I grabbed my cane and bowed.
“The red sun draws near,” she said in lieu of a greeting. The reminder pained me, though she couldn’t know why.
“I’m nearly finished, Your Highness.”
“So you found them?” she said hollowly. “Amana’s children?”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
Lady Sarnai held a fan, as always, but she twisted it in her hands, so hard I thought it must break. When she spoke next, her voice was tight. “Show me what you’ve done.”
I knelt by my trunk, glad I had taken the time to clean it of sand and dirt. One by one I carefully took out my three dresses.
Lady Sarnai snatched the first one from me, lifting it by the sleeves to view.
“That is to be the gown of the moon,” I said. “I haven’t sewn in the moonlight yet.”
Even without its magical element in place, the dress was breathtaking. I could tell from Lady Sarnai’s silence that I had created something otherworldly.
The sleeves were long and wide and, when held up, curved like the elegant base of a lute. White-gold floss sparkled from the cuffs and the cross-collar, which I’d painstakingly embroidered with tiny flowers and clouds, and the skirt was silver, layered with five sheets of the thinnest silk to create the illusion of pale, shimmering light.
It moved her, how beautiful the dress was. I could see tears misting in her eyes, even though she blinked and struggled to hold them back.
Lady Sarnai dropped the gown to the floor. The color had drained from her face, and her eyes flooded with a mixture of wonder and horror. “It was supposed to be…impossible.”
“It wasn’t easy,” I said tiredly. I couldn’t gloat—the dresses had come at a great cost. “We faced many obstacles, magical and not. Some of your father’s men pursued us.”
Lady Sarnai’s face darkened at the news. I thought she would lash out at me for insinuating that she’d sent Edan with me so her father could capture him, but she said nothing. Still, she wasn’t surprised. I wondered if she was torn between her duty to the shansen and her hatred for him—for forcing her into marriage with Emperor Khanujin.
Lady Sarnai lifted her chin, reconstructing her careful mask of stone, but it was not quite as convincing as it had been before. “Very good, Master Tamarin.” She kept her gaze high to avoid looking at the dress, as if the very sight of it wounded her. “I’m sure Emperor Khanujin will be pleased that you have delivered his wedding gift. But don’t fool yourself into thinking this is your first of many great feats for him. The Son of Heaven’s promises are as empty as the clouds that bore him. You should never have come back.”
Her fan snapped in her hands, and she dropped the broken pieces on my dress. Without so much as a glance at the other two I’d made for her, she stormed out.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
I survived the next few days by immersing myself in my work. I was so engrossed in finishing Lady Sarnai’s dresses that I barely heard the bells ringing every morning and night, or the rain battering my roof during the storms that pounded the Autumn Palace. I scarcely even paid attention when Ammi chattered away about the emperor’s miraculous recovery from his illness, though I perked up once—when she complained the Lord Enchanter wasn’t eating much at dinner. Whatever magic I was working into the dresses muffled all the noise outside, making my deadline for Lady Sarnai feel far, far away.
After nearly three months on the road, I’d forgotten how exhilarating it was to lose myself to my craft. Not long ago, it had been my heart’s desire to become the greatest tailor in A’landi. Life had been so different then—before I came to the palace, before I wielded my magic scissors, before I met Edan.
He hadn’t come to visit me. It stung, but I couldn’t blame him. Emperor Khanujin must have forbidden it, though sometimes from my window I felt sure a hawk watched me work late into the night. Deep down, when I pushed aside my anger for the emperor, I told myself it was better this way—for both of us. It would hurt less when we had to part.
And so, with the help of my magic scissors and spider-silk gloves, I spent the days spinning sunlight into golden thread so delicate it wouldn’t blind or burn. Sunlight wasn’t something I could spill onto my cutting table and measure with a stick. So I worked straight