BY ANDREA STEWART

The Drowning Empire

The Bone Shard Daughter

The Bone Shard Emperor

ORBIT

First published in Great Britain in 2021 by Orbit

Copyright © 2021 by Andrea Stewart

Excerpt from Son of the Storm by Suyi Davies Okungbowa
Copyright © 2021 by Suyi Davies Okungbowa

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Map illustration by Charis Loke

All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A CIP catalogue record for this book
is available from the British Library.

ISBN: 978-0-35651-496-3

Orbit
An imprint of
Little, Brown Book Group
Carmelite House
50 Victoria Embankment
London EC4Y 0DZ

An Hachette UK Company
www.hachette.co.uk

www.orbitbooks.net

For John, who always makes sure I have time to write.
They say no one is perfect, but that is obviously a lie.

CONTENTS

1: Lin

2: Jovis

3: Lin

4: Lin

5: Jovis

6: Nisong

7: Lin

8: Jovis

9: Phalue

10: Lin

11: Ranami

12: Jovis

13: Lin

14: Jovis

15: Lin

16: Phalue

17: Nisong

18: Lin

19: Phalue

20: Jovis

21: Lin

22: Jovis

23: Lin

24: Ranami

25: Jovis

26: Lin

27: Jovis

28: Nisong

29: Lin

30: Jovis

31: Lin

32: Jovis

33: Lin

34: Jovis

35: Nisong

36: Phalue

37: Lin

38: Lin

39: Jovis

40: Lin

41: Nisong

42: Jovis

43: Ranami

44: Lin

45: Jovis

46: Nisong

47: Lin

48: Jovis

49: Phalue

50: Lin

51: Jovis

52: Lin

53: Jovis

54: Lin

55: Nisong

56: Lin

57: Ranami

Acknowledgements

About the author

1

Lin

Imperial Island

I’d thought I could set things right in the Empire if only I’d had the means. But setting things right meant weeding a garden gone wild, and with each new weed pulled, two sprouted in its place. It was so like my father not to leave me an easy task.

I clung to the ceramic tiles of the rooftop, ignoring the soft whimper from Thrana below. There was little privacy in the palace of an Emperor. Servants and guards walked the hallways; even at night there was always someone awake. My father had strolled the hallways of his own palace at all hours with impunity; no one had dared to question him, not even me. It probably helped that he kept more constructs than servants, and the servants he did keep regarded him with terror. I wanted to be a different kind of Emperor. Still, I hadn’t counted on having to sneak around my own palace.

I wiped the moisture from a rain-slicked tile with my sleeve and pulled myself onto the peak of the roof. It seemed a lifetime ago since I’d last climbed up here, and though it had in fact been a few short months, my muscles felt the lack of activity. There had been administrative matters to deal with first – hiring servants, guards and workers. Repairing and cleaning out the buildings on the palace grounds. Reinstating some of my father’s commitments and abolishing others.

And always there were people watching me, wondering what I would do, trying to take my measure.

Somewhere below me, Jovis, my Captain of the Imperial Guard, paced the hallway outside my room, his beast, Mephi, beside him. He’d insisted on taking on this duty himself, and though he did sleep at some point, he only did so after he’d had another guard relieve him. Having someone stationed outside my door at all hours made me grind my teeth. Always he wanted to know where I was, what I was doing. And how could I blame him when I’d tasked him with my safety? I couldn’t very well order him and his guards to leave me in peace without sufficient reason. My father had been known to be ill-tempered, eccentric, reclusive. How could I give that order without appearing to be the same?

An Emperor was beholden to her people.

I sat on the peak of the roof for a moment, taking in the damp air, the smell of the ocean. Sweat stuck my hair to the back of my neck. Some of the rooms I’d discovered in the aftermath of my father’s death were pointlessly locked. One filled with paintings, another with trinkets – gifts from other islands. These I set the servants upon to clean and to organize, to display in the newly renovated buildings.

There were other rooms I dared not let anyone else access. I still didn’t know all the secrets that lurked behind these doors, what the things I’d found meant. And prying eyes made me wary. I had my own secrets to keep.

I was not my father’s daughter. I was a created thing, grown in the caves beneath the palace. If anyone ever found me out, I’d be dead. There was enough dissatisfaction brewing with the Sukai Dynasty without adding this to it. The people of the Phoenix Empire wouldn’t suffer an impostor.

In the courtyard below, two guards patrolled. Neither looked to the roof. Even if they had, I’d only be a dark shape against a cloudy sky, the rain that drizzled into their eyes obscuring their vision. I crept down the other side, making my way to a window I knew was still open. The night was warm in spite of the clouds and the rain, and shutters were often left open unless we were in a true gale. Only a few lamps were lit when I slid from the edge of the tiles, my feet finding the sill.

There was an odd comfort in creeping through the hallways of the palace again, my engraving tool and several keys hidden inside my sash pocket. It was familiar – something I knew.

I couldn’t help but peer around the corner to see the door of my room. Jovis was still there, Mephi next to him. He was showing the beast a deck of lacquered cards. Mephi reached out with a webbed claw and touched one. “This one.”

Jovis sighed. “No, no, no – if you play a fish on a sea serpent, that means you lose that turn.”

