The Skull Throne

In seconds she was through, dropping into a tumble on the floor and flowing smoothly into a prostrate pose. Kneeling, she spread her hands on the floor, pressing her head to the worn carpet. She wore a silken Sharum garb—pantaloons, cinched robe, and headwrap of the deepest black, contrasted by the stark white of her wedding veil. Her hands and feet were bare.

“Stop that,” Rojer said. The Krasians might have enjoyed such shows of submission, but they made him deeply uncomfortable, especially from someone who could kill him with her littlest finger.

Sikvah rolled back to sit on her heels, facing him. She undid her veil, pulling the wrap back to show her hair.

Rojer went to the window, sticking his head out and looking down the sheer wall of the tower. There were no ropes, no climbing tools. Had she scaled it with hands and feet alone? “Did Amanvah send you to free me?”

Sikvah shook her head. “I can, if you command it, but the Jiwah Ka does not believe that is your wish. I am here to watch over you and keep you from harm.”

Rojer looked around the tiny room with its few furnishings. “Not a lot of places to hide, if someone comes to check on me.”

Sikvah smiled. “Close your eyes for two breaths.”

Rojer did, and when he opened them, Sikvah was gone. He searched the room, even looking under the low bed, but there was no sign of her. “Where are you?”

“Here.” Her voice came from above, but even looking up at the sound, Rojer could not see her among the rafters. But then, as he looked on, one of the shadows unfurled and he caught a flash from her white veil.

Sikvah dropped silently to the floor, seeming to bounce as she struck. Even watching closely, he lost sight of her, wandering the room until her hand snaked out from under the bed to grasp his ankle. He jumped and let out a yelp.

Sikvah let go immediately, appearing a moment later at the door. She stood quietly a moment, then shook her head. “There is a guard three flights below. He is lax and unlikely to hear, but we should be cautious.”

This time he watched in amazement as Sikvah scaled the stone wall, worn sheer over the centuries, as easily he might climb a ladder.

“When I get out of here, we’re reworking our entire Jongleur’s act,” Rojer said. “You’re wasted just singing.”

They spoke deep into the night, Rojer lying on his bed, hands folded beneath his head as he stared up into the darkness that cloaked Sikvah.

She told of how she had been given to the Damajah, and sent into the bowels of the Dama’ting Palace. Of the brutal training that followed.

“You must have hated Enkido,” he said.

“For a time,” she said, “but the life of a Sharum is not forgiving, husband. There are no second chances in battle, as there are in performance. Enkido gave us the tools to survive. I came to see that everything he did, he did out of love.”

Rojer nodded. “It was much the same with me and Master Arrick.” He had always taken care to present the shiny, respectful version of his master to his wives, but Sikvah was baring her life to him, and he did the same in return.

He told of how Arrick tried to leave him and his mother to die. Of his struggles with wine, and the violence it spurred in him. How he had let the drink—and his own ego—dash their fortunes again and again.

And yet, Rojer couldn’t bring himself to hate Arrick, for his dying act had been to leap over the wards and fling himself on a wood demon, that Rojer might live.

Arrick had been weak, selfish, and petty, but he had loved Rojer in his way.

Sikvah spoke without hesitation, sharing more of herself that ever before, but she had yet to have her sincerity truly tested.

“The day we met,” Rojer said. “And you failed the test of purity …”

“You spoke in my defense,” Sikvah said. “That was when I knew.”

“Knew what?” Rojer asked.

“That you were not like Krasian men,” Sikvah said. “That when you looked at me, you did not see only property.

“I did not know you that day, husband. I had not seen your face, or heard of your deeds. I knew your tongue, but nothing of your ways, or those of your people. I was not asked to become your wife. I did not volunteer. I was given to you.”

“You’re a princess, not some slave …” Rojer began, though he knew that even in the North, such things were not uncommon, especially at court.

“Your forgiveness, husband,” Sikvah said, “but I am what the Damajah made of me. An instrument of her will. If she commanded I marry you, then it was inevera I should do so.”

“Why did she?” Rojer asked. “Why you?” It was a simple question, but he knew it was the beginning of several that would test her loyalty to Inevera, probing deeper into her machinations in his life.

But Sikvah did not hesitate. “To protect Amanvah, of course. The Damajah wanted a powerful and loyal agent amidst the greenlanders, but she would not place her eldest daughter at risk. There could be no better bodyguard than Enkido, but there are places a man, even a eunuch, cannot go. I, however, could be at Amanvah’s side always.”

“And Amanvah?” Rojer asked. “She is dama’ting. Was she at least given a choice?”

There was a whisper of silk above that might have been a shrug. “The Damajah’s words offered a choice, but her will was clear and dama’ting or no, Amanvah could no more refuse her than I.”

She laughed. “I know we have always seemed as sisters to you, but before that day we despised each other.”

“She turned on you, when you failed the purity test,” Rojer said. He paused, waiting for a response, but Sikvah was silent.

“I never asked for the test,” Rojer noted. “Quite the contrary, I said it was not needed, but Inevera insisted.”

Still Sikvah said nothing.

“And then Leesha lied, saying you passed just to spare you dishonor, yet Amanvah turned on you.”

Silence.

“Did she do it because she despised you,” Rojer asked, “or was it an act?”

“The Damajah cast the dice before our meeting,” Sikvah admitted. “She knew you would try to protect me.”

“Bravo,” Rojer said. “That act had even me fooled.” He supposed he should be angry—enraged even—but he had no energy for it. The past didn’t matter. That Amanvah and Sikvah had begun as Inevera’s creatures was no surprise. It was what they were now he needed to know.

“Who was he?” he asked.

“Eh?” Sikvah said.

“The man who … knew you,” Rojer said. Part of him didn’t want to know, but he had been with many women he was not proud of, and was in no position to judge.

“No one,” Sikvah said. “I broke my hymen in sharusahk training. My dishonor to you was a fiction only.”

Rojer shrugged. “You certainly seemed to know what you were doing.”

Again she laughed, a sweet, tinkling sound. “The dama’ting taught us pillow dancing, that my spear sisters and I could appear the perfect brides.”

Pillow dancing. The very word made him squirm. He changed the subject. “Why did Amanvah poison Leesha?”

For the first time, there was a pause. “Amanvah brewed the poison, husband, but it was I who dosed her tea.”