Alien Chronicles 1 - The Golden One (30 page)

The Kaa appeared, tall and resplendent in a rill collar of solid gold and a coat of myriad colors that swirled and changed with his every movement. His bronze skin gleamed with supple health, and if the lamplight caught it just right it looked iridescent. Never had he looked more virile or magnificent.

A sigh of reverence passed through the crowd, and everyone bowed low.

The Kaa walked beneath the arch of swords, followed by Lady Zureal, Lady Myneith, Lady Abiya, and the other favorite wives. The trumpets sounded again, and the crowd surged forward to follow them into the banquet chamber, their chatter swelling up and drowning out the music that began to play.

Heralds and stewards scurried in all directions to guide banqueters to their correct places. Circular arrangements of reclining couches filled the room, with the most important circles being closest to the Kaa’s.

On a spacious dais at one end of the banquet chamber, the couches for the imperial party were arranged around a low, round table of costly wood. The Kaa’s couch was draped in crimson velvet bound at the corners with fat bullion tassels. Israi was positioned on the Kaa’s right; Lady Zureal took her place on his left. Lightly rubbing her jaw with a delicate motion, Lady Zureal allowed her attendants to arrange the folds of her gown, then sent a smile in Israi’s direction.

Israi nodded to her and sent a perfunctory smile back.

The other wives took their places with much giggling and rustling of their elaborate gowns. They were all swollen with eggs, slow-moving, and treated with extra solicitude by attendants, servers, and the Kaa himself.

Ampris stood at the foot of Israi’s couch, both proud at the privilege of being present at such an important occasion and deeply apprehensive of what was about to occur.

She let her gaze stray to Lady Zureal, wondering if the potion was working yet.

“Ampris,” Israi said.

At once Ampris hurried to take a small dish from the sri-Kaa’s hand.

“These spiced antas are particularly good,” Israi said, her eyes dancing. “See that Lady Zureal tries them.”

Ampris presented them to Lady Zureal with a bow. She couldn’t take her eyes off the lady’s jaw, where her delicate skin was beginning to mottle yellow and pale green.

“Antas?” the Kaa said with interest, taking a morsel off the dish Ampris held. He popped it into his mouth and gazed at Zureal with deep tenderness in his eyes. “Delicious. Try it, our dearest.”

Lady Zureal seemed distracted and uncomfortable, but she inclined her head to the Kaa and took an anta. More yellow splotches were breaking out across her forehead and below her ear dimples. Her wrists looked puffy and splotchy as well.

The Kaa stared at her. “Are you feeling unwell?”

Lady Zureal murmured something inaudible and rubbed at her wrist and then her face. The rubbing seemed to make the breakouts worse. “I don’t know,” she said, rubbing harder. “I feel very strange.”

Watching in horrified fascination, Ampris stepped back. She glanced at Israi, who flicked out her tongue in satisfaction.

The Kaa continued to stare at his favorite, who was now making soft little cries of distress and constantly rubbing her face and throat. “What is wrong?” he asked her.

“I don’t know!” she cried.

He gestured, and attendants hurried forward. “Assist Lady Zureal. She is ill.”

The courtiers had begun to notice. Several were staring, and someone pointed. “Look at her face!”

Lady Zureal gasped and put her palms against her jaws.

Israi buried her face against her cushions for a moment, then looked up. “How ugly!” she said in a loud voice. “What a dreadful rash. It quite destroys her beauty.”

Lady Zureal began to rock from side to side, making a rasping sound in the back of her throat.

Her attendants hurried to surround her, assisting her to her feet and leading her away.

Also standing, the Kaa summoned a steward. “Send for the physician, immediately.”

“At once, sire.” The steward vanished at a run.

The whole banquet chamber filled with buzzing speculation. Courtiers stopped eating and rose to their feet because the Kaa was standing. They stared as Lady Zureal was ushered out.

“Cover me,” she kept saying, her voice raw with shame. “Cover me.”

Murmuring soothing platitudes, her ladies veiled her face with scarves and vanished with her.

The Kaa stood there, puffing his air sacs in and out, until Chancellor Gaveid approached him.

“It would be best, sire, to resume the banquet as though nothing is wrong.”

The Kaa made an impatient gesture. “She is ill. Disease has struck her on the eve of Festival. Her eggs could be in jeopardy.”

