14

I was on my feet before Mother got into the room. Blocking the slap would have been easy, but I braced myself and took it. The impact stung, snapping my head to the side.

“Disrupting a sacred ceremony with bloodshed. What the hell were you thinking?”

“I’m fine, Mother.” I rubbed at my cheek. “Thanks for asking, and if you don’t mind me pointing it out I wasn’t the one disrupting anything. Someone tried to kill me. Typical luck for this family lately.” I mentally winced at my snide tone.

“You shot a man, Haili!”

“He was trying to kill me.” My grip on my temper slipped precariously at the condemnation in my mother’s voice. There was no sympathy, no concern. Dementia or no, you’d think she’d be a little worried about me.

Get a grip, Hail. She doesn’t get to pick and choose when she’s lucid.

“The media—” Mother sputtered, waving a hand in the air. “Hailimi, you were caught on camera murdering a man!”

Even Bial winced at that one and surprisingly defended me. “Your Majesty. The princess did not murder—”

“Fine, killed. Whatever,” Mother snapped at him. “We don’t need the reminder that our daughter was a criminal. Which is exactly how those jackals will use this.”

“I’m sorry, was I supposed to let him kill me?” The second slap wasn’t even as hard as the first, but I thought I showed admirable restraint by not hitting her back. I was, however, at the end of my patience. “Mother, I’d suggest not hitting me again.”

“Don’t threaten me, child.” The command and the imperial set of her spine were ruined by the fact that she took an immediate half step away from me.

“It’s not a threat,” I said, keeping my voice even through sheer force of will.

Bial’s hand twitched toward his gun and the tension in the room ratcheted up several notches.

“I told your father we should have hit you more. Shouldn’t have let you play with those hooligans. It’s distressing I have no proper daughters left. I should have formally adopted Ganda as was suggested.”

Now Mother was rambling, starting a slide away from coherence that was becoming familiar, but I raised an eyebrow at the last bit. If we’d been alone, I would have pushed her a little about just who’d suggested she adopt my cousin, but I wasn’t about to grill my mother in front of everyone.

“It’s a little too late for that. I supposed you could join forces with whoever is trying to wipe out our family. Though they’re three and zero with me, I’m not sure I’d put money down on them just yet.”

Bugger me, Hail. Could you stop sounding like a petulant child every time you speak to your mother?

Mother didn’t notice my grimace. She grabbed me by the shoulders and jerked me close. “I am betrayed by those closest to me, my little terror. I’m sorry. You are the only one left,” she whispered.

This wasn’t dementia ravings. The haze of sickness had lifted from her eyes, replaced with a determined desperation blazing within. For a moment I saw the mother I’d worshiped, the one from my childhood who could do no wrong.

Just as quickly, the mother I remembered was gone, replaced by the cold empress I hated. She shoved me away, turning her back on me as if nothing had happened.

Emmory caught me before I tripped over the couch in my shock, his hands squeezing my upper arms lightly before he let me go.

“You have BodyGuards for a reason, Hailimi.” Mother sniffed, gathered up her gray skirts, and marched out of the room without another word.

“Highness, I am sorry.” Bial murmured the genuine apology to me and followed her from the room.

“At least she seems to have forgotten that I wasn’t supposed to leave my rooms.” I rubbed at my face, trying to decide which problem to tackle first. I didn’t want to talk about what had just happened. There were too many ears around, even with Emmory’s surveillance-blocking abilities. “Did they really catch me on camera?”

“I’m afraid so, Highness.”

“Is the response bad?” I bit my lip as I turned to the window. The last thing I needed was bad press. Not that it was worth trading my life to avoid, but Mother was right about one thing in that we couldn’t afford any more bad press for the throne right now.

“Actually most of the major networks are being very sympathetic about it. The spin at the moment is of the ‘thank the gods she’s okay’ variety. The fact that you still lit the flame helped with that,” Zin replied. “We’ll see if that holds.”

“I didn’t do it for the brownie points,” I muttered, swiping both hands over my face.

“Highness.”

The sympathy in Zin’s voice threatened my already tenuous grip on my emotions. “Don’t.” My voice was too sharp, cutting through the air like a laser-blade. “Sorry. I’m sorry. Just give me a minute, okay?”

I turned toward the windows and gripped the sill so hard it was a miracle the wood didn’t splinter. Snap out of it, Hail. You can’t fall apart now. Killing someone wasn’t easy and I saw the man’s sightless eyes when I closed my own.

