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  Amilia grunted in reply. She was not a morning person and today’s agenda held a meeting with Regent Saldur. If anything was likely to ruin a day, that would. She opened her office door with a key kept on a chain around her neck.

  The office was a reward for the successful presentation of the empress nearly a month before. Modina was near death when Saldur first appointed Amilia to the post of Imperial Secretary to the Empress. The young ruler never spoke a word, was dangerously thin, and her unwavering expression was never more than a blank stare. Amilia provided her with better living conditions and worked hard to get her to eat and, after several months, the girl began to improve. Modina managed to memorize a short speech for the day of her presentation but abandoned the prepared text and publically singled out Amilia, proclaiming her a hero.

  No one was more shocked then Amilia, but Saldur held her responsible. Rather than exploding in anger, he congratulated her. From that day on, his attitude toward Amilia changed—as if she had bought admission into the exclusive club of the deviously ambitious. In his eyes, she was not only capable of manipulating the mentally unbalanced ruler, but willing to do so as well. This raised opinion of her was followed by additional responsibilities and the new title of Chief Secretarye Grand Imperial Empress.

  She took her directions from Saldur as Modina remained locked in the dark recesses of her madness. One of her new responsibilities was reading and replying to mail addressed to the empress. Saldur gave her the task as soon as he discovered she could read and write. Amilia also received the responsibility of official gatekeeper. She decided who could, and who could not, have an audience with Modina. Normally a position of extreme power, it was all a farce since absolutely no one ever saw Modina.

  Despite its grandiose new title, her office was a small chamber, nothing but an old desk and a pair of bookshelves. The room was cold, damp, and sparse—but it was hers. It filled her with pride each morning when she sat behind the desk and pride was something Amilia was unaccustomed to.

  “Are those more letters?” Amilia asked.

  “Yes, I am afraid so,” Nimbus replied. “Where would you like them?”

  “Just drop them on the pile with the others. I can see now why Saldur gave me this job.”

  “It is a very prestigious task,” Nimbus assured her. “You are the de facto voice of the empire as it relates to the people. What you write is taken as the word of the empress and thus the voice of a god incarnate.”

  “So, you’re saying I am the voice of god now?”

  Nimbus smiled thoughtfully. “In a matter of speaking—yes.”

  “You have a crazy way of seeing things, Nimbus, you really do.”

  He was always able to cheer her up. His outlandishly colored clothes and silly powdered wig made her smile on even the bleakest days. Moreover, the odd little courtier had a bizarre manner of finding joy in everything, blind to the inevitable disaster that Amilia knew lurked at every turn.

  Nimbus deposited the letters in the bin beside Amilia’s desk then fished out a tablet, looked it over briefly before speaking. “You have a meeting this morning with Lady Rashambeau, Baroness Fargal, and the Countess Ridell. They have insisted on speaking to you directly about their failed petitions to have a private audience with Her Supreme Eminence. You also have a dedication to make on behalf of the empress at the new memorial in Capital Square. That’s at noon. Also the material has arrived, but you still need to get specifications to the seamstress for the new dress, and, of course, you have a meeting this afternoon with Regent Saldur.”

  “Any idea yet what he wants to see me about?”

  Nimbus shook his head.

  Amilia slumped in her chair. Certainly Saldur’s visit had to do with Modina berating the clerk yesterday. She had no idea how to explain the empress’s actions. It was the only time since her speech that Modina had muttered a single word.

  “Would you like me to help you answer those?” Nimbus asked with a sympathetic smile.

  “No, I’ll do it. Can’t have both of us playing god now can we? Besides, you have your own work. Tell the seamstress to meet me in Modina’s chambers in four hours. That should give me time to reduce this pile some. Reschedule the Ladies of the Court meeting to just before noon.”

  “But you have the dedication at noon.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Excellent planning,” Nimbus praised. “Is there anything else I can do for you, before I get to work?”

  Amilia shook her head. Nimbus bowed and left.

