Page 40 of House of Dusk
Queens did not sleep in dining rooms.
There were two other doors, aside from the one by which she and Sinoe had entered. One of them must lead to the queen’s bedchamber. Was that where the kore lay during the night? Her bones tucked into a silken sleeping gown, a scarf tied round her poor bare skull?
Did the king—
Raised voices interrupted her thoughts, which was probably all for the best.
“The ambassador meant no insult, Father,” Sinoe was saying.
“What did she mean, then?” The king tore at a leg of quail, fingers digging into the oily flesh.
Sinoe gave one of her light, tinkling laughs. “Tami’s an ailouron, not a marriage contract. You should be happy about it, Father. It shows how greatly the Scarthians esteem us.”
“It shows how shamelessly they try to manipulate you,” scoffed Hierax. “That woman thinks she can win you over with amber baubles and ill-bred pets.”
“Tami isn’t ill-bred,” protested Sinoe, her expression hardening. For the first time, Yeneris saw the resemblance between father and daughter, as they glowered at one another. “The gift of an ailouron is a great honor. A sign of respect for me, as Kizare’s daughter.”
Crack!
The king’s fist struck the table so hard it made the wine slosh from Sinoe’s goblet. “Enough. I will not have you insult my true queen. You will return that beast, or we’ll be feasting on ailouron flesh next time we dine together. Now. Apologize.”
Sinoe’s lips trembled. Yeneris winced as Tami’s talons clutched at her, and she could hear the low growl beginning to boil in the creature’s chest.I know. I want to tear his throat out too.But that would only make things worse.
Gingerly, she lifted a hand to stroke the ailouron, the way she’d seen Sinoe soothe Tami earlier. Surprisingly—but gratifyingly—Tami did not snap her fingers off. The feathers around her neck calmed somewhat, though she continued to rumble unhappily.
“I’m sorry, Father,” said Sinoe at last, though there was little repentance in her tone.
Hierax stared back, still thunderous. “I’m not the one you insulted.”
Sinoe’s shoulders hunched. She looked ill. But she turned toward the silent, veiled figure. Her voice was almost a whisper, hoarse with unhappiness. “I’m sorry. Mother.”
They finished the meal in silence.
CHAPTER 12
YENERIS
Yeneris snuck out two nights later. She waited until Sinoe was asleep, then another hour to be safe. When she moved to the window, Tami creeled faintly from the cage, but a handful of her favorite dried lamb quieted her.
Sinoe had said nothing of returning the ailouron to the Scarthians. If anything, she lavished more attention on the creature than ever, feeding her choice treats, grooming her feathers to a mirror gloss. She’d shocked Yeneris by waking at dawn that morning in order to take Tami to the gardens. They’d watched the ailouron fly, her wild swoops making both of them laugh. But there had been a ghost of sorrow in the princess’s eyes.
Yeneris shoved all thought of Sinoe’s eyes aside. Tonight, she belonged to Bassara. Tonight, she was herself again. Holding that thought close, she slipped out into the night.
She still didn’t trust the wisteria to hold her, but that was all right, because she was going up, not down. She gripped the ornate casement and pulled herself up. This was one of the advantages to the excessive ornamentation the Helissoni favored. It made scaling the palace exteriormucheasier.
A few minutes later she was on the roof, padding lightly across the crimson tiles. She’d scouted the route during her first week, when she first heard the rumor that the reliquary was in the south wing. Too risky to do more at the time. But now that she’d seen the interior, she at least had some better sense of where to go.
Still a risk. Maybe she was being a fool. But the memory of the kore dressed as a puppet queen haunted her. And it wasn’t as if she were planning to take on all eight guards single-handedly—though she had to admit a part of her brain was playing out that exact scenario, and even insisting on including Sinoe as an admiring observer, which was ridiculous, since if the princess had known what she was up to she’d be anything but admiring.
No, she would play this smart. From what Yeneris had seen, the south wing was laid out in almost a mirror to the north. Which meant that there was a good chance that it would have the same air shafts in the ceiling. If she could make it onto the roof undetected, that might give her a way inside.
Harder to get back out again, of course. She’d need rope, which might be tricky.
Everything was going just fine until she reached the southwest tower. There were four of these tall spires, one at each corner of the palace. Yeneris had bypassed the northwest tower easily enough, spidering her way around just beneath the circular balcony—the same balcony from which she and Sinoe had watched the prince depart.
It should have been easy enough to do the same at the southwest tower. Except for the foxwings that had decided to build a nest right between what would have been her third and fourth handholds.
She heard the warning chitter just in time to snatch back her hand, narrowly avoiding the stab of sharp teeth. Cursing silently, she tried to work her way back. Maybe she could get around the other side?
