The big day the Komizar promised me began with a fitting for a wedding dress. I stood on a block of wood in a long, barren gallery not far from his quarters. A fire roared in the fireplace at the end of the room, chasing some of the chill away. Every day had grown colder, and a puddle of water on my window ledge from last night’s rain had turned to ice.
I watched the flames lick the air, hypnotized. I had almost told Kaden last night. I came close, but when he said it was a game I wouldn’t win, I feared he was right. All it took was one misstep.
A confession was on the tip of my tongue but then the smug exchange between Kaden and the Komizar at the end of the evening had flashed through my mind. There’s a strong bond between them. They have a long history together.
I could almost admire the Komizar for his brilliance.
Who better to have as his Assassin than Kaden, so intensely loyal, so loyal he would never challenge the Komizar? So loyal he would set aside a knife even in a fit of rage. Kaden was forever in his debt, an Assassin who couldn’t forget the betrayal of his own father and who would never repeat his treachery even if it cost him his own life.
“Turn,” Effiera instructed. “There, that’s enough.”
The army of dressmakers were a welcome distraction. Though a special dress was not customary in Vendan weddings, the Komizar had ordered one, and he wished to supervise the fitting as it progressed. He would issue his approval before final work was begun. It was to be a dress of many hands to honor the Meurasi clan, but he had specified the color was to be red, which Effiera and the other dressmakers had clucked about all morning, trying to find just the right mix of fabrics, and seeming satisfied with none. They pieced together scraps of velvets, brocades, and dyed buckskin.
They pushed and prodded with their pieces, and a dress finally took form on me as they pinned and unpinned, a labored nervousness to their work. They were used to crafting dresses from their tents in the jehendra and not under the supervision of the Komizar.
Every time he said “Hmm” and shook his head, one of the dressmakers would drop her pins. But his comments weren’t harsh or angry—he actually seemed preoccupied with something else. It was a side to him I hadn’t seen. We were all grateful when Ulrix called him away to attend to a matter, but he promised to return soon. They worked quickly while he was gone to finish the long snug sleeves—this time I at least had two—but my shoulder was still carefully left bare to show off the kavah.
“What do you know of the claw and vine?” I asked.
The women all fell silent. “Only what our mothers told us,” Effiera finally said quietly. “We were told to watch for it, that it was the promise of a new day for Venda—the claw, quick and fierce; the vine, slow and steady; both equally strong.”
“What about the Song of Venda?”
“Which one?” Ursula asked.
They said there were hundreds of songs of Venda, just as Kaden had told me. The written songs were all long destroyed, but that didn’t keep her words from living on in memory and story, though there were few now who remembered them. At least they knew of the claw and vine, and the clans I’d met on the fens and uplands knew of the name Jezelia too. An anticipation ran through them. Pieces of Venda’s songs were alive, in the air, and rooted in some deep part of their understanding. They knew.
All the written songs destroyed. Except for the one I possessed. And someone had tried to destroy that one too.
The door opened, and they all startled, expecting to see the Komizar, but it was Calantha.
“The Komizar’s been delayed. It may be a while. He wishes the dressmakers to wait in the next chamber until he’s ready for them again.” The women wasted no time in following the instructions and scurried off with armfuls of fabric into the next room.
“What about me?” I asked. “Am I supposed to wait, stuck in a dress full of pins until he decides to come back?”
“Yes.”
I grumbled a seething breath.
Calantha smiled. “So much hostility. Isn’t an uncomfortable wait worth it for your beloved?”
I looked at her, tired of her sarcasm, and formed a biting reply, but it suddenly stalled on my lips as I stared at her. She was always trying to hate me. My own words circled back to me. I think you’re dabbling with a bit of power. A power she was afraid to exert. She was like a wildcat circling a hole, trying to find a way to get the bait without falling into the trap.
She turned to go abruptly, as if she knew I had glimpsed her secret.
“Wait,” I said, jumping down from the block. I grabbed her wrist, and she stared at my hand as if my touch burned her. I realized that, other than a stiff poke to my back, I had never seen her touch anyone.
“Why did you help the Komizar kill your own father?” I asked.
As pale as Calantha already was, she blanched. “That’s not for you to ask.”
“I want to understand, and I know you want to tell me.”
She yanked her wrist loose. “It’s an ugly story, Princess. Too ugly for your delicate ears.”
“Is it because you love him?”
“The Komizar?” A small laugh escaped her lips. She shook her head, and I could almost see something large and numbing jar loose inside her.
“Please,” I said. “I know you’ve both helped and hindered me. You’re battling something. I won’t betray you, Calantha. I promise.”
The air was taut. I held my breath, afraid the slightest move would push her away from me again.
“Yes, I love him,” she admitted, “but not in the way you’re thinking.” She walked across the room and stared out the window for a long time, then finally turned and told me. Her voice was detached, vacant, as if she spoke of someone else. She was the child of Carmedes, a member of the Rahtan. Her mother had been a cook in the Sanctum who died when she was small. When she was twelve, Carmedes seized power and became the 698th Komizar of Venda. He was a suspicious man with a heavy hand and short temper, but she managed to mostly avoid him. “I was fifteen when I fell in love with a boy from the Meurasi clan. He told me clan stories of other times and other places that made me forget my own miserable life. We were careful to keep our relationship a secret and managed that feat for almost a year.” Her chest rose in several slow breaths before she went on. “But one day, my father caught us in the servants’ stable together. He had no reason to be angered. He cared little about me, but he flew into a rage.”