“A small rash, sire,” Gaveid said soothingly. “Let us not overreact and cause unseemly gossip.”

The Kaa nodded reluctantly and glanced at Ampris, who froze in place. Her heart suddenly pounded, and she was certain he was going to accuse her then and there.

But his gaze shifted away, and he returned to his couch. The other wives plied him with questions and speculations, their chatter serving to distract him.

Israi kept on eating, keeping her gaze away from her father, but Ampris could see the grin that kept straying across her face. Beneath her gown, her tail switched from side to side.

Ampris wanted to nip her. She was going to give everything away if she didn’t master her composure. The rash had been everything the potion maker had promised. Those large yellow blotches were perfect. Lady Zureal had been publicly humiliated, but Ampris felt no satisfaction. Instead, she felt shame and worry, and she wished Israi would not gloat so much.

After several minutes word was brought to the Kaa that the lady was not seriously ill. The cause of the rash remained a mystery, but it accompanied no fever. Perhaps too much excitement had distressed the lady.

“The lady is resting now. Her physicians have given her a sedative. All is well.”

Israi glanced at Ampris and smiled in satisfaction, then turned to the Kaa and touched his sleeve.

“There, Father,” she said brightly. “All is well. You know how high-strung and delicate some of the southerners can be.”

He was still puffing his air sacs. “It would seem so.”

“Put it from your mind this evening. She is comfortable now. Tomorrow all will be well,” Israi said. “I want to ask you about the processional and what surprises have been planned.”

Her chatter went on, occupying the Kaa’s attention and distracting him from fretting over Lady Zureal. Several times during the long evening Ampris caught Chancellor Gaveid looking at Israi in approval.

Ampris had to admit that her friend was in perfect form tonight. Gone was the wild behavior and rudeness that Israi so often exhibited. Tonight she appeared poised, accomplished, articulate. Her comments were witty and displayed her educated mind well. She acted mature for her years, and only Ampris knew the truth.

Israi was happiest when playing a role, as she did tonight. When she had charmed and impressed everyone, including her preoccupied father, she finally took her leave at the proper time, heeding Lady Lenith’s discreet signal without any protests.

“It is the hour of my retirement,” she announced with a pretty little sigh, tilting her head to show the Kaa her regret before she rose from her couch with lithe grace. “Enjoy the remainder of the revels, Father.”

She leaned over and blew in his ear canal, and he patted her hand in return.

“Well done, Daughter,” he said with pride. “You have comported yourself well. We are most pleased with how much you have grown up.”

Israi glowed at his praise, and a blush colored her rill. She bowed low, then with shining eyes turned to the wives and wished them well on the morrow.

Then she hurried out, with Ampris faithfully at her heels. Many of the courtiers bowed to her in open admiration, and Israi’s eyes glittered with satisfaction.

Israi’s ladies in waiting had to trot to keep up with her. As soon as the tall doors to the banquet chamber closed, Israi tipped back her head and unleashed a peal of laughter.

“We did it, Ampris. It was perfect!” she crowed.

Mortified, Ampris longed to shush her.

Naturally Lady Lenith’s suspicions were immediately aroused. “I suspected the Imperial Daughter was too well-behaved tonight,” she said, eyeing them both. “What prank have you pulled now?”

Israi threw up her hands and spun around and around until her gown belled around her legs. Without answering Lady Lenith, she laughed again and then ran to her chambers, leaving her attendants far behind.

Slamming shut the door, Israi whirled around and gripped Ampris by both hands. “We did it!” she said. “Public humiliation and embarrassment for that silly, vain puff of nothing! Ha!”

Giving Ampris a swift hug, she pushed away and began to dance across her sitting room.

Lady Lenith entered with the attendants and saw Ampris pulling off her scratchy flower garland while Israi danced in glee.

“Undress me!” Israi commanded even as she eluded the attendants’ approach. “I am ready for bed. It has been a perfect day, and a splendid evening.”

The attendants looked at each other, and even Subi—standing in the doorway of the bathing chamber—shook her head.

“Too much wine,” someone said.

