“Undoubtedly, Your Grace.”

He looked back down at the grey patch. There’s no chance an Idrian did this, he realized. Not if he used Awakening. “What was this Lifeless creature you mentioned?”

“A Lifeless squirrel, Your Grace,” one of the men said. “The intruder used it as a diversion.”

“Well made?” he asked.

They nodded. “Using modern Command words, if its actions were any judge,” one said. “It even had ichor-alcohol instead of blood. Took us the better part of the night to catch the thing!”

“I see,” Lightsong said, standing. “But the intruder escaped?”

“Yes, Your Grace,” one of them said.

“What do you suppose he was after?”

The priests wavered. “We don’t know for sure, Your Grace,” one of them said. “We scared him away before he could reach his goal—one of our men saw him fleeing back out the way he had come. Perhaps the resistance was too much for him.”

“We think that he may have been a common burglar, Your Grace,” one said. “Here to sneak into the gallery and steal the art.”

“Sounds likely enough to me,” Lightsong said, standing. “Good work with this, and all that.” He turned, walking back down the hallway toward the entrance. He felt strangely surreal.

The priests were lying to him.

He didn’t know how he could tell. Yet he did—he knew it deep inside, with some instincts he hadn’t realized he possessed. Instead of disturbing him, for some reason the lies excited him.

“Your Grace,” Llarimar said, hurrying up. “Did you find what you wanted?”

“That was no Idrian who broke in,” Lightsong said quietly as they walked into the sunlight.

Llarimar raised an eyebrow. “There have been cases of Idrians coming to Hallandren and buying themselves Breath, Your Grace.”

“And have you ever heard of one using a Lifeless?”

Llarimar fell quiet. “No, Your Grace,” he finally admitted.

“Idrians hate Lifeless. Consider them abominations, or some such nonsense. Either way, it wouldn’t make sense for an Idrian to try and get in like that. What would be the point? Assassinating a single one of the Returned? He or she would only be replaced, and the protocols in place would be certain that even the Lifeless armies weren’t without someone to direct them for long. The possibility for retaliation would far outweigh the benefit.”

“So you believe that it was a thief?”

“Of course not,” Lightsong said. “A ‘common burglar’ with enough money or Breath that he can waste a Lifeless, just for a diversion? Whoever broke in, he was already rich. Besides, why sneak through the servants’ hallway? There are no valuables there. The interior of the palace holds far more wealth.”

Llarimar fell quiet again. He looked over at Lightsong, the same curious expression as before on his face. “That’s some very solid reasoning, Your Grace.”

“I know,” Lightsong said. “I feel positively unlike myself. Perhaps I need to go get drunk.”

“You can’t get drunk.”

“Ah, but I certainly enjoy trying.”

They walked back toward his palace, picking up his servants on the way. Llarimar seemed unsettled. Lightsong, however, simply felt excited. Murder in the Court of Gods, he thought. True, it was only a servant—but I’m supposed to be a god for all people, not just important ones. I wonder how long it’s been since someone was killed in the court? Hasn’t happened in my lifetime, certainly.

Mercystar’s priests were hiding something. Why had the intruder released a diversion—particularly such an expensive one—if he were simply going to run away? The servants of the Returned were not formidable soldiers or warriors. So why had he given up so easily?

All good questions. Good questions that he, of all people, shouldn’t have bothered to wonder about. And yet, he did.

All the way back to the palace, through a nice meal, and even into the night.

24

Siri’s servants clustered around her uncertainly as she walked into the chaotic room. She wore a blue and white gown with a ten-foot train. As she entered, scribes and priests looked up in shock; some immediately scrambled to their feet, bowing. Others just stared as she passed, her serving women doing their best to hold her train with dignity.

Determined, Siri continued through the chamber—which was more like a hallway than a proper room. Long tables lined the walls, stacks of paper cluttered those tables, and scribes—Pahn Kahl men in brown, Hallandren men in the day’s colors—worked on the papers. The walls were, of course, black. Colored rooms were only found in the center of the palace, where the God King and Siri spent most of their time. Separately, of course.

Though, things are a little different at night, she thought, smiling. It felt very conspiratorial of her to be teaching him letters. She had a secret that she was keeping from the rest of the kingdom, a secret that involved one of the most powerful men in the entire world. That gave her a thrill. She supposed she should have been more worried. Indeed, in her more thoughtful moments, the reality behind Bluefingers’s warnings did worry her. That’s why she had come to the scribes’ quarters.

I wonder why the bedchamber is out here, she thought. Outside the main body of the palace, in the black part.