Mephi tilted his head and sat back on his haunches. “Feed the fish to the sea serpent. Make the sea serpent your friend.”

“That’s not how this works.”

“It worked on me.”

“Are you a sea serpent?”

Mephi clacked his teeth. “Your game makes no sense.”

“You said you were bored and wanted to learn,” Jovis said. He started to tuck the cards back into his pocket.

Mephi’s ears flattened against his skull. “Wait. Waaaaait.”

I pulled back, keeping an ear out for footsteps. Playing cards while guarding the Emperor’s room wasn’t very professional, despite Jovis’s insistences that he needed to protect me. I supposed I’d done this to myself, hiring a former member of the Ioph Carn and a notorious smuggler as Captain of the Imperial Guard. But he’d saved hordes of children from the Tithing Festival and earned a great deal of goodwill from the people.

And goodwill was something I had in short supply.

I made my way to the shard storeroom, ducking down side passages or behind pillars whenever I saw a guard or a servant. Swiftly, I unlocked the door and slipped inside. I moved through muscle memory, taking down the lamp by the lintel, lighting it, striding to the back of the room. There was another door there, carved with a cloud juniper.

Another lock, another key.

I descended into the darkness of the old mining tunnels below the palace, my lamp casting the sharp edges of the walls into stark relief. The constructs my father had placed to guard the way were dead, disassembled by my hand once I’d had the strength. The constructs still scattered across the Empire were another matter. All were commanded to obey Shiyen. And now that he was gone, their command structure had fallen to pieces. Some had gone mad. Others had gone into hiding. There were only two constructs I’d considered mine. Hao, a little spy construct I’d rewritten to obey me, and Bing Tai. Hao had died defending me from my father. Only Bing Tai remained.

At the fork in the tunnels, I veered left, unlocking the door that blocked the way. I’d often wondered what my father was doing when he disappeared behind his locked doors. I still didn’t exactly know.

The tunnel opened up into a cavern and I lit the lamps scattered throughout. A pool filled part of the cavern; a workstation was set up next to it. There were bookshelves, a metal table, baskets of tools I didn’t recognize. And the chest that held my father’s memory machine. It was here I’d found Thrana, submerged in the pool, connected to that machine. As I did every time I entered this cavern, I checked the water. My lamp reflected off the dark surface; I had to squint past that to see into the water below. The replica of my father still lay in the pool, his eyes closed. After the first rush of relief came that familiar pang. He looked so much like Bayan – or, I supposed, Bayan looked so much like him.

But Bayan had died helping me to defeat my father, and when I’d finally taken the time to grieve, I’d realized there was no bringing him back. I was proof of that. While my father had grown this replica by submerging his own severed toe in the pool, he’d grown me from the parts of people he’d collected throughout the Empire. He’d tried to infuse me with the memories of Nisong, his dead wife. It had only partially worked. I had some of her memories, but I wasn’t her.

I was Lin. And I was Emperor.

Even if I could use the memory machine to restore some of Bayan into this replica, it wouldn’t be him.

I whirled, suddenly sure I’d heard something. A footstep? The scuff of shoe against stone? The lamps I’d lit behind me illuminated only stone and water; the only sound I could hear was my heartbeat thundering in my ears. In that one instant of blinding panic, I could feel everything being taken away from me – my years of hard work, the nights spent reading about bone shard magic, the courage I’d had to gather to defy my father – all of it dissolved in a moment of discovery. I was getting paranoid, hearing things where there was nothing. How could someone have followed me down here without the keys? The doors all locked again as soon as they latched shut.

Several of the books and pages of notes my father had gathered lay spread across the metal table. I was reluctant to move them to my rooms, where servants might see them. These were the weeds I was trying to pull: the Shardless Few, the sinking of Deerhead Island, the leaderless constructs and the Alanga. There were answers here, if only I could find them. It was finding them that was difficult. My predecessor’s notes were scattered, his handwriting messy. In spite of the three locked doors, my father wrote as though afraid someone else might find these books. Nothing was straightforward. Often he referenced notes he’d written previously, or other books, but without naming where those notes could be found or the titles of the books. I was trying to assemble a puzzle that had no picture.

I drew up the chair and flipped through page after page, a headache forming quickly behind my eyes. A part of me thought that if only I read enough, if only I read it enough times, I’d figure out my father’s secrets.

So far, all I’d been able to gather was that islands had sunk before, a long time ago. Knowing that more than one had sunk back then, and so far we’d only seen Deerhead Island fall, made sweat gather on my palms. I still didn’t know what had caused Deerhead to sink, or when or how I might expect another island to drown. And the Alanga – another thing my father would have told his heir. Who were they, and if they returned, what could I do to fight them off?

My gaze strayed to the memory machine.

There had still been liquid in the tubes when I’d disconnected it from Thrana. Some held her blood and some held a milky fluid. I’d gathered her remaining blood into a flask I’d taken from the kitchens, and the fluid into another. In his notes, my father had mentioned feeding the memories to his constructs and to me. He’d seemed dissatisfied with his first attempts, reluctant to disassemble the constructs that might be carrying his dead wife’s memories but unhappy with how little they seemed to understand of Nisong.

I wasn’t sure what he’d done with those constructs, but the more pressing matter was where the memories were stored.

