Council members were plotting against him, and he had no idea which ones.
He was beginning to suspect the woman he had loved had played him for a fool, and here he was—sitting and giggling.
The amusement faded.
At this moment, the note meant nothing. The throne was his, and it would not be wrested from him by those inside the walls or the Xhelozi beyond them. Even if Carys had somehow lived and escaped the castle, the withdrawal from the Tears of Midnight would have taken its toll on her body. She could not have gotten very far without help.
He thought of Trade Master Errik and Lord Garret. Neither of them had been seen since the night she disappeared. Maybe . . .
He shook his head. There was no way to know if this note was placed under the stone before or after that final Trial and, until there was proof otherwise, Carys was dead.
And yet, he had never felt her death.
When Carys broke her arm, Andreus swore he could feel an echo of her pain.
Carys always knew when he was having trouble breathing, even when no one else saw a hint of his secret.
After his sister’s betrayal during the Trials, he had been determined to cast her from his mind. But despite his anger, they were twins. Shouldn’t he have felt something when she died?
Shoving the complicated feelings aside, Andreus made his way to the battlements. The temperature had dropped since earlier in the evening when he had examined the lights on the walls. Graylem and the ladies stood just steps away, huddled in their cloaks. Andreus forced a smile and moved forward as the windmills rolled against the night sky.
Yesterday the mills had moved sluggishly. Today the creaking of the blades was slower still. The air felt stagnant. If he didn’t move fast, he could soon be fighting a war on two fronts—inside the Palace of Winds and on the Garden City walls. And right now, he was fighting it all on his own.
His swirling thoughts made it hard to focus on Demitria. He feigned interest in her admiration of the orb and his climb down the wall and subsequent race to retrieve the crown from the Tomb of Light. She pressed her body against his as she talked—something he would have been delighted to take advantage of just weeks ago. But when he pulled her close and kissed her and she caught fire in his arms, there was no rise of passion. No spark.
He caught Graylem’s eye, then took Demitria by the hand and led her to the shadows of the windmill. Pressing her against the wall, Andreus kissed her one more time and whispered, “I am more sorry than you know that I have to cut our time short. Lord Graylem will see you arrive safely home.”
Graylem bowed, still holding fast to the dark-haired girl’s hand. “It will be my privilege.” The flush on Graylem’s face was bright even in the low light.
Andreus placed a kiss on Demitria’s hand as he led her into the stairwell, then walked to Graylem and pulled him to the side. “Take your time showing them out. Give them a tour and make the first stop my rooms. I need the Elders to think I am still occupied so they don’t come looking for me.”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Graylem agreed.
“I could also use a distraction in about an hour,” Andreus added. If he hadn’t found anything tangible that pointed him to the truth in that time, there wouldn’t be anything to find.
“A distraction?”
“Anything that will pull the attention of the guards and whatever intelligencers the Elders have roaming the halls away—without burning the palace down.”
“It shall be done.” Graylem met Andreus’s eyes and nodded.
After a lingering farewell kiss for a visibly disappointed Demitria, Andreus headed back onto the battlements, careful to stay in the shadows before ducking into the windmill that topped the southwestern tower.
The creaking of the gears was louder inside the mill. The octagon chamber was pitch-black when he closed the door. The interior of each windmill was used by the Masters for a specific purpose. Some housed the apprentices. There was meeting and building space. This one was storage. Rarely did anyone enter this particular mill after nightfall, which is why it was a favorite location for Andreus to visit with whatever amorous lady he was sampling on a particular day. It was also the reason Andreus had chosen it for the next phase of this hastily conceived plan.
He felt around the floor next to the entrance and smiled into the darkness as his fingers brushed across a large satchel. Max had come through. Tomorrow, Andreus would make sure the kitchen baked dozens of apple tarts for him to share with his friends.
An icy chill bit into his body as he pulled off his coat and shirt and shrugged into Graylem’s guard tunic. The material was coarse and itchy, but not as bad as the improperly sized trousers that Andreus struggled to get over his thighs. After several tries, he finally fastened them. The ensemble was more tourniquet than uniform, but it would have to do.
He slid the sword into the scabbard, slapped the helmet onto his head, and threw the guardsman’s cloak over his shoulders. Then he headed back out onto the battlements. He walked slowly, concentrating on disguising his limp, which would quickly give his identity away.
The walls around Garden City were brightly lit. Nothing moved in the darkness beyond them. For now, the Xhelozi were being pushed back by the lights. He could only hope the wind would blow again before the stored power was depleted.
Pulling the cloak tighter, he strode across the battlements and headed down the stairs on the northwesternmost tower. He spotted Master Triden in his gray robes standing beneath the tallest of the towers. He stared up at the orb as it glowed bright in the night. He was about to make a detour to speak to the Master of Light when he saw two men striding across the battlements toward the Master. The short white beard made Elder Cestrum recognizable from a distance. The other man had his hood raised.
Frustrated that there was nowhere he could hide and listen to their conversation without potentially giving his own deception away, Andreus turned and hurried into the stairwell. He paused at the bottom of the tower and listened for the sound of footfalls, then continued down the hall to a doorway that led out of the Palace of Winds.
