her shoulder to the near wall, watching the men. There were ten guards in all and four lingered by the door, their attention on the empire mother as she walked down the hall, her black hair swinging against her shoulders.
They would never let her wait here. By the time Nessaket returned, they would have discovered her and dragged her down to Gorgen. She darted forward and slipped behind their backs into the empire mother’s room. Once there she took her place in the shadows between two wardrobes, far from the single lantern that cast a soft light around the mirror.
Madness. She would be killed for this.
No sooner had she pressed her shoulders against the wall than a guard entered the room, walked to a gilded cradle that had been set beneath the window and looked down. “Sleepy tonight,” he said aloud.
“He loves to sleep.” Rushes jumped at the sound of a woman’s voice. She had not seen her when she ran in. She leaned out and looked at her: small, with short dark hair, probably a nursemaid. When the guard turned she snapped back into the darkness, hoping he would not see her bright hair. He passed by without looking.
The woman sang a song to the babe, about ships fighting on the ocean and a child who floated away. Rushes listened, caught by the fate of the child on the waves, but also by the spray of salt water, the snap of the sails, and the clash of swords on a rocking boat. When the song was finished she remained with her eyes closed for a time, relishing the images, forgetting that she had sneaked into the empire mother’s room. But soon she remembered how foolish she had been Perhaps the nursemaid would take pity on her, help her to get back to the Ways. She in turn could warn the nursemaid about the snake. No-one need to know she was here, dirtying the silk rugs. She thought a moment before nodding to herself. It was the best plan. The tiny woman, a servant herself, might understand.
She crept out, skirting the lantern, keeping to the shadow. As she neared she realised the nursemaid was sleeping, chin against her chest, one arm extended over the prince. Rushes paused, wondering whether to wake her. She might cry out, and then the guards would come.
Movement drew her eye to the window-screen, a shimmer of brown-onbrown, a curve where there should not have been one. A snake slithered through the holes in the wood; it must have come through from the balcony. Its head extended over the cradle where Prince Daveed lay sleeping, his chubby arms extended to either side.
She knew snakes; she knew them from the long grass and the summer heat of childhood days. She remembered her father sticking a long branch beneath a boulder and lifting a snake from its middle. “Keep your distance,” he had told her, his indigo eyes intent on the danger, “Use as long a stick as you can find.” Then he took it away from their little hut, where it could not cause them any harm.
Rushes looked around the room. The only thing that resembled a long stick was the fireplace poker. The silk-clad all had fireplaces, though she had never seen one used. She lifted it and tested the heavy iron. She could not hold it extended for very long, so she would hold it and wait for the right moment. She crept back to the cradle and watched the snake’s slow movements. It was only one third of the way through. It had not seen her, or did not think her a danger; she remembered one threatening her father, the way its scales seemed to shiver, the angry position of its mouth. This one was relaxed. She waited. Prince Daveed moved his head, just a little, and she tensed her fingers around the iron. She tried not to think what would happen if the nursemaid should wake up and scream, or if Nessaket returned and began to shout. If only I had that luck-stone.
At last the snake bobbed its head and slithered down to the edge of the gilded cradle, but half of it remained wound through the window-screen. She prayed to Mirra it would come all the way through before anyone moved and frightened it. She extended the poker, slowly, beneath the snake’s middle, feeling the ache in her arm muscles, afraid of dropping it and waking the baby.
With a quick movement the snake dropped and just as quickly Rushes lifted the iron poker. I will be bitten. It will slide off and escape. She ran to the balcony, threw the poker and shut the door. She heard a dull thud as it hit the wooden screen and then a clatter as it fell upon the tiles. Without pausing to judge whether anyone had heard she hurried to the screen and fastened the shutters. She backed away and leaned against the fireplace, counting her breaths until they slowed.
“Very good, Red-rose.” The emperor stood behind her, his white robes glowing in the light from the single lantern. She stifled a yelp of surprise and forced her feet to stillness; she would not run, though every part of her wanted to do so. She shivered, recalling his touch. He knew everything — about her brother, Beyon, Gorgen-all of it. He had gleaned it all from her eyes that night. It made her feel sick, butterflies crawling along her skin.
