This specifically wasn’t even about trying to prevent a danger to the empire the Soothsayers had warned about.
This was, as she had said, insane.
And he’d helped make it possible.
Before the mage could speak, throw accusations or curses—both justified—a door opened. She shot him one last disgusted look, then spun around to throw herself at the bars separating her from the room below.
The deck stretched along one side of a square room. Longer and higher than the small box where the emperor spied on the mages, it was much the same idea without the Imperial trappings or the secrecy. The floor and the walls of the room had been covered in the same large white tiles he stood on. The ceiling had been entirely mirrored, brass rings marking the holes where a dozen lamps had been lowered down from above. At first glance the room looked featureless in the brilliant gleam of the reflected light. At second glance, Reiter saw the rings and clamps where any manner of things could be attached to the walls and the floors.
Through the open door in the west wall, Reiter could see the small, dark-haired mage. Although her guards attempted to throw her into the room, she twisted free and limped through the door under her own power. Rolled her eyes when the door slammed behind her. Glanced up. Curtsied mockingly at the emperor.
She tried to hide it, but Reiter had seen that expression before. Had passed soldiers lying wounded on the battlefield, looked into their faces and seen dead men look back. Men who were breathing and making jokes, but who knew they were dead.
He didn’t understand. She’d lain with beastmen in the past and they were, when it came down to it, only another kind of men.
This would be public and unwanted, but she’d survive the experience. The emperor’s plan to control the only mages and beastmen in this part of the world meant he needed these mages alive.
What did she know he didn’t?
“Kirstin!”
Reiter silently repeated the name the blonde mage had called out. People had names. Abominations didn’t.
Kirstin raised a hand in acknowledgment, but didn’t look up.
What didn’t she want her friend to know?
“We’re putting the big tricolor in with her.” Nothing in the emperor’s voice gave any indication he was aware he was about to destroy a life. Nothing suggested he was about to enjoy the pain and humiliation he’d ordered to happen. “He’s been restless, and they tell me he keeps setting the others off. Hopefully, this will calm him a little. The volume they can achieve may be scientifically amazing, but it’s still annoyingly loud for the poor people who have to care for them.”
“Big tricolor,” Reiter repeated. He remembered his grandfather talking the same way about the pigeons he kept.
The emperor laughed. The gleaming toes of his boots were pressed right up against the bars. Against, Reiter noted, not through although there was room enough. “Big tricolor rather than the small- or medium-sized tricolor. It’s completely unnatural, so it’s the easiest to spot when the abominations try to hide among people. I have a number of them. I know it’s foolish, but I’m hoping I can get some other colors when these five…no, four whelp. Unfortunately, the result of this…” He waved a hand toward the room. “…will likely be another tricolor.”
The door seemed to open again on a wave of sound: snarling, howling, claws and teeth ringing against steel. In the open doorway, a cage. In the cage, an enormous wolf; black and gray and tan fur blended in a way that made it…Him, Reiter corrected. Made him hard to see in the shadows beyond the door.
The silver collar around his neck glinted in the spill of light from the room as he fought to get free.
“Kirstin!”
“They were very chatty when they brought me around, Danika. I know what to expect.” She spoke Imperial so that everyone could understand her—making it harder for the enemy to consider her a beast, Reiter assumed—but she still didn’t look up. She backed slowly away until she stood against the wall opposite the door. She twitched invisible wrinkles out of her skirt, folded her hands, and waited.
Metal screamed as the front of the cage rose. The wolf charged out onto the tile.
He was huge. Gaunt. Starving, if Reiter was any judge. His hips jutted up and his ribs hung down like another cage under loose patchy fur.
The mage watching—Danika, he reminded himself. Danika made a soft, pained noise that had Reiter curling his hands into fists, nails pressed into his palms.
Silver spikes lined the inside of the collar, the ends driven into the flesh all around the wolf’s throat. Silver poisoned the beastmen. Every soldier in the Imperial army knew that now. What must silver constantly digging into a wound be doing?
The wolf walked carefully, his nails skidding on the slick floor. As the door swung shut behind him, he lifted his head, stared at the emperor with deep-sunk, mad eyes, and charged forward.
One paw nearly reached the emperor’s boot. Reiter winced as the wasted body slammed down onto the floor, bones barely covered with flesh and fur rattling against the tile.
The emperor shook his head and sighed. “Every time. They just don’t learn. Well, every time they’re not tied down,” he added thoughtfully.
“He can’t change with the collar on!” Danika’s cry was loud enough Reiter knew the dark-haired…Kirstin had to have heard it. She didn’t react. She didn’t look up. She didn’t take her eyes off the wolf. She wasn’t surprised.
“That is the point of the collar,” the emperor agreed.
When Reiter turned toward her, Danika stood pressed against the bars, her knuckles white where she clutched at the steel. The cheek he could see, glistened in the harsh light. “How long has he been kept like that? How long since he’s been allowed to change?”
“He’s permitted to change when we need him to heal.” Staring down at the wolf, the emperor shrugged. “He’s fine.”
“He’s barely there!” She took a deep breath, stepped back, and turned toward the emperor. Reiter watched her swallow her pride and her fear and keep her voice calm and level. In a lifetime spent under Imperial banners, he’d never known anyone with that kind of strength. “Your Imperial Majesty, please listen. If the balance between fur and skin is not kept, if there’s too long spent in one form over the other, then that form begins to dominate. If this man has been forced to remain in fur, tortured in fur, starved, he won’t be responsible for his actions. You still have only five of the six mages the Soothsayers prophesied. If you allow this to continue, you’ll have four.”
“He’s not a man.” When she made a noise, as though she couldn’t believe that was what he chose to respond to, the emperor turned to face her. Standing behind him, Reiter couldn’t see his expression, but he knew he was smiling. He even knew the smile. The pleased smile of a teacher who enjoyed sharing his knowledge. “As the abominations are attracted to power regardless of form, I don’t see the problem.”
Reiter forced his voice to work. “Majesty, I think she’s saying there’s a good chance the wolf has gone insane.”
“I know what she’s saying, Captain. Given the way she’s throwing the accusation around, I don’t think she knows what the word means. Oh, good. He’s spotted her.”
The wolf had lowered his head, his nose almost to the floor, his shoulder blades rising up above the line of his spine like paddles. There was so little meat on his bones, Reiter wasn’t sure how he could even stand. This is what he would have brought Tomas to.
Both of them to, he amended, looking at Kirstin. He’d have brought both Tomas and Mirian to this.
Kirstin’s eyes were locked on the wolf, and her mouth was moving. Not begging, nor pleading. She looked determined. He couldn’t hear what she was saying.