Page 83 of The Rebel's Prize

Aristides actually smiled at that. "I am glad to hear it."

He turned his attention to Imogene. "And you, Major? Sophia knows you."

Imogene's amusement shifted to a polite aristo mask. "If you insist, Your Imperial Majesty, but I would prefer to remain with my husbandat this time."

The emperor frowned, looking as though he was about to tell Imogene that it was his preferences, not hers, that were important.

Lucien felt an odd combination of amusement and concern from Chloe. Did she know why Imogene was refusing?

"There are matters of our estate that are...pressing," Imogene added in a gentler voice.

Aristides's eyes narrowed as he looked at her for a moment, and then the side of his mouth lifted, apparent understanding lightening his expression. "Well, far be it from me to stand between you and the duties of the du Laq house."

The amusement flowing through the bond increased as Imogene's expression turned to relief.

She rested one hand on her stomach briefly before clasping her hands behind her back, and suddenly it hit him. She was pregnant. That would explain the late-night chats with Chloe aboard the navire and the endless cups of herbal tea she had drunk on the return journey.

He fought to keep a smile off his face. Protocol required that everyone pretend that a pregnancy didn't exist until the couple announced it. Though Imogene couldn't be very far along—the lines of her uniform were as sleekly tailored as ever. Which was another reason she may not wish to travel. Or say why.

"Very well," Aristides said. "I am sure Colonel Ferritine can find someone to send. We have had several delegations back and forth already. Anything else?”

"No, Your Imperial Majesty," Lucien said.

"What will you do while we wait for Queen Sophia to arrive?" Aristides asked, clearly entertaining no notion that Sophie would refuse to come.

"Research," Chloe said. "We need to hunt through all the archives and see if we can find anything similar to this that has happened before."

"You think someone else has learned this magic in the past?"

"Or something similar. Given what it allows people to do, I can only think that if it has, no one would have wanted it known." She tilted her head at Aristides. "Do emperors share knowledge of such things, Your Imperial Majesty?"

Her tone was cautious. Aristides's father had died young. The emperor had ascended to the throne at eighteen. And while he'd been raised as the heir from birth, there may well be things his father had never had time to share.

"I have archives of my own," Aristides admitted. "I have never heard of such a thing, but many of my forebears kept diaries and records of one kind or another. I used to have to study parts of them when I was younger."

"That must have been enlightening," Lucien said.

"Some of it," Aristides agreed. "Though much of it was long entries about negotiations of tariffs and tax quotas, which, while enlightening, is not what anyone would describe as exciting. I preferred the anecdotes about military history. I suspect I was too young to be shown anything too scandalous during my education. And I have never needed to turn my attention to magical misdeeds in the past. But there are full copies held in the palace archives. I shall consult my record keepers."

CHAPTER18

Two days later, Chloe had a distinct urge to set fire to the entire archives. After far too many hours of trawling through ancient texts unearthed by the archivists, including Venable Orleane, the Academe's Chief Archivist herself, she was wondering if mages were deliberately oblique in writing about their magical discoveries. She put down the latest dusty tome, which seemed to focus far more on the author’s obsession with irrigation in the town he'd settled in than actual water magic, and groaned.

Lucien and Imogene, seated across the table from her, looked up hopefully.

"Don't get excited. That was frustration, not discovery." She pushed back her chair and stood, stretching her arms wide to ease the ache in her back from too many hours spent hunched over books.

From above her came a squawk. She looked up at Mai, perched in what had become her usual position on the top of the nearest bookshelf. Ever since Chloe had set foot back in the Academe two days ago, the raven had been her constant shadow. She shouldn't have been able to get into the archives, which were off-limits to students, let alone birds, but her antics had been something of a welcome counter to their unsuccessful search for any clues about memory magic. They had found plenty of references to such things being forbidden and too dangerous to try, but not so much on why.

They had more luck learning about how the healers eased a memory, but that, as Valentin had already explained, wasn't the same as erasing it completely. There were a few herbal concoctions that could have the same effect, but they were also temporary.

Even the record of the incident that had earned Deandra her expulsion was lacking in any useful detail about how she'd been planning to erase the memory of the student who'd been manning the library the night Deandra tried to steal old exams.

Henri had admitted that he'd been more focused on simply dealing with the expulsion, given the magic had clearly been unsuccessful. Nothing similar had happened since, maybe precisely because of how strongly the story of Deandra and her fellow conspirator had been impressed upon new generations of students.

Cheat and lose any hope of graduating from any of the empire’s Academes.

Mai squawked again. Chloe held out her arm in invitation, knowing the raven would just keep interrupting if she didn't. Mai swooped down, landing gracefully on Chloe's forearm.

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