Amused again, Lady Nagamochi nodded before looking to Zenobia, whose expression was both stunned and disbelieving. “And I will inform your wife of the expected etiquette.”
The etiquette of a khagan’s palace was not the same as the etiquette in front of an empress, so Ariq listened to the instructions from behind the screen as he dressed. Do not approach the empress or presume to look her in the eyes. Speak only when spoken to, and never directly to the empress, only to Lady Nagamochi. Show the deepest humility.
He would. But beneath the calm his dread was rising. This didn’t make sense. Why would the empress come
here
? And no matter how polite Lady Nagamochi had been, this was still an ambush—though he suspected that the first arrows hadn’t yet been loosed. He needed to make certain Zenobia was safe when they were.
Finished dressing, he emerged from behind the screen. An airship hovered silently outside the balcony. A silk cloth created a path from the balcony to a red dais that had been placed in the center of the chamber. Upon the platform sat a gold throne softened with red cushions.
Guards flanked either side of the path. Farther back, Lady Nagamochi stood with Zenobia. “Governor. We await the heavenly sovereign.”
He went to Zenobia’s side and took her hand. Though tension still held her in a stiff grip, her palm was warm and dry now; the clammy fear had receded. He saw her gaze shoot to the notebook abandoned on the table. This time, he could not get it for her. Scribbling notes while the empress entered would not be showing the proper humility.
She caught his glance toward her notebook. Her lips pressed together, as if to hold back a smile—perhaps imagining herself scribbling, too. Then her smile faded, her jade gaze became earnest, and beneath the echoing announcement of the empress’s entrance, she murmured, “I was coming to find you.”
After he’d left her in anger. None of that mattered now. He squeezed her hand, then they bowed with the others, and over the rustle of cloth came a faint
click
. And another.
Not the device by the balcony. Not the empress’s shoes. The empress herself.
He saw Zenobia’s startled glance upward before she caught herself and lowered her gaze again. Ariq didn’t need to look—and he should have realized what was coming. Of course the real empress wouldn’t risk her safety by visiting this tower or deign to meet with them in person.
An automaton.
But they would not be bowing to a mere machine—the most finely wrought duplicate that he’d ever seen. The long black hair looped and styled beneath an intricate headdress was undoubtedly real. Embroidered silk robes hid the machine’s body and long sleeves covered its hands. If the automaton’s back had been turned toward Ariq, he wouldn’t have been able to decide whether it was machine or human. But the face, though perfectly sculpted and painted, was too still to be real and too fine to be a mask, and the eyes didn’t resemble a human’s. Unmoving and blank, they stared sightlessly, as if dark glass orbs had been inserted into the sockets.
With a series of ratcheting clicks, the machine pivoted on the dais and sat on the throne. A deep hum emerged from beneath the automaton’s heavy robes—or from the chair beneath it. The eyes filled with sudden flickering light, as if a snowstorm had been trapped within its metal skull.
The lips parted slightly and a feminine voice projected from its mouth, vibrating as if spoken down a long, tin tunnel. “You may proceed, Captain.”
Beside him, Zenobia’s entire body seemed to jolt in astonishment before she stilled again, quivering. Ariq was not so surprised. He hadn’t seen a device like the automaton before, but he’d heard speculation that the same radio signals the Khagan used to control populations in the labor colonies by influencing the nanoagent machines in their blood might also be used to communicate over long distances and influence larger machines. Apparently the Nipponese scientists had found a way to link an automaton to another device in the empress’s palace.
“With your permission, your majesty.” Lady Nagamochi’s bow deepened before she rose. “The writer, Madame Fox, has promised that no disrespect was intended with her story.”
“As we suspected. And her new tale?”
“Is only partially complete and follows the adventures of a tinker, your majesty.”
“Will this tinker also overthrow a king?”
And what if the tinker did? Ariq’s jaw clenched and he glanced at Zenobia, who looked back at him with her brow furrowed in confusion. She hadn’t understood a word, he realized. The empress and Lady Nagamochi had been speaking in Nipponese.
Now the captain of the guard addressed Zenobia in French, repeating the empress’s question.
His wife frowned a little, then said, “I originally intended to write that ending, but I’ve written it too many times before.”
“So what will the new ending be?” Lady Nagamochi pressed.
A spark of irritation lit Zenobia’s jade eyes. She suppressed it before answering, “The ruler is a young man with good intentions, but is surrounded by nobles who serve their own interests and seek to manipulate him, and who have dragged his kingdom to the brink of ruin. While in disguise as a commoner, he will befriend the tinker, and together they will destroy the corruption surrounding the throne.”
An even more fantastical tale than her previous ones. Ariq bent his head to hide his grin as Lady Nagamochi translated her response for the empress. Zenobia’s gaze caught his, her eyes flashing fire again.
Yes, he laughed at her. He’d never known anyone so sensible and so utterly fanciful all at once.
So practical that she planned for every eventuality, such as raising a child alone. And yet Ariq could shatter her heart by saying he would let her go.
By the eternal blue heavens, how he loved her.
The empress’s tinny, echoing voice filled the chamber again. “I see no danger in that ending as described. When it is finished, we will determine whether the story is acceptable. Until then, she may proceed with her writing.”
Zenobia nodded when Lady Nagamochi translated, but by the tautness of her lips and the narrowed set of her eyes, Ariq thought his wife must be biting her tongue—probably stopping herself from saying that she would write and publish it with or without the empress’s approval.
“Continue to the other matter, Captain,” the empress said.