Andreus stayed in the shadows as he crossed the courtyard of the palace toward the North Tower . . . the tower that was constructed at the plateau with the sheerest drop. It had only one entrance to make sure the prisoners inside would have less chance of escape. Andreus had never had cause to go to the North Tower. Carys, however, had been on several occasions—each because she had drawn punishment on herself to distract others from one of Andreus’s attacks.
The last time was on the night of their father’s death. She had spoken to one of the King’s Guard. He warned her against asking questions, but Carys had vowed to return and get the truth of what happened to the King and the Crown Prince as soon as she recovered from the flogging she’d received. Only, the four King’s Guard were discovered dead first. Poisoned. By whom, no one knew.
Carys had believed that the men were killed before they had a chance to reveal the truth behind the ambush that took the lives of the King and the Crown Prince.
Andreus had not found the guardsmen’s deaths as menacing as his twin. It wasn’t uncommon for a prisoner who displeased the guards to suddenly die before the end of their sentence. The North Tower was not a kind place.
Now, Andeus wished he had asked more questions when his sister had told him about sneaking up to the second floor where the King’s Guard were locked away.
Andreus intended to retrace her steps now. The only place to find confirmation of his mother’s accusations was where the King’s Guardsmen died.
He pushed open the heavy iron door of the North Tower and winced as the hinges groaned. The musty smell of rotting fabric, rusty metal, and soot washed over him. Wind power was not wasted on those who committed crimes against the crown—not even here on the first floor where minor trials were held and corporal punishments were enacted.
He eased the door closed behind him. A snorting grunt echoed in the shadows, and he almost lost his grip
on the handle in his surprise. He froze. Blood pounded loud in his ears as he waited for the guard sitting on a wooden chair near the stairs to jump up and recognize him.
The guard shifted in the chair and snorted again as he slept on.
Now what?
A picture from that fateful night of Carys wielding a sword outside the palace entrance flashed in his head. She had boldly drawn attention to distract from her true purpose. Using that image as inspiration, Andreus let the heavy iron door slam shut and yelled, “On your feet, Guardsman!”
The guard scrambled to get up, almost knocking over the chair. Andreus kept his face in the shadows as he snapped, “I didn’t know sleeping was one of the duties for guards in the North Tower. I will have to have a talk with Captain Monteros upon his return.”
The guard shuffled his feet. “It was just . . . it was dark and I didn’t mean . . .”
“Silence!” Andreus stepped forward. “I have been instructed by the Council of Elders to handle a delicate matter upstairs. While I do so, I would suggest you step into the cold outside to wake yourself up. If I can be certain you will not make the same mistake again, I will not report your actions. I remember what it was like to have to stand watch on a long, uneventful night.”
“Yes. No. I mean, I will step outside. Thank you. I promise it won’t happen again.” The young guard barely lifted his eyes as he hurried toward the exit. Andreus stepped to the side and let out a sigh of relief when the iron door slammed shut.
Once he rooted out the treason in the palace, he would have to insist on better training for his guard. But for now, Andreus grabbed a torch off the wall, lifted a ring of iron keys off a hook near where the guard had been sleeping, and headed up the steps.
The smell of decay grew as he climbed. He could almost taste the stench of rotting food, unwashed bodies, and defecation.
Andreus stepped out of the stairwell onto the second floor and started down the hallway that, aside from his torch, was bathed in blackness. It appeared light was now denied to those who did not embrace the seven virtues, especially since the torches were needed in the halls of the Palace of Winds and throughout the city below.
Metal clanged against stone.
Someone wept.
And from down the hall, there was a sound of humming. Faint, but Andreus recognized the old folk tune. It was the air their nurse had sung when he and Carys were little. Then, it was a song of warmth and kindness. Now, it was the melody of hopelessness and decay.
Torch held high, Andreus peered into the first cell. The wooden door was thick, with an iron lock and bars that lined the narrow window near the top. The cell was empty except for moldy hay and a small bench. Something scrambled across his foot. Andreus jerked to the side. The keys in his hand clanged against the wall as the rat scurried down the hall into the darkness. Had Carys been here, the rat would already be dead.
Andreus straightened and realized the humming had stopped. But something rustled in the cell next door.
Andreus lifted the torch to the window. A dirt-smudged, gray-haired woman sat on the wooden bench. Eyes squinted at him before she looked back down at her hands.
“How long have you been here?” he asked.
“Three days,” she answered. “I think it’s been three days. Maybe four. My husband is sick. I was only trying to get him help. Do you know what happened to ’im?”
Four days. An eternity to her, but not long enough to help Andreus.
“I’m sorry.” Pity swirled as he stepped back and moved along the hall. His stomach lurched at the now-overwhelming stench of unwashed bodies and urine.
He peered into the next cell. A man with bloodstained bandages wrapped around a stump that ended just above where his elbow used to be was sprawled on the ground—not moving. Dead—or soon would be.
