It felt strange to be separated from them, and even stranger to be spying upon her hosts. She was not averse to it-the Kamarisi and his consort needed watching-but ties with Galahesh had always been strong, primarily between the Vostromas and the line of Kirdhash. In many ways, they had always seemed like the tenth Duchy-perhaps not to anyone who’d grown up on a more distant archipelago, but certainly to anyone who’d been raised on the shores of Vostroma.
A knock came at her door, and Yalessa stepped in. “He’s come.”
Atiana merely nodded. She followed Yalessa outside, and there, waiting for them, was a bald man, no older than Atiana. He stood meekly, clasping his hands together. He was a mute, and most likely castrated as well.
Atiana had always felt uncomfortable around the slaves of Yrstanla, but there was little choice in the matter now. Galahesh allowed few slaves, but with so many visiting from the capital, the kasir was thick with them.
They traveled down through little-used hallways and stairwells until they reached the ground floor. Throughout the walk, Atiana did not see a single other soul-clearly Bahett’s doing.
They left the kasir through the door reserved for the servants and continued until they reached a high wall built from ragged, sharp stones. Atiana knew that inside lay the graveyard. She dearly hoped that this was not where the servant was taking them, but she knew in the same breath that it was.
They followed a stone-lined path. Near the top of the wall, spaced every few paces, were round holes, like windows meant to allow the dead to look out upon the living, upon the lives they once led. One section of the wall was marred by hundreds of pockmarks and several larger holes-signs of battle, Atiana knew, and somewhat recent, as the revealed stone was still bright, where the rest was dull and gray.
Even the walls have tales to tell, she thought.
They eventually came to a tall iron gate. The servant opened it soundlessly, and together they walked through the elaborate stone mausoleums. The early stars were out, the day having been reduced to a haze in the west. She had been to the cemetery only twice before. Both times had been for funerals, and she had found the experience unnerving, seeing so many houses for the dead crowding the landscape like crows before the feast. She had never been here at dusk, however, and it made the experience all the more chilling.
“How much further?” she asked.
The slave turned and motioned ahead with his hands, bobbing his head apologetically.
They turned down a row bordered by stone tombs with peaked roofs and crouching lions that stared hungrily down at them.
“Do you have a light?” Atiana asked.
The slave shook his head, this time not bothering to turn around.
Atiana stopped.
“What is it?” Yalessa asked.
Atiana stared down the row, feeling something crawl along her spine as she watched.
Something wasn’t right.
The servant turned. She could no longer see his face in the darkness, only a patch of white where his face once was. He raised his arm and beckoned her.
She looked to the roofs, to places hidden by the corners of the mausoleums.
The servant gestured toward the end of the row.
She couldn’t go. Something terrible awaited her there. She just knew it.
The servant stepped forward, holding one hand out to her.
The simple gesture drove fear through her like a knife. She grabbed Yalessa’s wrist and ran, not the way they’d come, but deeper into the graveyard. She sidled between two of the tombs, and then ran toward the southeast corner.
Yalessa knew enough to keep quiet, but when they came to a rest behind a massive family tomb, she whispered to Atiana. “What is it?”
“I don’t know,” Atiana said.
Atiana’s lungs and throat were burning, but she forced herself to slow her breathing. And she listened. There were no signs of pursuit. There were no sounds at all, except for the servant, far in the distance now, grunting something that sounded like please in Yrstanlan.
Atiana was beginning to feel foolish. It had only been a feeling, a premonition, but she had come to rely on such things in the years since she’d embraced the aether.
Yalessa began to speak, but Atiana placed a hand over her mouth. In the distance, at the peak of one of the tombs, there was a silhouette-a shoulder or a head outlined by the dim light coming from the west.
Atiana watched, and it did not move, and she thought surely it was merely another statue.
“Should we return?” Yalessa asked.
Atiana turned back to the tomb, a shiver running through her.
The silhouette was gone.
“Quickly now,” she whispered.
“My Lady, we’re going the wrong way.”
She gripped Yalessa’s hand fiercely as they ran, willing her to silence.
Atiana led her around the large tomb. They followed a haphazard trail, dashing through several more rows, cutting between tombs, then running and slipping down a narrow path between two massive stone statues, all in a desperate attempt to throw their pursuers off the scent.
At last they came to an area where there were no tombs. A circle of standing stones, no higher than Atiana’s waist, stood around a small field of grass, and in the center of the field was a willow, tall and swaying in the breeze. Standing beneath the vine-like branches was a man, tall by the look of him. She could see no other details. It was too dark.
She slid sideways along the paving stones set into the mossy earth. Yalessa gripped her hand so hard it hurt.
Atiana heard a faint click, then again. It was soft, but the sound carried like a knife in the dark.
Moments later two more forms-one on either side of Atiana-slid out from between the tombs.
Atiana had only a short knife at her belt, useless here, but she drew it just the same and stepped toward the form beneath the willow.
“Who are you?”
“Be quiet,” he said, “and come. Leave the girl with my men.”
He spoke Anuskayan, though his accent was thick with Yrstanlan.
Atiana thought quickly. She did not want to leave Yalessa, as scared as the girl was-and Atiana herself felt hardly any braver-but these men could have already killed them had they wished to. “Go,” she whispered to Yalessa, who continued to hold onto her hand for dear life. “Go,” she said louder. “All will be well.”
Yalessa left, shivering, as the men closed in beside her. Atiana stepped toward the willow. The man parted the vines and she stepped inside. The darkness became pronounced; the only thing she could see was the faint imprint of willow leaves swaying. The rustle of the leaves was just loud enough to cover their conversation.
“Who are you?” Atiana asked again.
The man was silent, making it clear this was not a question he would answer, at least not yet. “Let us speak instead of why you’re here.”
“Those are my reasons alone.”
“Yours and Bahett’s.”
“It’s no secret the Kaymakam and I are to be married.”
“This has nothing to do with your marriage.”
The wind blew the willow vines, tickling Atiana’s ankles and the hem of her dress. “I would know with whom I’m speaking before I say one more word.”
“Consider me a friend for now.”
“That’s not good enough.”
In the darkness, she saw him shift his weight from one hip to another, perhaps choosing his words carefully. “I’m a man loyal to the Kamarisi.”
“Then why are you sneaking about his cemetery?”
“It’s not the Kamarisi’s. It’s Bahett’s, the Kaymakam’s, and it is him I do not trust.”
“And by that you mean you do not trust me.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“But you meant it.”
Again he was silent for a time. “You’ve come here at Bahett’s bidding, and if I didn’t know who you were, I wouldn’t think much of it. A princess from a foreign land, a woman who’ll soon become his ilkadin, would have every right to visit the cemetery, perhaps paying respect to relatives who died here long ago. But it is known that you are Matra, and this is what gives me pause.”