“Aha.” Andross looked triumphant; he’d seen the lie on Kip’s face. He was in control again. “Well, I’m sure Gavin put you up to it, and it speaks well of you that you’ve continued to play it quietly in his absence, in case he came back. We’ll discuss this fraud more, in time. For the nonce, only one thing matters: your choice. I gave you one task, and a prize if you accomplished it. You failed. Consider it a miracle I don’t have you killed. Your half brother will be named Prism-elect at dawn. At midwinter, he will become Prism. There is nothing you can do to stop this or take his place. No doubt your squad will greatly enjoy guarding him against threats like you.

“Your choice now is simple. If you wish to marry that girl and be my spy—and live—come by and talk to me before you leave. Choose what you will, but if you’re here tomorrow, you’ll be dead before sunset.” He cocked his head at a sound. “I’ve stayed overlong. Decide well, Diakoptês, or it will not be your dreams alone that will be broken this night.”

He hit the light control on the wall, and left Kip in darkness.

Chapter 80

~Black Luxin~

“Mother,” I yell. “Mother!” I come running in from the street as usual.

Jarae stops me before I even get past the entry. She’s a dour figure, looming in doorways, but quicker than you’d suspect with her bulk. “Shoes, young master, shoes!”

I step on one heel after the other, kicking them off without a thought. “Where is she, Jaejae?”

“In the garden, Dazen, but she’s—”

I’m already off. The slaves are settling us in to our new home on Big Jasper, dusting, and rolling out carpets, washing bedthings, and moving furniture. Two young men in sleeveless tunics, arms knotted and muscular, are carrying a lounge chair across the hallway. I speed up.

They don’t see me until too late, and I see their eyes widen as it looks like I’m going to collide with them. They brace themselves.

I drop to my knees at the last second and slide right under the heavy chair. I pop back up to my feet with a whoop.

“You nearly gave me a fit, you d— young master!” one of them shouts after me.

Yes! Now that he’s shouted at me, I know he won’t report me to father, lest I tattle back on him.

Farther down, a bed is in the hallway, but no one’s carrying it. I jump and slide over the top, but get tangled in the dusty sheets covering it and fall on the other side, smacking my knee. I pull the dusty sheets behind me for a good twenty paces as I try to get disentangled. I leave it in the hall, all of its dust deposited on me, and hobble into the garden.

“Mother!” I shout.

“I’m right here, Dazen. You should come and meet—”

But I’m already running, and I jump into her arms.

She laughs and spins me around once, then puts me down. “Dazen, you are getting too big to—what is this? You’re filthy!”

I have put about a sev of dust on her pretty blue dress.

“Sorry, mother!” I say. I know she’s not really mad.

She sighs. “Never you mind. Dazen, I’d like you to meet my guest and my dear friend, Lady Janus Borig.”

Lady Borig is seated in one of the wrought iron chairs, and she’s old. Gray-and-red hair, pulled back tight under her hat, long nose, bright eyes. She’s smoking a long-stemmed meerschaum pipe adorned with rubies. The faded freckles on her arms and the red in her hair say she’s a Blood Forester. Gavin’s been teaching me all the old-fashioned court rituals of the satrapies.

“Mother,” I say.

“Dazen, greet our guest.”

“Mother, your shawl, please.”

I draw myself to what my tutor calls a proper little lordling’s pose. My mother hands me her shawl. I drape it over my shoulders, adjust it, and sweep into the old courtier’s bow of the Forest Court. One needs a cloak to do it properly. “Lady Borig, may your roots grow deep, and the circular skies bring you sun and shade in perfect proportion. May your herds increase, may your sons be unto you like a quiver full of arrows, may the small folk fear you, and may the tygre wolves hunt only your enemies.” Whew, almost forgot the last part.

Lady Janus Borig studies me silently.

“His father’s memory, I’m afraid,” mother says.

“And his mother’s charm. I seem to recall you stealing hearts when you were his age, too.”

“I spoil him,” my mother says. “I know it’s not good.”

“But you continue because.” Lady Janus Borig waves her pipe vaguely. In the direction of my father? I have no idea what she’s talking about.

“Exactly.”

“Please,” Lady Janus Borig says, “take your time with your son. The matter between you and me can wait. Pretend I’m not here.”

I look at her, then at my mother. This is all kinds of backwards. Adults never want to wait while children speak first. I can’t imagine father saying such a thing, not even with Gavin. But she seems serious.

“You were out with Magister Kyros?” my mother prompts.

“After lessons, we were playing at the Great Fountain, and I was talking to some of the other boys, and they said they’d learned from their tutor about other kinds of luxin that Magister Kyros won’t teach me about. They said it’s because I’m not smart enough. They said it’s too advanced. I asked him about it, and he wouldn’t say anything. It’s true, isn’t it?”

My mother’s face darkens, and the whole world darkens with it. “Let me guess, the White Oak boys again? You know they’ll be looking for an excuse to hurt you after your brother blackened Tavos’s eye last week.”

“I know, mother, I wasn’t trying to be around—” Oh no.

“So it was Gavin who hit him. Last week you said you had no idea what happened.”

I’ve let it out of the bag again. Gavin’s going to hit me for that.

“Mother, you tricked me!”

“Son, you lied to me.”

Quick. “There’s so many of them, wherever my tutors take me, there’s one of them there.”

“Yes, son, and it behooves you to remember that.”

“What, mother?”

“There’s more of them than there are of us.”

I sniff and raise my chin, just like father. “Ain’t afraid of nothing. I’m Guile.”

Mother laughs despite herself. She covers her mouth and smothers it, but her eyes are light again, and I know she won’t be mad at me anymore. “Oh, my little man, you’re growing up fast, aren’t you?” She looks over at Lady Janus Borig. “You see?”

“Indeed,” the old woman says. She doesn’t sound pleased.

“Growing up fast enough to be told about the luxins?” I ask hopefully. I see my opportunity slipping away.

She scowls and I do my best to look cute and harmless. She sighs. “Don’t tell your father?” she says.

“Promise!”

My mother pauses, though. She turns. “Lady Borig?” she asks. “Somehow, I think your own knowledge of that might be just a bit larger than my own.”

“Indeed.” Lady Borig’s index finger suddenly glows hot, and she sticks it into the bowl of her pipe, reigniting the ashes. A sub-red drafter. She puffs on the pipe for a time until she’s enveloped in a cloud. “How much do you want me to tell him? For that matter, how much do you want me to tell you? ’Tis the stuff of nightmares.”