I shook my head slowly. “And my father?”
“As far as I could tell, he was still sick when she left.”
But my father had survived the Walking Death. Surviving was not unheard of, but it was rare, especially among those who had reached third stage.
Perhaps Dekarta had changed his mind? If he had ordered it, the palace physicians would have ridden out after the carriage, caught up to it and brought it back. Dekarta could have even ordered the Enefadeh to—
Wait.
Wait.
“So that’s why she came,” Viraine said. He turned from the window to face me, sober. “For him. There’s no grand conspiracy to it, and no mystery—any servant who’d been here long enough could’ve told you this. So why were you so anxious to know that you’d ask me?”
“Because I thought you’d tell me more than a servant,” I replied. I struggled to keep my voice even, so that he would not know my suspicions. “If sufficiently motivated.”
“Is that why you goaded me?” He shook his head and sighed. “Well. It’s good to see you’ve inherited some Arameri qualities.”
“They seem to be useful here.”
He offered a sardonic incline of the head. “Anything else?”
I was dying to know more, but not from him. Still, it would not do to appear hasty.
“Do you agree with Dekarta?” I asked, just to make conversation. “That my mother would have been more harsh in dealing with that heretic?”
“Oh, yes.” I blinked in surprise, and he smiled. “Kinneth was like Dekarta, one of the few Arameri who actually took our role as Itempas’s chosen seriously. She was death on unbelievers. Death on anyone, really, who threatened the peace—or her power.” He shook his head, his smile nostalgic now. “You think Scimina’s bad? Scimina has no vision. Your mother was purpose incarnate.”
He was enjoying himself again, reading the discomfort on my face like a sigil. Perhaps I was still young enough to see her through the worshipful eyes of childhood, but the ways I’d heard my mother described since coming to Sky simply did not fit my memories. I remembered a gentle, warm woman, full of wry humor. She could be ruthless, oh yes—as befitted the wife of any ruler, especially under the circumstances in Darr at the time. But to hear her compared favorably against Scimina and praised by Dekarta… that was not the same woman who had raised me. That was another woman, with my mother’s name and background but an entirely different soul.
Viraine specialized in magics that could affect the soul. Did you do something to my mother? I wanted to ask. But that would have been far, far too simple an explanation.
“You’re wasting your time, you know,” Viraine said. He spoke softly, and his smile had faded during my long silence. “Your mother is dead. You’re still alive. You should spend more time trying to stay that way, and less time trying to join her.”
Was that what I was doing?
“Good day, Scrivener Viraine,” I said, and left.
I got lost then, figuratively and literally.
Sky is not generally an easy place in which to get lost. The corridors all look the same, true. The lifts get confused sometimes, carrying riders where they want to be rather than where they intend to go. (I’m told this was especially a problem for lovesick couriers.) Still, the halls are normally thick with servants who are happy to aid anyone wearing a highblood mark.
I did not ask for help. I knew this was foolish, but some part of me did not want direction. Viraine’s words had cut deep, and as I walked through the corridors I worried at the wounds with my thoughts.
It was true that I had neglected the inheritance contest in favor of learning more about my mother. Learning the truth would not bring the dead back to life, but it could certainly get me killed. Perhaps Viraine was right, and my behavior reflected some suicidal tendency. It had been less than a turn of the seasons since my mother’s death. In Darr I would have had time and family to help me mourn properly, but my grandfather’s invitation had cut that short. Here in Sky I hid my grief—but that did not mean I felt it any less.
In this frame of mind I stopped and found myself at the palace library.
T’vril had shown me this on my first day in Sky. Under ordinary circumstances I would have been awed; the library occupied a space larger than the temple of Sar-enna-nem, back in my land. Sky’s library contained more books, scrolls, tablets, and spheres than I had seen in my entire life. But I had been in need of a more peculiar kind of knowledge since my arrival in Sky, and the accumulated lore of the Hundred Thousand Kingdoms could not help me with that.