Mal didn’t even break his stride. “There’s no point,” he said. “I knew it would be this way.”
He said that, but I saw in the slump of his shoulders that some part of him had still hoped. I wanted to grab hold of his arm, make him stop, tell him I was sorry, that somehow we’d find a way to make things right. Instead, I hurried along beside him, struggling to keep up, keenly aware of the footmen watching us from every doorway.
We retraced our steps through the gleaming hallways of the palace and down the marble staircase. Fedyor and his Grisha were waiting by their horses. They’d cleaned up as best they could, but their brightly colored kefta still seemed a bit bedraggled. Tamar and Tolya stood slightly apart from them, the golden sunbursts I’d given them sparkling on their roughspun tunics. I took a deep breath. Nikolai had done what he could. Now it was my turn.
Chapter
13
THE WINDING WHITE gravel path led us through the palace grounds, past the rolling lawns and follies, and the high walls of the hedge maze. Tolya, ordinarily so still and silent, squirmed in his saddle, his mouth set in a sullen line.
“Something wrong?” I asked.
I thought he might not answer, but then he said, “It smells like weakness here. Like people getting soft.”
I shot a glance at the giant warrior. “Everyone is soft compared to you, Tolya.”
Tamar could usually be counted upon to laugh off her brother’s moods, but she surprised me by saying, “He’s right. This place feels like it’s dying.”
They weren’t helping to settle my nerves. Our audience in the throne room had left me jittery, and I was still a little taken aback by the anger I’d felt toward the King, though Saints knew he deserved it. He was a filthy old lech who liked to corner servant girls, to say nothing of the fact that he was a rotten leader and had threatened to execute both me and Mal in the space of a few minutes. Even thinking about it, I felt another jab of bitter resentment.
My heart beat faster as we entered the wooded tunnel. The trees pressed in on us and, above, the branches wove together in a canopy of green. The last time I’d seen them, they’d been bare.
We emerged into bright sunshine. Below us lay the Little Palace.
I missed it, I realized. I’d missed the shine of its golden domes, those strange walls carved with every manner of beast, real and imagined. I’d missed the blue lake gleaming like a slice of sky, the tiny island not quite at its center, the white flecks of the Summoners’ pavilions on its shore. It was a place like no other. I was surprised to discover how much it felt like home.
But not everything was as it had been. First Army soldiers were stationed around the grounds, rifles on their backs. I doubted they’d do much good against a force of determined Heartrenders, Squallers, and Inferni, but the message was clear: The Grisha were not to be trusted.
A group of servants dressed in gray waited on the steps to take our horses.
“Ready?” Mal whispered as he helped me dismount.
“I wish people would stop asking me that. Don’t I look ready?”
“You look like you did when I slipped a tadpole into your soup and you accidentally swallowed it.”
I bit back a laugh, feeling some of my worry ease away. “Thanks for the reminder,” I said. “I don’t think I ever paid you back for that.”
I paused to smooth the folds of my kefta, taking my time in the hope that my legs would stop trembling. Then I climbed the steps, the others trailing behind me. The servants flung the doors open wide, and we stepped inside. We passed through the cool dark of the entry chamber and into the Hall of the Golden Dome.
The room was a giant hexagon with the proportions of a cathedral. Its carved walls were inlaid with mother-of-pearl and topped by a massive golden dome that seemed to float above us at an impossible height. There were four tables arranged in a square at the center of the room, and that was where the Grisha waited. Despite their diminished numbers, they still kept to their Orders, sitting or standing in tightly clustered groups of red, purple, and blue.
“They do love their pretty colors,” grumbled Tolya.
“Don’t give me any ideas,” I whispered. “Maybe I’ll decide my personal guard should wear bright yellow pantaloons.”
For the first time, I saw an expression very much like fear cross his face.
We walked forward, and most of the Grisha rose. It was a young group, and with a twinge of unease, I realized that many of the older and more experienced Grisha had chosen to defect to the Darkling. Or maybe they’d just been wise enough to run.