The Liar's Key (The Red Queen's War #2)(92)

Nothing felt quite right, as if the palace were another man’s boots I’d pulled on by mistake. I went to the Glass Chamber, a room where some previous cardinal had gathered a collection of glassware from the sunken cities of Venice and Atlantis, all displayed in tall cabinets. I’d avoided the room for years since the incident with the egg fight where somehow Martus and Darin escaped scot free and conspired to have me take the blame. Now, though, I paced among the old cabinets and their forgotten contents gleaming in all the colours between red and violet, led on by some old memory and the taste of blood.

Crouching in a corner, I pulled away a piece of loose skirting board, and there, glowing in a small hole in the plaster sat the rune-set cone of orichalcum that had fallen from Mother’s hand as Edris Dean killed her. When they released me from the care of the surgeon and his nurses, and when at last I had my first opportunity to be alone, I went to the Star Room, retrieved the cone from beneath the couch where it had been kicked, and came here to hide it. The thought that Garyus might want it back never troubled me, and he never asked after it—perhaps because to do so would mean accusing me or my mother of theft. I had hidden it away, and pushed all thought of the murder from my mind: the cone, its hiding place, the whole terrible business. Until Kara’s blood magic woke those memories.

“Mine.” I snatched the thing up, cold in my fist. The light pulsed through my hand, making the flesh rosy and the bones of my fingers into dark bars. I wrapped it in a handkerchief and thrust it deep into a pocket.

I stood, but kept my place, staring sightless into the corner. I say Kara’s magic, because it was her spell that brought those dead recollections back to life, her work that disturbed their peace and set them playing over and over upon the inside of my skull like some monstrous shadow play . . . but the key had started it. Truly it had been Loki’s key that unlocked all this—against advice I’d used the key and opened a door onto the past that I couldn’t close. I wondered then just how hard it might be to close the door Snorri had it in mind to open.

I replaced the skirting board and for the next hour paced the corridors of the Roma Hall. Sleep did not come easy that night.

? ? ?

I needed to speak to someone who might understand what had happened to me. I considered going to Garyus but seeking advice from a man who hadn’t left his room in sixty years and had never been outside the palace walls seemed foolish. Besides, the power lay with his sisters. After half a day reflecting on the matter I decided to confront the non-silent one. I strapped on my dress sword before going. The door guard would take if off me but Grandmother would notice the scabbard and she liked to see her spawn go armed.

The walk to the Inner Palace was nearly long enough to erode my store of courage to the point where I turned back. Another hundred yards or so would have done it, but instead I found myself climbing the steps to the grand doors.

Ten of the queen’s personal guard flanked the topmost steps, enduring the heat in their half-plate. The knight at the door towered over me, made taller by his high helm and crimson plume. “Prince Jalan.” He bowed his head a fraction.

I waited for the “but you’re dead,” ready to be irritated, and found myself disappointed when it didn’t come. “I wish to see my grandmother.” She always held a noon court on Sunday after church. I’d gone to the Roma mass hoping to see her there, but she must have attended her private chapel, or skipped the whole tedious business as I normally do. Bishop James had conducted the mass at the Hall and offered thanks for the return of a lost sheep to the fold. I would have preferred “conquering lion to the pride” but at least it made my return official and meant Maeres couldn’t have me quietly murdered.

“Court is in session, my prince.” And the knight struck the door for admittance, stepping aside to let me past.

? ? ?

The Red Queen’s court is unlike others in the region. King Yollar of Rhone holds a sumptuous court where aristocrats gather in their hundreds to slight and bicker and display the latest fashions. In our protectorate of Adora the duke hosts philosophers and musicians in his halls, with lords and ladies attending from across his realm to hear them. In Cantanlona the earl is famed for debauched court parties that last for a week and more, draining the towns around his capital of wine. Grandmother’s court is more dour. A businesslike affair where fools are suffered only briefly and the sparkle of a new gown is seldom seen, there being no audience for such.

“Prince Jalan Kendeth.” The court officer, Mantal Drews announced me, clad in the same sombre greys he wore the day I left.

The dozen or so attendees turned my way, heavily outnumbered by the royal guard hulking around the margins in their fire-bronze mail. These latter spared me not a glance. No surprise showed on the faces pointed in my direction, not even a whisper of it muttered behind fans—news travels fast in the palace. The word would have rippled out through guards and servants overnight, confirmed that morning by the highborn who saw me at the service.

The queen herself did not look up, her attention occupied by a fellow in a purple robe too heavy for the season, hunkered before the throne and making some or other impassioned plea. Two of Grandmother’s sour old retainers flanked her, one a bony stick of a woman and the other a stout, grey-haired matron in her fifties, both in drab black shawls. I glanced around for the Silent Sister but saw no sign of her.

Gathering my resolve, I strode into the midst of the throne room, old anxieties queuing at my shoulder. I did my best to present the mask that had served me so well for so long: bluff Prince Jal, hero of the pass, a devil-may-care man’s man. I lie as well with my expression and body language as I do with my tongue and like to think I carry off the deception rather nicely. The courtiers, or rather I should call them today’s supplicants, for none of the aristocracy kept at court past the completion of their business, gave me space. I recognized a few of them: minor lords, the Baron of Strombol down from the shadow of the Scorron Aups, a gem merchant from Norrow whose daughter I’d known rather well for a night or two . . . the usual.