I’d corked both flasks, placing them on the table with the books. I’d gotten as far as uncorking the one with the milky fluid and sniffing the contents. But always I stoppered it again, searching Shiyen’s notes for more concrete evidence that the memories were in that fluid. Was I getting that desperate, to consider drinking it without knowing for sure? For all I knew, it could be some sort of lubrication for the machine, poisonous and not meant to be consumed.

But some of that had come from Thrana. I wasn’t sure of the connection – where he’d found her, what sort of creature she was. She was like Mephi, and Jovis had found him swimming in the ocean after Deerhead’s fall.

There was nothing toxic about Thrana.

Ah, I was making excuses because part of me just wanted to drink it. I wanted to know. I couldn’t be sure whose memories might be in that fluid, but I had an idea. Shiyen had been old and ill. He would have been trying to gather his memories, to place them within his replica before he died.

I was looking for answers, and some of those answers might be in the flask. The Phoenix Empire stood on a knife’s edge. What was I willing to do to save my people? Numeen had told me they needed an Emperor who cared. And I cared. I cared so much.

I seized the flask, uncorked it and lifted it to my lips before I could change my mind again.

The liquid was cold, though that didn’t mask the taste. Copper, sweetness and a strange, lingering aftertaste filled my mouth and clung to the back of my throat. I swiped my tongue over my teeth, wondering if I should have tasted it before swallowing. Perhaps it was poison. And then the memory swept over me.

I was here, still in this chamber, though it looked different. Three more lamps were lit in the working area, and Thrana still lay in the water. My hands adjusted the tubing leading into the memory machine. Liver spots scattered across the backs of my palms, tendons pressing against skin. I pushed too hard; my hand slipped and hit the side of the chest. Something jolted loose.

“Dione’s balls!” Frustration welled within me. Always one thing after another. Get something into place; another thing falls out of place. The only thing I had to live for were these experiments. My chest ached as I thought of Nisong, of her dark eyes, her hand in mine. Gone. I felt around the bottom of the chest, pushing the hidden compartment back into line.

My gaze flicked involuntarily to the other end of the cave.

And then I was back in my own body again, wondering if that was what it felt like to be my father. Strangely astonished that he had such strength of feeling at all. I’d always known him to be cold and distant.

He really had loved Nisong. I wasn’t sure why that surprised me. Perhaps it was because, no matter how hard I’d tried, I could not get him to love me.

In the memory, a hidden compartment had come loose from the chest. Experimentally, I struck the side of the chest with the flat of my palm. Nothing jolted loose, but I put my hand where I remembered my father’s hand pressing the wood back in.

There was something there. A small rectangle where the wood felt slightly raised. I struck the chest again.

This time, it came loose. A drawer slid partway open. I pried it the rest of the way out. Inside rested a tiny silver key.

I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to laugh or to cry. Always my father kept so many secrets – secrets within secrets within secrets. His mind was a maze even he couldn’t find his way out of. What if he had truly raised me as his daughter? What if he’d put aside his foolish quest to live on in another body, to bring his dead wife back to life?

The key was cold when I picked it up, the tiny teeth at the end sharp. I’d unlocked all the doors I could find in the palace. This belonged somewhere else.

My gaze flicked to the other side of the cave. He’d looked in that direction when he’d pushed the drawer back into place. I hadn’t thought there was anything there, but perhaps I hadn’t looked closely enough.

I lifted my lamp. Stalagmites blocked my path to the other side; I had to weave between them like a deer through bamboo.

At last, I reached a clear area against the wall – the spot I’d seen my father looking at. As I cast my gaze around, my heart sank. There was nothing here, just stone and the flash of crystal in the walls. I’d walked over here before; I wasn’t sure why I expected anything different.

Secrets within secrets.

No, there was something here. He’d glanced at this spot, and I’d been experiencing his memory. There’d been a reason for it, I could feel it. I dropped to my knees, setting the lamp down and feeling around on the ground.

My fingers found the smallest crack filled with dirt.

I set aside the key, pulled my engraving tool from my sash pocket and used it to clear the dirt from the crack in the stone. Someone had chiseled a piece of stone away and then replaced it. There was something here; I hadn’t been wrong.

The engraving tool bent as I used it to pry the stone out. My fingernails ached as I wedged them beneath the slab, pulling until it came free. Dirt shook loose, catching the lamplight. I peered inside the cavity and found a hatch with a keyhole.

What would my father have kept that necessitated a series of four locked doors? The key slid into the lock easily and turned with a soft click. The hinges to the hatch were well oiled; it opened soundlessly. When I swung my lantern over the hole, all I could see was a ladder descending into the dark.

There might be anything down there. I crouched down, lay on my belly and lowered both the lantern and my head into the hatch.

It was difficult to see very far into the cavern below with only one lamp, and upside down at that. The ladder was long, the bottom farther than I’d first thought. But I could make out shelves against one shadowy wall.

Well, I’d come this far, hadn’t I? And it wasn’t as though I was going to go back and ask Jovis to accompany me into my father’s lair. I’d defeated my father; I could climb into a dark hole by myself. I pushed myself back up, tucked the engraving tool back into my sash, gripped the lantern’s handle between my teeth and set my feet upon the ladder.

