The Heart of Betrayal (The Remnant Chronicles #2) - Mary E. Pearson Page 0,112

hundreds of songs of Venda, just as Kaden had told me. The written songs were all long destroyed, but that didn’t keep her words from living on in memory and story, though there were few now who remembered them. At least they knew of the claw and vine, and the clans I’d met on the fens and uplands knew of the name Jezelia too. An anticipation ran through them. Pieces of Venda’s songs were alive, in the air, and rooted in some deep part of their understanding. They knew.

All the written songs destroyed. Except for the one I possessed. And someone had tried to destroy that one too.

The door opened, and they all startled, expecting to see the Komizar, but it was Calantha.

“The Komizar’s been delayed. It may be a while. He wishes the dressmakers to wait in the next chamber until he’s ready for them again.” The women wasted no time in following the instructions and scurried off with armfuls of fabric into the next room.

“What about me?” I asked. “Am I supposed to wait, stuck in a dress full of pins until he decides to come back?”

“Yes.”

I grumbled a seething breath.

Calantha smiled. “So much hostility. Isn’t an uncomfortable wait worth it for your beloved?”

I looked at her, tired of her sarcasm, and formed a biting reply, but it suddenly stalled on my lips as I stared at her. She was always trying to hate me. My own words circled back to me. I think you’re dabbling with a bit of power. A power she was afraid to exert. She was like a wildcat circling a hole, trying to find a way to get the bait without falling into the trap.

She turned to go abruptly, as if she knew I had glimpsed her secret.

“Wait,” I said, jumping down from the block. I grabbed her wrist, and she stared at my hand as if my touch burned her. I realized that, other than a stiff poke to my back, I had never seen her touch anyone.

“Why did you help the Komizar kill your own father?” I asked.

As pale as Calantha already was, she blanched. “That’s not for you to ask.”

“I want to understand, and I know you want to tell me.”

She yanked her wrist loose. “It’s an ugly story, Princess. Too ugly for your delicate ears.”

“Is it because you love him?”

“The Komizar?” A small laugh escaped her lips. She shook her head, and I could almost see something large and numbing jar loose inside her.

“Please,” I said. “I know you’ve both helped and hindered me. You’re battling something. I won’t betray you, Calantha. I promise.”

The air was taut. I held my breath, afraid the slightest move would push her away from me again.

“Yes, I love him,” she admitted, “but not in the way you’re thinking.” She walked across the room and stared out the window for a long time, then finally turned and told me. Her voice was detached, vacant, as if she spoke of someone else. She was the child of Carmedes, a member of the Rahtan. Her mother had been a cook in the Sanctum who died when she was small. When she was twelve, Carmedes seized power and became the 698th Komizar of Venda. He was a suspicious man with a heavy hand and short temper, but she managed to mostly avoid him. “I was fifteen when I fell in love with a boy from the Meurasi clan. He told me clan stories of other times and other places that made me forget my own miserable life. We were careful to keep our relationship a secret and managed that feat for almost a year.” Her chest rose in several slow breaths before she went on. “But one day, my father caught us in the servants’ stable together. He had no reason to be angered. He cared little about me, but he flew into a rage.”

She sat on one of the dressmaking stools and told me that back then our current Komizar was the Assassin. He was a young man of eighteen, and he had found them both bleeding into the straw. The boy was dead, and she was half dead. The Assassin scooped her up and called for a healer. “The bruises faded, the bones mended, the torn patches of hair grew back, but some things were gone for good. The boy and—”

“Your eye.”

“My father came to see me once during the weeks that I lay bedridden. He looked down at me and said if I ever