Sardou recoiled. “Destroy House Aurelian? I have no such goal. I wish to strengthen them where they are weak.”
Kel looked at him in the shadow-shifting darkness. He knew he should stay, pressure Sardou, try to discover more. But he felt a sudden revulsion for all of it—for the Ragpicker King, for Prosper Beck, for the lies he had told Conor, for what he had just done to Antonetta. For having looked inside the locket at all.
Antonetta had worn the locket necklace since she was a child; she could easily have placed the ring inside it years ago and forgotten all about it. But it did not change the fact that he was most likely the last person she would ever want to know it was there. He could not escape the feeling he had violated more than her trust. And then there was Prosper Beck. Why on earth would the crime lord care about the dried-up remnant of a long-gone crush?
But is it long gone? whispered a voice in the back of his head. Did your heart not skip a beat when you saw the ring, hidden away? Does it not mean something to you that she kept it, all these years?
Kel was well practiced at ignoring that small voice, the one that wished him to know more about himself than was practical or wise. He pushed the thought away, concentrating on Sardou.
“I shall remember what you’ve said,” Kel said, carefully, “as the words of a loyal man who wishes to protect his Prince and his King.”
“Indeed.”
Kel took a step back. “But I must go. Conor will be looking for me.”
Sardou’s smile turned brittle. “Of course.”
Kel felt Sardou’s eyes on him as he left the terrace and went back into the mansion, where he found Antonetta in conversation with one of the brightly dressed courtesans. She turned to smile at him as he approached. “Everything all right?” she said.
“Yes, only hold out your hand,” he said, and when she did, he set her locket gently in her palm. “You dropped this,” he said.
“Oh, how lovely!” said the courtesan, leaning in. “What do you keep inside it?”
Kel felt his stomach lurch as Antonetta flicked the locket open. “Why, nothing. It’s a pretty bauble, but I don’t keep anything in it. I just like people to think that I have secrets.”
Lin dreamed again of the tower that night. This time she did not have to wait for Suleman to arrive; he was already there, standing at the tower’s edge, the black and red storm clouds coalescing behind him. When he came toward her, she saw the winking gleam of his Source-Stone in the hilt of the sword belted at his side.
He held out his arms to her, and this time, for the first time, she let him pull her close. Pull her down, so that they were both lying on the rough stone top of the shaking tower. When she drew him on top of her, she felt the relief of it. She had wanted him so much—had loved him, and love did not disappear when hatred bloomed. Rather, her hatred seemed to feed her passion, as if she were watering a monstrous plant with poisonous water.
She tore at the front of her dress, baring her skin to the thundering sky. He kissed her bare breasts and she arched up against him. His mouth was hot on her skin, the only warm thing in a world of distant flame and icy wind. She clutched at him, drawing him closer, closer still, her hand lowering to grip the hilt of his sword. She pulled it free with a single motion, driving it into his back even as her legs wrapped around him. And when he gasped, she did not know if it was pleasure or pain, only that his blood was hot against her as it ran out over her bare skin, burning scarlet as the eye of the storm . . .
After generations, the people of Aram found a peaceful settlement. They began to build, and to raise their children there, until the king of a neighboring land heard that they were users of magic, and came to them at the head of an army, saying, “If you swear fealty to me, and use your magic on my behalf, I will not slay you.”
And the younger of the Ashkar said, “It is worth it, for peace, to do this thing.”
But Judah Makabi remembered their Queen, and he remembered, too, what happened when kings used their people as tools to do magic. And in despair he went away from the settlement, and into a cave in the mountains. And he cried out to his long-gone Queen Adassa, saying: We have always been faithful to you, O Queen, we have always been your people. Do we die in your name or do we give our fealty to another?
It was then that Adassa appeared to Makabi in a vision.
—Book of Makabi
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Sunlight woke Kel, lancing through the window glass and, it felt, directly into his eyeballs. He rolled over, wincing. It seemed that despite his best attempts, he’d managed to down enough alcohol the night before to give himself a hangover.
He sat up, the sheets tangling around his waist. He could guess by the angle of the sunlight that it was about noon. He glanced over at Conor’s bed, but the curtains were drawn tightly. Whatever hangover Kel had, Conor’s was likely twice as bad.
After Antonetta had revealed her empty necklace, Falconet had appeared and spirited Kel away, telling him that he had to accompany Joss to the drawing room where Charlon had stripped off his clothes and was allowing one of the courtesans to paint him gold; the small group that had gathered to watch were taking bets on when Charlon would be rendered unconscious by the paint fumes. Conor had been there, smiling a glittering, hard smile; he had pressed blue wine into Kel’s hand, and Kel recalled little of what had happened after that.
He stared up at the ceiling. Like a tickle in the back of his throat, or a sore tooth, the thought of Antonetta’s locket was a botheration he could not quite ignore, as he could not ignore the pounding in his head. The grass ring inside—why had she kept it, and kept it so close to her? Was it a sign that she had missed their friendship as much as he had? A fond memory of a long-gone time? Had she placed the ring there years ago and forgotten it was there?
Or was it something else? He thought again of what Lin had said. Antonetta fancies you. And then, Antonetta does not know me. Not me as I really am.
And then there was the matter of Prosper Beck.
Why had Beck sent him to retrieve—at some risk—a locket that contained nothing inside it save a dried-out loop of grass? Did Beck even know about the ring’s false bottom, or had the whole business been some sort of test? Had someone else already gotten to the contents? But Antonetta had clearly expected the locket to be empty. Had she removed the contents herself? If there was one thing he had learned during these past strange weeks, it was not to underestimate Antonetta as she seemed to wish to be underestimated.
He swung himself out of bed; there was, after all, only one person who could unknot this knot. And he could explain any absence from Marivent as the need to take a walk and clear his head. Perhaps he would stop at the kitchens and ask Dom Valon for a serving of his hangover cure before he headed down into Castellane. Maybe ask for an extra helping of white vinegar. After last night, Kel felt as if he needed to be cleansed, inside and out.
Kel was just stepping into a pair of linen trousers when there was a rustle from behind the heavy velvet drapes that shielded Conor’s bed. A pale hand parted the curtains, and a distinctly feminine leg followed.
So there was a girl in Conor’s bed. It was hardly the first time. Kel cast about for a shirt while a slim, white-clad form slipped between the curtains, closing them carefully behind it. She exhaled and shook her head, sending a fountain of dark-red hair tumbling over her shoulders, and for a moment, Kel’s heart stopped.