The air felt even cooler in this lower cave than in the cavern with the pool. It had a musty petrichor scent, though I couldn’t detect any excess moisture. It was a relief to finally touch ground again, to take the lamp from my jaw, which had already begun to ache.

I shook out the tension in my shoulders. There were perhaps more books down here, more notes, more puzzle pieces I could lock together. I pivoted, lifting the lamp.

And found its light reflecting from two monstrous eyes.

2

Jovis

Imperial Island

I made a better smuggler than Captain of the Guard. If I’d been smarter, I’d have kept that job and turned down this one. But here I was, determined to save as many poor sods in the Empire as I reasonably could.

Hopefully, I could keep my head while I was at it.

Mephi pawed at my jacket. “Take the cards back out.” He paused, then added reluctantly, “Please.”

I swiveled my head just the slightest bit to where I’d seen Lin peer around the corner. She was gone. She was good, I had to admit that. I wouldn’t have expected it of an Emperor’s daughter. But I’d heard a soft scrape on the tiles above and I’d known she’d climbed to the roof. It could have been any number of things, including my imagination, but I’d fine-tuned my instincts after years on the run. I shouldn’t have expected the Emperor to acquiesce when I’d asked to know where she was at all times.

The Shardless Few were right: she had secrets. And they’d charged me with uncovering them. Following a young lady around in the dark – I supposed this was how I was going to save the Empire. Not exactly worthy of another folk song. “Shh,” I said to Mephi before he could paw at me again. “Lin – she’s not in her room anymore.”

The beast went still, ears pricked.

“Stay here,” I told him. “I’m going after her.” I made it as far as the corner before a horned head appeared at my side. I lifted my hands in silent frustration.

“You said we stay together,” Mephi whispered. He’d fortunately mastered the ability to actually whisper by now.

I had told him that. I’d left him behind once when completing a task for the Shardless Few, and it had ended disastrously for me and, I’d thought back then, for him. I’d nearly died and he’d fallen into what I’d thought was an illness – but turned out to be a hibernation of sorts. I’d never felt so worried before in my life, unsure whether he would live or die. What if it happened again? “Fine,” I said. “But stay quiet, and stay close.”

Despite the newfound gangliness of his limbs, Mephi still moved with the grace of a serpent across the rocks. He slipped through the hallways even more silently than I did. I caught a glimpse of Lin ducking behind a pillar to avoid a servant.

I waited in the shadows, Mephi’s tail curling around my leg. When she moved again, I moved. I’d shadowed people before – to find out where they’d hidden things, to obtain blackmail and to eavesdrop on secret meetings.

Perhaps smuggling and spying weren’t so different after all.

She stopped at a small door, looked both ways, unlocked it and slipped inside.

“Mephi . . . !” I hissed.

He was moving before I’d even said his name, darting across the floor as swiftly as a river. I rushed to catch up to him, trying to keep my footsteps light, my heartbeat hammering.

He’d caught the door with a claw just before it had latched. I’d been able to read his moods from his face, unlike as it was from my own, and now I read “smug” in his expression. I gave him a grudging nod. Yes, I’d have been very put out if I hadn’t brought him. Yes, it had been a good decision on his part. Yes, I needed him more than I thought.

Mephi gave me a perfunctory nod back before prying the door open a crack.

I watched Lin move to the back of the room, her lamp held high, watched her open a door carved with a cloud juniper. I opened the door wide as soon as she’d slipped inside and Mephi rushed forward.

There wasn’t time for me to examine the room, and with the door shutting behind me, the light faded. There were no windows here, no places for prying eyes to reach. I found Mephi by touch.

We followed Lin into the darkness, the glow of her lamp lighting the way.

What was this place? The walls were stone and became rough-hewn; the floor tilted at a slope, leading us down. It took me a moment to realize we were no longer in the palace. We’d descended into the mountain the palace abutted. An old mine? I’d heard that Imperial Island once had a witstone mine, but it had been closed without explanation years ago. Judging by the vein of white I saw running across the ceiling, it hadn’t been for lack of stone.

So what was Lin doing down here? The Emperor had her own store of witstone; she wouldn’t need to mine any herself. She was here for another reason. Was she hiding something? Keeping someone prisoner? The place certainly felt like a dungeon – dark, closed-in, oppressive. Mephi pressed in close to me, and I found his presence more comforting than I’d thought I would.

A fork appeared ahead, the glow of Lin’s lamp emanating from the left side. I crept forward, wondering how deep below the surface we were now. Even my breath seemed to echo off the walls in the quiet. And then the tunnel dead-ended. In yet another door. Lin pulled a key from her sash pocket.

My apprehension rose. I wasn’t sure I understood this Emperor. I wasn’t foolish enough to believe the official statement – that Shiyen had died of a long illness, peacefully in bed. There had been no construct guards manning the walls when I’d arrived at the palace. Even the front doors had been unattended. I’d run into Lin in the hall, her clothes torn and bloodied, Thrana and her construct Bing Tai flanking her.

It hadn’t been a peaceful transfer of power.

And then, instead of executing or imprisoning me, she’d given me a position as Captain of her Imperial Guard. She’d explained how she wanted to make things right, how she was ending the Tithing Festival and her father’s iron-fisted way of rule.