She sat on one of the dressmaking stools and told me that back then our current Komizar was the Assassin. He was a young man of eighteen, and he had found them both bleeding into the straw. The boy was dead, and she was half dead. The Assassin scooped her up and called for a healer. “The bruises faded, the bones mended, the torn patches of hair grew back, but some things were gone for good. The boy and—”
“Your eye.”
“My father came to see me once during the weeks that I lay bedridden. He looked down at me and said if I ever did anything like that again, he would take out my other eye and my teeth as well. He wanted no more bastards running through the Sanctum. When I could walk again, I went to the Assassin, opened his palm, placed the key to my father’s private meeting chamber in it, and pledged my loyalty. Forever. The next morning my father was dead.”
She stood, pulling back her shoulders, looking drained.
“So if you see me both prod and thwart, Princess, it’s because some days I see the man the Komizar has become, and some days I remember the man he was.”
She turned and walked toward the door, but I called after her just as she opened it.
“Forever is a long time,” I said. “When will you remember who you are, Calantha?”
She paused briefly without responding, then closed the door behind her.
* * *
I had been waiting so long I hardly noticed the door easing open. It was the Komizar. His gaze landed on the dress first, then rose to my face. He closed the door and took another long look.
“It’s about time,” I said.
He ignored my remark, taking his time as he approached. His eyes skimmed over me, touching me in ways that made my cheeks grow hot.
“I think I chose well,” he said. “The red suits you.”
I tried my best to make light of it. “Why, Komizar, are you actually trying to be kind?”
“I can be kind, Lia, if you’ll let me be.” He took a step closer, his eyes molten.
“Shall I call the dressmakers back in?” I asked.
“Not yet,” he said, strolling closer.
“It’s not easy to move in a dress held together with pins.”
“I don’t want you to move.” He stopped in front of me and ran a gentle finger down my sleeve. His chest rose in a deep controlled breath. “You’ve come a long way since the burlap dress you wore on your arrival.”
“That wasn’t a dress. It was a sack.”
He smiled. “So it was.” He reached up and pulled a pin from the dress. The fabric at the shoulder fell loose. “Is that better?”
I bristled. “Save your charming seductions for our wedding night.”
“I was being charming? Shall I take out another pin?”
I took a step back, which I was loath to do, for fear it would encourage him. I tried to change the subject and noticed he had changed into riding clothes. “Isn’t there something you should be doing right now? Somewhere you need to be?”
“No.”
He stepped forward, reaching for another pin, but I hit his hand away. “Are you trying to seduce me or force yourself on me? Since we’ve agreed to be honest with each other, I’d like to know up front so I can decide how to proceed.”
He grabbed my arms, and I winced at the prick of pins in my flesh. He pulled me close and pressed his lips to my ear. “Why do you shower the Assassin with your affections and not your betrothed?”
“Because Kaden has not demanded my affections. He has earned them.”
“Have I not been kind to you, Jezelia?”
“You were kind once,” I whispered against his cheek. “I know you were. And you had a name. Reginaus.”
He pulled away as if I’d thrown cold water on him.
“A real name,” I continued, feeling a rare advantage. “A name given to you by your mother.”
He stepped toward the hearth, his ardor vanished. “I have no mother,” he snapped.
It was evident I had opened one of the few veins of warm blood in his body.
“It would be easy enough for me to believe that was true,” I said. “It seems more likely that you were spawned by a demon and an available knothole. Except that I spoke to the woman who held you as your mother grunted you onto this earth. She said your mother named you with her last breath.”
“There’s nothing special about that, Princess. I’m not the first Vendan whose mother died in childbirth.”
“But it’s a name. Something she gave to you. Why do you refuse to be called by the last word that left your mother’s lips?”
“Because it was a name that meant nothing!” he lashed out. “It gave me nothing! I was only another filthy brat on the streets. I was nothing until I became the Assassin. That name meant something. There was only one name better. Komizar. Why settle for Reginaus, as common as dirt and just as useful, when there’s a name that only one can bear?”
“Is that why you killed the last Komizar? Only for a name? Or to avenge Calantha’s cruel beating?”
His fury waned, and he peered at me cautiously. “She told you?”
“Yes.”
He shook his head. “That’s not like Calantha. She never speaks of that day.” He threw another log onto the fire and stared into the flames. “I was only eighteen. Too young to become the next Komizar. I hadn’t built enough alliances yet. But I hungered for it. Every day. I imagined. Komizar.” He turned and sat down on the raised hearth. “And then Calantha happened. Most of the Council was quite fond of her. She was a pretty little flower then, but they didn’t dare go near her for fear of the Komizar. She was ruined by the beating, scarred inside and out, but many of the Council favored me after that for saving her life. When Calantha pledged her loyalty to me, many of the Council did too. The ones who didn’t I eliminated. I had learned then that alliances are not just offered, they have to be carefully devised.” He stood and walked closer to me. “To answer your question, one purpose simply served another. Avenging her beating also brought me a name that I desired.”
He gave the dress a cold perusal. “Tell the dressmakers that one will do,” he said, offering his final approval. “And, Princess, just so you know, if you bring up the name Reginaus again, I’ll have to pay a visit to the midwife with the loose tongue. Do you understand?”
I dipped my head in a single nod. “I know of no one by that name.”
He smiled and left.
And I spoke the truth. It was clear that the boy named Reginaus was long dead.