All along, Tavin had been helping her. Undermining Rhusana. Dying by inches. All along.
She’d thought he’d given up. She’d thought he didn’t believe they could win against Rhusana, that she was not enough.
But he’d never once stopped believing.
She wanted to sing. She wanted to howl. She wanted to weep and laugh and tear the garden down. She wanted to strangle Tavin and kiss his wretched fool face until her lips fell off.
She needed to—
Stick to the plan.That’s what Khoda would tell her. She had every intention of booting him off the nearest suitable cliff for putting her and Tavin and Jasimir through this, but it would have to wait.
Rhusana still needed Tavin. He would play the fool and get away from the queen when he could, and—and he would find her, and—
The hour-bell began to toll.
Fie set the teeth down on the bench and ran her hands over her face, over her hair, until the thunder in her skull retreated enough for her to think. She needed a new face, a new gown, a steady heart. The Peacock glamour shifted, the fabric bleeding from delicate teal to the same crimson as the lantern-lilies, the illusion of Niemi’s long braid weaving instead into one that sat over her head like a crown. When Fie stood and caught her reflection in the glassblack window, she realized the face she wore now was none other than Ambra’s.
The one upshot of this all, Fie thought grimly to herself, was that, being dead for so long, the artists never got Ambra’s face right.
She heard the commotion of Peacocks gratefully fleeing the swamp of the Tower of Memories and slipped back inside, falling in with the crowd. They shuffled out and into the late-afternoon haze, then up the steps to the Hall of the Dawn. Hawk war-witches were at the doors, testing caste.
Fie got in line for the one from Draga’s office, who had recognized Jasimir. Draga had said they would be stationed at the door to make certain Fie made it in, and as the war-witch’s hand clasped Fie’s wrist, she saw their eyes sharpen.
“You may enter,” they said, and then added under their breath: “Fortune’s favor to you, Lady Crow.”
It was a small thing, a scrap of faith, and once it had felt like a burden. Now it felt like another tooth in her arsenal.
Fie gave them the same slight smile they’d given Jasimir, and headed into the Hall of the Dawn.
It was not the same place it had been on the solstice. Layers of whitewash had been slapped over the once-vivid walls, the rich tapestries replaced with filmy gauze of silver, gold, white. The lanterns within the great iron columns had not been rekindled. Instead, fresh white oleander blossoms had been stuffed into the gaps, making eachtowering Phoenix’s portrait look almost as if it had gone rotten and molded over. White petals carpeted the marble floor, the dais, even the thrones, though Fie dearly hoped Rhusana had had the sense to order flowers less poisonous than oleanders for that.
Even the wreckage of the golden sunrise behind the thrones had been twisted and threaded through with garlands of more white blossoms. If Fie squinted, she thought it could be a swan now, but a sickly one for certain.
Servants were picking their way across the flowers with trays of wine and sweets, but there were markedly fewer than at the coronation. All of their sleeves were buttoned above the elbow, displaying arms free of the Sinner’s Brand. They all looked worn to near bone—doubtless the work of making over the Hall of the Dawn had fallen on them, too, for no one else could.
It was no secret that Sparrows were fleeing the palace rather than wait to see what would kill them first, Rhusana or the plague. It was a trap Fie knew too well.
Fie wove her way around the knots of uneasy Peacocks, who looked unsteady and garish in their bright garb against the bleak whites and blacks of the hall. Even the music sounded timid, strained, the few musicians clustered on the ground floor.
It felt like when she’d walked the empty halls of the royal quarters at night—too still, too lifeless. It felt like crawling through a glittering corpse.
Fie marked Draga near the head of the hall, looking more than ever like a tiger ready to make a kill. If the master-general had not had a reputation for loathing parties, it would have been perhaps a bit too obvious, but her scowl was perfectly typical.
Jasimir was not out among the servants yet. They couldn’t risk him being dispatched on an errand and missing his cue. Khoda, however,was winding through the crowds, his glamoured face the picture of servile serenity.
A swell of simmering fury boiled in Fie’s backbone at the sight. Some even-headed part of her knew he’d done what he’d done for her sake, for Jasimir’s, for Sabor’s.
The rest of her was ready to tear his throat out.
Not yet, her Chief voice ordered.Not here.
Fie wandered until she was close enough to the head of the hall to have a clean view. It would be just like the coronation: wait for the right moment, conjure another firebird, throw in a sign that the Covenant favored Jasimir once he was revealed.
She just had to wait for the right moment.
Her heart drummed, drummed, drummed in her ears.
Minutes ticked by. The musicians played on. The sun crept toward the horizon. The queen was late.
