The craft’s wicked mulberry skin might have shown traces of purple under direct sunlight but currently it looked black, dangling from a claw of cloud. The Odalisque’s silver filigreed fins and spines marked her as an exclusive pleasure ship and though they tantalized the air with their femininity, they were also vaguely threatening.
Caliph shifted from one foot to the other. He watched the lights flash, signaling that the ship had successfully docked. People began to move.
The airship’s cargo doors opened and casket-shaped boxes began sliding out, pulled by rope handles, maneuvered by giant men. A small, fierce woman, clearly in charge, barked at the unloaders. The men adjusted their grips, used tarps to shield the containers from the rain and lugged the heavy loads toward the castle without complaint.
Caliph took a flight of cement steps up to the parapet that would conduct Sena from the Odalisque to the castle’s warm interior. There were already servants moving back and forth along the narrow pathway hedged with crenels. He made his way toward the airship and spotted the captain. A big man with blond thickets on his forearms stepped out and addressed him with a quizzical smile. “Your majesty? Did she forget something?”
“What?”
The captain kept grinning. “Did she leave something behind? I’ll help you look.” He turned toward the ship.
Caliph stopped him. “She’s already left? She’s already gone inside?”
The captain turned back around, lips puckered, eyes wide. “Well … yes.”
“And she came this way?” Caliph hooked a thumb toward the narrow parapet.
Now the captain showed traces of concern. “Yes, she did. Is something wrong?”
Caliph looked back through the rain in the direction he had come, feeling dizzy. It was impossible. He couldn’t have missed her. He didn’t know whether to board the Odalisque and search for her or return to the castle. Finally he forced a grin and waved his hand dismissively. “No. Nothing’s wrong. I must have gotten here late.”
The captain saluted as Caliph turned and ducked back over the busy walkway, rain pounding him. By the time he entered the castle, he was soaking.
A short, thick maid with breasts like gun stones nearly walked into him before declaring that he was drenched. She insisted on getting a towel.
“Where is Sena?” Caliph followed her to a nearby linen closet.
The woman didn’t know. People milled near the doors; some glanced at him curiously.
“Did you see her come in?”
“Yes, I did. But I don’t know where’s she’s gone. Let’s get you dried off.”
Caliph took the towel but left her immediately. He headed for the library, reached it in under a minute and found it locked. He grabbled through his keys, dropped them twice. When he finally unlocked the door, the space beyond was dark and empty.
He headed for the kitchen, feeling strangely panicked. Sena wasn’t there. By the time he reached his bedroom—their bedroom—he was huffing. Two servants looked up at him, eyes turned saucer. They were folding down the sheets.
“Have you seen Sena?”
They shook their heads. Am I going crazy? He checked his choler. Was she doing this intentionally? Just then, a young butler Caliph knew appeared at the bedroom door and spoke with an irritatingly cheerful tone. “Pardon me, your majesty. The door was open. I hope…”
Caliph’s frustration slipped out. “It’s fine, Gilver. What is it?”
The butler continued smiling. “Her ladyship would like to meet you in the east parlor in half an hour. Can I tell her yes?”
Caliph felt stunned. What could be more important than seeing him after so many months? Where was she? What was she doing?
“No. Tell her I’ll meet her now.”
Gilver’s smile vanished and his cheeks went pink as if Caliph’s displeasure had seared him. The butler turned, trying to maintain decorum. He gave up. His stride broke into a stiff-legged run.
* * *
SENA disregarded the summons, which put Caliph at the table for forty minutes working his way through spinach leaves and creepberries and almond-crusted tenderloin—alone. When he was done, he stalked back to the great east parlor where a salver of ice cream and wine waited.
Sena liked ice cream regardless of the season.
He wound the thermal crank and flicked the lid on his chemiostatic watch. He was fuming. He plunked down and dished himself some dessert. She was uncontrollable. Unreliable. Unfathomable. And what was he going to do about it? Evict her?
After nearly two years on the throne, he had a grip on most aspects of his domain. He knew how to handle the burgomasters. Multinational relations were a work in progress. But Sena?
There was a steaming cup of milk and honey on the table, recently placed by one of the servants. He pushed it aside and opened the wine.
Partly because he didn’t want to think about her and partly because he couldn’t help it, he tried instead to focus on his country’s politics. He could already hear the journalists.
Have the Pandragonians given us any ultimatums, your majesty?
Is solvitriol research still going on at Glossok?
No and no.
But the problem of the solvitriol accord dragged him down onto the nearby chaise. He grabbed a pillow and lay back, staring up at the ceiling. No ultimatums yet, he would lie.
What would Nuj Ig’nos report once he arrived in Pandragor? Caliph had seen machinations like this before: the charade of diplomacy laying the groundwork for a bloody inevitability. He sat up and poured himself another glass of wine.
He had tried to assure the visiting diplomats that Stonehold’s solvitriol research had been abandoned; that the facility at Glossok had been shut down. But tours hadn’t satisfied his critics. Now they were demanding access to Stonehavian factories, warehouses, even the cellars of Isca Castle.
“I can’t do it,” he said aloud. “Letting them in is a no-win. We’ll wind up like an old circus beast, limping through hoops, extending our paw every time some ticket-holding monarch wants proof we’ve been declawed.” The second glass … or was it the third?… went down like the first (or the second). Too fast. It puckered his mouth.
No proof you give will be enough.
Caliph frowned. “No. It won’t.” He almost looked around for the speaker.
Solvitriol’s just a pretense. It was a breathy scratch inside his head more than a voice. Caliph looked at the bottle of wine and noticed it was over half gone. “Yore absolutely right. Alani and eye whir thinking the same thing. Why wood they come awl the whey up hear win they’ve got wore on they’re hands rite next door?”
The voice in his head was asexual and monotone. It reminded him, for blurry reasons, of his childhood. Its answer felt miraculous.
Caliph scowled.”What dew yew mean, ’the whiches told the south’?” he asked the invisible speaker.
He pictured his uncle’s book, the Cisrym Ta. For no reason that he could think of, its faded red and filthy hide rose up in his mind. The room had grown distant, it reached him only through a filter of gauzy impressions, one of which was that the presence he was talking with smiled like a sarchal hound.
My uncle’s book …
In his head, he heard the words: It’s mine!
Caliph didn’t find it strange. He almost laughed as he took another drink. It tasted like brine.
Caliph pawed his face with clumsy fists. “Why everyone care about an errant text ewe bot in Sandren four five scythes?”
You mean arrant?
Caliph laughed. A moment of clarity seized him. “Ewe told me its pages were pounced from stillborns! That’s fucking errant!”