Inherit the Flame

Chapter Twenty-Two

The sun was threatening to rise by the time Ripka and Honey had hammered out their plans with Dranik and dragged themselves, aching and exhausted, back to the palace. Even at night it was a piece of art. Carved into the side of a dormant firemount, the wide terraces of the stepped structure were strung with glimmering oil lamps, faceted glass splashing brightness in all directions. A flagrant display of Hond Steading’s wealth, but one the citizens seemed to admire. They struck Ripka as ostentatious, but then, this wasn’t her city. She wasn’t sure she’d ever have a city to call her own again.

The front steps were more in line with Ripka’s aesthetic. They were broad and shallow, spaced in such a way that would make them difficult for an invading force to take at any speed. The builders of this place had carved it into a gleaming jewel, and its edges could still cut when required.

The guards lining the walkway were reminder enough of that. Jacketed in sharp black, spears held easy at their sides, they dotted both sides of the broad stairs on every third step, their gazes locked on all approaching visitors. They appeared ceremonial to the average citizen, but Ripka saw the tension in their jaws, the spring in their knees, and knew them the deadliest warriors the city had to offer. And the city would soon need them.

Massive double doors loomed at the top of the steps, thrown wide despite the late night. Dame Honding welcomed her citizens to seek refuge in her palace at all times. In the few days Ripka had been in the palace, she’d stumbled across troubled souls more than once, pacing or praying or weeping in silence in the solitude of the Dame’s home.

There was kindness here, amongst the harsh living of the desert. A kindness born from the seed of the ruling family’s philosophies. She wondered if Dranik ever considered that.

She stepped into that place of welcoming, and a guard grabbed her arm.

“Miss Leshe, Miss Honey?”

“Yes? Is there a problem?”

A red-eyed man reading on a bench nearby looked up, assessed the two women being apprehended, and shuffled away to a far seat. She couldn’t blame him.

“The Dame wishes a word with you.”

“It is very late…”

“She has been waiting.”

Ripka nodded understanding. They were escorted through the welcoming room and down a side hall Ripka knew well – the path to the Dame’s private sitting room. Her heart thundered, wondering just what had kept the Dame up through the night to speak with her. When the door opened, her stomach dropped.

The messenger she’d intercepted stood alongside Dame Honding’s chair, his pale face streaked with what might have been dried tears. Tibal lingered to the side of the room, Enard on the other, and both had a set of guards twin to the two escorting Ripka and Honey.

Ripka put a placid face on, and bowed over her hands like this were any other meeting. “Good evening, Dame.”

The Dame snorted and flicked the hem of her long sleeve. “My patience has burned away with the lamp oil, Miss Leshe. You know why you are here, do not insult us both by pretending otherwise. You accosted this young man and intercepted a message from me meant for the Valathean Fleet. Why?”

Ripka wished she was facing this with a well-rested head. After a moment’s consideration, she decided to gamble with the truth. “I find Ranalae’s promises to you impossible, and I fear what will happen to Hond Steading if you invite her and her forces within your walls. Frankly, Dame, once she is inside your palace, you will never get her out again.”

“Now that’s unfair.” Ranalae stepped from behind a pillar. The dignitary looked ragged from lack of sleep, but otherwise composed. Maybe even a little amused. “I do have my own home to return to.”

I bet you do, Ripka thought, but bit her tongue. Antagonizing the woman without a point wouldn’t win her any good will from the Dame, and that was what she desperately needed now.

Interfering with a Honding messenger was treason. And she knew full well how treason would be handled in Aransa: walk the Black, or face the axe. She licked her lips, composing an argument to keep Honey, Enard, and Tibal free of the fallout she’d brought down upon them all.

“I understand,” the Dame said, “that you faced a great deal of hardship in Aransa. The stories you have told me, and that I have heard from others, are quite chilling. But I fear your experiences have biased you to reality, my dear. The Scorched exists because of the goodwill of Valathea. Even Hond Steading, though unique in its system of government, relies on the empire for trade and, yes, even protection, when it comes to that. Relations between our city and the empress have always been strong. And now, in our time of need, they have come to our aid. I will not allow you to insult our imperial friends to soothe your paranoia. Is that clear?”

“And where was their friendship, when they took your nephew and tortured him?” The words were out before she could stop them, thrown hard as knives against a woman she could not otherwise wound.

The Dame took a sharp breath, but Ripka’s gaze was on Ranalae, whose smile turned decidedly predatory. Whatever Ranalae’s position in the empire, she knew. She must know what went on in the Bone Tower. There was no hiding something like that from the higher-ups. And, in knowing and doing nothing, Ranalae had been complicit in Detan’s suffering. Could even be held accountable for the wall he brought down during his desperate escape.

