twelve

I knew when we had descended to the garrison prison because the air abruptly became cold and still. We were escorted into a room, and the door slammed and locked behind us.

“You can look around now, Lilah.” Peitar was breathless, but his voice was kindly. “There’s nothing to see.”

And there wasn’t. Instead of a dungeon full of torture instruments, we were in a room that might have been anywhere, except that it had no windows. A glowglobe was set high on one whitewashed wall. There was a cot, a table with two chairs, and a bench.

The door opened again, and a tall, grizzled warrior in a violet battle tunic came in, incongruously carrying a tray. He set it down on the table and bowed, a quick motion not quite toward either of us.

“Thank you, Captain Avnos,” Peitar said as he sank onto the cot.

“You know him?” I asked after the door closed.

“He used to carry me around on his shoulder when I was eight or nine, when Uncle Darian had gotten rid of my crutch,” Peitar murmured. “Before he was made a captain. Mind scouting that breakfast? I don’t think I can get up again so easily. It’s been a difficult morning.”

“Difficult!” I repeated, springing to my feet. “It’s a nightmare! Why are we even in here? We didn’t do anything!”

Peitar just shook his head, so I turned to the tray. The scent of steeped gingerroot drifted up from a clay teapot. There was a plate of toasted bread, a hunk of cheese, and a bowl of boiled oats with honey, as well as cups and utensils.

I set the food down near Peitar. “Do you think Captain Avnos brought this in secret? Is he one of us?”

“No, he’s loyal to Uncle Darian.” Peitar poured out the steeped gingerroot. “This is on our uncle’s orders, I’m certain. I’m also certain that nothing will happen to us until I have an interview with him. It’s the interim that worries me.”

“You mean, after we eat, he’s going to have us tortured?”

“Not that.” Peitar’s smile was rueful, but his eyes looked terrible. It wasn’t anger, it was grief—real grief. The sheen of tears brightened his lower lids. “Oh, Lilah.” He sat back, holding his cup. One of the tears slid down his cheek, but he didn’t seem to notice. “Something betrayed us, if not someone. Tell me what happened with Derek?”

I gave a shuddering sigh. “I don’t know if it means anything, but before Derek came, I went exploring in that passage. . . .”

“Lilah. You didn’t.” He winced and shook his head. “My fault, my fault. I never should have told you. Go on. I take it you ran straight into our uncle.”

“Yes. He was right in the middle of getting dressed! How was I supposed to know that he’d turned the study into a bedroom?”

“I should have guessed he would avoid the old king’s rooms. Tell me everything, just as it happened, please?” When I had finished, he said, his voice very soft, “Lilah. You didn’t think to check the passage?”

“I—no! I, I forgot when I saw Derek.” I groaned. “It’s my fault. Our uncle must have sent a spy after I left, and they heard everything Derek said!”

“And when you ran all over the gardens looking for me, Uncle Darian was busy closing the trap around us. Carefully, quietly, so no one would know. Including us.” Peitar sighed. “That’s why there were guards in the hall when you were summoned—they were sent to find Derek.”

“Do you think they sent some up the passage from Uncle’s rooms, too?”

“Probably. But they couldn’t know that Derek was dressed in servant gray, and we saw him go out that way. I hope it means he escaped.” Peitar shook his head. “We’d better eat. Yes, we are in trouble, but it could get worse. Very quickly. We need to be able to think.”

“You have to think. I’ve already ruined everything.” My throat closed up, and tears of self-pity burned in my eyes.

“We have to think.” Peitar drank off his steeped gingerroot. “Things are fairly desperate, I’ll admit, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be made worse. We have to prevent that, if we can.”

I fought back the tears. “All right. Here, you take some oats first.” We ate in silence.

“Is Derek mad at you for something?” I finally asked.

“Not with me, but with my ideas. We disagree not on fundamental needs but on how to accomplish them.”

“He almost sounded like he didn’t trust you.”

“Oh, he does. That is, he did.” Peitar set down the bowl. Despite his words, he hadn’t eaten much.

Instead, he poured more steeped gingerroot and held the cup as he stared through the opposite wall to distant places and times and people, and said, “You probably don’t know this, but Derek’s father was a groom in the royal stable. Our mother fell in love with him—and our great-grandfather was furious.”

Another surprise. “Because he wasn’t a noble?” I asked, and when Peitar nodded, I said, “I just don’t understand why our great-grandfather, or anyone, should care.”

Peitar said, “Adamas Dei says that you cannot exploit people you respect. The things Derek is angry about aren’t Uncle Darian’s fault, or even our great-grandfather’s. They’re the result of a series of increasingly damaging attitudes going back several hundred years.”

