Tower & Knife 03 - The Tower Broken Read Free

and ashes from Meksha’s fires into the room. The map lifted from the table. For a moment it twisted, caught in the current, then landed on the floor, ashes circling it like bees around a hive. Their movements gained structure and purpose, finally gathering over the western quarter of the mapped city and forming a bright blue circle over the Holies. Then the wind blew again and scattered them to all four corners of the room.
    ‘Did you see that?’ asked Mesema, scrambling on her knees after the map.
    ‘Your Majesty! You must let me—’
    But Mesema already had it in her hand, seeking the building the pattern had indicated. ‘Here.’ She tapped the depiction of a large rectangular estate up on the Great Plateau. ‘That’s the place. Tarub,’ she said, standing and brushing off her knees, ‘I need servant’s garb and a pouch of water and—’ She thought what normal townsfolk might carry. ‘A veil.’
    ‘Yes, Your Majesty,’ said Tarub, bowing. ‘But … why?’
    ‘Because I am going into the city.’

3

Mesema
    Mesema had known how to exit the palace by the Ways or servants’ halls since the time she and Sarmin had hidden together in his room, but she had never before done it. She did not approach the Elephant Gate and its high teak doors but chose one of plain iron, used by slaves and delivery men, well-guarded nevertheless. She pulled the veil tight over her face as she stepped through. With her other hand she held tight to a bag of soiled linens, but nobody asked her business and she breathed a sigh of relief. A few feet outside the great walls she halted, heart beating fast.
    No wife of the emperor was to travel unaccompanied. Her bodyguards and chaperones ensured her safety, chasteness and good behaviour. The women of the palace were never to set feet outside of it, lest they become sullied by the eyes of the common people. By the rules of the court she had already committed a crime. Tarub and Willa had cried and begged her to stay, and wisdom should have made her listen, but the Hidden God had pointed and she would follow.
    And yet she paused, thinking of Sarmin. At this moment he was in his throne room, listening to petitions great and small, the lords and generals gathered around him like wolves. To keep their jaws from his flesh he required strength, and hegathered it from knowing she and Pelar were safe. Her absence could be devastating. Like all those born under the Scorpion’s tail she had acted first and thought later. Mesema turned back, but one of the guards at the gate shook his fist at her, saying, ‘Stop lurking, you lazy get!’ and she backed away. If he recognised her, it would be bad for him, for her and for Sarmin. After tossing her bag into a doorway she hurried down the palace road, a gentle slope that later turned into a steep incline approaching the river. The palace stood high above the city, overtopping all but the Tower.
    The heat surprised her; this was the same sun that hung over the palace, but out here it reflected off the street and walls, bringing a sweat to her skin that soaked her robes. She walked along paths she had long watched from Nessaket’s garden, jostled by petitioners, scribes, tailors and money-counters. All were dressed in fine cloth, and the stones lay white and sparkling in the full day; but she would be walking on, through roads that were not so clean.
    When she first arrived in Nooria, the air had smelled like char. Later she learned it had been the Carriers, turning to ash under the patient eyes of Blue Shields. Now as she left the palace compound the stench of rotting vegetables caught her nose and, as she walked further away, a urine-stink caught in her throat.
    A marketplace set up along the road brought more welcome scents: roasting meat, incense and cloves. Colourful fabric stretched from stall to stall, protecting customers from the harsh sun and casting a blue and yellow design over the street-stones. Mesema hurried across them as if the