Page 71 of A Reign of Embers

I tamp down those heated thoughts and peer out at the guards clustered outside. The fact that I find myself looking at five rather than the usual three sends any other consideration right out of my head with a jangle of my nerves.

“What’s going on? Has there been—” Panic spikes through my veins. “Is Coraya all right?”

Kassun’s eyes widen at my tone. He holds up his hands. “No one’s been hurt. We just—there was an incident overnight—the high commander ordered extra precautions until we’re sure it’s dealt with.”

“Thatwhatis dealt with?” I demand, not quite able to smooth my temper from my voice. Apparently I’m the supreme ruler of the empire until I want the answer to a simple question that directly affects me.

Do they really think I’m so fragile?

Kassun, at least, doesn’t. He bobs his head, gives his fellow guards a stern frown as if daring them to object, and motions for me to follow. “It’s just… a bit of a mess. In the audience room. Like I said, no one was hurt. The cleaning staff should have it back to normal by the end of the day.”

I march along behind him with Marc at my heels and my other guards surrounding me on either side. As I reach into the well of calm at my center to settle my mood, a trace of absurd amusement passes through me.

We rarely use the audience room except for formal proclamations and assemblies. If this ‘mess’ is something that can be fixed in a day, I might never have found out about it if my staff hadn’t been so nervousaboutme finding out.

Or maybe I’d have noticed something was off regardless. More soldiers than usual are patrolling the halls. Even the nobles I pass turn tight-lipped and tense at the sight of me, though they offer their usual bows and respectful greetings.

Outside the audience room, Captain Evando is pacing. Another soldier reaches him just before I do and murmurs her report.

Evando sighs. “Well, I suppose that’s to be expected.”

He turns to me, his posture drawing stiffly rigid. “Your Imperial Highness. We hadn’t wanted to trouble you with?—”

“So I gathered,” I say, more dry than snippy now, and crane my neck toward the doorway. “Is it safe for me to go in and see this mess, or must I insist that you describe it to me?”

Evando grimaces. “It appears to be an entirely superficial defacing. Unfortunately, the likely culprits have fled in the night, so we can’t get confirmation of their intentions. But neither had significant gifts we’re aware of. You should be safe, but keep your guards close.”

My gaze flicks over the men and women in their stubborn ring around me. “I don’t think that’ll be a problem.”

I step into the vast room, and my heart sinks.

I have no love for the imperial audience room. It’s been the site of some of my most traumatic memories from my time in the palace.

This is where I first stood before Emperor Tarquin and his heir and found out my betrothal was a sham. Where I watched as the first of my unwilling competitors had her throat slit. Where one of the twins—possibly the one flanking me right now—had me brand my three lovers with the imperial crest.

None of that makes the wanton defacement any less horrifying.

All across the walls that stretch the sprawling length of the space, thick red paint has been smeared. It gives off a tangy, chemical scent that turns my stomach. Some of it is just random blotches, but in many spots it forms Sabrelle’s sigil or crude images of her totem symbols: stallions, hounds, swords and shields.

The two thrones on the dais at the far end of the room have been completely drenched in red, as if someone was slaughtered across them and left to bleed out. More red splatters the indigo rugs around them, where several servantsare scrubbing furiously while a couple of others hold out their hands, perhaps working gifts.

I wrinkle my nose. “What—how did this happen without being noticed?Canit be cleaned?”

“No one uses the audience room at night, so there weren’t any guards posted inside,” Evando says. “With no access to the space from outside the palace, there’s never seemed to be any reason to focus attention on it during the patrols. We’re assuming the perpetrators slipped in when no one was watching this particular hall and did their work quietly. And the paint… They used a particular formula that’s resistant even to gifted measures to clean it. But we have made some progress.”

Great God help me, the room used to lookworse? More nausea bubbles up.

I glance around, noticing the nobles starting to gather in the hall outside to observe my reaction—instinctively seeking out a particular icy blue gaze and head of auburn hair. Opening my mind as if a resonant voice might travel into it to reassure me.

But of course all I see and hear are regular members of the Darium court. All of the foster princes left before dawn three days ago.

My spirits waver like a candle flame in a draft. I catch a sideways look exchanged between two marchionissas and a baron’s eyebrows arching at a judgmental angle.

Jerking my gaze away, I square my shoulders.

I can’t let my court see me shaken. If I lose any more support here in the palace, gods know I’ll face more troubles than paint on the walls.

I turn back to Evando, firming my voice. “And those perpetrators, the soldiers responsible—they’ve vanished like the earlier ones?”

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