Third Daughter (The Dharian Affairs, Book One) (16 page)

The box would have to give up its secrets.

It was covered with the same closely packed array of symbols as her mother’s aetheroceiver. She pressed three fingers to random choices on the box, all to no avail. There were dozens of the tiny, etched images. She would be there half the night if she had to guess. Perhaps there was some logic behind the code.

She studied the symbols more closely and quickly found one of a cable carriage. Did that represent the Jungali people, like the wheat did for Dharia? Or was it the miner whose shovel loaded coal into the cart by his side? The etching with two men engaged in a swordfight seemed more likely. She thought of the Jungali as club-wielding barbarians, reclusive in their high mountain hideaways, coming down only for raiding parties and war. But that was the Dharian view. How would the Jungali see themselves?

The Jungali were a mountain people—they built cable carriages in the sky and palaces on the sides of cliffs. One of the tiny symbols was a trio of jagged triangles disappearing into a puff of cloud. Aniri placed her finger on that one. The others had to be within a hand’s distance. The second symbol had been a crown for Dharia, and there were similarly a half dozen crowns on the box. Aniri had no idea which was the right one, but with only six, she could try them all.

What was the final symbol? If it was personal, like the nickname her mother had for her father, she would have to try every symbol on the box. Maybe it wasn’t the nickname, but what it meant: something that captured the heart of her sovereign. Just under her thumb, on the side of the box, was a heart. Would it be so literal?
We are a romantic people
, the prince had said. Did the box belong to the Queen or the prince? Was the mother as sentimental as the son?

Aniri pressed the mountains, the heart, and then each of the crowns in succession. On the fifth crown, the box whirred and clicked. She nearly jumped out of her pajamas with the sound of it racketing around the room. Aniri glanced at the door, afraid a guard would come barreling through at any moment.

But the box unfolded itself on the desk and lay still, waiting for her, and still no guard. She searched and quickly found a scrap of wound tape with messages still decoded on it. There was no small notebook, like Janak had stored in her mother’s aetheroceiver, and the message tape was short, as if the last user of the box had forgotten to clear it away before packing the box again. She held the slip under the light so she could read the string of words.

PEOPLE PLEASED WITH KISS GARESH DOUBLED MINING NAVIA

The first part was clear enough, but what was
navia
, and why was Prince Malik’s arch-rival General Garesh doubling the mining of it? There were all kinds of rare minerals that were mined in the mountains of Jungali, although mostly they were the source of coal for Dharia. Metalwork came from the mountainous regions of Samir. But navia? She had never heard of it, but that didn’t mean much.

Her education in the commerce of Jungali was apparently woeful indeed.

She had hoped for more. There was nothing to support, or deny, the idea of the flying machine, but the prince clearly had a spy in General Garesh’s province. He was monitoring the Sik people’s response to the announcement of their marriage. He hoped to win their hearts to peace.

What would happen when her mission was complete, and she abandoned the pretense of the marriage? Would it destroy the young prince’s attempts to build peace? She tried not to think on that while she quickly folded up the aetheroceiver and placed it exactly where it had been on the high shelf, erasing any evidence of her intrusion into the prince’s inner sanctum.

She crept to the balcony door, then froze, hand on the doorknob, looking through the glass toward her guest room.

Great billows of gray smoke spilled from her balcony into the mountain air.

An orange flame licked the wall above Aniri’s balcony. Clouds of black and gray smoke churned and crawled up the estate’s granite wall.

Her guest room was on fire.

Even if she was willing to dare another climb across the abyss, there was no returning to her room now. Then she realized Priya and Janak were in the anteroom, with only one door: into her room. They were
trapped
. She spun away from the prince’s balcony and flung open the door to his office, bolting through the receiving room and spilling out into the fine-tiled hallway of the prince’s estate.

Where were the stairs that led up to her room?

It took a moment to gain her bearings, then she sprinted down one hall, turned a corner, and found a familiar-looking set of stairs. As she took the steps two at a time, she heard shouts coming from the floor above. She ran faster. When she arrived at the top, she choked on the smoke-fogged air. The space was crowded with people: chambermaids and guards, some dressed, some in their pajamas, some running from the fire, others toward it, many with buckets that sloshed precious fire-eating water on the floor. Aniri clung to the wall, pushing toward the fire and scanning every face through the thickening smoke, searching for Priya and Janak among them. Her eyes stung and watered, making it even more difficult to tell one face from another.

Finally, she reached the door to her room, which was blocked with people coming and going, disappearing and reappearing out of the thick billows of smoke that roiled inside. The heat was intense, scorching her face as she blinked away tears and looked for an opening to lurch inside. Prince Malik emerged from the wall of gray and stumbled toward the door. He carried Priya in his arms, and she clung to him, coughing so hard her entire body shook. Aniri leapt back to give the prince room, and he brushed past her, hurrying Priya out into the less toxic air of the hallway. Janak followed close behind, coughing and stumbling and pushing away a guard who tried to help him. That he was well enough to be surly gave her a surge of warmth that surprised her. She wiped her face and followed them a few steps down the hall, where Prince Malik was gently setting Priya on the floor.

Aniri’s heart squeezed as Priya coughed and struggled for breath. She reached out to touch her handmaiden’s cheek. “Priya! Are you all right?” Her voice trembled as much as Priya’s thin frame.

Priya didn’t answer as the coughing took her again, but Janak looked up sharply when Aniri spoke. His face went through a fleeting flurry of emotion: shock that she was standing before him; a rapid scan of her person to ensure she was untouched by the fire; and slack relief that made Aniri’s throat close up. Priya bent over, still coughing, and Janak gently took hold of her shoulders, keeping her upright. He nodded to Aniri, and she pulled back, crossing her arms tightly over her chest. She was glad for Janak’s strength; her shaking arms wouldn’t have been much comfort to her handmaiden.

