Tia let out her breath and realized she had held it captive. Tempted to dismiss the Jew’s words, instead she savored them, secreted them away in her heart to ponder in solitude.
Pedaiah cleared his throat.
She jolted. She had forgotten his presence.
“These lost hours, Daniel. What do you make of them?”
Daniel nodded, as if in agreement with an idea Pedaiah had not spoken. “Yes, yes, she must be cautious.”
She looked between them. “Cautious? Of what?”
Daniel stood.
Tia fought the urge to pull him back.
“There are substances known, my child, to affect the mind. Such things are known to those who study the ways to induce false religious experiences.”
“Priests? Magi?”
Daniel inclined his head, all the agreement he would concede. “You must watch what you eat and drink, child. Nothing from the hand of anyone but yourself. Especially at night.”
Pedaiah glanced at the jug of wine and cup on her bedside table. He handed the cup to Daniel, and the older man swirled its contents and sniffed.
“Yes, it is possible.”
She felt her lips part. “But that was placed by my personal slave women!”
Daniel said nothing. It was Pedaiah who answered, voice urgent, eyes pleading. “Please, Tia. Trust no one.”
Ah, but did he know how much she trusted him? How she would take anything from his hand, that hand that had covered her not once, but twice, in prayers of deliverance? Tia swallowed, her throat tight, and nodded.
“It is only the beginning, Tiamat.” Daniel stepped away from her bedside, and with the flickering light behind him, his shoulders appeared strong, solid. He had these roots he spoke of. A strength that had lasted forty years. He had remained a drop of pure water in a brackish pool, not absorbed or dispersed or diluted.
He spoke again, like an oracle peering into her future. “You have risked and failed. But there will be more losses to come. You must be prepared.”
The guards did not leave her door. Tia slept and waited for her chance to seek answers. The sun flared, then waned at her chamber window and still they did not leave. She tried to pass the time with her scrolls, but time grew short. Only a few more days until her marriage to Zagros. If she were to stop both Shadir’s plot and her mother’s intent, she must get proof that Amel was not her brother. She paced her chamber. Anxiety stretched her nerves taut.
True to her word, she took no food or drink from the hand of Omarsa or Gula. By evening she was weak with hunger and thirst. Had her mother made good her promise to imprison her until her marriage?
She instructed Omarsa and Gula to seek word about the death of Ying. They returned with nothing. Nothing was being spoken, even in whispers, of the strange happenings of the previous night. Power had its privileges.
Tia awoke in the center of the next night, her throat like hot sand and her tongue thick. She lay still, listened to the gentle breaths of her slave women, asleep on their nearby mats, then slipped to her chamber door and nudged it ajar. Her legs vibrated with the effort and the urgency.
No guards!
She left the door cracked, fumbled in the room for a cloak and sandals, knocked against a chair, and cursed. Her pulse raced against time. She held her breath and counted off ten quick heartbeats. Neither woman moved. She exhaled through an open mouth, wrapped her shoes in the cloak, and bolted through the door.
The corridor was cool and dark. Tia shivered against the chill and slowed to don her sandals, wrap the cloak around her shoulders, and pull its weighty hood over her head.
She dared not detour. Dawn would burst over the city soon enough, and she must be out of the palace. But as she crossed the first courtyard, the staccato beat of fountain water dragged her to the pool’s edge. She plunged both hands beneath the water and even her skin seemed ravenous. Several gulping mouthfuls later, she forced herself back to her path through the greenery of the courtyard.
She took the same kitchen entrance she had slipped through to meet Pedaiah the night they had run through Babylon hand in hand. The memory scorched her, surprised her with its intensity. She clenched her fists against the pain and hurried into the night-black city.
By dawn she huddled in the farmers’ district, where Pedaiah told her Amel lived with his mother before the palace. It was one of the poorer sections of the city. Mud-brick homes jostled elbows on the streets, and paltry gardens struggled to thrive, too far from the lifelines of river and canal.
She waited while the city awoke, waited for the press of crowds headed to markets, for the beggars to stir at their corners and begin their laments. The smells of the city also wakened, the night’s refuse dumped, fresh morning bread baked over hot fires.
