Page 11 of The Uncrowned Prince

Truth, truth, lie.

The rush of surprise accompanying that first truth nearly drowned out the lie that clamored for attention. Why did he not want her to return home?

The thought haunted her even as she withdrew into the shadows, pulling up her hood and merging soundlessly with the night.

* * *

Now that she had learned better than to ask questions directly, Karreya set herself the task of learning the city—discovering its life and its rhythms, its ways and its moods, its cadence and its flavors. Brine and fish, smoke and tar, water and decay.

Parts of Viali were better lit than others, and the brighter the lights, the more people were about, but it was still a simple matter to traverse its streets, cross its rooftops, and descend into its alleyways without being seen.

Despite the shroud of darkness, as she drifted invisibly through the night Karreya could sense the influence of sun and storm, seasons and tides, bending and balance.

The city felt old, though it was little more than an infant beside the weight of Zulleri history. And it’s people… they seemed to carry their emotions so openly, going on their way with their secrets and their hopes and their fears lived out where everyone could see, each one a unique shape in the picture she was drawing in her mind.

A grizzled sailor with a wooden leg limping along beside an old dog with only one eye, singing softly to himself in the dark…

A young woman in a cloak hurrying through the shadows, her soft white fingers clenched around the material as an equally soft smile played across her lips…

A uniformed guard striding down the margins of the road, filled with the confidence of unchallenged youth, his hand far from his sword hilt and his eyes fixed on the obvious, never straying to the darkness above…

Ribald songs drifted through the air from the half-open doors of pubs, while gentle lamplight gleamed through the windows of tiny stone houses, illuminating snatches of the everyday moments within.

A mother bathing her child in a copper tub. A wife arguing with her husband while a baby cried in the background. A father showing his son how to hold a knife as he whittled some shape out of a simple block of wood.

Ordinary people, ordinary lives. Or so Karreya assumed. But whether these were odd or ordinary, how would she know? Before this moment, such people and their doings had been no more than stories. Pictures drawn with words, of strange, stilted worlds filled with flat figures who were born, then worked, suffered, and died. They had never been truly real.

But all of these people were very real. She caught glimpses of their histories in the scars and sorrows on their faces, heard them echoing in their unfamiliar accents, and found them drawn in vivid color by the unfettered laughter and tears that flowed whenever they were together.

What must it be like to live so thoughtlessly? To find satisfaction in the small joys of an existence with no great purpose or destiny?

She remembered so little of her own life before the Enclave. Her father had been wealthy, but she saw him rarely. She knew only the servants, silent and obedient, many of them with the bracelets and collars that subjected their magic to complete control.

And because she was small, quiet, and no more than a task to be completed, she often went unnoticed among them, learning by watching that she must never tell anyone about her own magic. Not the most important part.

Her grandmother was aware that she could see certain kinds of magic, but that was all. Her father knew nothing about her except that she lived, and perhaps not even that by this time. He had always behaved as if he could not bear the sight of her, and her mother… Well, Karreya suspected her mother was dead, though no one would tell her the truth. Every story she’d been told was a lie.

But… this wallowing was ridiculous. She was permitting this strange land to distract her, and Mistress Bethia would be ashamed.

Rising from her crouch atop a white marble temple near the water, Karreya grasped the edge of the roof, swung by her fingertips, and dropped to an ornamental ledge between fanciful carvings of ships and mermaids and whales. There she paused for a moment, checking for movement before making her way to the ground.

She must not allow herself to be led astray. Even if she were successful—even if she found her father and convinced him to return—she would be a fool to pretend she had the luxury of wishing for a life to call her own.

Affections and preferences were for the weak, and she had no need of them. Nor did she want them. All she wanted was to go home, to the high walls of the Enclave where she had grown to adulthood. Where all was neat and orderly and predictable. Where she knew her place, and was respected for her skills.

Her sojourn here was only temporary, but she could see now that she would need to guard herself well against this wild and unpredictable land of Abreia, where mages ran free and five kings squabbled over their tiny little kingdoms and fought petty wars over territory. Strange people, these Abreians—strange and loud—and yet still oddly compelling. And utterly unaware of their own insignificance.

They would be crushed in a moment, should the Empress ever decide to reclaim these lands. They had no fortifications, no watchtowers, and few guards of any note. Should the Imperial Fleet sail into the harbor, the city would be reduced to rubble in less than an hour.

Not that the Empress would bother. She had bigger problems than these pitiful refugees, scratching out their lives on wild, uncivilized shores.

Unless, of course, Karreya failed…

But she would not fail. She had only just arrived, and there was still much to be done.

Find a safe place to sleep. Connect with other imperial citizens living or working in the city. Ask questions without arousing suspicion. And avoid stabbing anyone.

That last part was definitely going to be the hardest.

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