Zin gave me space. Emmory, unsurprisingly, didn’t. He’d taken me seriously when I said I wanted honesty.

“Let it go, Highness. You were protecting yourself. It’s obvious the empress isn’t herself.”

“I think you’d be surprised how close that was to the arguments we had before I left,” I said. My reflection smiled wryly back at me. “She hit me less then, but that’s about the only difference.”

“With respect, Highness, she might treat you less like a wayward daughter if you stopped giving her the opportunity.”

“I know,” I sighed. “I’m trying, it’s just… She brings out the best in me apparently.” I forced a smile. “It’s not the violence that bothers me, Emmory.” I used our dedicated com on my smati for the first time since this whole thing started. “Did you hear what she said to me?”

Emmory didn’t even blink. “No, Highness. What did she say?”

“Not here. We need to get out of the palace. The ocean would be best.” The roar of the waves and the song of the dolphins would give us the perfect cover for a conversation that had to be private.

“You’re not going out in the open again.”

“I’m not staying trapped in here for the rest of my life, however short it might be.” I didn’t miss the fury that ripped through his face at the suggestion he couldn’t keep me alive, but I wasn’t about to back down. “No one knows I want to go. It’s not like some dolphin will be lying in wait to try and kill me. And we have to talk.”

“Fine,” he said, surprising me with his abrupt agreement. “Zin, tell Jet to come in.”

I turned away from the window with a frown at my Ekam. “He’s not coming back on duty, is he?”

“He asked if he could speak with you, Highness.”

Jet came into the room, looking weary but healthy, and dropped to a knee in front of me. “Highness.”

“Fasé took care of you. Did they get you hooked back in?” I smiled, shoving aside my worry.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I think we can spare you for the day, Jet. Get up, man. Get some rest. We’ll see you tomorrow.”

He looked up at me in surprise. “Ma’am?”

“Was I not speaking Indranan?”

“Your Highness, I’ve come to give you my resignation.”

“Excuse me?”

“I failed you.” Jet dropped his eyes to the floor. “Your blood was spilled. It’s unforgivable.”

I whirled on Emmory. “Did you tell him he had to do this?”

He looked just as startled as I was. That wasn’t good.

“No, Highness. I don’t think—”

I waved a hand, cutting Emmory off, and turned away, casing the room as I did. Zin and Cas had the same looks of poorly concealed shock as the rest of us, but there was a smug look in Nal’s eyes that I didn’t like at all.

My brain raced through my options at lightning speed. If Jet had been on my crew, I would have bought him a drink and given him my share of the profits from the job. I learned early on from Po-Sin that fear was a great motivator but that it didn’t inspire much loyalty. That came from praise and tangible rewards.

Rewards happened in front of the rest of the crew. Ass chewings were private affairs. I nudged Jet with a bare foot. “Get your ass up.”

“Highness?”

“You heard me, get your ass up.” I let him get to his feet and then grabbed his face with both hands. “Ojayit Uli Gaiden, I realize you hit your head today; however, I doubt very much it scrambled your brains enough to make you believe I would let you walk out of here in disgrace. You saved my life.” I shook him, the bracelets Stasia had forced on me in a desperate attempt to break up my severe outfit jingling with the movement; then I released him with a smile. “I would be a fool to let you go. I thank you for it and I owe you for it.”

Jet was still staring at me, confusion etched into his weathered face. His dark gray eyes darted between me and Emmory. “Your Highness, I—”

“Highness, your empress-mother will object.”

“You will hold your tongue, Nalmari. I haven’t asked for your opinion.” I didn’t raise my voice but my Dve jumped like she’d been stung.

Okay, so most of the time ass chewings happened in private.

“You think on it,” I said with another smile at Jet. “My influence sucks at the moment, but that’ll change eventually. If it’s in my power, I’ll grant you whatever you ask. Now, go get some rest.” Winking at him, I gave him a little shove toward the door. “You say, ‘Yes, ma’am,’ and get out of here.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Jet echoed, still looking utterly baffled as he left the room.

“Zin, out.” I waited for the door to close before I turned on Nal. “Do we have a problem?”

“No, Highness.”

“I welcome suggestions, Nal, but not if they are prefaced by ‘my empress-mother objects’ or ‘my empress-mother will be offended’ or any variation thereof. I don’t care about what my empress-mother would do. I am not her. Is that clear?”

“Perfectly, ma’am.”

