better glimpses of the royal couple. Girls with fishnet pantyhose and feathered tails and bras distributed fanciful drinks in impossibly tall glasses or whisked empty ones away.
Below the royal box, in aisle three, a soused nobleman groped his friend’s wife and fell over a row of chairs, creating a small fracas. He promptly disappeared in the arms of three burly ushers and the tittering waves of conversation resumed as though nothing had happened.
“I liked the Minstrel’s Stage better,” whispered Caliph.
Sena smirked indulgently. The preceding weeks had been hard on both of them.
At first, Caliph had chuckled when he read the note drawn out of the hawk’s tiny canister. Then he had reread it. Then he had reread it again, disbelieving. Finally he had begun to shake and whisper and pace the floor and scowl. What could it mean? he thought. Fallow Down has disappeared.
By fast horse and private zeppelin, the adventuresome had already gone out and returned with firsthand accounts of the devastation. There was no keeping it a secret.
The fickle papers had minted every kind of lie and theory they could dream up. Laws passed under the old Council ensuring freedom of the press remained unchallenged though barbs enough to fill a dozen quivers had been hurled at Caliph by several fearless periodicals offering special biweekly editions (or seditions as those loyal to the High King liked to call them).
Caliph had juggled all kinds of meetings with military personnel and worried burgomasters and journalists who constantly overstepped their bounds.
He wanted to go out and see the thing for himself but his advisors forbade it. Round trip, it was nearly seventy-five miles out of the way, and those were precious hours to and from Tentinil better spent in Isca directing operations from a central seat of power.
Caliph had departed on the fifteenth for Queen Guerrian’s funeral (the prince’s mother had died in her sleep) and returned late the same night by zeppelin. He leapt off the Byun-Ghala, and dashed to a late-night meeting like the operator of a mad machine racing to throw switches in an effort to regain control.
Then came the second blow, more devastating on a personal level to Caliph’s reign and even more confusing to his supporters than the news that Fallow Down had disappeared. It brought the castle down to a deathly hushed still as the staff read the Iscan Herald with utter disbelief.
Some woman had come forward with details. She claimed to have known Sena for many years and felt it her duty to inform the Iscan people of the truth behind the High King’s new mistress.
Sena could still remember the headline and the opening paragraph of a two-page story.
High King Court’s Witch
by Nick Glugh, Journalist
As if the Iscan people needed more bizarre news another report rocked the foundations of King Howl’s fledgling reign when a woman identifying herself as Miriam Yeats came forward with an accusation that the new High King’s mistress is a Shrdnae operative. This, just scant days after the tragedy at Fallow Down, an event critics are calling a holomorphic holocaust, once again casts the specter of suspicion over the Iscan Crown . . .
The fact that Caliph had blown it off entirely only made Sena’s sense of guilt more profound. He wouldn’t even consider arresting the journalist for slander—who had gone into hiding after the story created a sensation. There were rioting protesters near Octul Box: something that had never happened before.
But Caliph dismissed the suggestion of his advisors to retaliate by naming names. They had dug up the college degrees of every politician in Isca, ready to publicly announce those who had gotten a grade in holomorphy from any university in the north.
Instead, Caliph held a press conference and told the journalists the truth.
“Yes,” he said. “She’s a holomorph. She studied holomorphy at Desdae—just like I did.” He refused to answer any question directly as to whether holomorph also meant witch.
“No . . . no I won’t change the laws pertaining to witchcraft. As far as I know, the women sentenced over the past several years weren’t even tried on the grounds of witchcraft but as spies for treason.”
It had been a long conference. Caliph had been raked over the coals afterward by the same newspapers that had backed him two months ago when his father died. The same newspapers he allowed to exist.
All he had to do was give the word and the city watch would raid. He could fill West Gate overnight with editors and journalists and