Either way, the servants’ section of the palace—God King’s bedchamber excluded—was the last place the scribes expected to be disturbed by their queen. Siri noticed that some of her serving women looked apologetically at the men in the room as Siri arrived at the doors on the far side. A servant opened the door for her, and she entered the room beyond.

A relaxed group of priests stood leafing through books in the medium sized chamber. They looked over at her. One dropped his book to the floor in shock.

“I,” Siri proclaimed, “want some books!”

The priests stared at her. “Books?” one finally asked.

“Yes,” Siri said, hands on hips. “This is the palace library, is it not?”

“Well, yes, Vessel,” the priest said, glancing at his companions. All wore the robes of their office, and this day’s colors were violet and silver.

“Well, then,” Siri said. “I’d like to borrow some of the books. I am tired of common entertainment and shall be reading to myself in my spare time.”

“Surely you don’t want these books, Vessel,” another priest said. “They are about boring topics like religion or city finances. Surely a book of stories would be more appropriate.”

Siri raised an eyebrow. “And where might I find such a ‘more appropriate’ volume?”

“We could have a reader bring the book from the city collection,” the priest said, stepping forward smoothly. “He’d be here shortly.”

Siri hesitated. “No. I do not like that option. I shall take some of these books here.”

“No, you shall not,” a new voice said from behind.

Siri turned. Treledees, high priest of the God King, stood behind her, fingers laced, miter on his head, frown on his face.

“You cannot refuse me,” Siri said. “I am your queen.”

“I can and will refuse you, Vessel,” Treledees said. “You see, these books are quite valuable, and should something happen to them, the kingdom would suffer grave consequences. Even our priests are not allowed to bear them out of the room.”

“What could happen to them in the palace, of all places?” she demanded.

“It is the principle, Vessel. These are the property of a god. Susebron has made it clear that he wishes the books to stay here.”

Oh he has, has he? For Treledees and the priests, having a tongueless god was very convenient. The priests could claim that he’d told them whatever served the purposes of the moment, and he could never correct them.

“If you absolutely must read these volumes,” Treledees said, “you can stay here to do it.”

She glanced at the room and thought of the stuffy priests standing in a flock around her, listening to her sound out words, making a fool of herself. If anything in these volumes was sensitive, they’d probably find a way to distract her and keep her from finding it.

“No,” Siri said, retreating from the crowded room. “Perhaps another time.”
* * *

I TOLD YOU that they would not let you have the books, the God King wrote.

Siri rolled her eyes and flopped back onto the bed. She still wore her heavy evening dress. For some reason, being able to communicate with the God King made her even shyer. She only took off the dresses right before she went to sleep—which, lately, was getting later and later. Susebron sat in his usual place—not on the mattress, as he had that first night. Instead, he had pulled his chair up beside the bed. He still seemed so large and imposing. At least, he did until he looked at her, his face open, honest. He waved her back toward him where he sat with a board, writing with a bit of charcoal that she’d smuggled in.

You shud not anger the prests so, he wrote. His spelling, as one might expect, was awful.

Priests. She had pilfered a cup, then had hidden it in the room. If she held it to the wall and listened, she could sometimes faintly hear talking on the other side. After her nightly moaning and bouncing, she could usually hear chairs moving and a door closing. After that, there was silence in the other room.

Either the priests left each night once they were sure the deed was done or they were suspicious and trying to fool her into thinking they were gone. Her instinct said the former, though she made certain to whisper when she spoke to the God King, just in case.

Siri? he wrote. What are you thinking about?

“Your priests,” she whispered. “They frustrate me! They intentionally do things to spite me.”

They are good men, he wrote. They work very hard to mayntayn my kingdom.

“They cut out your tongue,” she said.

The God King sat quietly for a few moments. It was nesisary, he wrote. I have too much power.

She moved over. As usual, he shied back when she approached, moving his arm out of the way. There was no arrogance in this reaction. She had begun to think that he just had very little experience with touching.

“Susebron,” she whispered. “These men are not looking after your best interests. They did more than cut out your tongue. They speak in your name, doing whatever they please.”

They are not my enemes, he wrote stubbornly. They are good men.

“Oh?” she said. “Then why do you hide from them the fact that you’re learning to read?”

He paused again, glancing downward.

So much humility for one who has ruled Hallandren for fifty years, she thought. In many ways, he’s like a child.

I do not want them to know, he finally wrote. I do not want to upset them.

“I’m sure,” Siri said flatly.

He paused. You are shur? he wrote. Does that mean you beleve me?

“No,” Siri said. “That was sarcasm, Susebron.”

He frowned. I do not know this thing. Sarkazm.

“Sarcasm,” she said, spelling it. “It’s . . .” She trailed off. “It’s when you say one thing, but you really mean the opposite.”