“STOP HER!” Ileem roared.
But no one heard him over the chaos of the ballroom, courtiers screaming and fighting back against the Denlahns as best as they could.
Eda tore her crown off and ducked into the writhing crowd, grabbing a fallen sword and fighting her way to the door.
Somehow, no one seemed to take much notice of her.
Somehow, she made it out to the corridor.
She ran until she was about to collapse, and ducked behind a pillar to catch her breath. Her mind was working furiously, trying to calculate her options, figure out her escape route. Her garrison of Imperial soldiers was stationed just outside the city. She would go to them, and they would break upon the palace like an ocean wave and have it back under her control before dawn.
That’s what she would do. She forced breath into her shuddering body.
Someone seized her arm and hauled her into a hidden alcove.
Eda looked straight into Liahstorion’s face. The Denlahn Princess was holding a sword of her own, grim determination pressed into her forehead. She stood in the archway, blocking Eda’s path.
“Let me by,” said Eda, forcing her voice not to shake. “Let me pass.”
But Liahstorion didn’t move. “You can’t go to the garrison.”
“What?”
“The garrison. That’s where I would go if I were in your place, but you can’t. My brother poisoned every soldier during the wedding ceremony and even now is burning the whole place to the ground. There are men waiting for you there. You’ll be dragged back to the palace and executed—Ileem doesn’t mean for you to make it through the night alive. Now that he’s been crowned Emperor, he doesn’t need you anymore.”
Eda stared, trying to comprehend what Liahstorion was saying.
The other girl grabbed her by the shoulders, shook her hard. “Are youlistening,Eda? Your garrison is gone. My brother means to kill you. You have to leave, and you have to leavenow.Do you understand?”
There was a roaring in Eda’s ears, and around her the world seemed to shake.
Something in Liah’s face softened. “Do you have somewhere to go?”
It wasn’t the world that was shaking. It was Eda. “You’re not taking me back to him. You’re not handing me over to … to your brother.”
“Not to my brother, and not to his god. I never wanted to come here, I never wanted to betray you. But Ileem wouldn’t be dissuaded. He couldn’t let go of his anger over our father, but more than that he—he thrives on chaos and confusion. He thrives on hurting people, and his god drives him to it, more and more.”
A headache pressed between Eda’s eyes. “But he—but he married me. He loved me. He swore on Tuer we were one.”
Liah shook her head. “Eda. Listen to me. If you’re going to survive you have to be steady. You have to use your head, and you can’t let any of my brother’s lies distract you. His one and only goal in coming here was to destroy you. You have to remember that. Can you?”
Eda forced herself to nod. She pressed her fingers against the wound in her throat and found it was still bleeding. Liahstorion ripped off a piece of her Enduenan-style sash and gave it to Eda to press against the cut.
“All right?” said Liahstorion, a storm of emotion in her dark eyes.
“All right,” said Eda.
“Good. I’ll distract Ileem as long as I can.”
Eda took a deep breath. “Why are you helping me?”
A shadow of a smile touched Liahstorion’s lips. “Because no matter what you’ve done or haven’t done, no one deserves to die in the dark. And because I made a vow of peace—a true one. Now go.”
Eda pressed Liahstorion’s hand and ducked out of the antechamber, darting from shadow to shadow down the corridors, then through a servant’s entrance and out into the night. The courtyard was still damp from the day’s long rain. She stumbled over a stone and landed face-first in a puddle slick with mud, then picked herself up and barreled into the stable.
She had a moment’s hesitation over whether or not to take an inconspicuous horse, but in the end she saddled Naia. Right now, Eda needed speed, and Naia could give that to her. She let a couple other horses loose for good measure, thinking maybe Naia wouldn’t be noticed in the confusion. There was a pile of rags in the tack room; she grabbed one of the larger ones and pulled it over her hair, tying it at the nape of her neck. It smelled like hay and saddle oil and damp earth. There was nothing to be done for her blue beaded gown or her calfskin sandals; probably the mud would disguise them better than anything. She didn’t even consider parting with her arm cuff—it meant too much to her, and she couldn’t bear the thought of abandoning it in the muck.
She led Naia from the stable, out through a gate in the wall and into the desert. The dust had been washed clean from the air and she breathed in, deeply. But the tang of smoke made her jerk her head to the northeast, where her garrison had been. Dark plumes billowed high, and her stomach twisted. All those men, dead, because she’d trusted Ileem.
