The Bone Shard Daughter (The Drowning Empire, #1)(121)

I knelt and tore loose the tubing from the chest. Blood and some white, milky liquid seeped from the ends. I cast them onto the cave floor and watched the water.

For a while, I thought even this small kindness might have killed the creature. It was in a weak and sickly state; any change to its circumstances might be a shock to its body. But then the surface bubbled, and a pale shape rose from the darkness.

It bobbed to the surface and scrabbled at the stone. I went to help it, forgetting for a moment about the wounds on my shoulder and belly. I felt the wound in my shoulder open a little as I grasped the creature’s leg, as I pulled it out onto the stone. Before it could react, I tugged the tubes loose from its body. Each was a little thicker than my finger and left gaping holes in the beast’s flesh.

My instinct was to run, to back away, to stand at a distance to see what the creature would do. But its head came to rest on my shoulder in a strange sort of embrace.

Something shifted within me, the same sense of wonder and hope I’d felt upon unlocking the first of my father’s doors. Was it the trust she’d shown in me? The simple touch of her chin to my collarbone? Whatever it was, it drained away all the bitterness I’d felt at never receiving my father’s affection, at never being enough. For this creature, I was more than enough. I was everything. I found myself putting a hand on her neck – I knew in my bones it was female – and whispering into her ear, “It’s all right. I’m here. You’re safe.”

She breathed out a shuddering sigh, like a terrified, exhausted lamb finally laying down to rest.

“Come on, you don’t need to be in the dark anymore.” She limped with me from the cavern, Bing Tai at our heels.

By the time we’d emerged into the palace proper, a few servants had begun to slink out from their hiding places, tiptoeing through the halls as though expecting to find monsters at every turn. They weren’t much wrong.

“You.” I beckoned to the first servant I saw. She bowed low, her head nearly level with her waist. Despite her obeisance, I could see the tension and fear in every line of her body. Doubtless she expected I might decide to kill the witnesses to my apparent patricide. Let them spread their gossip. I needed a fearsome reputation if I was to hold the Empire. “Fetch me parchment and pen and bring it to my room.” I had proclamations to write.

My beast – I’d already begun to think of her as mine – leaned against me. I wanted a bath.

“Thrana.” Her name. She needed a name.

Thrana chirruped and nudged my arm with her nose. I scratched the base of her horns.

“Bing Tai, follow.”

I’d have to find another servant and ask them to accompany me to the bath house, to fill the one remaining working bath there. The proclamations would be next. I’d have to find a way to clean the dining hall, to dispose of the bodies. No matter how tired I was, how heartbroken, I’d get little sleep tonight. I made my way toward the entrance hall and froze, dread rising in my breast.

I could see the edge of the faded mural, the Alanga hand-inhand stretched across the wall.

Their eyes were open. They’d been closed the last time I’d seen them, only a day ago. No one would have had the chance to paint them open, and there was no discernible fresh paint. What could it mean?

Someone stepped into the hallway. He wasn’t dressed in servant’s clothes. Blood dripped from his limbs and onto the floor. My hand tightened around Thrana’s neck. And then a creature appeared beside him. I blinked, trying to believe what I saw. It was smaller than Thrana, with much more fur, but it was the same sort of creature. How could I never have seen one before and now had encountered two in one day?

Without intending to, I called out. “Who are you?”





45





Ranami


Nephilanu Island

Ranami watched Phalue settle into her role as governor with the ease of an otter learning to swim. She seemed born to the role, a brash and honest leader with enough humility to ask for help when she needed it. She asked Ranami for help often, sending missives to her apartment by the docks, asking her respectfully to make the trek to the palace to offer her counsel.

The distance between them was more than physical.

This was what Ranami had been working toward with the rebellion, yet she’d told Phalue more than once that she did not want to be a governor’s wife. And she knew, every time she went to the palace and offered her counsel, that Phalue wondered where that left them.

Ranami crumpled the latest missive in her hand as she strode up the path to the palace. She wasn’t sure herself where that left them. The words Jovis has spoken to her before leaving still echoed in her mind, drumming against the inside of her skull as surely as the rain drummed against the hood of her cloak. She couldn’t trust Gio. Gio wanted Phalue dead. However inadvertently, she’d brought this danger upon Phalue, had even encouraged it. Although the rebels now seemed content with Phalue’s governorship, guilt still tugged at Ranami’s heart. She’d pushed Phalue to this, to imprisoning her own father. It didn’t sit lightly with Phalue, and Ranami could see the strain each time she looked at her.

She stuffed the missive back into her pocket. “Please come to the palace. I need your advice.” That was all it said. No mention of the matter. No playful, loving sign-off at the end. Just those words and the official governor’s seal on the outside. Half-disbelieving, she’d turned it over, expecting to see more words. Nothing. Not that she deserved any more.