  The pile beside her got higher each day. She plucked a letter from the top and started working. While not a hard job, the task was repetitious as she said the same thing in each.

  The Office of the Empress regrets to inform you that her most serene and royal Grand Imperial Majesty the Empress Modina Novronian will not be able to receive you due to time constraints caused by important and pressing matters of state.

  She had only replied to seven of the letters when there was a soft knock at the office door. A maid popped her head inside hesitantly. It was the new girl. She only started yesterday, but she worked hard and quietly, which Amilia liked. Amilia nodded an invitation, and wordlessly the maid slipped inside with her bucket, mop, and cleaning tools, taking great pains not to bang them against the door.

  Amilia recalled her own days as a servant in the castle. As a kitchen worker, she rarely cleaned rooms but occasionally would fill in for a sick chambermaid. She used to loathe working in a room with a noble present, always so self-conscious and frightened. You could never tell what a noble might do. One minute they might be friendly, the next they were calling for you to be whipped. She never understood how they could be so capricious and cruel.

  Amilia watched the girl set about her work. The maid was on her hands and knees scrubbing the floor with a brush, the skirt of her uniform soaked with soapy water. Amilia had a stack of inquiries to attend to, but the maid distracted her. She felt guilty not acknowledging the girl’s presence. It felt rude. I should talk to her. Even as Amilia thought this, she knew it would be a mistake. This new girl saw her as a noble, the Secretary to the Empress and would be terrified if Amilia so much as offered a “good morning.”

  Perhaps a few years older than herself, the girl was slender and pretty, although little could be determined given her attire. She wore a loose fitting dress with a canvas apron, her figure hidden, a mystery lost beneath the folds. All serving girls adopted the style except the foolish or ambitious. While working in the halls of those who took what they wanted, it was best to avoid notice.

  Amilia wondered if the girl was married. Might she have a family in the city that she went home to each night, or like herself, had she left everything, and everyone, to live in the castle? Despite her youth, she likely had several children by now. Pretty peasant girls married young.

  Amilia chided herself for watching the maid instead of working, but something kept her attention. The way she moved and how she held her head looked out of place. She watched her dab the brush in the water and stroke the floor, moving it from side to side like a painter. She spread water around, but did little to free the dirt from the surface. Edith Mon would whip her for that. The headmistress was a cruel taskmaster. Amilia had found herself on the wrong end of her belt on a number of occasions for lesser infractions. For that reason alone Amilia felt sorry for the poor girl. She knew all too well what she faced.

  “Are they treating you well here?” Amilia found herself asking despite her determination to remain silent.

  The girl looked up and glanced around the room.

  “Yes, you,” Amilia assured her.

  “Yes, milady,” the maid replied, looking up.

  She is looking right at me, Amilia thought, stunned. Even with her title, and a rank equivalent to a baroness, Amilia still had a hard time returning the stare of even the lowest nobles, but this girl was looking right at her.

  “You can tell me if you aren’t, I know what it is like to—” she stopped, realizin
g the maid would not believe her. “I understand new servants can be picked on and belittled by the others.”

  “I am getting along fine, milady,” she said.

  Amilia smiled, trying to set her at ease. “I didn’t mean to suggest you weren’t. I am very pleased with you. I just know it can be hard sometimes when you start out in a new place. I want you to know that I can help you if you are having trouble.”

  “Thank you,” she said, but Amilia heard the suspicion in her voice.

  Having a noble offering to help with bullying peers was probably a shock to the girl. If it had been her, Amilia would think it a trap of some kind, a test perhaps to see if she would speak ill of others. If she admitted to problems, the noble might have her removed from the palace. Under no circumstances would Amilia have admitted anything to a noble no matter how kindly the woman might have presented herself.

  Amilia felt instantly foolish. There was a division between nobles and commoners and for good or ill, she was now on the other side. The conditioning that separated the two was far too entrenched for her to wipe away. She decided to stop tormenting the poor girl and return to her work. Just then however, the maid put down the scrub brush and stood.

