“You know quite a bit about the Imperator’s office,” I said.
Blackwood looked a bit sheepish. “I confess it’s a job that’s always interested me. Though there’s an unofficial rule that says Blackwoods can never be Imperators—we’re too influential already.”
“They’d be mad not to consider you,” I said. Blackwood would be one of the best choices for a leadership role. Even though he’d only just turned seventeen, he had a cooler head than most men twice his age. He sat up even straighter, his green eyes brightening.
“Howel!” Dee bolted up the stairs toward Blackwood and me, as excited as an overgrown calf in clover. I didn’t care. Someone from my old Incumbent house was here, besides Blackwood. Dee ducked into our row, jostling a pair of sorcerers, and sat on my skirt. It took a couple of tugs to get it out from under him.
“Dee! I didn’t think you’d be back from Lincolnshire. Did you battle Zem?” I said, stifling a laugh while he tried to yank his robe into propriety. Dee’s red hair was a brambled mess. He must have flown here.
“I didn’t get up close, but the Great Serpent was at work burning down masses of fields. Suppose the Ancients want to destroy crops, what with the winter coming. I got to work in the rain unit, you know. Even managed some lightning.” His round face flushed with pleasure. Well, he should have been proud. Summoning lightning was a bloody challenge.
“You must have won a great victory.” I smiled at him.
“We put the fire out, at least. How is everyone at home?” he asked, painfully trying to sound casual.
He was clearly asking about Lilly, my maid. He’d liked her since we’d all lived in Agrippa’s house together, though he’d never made his feelings known. Normally I’d have been worried about a young gentleman chasing a maid—those sorts of things didn’t usually end well for the girl. But I knew Dee would sooner cut off his own hand than harm Lilly. And if he didn’t, I’d do it for him.
“Everyone is very well. Everyone,” I said with a wink. Dee blushed harder, if such a thing were even possible. His skin practically glowed.
“What was that about?” Blackwood whispered.
“I don’t have to tell you all my secrets,” I said primly, fluffing my skirt.
“Pity. I’d like to know them.”
I couldn’t tell if he was joking, and I studied him a moment. Blackwood’s profile was strong and distinguished in a shaft of moonlight, and the look in his eyes utterly distant. No matter how much time I spent with him, he could be as inscrutable as the dark side of the moon.
“All rise,” a sorcerer called at the door. Instantly, I was on my feet, alongside Blackwood and the rest of the room. We were silent as a black-robed man entered, walked up the steps of the dais, and seated himself upon his throne. Horace Whitechurch, Imperator of Her Majesty’s Order.
When I’d first met him, I’d thought him the thinnest, most unassuming old man, with white hair and wet black eyes. Now I could feel how his strength radiated outward. In this room, coupled with the power of the elemental square, I imagined him as the beating heart of a great body, his life force nourishing each one of us in turn. This man was strength.
“Be seated,” he said, and we all obeyed in a whisper of silk. “To business. I shall be brief.” He paused, as if gathering his words. Then, “There has been an attack on the queen.”
He said it so matter-of-factly. Sharp cries sounded throughout the room, echoing off the high walls. Blackwood, Dee, and I looked at each other with horror. Whitechurch cleared his throat, restoring silence.
“Her Majesty is well. She herself has not been assaulted, but a message was found in the queen’s bedroom,” Whitechurch continued. He took something from his robes and held it up for all of us to see. It looked an ordinary type of letter. “From R’hlem.”
Holy hell. The Skinless Man, the most fearsome, the most intelligent, the most ruthless of the Seven Ancients, left a message in the queen’s bedroom? This time, there was no outcry. The room, as one, held its breath.
Finally, one young man in front of us stood. “How can we be certain it’s from him, sir?”
“The message was found,” Whitechurch said, unfolding the paper, “pinned to the body of one of Her Majesty’s footmen.” My stomach tightened to think about it. “A shadow Familiar was found painting on the walls with the poor man’s blood.”
I unsheathed Porridge and held it in my lap. I swore that the stave warmed in my hand, as if giving me comfort.
A shadow Familiar, he’d said. Could it have been Gwen? I recalled her the night of our commendation, laughing wildly as she pulled Agrippa away into the air. My heart twisted. Even now, the thought of Agrippa hurt. He’d welcomed me into his home, trained me. He’d been the first to believe in me. True, he had also betrayed me, but that part didn’t seem to matter any longer.
“What became of the Familiar?” someone else called out. Blackwood was right: Order meetings were quite informal.
“We burnt the thing. It did not return to its master.” Whitechurch turned his eyes down to the paper in his hand.
A cold sweat broke out along the back of my neck. It was as if I’d gone back to that night months before, when I’d come face to face with the Skinless Man. It had been an illusion, and a damned good one. The monster had caught me by the throat and nearly choked me to death. Thinking about that one burning yellow eye in the center of his forehead, the bloodied stretch of his muscles, the…I nearly vomited.
The worst part of all this was that if one of R’hlem’s agents had gained access to the palace and the queen’s bedroom, then we were not nearly as safe as we’d hoped. After the ward came down, we’d erected barriers all around the edges of the city, barriers patrolled day and night. But clearly it hadn’t been enough.
At least the queen was unharmed. At least he hadn’t succeeded in attacking her. Unless it was R’hlem’s plan to instill fear in us.
I knew from experience that fear could lead people to do terrible things.
Whitechurch began reading, “?‘My dear Imperator, I pray you’ll excuse the messy delivery of this salutation. One must always make an impression.’?” Even though Whitechurch spoke those words, I could hear R’hlem’s voice saying them, his tone deep and soft and sinister on the edges. “?‘It has been rather a dull summer, wouldn’t you agree? I admit that my dear Korozoth’s destruction was a bit of a puzzle to me. But if there is anything I enjoy in this life, it is a challenge.
“?‘I’ve decided to give you fair warning: I am preparing an onslaught to bring your Order to its knees. I will show you horror, my dear Imperator. I will give you the very taste of fear. And you know that I am a man of my word.’?”
I scoffed at that; R’hlem was hardly a man.
Whitechurch continued, “?‘There is one measure that you may take to spare yourself, your queen, and your loyal sorcerers from this coming apocalypse. Give me what I ask, and I shall perhaps not crush you beneath my boot. Be assured that if you refuse me, nothing can prevent your destruction.’?”
Without thinking, I rested my hand on top of Blackwood’s. He slipped his fingers through mine for an instant.
Whitechurch glanced out at the room. “?‘I asked my servant to leave behind my demand.’?”
With that, Whitechurch spun his stave and swept up the water from the elemental pit into a ball. He flattened it out into a thin, shimmering square and touched his stave to it. The surface rippled, and an image appeared. Agrippa had shown us this once—a way of looking into other locations, like a scrying mirror.
Again, I wished Agrippa were here now.
The image settled upon the queen’s room. I could see the foot of her canopied bed. A great splattering of blood covered the floor and sprayed up onto the pale walls, still fresh enough to be dripping. I imagined a shadowy demon slicing the poor footman’s throat, the servant’s life bleeding away. Monster.
Whitechurch expanded the image. Above the mess, the Familiar had used the gore to write a few crude words: