The Bone Palace - Amanda Downum [120]
Curiosity prickled, but Savedra kept her face smooth, her gaze moving over the crowd. “Of course. In the Queen’s Solar, perhaps, before the sixth bell?”
“Yes,” he said, squinting in consideration. “I’ll be there. I needn’t mention discretion to you.”
“Indeed,” she replied dryly. “You needn’t.”
His mouth quirked. “Your pardon. Thank you, Pallakis.”
The next moment he was gone, melting back through the crowd to stand beside the dais once more, just in time for Mathiros to dismiss the quarreling houses and call for the next supplicant.
A trio moved forward, a man and two women. All were fair and dressed in plain wool, their dark coats brightened with embroidery.
“Your Majesty,” the first woman said, bowing her head. “I am Irena Ariseva, of Millrind Street. This is my cousin Priska, and Taras Denisov of Lathe Court. We are citizens of Erisín.” Her mouth twisted. “Or so we were told.”
Mathiros nodded. “Selafai is open to all who would swear fealty.”
“And swear we did. Why is it, then, that we are not afforded equal protection by Selafaïn law? By Erisín’s Vigils.”
“Equal protection belongs to any who have not forfeited it,” the king said with a frown. Nikos and Adrastos also looked nonplussed. This complaint wasn’t one they had expected. “How has yours been lacking?”
“In the past three months, eight young women have disappeared in Elysia and Little Kiva. Rosian women—our friends, our neighbors, our daughters. Half of them have been found dead, pulled from the river. We can only assume the rest have not been found, but that their fate was the same. With every disappearance we go to the police, and every time we are told that someone will look into it.” Her mouth twisted on the words.
A wary mutter ran the length of the hall. Mathiros leaned forward, his frown deepening. “And you don’t believe the police are investigating?”
The woman laughed. “They find nothing. Not even a pretense of an arrest to placate us. They take our stories and we never hear from them again. What are we to think, Majesty?”
“All citizens of Erisín are due the same justice, no matter where they may have been born. I will make sure the Vigiles Urbani are reminded of this.”
It wasn’t enough—that was clear from Irena’s scowl. But it was also the best she would get from such an audience, and that too was clear. She and her companions bowed and retreated, ceding the floor to more mundane problems. The whispers took longer to fade.
The audience lasted six hours, breaking for refreshments at three. Savedra didn’t see the Rosians in the crowd when the fourth bell chimed—gone once their business was addressed, or surreptitiously removed?
A palace page elbowed his way through the press and bowed. “Milady. I have a message from Archa Severos.”
Out of the corner of her eye she saw Nadesda still on the far side of the room. “Thank you.” She traded the boy the sealed envelope for a silver penny. “Does she expect a reply?”
“She said it was nothing urgent.”
Savedra nodded, and the boy bowed again and retreated. As soon as he was gone she inspected the black wax and broke the seal. By Nadesda’s standards “nothing urgent” only meant that no one would die in the next hour.
The note was a short one, written in a simple private cipher. Make sure the princess is especially radiant at the masquerade, it read. Her newest friends will be there, with gifts.
She stifled a scream, smiling instead as if reading a pleasant trifle. Her hand was steady as she tucked the note into her sleeve, but only barely. Friends for enemies was a common substitution, gifts for harm another. The assassin would try again.
She might have gone to her mother and demanded more information, but when she turned she nearly stepped into Ginevra Jsutien.
“Imagine meeting you here.