To the Shardless Few’s leader, Gio, it didn’t matter who was Emperor. Only that there was one. I’d thought perhaps he was wrong. That a good Emperor, one who cared about the people of the Empire, might not be a bad thing.

But now, following Lin into the dark, I couldn’t help but spin tales in my mind of what secrets she was keeping, what terrible deeds I might uncover.

Mephi rushed forward as she passed through the third – and I hoped last – door. “Thank you,” I whispered to him in the dark as I cracked the door open. I wedged a rock into the opening. I might need to make a quick, silent exit.

“We stay together,” he whispered back, his voice fierce.

“You’re right,” I said. I could nearly feel the smugness vibrating off the beast. Like most adolescents, he very much enjoyed being right about things. Obviously I just didn’t know better. Not until he came along to correct me.

Behind the door was another tunnel, leading down. Light flared at the bottom. I pulled my staff loose from its strap on my back, took a deep breath and descended.

The cavern the tunnel opened up into was vast – the size of the palace’s entrance hall three times over. A pool filled part of it, a thick vein of witstone running across the ceiling. Lin had lit the lamps in the cavern, and the light pressed against the vast shadows. She stood at the center, at what appeared to be a workstation. There were shelves, books, baskets, chairs and a metal table scattered with various items.

I frowned. What would a person be working on in a secret cave below the palace except something sinister? There were a few stalagmites but no real cover – I couldn’t sneak past the entrance and expect to remain undiscovered. So I lingered, squinting at the workstation, trying to make out something useful.

“Mephi,” I whispered, “can you—?”

And then Lin lifted a flask from the table’s surface and drank from it. Her whole body went rigid, the flask still gripped in her right hand.

Poison? I couldn’t make sense of what I was seeing. I tensed, wondering if I should do something to help. But I was supposed to be spying on the Emperor for the Shardless Few, not helping her. Helping Lin wasn’t my job. I mean, it technically was. But it wasn’t the job I’d been sent here for.

But what sort of person was I? I didn’t know what sort of person she was, not yet, and what if she was dying? Could I really sit here and watch?

Her hand moved, setting the flask down. I let out a breath.

Mephi, next to me, was sniffing the air, his whiskers trembling. “It smells familiar,” he whispered by way of explanation when I stared at him.

“You’ve never been here before,” I said.

His ears flattened. “I know that.”

By the time I looked back to Lin, I saw something glinting between her fingers. A key. Another bedamned key. She stood up from where she crouched over a chest, and made her way to the far end of the cavern. I couldn’t see what she was doing there, behind a cluster of stalagmites, though I heard scraping sounds, and then soft grunting as she lifted something.

As I watched, she crouched and then disappeared.

I gestured to Mephi and we moved into the cavern. I stayed close to the wall opposite the side with the pool, hopeful that if Lin popped back up again, I could hide in the shadows against the undulating stone. It was a risk, but I’d taken a fair bit of those in my day. They mostly worked out in my favor. Mostly.

Behind the cluster of stalagmites lay an opened hatch and a slab of stone. Light emanated from the hatch. Mephi sniffed the air, all the hair on his back standing on end. “Don’t like it,” he said beneath his breath. “Smells bad.”

I resisted the urge to tap my staff against the cavern floor, though I could feel the sweat gathering on my palm. I wouldn’t know what was down there unless I looked.

A growl, thick and gravelly, filled the cavern.

Now my hair was standing on end. Mephi darted forward before I could stop him, ducking his head into the hole. “Monster,” he squeaked at me. He opened his mouth as though trying to form a more coherent thought, and then snapped it shut again.

“Stay back.” Lin’s voice, quavering.

I had two choices: to wait and see if Lin survived this, or to—Ah, it looked like my feet had made the choice for me already. The ladder was held solidly in place, which I was grateful for, because when I’d descended low enough to see the cavern below, my limbs trembled.

The Emperor stood between me and what Mephi had accurately identified as a monster. A construct filled half the space, its flashing golden eyes as big as my fists. Its maw was open, exposing multiple rows of sharp, white teeth. Muscular legs ended in claws that could end me with one swipe. I’d never seen one so large. What was it doing down here, behind four sets of locked doors?

I caught a glimpse of shelves, of something hanging on the walls, before my gaze was drawn inevitably back to the stand-off.

Lin held the lamp in one hand, her engraving tool in the other, and she wasn’t budging. Was she mad? That thing was going to eat her.

And then the construct’s gaze landed on me.

There I was, hanging partway down a ladder, staff clutched in one sweaty hand. My most potent trick required contact with the ground, which was . . . still a fair bit down.

“Jovis,” Mephi hissed from above me, “move!”

It was a testament to my foolishness that I went down the ladder rather than back up, sliding as quick as I could manage. I felt the rush of air as the creature moved, its jaws snapping just above my head. Apparently, I looked like I made a more appealing meal than Lin. I was a fair bit larger. And she did look rather sinewy.

But I didn’t have time to speculate on the culinary qualities of humans. I jumped the rest of the way, the impact from the fall jolting the teeth in my jaw. But I had my staff in hand, and the thrumming in my bones. The construct charged at me again, and I stamped a foot.

