The Will of the Empress

It wasn’t so bad when I started out, she thought, forcing herself to go through that gate. When people didn’t know. But then it got out that time I knew Glaki had fallen and broken her arm. After that they all decided I was going to lord it over them.

She looked at the house. Two young women, one black, one white, were coming toward her. One was in a smith’s apron; one was dressed like a noble. Both were wearing smiles as uncertain as the one on Tris’s mouth. Tris halted, frowning. For a moment these two were strangers, smooth and polished creatures who moved as if they were sure of themselves. Behind them stood a three-story house with neatly planted garden strips in front, good ironwork around the windows, and sturdy outbuildings to either side. Even the location was expensive.

They look like the world is theirs, she thought bleakly, rocking back on the worn heels of her boots. And isn’t it? Daja could afford this house, from all her work in living metal. Sandry’s rich. When Briar comes back—if he comes back—he’ll be rich, too, from working with miniature trees. I’m the poor one. I’ll never belong here like they do.

“I’ll be your housekeeper, Daja,” she said abruptly. “Not a charity case. I’ll earn my keep.”

Sandry and Daja looked at each other. Suddenly they—and the look of exasperation they shared—were very familiar.

“Same old Tris,” they chorused.

Tris scowled. “I mean it.”

Sandry came forward to kiss Tris’s cheek. “We know. Oh, dear—you’re clammy. And your color’s dreadful. Lark wrote you’ve been ill. Come—” Her blue eyes flew wide open as Chime stood up on Tris’s shoulder and made a sound of glass grating on glass.

“Hello, beautiful,” said Daja, holding out both hands. “You must be Chime.”

The glass dragon glided over to land in Daja’s hands.

“Traitor,” grumbled Tris. She let Sandry wrap an arm around her shoulders. “Actually, I would feel better for some tea,” she admitted.

Daja led the way indoors, cooing admiration of Chime.

The 25th day of Storm Moon, 1043 K. F.

Discipline cottage

Winding Circle temple, Emelan

At first Briar Moss’s homecoming was grand. Lark worked her welcoming magic on all of them, erasing lines from Rosethorn’s face that Briar had thought would never go away, and making Evvy feel as welcome as if she were Lark’s own daughter. Lark barely hesitated on meeting Evvy’s strange friend Luvo before she found him the ideal place to sit and watch them all. Briar she saluted, letting him know that he had finally brought them all home safe. At that moment it didn’t seem to matter that Tris had left a new student with Lark, or that another student, a fellow so shy he didn’t want to share the attic with anyone, lived upstairs. All that mattered to Briar was that he was safe at Discipline, that Little Bear still remembered him, that Rosethorn seemed more like her old self than she’d been since they’d reached the far east. Even the sight of temple habits—Earth green here at Discipline; Fire red, Air yellow, Water blue, novice white on the spiral road—didn’t rattle him. This was Emelan, not Gyongxe. Outside the walls he could hear the crash of the sea in the cove and the cry of gulls overhead. Briar was home, and safe.

The first problem came when Rosethorn told him that he could sleep in her room for his few nights at Discipline. She would stay with Lark for the present. The child Glaki had Briar’s old room. There was no question of sharing the attic with the ferociously shy Comas. It felt strange, lying down in Rosethorn’s small, neat chamber, but it was only temporary. Since they picked up Sandry’s letter when they made port in Hatar, Briar had known that things had changed. It was just as well, he’d thought then. He couldn’t live as he did these days in a small temple cottage, under Lark and Rosethorn’s far-too-perceptive eyes.

Rosethorn’s bed was just not comfortable. It was a dedicate’s hard cot, not luxurious by anyone’s standard, but Briar was not used to even its mite of softness. With mental apologies to Rosethorn, and a promise to restore the room later, Briar moved the pallet to the floor. That was better, but when had Discipline gotten so noisy? The attic floor creaked—was that fellow up there rolling to and fro? Briar couldn’t remember if the clock in the Hub tower had ever woken him before. Then he could swear he could hear the dog snoring from Glaki’s room.

It was also stuffy. Who could breathe in here?

At last he found his bedroll and crept out the back door, into the garden. It was cold, for Emelan, wintertime around the Pebbled Sea, but Briar’s roll was made for Gyongxe winters. It was more than adequate for a night without rain, even in Storm Moon. He laid it out on the garden path and slid between the covers, plants and vines in full slumber all around him. He was asleep the moment he pulled the blankets up around his chin.

He heard the chime of temple bells, summoning Earth temple dedicates to the midnight services that honored their gods. As he fell back into his dreams, flames roared up around him, throwing nightmare shadows on his eyelids. In the distance, triumphant warriors shouted and people shrieked. The wind carried the scent of blood and smoke to his nostrils.

Burning carpets wrapped around him. Briar fought to get free while boulders shot from catapults smashed temple walls to rubble.

Briar gasped and sat up. Sweat poured over his face, stinging in his eyes. He’d ripped his bedroll apart in his struggles, flinging blankets into the winter garden. Shuddering, he gulped in lungfuls of cold air, trying to cleanse his nose and throat of the lingering reek of burning wood and bodies. As his head cleared, he drew up his knees and wrapped his arms around them. Resting his face against his legs, he began to cry.