to enter the women’s wing.
“He is High Mage Govnan,” Lana said.
“A mage?” Mesema turned a seed in her mouth, thinking of the pattern. “What kind of mage?”
Lana kept her eyes on the floor, studying the mosaics. Juice beaded her nails as Mesema tore the remains of the pomegranate apart. The mage hadn’t looked dangerous, he had looked tired and old—and yet he had called freely upon the emperor’s time.
“What did he say to the emperor?” Mesema had seen them exchange words by the door. Govnan had spoken only once, and Beyon had nearly stumbled, putting a hand on the old man’s shoulder, as if for support. They left together with no goodbyes.
“I don’t know.” Her voice trembled, and she kept her eyes down.
“Has someone died?” Mesema didn’t know why she asked it, but as the words came she knew them to be true. She felt the pattern closing in, stronger now.
Lana kept her head down, but the tears fell in a steady rain. Mesema felt her eyes prickle. It couldn’t be Sahree; the high mage would not concern himself with a mere servant, nor would Beyon react so to her death. Nevertheless a sudden grief welled in her, blurring the lamplight that gleamed on her plate. She pushed it away.
“I’m sorry.” She put her hand on Lana’s, her fingers pale against the dusk of the woman’s skin.
Lana pulled her hand back. “I had a son, Pelar. They will be together now.”
For a moment they watched the floor together. From nowhere, maybe from memory, Mesema felt the tug of a cold wind, and with it a longing for the wideness of sky and the endless grass of home. Nothing here gave the eye peace; the walls, the ceiling, the floors, they were all worked and scrolled, all intricacy and convolution, like the essence of a lie without the substance.
“What happened?” She wanted to insist, but the words sounded faint, as if spoken into a vast cavern.
Lana ignored her, and Mesema wanted to take her by the shoulders, to demand an answer, but it would be useless. She put the remains of the pomegranate on the silver dish and rose to her feet. She walked past scrollwork and gold leaf, carvings and tapestries, until she saw darkness through the curved lattice of a wooden screen and found, beyond it, a balcony overlooking the courtyard.
The soldiers below were joking and shouting among themselves, relaxing in the torchlight, reminding her of the Riders back home, but when they saw her they fell silent and scattered from view. From up here she could see the courtyard’s stones formed a diamond pattern of black and brown. Its far end pointed towards the city, a confusion of roofs and awnings illuminated by orange bonfires. Each fire was tended by a lone silhouette. Mesema shivered.
She ran her fingertip along the stone railing. Perhaps the rough surface would rub the mark away, but even without looking, she knew it clung to her still, telling her of Beyon’s distant movements.
A wind blew up around her, hot as fire-stones and smelling of char. A flag atop one of the towers cracked and strained against its fittings. She pushed her hair from her eyes and looked at the Bright One, stepping near the top of the moon. Just a few more days—a week, perhaps. She put it from her mind.
Then she saw it: the highest tower in the palace, the topmost window gaping. Though the night was dark, the room beyond the window appeared darker still.
Something held her gaze—there! Something or someone was hidden there. She could almost remember, and the lost memory pulled at her, the half-formed image—something of both softness and cruelty. Beyon knew who or what crouched there alone, removed from the rest of the palace. Perhaps he had put it there.
Mesema rubbed her fingertip, trying to bring forth those things she had touched in Beyon, but she had lost this piece of his past, as she had lost so many others. She knew only that it felt like grief. She didn’t know what the pattern meant for her or Beyon. She didn’t know whether Arigu’s games would change the empire, or what role Banreh would have in that, if he lived. She didn’t know what had happened to Sahree.
But she could find out what was in that tower.
She left the balcony and passed the scrollwork, the tapestries, and the tasselled cushions. The floor mosaic caught her eye: the pattern seemed to flow, a slow rotation, with only one