“Get out of here.” I watched her go and muttered an unpleasant word under my breath. “Emmory, when you have a moment, I’d like the files on all my BodyGuards,” I said, and headed back to the window.

“May I ask why?”

“I’m not going to interfere with your choices.” I grinned at him and leaned against the sill. “But I think it’s only fair I know something about the people who are risking their lives for mine. You included.”

“I think I’ve misjudged you.”

“I’m not even going to ask what that means,” I replied with a laugh. “Let me get my boots, Emmory, and we can go to the beach.”

We avoided the throng of media at the front gate and took off in an aircar for the coast. Cas and Zin stood like the statues around Balhim Bay, silent sentinels against the chill winds that cut in off the water. I huddled deeper into my heavy coat, burying my nose in the pristine fur of a silver tigerfox as I walked along the shoreline.

I could see the palace from here. The bright blue domes and intricate windows peeked out from among the tall buildings of Krishan’s downtown. The winter sun flashed off the steel surfaces, bouncing around and making the gold accents on the palace walls gleam.

Our ancestors had carried the plans and designs of their forefathers to this strange planet, surrounding themselves with memories of India in every rounded archway and curved dome they constructed.

The architecture of our capital reflected our roots at the core and then became more and more modern as it splayed outward toward the sea.

Emmory stood at my side, unaffected by the cold, in nothing more than a heavier version of his uniform jacket.

“Nal’s right. Your empress-mother will not be happy about you keeping Jet.” The wind and the song of the dolphins grabbed at his words with greedy fingers, tearing them into shreds almost as fast as they left his mouth.

“She’ll deal. He saved my life, Emmory. I’m not going to can him just because I got hurt in the process. By that logic I should toss the lot of you.” I trusted them now, and I didn’t want to have to try and forge ahead without them.

I swore as I connected the dots. “That’s why I don’t recognize any of her Guards, isn’t it?” All the familiar faces around my mother were gone and it shocked me to realize how much I cared. I’d seen the fear in her eyes when she grabbed me. She was sick, isolated, and I had no clue how to help her.

“I suspect so, Highness. Bial replaced Ven after the accident.”

“Convenient.”

“He was on the short list, Highness.”

I made a face and didn’t look Emmory’s way. Every Ekam had a short list of replacements that could be trusted to take over if they were killed in the line of duty. Given how few people he trusted, I wondered if he had more than just one. “Doesn’t mean I have to trust him, too. Ven’s dead, Bial could be responsible.”

“Bial picked the three Guard replacements for those who’d died with Ven. Then either he or your empress-mother replaced her other Guards one after another. She is extremely ill.”

“She’s slipping into paranoia.” I tried hard to keep the tears out of my voice. Now wasn’t the time to remember the scared little girl whose mother had suddenly become empress and left her alone. “She said she couldn’t trust anyone around her.” I recounted her words.

“I know that paranoia can manifest at the end, Emmory, but she didn’t seem sick. If anything, it was the most lucid that I’ve seen her since I got back. It doesn’t make sense.”

“What are you thinking, ma’am?”

“I don’t know. Something is off.” I squinted out at the ocean. “I can’t put my finger on it.” Shaking my head in frustration, I crouched to examine the shimmering gray sand. I tugged off my glove and stuck my fingers into it. The cold burned, a thousand slivers of glass, but even that pain didn’t ground me and I couldn’t wrap my head around whatever was bothering me.

The desperate pleading in Mother’s voice during that brief moment of sanity had jammed a knife into my chest and twisted it sideways. She’d given up any hope of surviving, laying all her faith on me instead. The one gods-damned daughter who’d failed her time and again.

“That doesn’t give me a lot to go on.” Emmory crouched at my side, dark eyes still tracking the space around us, ever alert for any sign of a threat.

“I know. I’m sorry.” I looked up from the sand. Emmory’s face was expressionless, and I knew anything I told him would be calculated and analyzed with the speed and precision that only a Tracker could manage.

But there was something else, a flicker of concern in the depths of his eyes that gave me the strength to bare my soul to him. He was my last link to Portis—if I couldn’t be honest with him…

“I saw an old friend at the lamp lighting.” I swallowed. “Taz was in the crowd. I spotted him just before the shooters appeared.”

Trust was a double-edged sword here. Tazerion Benton Shivan had been my best friend and the man Mother wanted me to marry. Of course, if she’d suspected he was a member of the Upjas, I doubt she’d have been so excited about our marriage.