Only then did the prince seem to recognize her. “Aniri! By the gods—” He seized her shoulders like he couldn’t quite believe she was real. His face was blackened with soot and the arm of his night tunic was pockmarked with burns. He threw his arms around her, hugging her fiercely to him. “We thought you were—” He stopped to cough, the force of it shaking her. He pulled back and scanned her pajamas, which of course were unmarred even by smoke. “Are you all right?” There was amazement in his eyes when his gaze traveled back to hers. “We thought sure you had perished in the fire. I tried to... I couldn’t find you anywhere in your room, but the heat was so intense, I thought there was no possible way that...” He was rambling. And stunned.

“I’m all right. I was never in the room.”

He frowned in confusion. Priya had stopped coughing, and Janak still held her, but Aniri could tell he was paying attention to her words. Prince Malik must have felt the heat of Janak’s stare because he quickly dropped his hands from Aniri and took a half step back.

She needed a cover story, but floundered for something plausible. The smoke made breathing even more difficult than the thin air, but her cough was more to buy time than clear her lungs.

Finally, she said, “I wasn’t able to sleep, so I went for a walk. I had no idea what had happened until I returned.” Aniri glanced at the chaos still reigning around her room. The guard always present at her door would quickly counter her story, but she didn’t see him. And her handmade rope would certainly give her away once the fire was tamed. Unless she was lucky enough to have the flames send the evidence of her espionage plummeting to the depths of the ravine.

Janak’s face was alive with suspicion, but he held his tongue. The prince’s frown grew into a darker look. Her heart seized. Did he suspect her?

“It is tremendously fortunate you took your stroll when you did, princess,” Prince Malik said. “I don’t know who threw this fire bomb, or how it was possible for them to get past my guard, but I assure you I will find out.”

She hoped he wouldn’t search too hard.

But her alarm eased, and she coughed out more smoke, for real this time. The prince’s face softened. He gently took her shoulders again, this time steering her down the hall and away from the fire.

“Thank the gods you are safe,” he said quietly. “And your handmaiden and guard, too. That is the most important thing.” Priya and Janak followed them closely down the hall.

Aniri gave the prince a grateful smile. He had saved them. From the looks of his tunic, he had risked his life to save her, too. Not his guard. Not his personal servants. He himself had plunged into the smoke and fire-filled room to save her.

While she was busy spying in his office.

A turmoil of feelings rumbled through her chest as the prince gently escorted her, Janak, and Priya to a new room. It was far from the fire, literally on the opposite side of the palace from her damaged room. The prince seemed to take comfort from having his arm around her as they walked, as if he didn’t want to release her lest an assassin leap from the drapes to plunge a dagger into her heart. She wasn’t entirely sure his fears were overstated, so she allowed it.

Even inside the room, Prince Malik stayed by her side, sitting with her on a small couch near the window. His arm left her shoulder, but only traveled as far as the back of the couch behind her. Janak gave them room, attending to Priya by another window, thrown open so she could obtain fresh air. Aniri couldn’t see the side of the palace where the fire had raged, but they had carried the smell of smoke with them. It still clogged her lungs, and her labored breathing filled the silence around them.

The prince seemed deep in thought, clenching and unclenching his fist on his knee. Aniri didn’t want him to ask any probing questions about her “walk,” so she didn’t disturb him.

Finally, a small battalion of guards arrived at the room along with a servant—six in total, looking like they had been roused from bed and hastily put on their starched uniforms. They were armed with pistols and daggers and ferociously serious looks. Prince Malik arose and went to speak in hushed tones with the servant at the door, who was then promptly sent away.

The prince returned to her, his face grave. “These men will ensure your safety. Please, do not go anywhere without them, or your private guard. I don’t want you to feel like a prisoner in your own palace, but there’s an assassin who just tried to take your life, and I’m not inclined to give him another chance.”

Aniri nodded, not missing the way he referred to his palace as her own. A flinch of guilt clenched her stomach even tighter. The prince acted as if they were already married, giving her the benefit of full privilege in his home. And he had just tried to save her life. He kept moving her with his words and actions in a way that left her off balance and dizzied like the thin mountain air in which he lived.

“We found a rope dangling from your balcony,” he continued, “although I can’t imagine how the assassin thought that might lead to an escape. It will be lucky for him if the bottom of the ravine finds him before I do.” The dark look was back, and it made Aniri shudder. “However, I doubt very much the assassin turned into a bird and flew away. He is likely still here in the estate, or possibly trying to flee Bajir. He may also return to make another attempt on your life. Or others may follow where he has failed. Regardless, for now, I would greatly prefer it if you stayed in your room.”

“Of course,” Aniri said, surprised how shaky her voice sounded.

The prince must have heard it, too, because he shifted closer, kneeling on one knee in front of her. He took her hands in his still soot-covered ones. “I am so sorry, Aniri. If I had known the risk would be this severe...” He stared at her hands, then met her eyes again. “Perhaps we should reconsider our arrangement.”

“No!” Aniri said, too quickly. She reflexively glanced at her father’s bracelet and the prince’s soot-covered fingers gently holding her hand near it. She wasn’t entirely sure why her reaction was so strong. But she couldn’t leave, not yet. There was too much at stake in the success of her mission. And she knew the dangers when she agreed. Even more, she didn’t want to prove Janak right about her unsuitability to fulfill her duty. She calmed herself and sat straighter, patting the prince’s hand to reassure him. “I am fine, Prince Malik. And I refuse to be frightened off by a clumsy assassin who can’t even firebomb my bed when I’m actually in it.”