46
The ground before the Temple of Light looked more like a muster field than a holy space. The bastard must have added another five hundred soldiers, Adare thought to herself, eyeing the Sons of Flame as they stood at their posts. None challenged her palanquin, none so much as glanced in her direction, and yet the message sent by all that glittering mail, those twelve-foot polearms, was clear: The Church of Intarra felt as though it had enemies inside the city of Annur, and it intended to defend itself.
Aside from the soldiers, a middling crowd had assembled before the temple, filing in for the noon service. As Adare stepped down, an angry stir passed through the group. Her role in Uinian’s trial had spread as quickly as his “miracle”—the jealous princess who had tried to see an innocent man, a holy man, condemned—and the Aedolians were forced to shoulder a path through the throng. A few of those closest dropped to one knee, knuckling their foreheads, but for many the gesture was slow, almost resentful, and a few rows back, people were mocking her or shouting open defiance.
There were many ways that her plan could fail, but the thought that she might not even make it to the door had not occurred to her. I should have taken Ran up on his offer to provide more troops.
The kenarang had been adamant.
“I don’t want to see you cut down by an angry mob,” he insisted, “especially now that I know how well you kiss.”
She had pushed him away, flattered and irritated at the same time.
“You can’t be part of this.”
“I’m the regent. You can’t stop me. Besides, against my better judgment, I find myself smitten.”
“Listen,” she said, “this can’t be about you. First of all, it can’t look like we’re forcing the issue or overwhelming the temple with an Annurian legion. That will just breed more resentment of the Dawn Palace and more support for Uinian. More importantly, though,” she pressed on, putting a finger to the kenarang’s lips to stifle the objection, “this is between Uinian and me. He’s made a personal attack on Malkeenian power, and if my family is going to hold on to the throne, I have to humble him personally, not through some overbearing show of force.”
The argument had made sense at the time, but as the grumbling mob pressed close around her knot of Aedolians, Adare found herself wishing for just a little more support. Sanlitun had once explained to her that men were most fickle in the grip of emotion, and that mobs magnified emotion. If the crowd were to turn ugly, the dozen Aedolians surrounding her would crumple before they could even draw their steel.
Just keep walking. Hide the fear. Hide the doubt.
She managed to keep her head high and her eyes level, but heaved a sigh of relief nonetheless when they passed, finally, beneath the gate.
*
Thankfully, the imperial family kept a small booth inside the temple, from which the Malkeenians could observe the ceremony without rubbing elbows with the common folk. The wooden walls of the box wouldn’t restrain an angry mob, but they gave her some breathing space, especially after the Aedolians had taken up their posts around the perimeter, and she sat on one of the plush chairs to hide the trembling in her legs. Some of the parishioners looked her way and pointed with angry mutters and scowls. She ignored them, keeping her eyes on the charred stone beneath the lens. The sun had risen almost to its noonday height, and a column of air beneath the lens had begun to shimmer already with that blistering heat.
Only when the crowd had settled did Uinian IV make his entrance from a gilded door halfway down the southern aisle. If you stripped off that overwrought amice and alb, Adare thought, you might mistake him for a carpetmonger or a wheelwright. The priest’s entourage ensured that there was no danger of that. Before and behind him walked two columns of novices, boys and girls both, each dressed in the gold and white of Intarra, each swinging a crystal from a golden chain. The stones caught the light and scattered it dizzyingly across the walls and floor, but Adare kept her eyes on Uinian.
The man’s defiance and ambition had only grown in the weeks since the Trial. In addition to augmenting the Sons of Flame, he was preaching openly on the distinction between human and divine rule, turning what had been an abstract theological issue into a contention that could overturn an empire. According to il Tornja, people were arguing about the difference between Divine Mandate and Divine Right in the Graymarket and the dockyards, arguing, that was, about the very legitimacy of Malkeenian rule. Worse, Uinian had taken to repeating his “miracle” every day in the noon service. To the men and women gathered in the pews, he was not simply the Chief Priest; he was the anointed of the goddess herself.
Which is why I have to be here, Adare reminded herself. To do this.
For a long time it appeared that Uinian had not noticed her, but as he drew abreast of the imperial booth, he halted the procession with a gesture, and turned to face her. When he spoke, he kept his eyes on hers, but his voice was meant for the congregation.
“How unusual. The princess graces us with her presence.” A hiss and murmur rippled through the crowd, but Uinian raised his hand for silence, a sly smile on his face. “We have not seen you in this place of worship for a very long time, my lady.”
Adare took a deep breath. She had broken the dam; it was time to see if the flood would carry her on its current or drown her. “My family worships the goddess who gave us life in the old place, atop Intarra’s Spear each solstice.”
“Of course,” Uinian nodded, steepling his fingers before his lips. “Of course. An ancient place, and holy. And yet, the solstice services come but twice a year.”
“It would be strange,” Adare shot back, “if we had more solstice services than solstices.”
As soon as the words left her lips, she knew she had made an error, conceded territory in the dangerous game they were playing. The parishioners who came to the daily noon service were pious folk, devoted to the goddess. Some, no doubt, made the visit every day from as far away as the dockyards, the Graymarket, or south of the Godsway. Her flippant tone grated against their faith.