It was supposed to be a joke, but it was also a reminder. I was a Noavek, and he was a Kereseth. I was nobility, and he was a captive. Whatever ease we found together was built on ignoring the facts. Both our smiles faded, and we returned to our respective tasks in silence.
A while later, when I had done four petals—only ninety-six left!—I heard footsteps in the hallway. Quick, purposeful ones, not the movements of a wandering guard doing the rounds. I set my knife down and took off the gloves.
“What is it?” Akos asked.
“Someone’s coming. Don’t let on what we’re really doing in here,” I said.
He didn’t have time to ask why. The door to the apothecary chamber opened, and Vas came in, a young man at his heels. I recognized him as Jorek Kuzar, son of Suzao Kuzar, Vas’s second cousin. He was short and slim, with warm brown skin and a patch of hair on his chin. I hardly knew him—Jorek had chosen not to follow in his father’s path as a soldier and translator, and was regarded as both a disappointment and a danger to my brother as a result. Anyone who did not enthusiastically enter Ryzek’s service was suspect.
Jorek bobbed his head to me. I, flush with currentshadows at the sight of Vas, could hardly nod in return. Vas clasped his hands behind his back and looked with amusement at the little room, at Akos’s green-stained fingers and the bubbling pot on the burner.
“What brings you to the manor, Kuzar?” I asked Jorek, before Vas could comment. “Surely it’s not visiting Vas. I can’t imagine anyone would do that for pleasure.”
Jorek looked from Vas glaring at me, to me smiling back, to Akos staring determinedly at his hands, which gripped the edge of the counter. I hadn’t noticed, at first, how tense Akos had become the moment Vas appeared. I could see the muscles in his shoulders bunching where his shirt stretched tight across them.
“My father is meeting with the sovereign,” Jorek said. “And he thought Vas could talk some sense into me in the meantime.”
I laughed. “Did he?”
“Cyra has many qualities that are useful to the sovereign, but ‘sense’ is not one of them; I would not take her opinion of me too seriously,” Vas said.
“While I do love our little chats, Vas,” I said, “why don’t you just tell me what you want?”
“What are you brewing? A painkiller?” Vas smirked. “I thought groping Kereseth was your painkiller.”
“What,” I repeated, terse this time, “do you want?”
“I’m sure you’ve realized that the Sojourn Festival begins tomorrow. Ryz wanted to know if you would be attending the arena challenges at his side. He wanted to remind you, before you answer, that part of giving Kereseth’s service to you was to get you on your feet, so you can attend events like these, in public.”
The arena challenges. I had not watched them in seasons, claiming pain as my excuse, but really, I just didn’t want to watch people killing each other for social status, or revenge, or money. It was a legal practice—even a celebrated one, these days—but that didn’t mean I needed to add those images to the violent ones that already existed in my mind. Uzul Zetsyvis’s melting scowl among them.
“Well, I’m not quite ‘on my feet’ yet,” I said. “Send my regrets.”
“Very well.” Vas shrugged. “You might want to teach Kereseth to unspool a little, or he’ll pull a muscle every time he sees me.”
I glanced back at Akos, at his shoulders rounded over the countertop. “I’ll take it under advisement.”
Later that day, when the news feed cycled through the planets in turn, the report on our planet included the comment: “Prominent Shotet fenzu producer Uzul Zetsyvis found dead in his house. Preliminary investigations suggest cause of death is suicide by hanging.” The Shotet subtitles read: Shotet mourns the loss of beloved fenzu caretaker Uzul Zetsyvis. Investigation of his death suggests a Thuvhesit assassination, aiming to eliminate essential Shotet power source. Of course. The translations were always lies, and only people Ryzek already trusted knew enough languages to be the wiser. Of course he would blame Uzul’s death on Thuvhe, rather than himself.
Or me.
I received a message, delivered by the hallway guard, later that day. It read:
Record my father’s loss. It belongs to you.
—Lety Zetsyvis
Ryzek may have blamed Uzul’s death on Thuvhe, but Uzul’s daughter knew where it really belonged. On me, on my skin.