In her fright she forgot her obeisance, but he did not notice, jerking his head towards the balcony. “I will kill it,” he said, drawing a dagger from his belt, a twisted one, and ugly. He opened the doors, stepped out and disappeared into the night. She heard a scrape of metal on stone and he returned, grinning in a cold way, like the Fryth priest. “It is dead.”
At last the nursemaid woke, looking around the room in confusion as she blinked the sleep from her eyes. The emperor leaned over her and gave her a kiss, but even in that affectionate motion Rushes detected an air of scorn. “Little Mother. You may leave.” She gave Rushes a curious look before bustling from the room.
“I think we can do without her guarding skills,” he said, to nobody in particular, looking down at his brother Daveed. “Look at this one. He is not so strong. Pelar will be the strongest.” He lowered his voice. “Pelar is my son.”
“Yes, Majesty.” Rushes wondered why he shared it so intimately, like a secret. Everyone knew Pelar was Sarmin’s son and heir. She wondered how he had killed the snake so easily-Emperor Sarmin, who had lived most of his life in one small room with neither snakes nor any other animal.
“I killed that filthy kitchen boy,” he continued, the grin returning to his face, “I found him in the pantry and I snapped his neck.”
Cold claws held Rushes’ heart. “Gorgen is dead?” She thought of Gorgen, standing by the fire, talking, taking off his belt to give her a whipping. He had been terrible and fearsome, but always alive, with thoughts and fears and wishes of his own.
Rushes remembered the overfull rice sack, the kick she’d given. She went over it in her mind: the acrobat’s memories, the feeling in her legs, the run for the dungeon, and then the emperor’s fierce look in the lantern light, the set of his shoulders when he left her. “Your Magnificence!” Her knees failed her, and once kneeling, she fell into her obeisance at last. Turning her face to the floor allowed her to hide the horror that must be written there.
“I said that I would protect you. I kept my word. Not like my brother.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” But it had been Emperor Beyon who promised to protect her. She swallowed. She had imagined something, built on the ghost of a memory, but it was preposterous. Impossible.
He took her right arm and lifted her out of her obeisance. Emperor Sarmin was thin and wasted, but he loomed over her with shoulders as wide as his brother Beyon’s. Rushes clenched her teeth against a scream as he reached into her robes, but it was a smooth-edged stone, the luck-stone, he pressed into her hand. “He wants this,” said the emperor, “and I can’t let him have it. Throw it into the deepest part of the Ways where he will never find it.”
Who? Again she thought of the Mogyrk priest and his cold smile. “Yes, Your Magnificence.” Her shaking hands wanted to keep it, to keep holding it. She put it into her pocket and it felt heavy, a reassuring weight at her side.
“I have kept my promise to you. Will you keep your promise to me, Redrose?” His dark eyes threatened. She remembered that look.
“Yes, Magnificence. I promise.” But in truth she was not sure; oddly, with Gorgen dead and the emperor as he was, the palace felt more dangerous, not less. She curled her fingers around the stone. It made her feel safe.
He touched a hand to his forehead as if it hurt. “One moment-I will return.” At the door he said something to the guards, who looked in and saw her at last. Their expressions changed from dismay to surprise when the emperor commanded they allow her to stay.
Rushes watched Prince Daveed sleep and turned the stone in her pocket. It grew warm against her skin. The emperor did not return, nor did the empire mother. Eventually someone would send her back to the Little Kitchen. Would they ask her about Gorgen? She could not tell anyone who had killed him, nor would anyone believe that Emperor Beyon lived on in his brother’s body. She had not been believed herself until he reminded her of his promise, though she had recognized him in the dungeon. Emperor Sarmin did not know her real name-Red-rose-nor had he ever promised to protect her.
But he had changed. When he spoke with her she saw his anger and his determination, even to keep his