The entire cavern shook, dust coming loose from the ceiling. The monster stopped in its tracks but did not topple, did not so much as wobble.

Four legs. Right.

From behind it now, Lin rose, striking dust from her robe, evidently not the benefactor of the same sort of stability. “You’re going to bring the whole cavern down on us, you fool!” she spat.

I couldn’t argue with her. I’d panicked at the sight of the creature, forgetting where I was. I lifted my staff, hoping strength and speed might help me stay alive. I wasn’t sure how I could kill such a creature, or if I could at all.

“You followed me,” Lin said, brandishing her engraving tool. “You broke into my locked chambers. How did you even get down here?”

A thousand lies sprouted in my head, and I uprooted each of them. This wasn’t the time for explanations. I eyed the beast, wishing I’d chosen some other weapon. Something sharp or pointy. Clobbering it on the head was only likely to make it angry. “Can we discuss my execution later?”

Another growl, the gravelly sound making the pit already growing in my stomach widen further. It came for me again, and this time I was ready. I brought my staff up and struck the construct on the nose, hard as I could.

It yelped and shook its head at the blow, though I hadn’t done so much as draw blood. I rushed forward, trying to take advantage of its momentary hesitation.

For a creature so large, it was surprisingly quick. It ducked away from my follow-up blow, teeth bared. I caught a glimpse of Lin, stalking closer.

“Get to the ladder,” I called to her. “I don’t know how long I can hold it off.” I wasn’t sure if I could hold it off at all. Why was I sticking my neck out for her? All I knew was that I couldn’t just leave her down here to face this creature alone, no matter who she was. I was getting soft. Maybe I’d always been soft.

The construct, sensing my attention had wavered beyond it, turned its golden-eyed gaze on Lin. Its irises flashed in the lamplight. Claws dug into the stone.

I should have considered making a run for the ladder myself, but instead I raised my voice. “Hey – finish what you started!” Technically, it had started with Lin, but I doubted it was going to stop to correct this mistake.

I was right.

It wheeled on me, charging like a deer in the middle of mating season. I supposed I should be grateful it didn’t have horns. I stumbled back, my footing uneven on the stone floor, catching myself with the end of my staff. Did it matter if I died on my own two feet or on the ground? I lifted my staff and the creature pulled up just short of me, grunting. The nose was a pain point, then. Even the most fearsome beasts had sensitive spots. The eyes, too. I could aim for those.

I needed to bring its massive head within reach.

Mephi’s voice echoed into the chamber. “Can I help?”

“You can help by staying there and being ready to close the hatch,” I called back. I took another step back and felt the wall.

Great. I’d let it corner me. Amateur mistake for a smuggler and a Captain of the Imperial Guard. I much preferred fighting a dozen men in the open streets to this one beast in an enclosed cave. Always check your exits. Always leave a way out. But if some other person fell into danger, my brain became muddled as the melon pulp at the bottom of the wine barrel. I’d told myself so many times I wasn’t a hero.

I lifted my staff to the side, opening my arms, inviting the construct to attack.

Maybe I was a hero. And heroes were idiots.

Its jaws opened, saliva dripping onto the floor. It lunged.

I brought up my staff – too slowly. I felt as though I were watching myself from the side, everything in that moment clarified, distilled to a fine point of fear.

They didn’t usually sing about the heroes’ grisly deaths in the folk songs. Usually the hero swooned at the end of a battle, bleeding prettily from one wound, a single tear escaping. There wasn’t going to be enough of me left for that.

The beast froze.

I came back to myself in bits and pieces. My painfully tight grip on the staff, my clenched jaw, my heartbeat kicking wildly in my chest.

The construct was frozen and I wasn’t dead. Mephi? Was this some new power he’d granted me?

A soft scrape sounded from behind the construct and I nearly jumped out of my skin. Lin strode around the bulk of the beast, a few shards of bone in her hand, the lamp held high in the other.

“Would you care to tell me what you’re doing down here?”

Despite her stature, there was something of Shiyen in the way she held her head, the way her gaze seemed to pierce through mine. I’d never met the man, though I’d seen his portraits. He hadn’t smiled for any of them.

“My job,” I answered simply.

“I didn’t ask to be followed,” she said. She glanced to the side, where Mephi was watching from the hatch. “And you brought him along too. That’s two mouths I need to keep silent.”

“So you’re hiding things.”

“Of course I am,” she spat back at me. Her eyes flashed nearly as brightly as the construct’s had. “This place isn’t mine. It’s my father’s, and he never told me about it. I don’t know all the secrets he kept. You would propose instead that I open up all his locked doors for everyone to inspect? Imagine some poor servant coming down here and falling victim to this construct.”

Something about her righteousness pricked my anger. She sounded like Gio. “You almost fell victim to it. What do you think would happen to me if you died? Everyone would think I’d had something to do with it – or at the very least, I hadn’t been doing my job.”

“No,” she said. “You almost fell victim to it. Not me. The constructs are my domain, my responsibility. Not yours.”

My mouth kept moving, my mind struggling to keep up. “And your safety is my responsibility.”

She thrust her hand inside the beast and then removed it, her fingers now empty. I tensed as the creature moved again, bringing my staff to bear. So this was to be my execution? Mephi started down the ladder headfirst, a soft whine in his throat.

