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“Not in any consequential way. Are you?”
“Barely,” Kadou whispered. “I’m sorry,” he said again. “I promised to run, and then I . . .” He trailed off. The wagon began moving, and the clatter of the wheels on the cobblestones made it rather too noisy to talk.
Evemer closed his eyes against the sting of tears and tried to think—there must be some gambit, some way out of this. If he could sacrifice himself to let Kadou escape . . .
He had many hurts, but he was used to ignoring them. He had trained specifically so that physical discomfort would not impede him. That, he could push past or set aside.
The shame of failure was more difficult to ignore. It was doubled, and doubled again, by the thought that he had failed with the taste of Kadou still on his lips, the smell of Kadou’s hair still in his nose, the burning brands left by Kadou’s teeth still on his neck.
If they had run the moment that Siranos had left—if he had invoked his discipline and denied himself that one more moment of bliss—
It still would not have been enough. The thugs were the people who had been blocking the door and talking. Siranos had brought them with him. He probably went everywhere with them.
There must be some way to get out of this.
At least if he sacrificed himself tonight, he’d be dying still feeling the ghost of Kadou’s weight in his arms, the memory of how his cheeks flushed and his eyes sparkled when he was kissed, how his breath had caught in his chest. How he’d kissed back. It hadn’t been just for the pretense. It had been real.
Evemer closed his eyes against the dark. Is this how it had been for Tadek, when he’d fallen together with Kadou? This slow descent into wanting until, before he knew it, he was wild with it? No, Tadek would have thrown himself into it with his eyes open. He would have known what he was getting himself into, at least well enough to know that it hadn’t involved an exchange of hearts. He would have had a map for that wilderness—but Evemer had no map, and both he and his heart were already lost . . . Except for Kadou, burning like the compass star, the center of his sky that all the heavens turned around, steady and constant enough for Evemer to set his course by.
And yet Evemer had given in to base lust, as if he deserved to look upon Kadou in that way and think that he could reach far enough across the vast expanse of space to kiss Kadou’s mouth again, to touch him, to hold him.
He could have run. Perhaps Evemer’s sacrifice would have been enough, if Kadou had just managed to be a little less goddamn noble. Why couldn’t he just accept that Evemer’s place was to hang back and hold them off?
But Kadou never left him behind, never turned his back, even before they knew each other well, even when Evemer still disliked him. Every opportunity he’d had to stand with Evemer, he’d seized with both hands. And Evemer (gods strike him down) had thought him careless, flighty, negligent.
Stupid noble little fool. Fools, the both of them. Kadou, for placing too much value on Evemer’s life. Evemer, for being so shamefully, wretchedly grateful to not be dead just yet—oh, gods, strike him down. Gods, forgive him.
Kadou had stood and fought, and Evemer’s soul sang out toward him.
He didn’t know how long they were in the wagon, but eventually it jolted to a stop, and there were voices outside again, and the doors were opened. Their eyes were blinded by the flare of lanterns. While they were wincing, the bonds around their ankles were cut and they were dragged out.
They’d been taken to a very well-to-do quarter of the city, inhabited mostly by merchants, visiting minor dignitaries, business owners, and a few particularly wealthy and exclusive artists and artisans. They were led to a large blocky house of three stories with a grand front door, stained wood with wide beaten-brass straps, framed by a large portico. The building was made all of pale stone, and the entrance hall, when they were dragged inside, was floored with smooth marble.
Lamps were hung everywhere, and fine rugs covered the floors. The thugs dragged the two of them up a flight of stairs, through winding hallways, and into a room where Siranos and Sylvia already waited.
The room was a salon—a wide chamber with tall windows on the long side that overlooked the street. It was floored with polished dark wood and paneled with the same, though the wall panels were extravagantly carved into a series of stylized trees whose lacy branches arced to the ceiling. There was a great fireplace, lying cold now for the warmth of summer.
There was another person in the room besides Siranos and Sylvia: the not-quite-convicted criminal Azuta Melachrinos. He suspected Kadou would have only seen her once, when Her Majesty had hired that Inachan satyota to question her. Evemer had still been on the fringe-guard when she’d been arrested and he’d seen her only a couple times more than that, but there was no mistaking her. She was wearing an Arasti women’s kaftan—brocade in shades of umber and burgundy, trimmed with silk braid and closed with gilt buttons—but her iron-and-black hair was pinned up in a distinctly Oissic chignon. She was middle-aged and held her chin high and proud, and the last time Evemer had seen her, she’d carried herself with such icy poise that the iron shackles on her wrists had looked like jewelry.
That poise had vanished now. “Thank the gods,” she snarled when she saw them. “What did I tell you,kyrioi? Here he is, the nosy little prince who’s been causing you so much trouble! I told you he’d come sniffing again!”
“It’s certainly a relief,” Sylvia said darkly from where she was lounging elegantly across one of the couches by the fireplace. “One prince, a neatly gift-wrapped hostage. But the other one looks familiar . . . ?”
“His guard,” Siranos said. “Nobody important.” He stalked toward them, furious. “You couldn’t have just stayed out of it, could you?” he hissed to Kadou in a low voice. “I tried to be kind to you, and—I was going to undo it. I would have undone it all and come back, and you just . . .” He bared his teeth. “But it’s all useless now, isn’t it? You’ve already told Zeliha, and I’ve lost everything, haven’t I? Knew that as soon as I sawhimlast night.” His eyes shot to Evemer.
“Yes, yes,” Sylvia drawled, rolling her eyes. “If you’d just listened to me the first hundred times I told you that it was all pointless, you wouldn’t be in this mess. But here we are, and at least you’ve come to your senses now. If you’re good, I won’t even tell Father that you nearly sold us out. First question: What are you planning to do with the prince?”
“You have space enough in this house, don’t you?” Siranos said. “You’ve got entire warrens of cellars, or at least doors that lock. And I have guards enough to watch him. We only need a few days to find afuckingship to get us out of here—”
Sylvia held up one hand, glittering with rings. “Yes, we’ve heard quite enough of your vulgar language about the ships, brother. Do stop panicking, it’s giving me such a headache.”
Siranos did look haggard, now that Evemer was looking at him in decent light. He was moving with quick little jerks, his jaw clenched and his hands flexing open and closed, as if he wanted to be pacing or chewing his nails or breaking things. Evemer tried to shift closer to Kadou, but the guards yanked him back.
A few days, they said, and they didn’t mean to kill Kadou. That was something, at least. Better a hostage than dead. Evemer looked helplessly at Kadou, wondered if Melek had seen them taken, if çe had followed the carriage . . . But even if çe hadn’t, their absence would be noted and the alarm raised—çe would run back to Mama’s house and tell the kahyalar there, and they’d take it to Zeliha at once, and then within hours there would be patrols on the street—
Surely there were enough loyal kahyalar for that. Surely.
But if Kadou was locked up in Sylvia’s alleged warren of cellars, would they even have a hope of finding him? Zeliha knew of Siranos and Sylvia’s involvement, surely had intelligence about the location of their residence . . . Unless thiswasn’ttheir residence, and they’d already been covering their tracks.
