“His skin turned black as a raven’s wing, his eyes red like coals. His armor, of a metal that was both red and blue, grew over him like moss on a stone until he was covered from head to foot. All of us, the king’s servitors, stood gaping like birds entranced by a snake. One of his hands reached up and there was a whip of fire in it. The other reached out and caught up a rod of crystal. He began then to strike out—even the song he sang was terrible. You have never seen a god, Kayyin. A god in his battle array is the most frightening thing you can imagine. I hope my own long life will end before I ever see such a thing again. In fact, with a god like Trickster, a lord of moods and mysteries, his appearance itself was part of what made him so fearsome—our own terror made him greater.
“But do not misunderstand—his power was all too real. Some may say that the gods come from the same stock as we do—that they came at first from the same seed and bone, but what was different about them is what they could be, what they could control. Others say that they are another family of beings entirely. I do not know, Kayyin. I am only a soldier, and although I am old, the gods were old before I came into this world. But whether they are somehow our cousins, our fathers, our ancestors, never make the mistake of believing they are like us, because they are not.
“King Numannyn was among the first to die, split by Trickster’s humming staff like a piece of wood chopped for kindling. The other two generals died defending him, as did many dozen of their soldiers, wailing like the callowest of mortals. If Trickster’s own guards had not run shrieking in terror when he revealed himself they could have destroyed half our army, so terrible was the damage the angry god caused. But he had told the truth—he did not like war. When the first heat of his anger had cooled Trickster turned and walked away, shrinking as he did so like parchment in a candleflame until only his mortal disguise remained. None of the survivors made a move toward him. I doubt any of them even considered it.
“I had been beaten down in the first moments, my shield broken into flaming shards by Trickster’s whip, my body flung away across the field by a chance blow from his gauntleted hand. I lay insensible for a long time and only awakened when your great-great-great-grandfather, Ayyam, was carrying me back to my troops. He was a warrior-servant to one of the other generals and had been wounded trying to save his master. He was loyal, and perhaps he went after me because he felt he had failed his general and his king.
“In any case, we became friends and in later days more than friends. We never spoke of the night we had met, though. It lay across both our thoughts like the scars of a bad burn…”
She paused then as if in a moment she might say more, but some time passed and she remained silent.
“So why do you tell me this tale?” Kayyin asked at last. “Am I supposed to take some instruction from my ancestor’s loyalty?”
She looked up slowly, as though she had forgotten he was there. “No, no. You asked me why I do not destroy the mortals when I have told all the world I will. My beloved servant Gyir has died and the Pact of the Glass has come to nothing, as I feared it would. And so I will take down the mortals’ castle, stone by stone if I have to, to get what I need. But that does not mean I will rush in, despite your impatience… and even despite mine.”
He tipped his head, waiting to hear.
“Because the thing that dreams and suffers in uneasy sleep beneath that castle is a god, you foolish child. He is also my father, but that is of importance only to me.” Yasammez’s face was as pale and dreadful as a sky awaiting a thunderstorm. “Did you not understand anything of the story I told you? The gods are not like us—they are as far beyond us as we are beyond ladybugs clustering on a leaf. Only a fool rushes to disturb something that he cannot understand and cannot control. Do you understand me now? This will be our people’s dying song. I wish to make sure that however it ends, we at least sing the tune we choose.”
Kayyin bowed his head. After a moment, Yasammez did the same. A stranger wandering into that place might have guessed they were two mortals at prayer.
“Is that really what you’re going to wear to meet the prince, Highness?” Feival asked disapprovingly. He was enjoying his new role greatly—too greatly, Briony thought: he was as much of a nag about her appearance as Auntie Merolanna or Rose and Moina had ever been.
“You must be teasing, Highness!” said her friend Ivgenia. “Why didn’t you tell me? Is he truly coming here—Prince Eneas?”
Briony couldn’t help smiling at the girl’s reaction. Eneas was only a king’s son, no different than Briony’s own brothers—although, it had to be said, prince of a much bigger and more important court and country. Every woman in Broadhall seemed determined to treat him like a god. “Yes, he’s coming.” She turned to her other ladies. “And don’t gawk at him when he arrives, you lot. Get on with your sewing.” As soon as she said it, Briony wished she hadn’t. It was the first time in the days since little Talia’s terrible death that any of them had seemed interested in anything. “Or at least look as though you’re sewing, please. Otherwise you’ll frighten him off.” She had an inkling that Eneas, like her brother Barrick, did not like being fawned over, although probably for quite different reasons.
When the prince appeared it was with an admirable lack of ostentation, without bodyguard or escort and dressed in what, for the court at Tessis, was very informal clothing, a plain although clean and well-made jerkin and doublet, the full, baggy knee-breeches that were now the style here, a traveling cloak stained from actual travel, and a wide flat cap that also looked as though it had spent too much time in the elements. Briony could tell that Feival was impressed by the prince’s good looks, but disapproved of his ordinary attire.
“He must have closets the size of Oscastle,” the young player whispered to her, “and yet he clearly never goes into them.”
Eneas must be the only person in this whole court who isn’t in love with his mirror, Briony thought. The combination gave him a serious, pleasing air as far as she was concerned: he was a man who put on clean and handsome clothes to visit a lady, but also had things to do, and so wore his workaday cloak and cap.
“Princess Briony,” Eneas said, bowing. “Like everyone else, I was horrified to hear what happened to you here in the very heart of my father’s kingdom.”
“By sheer luck, nothing happened to me, Prince Eneas,” she said gently. “However, poor Talia, my maid, had luck of a much different kind.”
Charmingly, he blushed. “Of course,” he said. “Forgive me. I can only guess at the sorrow her family will feel when they learn this news. It was a dreadful day for all of us.”
Briony nodded. He took off his cap, revealing hair dark as dried cloves; it looked as though it had received some attention but no great trouble from a hairbrush. She gestured to the cushioned seat. “Please, sit down, your Highness. You know Lady Ivgenia e’Doursos, of course—Viscount Teryon’s daughter.”
The prince nodded to the girl, his face solemn. “Of course,” he said, although Briony doubted he did remember her, even as pretty as Ivgenia was: Prince Eneas was famous for spending as little time at court as he could manage, which made his presence here today doubly interesting and more than a little flattering.