Lady Nagamochi looked to Ariq. “Admiral Tatsukawa has been a loyal friend to her majesty and to her majesty’s mother. The accusations you have made against the admiral are disturbing. You claim that he facilitated the marauders’ attacks on several airships, including passenger ferries and a French naval vessel. You also claim that he abducted you from the home of the French ambassador.”
So the real battle had now begun—his word against Tatsukawa’s reputation. “That is what happened,” he said.
“You claim that the admiral intends to reignite a war with the Golden Empire against her majesty’s wishes, and that he has allied himself with Ghazan Bator to that end.”
“Not to reignite a war. The admiral said his purpose was to destroy the Khagan before the Golden Empire could strike against Nippon again.”
“But the attempt
would
reignite a war.”
“Most likely.” Not a prolonged war. The rebellion had leeched the Khagan’s strength and power. But still, many would die. Ariq hoped that the empress wanted to avoid that as much as he did.
“You also claim that the marauders’ attacks on the western shores were orchestrated to direct her majesty’s attention there.”
“Yes.”
“To what purpose? Sending a fleet to the western shore is not an attack against the Khagan. What does he hope to gain?”
So they’d come to it. Ariq hadn’t mentioned the Skybreaker in his talks with the ambassador and the nobles. Too many of them had only been concerned with their own interests. He hadn’t wanted their interests to turn toward the machine.
He could lie now. But he suspected the empress and Lady Nagamochi already knew of the Skybreaker’s existence. There was no other reason to take this route of ambush. If the empress believed him, she would withdraw her fleet. If she didn’t, she wouldn’t. There would be no negotiation, only an interview. But if the empress wanted the Skybreaker, she would come in as she had, with the clear upper hand—and the power to make him give it to her.
“The admiral hoped to gain a war machine,” Ariq said. “He and Ghazan Bator believe that if my town is under imminent attack, I will reveal its location to them.”
Lady Nagamochi’s gaze flicked to Zenobia. His wife had been watching them, listening silently though she couldn’t understand the language.
“Only if your town is threatened?” the captain of the guard echoed softly.
“The admiral and the general held my wife for ransom, as well,” Ariq said, “yet I didn’t give up the location.”
“They
just
held her?”
Rage from the mere suggestion of doing more to Zenobia threatened to burst through his calm. With effort, he banked the anger. He couldn’t let his response be mistaken for bluster. “They knew that if she was harmed, my cooperation would end and I would do everything in my power to destroy them, even if it meant my own death.”
A narrowing of her eyes said that the captain of the guard understood his message perfectly. “Where is this war machine?”
“Hidden,” he said. “And that is where it will stay.”
Lady Nagamochi looked to his wife and asked in French, “Do you know the location of the war machine?”
Zenobia’s lips parted. Eyes widening, as if in realization of what he and Lady Nagamochi had been discussing, she glanced at Ariq. “I don’t. I didn’t
want
to know, so that I couldn’t be forced to tell.”
Her gaze held his as the captain of the guard relayed her answer to the empress. He read the question in her jade eyes.
Were they in danger?
They were. But he wouldn’t see her frightened. Not yet. He shook his head.
From the automaton’s throne, the empress spoke again. “You are aware of my objectives, Captain. Do what you must to come to an agreement with the governor, but know that the ladies of my court now anticipate the tinker’s story.”
Relief opened up within Ariq’s chest. Zenobia would be safe for now. His wife’s stories had found favor in the palace and they wouldn’t hurt her unless all other negotiations failed.
Lady Nagamochi bowed. “As you command, your majesty.”
The shimmering light behind the automaton’s eyes went dark and its mouth closed. The deep hum from beneath its robes quieted, leaving the chamber in sudden silence.
“Governor,” the captain said softly in Nipponese, “do you want your wife to take part in our discussion?”
“No.” He wanted Zenobia as far from this chamber as possible. “Let me speak with her alone for a moment.”
That Lady Nagamochi so easily agreed told Ariq what he would see even before he led Zenobia out to the balcony. Three imperial gunships hovered around the tower. Submersibles floated in the ocean below, their copper hulls visible through the clear turquoise water. The captain of the guard had cut off every avenue of escape—and she wanted him to know it.
Zenobia recognized the implications, too. With her arms tightly folded over her chest and her face pinched by worry, she asked, “They want the Skybreaker?”
“Yes,” Ariq said.
“Will you give it to them?”
“No. I’ll offer a compromise.” Though he didn’t believe they would take it. The empress had her objectives, and Lady Nagamochi would only accept one conclusion: fulfilling those objectives. “But it will take time and I prefer that you are in another chamber.”
She frowned at him. “Why?”
“For the same reason I wanted you to stay at the embassy after I left.” Because she might be used as a weapon against him. They
would
use her, eventually. But if she was with him in the chambers, a weapon in plain sight, they might resort to that option more quickly.
Though obviously unhappy, she must have understood his reasons. She nodded and looked to the hovering gunships. “You are due at the embassy soon.”
“Yes. If the ambassador comes looking for us, he might be allowed through the air blockade. Let him know what is happening—and leave with him, if you can.”
Her head bowed and her fists clenched, as if she fought against her protest. But she must have realized that escape would be easier if he was alone. Finally she said, “I will.”
He drew her close and gently pressed his lips to her hair. “All will be well,” he said.
It wasn’t a lie. Not completely. But he suspected that it would be very bad before it was better again.
She nodded against his shoulder before drawing back, her face pale and mouth tight with determination. “I need my typesetting machine so that I can stay busy instead of worrying myself to madness.”
“You’ll have it.”
A guard already had the typesetter in hand when they returned to the chamber—so either Lady Nagamochi had a listening device or she already knew that much about Zenobia. Perhaps both.