By now Rigg had backed far enough into the room that he was near the opposite corner from where the spy normally sat to watch. Now, however, he could see why the spy was not moving: The hilt of a sword protruded from the wall right where the spy’s heart must be. It had been rammed right through the lath-and-plaster surface. And the path that led to and away from the sword was Mother’s.
“With your own hand,” said Rigg.
She saw where he was looking. “It wouldn’t do for any reports to reach the general public about how things proceeded here today.”
“I thought these spies served General Citizen,” said Rigg.
“The spies served the Council,” said Mother. “General Citizen managed them for the Council. You really didn’t think you could master royal politics in a few short months of wandering around in the library and playing with your sister?”
“You think General Citizen will keep you alive after you bear him an heir?” asked Rigg.
“Don’t be desperate and pathetic, my dear son,” said Mother. “He loves me devotedly, as Flacommo did before him. He’s smarter and stronger than Flacommo, but that’s why it’s worth having him as a consort instead of as a mere tool.”
“And Param and me-we’re nothing?”
“You were everything that mattered in my life,” said Mother, “until the situation changed. My first responsibility is to preserve the royal house and then to rule the kingdom we created-from Wall to Wall, we were meant to rule this world. Could you have done that? You didn’t even want to, with your skepticism about royal privileges. And Param? Weak-if I married her off to someone, she would merely be loyal to her husband and I could never control her. No, neither of you was likely to advance the royal cause. But General Citizen-he is of the highest noble blood. He was weaned on politics. He understands how to get power and how to keep it, and he’s not afraid to take bold and dangerous action. He is everything dear Knosso was not.”
“Do you love anyone?”
“I love everyone,” said Mother. “I love the whole kingdom, but I love none so much that I cannot sacrifice them in order to achieve a higher purpose. That is how a queen must live, my dear. I have come to like you so much-I was so touched by your loyalty, telling me about spies that I’ve known about ever since I lived here. If I could have had the raising of you, you might have amounted to something. But fate-in the form of that monstrous Wandering Man, so called-took you from me. You are who you are, and so you will most certainly die in this room in a few moments.”
Rigg was standing pressed against the corner of the room.
“I plan to weep bitter tears for you, when I’m informed later today that you and your sister were killed. These tears will be politically necessary, but they will also be sincere.”
Rigg nodded. “And I’ll weep for you, too, Mother,” said Rigg. “For what you might have been, if the human heart had not been trained out of you.”
Mother looked at him quizzically. Rigg knew what she was wondering. Why does Rigg think he’s going to be alive to weep for me? And… why haven’t these iron rods yet collided with Param, or persuaded her to return to visibility? “Is she there in that corner with you?” asked Mother.
Rigg nodded and truthfully said, “She’s right here.”
“She’s not-sharing space with you, is she?” asked Mother. “Because if I have these men ram these iron bars into your body, she’ll be forced into visibility and the two of you will make a nasty explosion. Are you thinking that will be your revenge? That the explosion will kill everyone in this room?”
Rigg did not have to pretend to feel wounded. “Don’t you know either of us, Mother? We love you. We would never do something that might hurt you.”
“Stop,” she said to the men. “No, keep moving the bars, you fools, just stop pressing forward.” The men obeyed her. “Rigg, you see there’s no escape. I know you know exactly where she is. Step away from her and allow your deaths to have dignity.”
“In other words, you have a use for our bodies.”
“Of course I do,” said Mother. “But I can make do without them. As I will. I will leave the room now. When the door closes behind me, they will pierce your body-and Param’s. It’s a shame I wasn’t able to say good-bye to her. But… no matter.”
Mother turned and headed for the door.
Rigg smiled at the soldiers. “You know that she’s just given orders for you to do something that will blow you all to bits, don’t you?”
But the soldiers seemed not to care. Rigg looked more closely-their eyes had a bit of a glazed-over look, and he realized now that they had been drugged. They could take brutal action, could follow orders-but could not recognize when those orders would lead directly to their deaths.
The door opened. The soldiers stopped waving the iron bars and prepared to thrust them like lances.
“Now would be a good time,” said Rigg.
He could hear a faint grinding of ancient machinery in the wall behind him. But nothing resulted from it.
We really should have tested the mechanism, thought Rigg. Just because it looks just like four other secret entrances to the passages doesn’t mean it’s in the same condition.
The soldiers leaned back, ready to make their lunges.
There was a metallic clang right behind him, and Rigg ducked. A section of floor, beginning right under his feet and extending along the outside wall, suddenly rose up as the wall behind him tipped back. For a moment the strip of floor and strip of wall made a V that swung from one side to the other. Then it was dark, Rigg was lying on his back, and there were half a dozen thunking sounds as the iron bars were bashed into the wall.
“Sorry,” said Param softly. “One of them was standing on the end of the floor section. The counterbalances couldn’t handle his weight and yours too. But when he shifted his weight to his back foot in order to lunge, then I could pop it up.”
“You heard everything?” asked Rigg.
“Yes,” said Param. But she added nothing, and her voice didn’t even sound upset. Was it possible she had known all along what a moral vacuum Mother was? “I think we need to get out of here before they start throwing axes into all the walls to find the whole system.”
“Oh, most of the walls are stone.”
“But some of them aren’t,” said Rigg.
“They’ll put the soldiers in a line around the house,” said Param.
“At first.”
“And by the time they realize their mistake.”
“That’s the plan, yes,” said Rigg-recognizing his own explanations in the words she now said. “But General Citizen is smarter than most people.”
“I know,” said Param. “So he won’t count on his soldiers to catch you. He’s like Mother-he’ll have a plan that makes us come right to him, whether we want to or not.”
“You might have mentioned this before,” said Rigg.
“You didn’t tell me till now that it was General Citizen.”
By now Rigg was fully used to the near darkness of the corridor, and they had descended to the level of the lowest sewer that passed under the drainage ditch between the house and the library. Rigg’s scan of the house behind and above him revealed that the signal had been given, and there were hundreds of soldiers now surrounding the house and searching-destructively-throughout it. Only a matter of time before the passages were found.
Meanwhile, the soldiers were seen crossing the street and entering Flacommo’s house. Rigg could see the paths of citizens running thither and yon, no doubt spreading word of an assault on the royal family. Though it was early in the morning, the people would pour into the streets and soon a dozen mobs would form. It would only end when General Citizen could show the royals to the city-or declare his kingship. But he could do neither until he had Param and Rigg, alive or dead. He would not find them; he could not catch them; so he must have a plan to make them come to him.
It was not as if he could claim to be holding Mother hostage. Even if he did, were they likely to sacrifice their lives to save her, knowing what they now knew about her? What leverage did he think he had, to make them turn themselves in?