Lin lifted a hand to forestall him. “Wait. Watch.”

Strangely enough, Mephi obeyed.

The skin of the beast sagged, fur sloughing off.

“I’ve broken it,” she said. “I am the only one who knows how.”

I couldn’t quite relax, even as the construct fell to pieces in front of me. My face felt hot. Had she not needed me at all? I’d exposed myself, and for what? But as I thought back to what I’d seen when I’d looked down the hatch, I didn’t think she could have gotten close to the construct if I’d not distracted it. “If you’re so competent and don’t need protection, why hire me?”

“You and I both know why I hired you. You lend me legitimacy with the people. But I cannot have you sneaking around after me, dogging my footsteps, demanding to know everything I am doing.”

Mephi climbed the rest of the way down and wound his way around my legs as though he could protect me from her wrath.

“Are you my Captain of the Imperial Guard? Or are you a spy?”

The heat drained from my face. She didn’t know – she couldn’t know. I’d not given any sign. I forced myself to breathe. It was an inquiry meant to needle me and nothing more. “What will you do then, Eminence? Strip me of my title? Execute me?” She’d already admitted that she needed me. “I can’t imagine the people who hold me in high esteem would like that.”

Mephi patted my leg, trying to soothe me.

Lin stepped closer, and though she had to crane her neck, it felt for a moment as though we were the same height. “Are you threatening the leader of the Phoenix Empire?” The air between us seemed to vibrate. “What is it that you want, Jovis? To become Emperor yourself?”

I was so taken aback by this accusation all I could think to say was, “Why would I want that?” It was the last thing I wanted. I hadn’t even wanted to be here in the palace. What an absurd idea. I would have laughed had I not been in a more dire position.

She blinked. The tension between us evaporated as her brow furrowed. “Why wouldn’t you?”

Any number of reasons, and I wouldn’t even have to lie about them. I opened my mouth to start listing them, but Lin’s gaze went to the hatch. She sucked in a breath. I whirled.

A small creature with bat ears and a gull’s wings watched us.

She grabbed my arm. “You propped open the door.” She said it like I’d boiled rice in too much water.

“Yes.” I wasn’t sure what she was so panicked about.

“That construct isn’t mine. I’ve never seen its like on Imperial before. It’s a spy.” And then she was putting the lamp’s handle between her teeth, running to the ladder, hauling herself up two rungs at a time. No wonder she hadn’t a moment’s hesitation about climbing onto the roof. She moved quick as a squirrel.

Constructs were her purview. They weren’t mine. She’d said as much. But I still found myself tucking my staff onto my back and running after her like a damned fool. What if she got hurt? What if it was blamed on me? Lies I told myself because I couldn’t admit that Mephi was right – I was a person who helped. And apparently I was a person who helped even when it was incredibly stupid to do so.

“You said you were the only one who knew bone shard magic,” I huffed as I climbed after her. Mephi clambered up after me, the ladder creaking beneath our combined weights.

“Yes,” she said. “But after my father’s death, everything went sideways.” She pulled herself out of the hatch, and to my surprise, turned to give me a hand up. “I need to catch it. They are no longer bound to my father, which means they can pledge loyalty to others. I cannot believe it was here by mistake. Help me.”

Any hesitation I’d felt melted away. Had she ever intended to execute me? Or was she just as foolish as I was, hoping that a single person could begin to make things right? I gave her a swift nod in response, and she ran after the construct. It disappeared up the tunnel entrance.

She was quicker than I’d thought she’d be, though my long legs and my Mephi-inspired strength made up the difference.

“Did you prop open any other doors?” she asked as we made for the tunnel.

“Just the one.”

“It came in through the spy entrance to Ilith’s lair, then. We won’t catch it down here. We can intercept it in the courtyard if we hurry. It has wings – once it takes flight, things will get difficult.”

We didn’t speak after that, and I let her lead the way through the winding tunnels, the lamp jolting in her hand and nearly extinguishing more than once. Mephi ran at my side, never questioning where we were going or what we were doing. He might sass me about cards, but when it mattered, he was always there for me.

She slammed through the cloud juniper door, and then through the outer one so hard I was sure her shoulder must be bruised. She didn’t even wince, just kept running.

The entrance hall felt ominous at night, only the two lamps by the main doors still lit. It took her a little longer to open one of those, and I added my strength to hers, our shoulders touching, our hands pressed to the wood.

We both nearly tumbled down the stairs as it gave way. I forgot sometimes to compensate for my newfound strength, to pull back when the occasion called for it. But Lin caught her feet beneath her, taking the steps down two – and then three – at a time. She ran straight for the garden.

The palace grounds were dark, the lamps outside all blown out. A drizzle of rain gathered beads on my face and eyelashes. I leapt down the bulk of the stairs and followed her.

“A boulder,” she called to me, her voice strangely steady. I’d thought she’d be more out of breath. “The entrance to Ilith’s lair is beneath a boulder next to the cherry tree.”

I didn’t think I’d be able to identify a cherry tree in the dark, so I just pulled my staff free as I ran, hoping I’d be prepared.