She chose her first target, a slave girl younger than herself, with an empty water jar in her arm, and gaze fixed at her feet. Tia blocked her path and she startled, lips parted. She was a pretty girl, with thick hair pulled into a knot at her neck and draped like a silk rope over her shoulder.
Tia shifted to gain height. “Where will I find Dakina, mother of the mage Amel-Marduk?”
The girl’s glance ran its course over Tia’s clothing.
Should have worn something less fine
.
She shrugged one shoulder. “There are many Dakinas here.” She pushed past Tia and hurried on.
Tia bit her lip and scanned the street. This could take all day.
Several attempts later she followed the wobbly fingered gesture of a beggar. “The Street of Enlil. The blue door.” His pointing finger became an upraised palm. She never carried money. She gave him a quick smile instead, a payment he did not value from the sour hiss that followed.
Blue door
. Strange, but easy to find. A heavyset doorkeeper met her, invited her into the shadows of the entryway, and left her there to announce her to the mistress of the house. No father, Pedaiah had said.
He was back in moments, moving quicker than his size would have indicated possible. “Come, come.” He waved her into the home with both hands, as though frantic to get her away from the street.
Dakina stood erect in the center of her courtyard. Tia took in the home and her person in one roaming glance and found them equally displaced in the farmers’ district.
Dakina was only a little younger than her father, she guessed, but her straight back and bright eyes belied her age. Her graying hair had been piled and pinned elegantly atop her head, exposing her long neck and graceful jawline.
The courtyard around her could have been transported from the palace. Blue-glazed tile walls with yellow and white mosaics echoed the throne room. The central fountain frothed even at this early hour. How was it supplied when the district seemed stripped of such amenities? The home was like a jewel lodged in the mud. The thought blazed across her mind, trailing dread. She had hoped to find a poor widow, telling tales about her son’s parentage to impress her neighbors.
Dakina was no ordinary woman.
She glided toward Tia, as smooth as a cat on the hunt, and Tia saw no welcome in her eyes. A quick head bob was all the acknowledgment her status received.
“My lady, this is a surprise.” Her eyes were cold, sharp. “And an honor.” This last tacked on, fueled by obligation.
“Thank you. I would—speak with you—if you have a moment.” The unexpected sophistication of Dakina and her home left Tia stumbling for words. Would she even deign to answer her questions?
Dakina extended a hand to chairs placed close to the fountain. Tia walked past her, head down, and lowered herself into a chair. Dakina did not sit.
This was a mistake. And yet, it was the only road open to her. She must learn the truth about Amel.
“I have met your son, several times, in the palace.”
Dakina’s eyes flickered, her first glimpse of softness.
Tia pushed forward. “He has been very kind to me. I think he progresses well in his training. He will no doubt be a valued advisor to the king one day.”
At this Dakina smiled, but it was not the smile of a mother pleased with her son. It was the condescending, bitter smile of a woman who has been given far less than her due.
Tia licked her lips. How to proceed?
“My father relies heavily on the wisdom of his magi. He respects their knowledge.”
Dakina’s eyes blinked several times and her shoulders dropped a fraction.
Tia sat forward. “You—you knew my father, once?”
She watched Dakina deflate, like a banner dropped to its pole when the wind has suddenly stilled. She crossed to the chair opposite the fountain and sank into it.
“Yes. I knew your father.”
“He is a good man. A good king.”
Her eyes found Tia’s. “Tell me. There are rumors—rumors that he is more than unwell. It has been so many years—” Her voice hitched over the words and her fingers tightened against the edge of the chair. “So many years since he has appeared among his people. Is this sickness more serious than we have been told?”
Her words, her pained look, were like a desert wind blowing away Tia’s doubts. No matter what lies had been told over the years, this woman and she shared a bond. They both loved her father.
Tia abandoned the chair and sat on the stone lip of the fountain, her knees nearly touching Dakina’s. “He lives, and I am very hopeful for his return to health.”
Dakina pressed her hands against her abdomen and nodded. “Good. That is good.”