“Those rumors are unsubstantiated,” the Dame snapped, “and the fanciful imaginings of sick minds. They tried to cure my nephew’s loss of sel-sense, he did not take well to the treatment. That is all.”

“Is that what Ranalae told you?”

Ranalae smiled knives at Ripka, but she pushed on. She’d already stepped in the quicksand, might as well get a few shots off before she was buried. “He was never a normal sel-sensitive. He was always deviant, and they dug around in his flesh to figure out why.”

“That. Is. Not. True.” The Dame’s cheeks had gone scarlet, her fingers curling into the arm of her chair.

“Why don’t you ask him, instead of this sycophant?”

“He isn’t here!”

Ripka jerked back a step, the anger seeping out of her sails. That was real pain in the Dame’s voice, broken and ragged, and it shook Ripka to realize she’d done that to the woman – that she’d ripped a scab right off a festering wound. While Ripka fumbled for words, the Dame shot a glance at Tibal and said, “Despite my best efforts otherwise.”

“He ain’t a pet to put on a leash,” Tibal drawled and rolled his shoulders. “But.” He hesitated, flicked a gaze to Ripka. “She’s right, you know. Weren’t pleasant little talks they were having with Detan in that tower. Talks don’t make a man scream in his sleep.”

“My nephew,” the Dame grated out the words, “is beside the point. The point is your treason, Miss Leshe, and your accomplices in the act.”

“I pressed them all into it,” she said immediately.

The Dame waved this off with a flick of her fingertips. “Noble of you, but I do not care. You are all quite lucky that the only damage you succeeded in causing was delaying matters by a few marks. If it had been otherwise, I would have you struck down where you stand. Now, out of deference to the friendship you have all shown my nephew, you may leave this place with your lives. But you are leaving this place.”

She snapped her fingers, and the guards brought forward finely made rucksacks and set them at the feet of all four. Ripka picked hers up, flicked back the top, and was unsurprised to see her new clothes stuffed inside.

“But you are not leaving this place completely free. Meet your new friends.” She inclined her head to the guards, none of whom so much as twitched an eyebrow in response. “They will escort you out of the palace and into an inn in the market district. That’s the other side of the city, you’ll note. There you will be given two rooms to split however you please, and I will cover the cost for the duration of your stay. Which will be indefinite, as I will not have the time to figure out what to do with you four until well after Thratia has been repelled from these walls. The rules of your new lives are simple: you may not leave the grounds of the inn without escort, and then only for excellent reason. And you, Tibal.” She swivelled to pin him with her gaze. “You will be watched exceptionally closely, and your flier will remain here for safekeeping until I decide what to do with you.”

He bared his teeth at the Dame, an expression of aggression that shocked Ripka straight to the core. “Wouldn’t want to risk losing your spare heir, would you?”

She drew back as if struck, then pressed her lips together and gathered herself once more. “You are of my blood, though it chafes you so. Whether you believe me or not, I care what happens to you. I will see you safe, even if I must imprison you to ensure that fact.”

“Why not just lock us up? You’ve got a big jail here.” Tibal’s arms came unfolded, his head cocked to the side like he’d scented blood in the air. “Why dress up what you’re doing to us like it’s something better than imprisonment?”

“Because it is most decidedly temporary, and my jail is for persons who have been convicted of crimes.”

And the only crime they could be accused of was treason. Which always, always, came with a death penalty – no matter how enlightened a city claimed to be. Ripka shot Tibal a look, but he must have figured it out for himself, because he shut right up and took a step back, folding his arms over his chest to start a good and proper sulk.

Dame Honding surveyed them all, let her gaze linger on every last so-called traitor she’d harbored under her roof, and a spike of guilt stabbed at Ripka’s chest. Though she had been acting for what she felt was the greater good, still she had betrayed this woman’s trust. This firm, kind woman, who was struggling to keep her city safe while what little was left of her family dissolved all around her.

Though her expression was stern, the Dame appeared so very tired in that moment, and not just due to the late night. In fact, Ripka doubted she got to bed at a reasonable time at all any more. The unsteady lantern light highlighted the crow’s feet stamped around her eyes, the hard lines about her lips where she’d spent her life schooling her expression to careful neutrality. Here was a strong woman, a proud woman, worn thin by time and circumstance, looking for a future – any future with a positive outcome – for the people she had spent her life serving. And now, toward the end of her life, she had nothing at all to support herself with. No family. No army. Just a lot of scared people, and a tenuous alliance with an empire that’d always been hungry to reclaim control of her family’s legacy.

But she wasn’t alone, though she didn’t quite understand that fact.

“Time to go,” Ripka’s guard said. Mechanically, she swung her pack over her shoulder, unable to take her gaze from the Dame.

Halfway to the door, she called, “You know how to find him. Write to him. Please.”

The Dame’s brows lifted, and then Ripka was ushered out of the room, and the door clicked shut behind her.