“I’m too late,” Teia said. “I can’t … It’s like he made this hoping I’d try to disrupt it. If I touch them, she’ll die. But if I don’t touch them, she’ll die anyway. It’s somehow starving her heart. Her heart is dying. But if she so much as coughs … Kip, what do I do?”
“Shhh, child,” the White said.
Kip started. He didn’t even know she was awake. Didn’t know she could wake. Two Blackguards had stayed, but others had fled to get help.
“Wake my room slave, Kip, and say nothing more for the moment. Adrasteia, get behind the curtain, please.”
Kip walked to the slave’s closet and knocked. No response. He opened the door, and saw the old woman, snoring in her chair. “Caleen,” he said. “Caleen!”
She snorted and opened her eyes, then followed him blearily. And slowly. Damn she was old. But by the time they got back, Teia had hidden.
The White said, “It’s my time, Bilhah. Summon High Luxiat Selene. Ask no one else to come in. I don’t wish my end to be all a clamor and panic.”
Bilhah shuffled out past the Blackguards, slowly.
When the door closed behind her, Teia came out from behind the curtain. She asked, “Why did I have to hide? I mean, why’d I have to hide from her?”
“So you wouldn’t have to kill her,” the White said. “She’s been reporting to Andross Guile for ten years now. She has a grandson she loves.”
“And Andross used it against her,” Kip said bitterly. He didn’t know why it was hard to believe his grandfather had hired an assassin—the old monster had done it before. But still. Kip had played games with Andross. Andross was even charming sometimes. And a murderer. Killing people like they were cards to be cleared from the play surface.
“Why didn’t you sell her?” Teia asked. “She betrayed you.”
“Hers was a sin of weakness, not one of malice. It tortures her, and I let it. That’s her punishment. And if one is to have a spy in one’s chambers, what better than one who is hard of hearing and a little slow? After I pass, you tell her I knew, and that I forgave her. But not until after I pass. I don’t want her weeping to be the last thing I hear.”
Not for the first time, Kip wondered at the White. Both uncommonly gracious and uncommonly hard.
“Wait, why would Andross knowing that Teia was here matter? She’s— Oh.”
If the Broken Eye found out Teia had tried to foil the murder of the White, they’d know she was betraying them. They might figure it out anyway.
The White said, “You have my permission to tell Kip everything, Teia. But I don’t release you from your mission.”
“Where’s everyone else?” Kip asked. “It’s not right we should be the only ones here.”
The White simply breathed for a few long moments, as if her previous speech had worn her out. “The Spectrum is meeting, appointing Zymun Prism-elect. All my friends? Off, away, obeying orders,” she said. “Dying is a task I can accomplish alone. Adrasteia, stop. That’s enough. If not this night, I’ll die tomorrow. They only snip a few days from my natural span, and I am not such a fool…” She got winded and couldn’t speak for a little bit. “Such a fool I cannot take certain advantages from knowing my own last day. Go now, go.”
They turned and went to the door, but she said, “Kip, not … not you.”
Teia pulled her hood closed and disappeared, and the White beckoned Kip closer. “Desk. Card. Take it. And one last puzzle for you, O blood of Guile: Not only Prisms fly.”
Kip went to her desk and found the Nine Kings card held between panes of glass. The White, much younger: Unbreakable. He tucked it in a pocket.
“Open the curtains,” the White said. “I would … look upon the light.”
Kip drew the curtains all the way open. It was gray out, not quite dawn. “Orholam shine upon you, High Lady,” he said.
She didn’t respond. The Blackguards, who’d overheard the last, came to stand at her side. Keeping one last watch. Tears were streaking down Gavin Greyling’s cheeks.
Kip stepped out into the hall. He couldn’t mourn now. He pushed it off. Had to think.
Almost dawn on Sun Day, and Zymun was going to be named Prism-elect? They’d do it at dawn, or even before, so he could perform the morning ceremonies. If Kip wanted to get out, he didn’t have much time.
The squad was waiting for him. “Let’s go!” Kip shouted. They were ready. They ran for the lifts. High Luxiat Selene, coming to give last rites in her many-colored robes of office, stepped to the side as they pounded past her. They piled into the lift and set the counterweights. Made it, thank Orholam.