“Majesty?”
“Nothing.” The Queen rubbed her temples, willing her mind to be silent. The girl had done quite a number on Ducarte, but he wasn’t alone. The Queen, who believed she had killed off Evelyn Raleigh long ago, now found her mind peopled with Evelyn’s unquiet ghosts. She needed peace, time to sit and think, to figure out what to do. Some tea and a hot bath. Answers would come, and if they didn’t, she could at least take a nap, remove some of the muddle that seemed to cover her mind at all times these days. She had been so sure that the Tear sapphires would cure her insomnia, but of course they had not done this either, and now every day seemed to be about recovering the sleep she had lost the night before—
A light clang of steel echoed in the air. Out of old instinct, the Queen sprang from her throne and leapt off the side of the dais, landing in a crouch. Something thudded against the back of her throne, but she was already scurrying behind one of the enormous pillars that sat on either side of the dais. Her mind clocked glimpses of activity: Ducarte, grappling with one of his lieutenants; a knife lying at the foot of the stairs; the other lieutenant, stalking toward the pillar, sword in hand.
Assassination, the Queen thought, almost bemused at the idea. It was an old game, but it had been a long time since anyone had dared to play it here. She pressed her body against the smooth, rounded surface of the pillar, her mind working rapidly. The army was discontented, yes, but discontent alone would never drive them to such a drastic move. They thought her vulnerable, somehow. Did they think she had left the Tear intact out of weakness? Intolerable. Could Ducarte be in on it? She thought not; more likely, Ducarte was a secondary target. No one loved him, not even his own troops.
She sensed the second soldier coming for her now, could feel his heartbeat, light and rapid as a rabbit’s, on the far side of the pillar. She could kill him easily, but two lieutenants had never hatched this plot on their own; she needed at least one of them alive. From the center of the room came the thick, gagging sound of a man being throttled. She hoped it wasn’t Ducarte, but was forced to concede that it might be. The assassin was edging around the curve of the pillar now, approaching on her left, and the Queen tensed, preparing to go for his sword hand. But then something slammed into the pillar, an impact that the Queen felt even through ten feet of solid stone. The man’s sword clattered to the ground in front of her.
“Majesty? You are well?”
The words were spoken with a heavy Tear accent. The Queen peeked around the pillar and found one of her pages, the new girl that Juliette had selected when Mina died. The Queen could not remember her name. Continuing around the curve, she found that the girl held the lieutenant up against the pillar, his face smashed into the stone and a knife to his throat. The Queen couldn’t help being impressed. Though tall and muscular for a woman—all of the Queen’s pages were built so—the girl was still smaller than the soldier. But she held the lieutenant immobilized.
The state of the throne room said a great deal. Juliette had not moved, nor had the rest of the pages. The Queen’s guard captain, Ghislaine, was just pulling Ducarte from beneath his attacker, and even from here the Queen could see the ugly bruises forming on Ducarte’s throat. The other lieutenant was dead, knifed in the back. Most of the Queen’s private guard still lined the walls, sharp eyes watching her every movement. They had barely even stirred.
Good God! the Queen thought. My own Guard!
She turned back to the new page. “What is your name?”
“Emily, Majesty.”
“Benin! Are you well enough to take a prisoner?”
“I’m fine!” Ducarte spat, nearly snarling. “He blindsided me.”
The Queen’s lips tightened. No one ever took Ducarte by surprise. She turned back to the girl, Emily, sizing her up: good Tear stock, tall and blonde, tightly corded muscles in her arms. Pretty, but not bright; her face had that dull look which the Queen had always associated with the Tear underclass.
“You came in the shipment,” the Queen remarked.
“Yes, Majesty,” the girl replied in a mixture of Tear and broken Mort. “A page I’m chosen, last month only.”
A page who couldn’t even speak the language properly! Juliette must have been desperate. And yet, given the events of the past few minutes, the Queen couldn’t really fault the choice. She could have dealt with the assassins herself, but that didn’t matter. Of all the people in the room, only two had acted: Ghislaine and the slave. Competent Mort speakers were abundant, but loyalty was in very short supply these days. What a pity the girl was a Tear!