  “You’re, Lady Amilia, is that right?”

  “Yes,” she replied, surprised at the sudden forwardness.

  “You’re the Secretary to the Empress?”

  “How well informed you are. It’s good that you are learning your way around. It took me quite some time to figure out—”

  “How is she?”

  Amilia hesitated. It was very inappropriate to interrupt, and terribly bold to inquire so bluntly of Her Eminence. Amilia was touched, however, by her concern for the welfare of Modina. Perhaps this girl was unaccustomed to interacting with the gentry. She was likely from some isolated village that never saw a visiting noble. The unnerving way she held Amilia’s stare revealed she had no experience with proper social etiquette. Edith Mon would waste no time beating those lessons into her.

  “She’s fine,” she replied. Then as a matter of habit added, “She was ill, and still is, but getting better every day.”

  “I never see her,” the maid went on. “I’ve seen you, and the chancellor, the regents, and the lord chamberlain, but I never see her in the halls or at the banquet table.”

  “She guards her privacy. You have to understand as empress everyone wants time with her.”

  “I understand. I guess she gets around using secret passages?”

  “Secret passages?” Amilia chuckled at the imagination of this girl. “No, she doesn’t use secret passages.”

  “But I heard this palace is very old and is filled with them; hidden stairs, and corridors that lead to all kinds of secret places.”

  “I don’t know anything about that,” Amilia replied. “What got this into your head?”

  The maid immediately put a hand over her mouth in embarrassment and her eyes dropped to the floor in submission. “Forgive me, milady. I didn’t mean to be so bold. I’ll get back to my work now.”

  “That’s all right,” Amilia replied as the maid dunked her brush again. “What’s your name, dear?”

  “Ella, milady,” the maid replied softly, without pausing or looking up.

  “Well, Ella, if you have problems or other questions, you have permission to speak to me.”

  “Thank you, milady. That is very kind of you.”

  Amilia returned to her own work and left the maid to hers. In a short time, the servant finished and gathered her things to leave.

  “Goodbye, Ella,” Amilia offered.

  The maid smiled at the sound of her name and nodded appreciatively. As she walked out Amilia glanced at her hands where they gripped the bucket and mop and was surprised to see long fingernails on each. Ella noticed her glance, shifted her grip covering her nails, and promptly left the chamber.

  Amilia stared after her awhile wondering how a working girl could manage to grow nails as nice as hers. She put it out of her mind and returned to her letters.

  ***

  “You realize they are going to get wise,” Amilia said, after the seamstress had finished taking Modina’s measurements and left the chamber.

  The Imperial Secretary moved around the empress’s bedroom straightening up. Modina sat beneath the narrow window, in the only patch of sunshine to enter the room. It was where Amilia found her most often. She would sit there for hours, just staring outside watching clouds and birds. It broke Amilia’s heart a little each time she saw her longing for a world barred to her.

  The empress showed no response to Amilia’s comment. Her lucidity from the day before had vanished. The empress heard her though. She was quite certain of that now.

  “They aren’t stupid,” she went on as she fluffed a pillow. “After your speech, and that incident with the clerk yesterday, I think it’s only a matter of time. You would have been wiser to stay in your room and let me handle it.”

  “He wasn’t going to listen to you,” the empress spoke.

  Amilia dropped the pillow.

  Turning as casually as she could, she stole a glance over her shoulder to see Modina still looking out the window with her traditional vague and distant expression. Slowly, Amilia picked up the pillow and resumed her straightening. Then she ventured, “It might have taken a little time, but I’m certain I could have persuaded him to provide us with the material.”

  Amilia waited, holding her breath, listening.

  Silence.

  Just when she was certain it had only been one of her rare outbursts of coherency, Modina spoke again. “He never would have given in to you. You’re scared of him, and he knows it.”

  “And you aren’t?”

  Again, silence and Amilia waited.