They surrounded Israi and eventually managed to undress, bathe, and bed her. When the lamps were turned down low, and Ampris lay curled on her cot at the foot of Israi’s round bed, she could still hear Israi humming and chuckling to herself. Ampris closed her eyes, trying to shut out the sound. She wished she could join in Israi’s happiness, but her feeling of guilt and shame wouldn’t go away. It was one thing to pick on Fazhmind, who was pompous, horrid, and deserving of what he got. But Lady Zureal hadn’t deserved this, and Ampris felt cruel. They had gone too far tonight, and she wished she knew how they could undo it.

CHAPTER
•SEVENTEEN

The doors crashed open with a loud bang, awakening Ampris.

She sat bolt upright, alarmed and blinking, trying to claw her way awake.

In the dim gray light of dawn that illuminated Israi’s bedchamber, a tall figure in long robes stood silhouetted in the doorway.

An instinctive growl rumbled in Ampris’s throat even as she recognized the Kaa. Horrified at herself, she clamped her hands over her muzzle and scrambled out of bed as he came striding forward.

He didn’t even appear to notice Ampris’s presence. His whole attention was focused on Israi, who sat up and yawned.

“Father?” she said drowsily.

The Kaa’s eyes blazed at her, and his rill stood at full extension without the support of a collar. It glowed a dull crimson, and Ampris’s heart sank.

He had found out.

“Israi, get up,” he said. Every word was terse and cold.

His tone got through to Israi. Yawning and rubbing her head, she obeyed him and stood there in her sleeping robe, disheveled and half-awake.

“What did you give her?” he demanded.

Israi blinked at him and finally focused. She opened her mouth, and for a moment Ampris thought she was going to be evasive or at least pretend not to know what he was talking about.

But he was too angry. Towering above his daughter, he stood there with his air sacs inflated, his rill at full extension, and his tail switching from side to side beneath his robe. Pouches of exhaustion bagged beneath his eyes, which never left Israi’s face.

Meeting that furious gaze, Israi slowly drew herself upright and squared her shoulders.

“I gave her perfume,” she replied.

He snarled an oath that made Israi’s rill go pale. “What was
in
the perfume? Encetylide,” he said, answering his own question before Israi could. “An odorless compound that reacts chemically with the skin, causing swelling, discoloration, and severe itching.”

Israi dared smile. “Yes, like itching powder, except it blotches the skin.”

“How much did you pay the perfumer for this illegal transaction?”

“Twenty imperials,” she said.

Ampris couldn’t believe how unconcerned, how confident she was. Israi stood there, impervious to the Kaa’s anger.

“Rather a stiff price to pay for a prank,” he said.

She shrugged. “Perhaps. It took all my allowance to persuade him.”

“You didn’t pay him enough,” the Kaa said in a voice so low it was almost a growl.

“Why do you say that?”

“Because we ordered his neck broken this morning when he confessed. And twenty imperials is a very small inheritance for his wife and family to console themselves with.”

Ampris’s jaw dropped open, and she felt cold inside with shock.

Israi stared at her father, her rill flat on her shoulders. Finally she said, “You
killed
him? For a silly prank? I don’t believe it.”

“Believe it!” he roared, his voice rising suddenly in volume. “You caused Zureal distress—”

“Her own vanity caused the distress,” Israi said dismissively. “All the court does is talk about how beautiful she is, and she believes every word. Take away her beauty for a few hours, and she is reduced to a crying, pathetic heap. She is nothing but a vain and silly creature.”

The Kaa’s hand shot out and gripped Israi by the shoulder. He shook her, hard.

“Father!” Israi said in alarm, gasping in pain. “You’re hurting me.”

“Are we?” he said through his teeth. “And what of Zureal’s hurt, our daughter?”

“She’ll get over it as soon as the blotches go away—”

“Will she? Will she get over the loss of her eggs in the night?”

Israi stared at him, looking stunned. “What?”

He released her, giving her a little shove against the bed as he turned away. Back and forth he paced, his tongue flicking rapidly, his rill redder than ever, his eyes raw with rage and grief. “Yes, Israi, yes!” he said. “She miscarried.”

Israi stood in silence, several expressions chasing themselves across her face. “Oh, Father,” she said quietly at last.

“Do you know how dangerous it is to miscarry this late in term? The physicians worked for hours, trying to save them . . . and her.”

Israi’s eyes dilated, but it was Ampris who asked in a shaky voice, “Is she dead?”