The Purple Emperor

CHAPTER EIGHTY ONE

Fogarty found Queen Cleopatra skinning a deer. Her green arms were bloodied to the elbow and there were spatters of blood on her bare legs.

'Don't you have people to do that for you?' Fogarty asked curiously.

She gave him a sidelong glance with those astounding golden eyes. 'That's not the way things are done in the forest, Gatekeeper.' Her hands wielded the knife deftly as she plunged deeper into the carcass. 'We all muck in.' She smiled slightly. 'Isn't this the way it's done in the Analogue World?'

'Can't imagine our own dear Queen with anything between her knees except a horse,' Fogarty muttered dourly. 'Your Majesty, I -'

'Cleopatra will do. Or Cleo. No one stands on ceremony in the forest once they've been introduced.'

Fogarty sat himself down on a tree stump, pleasantly surprised by the lack of stiffness as he bent. 'I think our little party may be in trouble,' he said bluntly.

Cleopatra set down the knife and turned to look at him. No questions: she just waited. Fogarty liked that. 'I don't think the Emperor was at the palace,' he said. 'I think Hairstreak may have taken him to his new mansion right here in the forest. I think our party may be trying to get into Hairstreak's mansion right now.' What he really thought was that the party was probably inside and under attack, but since he couldn't really justify anything he felt it better not to overstate his case.

Oddly enough, Queen Cleopatra didn't ask him why he thought any of it. Instead she said, 'My people would have reported to me if the status of their mission had changed.'

'Mightn't have had the chance,' Fogarty said.

'If they went to Hairstreak's mansion, they would have returned to the forest.'

The implication was clear enough. If they'd passed through the forest, they would have stopped and told her. Fogarty sighed audibly. 'Pyrgus was leading them,' he said. 'You can't tell what that boy would do.'

The trouble was it all sounded lame and Fogarty knew it. Besides which, he wasn't sure what he wanted the Queen to do, even if she believed him. But Cleopatra only said, 'You're worried about the boy.'

'Yes.'

'My daughter's in the party,' Cleopatra said.

Fogarty blinked. 'Your daughter?' He made a rapid calculation. There was only one person it could be. 'Nymphalis is your daughter?'

The Queen nodded. 'Yes.' She pushed herself erect. 'I think I trust your intuition, Gatekeeper.'

'So what are you going to do?'

'Lead my army to Lord Hairstreak's mansion,' the Queen told him soberly. 'If you're right, the time for concealment may have passed us by.'