Page 58 of A Dance of Shadows

“I wouldn’t mention your plans to Linus,” he told me when he confirmed the arrangements two days ago, the last time I saw him. “He isn’t fond of your more charitable activities.”

I suppose he didn’t convey the exact nature of my break to his twin either. Linus made a few jabs about me shirking my imperial duties when we were together yesterday, but they were of a vague sort rather than pointed.

He also dragged me off to my bedroom shortly after dinner as if he thought he should fuck the reminder of how much he controls my life into my head.

My thumb grazes the side of my sapphire ring at the memory. Thank the gods I brewed plenty of the hallucinogenic sedative that spares me the worst of his attentions before we left Vivencia.

After I’ve eaten, I walk to the front of our imperial palace to find the two additional guards and a very imperial carriage waiting for me. I bite back a wince at the ornate carvings withtheir gilding of gold and turn to Kassun, the only one of my guards I’ve really conversed with.

“For this trek, I believe it’s safest to take a vehicle that’s much more subdued. I’d rather not announce who’s traveling in it before we’ve arrived at the temple.”

Kassun’s mouth twitches with a trace of a grimace, as if he’s chagrinned he didn’t think of that problem sooner. He calls over a couple of the footmen. Within a matter of minutes, a plain but still elegant carriage of dove-gray has been brought around.

I clamber in, resting the cloth purse that holds my assortment of potions and ointments on the bench beside me, and we set off through the city.

The most impoverished area of Delphine lies along the south end of the river, after its waters have already flowed through the rest of the capital. Bastien told me that the royal family has implemented various strategies they’ve learned for clearing refuse from the water along its journey, but nothing has kept it trulycleanby the time it reaches that point.

It’s safe enough to ensure the citizens there have something to wash with and to boil for drinking if their pipes fail. They plant scruffy gardens along the banks to supplement what food they can afford and what charity the royals and the temple can offer with their thinly stretched treasuries.

But even in a city dedicated to innovation, there are people stuck in the struggle for bare necessities.

The Temple of Placid Balms looms tall and broad amid the ramshackle wooden houses and dingy shops that line the nearby streets. Its stucco walls were clearly once white-washed but have been allowed to fade to a mottled grayish tan. Its pale presence shines over the neighborhood, but with a less imposing glow than the stark glare it must have shone with when it was first built.

The disciples of Elox know how to match the energy of their surroundings. The soft sheen of sunlight catching off the walls still emanates a sense of peace.

Marc sent word ahead for the cleric to expect me. When the carriage draws to a halt outside the short flight of front steps, an aged but robust woman in the standard white robes hustles out to meet me with a few of her devouts trailing behind her.

I step out into a breeze that carries a sour tang of tainted river water and rotting food scraps. Feeling the cleric’s evaluating gaze on me, I suppress the reflexive wrinkling of my nose.

Like every cleric I’ve met, she’s learned the Darium tongue—the better to work with her country’s conquerors, I suppose. Her voice is clear and only softly accented. “Your Imperial Highness, it’s an honor to have you visit our humble temple. I understand you wish to offer aid to our neighbors. Shall we bring those in need to you inside the temple?”

I shake my head. “I’d like all the citizens to see that the empire will care for the people of Cotea. My guards will enforce a safe boundary, and I’d imagine your devouts can guide those who could most benefit from my help to me?”

The last thing I want is a repeat of my spontaneous sharing of my gift in the Darium city of Rexoran, where Marclinus ended up killing a man who grabbed me in his frustration. This time I’m more prepared.

The cleric bobs her head again. “We do what we can for the worst illnesses that affect the locals, but our gifts have their limits. I believe yours is best suited for relatively simple maladies? Those may not be life-threatening, but they can cause a lot of misery. Anyone you can cure would be most grateful, as would we.”

I smile at her. “That would be the perfect use of my gift. I’ve brought several doses of a few different curatives that should cover quite a few milder ailments.”

There are plenty of more serious illnesses I could treat—but not with the sorts of concoctions I could brew ahead of time unknowing. And there are plenty that would only present to me that yawning blackness of impossibility, where there’s nothing I could offer except comfort through the pain.

Perhaps in the future when I decide how I spend more of my days, I’ll set aside many to consult with those most in need and contribute my gift to its full extent. For now, this will have to do.

At least I shouldn’t leave anyone disappointed.

The cleric ushers me up to the top step outside the temple entrance. As my four guards assemble themselves on either side of me and a couple of stairs below like a shield, the devouts spread out through the street around the temple.

A few dozen civilians have already ventured over to see what’s happening at the temple. At the devouts’ murmurs, they keep a few paces back from the bottom of the steps. More drift out of nearby buildings to join the growing crowd.

They gaze up at me with a hunger in their eyes that I don’t think is only for food. These are the people who’ve suffered the worst from the demands Dariu has made on their country.

Some probably wish for vengeance, but others may be searching for reason to hope. For a chance to believe that their latest tyrants may not be quite so tyrannical.

Gods willing, I can give them that much.

I can’t help noticing the shabbiness of much of their clothing, stained and mended with darning and patches that don’t quite match. The eager face of the courtier who promised extra fabrics for Dariu’s use comes back to me.

He’d rather claim the coin and prestige of dealing with the imperial court than see that the people of his own city are properly clothed. Not even the conquered kingdoms are free from that sort of greed.

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