“I’ll send Irris when everyone is assembled,” Charon said, and she left him, feeling a little embarrassed as she entered the main foyer.
The Summer Palace was beautiful, the floor made of pink marble, the slivers of wall between the numerous wide windows washed a soft eggshell blue. Even the roof was partially glass, to allow inhabitants and their guests to dine and dance under starlight when the long summer days of Rhannon finally darkened. Like the Winter Palace, it was preserved exactly as it was the last time Mael had been there. But unlike the Winter Palace, it was clean.
Shame filled her then. She should have done more to keep things under control. She shouldn’t have let her father be an excuse. She caught herself resolving to do better when she returned and stopped, one hand mid-air as she reached for the banister, as she recalled she didn’t know what she’d be returning from. Nor who might be returning with her.
Something emerald and venomous roused itself inside her stomach at that thought.
“We beg your pardon, Miss Ventaxis.”
Sorrow turned, hand still outstretched, blinking, at two young women who stood watching her. Sorrow guessed they were a year or two younger than her, dark-eyed, brown hair drawn back in long braids that reached their hips, long grey aprons over their black tunics. The elder of the two continued. “Can we do anything for you?”
“I need to freshen up; can you show me where I can do that?” Sorrow said, as the serpentine feeling in her belly fell quietly dormant.
“I’ll show you to your rooms, Miss Ventaxis,” the younger said. “Please, this way.”
They passed through a set of ornate, thick doors into a wide corridor, a part of the palace she’d never been to before. The floor here was thickly carpeted, and Sorrow looked down to see her shoes were leaving orange dust stains in the cream pile. She paused, tugging the shoes off, ignoring the surprised look on the serving girl’s face, and then took a step, moaning with the unexpected pleasure of the softness beneath her feet. The Winter Palace was carpeted, but it had also been constantly used over the last eighteen years, and not replaced. The carpet here was surely as pristine as it had been the day it was laid.
They continued on, passing doors that tempted Sorrow to open them. As in the grand hallway, the ceiling was glass, open to the sunset that was finally beginning above them, casting an orange glow on the walls.
Finally, the serving girl stopped outside a set of doors and, with a small curtsy, opened them. Sorrow stepped inside.
The room was dark but airy, and Sorrow suspected that the window and curtains had only recently been closed. She imagined the girls racing from room to room when they discovered that this year people wouldn’t be coming to merely view the portrait but to stay overnight. Closing windows and curtains, trying to hide the evidence of their crimes.
The crime of wanting sunlight, and fresh air.
Sorrow liked the idea of a pocket of rebellion here in the Summer Palace, as she had her own in the Winter Palace. She liked the idea that the small staff here, forgotten most of the year, lived lives filled with secret pleasures behind the closed doors. Furniture upholstered in reds, blues, golds; windows and curtains thrown open. She hoped the girls had a Malice set, or other games and books they enjoyed secretly too. She made a note to send them some of her own personal games once she was back in Istevar.
Sorrow crossed to the drapes and pulled them aside to find a huge window behind them. She peered through the glass and found the room faced a garden she’d never seen before. Lush palms, thick grass, broad waxy leaves, all lit by the last of the sunlight.
A rush of vertigo hit her, and she drew back, taking a sharp breath. Looking down into the garden, even through the glass, reminded her uncomfortably of what had happened in Rhylla by the river.
“Are you all right, miss?” the girl asked, and Sorrow nodded, allowing the drapes to fall into place again.
She examined the rest of the room. There was a pair of cream couches, and Sorrow marvelled at them – the material looked so new, so clean. No holes or patches, no stains. The legs ended with the paws of lions, a table between them containing a platter of fruit, and a carafe studded with condensation. As Sorrow moved further in she saw two open doors, the one to the left revealing a bed furnished in white bedding – white! – so soft it looked to Sorrow like a cloud, and to the right a bathroom, the feet of the bath clawed to match the sofas.
The girl hovered nervously in the doorway. “Is everything to your satisfaction?” she said.
“It’s lovely,” Sorrow said. “Are we – where are we?”
“In the palace?” the girl asked, and Sorrow nodded. “We’re in the chancellor’s wing – also called the Goldcrest wing, but there was no bedroom assigned for you in the plans. This is one of the most important guest rooms, though.”
“It’s lovely,” Sorrow said again. “I’ve only seen the staterooms before.”
“Would you like a tour?” the girl asked shyly.
“Perhaps tomorrow,” Sorrow said.
The girl nodded. “Can I do anything else?”
“No, except tell me your name?” Sorrow said.
“Shenai, if it pleases you, miss. My sister is Shevela.”
“Have you always worked here?”
“Yes, miss. Our father is the steward. We were born here.”
They had been lucky. To have grown up somewhere where they had the chance to live like this. “I’d like some fresh clothes,” Sorrow said. “But that will be all. Thank you.”
Shenai curtsied again, and then left Sorrow alone.
She wandered around the room, touching everything she came across: the brocade rope between the silk of the sofa and the wood of its frame, the cool eggshell-blue walls with their stucco detail. In the bathroom she lifted the unmarked jars that lined a small shelf and smelled them, one by one, unable to name most of the scents but a little bit in love with them all. The soft towels, the chill of the enamel on the bath. She ran the taps, cold, then hot, and marvelled at the smoothness of the plumbing, much less temperamental than in Istevar.
A knock at the door announced Shenai or Shevela’s return, and Sorrow called for them to enter. She was surprised and pleased to find it was Irris instead, carrying a black gown.
The two girls embraced without speaking, holding each other tightly.
“Are you OK?” Irris asked, pulling back and holding her friend by the arms as her eyes roved her face.
The moment she released her, Sorrow slumped, suddenly drained, as though she’d been saving the last of her energy for this. “I don’t know. I can’t think. It’s all happening too fast. And the moment I think I have something straight in my head, something else happens.”
“You don’t think he’s really Mael?”