The Blinding Knife(95)
“Does it have to do with Zymun?” she asked.
“Zymun? Oh, you fear that I’m trying to pair you off with him?”
“He’s certainly doing his best, my lord.”
“Yes, I’m not surprised. Zymun never underestimates himself. No, I put you with Zymun because you’re of an age and I thought you’d appreciate that. And it keeps both of you busy. If you prefer another tutor…?”
“No, my lord. I’ve rather grown… used to him, I should say.” So long as she didn’t insult Zymun’s own intelligence, which he couldn’t bear, he was an unending fount of praise for her abilities, for how quickly she mastered abstruse concepts and remembered obscure history. He made her feel good about herself. Special. And his ceaseless attempts at seduction made her feel grown-up, womanly, desirable. “Only… he doesn’t speak about his past much.”
“The only important thing for you to know about Zymun’s past is that he tried to assassinate the Prism,” the Color Prince said.
“He really did? He said something, but I thought he was—”
“I gambled. Sent Zymun on a mission that had a low chance for success. He thinks he failed, which is good. It helps me keep him in line. Truth is, he only half failed. History may give him credit for midwifing…” His voice trailed off. He looked up at the sky.
“A new era?” Liv suggested. “Midwifing a new era?” She followed his gaze as the moon emerged, illuminating the nighttime clouds. They were spread across the sky in perfect lines, horizon to horizon, perfectly spaced, perfectly parallel. The vision—for such a thing couldn’t be real, could it?—lasted for perhaps twenty seconds, then the clouds broke under the onslaught of the winds, smeared, scattered.
The Color Prince broke the silence. “New gods, Aliviana. New gods.”
Chapter 47
“Secrets?” Kip asked. “What secrets?”
“I don’t know. Yet,” Janus Borig said. “That’s why I brought you here today. I wanted to know if you were one of them.” She sucked at her teeth. “You’re not.”
“So is that good news or bad news?” Kip asked.
“It is very, very bad news.”
“I still don’t understand,” Kip said.
“Understatement.”
“Huh?”
“Come here.”
Kip came to her side. She showed him her sketches. The first was of a cloaked, hooded figure, lit from behind, long hair falling in front of his eyes in a dark curtain, eyes dimly gleaming from behind the mass, a beard with gleaming beads woven in, a dagger drawn. An assassin? Another showed a bald, ebony-skinned man, bleeding from a cut under one eye, wearing an eye patch, spinning short swords in both hands. Another showed—
“Wait, that’s Commander Ironfist,” Kip said.
“Ah, so it is. Thank you,” she said. “What happened to his hair?”
“He’s in mourning for his lost Blackguards.”
“Ah yes, of course.”
“Why are you asking me? Why does he only have one eye?”
“Does he not only have one now? Hmm. It’s not always literal.” Her head tilted to the side. She scrawled an old Parian word on the paper below Ironfist.
“Guardian?” Kip asked.
“Sentry. Watchman. Guardian. Vigil Keeper. Strong Tower. Quiet.”
“Quiet?” Kip asked. “How’s that fit?”
“Not him. You. Be quiet.”
“Oh, oh, sorry.”
She drew a scrawl around his neck. A necklace. But her hand paused when it got to what was hanging from the chain. She sucked at her pipe, bringing the dormant coals back to life. Then she sighed. “Lost it.”
“I’m still back at what you’re doing with Commander Ironfist,” Kip said. There was some corner of dread turning over in his soul. She turned her eyes on him, and his heart flipped over and convulsed, tried to crawl off the squeaky clean floor to the stairs, its palpitations making it hop like a deranged bunny, the worst escape attempt in history.
“Do you think being Prism is too small for you, boy?”
“You keep saying these things that make no sense to me,” Kip said.
“Because I keep trying to draw you as the next Prism, and I can’t. You won’t be the Prism, Kip.”
“I don’t aspire to that,” Kip said. A chill. Like being collared by history.
“Do you aspire to more?”
“There is no more, is there?” Kip asked. What could be bigger than being the Prism?
“Is there a name that the others call you?”
“You mean besides Kip? Sure: Fatty. Lard Guile. Bastard. Pokey.”