A slave appeared, breaking the moment apart. He placed a tray of fresh, crusty bread and a jug of wine beside her on the fountain’s wall. Tia’s stomach roared in response. She had eaten nothing since the day before last. Did she dare trust food here? Dakina had not even known she was coming.
“Please.” Dakina held a hand toward the bread. “Eat.”
Tia obliged. The watered wine was cool on her lips and tongue but went down warm. She chewed the bread quickly and decided on frankness.
“Tell me how you met my father.”
Dakina sat back in her chair and her eyes fluttered. A girlish flush bloomed against her cheeks. She studied Tia for several moments. “My father was a nobleman in your grandfather’s court. Your father and I met while we were still very young. Before he left to conquer the world and bring back spoil.”
But that had been over forty years ago. Tia calculated times and ages and came up with only more questions. “And when he returned?”
Dakina looked over her shoulder, into the past. “When he returned, nothing had changed between us.”
“You had not married?”
“I could not.”
Tia let this statement go, though she was unsure of its meaning. “And he did not marry for some time either.”
Her attention came back to Tia. “These are memories best forgotten, Princess. Why are you here?”
Tia set her cup aside and took Dakina’s hands in hers. Dakina gripped her with a warmth Tia did not expect, and the gesture brought a twinge to her heart that she could not name. “Because I wish to know the truth.”
Dakina’s smile was thin, watery. “The truth can bring great pain.”
“And great pain can bring needed change.”
She sighed and studied their clasped hands. “I loved him completely. But his father would not allow it. There was no purpose to be served in a marriage between us. Nothing gained. We were to be kept apart.”
“And did you remain apart?”
“Mostly.” The small smile again. “But not far enough. Later, later I was sent away. Your father was told I went to live in Assyria.”
“But you were here? All these years?”
She lifted her eyes to Tia’s. “I could not bear to be any farther from him.”
The pang in her chest again—a mix of pity and warmth for Dakina, and jealousy that she had been Amel’s mother and not her own. Tears clung to Tia’s eyelashes and she blinked to release them. Dakina placed a cool hand against her cheek, and the hostility Tia felt on entering her home seemed a lifetime removed.
“Did he know?” It was the only question she cared to have answered now. “Did my father know that you carried his child?”
Dakina bore the question with dignity and only shook her head. “The mage Shadir arranged everything. This home”—she lifted a hand to the courtyard—“Amel’s education. Everything we needed.”
“And you never married.” Tia imagined Dakina here, all these years so close to the palace, raising Amel alone, knowing he was the king’s only son.
“I was overjoyed when Shadir came again after so many years, took Amel under his wing. He will give my son a chance to make something of himself. To at least live near his birthright, even if it goes unclaimed.”
“But why does he not claim it?”
Dakina’s eyes widened, as if she had remembered something too late. She pulled her hands from Tia’s.
“What is it, Dakina?”
Her lips tightened and she shook her head. “Shadir warned me of this. I have been a fool.”
“You have nothing to fear from—”
“You are his daughter!” She stood as though to dismiss Tia. “I fear for his life!”
So Shadir had convinced her that Amel’s life would be in danger if he revealed his identity. Tia thought of the knot of advisors close to her mother. Of her mother herself and her unrelenting intensity over the safety and status of her children. Of the husbands of her sisters, who no doubt hoped to find themselves or their sons on the throne one day. Dakina had good reason to fear.
Tia stood and touched her arm. “I will not share your secret, Dakina. No one will learn of it from my lips.”
Dakina’s breath had grown labored, as though she struggled with whether to trust. “Please, Princess. Let Amel live the life that has been given to him.” She tucked an errant hair behind her ear. “He is to be married soon, he tells me.” A hopeful smile. “Grandchildren for me at last.”
Tia’s blood thickened. “Married?”
“Yes.” She nodded. “A young woman, newly widowed. Please”—she clutched Tia’s arm—“please do not ruin his chance for something better.”
Tia patted the hand on her arm, but the action was instinctive. Her thoughts had run elsewhere and her stomach tumbled after them.