The old man looked up from a stack of paper and laid down his pen. “Lady Tam,” he said, inclining his head slightly.
“Excellency,” she answered, returning his nod. Her eyes found the caged bird on the corner of his desk. When she was a girl, she spent hours listening to the bird, teaching it simple phrases, in the moist heat of her father’s seaside garden. It seemed smaller now.
And battered, she realized. Its metallic gold feathers were streaked with black burn marks, and the bird’s head hung askew along with its entire right side. Bits of copper wire protruded from a charred eye socket. It couldn’t even stand properly-it crouched in the corner of the cage and twitched, its one good eye blinking rapidly.
She sat on one of the plain wooden chairs in front of his desk, her eyes never leaving the bird.
Petronus must have followed her gaze. “You recognize this mechanical?” he finally asked.
She broke her stare and looked to Petronus. “I do, Excellency. It was my father’s-a gift from the Androfrancines. It arrived with his library today.”
Petronus’s eyebrows raised. “His library? Why would Vlad Li Tam send his library?”
She had spent the better part of the day wondering the same thing. Her father cherished his books, and she could not imagine what might lead him to relinquish them. “I’ve been asking myself the same question, Excellency,” she said.
“Have you asked him?”
She shook her head and paused to find the right words. “My father and I are not in communication.”
Jin Li Tam watched the surprise register on Petronus’s face. She met his eyes and saw the questions forming in them, then watched as h?€n watchee forced those questions to the side. “So for some unknown reason, Vlad Li Tam has donated his library to our work here. And he’s included this mechanical bird.” He paused. “You seem disturbed by this, Lady Tam.”
She nodded. “There’s more,” she said, swallowing. Part of her was afraid to move forward. Over the past months, she’d gone from questioning her father’s will to despising his work in the Named Lands.
I hate my own part in it even more, she thought, looking back to the bird again. She realized Petronus was waiting for her to continue. “Neb thinks he saw the bird near Windwir on the day the city fell.”
Petronus leaned forward, his eyes narrowing. “Did your father ever use the bird for message transport?”
She shook her head. “He did not. He considered it to be too noticeable.”
Petronus nodded slowly, now looking at the bird himself. “I had wondered if he had a hand in this.”
Jin Li Tam’s stomach sank. She’d not yet said it, but she wondered the same. Certainly, Sethbert had brought down the city. There was no question of that. He’d admitted it to her freely. But she knew Sethbert-given to fits of mood and rage, given to as much slothfulness as ruthlessness. She did not doubt he carried out Windwir’s Desolation. But she did not believe for a moment that he wasn’t led in that direction. And there was one man in all of the Named Lands whose sole work was bending people to do his will, using his network of children to gather the intelligence and execute his strategy. Finally, she said the words that she’d dreaded saying since the moment she saw the bird. “I fear my father used Sethbert to bring down Windwir.”
Petronus nodded. “It must be a hard conclusion for you to arrive at,” he said. His voice took on a gentle tone. “It is hard to discover that what we love most is not as it seems.”
She nodded. Suddenly, she found herself fighting tears. She forced them back, and thought about this old Pope. His words carried conviction and she found a question forming in her mind. She hesitated, then asked it. “Is that why you left the Papacy?”
Petronus nodded. “It is part of it.”
“And now, all these years later, you’ve come back to it. Do you ever wish you’d just stayed in the first place?”
Petronus sighed. “I wish that every day.” When he spoke next, his voice was heavy with grief. “I keep thinking that if I had stayed, perhaps I could have averted this tragedy entirely.”
She’d wondered?€17;d wonsimilar things today as she thought about the bird and what it might mean. She’d been with the Overseer for nearly three years, feeding information to her father and leaking information to Sethbert at her father’s direction. I should have seen what was happening, but I was blinded by faith in my father’s will.
Petronus continued. “I wish it every day,” he said, “but I know it’s a net with all manner of holes in it.” He forced a smile to his lips. “The truth of it is that given what I knew then, I made the best decision I could make. If I had stayed, I’d most likely be buried now with the rest of Windwir. And the work I’m now doing is far more important than any other I’ve been called to.”
Jin Li Tam nodded. “I understand.”
Petronus looked at the bird. “I will have Isaak check its memory scrolls and see what can be learned about this matter.” He paused, looking uncomfortable. “Your father and I were good friends once,” he said. “I would like to think that the boy I knew could not cause such darkness in the world.”
Jin Li Tam didn’t answer right away. She thought about Rudolfo-about his family and about his friend Gregoric. And she thought about the countless others her father and his father before him had bent like the course of a river to bring about their strategies in the world. She thought about the children-her brothers and sisters-that had been sacrificed along the way, no doubt in higher numbers than she would ever truly know. “My father,” she said, “is capable of much darkness.”
They sat in silence for a minute.
Finally, she stood. “Thank you for your time, Excellency.”
Later, when she was in her room, she sat on her bed and looked out of the window. Flowers were blossoming as spring took hold. The rains were finally letting up. She thought about Petronus’s words, and then she thought about the baby growing inside of her.
The work I’m now doing is far more important than any other I’ve been called to.
Jin Li Tam rubbed her stomach, and hoped that the light from this present work would outshine the darkness of her past.
Chapter 29
Rudolfo
The Li Tam estate was a flurry of activity when Rudolfo reached its unguarded gate. The large building towered above the palm trees, squatting over a green sea and white-ribboned beaches. Half of the iron armada was docked; the other half lay a†€…t anchor further out in the bay. Rudolfo saw crates, barrels and boxes stacked along the waterfront as servants loaded the ships.
He’d made the trip in six days-a wonder to be sure-and he’d only stopped when necessary. Riding alone and anonymous had its privileges-one of them was the relative ease of finding accommodations along the way. Rudolfo used that time to plan out the confrontation ahead.
But when he arrived to find the gate unattended, the estate’s doors flung open wide and servants and children hauling boxes and crates through the gardens and down to the docks, it gave him pause.
They are preparing to leave. But why? He looked around again. They moved with methodical urgency and occasionally someone would shout out a question or a direction. There was a system, an underlying strategy, to how the work was laid out. And the workers were divided into crews.
Rudolfo singled out a middle-aged man with long red hair. “I am Rudolfo, Lord of the Ninefold Forest Houses and General of the Wandering Army,” he said as he bowed slightly. “I would speak with Lord Vlad Li Tam.”
The middle-aged man nodded. “He is expecting you.” He pointed to the far side of the estate. “Follow the smoke.”
Rudolfo sniffed the air, catching the faintest hint of smoke-and he could see it rising beyond the house. He set out across the garden, the smell growing stronger as he went. As he rounded the corner of the estate’s north wing, he saw the bonfire.