  “I’m not afraid of anything anymore,” the empress finally replied, her voice distant and thin.

  “Maybe not afraid, but it would bother you if they took the window away.”

  “Yes,” Modina said simply.

  Amilia watched as the empress closed her eyes and turned her full face into the light of the sun.

  “If Saldur discovers your masquerade—if he thinks you’ve been just acting insane, and misleading the regents for over a year—it might frighten him into locking you up where you can’t do any harm. They could put you in a dark hole somewhere and leave you there.”

  “I know,” Modina said, her eyes still closed and head tilted upward. Immersed in the daylight she almost appeared to glow. “But I won’t let them hurt you.”

  The words took a moment to register with Amilia. She heard them clearly enough, but their meaning came so unexpectedly that she sat on the bed without realizing. Looking back it was obvious, but not until that moment did she see it. The speech was for Amilia’s benefit—to ensure that Ethelred and Saldur could not have her removed or killed. Few people had ever gone out of their way for Amilia. It was unimaginable for Modina—the crazy empress—to risk herself in this way. Such an event was as likely as the wind changing direction to suit her, or the sun asking her permission to shine.

  “Thank you,” was all she could think to say and for the first time she felt awkward in Modina’s presence. “I’m going to go now.”

  She headed for the door and as her hand touched the latch, Modina spoke again.

  “It isn’t completely an act, you know.”

  ***

  Waiting inside the regent’s office, Amilia realized she had not heard a word in her meeting or during the dedication that morning. Dumbfounded by her conversation with Modina—the mere fact that she even had a conversation with Modina—little else registered. Her distraction, however, vanished the instant Saldur arrived.

  The regent appeared imposing as always, in his elegant robe and cape of purple and black. His white hair and lined face lent him a grandfatherly appearance, but his eyes held no warmth.

  “Afternoon, Amilia,” he said, walking past her and taking a seat at his desk. The regent’s office was dramatically opulent. F
ive times larger than her office, it featured a more elegant decor. A fine patterned rug covered the polished hardwood, and numerous end-tables flanked couches and armchairs circling a table and chessboard. The fireplace was an impressively wide hearth of finely chiseled marble. There were decanters of spirits on the shelves, along with thick books. Religiously themed paintings lined the spaces between the bookcases and windows. One illustrated the familiar scene of Maribor anointing Novron. The immense desk, behind which Saldur sat, was a dark mahogany polished to a fine luster and adorned with a bouquet of fresh flowers. The entire office was perfumed with the heady scent of incense, the kind Amilia had only smelled once before in a cathedral.

  “Your Grace,” Amilia replied, respectfully.

  “Sit down, my dear,” Saldur said.

  Amilia found a chair and mechanically sat. Every muscle in her body was tense. Amilia wished Modina had not spoken to her that morning—at least then she could honestly plead innocence. Amilia was no good at lying, and had no idea how she should respond to Saldur’s interrogation in order to bring the least amount of punishment to her and the empress. She was still debating what she might say when Saldur spoke.

  “I have some news for you,” he said, folding his hands on the surface of the desk and leaning forward. “It will not be public for several weeks, but you need to know now so you can begin preparations. I want you to keep this to yourself until I announce it, do you understand?”

  Amilia nodded as if she understood.

  “In almost four months, during the Wintertide celebrations, Modina will marry Regent Ethelred. I don’t think I need to impress upon you the importance of this. The Patriarch himself is personally coming to perform the ceremony. All eyes will be on this palace…and on the empress.”

  Amilia said nothing and barely managed another shallow nod.

  “It is your charge to ensure that nothing embarrassing occurs. I have been very pleased with your work to date, and as a result, I am giving you an opportunity to excel further. I am putting you in charge of arranging the ceremony. It will be your responsibility to develop a guest list and prepare invitations. Go to the lord chamberlain for help with that. You will also need to coordinate with the palace cooks for meals. I understand you have a good relationship with the head cook?”