The archway into the garden led straight into a waist-high wall of hedges, which Lin wove easily around. I vaulted over and heard Mephi do the same. The garden felt even darker than the rest of the courtyard, but I followed the sound of Lin’s footsteps, nearly tripping at each step down on the path I couldn’t see. The path opened into a circular clearing, a tree and a boulder in the middle.

Something fluttered up and into the night sky.

“Shit!” Lin said.

I wasn’t sure why – after four locked doors, a cavern beneath the palace and a giant construct – this would be the thing that surprised me. An Emperor swearing like a smuggler.

She stamped her foot, and the ground shook. Mephi pressed his shoulder against my thigh. All the suspicions I’d been carrying since I saw Thrana, since that first discussion I’d had with Lin when she’d asked me to be Captain of her Imperial Guard, rushed back in.

Thrana was like Mephi.

Lin was like me.

And I was like . . . ?

I’d tried not to think too much about what I was, what this magic meant. But ever since I’d fought the four-armed construct in front of the palace, I’d wondered. I’d been able to gather the surrounding water, to harness it to my command.

The tales spoke often of Alanga control over water.

I cleared my throat. “I guess we should—”

But she was off before I could finish my sentence, darting to a nearby pavilion, shimmying up the drain like she’d done this a thousand times before. Perhaps she had.

“Dione’s balls!” I swore, and then followed her.

I caught a glimpse of Mephi’s forlorn face as I climbed up the building. “Wait here for me – I’ll be back!” I promised him. He’d be safe within the palace walls.

Lin had already leapt to the rooftop of another building by the time I’d crested the top of the pavilion. I ran after her, flinging myself to the next roof. I wouldn’t have been able to make the jump before I’d bonded with Mephi. How long had she been doing this for? She practically flew across the roofs, the construct a dark, fluttering shape in the sky.

Rain stuck to my forehead, forming into rivulets as I ran.

“Take it down!” I called to the guards on the walls. Two of them heard me, startling and turning to see who’d spoken. “In the sky,” I clarified. Only one had the presence of mind to lift her bow.

Too slowly. The construct would pass out of range before she could nock an arrow, and I wasn’t even sure if she saw the construct.

We reached the walls. The guards eyed us both, unsure of what to make of us.

Lin’s gaze went to the buildings of the city, her expression grim. I knew what she was going to do a moment before she did it. “Eminence, it’s too far. The construct is gone; it—”

She ran, leaping first to the top of the crenellations and then striking out hard for the rooftops. She barely made it. Her fingers scrabbled at the roof tiles, her feet hanging from the edge. But she pulled herself up in one smooth movement and was off again.

I knew my limits. Well, most times I did. I gave the guards an apologetic shrug and then dropped over the side of the wall.

The walls had been repaired since I’d arrived, which made them look a whole lot better but made them a lot more difficult to climb. I gave up halfway down and dropped to the ground. The fall jolted my knees and made me wince, but I knew from experience that any damage would heal quickly and the pain would fade.

The streets of Imperial City were empty this time of night, the shops closed and the people asleep. I’d been to the city a few times in my youth, back when I’d been studying at the Navigators’ Academy. Imperial City was a day’s trip away from the Academy by boat or by oxcart, and a popular place for students to get away and let loose. The streets were different then than they were now, but I could still find my way easily enough. And all I had to do was follow the sound of Lin’s footsteps against the tile rooftops – a faint click click click above the dripping of rain down the gutters. The stones of the street were slippery, but I risked a glance up and could barely make out the shadow of the construct against the sky.

We still had a chance to catch it.

Lin was freshly crowned; I wondered who had subverted a spy construct and sent it to Imperial so quickly. If the constructs could be called now to other causes and other masters, that left a veritable army of them across the Empire, waiting to fall into the wrong hands.

The thought chilled me far more than the rain against my cheeks.

A grunt came from above as Lin launched herself at the construct and missed, landing hard on a rooftop and nearly tumbling down the eaves.

“You have to get closer!” I called to her. “Or try . . . throwing something at it.”

“Throw what?” she shouted back.

I bit back a retort – that perhaps she should have thought of this before chasing the construct. I was running out of breath anyway. I careened down the main street of Imperial, flashes of a past life flowing past me. A drinking hall I’d been to once, where I’d sat in the corner alone, nursing a mug of wine. A shop with beautiful, elaborate maps, which I’d coveted but could not afford. The spot on a corner where a few fellow students had accosted me, accusing the half-Poyer boy of following them. I’d talked my way out of that. Eventually.

I never thought I’d come back to Imperial. Not to stay.

A loose oyster shell lay in the gutter in front of me. I scooped it up as I ran, feeling its heft. We were nearing the docks. I could smell the ocean, feel the breeze off the water, hear the waves against the shore. My feet kicked beneath me, moving faster than I’d thought possible, my breath quick in my throat. But wind and wings were faster still.

Another grunt from above as Lin launched herself at the construct. It veered as her fingers grasped at its tail and then pulled away, leaving her with only feathers and a fall to the rooftop.

The docks appeared ahead, the ocean beyond. Only one chance at this.

I focused on the construct, planted my feet, cocked my elbow and heaved the oyster shell at it. Should have kept running, looking for something else to throw, but I watched, my breath held.

The oyster shell went wide and the construct flew over the docks and out to sea. Escaped.