looks like she belongs here. She looks .
. . happy. And perhaps it was an act, but damned if the Mistress of Poisons wasn’t the picture of elegance, of sophistication.
She wasn’t the Mistress of Poisons at all, she was a doctor.
A respected court physician enjoying the evening with equally honorable and lofty fellows.
Nothing like the brutish, “drunken” pirate approaching.
“Captain al-Sirafi!” Lab greeted merrily upon spotting me. She held out a hand rich in golden rings. “Come, join us.”
Dalila had been smiling before the queen called out to me, but her grin faded as I drew nearer. I bowed to the queen, trying very hard not to compare all the stares around me to daggers.
“Resplendency,” I said, with all the warm subservience I could gather for a woman I badly wanted to stab with a broken spindle. “Thank you for inviting me.”
“But of course.” She gestured to a stool. “The doctor was reluctant, but I suggested that your engaging deeper with local customs might set your soul at ease.” She leaned back, lifting a cup of wine to her painted lips. “Perhaps one day it shall be you in Dalila’s place.”
If I had my way, not even Dalila would be in her place, but I forced a smile.
“If God wills it.” I glanced around, looking for some clue of what was to occur.
An altar or distinctively garbed priests, but there was nothing.
Small groups of attendees were gathered around low tables and lounged on plush couches, eating and drinking and carousing in a manner that seemed more surreal than raucous.
In one corner, a trio of musicians played a calming song on a lute, a harp, and a simple skin drum.
It felt more like a dinner party than a religious ceremony.
“Looking for something, Captain?” the queen inquired.