Andreus continued looking into cells, trying to decide how to find something that would help confirm the identities of the traitors involved in his father’s and brother’s deaths. His mother might be fabricating her story of treason, but there was no way to be certain without proof. One way or the other, he needed to speak to someone who had been here when the men died.
The guard he’d intimidated would return to his post soon. Andreus needed to finish his search and get out of here.
He reached the last of the cells in the hallway—all empty—and started back toward the stairs. Perhaps Graylem could ask some questions. It was risky and . . .
The humming started again.
Andreus stopped and listened hard through the sounds of shuffling hay and shallow coughs. It sounded as if the humming was coming from behind him—from the line of empty cells.
He headed back in the direction he just came from and the music stopped.
“Hello?” he asked quietly.
No answer.
“I know you’re there.”
He peered in the windows of the cells again. Empty. Just as before. Perhaps he’d just imagined the humming. Or . . .
“Feel it in the mountain air,” he sang softly, feeling beyond foolish as his voice cracked. Still he continued to sing, “See it in the streams. Virtues set the world alight.”
“Jealousy darkens dreams,” whispered a voice coming from the second-to-last cell.
Andreus pressed his face against the bars of the window. There was still no one in view. But there was someone there. He sang another line of the song and heard rustling in the hay. A moment later a rail-thin woman with sunken eyes and tattered clothes appeared in the window.
“How long have you been here?” he asked.
“Summer and winter and summer and winter again . . . ,” she sang in a gravelly, tuneless voice.
“Years?” Most prisoners stayed for a short time—many were punished and released. Some executed. But there were a few held longer. Sometimes for good reason. Some because they were forgotten.
She nodded.
“So you were in this cell a few weeks ago?”
She nodded again.
“You were here when the King’s Guardsmen were poisoned?”
“Winter and summer circle each other . . . jealously guarding their prey.”
“Is that a yes?”
“The stars in the sky . . .”
The clang of a door echoed through the hall. The woman jerked back, her eyes wide with fear. The guard downstairs must have come back inside. Either that or someone else had arrived in the North Tower. No one was coming up the stairs yet, but his time for this masquerade was running out.
He looked back through the window, but the woman had disappeared from view. “If you know anything about why the men died, tell me. I can help you get free if you tell me what you know.”
Silence.
“Do you know who killed them?”
There was rustling from inside the cell, but nothing more. He waited for several long seconds for her to return, but she didn’t appear, and the guard below would begin to ask questions soon. Frustrated, Andreus turned.
“They said that she promised. She said it was fated they would succeed. They would be rewarded. They said she would not abandon them.”
He spun back around. The words were ghostly. Barely audible, but real. “Who said?”
“The snakes. They whispered. They thought no one could hear them. They don’t know how to whisper. I know how to whisper. You have to whisper if you want to live. The snakes didn’t live.”
“Why? Do you know why they died?”
The door below slammed shut again. Someone else had come into the tower.
“They were promised summer. It was winter they ate.”
“What did they say?”
“They’d traded the Queen for the seeker of stars and the man of black heart and the moon they promised. New King. The seer promised summer if they gave her the old crown’s death.”
They promised to give the seer death. Bitterness churned in his stomach and filled his mouth.
“Lady Imogen?” he asked.
“They thought sh
e would step into the darkness for them. But one said she would never come. He was right. It was a man who came.”
Andreus glanced toward the stairs and asked, “Did they call the man by name? Do you know who the man of black heart is?”
Voices rose from below. It was time for him to go.
“Iron for blood. Iron for heart. Clawing for summer when winter does start.”
“Do you know who killed them?”
“He knew how to whisper.”
“Did he work with Lady Imogen? Did he work with the stars?”
“No. He wasn’t of the stars. They said they did as they were told, and saw the palace plunged into darkness.”
The darkness. They returned after the wind-powered lights were sabotaged! Was it a signal that those inside the Palace were ready to move on to the next phase of their plot?
“Who was the man who visited them?”
“Skin of snow. Eye of night. Scratching in the dark after the gift of death. Scratching. Lots of scratching until there was nothing.”
He didn’t understand, but he had run out of time because he could hear voices downstairs—and they were getting louder. “I must go.”
“Don’t accept gifts,” she whispered from the dark. “I don’t accept gifts. I’m alive. No scratching for me.”
Scratching, he thought as he limped down the hall. Was that crazy talk or had she truly heard scratching after the guards took the “gift” and before they died? Perhaps one of the guards left a clue behind . . .
Footsteps sounded on the stairs. Andreus adjusted the helmet so it sat low on his forehead and put his hand on his sword as the footsteps grew closer.
The clang of a gong echoed. Then another.
“The signal! The Xhelozi must be coming!” a voice called.
Maybe. Or maybe Graylem had provided the distraction Andreus had requested.
Andreus was betting on the latter. The footsteps on the stairs retreated and Andreus hurried to the empty cells. He pulled the first door open, and searched—the walls, the hay on the floor—looking for something. Anything other than rats and mold.
The gongs went silent as he moved into the second cell. Still nothing.