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“You look as if you were bound for your own funeral,” Glirastes says. My old friend sways up behind me to look out at the city.
“It may yet be.”
“Oh, please.”
“Do you have it?” He hands me the Dux pendant I had made for Rhone. “I am told there are crescents painted upon every street corner from the Hippodrome to the spaceport. You go too far.”
Glirastes shrugs. Today he wears silver and white, the colors of my house. On his neck is a gold chain with a great pendant of an eye with a ruby iris. The Eye of the Society, the greatest award any civilian can receive. Octavia gave it to him long ago at the unveiling of the Water Colossus of Tyche.
Though Atalantia has not executed him as a traitor yet, neither has she gifted him with a pardon.
“You’re projecting frustration, dear boy. Desist. I am the artist. If it is to be a diva duel, I’ll match you cry for cry and then piss on your pillow and blame it on my dead ocelot, and you’ll wonder if I’m insane, and I’ll cackle, because yes. Yes, I am. And I can get away with anything.”
“Atalantia still may kill you,” I say. “Don’t forget.”
“If I were a betting man…”
“Which you are.”
“Then I would wager all on the proposition that my head is more secure than yours, young Lune. After all, I am the best kind of hero—harmless. And you are the worst—young with a name.”
I sigh and lean on the railing with him. “I suppose I did ask for theatrics.”
“Yes, dear boy. And right now they’re the only thing keeping you alive.” That, and the furor for the Heir Returned that sweeps through Mercury and the legions.
I really don’t mind it much at all, but I fear Grandmother’s wisdom. Will Atalantia break me if she thinks I eclipse her in the mirror?
Ajax already tried. With my polite imprisonment in the Lady Beatrice, and Atalantia spurning my requests for an audience, I fear he is pouring poison in his aunt’s ear. She will think I did this for my own glory, to supplant her. Did I?
Glirastes searches my face. “Kalindora was asking for you.”
“I know.”
“She said it was important.”
I say nothing. Kalindora’s wounds were mended by the medici, but not the poison Darrow’s blade slipped into her bloodstream. She is dying. And I do not think I could do what I must were I to look her in the eye before the Triumph.
“Do you love her?” Glirastes asks.
I look at him. I left her on the ground to chase Darrow. What a hideous thing to do. “I never had the chance, but I believe I would.”
“Then I will find a cure.”
“You’re not a medicus.”
“No, but I am a genius.”
Heavy boots clomp the tile. Rhone stands in the entry. I am appalled by his armor. It is as black as the space between stars. Purple bands cover the joints, and on the chest plate is a silver crescent moon inside the pyramid of the Society. “Dominus, the shuttle has arrived.”
“Where did you get that uniform?” I ask. Rhone looks suddenly embarrassed.
“Their old gear is on Venus,” Glirastes explains. “I had new uniforms made in Naran and shipped here for the occasion.”
“You have to stop. The provocation…”
“Exists regardless of the accoutrement. I know. I know. You are not the Sovereign, nor do you campaign to be. But you are the last blood of Silenius. If Atalantia wants to kill you, she must kill your destiny before the eyes of the worlds.”
* * *
