consistency of butter, not stone. She popped it into her mouth and rolled it on her tongue, tasting sweet and salt together. She reached for a second, but found herself thinking of Beyon’s wives instead, and no longer felt hungry.
“I can see why you keep these in your belt,” she said. “They’re delicious.”
“They’re not for me. I usually give them to the slave children.”
“You like children?” she asked. The Bright One rose in her mind, though she couldn’t see it.
He frowned, studying the floor, where a god Mesema didn’t recognise held a hammer aloft. She realised with a pang that Beyon did not wish to discuss children with her now that his wives were dead, now that she had told Eyul to kill them.
But he forgot his own nature. He had threatened to behead Banreh; he had made Sahree, Tarub, and Willa disappear.
“Beyon,” she said, wiping salt from her fingers, “listen. What did you do with Sahree and the other body-slaves from the desert?”
“The dungeon.” He frowned again. “Probably still there.”
“With everything that’s happening, will the guards remember they have them?”
“Maybe. Maybe not.”
Mesema imagined the kindly old servant starving to death on the cold floor of a stone cell.
He must have seen something in her expression, for he raised his hands in a defensive gesture. “They could have seen your moon-mark. I did it to protect you.”
“Exactly,” she said, meeting his eyes. “Beyon, listen. I didn’t want your wives to die. Cerana brought me here, and Cerana brought the marks to you and me. Cerana has its terrible gods and the prices they demand. The rules of this game were made long before I started playing.”
“I know that.” He sat down beside her again. “But it’s not just Cerana. The rules of Settu are the rules of the world.”
She thought about her father, surrounded by the men in his longhouse. He and Banreh huddled together over ink and lambskin, planning war and alliances. There was always blood to pay, always a sacrifice. “I don’t know,” she said, but she thought she did.
“You think I’m angry at you because my wives died?”
“I thought, maybe.” Tears welled in her eyes. “It was a terrible thing.” Atia of the haughty eyes, Chiassa of the golden curls, Hadassi of the pouting mouth and her attention to rank, Marren of the wink and the joke.
He took her hands. “It’s true, but not the way you think. If my wives had been kept alive and screaming, I would have gone to save them— not because I loved them; I didn’t. They were my mother’s creatures; all of them spied on me from the moment they came to the palace. But they were my women, and my responsibility. Tuvaini knows me well. He knows what will draw me out.” He drew a breath before continuing, “You were right to protect me from charging in. It’s only… When I heard you say the words, I couldn’t help but think that the palace had corrupted you—that I had corrupted you—and I was sorry for that.”
She looked at their joined hands. “The palace corrupted you as well.”
“I was born to it. Sometimes I think that’s what the pattern is: the palace’s own stink, written on my skin.”
“I don’t think that.”
“You are a good person, Zabrina,” he said, kissing her hair. “I’ve told Eyul to kill many times, and it wasn’t always the right thing to do. I thought fear and cruelty were my best tools, but now I see there are other ways to rule. Tuvaini may well be a better emperor.”
“I don’t believe that. You want to be the emperor.”
He laughed. “Of course I want to be the emperor, but that doesn’t mean I’m a good one. Those are completely different things.”
“I like you better now than when you were the emperor.” That was true.
“Now, maybe, but we’ll see about tomorrow, right?” They both laughed.
“That’s about right,” she said.
“Mesema,” he said, surprising her by using her real name, “it’s all slipping away—my throne, my wives—I can barely feel them any more. I can only feel the end coming.”
She lifted her head and listened.
“Sometimes I tried so hard to be what an emperor should be, but really all I could think of was having a great tomb, like Satreth. Part of me always just wanted to join my brothers.”
I think you will. You will. She pressed her moon-mark to his as she blinked away tears. “Don’t slip away just yet. You have a brother who is still alive.”
The memories came,