The Bone Shard Daughter (The Drowning Empire, #1)(36)

But the shards would no longer take life from their former owners. There’d no longer be a need to suck life away to power the construct. And my father always seemed to know when one of his constructs died.

It would raise too many questions. I had to keep the construct alive for now.

Scenarios ran through my head. If I kept it in the palace, I’d be found out. Father didn’t come often to my room, but he did sometimes, and Bayan more often – to fetch me or to bother me. And there were other spy constructs in the palace, always watching.

I could only think of one place to keep the creature.

By the time I reached the blacksmith’s shop, the sun was cresting the horizon. I’d cleaned up the mess in the library and had dropped off the journal in my room. I’d taken another tunic to wrap around the construct. This would be cutting things close. My father and Bayan usually both stayed awake into the night and did not rise until well after dawn. I could not say this was an everyday occurrence though.

The bustle of a waking city was so different from the quiet within the palace walls. Doors open and shut, people strode past me in a hurry, baskets beneath their arms or bags slung over their shoulders. No one looked at me – a girl with her own bundle beneath her arm. They all had their own business to keep. Light filtered golden into the streets, chasing away the blue-tinged shadows of the night before. And the night fishermen were filtering in from the docks, their catches in buckets, filling the air with the ocean-water scent of fresh fish and squid. Water slopped from buckets and onto the street; I had to dodge puddles more than once before arriving at my destination. The drinking hall next door was silent, its patrons long since gone. The blacksmith’s shop was closed, but I heard the sound of a tiny hammer striking metal.

I knocked at the door hard enough to make my knuckles ache.

Numeen answered the door, and he frowned when he saw me. “You shouldn’t be here. You were only just here last night.”

“I know,” I said, and slipped past him before he could stop me. “I’ve come to ask a favor.”

“I can’t do favors.” But he closed the door behind himself. Sweat beaded on my scalp as soon as the door swung shut. Numeen had a small fire going, and despite the chimney and the open window, the entire shop felt like a furnace.

“A favor for a favor,” I said.

“You found my bone shard?”

“I – no.” Again, the pang of guilt. I shook it off. I’d find a way to retrieve his shard when I had the chance. I had larger things to care about. I reached into my sash pocket and pulled out the witstone I’d taken from my father’s store.

Numeen’s eyes widened when he saw it. The trade of witstone was highly regulated by the Empire. No one was to buy or sell it without the Emperor’s knowledge and consent. But I’d heard the reports from the Construct of Trade. The Ioph Carn stole and sold witstone, and a few others did as well. If you got your hands on some witstone, there was always a way to sell it, with or without the Empire. “What are you asking of me?”

The bundle beneath my arm twitched as though it knew we were speaking of it. “I caught a spy construct,” I said. “I can’t kill it – my father will know. I need a place to keep it until all of this is over. Can you make a cage for it? Keep it somewhere in your shop?”

“If the Emperor finds out, I’m dead. Not just me, but my entire family.”

“Then think of your family and what you could do for them if you sold this witstone. It won’t be for ever, and I’ll be back periodically to check on it.”

“And with more keys,” he said, his tone resigned. This was the truth of it, and I watched the realization dawn on his face. He couldn’t just walk away now. With that first key, he’d tied his fate to my own.

I proffered the bundle with the spy inside. It squirmed, but once in the grip of the blacksmith, the spy quieted. I watched his face, unsure of what to say. My father might have noted all Numeen had to gain in this bargain. He might have simply thanked him. I wondered how good at reading expressions my father really was, or if he just didn’t care – because I saw more than resignation in Numeen’s face. I saw resentment in his tightened lips and brow, his silence. “I’m sorry,” I blurted out before I could stop myself. I was Lin. I was the Emperor’s daughter. But still, I was sorry. “If I could do this without help, I would.”

“And what is it you intend to do?”

Become Emperor. Earn my father’s respect. The words wouldn’t come out. I’d been skulking about, stealing keys, trying to unravel my father’s secrets so that I could prove to him my worth, broken though I was. I’d always been anxious that he might die without leaving me any of his secrets, with only bitter words for me on his lips. I didn’t know how to explain that. So I said instead, “To survive.”

Numeen nodded and closed the curtains. The space inside the shop seemed to grow even hotter, firelight casting everything in red and yellow. “Come back when you need another key.”

I fled the shop, the bell at the door jangling as I let the door swing shut behind me. The streets were already brighter, the faint orange glow of lanterns in windows giving way to dawn. The servants would already be about their work.

I didn’t stop to rest. I ran through the streets, dodging surly, sleepy inhabitants as they prepared for the day ahead, baskets under arms and quick huffs of breath extinguishing lanterns. I was a dancer entering the stage four steps too late – upsetting those already there and unable to find my place.