Page 68 of A ?Sky Beyond the Storm

My scim is in my hand in an instant. “Who the bleeding hells is that? Where’s Far—”

Then I remember.

Loyal to the end, he had cried. The mantra of my Gens. My scars ache and the hollowed-out feeling in my chest makes sense.

“That’s Deci Veturius.” Livia looks at me like I might break, and it makes me want to snarl at her. “Faris’s replacement. Harper cleared him.”

“Empress,” Deci says again. “Forgive me. Captain Harper is here to see the Blood Shrike.”

I look around the room for an escape. The closet has a passageway. It’s guarded. But not by anyone who would dare to talk.

“She’s—ah—” Livia calls to Deci as I walk through the doorway to the closet. “She’s indisposed.”

“Very good, Empress.”

Livia scurries after me, ignoring Zacharias chewing on her knuckles. “Harper’s been worried sick.” She gives me a reproachful look. “I don’t think he’s slept since Quin came back.”

My heart twinges a little at that, fool that it is.

“Empress.” I feel for the passage entrance, and it opens silently. “If we are to solidify the loyalty of the Paters and lure over Keris’s allies, then we must win Antium for the Emperor,” I say. “I have much to do. By your leave.”

My little sister sighs, and Zacharias regards us solemnly, as if waiting to be let in on a secret.

“One day, sister,” Livia says, “you’ll have to reckon with all the things you try to hide from yourself. And the longer you wait, the more it will hurt.”

“Maybe,” I say. “But not today.”

I slip through the passageway and into the castle, which is as damp and chilly as ever, though humming with courtiers and soldiers and servants.

“It’s good to see you up and about, Shrike.” A Martial woman in a maid’s uniform smiles as she passes, a Scholar soldier at her side.

“Heard you gave Grímarr hell, sir,” he says. “I’m sorry he’s still alive, but I hope to be by your side when you kill him dead.”

All the way to Darin’s smithy, people call greetings or stop to talk to me about Antium.

“When are we taking back the capital, Shrike—”

“I knew you’d be back on your feet—”

“Heard you took down a hundred of those Karkaun thugs—”

The more people approach, the faster I walk.The people love you, Livia said. But it is the Emperor who they must love. The Emperor who they must fight for.

My injuries pain me, and it takes me longer than I anticipate to get to Darin’s smithy, a half-covered courtyard in the middle of the castle. The Scholar is stripped to his waist despite the chill, muscles rippling as he plunges a scim into the forge while Spiro Teluman works the bellows. As I step through one of the peaked archways into the courtyard, I notice a Scholar healer named Nawal watching Darin, steeling herself to approach.

“Not hard to look at, is he?” I jump at the voice next to me, my scim half-drawn. It is Musa, one hand gently nudging my blade back to its scabbard. He has a dozen bruises and as many cuts, most half-healed.

“So jumpy, Shrike. One would think you’d only just escaped a band of Karkauns by the skin of your teeth.” He chuckles darkly at his little joke, but his smile doesn’t reach his eyes. “Forgive me,” he says. “Laughing hurts less than facing what happened. I am sorry about Faris. I liked him.”

“Thank you,” I say. “And your joke was terrible, so naturally, Faris would have loved it.” I offer the Scholar a smile. “You’re no worse for wear, I hope?”

He pats his face, preening. “Everyone says I’m even more dashing with scars.”

“Piss off, you.” I shove him, surprised to find myself laughing, and move for Darin.

“How go the blades?”

Laia’s brother jumps, so immersed that he hadn’t noticed me.

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