“I don’t know why he was there. He wasn’t one of the shooters.” The words tumbled out of my mouth as I watched suspicion cloud Emmory’s face.

“I don’t believe in coincidences.”

“Neither do I, but he wasn’t pointing a gun at me, Emmory. And he seemed just as surprised as everyone else when the shooting started.” I shook the sand off my hands. “You think I’m stupid for defending a man I haven’t seen in twenty years.”

“I think,” Emmory replied, clearly choosing his words with care, “you are quick to discount the Upjas when you haven’t been home for a long time. There is no doubt of their goals, Highness. All their propaganda for the last year has been about removing your mother from power.”

“He helped me find Father’s killers; did Fenna mention that?” I looked away and changed the subject with the kind of ruthless disregard only a royal could get away with. “Mother and I had a decent relationship up until she was crowned. Even after, it was strained by the necessities of life at court, but we still managed to get along well.”

I wasn’t ready to talk about the Upjas with Emmory. I wasn’t ready to admit to him that my sister had been in love with one of their leaders, or that both of us had been involved with the rebels before I ran.

“When Father died… things got bad. I was”—I dragged in a breath—“I was unmanageable.”

“I remember the day we lost him, and I’ve seen the footage. You reacted with astonishing calm, Highness.”

“He made me leave him. I should have stayed until the end.” The confession was hoarse and I blinked back tears. “I idolized him. It drove me crazy the way people treated him. Even after everything he’d done, he was still nothing more than the empress’s husband.” I couldn’t believe the bitterness in my voice. “He was a hero. A genius. We would have beaten the Saxons if he hadn’t—” The words lodged themselves in my throat. I surged to my feet, needing to be on the move, and started down the beach with my skirts held in my hands.

“I wanted to follow in his footsteps. I wanted to join the Fleet. Join ITS. Anything to get me out of the damn palace and the bullshit restrictions that were strangling me. All the politics and lies. But Mother didn’t want me in the military. She wanted me married and out of her hair.”

“Highness, can you see it from your empress-mother’s position? She’d just lost her husband. Perhaps she wouldn’t send you into the war because she couldn’t risk losing you, too.”

Whirling on him, I threw my arms out wide in an extravagant gesture. “She lost me anyway! I thought if I hunted down the bastards who killed him, she’d at least let me live my life, but it wasn’t good enough. Nothing I ever did was good enough.”

I dropped my arms, my anger vanishing so abruptly my knees almost gave out. I locked them, smiling sadly at Emmory. “Did you know Mother never said ‘I’m sorry’? From the moment Daddy died, she never said those words again,” I murmured. “Until today. I can’t help her. I can’t save her. I can’t fix this. I’ve failed her again.”

“Not your empress-mother, no. But you can help your people, ma’am. You can fix what’s wrong here. Or at least get things started.”

“She’s going to get worse, Emmory.”

“Most likely.”

“I need some allies in court. Whom do you trust?”

He shook his head with a slight smile. “I don’t trust anyone except Zin.”

I gave him my best hurt look. “You still don’t trust me?”

His smile grew and he dipped his head. “Maybe just a little, ma’am.”

It was just the thing I needed to shake me out of my misery. “That’s something, I guess.” The laughter snuck up on me, spilling out of my mouth and into the freezing air. I bumped him with my shoulder, still giggling, and was rewarded with a little answering chuckle from my BodyGuard.

“Well, you’re kind of stuck with me, seeing as how I’m the heir and all,” I said once my laughter died out. Emmory didn’t say anything to that declaration and I felt oddly vulnerable for a moment.

“I need your help, Emmory, especially if Mother is going to keep me out of the briefings. I need your help navigating this mess. You’ve been around court more than I have. Everything I know I learned from gunrunners and criminals…” I trailed off, uncertain how to continue.

“It’s not true, ma’am. You learned plenty before you left and…” Emmory shrugged. “I’d deny it in public, but you weren’t far off the mark when you said there wasn’t much of a difference between a princess and a gunrunner.”

“Yes, but I was trying to persuade you to give me a gun at the time. I’m not sure I really meant it.”

“Lying, manipulation to get what you want; see, you’re already more than prepared for everything this planet can throw at you.”

“If I didn’t need your help here, I’d suffocate you in the sand.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

I tugged my gloves back on. “I guess we’re stuck with each other then. I’m freezing. Let’s get back to the palace.”