man with smoke.
“Who is that?” Qinnitan whispered under cover of the priests’ noise.
Chryssa was clearly shocked that she should dare to whisper, even when it was more or less safe to do so under the cover of the priests’ voices. “The autarch, you fool girl!”
It certainly made more sense that the tall one was their ruler—he had an undeniable power to him. “But then who is that… who is the man in the litter?”
“The scotarch, of course—his heir. Now be silent.”
Qinnitan felt stupid. Her father had once told her that the scotarch, the autarch’s ceremonial heir, was sickly, but she had entirely forgotten, and had certainly never guessed him to be so obviously afflicted. Still, considering that the autarch’s own life and rule hinged on the health and continued well-being of the scotarch, by ancient Xixian tradition, Qinnitan couldn’t help wondering at the autarch’s choice of such a frail reed.
It didn’t matter, she reminded herself. These folk were as much above her—all the doings of the high house were as far above her—as the stars in the sky.
“Where is the mistress of this temple?” The autarch’s voice was high-pitched but strong; it rang in the great room like a silvery bell.
Eminence Rugan came forward, head bowed, her usual brisk walk transformed almost into the slinking of a frightened beast. That, more than the soldiers or priests or anything else, made Qinnitan understand that she was in the presence of matchless, terrifying power: Rugan bowed to no one else that Qinnitan had ever seen. “Your glory reflects on us all, O Master of the Great Tent,” Rugan said, voice quavering a little. “The Hive welcomes you and the bees are gladsome in your presence. Mother Mudry is coming to offer you any wisdom the Sacred Bees of Nushash can grant. She begs your generous indulgence, Golden One. She is too old to wait here in the drafty outer temple without great discomfort.”
The look that crossed the autarch’s corvine features was almost a smirk. “She does me too much honor, does old Mudry. You see, I haven’t come to consult the oracle. I want nothing from the bees.”
Even cowed by the presence of a hundred armed soldiers, many Sisters of the Hive couldn’t restrain a gasp of surprise—some of the noises even sounded suspiciously like disapproval. Come to the temple and not consult the sacred bees?
“I’m… I’m afraid I don’t understand, O Golden One.” Clearly confused, Eminence Rugan took a step back, then sank to one knee. “The high priest’s messenger said you wished to come to the Hive because you were searching for something…”
The autarch actually laughed. It had a strange edge to it, something that made Qinnitan’s flesh prickle on her arms. The curtain of the scotarch’s litter twitched as though the sick young man was peering out. “Yes, he did,” the autarch said. “And I am. Come, Panhyssir, where are you?”
A bulky shape in dark robes with a long, narrow beard like a gray waterfall trundled out from behind the Leopard guards—Panhyssir, the high priest of Nushash, Qinnitan guessed, and thus another of the most powerful people in the entire continent of Xand. He looked as fat and unconcerned with trivial human things as one of the drones in the sacred hives. “Yes, Golden One?”
“You said that this was the place I would find the bride I sought.”
Panhyssir didn’t look anywhere near as worried as the Hive priestesses; he had already overseen the collection of hundreds of brides for the autarch, so perhaps this seemed a bit routine. “She is definitely here, Golden One. We know that.”
“Ah, is she, now? Then I will find her myself.” The autarch took a few steps, his eyes sweeping along the rows of kneeling, terrified Hive Sisters. Qinnitan had no better an idea of what was going on than any of her comrades, but she saw the autarch and his Leopards moving across the temple toward them and so she turned her face toward the floor and tried to stay as still as the paving stones.
“This is the one,” said the autarch from somewhere nearby.
“Yes, that is the bride, Golden One,” said Panhyssir. “The Master of the Great Tent cannot be fooled.” “Good. She will be brought to me this evening, along with her parents.”
It was only when the guards’ rough hands closed on her arms and lifted her to her feet that Qinnitan realized that this astounding, unbelievable thing had happened to no one but her.
8. The Hiding Place
MEADOW AND SKY:
Dew rises, rainfalls
Between them is mist
Between them lies all that is
It had been the longest hour of his life. The young woman he admired beyond any other, without a hope of his affection ever being returned, had just spat on him and blamed him for her brother’s murder, and he was not at all certain she was wrong. Bleeding runnels showed where she had gouged his cheeks with her nails; the wounds burned, stinging with tears and sweat, both his own. But worst of all, his failure, the failure of every man sworn to protect the royal family, pressed on him like the walls of a lead coffin. King Olin had been gone for months, held prisoner in a far country. Now his son and heir was dead, butchered in his own bedchamber in the middle of Southmarch Castle.
If the world was indeed ending, thought Ferras Vansen, captain of the royal guard, then he hoped the end would come quickly. At least it would mean an end to this most horrible of nights.
Hierarch Sisel, shocked wide-eyed and murmuring to himself, had hurried from his guest chambers in the Tower of Summer, and was now struggling to remember the words to the death rite—he had not been an ordinary priest for a long time—as he leaned over Prince Kendrick’s bloodied corpse. The dead prince had been lifted onto the bed and unfolded from his death spasm; he lay now with eyes closed and arms at his sides in a semblance of peaceful rest. A cloth stitched with gold had been draped over his wounded body so that only the naked shoulders and face were showing, but scarlet flowers of blood were already beginning to bloom through the covering. Chaven the physician, as pale-faced and disturbed as Vansen had ever seen him, waited to examine the murdered prince before the royal body was taken by the Maids of Kernios to be prepared for the funeral.
Wordless as survivors of a terrible battle, the twins had not left their dead brother’s side. Blood had dried on their nightclothes—Briony in particular was so red-painted that a newcomer would be forgiven in mistaking her for the prince’s killer. She kneeled weeping on the floor by the bed, her head resting on Kendrick’s arm.
Lord Constable Avin Brone, huge and deep-voiced and as much a part of the Eddon family as anyone not of the blood could be, was perhaps the only one who could even think of trying to move the princess from her dead brother’s side. “There are things to do, my lady,” he rumbled. “It is not meet that he should lie here untended. Come away and let the physician and the death-maids do their work.”
“I’m not leaving him.” She would not even glance at Brone.
“Talk sense to her,” the lord constable growled at her pale twin brother. Barrick looked half his years, a frightened child, his hair still tousled from bed. “Help me, Highness,” Brone asked him more gently. “We will never find what happened here, never discover the cruel hand that did this if we cannot… if we must work with a mourning family watching us.”
“The dark man… !” Briony lifted her head, a sudden feverish light in her eyes. “My maid woke dreaming of a dark man. Where is that villain Dawet? Did he do this? Did he kill… my… my… ?” Her mouth curled, lost shape, then she was weeping again, a raw, heartbreaking sound. She pressed her head against Kendrick’s side.
“My lady, you must come,” Brone told her, tugging his beard in anxious frustration. “You will have a chance for a proper farewell to the prince, I promise you.”
“He’s not a prince—he’s my brother!” “He was both, Highness.”
