Empress of a Thousand Skies(37)

“That’s a lie,” Rhee said. “I’ve never seen that boy.”

“All of the holos are reporting it.”

Rhee knew that. She’d been watching. They’d claimed Alyosha Myraz had enlisted in the UniForce under false credentials in a long-term plot to assassinate her. Rumor had it he’d planted that explosive device in case his attempt on her life had failed.

“Have they caught him?” Rhee asked. When Tai Reyanna shook her head, she exhaled with relief. But with his image beamed everywhere across the universe, it couldn’t be long. So many people, dead in her place.

“What’s going on, Rhiannon? What have you done to your face? What happened to you?” Tai Reyanna asked. There were dark half-moons under her eyes.

Rhee brought her hand up to touch her face, which was still swollen. “You know what happened,” she said without bitterness. She’d lost the will to play games, trying to outmaneuver and outsmart at every turn. The mounting deaths weighed on her, and the memory of Seotra waving from the knoll burned inside of her. “Seotra sent Veyron to kill me.”

There was a question buried deep inside, clawing its way out of her throat and onto the tip of her tongue: Did you conspire with him? But she couldn’t bring herself to ask it.

“Veyron?” Tai Reyanna repeated. The woman turned away, gripping the windowsill as though to stay on her feet. “No. He wouldn’t.”

Tai Reyanna looked back to her. “Whoever sent him, it wasn’t Andrés Seotra. He was your father’s closest and oldest friend,” she said, her voice a low current that shocked Rhee. “They were as close as brothers. Andrés Seotra fought to be Crown Regent so he could protect the Ta’an’s interests.”

“I know that. It makes his betrayal ten times worse,” Rhee said.

“There was no betrayal,” Tai Reyanna said sharply. “Not by him. He has been loyal to your bloodline.”

“He opposed the Urnew Treaty—”

“—because it did not go far enough,” Tai Reyanna cut her off. “He wanted a peace that endured even if there was no Ta’an on the throne. Don’t you see? He worried that otherwise there was incentive to kill you—to kill all of you. Ancestors, help me,” Tai Reyanna murmured, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Is this what you’ve believed the whole time? Is this why you refused to see him all these years?”

“You knew that he—that he wanted to see me?” Rhee felt the knowledge bleed through her, staining every bit of her silly, petty soul.

“Of course. He’d consulted me on the matter. He thought he must remind you of your grief, and we’d agreed we had to give you time.”

Every hair stood on end. Half the beings in the galaxy will want you dead, he’d said in her memory. Is this what he’d been speaking of? That the treaty did not provide strong enough protections?

Had she even ever bothered to find out?

No. She was getting confused. Seotra was responsible. Rhee was sure of it—she’d always been sure of it. The goal she’d worked toward was so tantalizingly close, and she couldn’t afford to be distracted by any doubts.

“Take me to Seotra. I want to talk to him,” Rhee said. “I want to know everything that he’d meant to tell me. From the beginning.”

It was a half-truth. She did want to talk to Seotra, to face him, to call him a liar—and to kill him, still. Despite what Tai Reyanna said, or perhaps because of it. Rhee still wasn’t certain she could trust her entirely.

“You should’ve reached out earlier.” Tai Reyanna turned away from her and moved to the door. “I mourned you. I prayed to you. And this whole time you were still alive.”

Rhee didn’t answer. She imagined her heart as a stone—something impenetrable, unmoved. Someone had to pay for her grief.

No—Seotra had to pay. Because the terrifying truth had come to her: She wanted him to be guilty. She needed him to be guilty, so she could finally atone.

Rhee should have died with her family.

This was the only way to say she was sorry.

? ? ?

The Tinoppa palace library was nothing like the libraries she’d known. Her mother had maintained the palace library back in Sibu, but its smell had been worn and musty, and comforting, too—like a soft blanket slipped around your shoulders. Sunlight would filter in, slanting slowly across the room.

This library was cold, dim, and without windows. As they moved through the enormous towers of books, goose bumps formed on Rhee’s arms and shoulders. The room must have been climate-controlled to preserve the paper, but her body was reacting to something apart from the temperature. Half the books were wrapped in plastic, sheathed like dead bodies, or tucked behind glass. Their footsteps barely made a sound on the carpet.

“Where is he?” Rhee whispered. The library appeared to be deserted.

Tai Reyanna just frowned and shook her head. Rhee heard light footsteps and turned just in time to see the shadow of a man pass quickly between shelves. Electricity danced on her skin. A trap. It had to be a trap.

She looked at Tai Reyanna. “You lied to me.” Her governess was short, like her; they stood face-to-face, and Tai Reyanna looked terrified. “Where is he?”

Tai Reyanna shook her head. “Seotra?” she croaked, and then cleared her throat. “Seotra?”