“Oh,” I said.

“When our parents were betrothed, Derek’s father was banished to the eastern half of the kingdom, where he started a family. He raised Derek and Bernal to love two things: justice and the shadow of our mother. The day he got the news of her death, he walked into a snow bank, hoping to be reunited with her beyond this world—it inspired a lot of tragic love ballads. Anyway, after that—after hearing about us all his life—Derek made his way to Selenna, risking his life when he was hardly older than you are now. He found out that we agreed on a lot of the same principles, and included me in his plans. Lizana protected him as much as she could, but it was still dangerous.”

“Love! Every time I hear about it, I’m glad I’m too young.”

Peitar shook his head. “Love is love, it’s ineffable. But when it’s mixed with politics, it becomes a stain on the spirit.”

“Will that ever make sense?” I asked, pulling the oatmeal bowl toward me. “It sure doesn’t now.”

“Is that your kindly way of saying that I’m talking a lot of hot air?”

The ring of boot heels outside silenced us. The door opened, and a battered young man was shoved in. He crumpled to the floor, moaning.

“Lilah. Help him.” My hands shook as I moved the tray to the table. By then, Peitar had reached the stranger, whose bruised, puffy face resembled Derek’s. His hands had been tied behind him. Together we managed to shift him to the cot. He was unconscious.

We attempted to undo the knots around his wrists, but they were too tight, and blood-soaked besides. Finally Peitar straightened up, his face drained of color.

“Is—is this Bernal?” I asked, my voice too high.

“A reminder, sent by Uncle Darian, of the price of high politics,” Peitar said. “He will be summoning me very soon. I’ll try to get some bandages and things brought here, if I can. If I can’t, I want you to help Bernal. Try to make him comfortable.”

“Is this going to happen to us next?” I asked, my voice quavering.

“I don’t know. What I do know is that we have effectively vanished. Our uncle had just enough time to plan it while you sought me in the garden. No one knows where we are—not servants nor courtiers, much less spies in the city. He must have tried to do the same with Derek. It means he no longer trusts anyone—anyone at all.” He looked up at me soberly. “Derek’s words in your room had to have been a strike to his heart.”

“Uncle Dirty Hands doesn’t have a heart,” I snapped.

“Yes, he does. But it’s banded by thick scars.”

For a time we sat in silence, me beside the cot, my insides knotted with fear, and Peitar on the chair, looking down at Bernal.

Presently, just as he had predicted, the guards came for him.

There was nothing I could do for Bernal until he woke up, so I just sat there, waiting. I have no idea how much time passed, for there was no candle to burn down or light to change. Time was measured in Bernal’s painful breaths, in and out. Tears ran down my face, hot, then cold.

When they stopped I remained crouching, watching a spider spin a web on one of the legs of the cot. The little creature lived its life unheeding. I wished I was back at Selenna House, playing in the garden and dreaming about what was over the wall.

Bernal’s breathing changed just before I heard noise again. I wiped my face on my silken sleeve and waited.

The door was unlocked, and Peitar came in, his forehead tight with pain. I looked at him questioningly. He sat and gave that sardonic smile that jolted me with its resemblance to our uncle’s. “We had a discourse on duty.”

Then Bernal moved. He was awake. “Peitar,” he whispered.

“This is my sister, Lilah,” Peitar said. “Shall we help you bind those wounds we can reach?” He smiled slightly. “Lilah is carrying a bit of superfluous cloth.”

I looked down at all my petticoats but didn’t feel like laughing.

“No matter,” Bernal managed. “I—why are you here?”

“I’m afraid my uncle found out about our participation.”

“Does Derek know I got caught?” Bernal’s brown eyes were anxious.

“Yes,” Peitar and I said together.

He made an unhappy sound. “Then he’ll do something. Tonight.” At Peitar’s questioning look, he went on. “Because tomorrow I’m to be put to death. Public. City square.”

I crouched in a ball, almost biting through my lip, but I felt no pain.

The two of them just talked, their voices low murmurs. Not about Derek or plans or anything like that. Bernal didn’t rail against courtiers or even against Uncle Darian. Instead, they spoke of Arnathan, the province where the Diamagans had spent their childhoods, and horses. I got a feeling that if Bernal hadn’t devoted himself to Derek’s cause, he would be raising them.

Time passed, and I helped Bernal drink the rest of the gingerroot, and then he slept.

Peitar laid his head on his crossed arms, and after a time, I heard his breathing slow down.

I tried thinking, I am Lasva Dei the Wanderer, and this is my adventure, but I was too scared to believe it. So I sat there and studied the little spider in her web.