The cold air sank sharp teeth into him and Remin realized he was outside, but he hardly knew where he was going or why, only that he couldn’t stay where he was. His long legs carried him down the lane beside the house, the white snow illuminating the dark enough for him to find his way, and the path to the stable had been shoveled only that afternoon.
His chest hurt. His hands shook as he clenched them into fists, striding faster and faster, and when he pushed open the doors of the stable, he didn’t know why he was there. If he was running, he could not escape the thing that was chasing him.
There was no safe place. Ever.
***
Miche found him there a few minutes later, standing in the wide straw-strewn aisle between horse stalls, with his arms wrapped tightly around himself.
“Rem,” Miche said, pushing the door shut. “A little late to go out riding.”
“You were listening.”
“Of course. Saves me the trouble of asking you and Ophele to repeat it later.” Miche moved forward, but not too close. Even with the warmth of the horses, it was still cold enough in the stable that their breaths curled up white.
“I just needed to think.” Remin’s voice hitched. “I knew she had something to do with it. I knew—it doesn’t change anything. They’re all dead, and nothing will ever bring them back, and she…betrayedthem.”
“Whatever her mother did, Ophele is innocent,” Miche said quietly.
“I know. I know, I don’t blame her. I love her. I just don’t…I don’t know,”Remin said, and sank down on a nearby bale of hay, scrubbing a hand over his face. “I know how it works. I can guess how it happened. She was young, alone, I’m sure they threatened her. They used her to kill my father, my mother,everyone,and I still don’t knowwhy.”
Miche sat down beside him. Listening.
“If I don’t know why, it could happen again,” Remin whispered. His arms wrapped around his middle, his black eyes fixed on the floor. “I keep…dreaming about it, ever since that messenger came. I dream about the Place of White Stones, and…sometimes it’s my father and my mother, and sometimes it’s you there, or Juste, or Ophele on the block, and they cut off all her hair, and she’s crying for me but I can’t get to her, or I have to watch, and sometimeshe’sthere and hemakesme see it, hemakesme watch…”
Miche did not need to ask whohewas. There was only one person in the world that put that raw horror in Remin’s voice, and Miche was one of the few people that knew that Remin was afraid of the Emperor, that he feared that man with an almost religious terror. The Emperor had destroyed his world, and had been terrorizing him since he was eight years old.
“He won’t do that. That won’t happen,” Miche said, gripping his shoulder hard. “Juste is already seeing to that. And she’s the Emperor’s daughter, he can’t—”
“Who says she is?” Remin yanked away, suddenly furious. “Can weprovethat? What’s to stop him from declaring her an imposter the second we walk through the gate in Starfall? He could say I killed her and got some woman to replace her, and who’s going to argue? What am I going to do, wave fucking papers at him?”
“Oh.” That was all Miche could manage, stricken.
“He could.” Remin caught his breath. “He could. The Court of Nobility wouldn’t stop him; they didn’t stop him when he wiped outtwo noble Houses.The Temple wouldn’t, not if he claims she’s not an Agnephus. They might even have her flogged for blasphemy. He could have her killed, or imprisoned, or even if it’s not now, it could be my children, he could take everyone away from me again, to the—the P-Place of White…and…and the crowd, and I can’t…Ican’t…”
He was shaking all over, gasping, and Miche rose and went to him.
“Why can’t heleave me alone?”Remin asked, his voice cracking, and even as Miche reached for him, he broke, in terrible, racking sobs. His shoulders heaved as he bent, letting Miche hold him even as Miche staggered under the weight and held on, arms squeezing as hard as he could, pounding the back of one huge, shaking shoulder with his fist.
“We’ll think of something,” he promised, forcing the words through his tight throat. “I swear it, Rem, I swear it. That will not happen. We’ll talk to Juste…”
Remin wasn’t listening. Not yet. His hot face pressed into Miche’s shoulder just as he had done on a night many years before, the night when he had slipped away for his first kiss and come home with his first kill, and the blood of his sweetheart on his hands. And now, as then, there was no remedy. There was nothing Miche could say. Nothing he could do but hold on tight, and curse the Emperor in his heart.
But it wasn’t long before this storm passed, and it wasn’t because of anything Miche did. Remin just stopped, straightened, and sucked it in, shoving it all back down as he had done so many times before.
Gently, he shrugged off Miche’s hands and stepped back.
“Sorry,” he said, averting his eyes. “Sorry. I’ll be back. I’m just going to…dunk my head.”
Miche nodded. When Remin finally reappeared sometime later, his wet hair was freezing in spikes, and his eyes were very red.
“I had this put by,” Miche said, producing a bottle of wine and patting the hay bale. Actually, he’d run off to Davi’s cottage to steal it, but he had figured it might take Remin a bit to compose himself. “Drink. Don’t stop until I count to five.”
Remin did not smile. But he drank obediently for five slow seconds, and then sighed and handed the bottle back. His hands had stopped shaking.
“We won’t let that happen,” Miche repeated. “It’s good that you thought of it. Edemir’s there right now, and Juste is sending his singers out all over the Empire. If it comes to that, Bram will have his mercenaries in the Place of White Stones. The river’s not far from there, and we’ll have boats waiting. We’ll have people in the prison. We’ll get Brother Oleare to attest the authenticity of Ophele’s birth records. Find some folk at Aldeburke to witness that Ophele is who we say she is. It’s a good thing I didn’t run them all off after all, I guess.”
“Azelma?” Remin asked thickly, letting his head fall back against the stable door behind him. Brambles stuck his nose through the bars and chewed gently on his hair.
