Alone out of the advisers, Liv was never asked to consult on anything. The bursar was consulted most often. She wore gigantic corrective lenses and carried a small abacus that she was constantly worrying. Or at least Liv thought she was merely nervously fidgeting with the abacus. After a while, as the woman gave a report about a dozen different ways the prince could structure his debts so as to maximize his own take, Liv realized the little woman was doing figures ceaselessly.
Finally, the prince asked one of the advisers to tell him what other business was waiting, and deemed that it could all keep until tomorrow. He dismissed the rest of his advisers and beckoned Liv to join him.
Together they walked upstairs and out onto the great balcony from his room.
“So, Aliviana Danavis, what did you see today?”
“My lord?” She shrugged. “I saw that governing is a lot more complicated than I ever would have imagined.”
“I did more for Garriston today-and more for Tyrea-than the Chromeria has done in sixteen years. Not that everyone will thank me for it. Forced labor to clean up the city won’t be popular, but it’s better than letting the goods rot or be taken away by looters and gangs.”
“Yes, my lord.”
He took out a thin zigarro of tobacco rolled inside a ratweed skin from a pocket in his cloak. He touched it to a finger full of sub-red to light it and inhaled deeply.
She looked at him curiously.
“My transition from flesh to luxin wasn’t perfect,” he said. “I’ve done better than anyone in centuries, but I still made mistakes. Painful mistakes. Of course, starting from a charred husk didn’t make things any easier.”
“What happened to you?” Liv asked.
“Some other time perhaps. I want you to think about the future, Aliviana. I want you to dream.” He looked out over the bay. It was clotted with garbage, the docks littered. He sighed. “This is the city we’ve taken. The jewel of the desert that the Chromeria did its best to destroy.”
“My father was trying to protect it,” Liv said.
“Your father’s a great man, and I have no doubt that’s exactly what he thought he was doing. But your father believed the Chromeria’s lies.”
“I think he was blackmailed,” Liv said, feeling hollow. The Prism she’d so admired had used Liv to blackmail her father into helping him. She didn’t even know how, but it was the only thing she could imagine had brought her father to fight for his sworn enemy.
“I hope that’s true.”
“What?” Liv asked.
“Because if so, it isn’t too late for him, and I’d love to have your father stand at our side. He’s a dangerous man. A good man. Brilliant. We’ll find out. But I’m afraid, Liv, that he’s been listening to their lies for so long that his whole system of understanding has been corrupted. He might see a few weeds on the surface and reject those, but if the soil itself is fouled, how can he see the truth? This is why the young are our hope.”
The sun was going down, and a fresh breeze had kicked up off the Cerulean Sea. The Color Prince took a deep drag on his zigarro and seemed to relish the redder light.
“Liv, I want you to think of a world without the Chromeria. A world where a woman can worship whichever god she sees fit. Where being a drafter isn’t a death sentence with a ten-year wait. A world in which an accident of birth doesn’t put fools on thrones, but where a man’s abilities and drive are all that determines his success. No lords but those whose nature establishes them. No slaves-at all. Slavery is the curse of the Chromeria. In our new world, a woman won’t be despised because she came from Tyrea-no, nor will it be a badge of honor. I’m not fighting to make Tyrea supreme. In our new world, it simply won’t matter. Your hair, your eyes, whatever it is that sets you apart will merely make you interesting. We will be a light to the world. We will open the Everdark Gates that Lucidonius closed and cut passes through the Sharazan Mountains. We will welcome all.
“In every village and every town, magic will be taught, and we’ll find that many, many more people have talents that can be used to better their lives and the lives of those around them. It won’t be in the corrupt hands of governors and satraps. As we learn, I think we’ll find that everyone, everyone, has been kissed by light. Someday everyone will draft. Think what geniuses of magic are out there even today-geniuses who could change the world! But right now, maybe they’re Tyrean, and they can’t afford to go to the Chromeria. They’re Parian, and the deya doesn’t like their family. They’re Ilytian, and they’re mired in superstition about magic being evil. Think of the fields that lie fallow. Think of children starving for the bread that they don’t have because they don’t have green drafters to fertilize the crops. The Chromeria has their blood on its hands-and none of them even realize it! It’s a quiet death, a slow poison. The Chromeria has drained the life from the satrapies one drop of blood at a time. That’s our fight, Aliviana. For a different future. And it won’t be easy. Too many people gain too much from the current corruption for them to give it up easily. And they’ll send the people to die for them. And it breaks my heart. They’ll sacrifice the very people we want to set free. But we’ll stop them. We’ll make sure they can’t do it again, that generations yet unborn receive a better world than the one we have.”
She hesitated. “Everything you’re saying sounds good, but the proof’s in the eating, isn’t it?” Liv said.
He smiled broadly. “Yes! This is what I want from you, Liv. Draft. Right now. Superviolet. And think. And tell me what you’re thinking. You won’t be punished. Regardless.”
She did, soaking up that alien, invisible light and letting it course through her, feeling it peel her away from her emotions to a hyperrationality, an almost disembodied intelligence. “You’re a practical man,” she said, her voice flat. Intonation seemed an unnecessary frill when you were in the grip of superviolet. “Perhaps a romantic, too. An odd combination. But you’ve been accomplishing tasks all day, and I wonder if I’m not merely the last on the list. I can’t tell if this is the prelude to a seduction or if you simply like the admiration of women.” Part of her was appalled at what she’d said-the presumption! But instead of yielding to her blushes, she huddled deeper in the superviolet’s dispassion.
Archly, the prince said, “Rare is the man who won’t swoon over women swooning over him.”
“So I’m trivially correct on the latter.” He enjoyed her attention, her growing awe, but he had barely touched her, even when he had excuses to do so. He didn’t lean toward her as they spoke. He was engaged intellectually but not bodily. “But this is no seduction.”
He didn’t look entirely pleased. “Alas, the fire that took so much else has denied me the simpler pleasures of the flesh. Not that I despise such. But no cavorting like a green for me.” Between the immobilization caused by the burn scars on his face and the immobilization of the luxins he was weaving into his skin, it was difficult to read any but the most overt expressions on his face, but she reminded herself that this didn’t mean he didn’t feel readily or deeply. His eyes swirled freely with colors, but Liv thought they, too, were only good indicators of his emotions when he felt something strongly. It made him something of a cipher.
Superviolet loved ciphers. Cracking ciphers.
“Do you know who I was?” the Color Prince asked.
“No.”
“And I’m not going to tell you. Do you know why?”
“Because you don’t want me to know?” she hazarded.
“No. Because superviolets love digging up secrets. And if I don’t set you to work digging up something that doesn’t matter to me, you might be smart enough to dig up something I don’t want known.”