Vanya let himself be led through the cool hallways of the estate to his mother’s private office that overlooked the rear garden. Spring meant the flowering bushes were in bloom, while the cluster of white-barked trees native to the plains provided enough shade to cool the area when the sun was high overhead.
Vanya sank onto a chaise, the soft cushions taking his weight easily, and let out a tired sigh. He closed his eyes, listening to the bustle of people around him in the room and the firm orders his mother gave out, one after the other. Then her hand settled on top of his head, and he was reminded of the way she’d touched him as a child like this, always guiding as he stood beside her when she faced down heartbreak.
“I thought I had lost you,” Zakariya murmured.
“I pride myself on being difficult to kill,” Vanya said, finally opening his eyes.
His father had taken a seat across the way from him, watching them. Servants darted in and out of the office to set up a luncheon on the low table between them. Platters of meats and cheeses, bean dip, herbed rice, and the thin flatbread his people ate with everything. It was enough to feed a squad of legionnaires, and really, Vanya could’ve eaten the whole thing.
Zakariya pulled her hand away. “The magician comes. Let him see to you.”
The servants left. Vanya discarded his dirty robe and succumbed to the exam provided by their House’s private magician who excelled in healing magic. The touch of the aether on his body as he ate his weight in food didn’t leave him nauseous, though he winced when somethingpoppedin his chest, ribs realigning themselves.
“A crack, but not a break,” Basri murmured as his wand traced the grooves of Vanya’s rib cage, aether-drawn magic spilling out of the clarion crystal. “If this is all you came away with from that crash, you were very lucky indeed, Your Imperial Highness.”
“I was poisoned.”
“With what?”
“Quiet killer.”
The sound of a glass shattering had Vanya looking over at where his mother sat, wine dripping from her fingers like blood onto the tiled floor. She slowly flicked shards of glass off her finger, staring at him with equal parts horror and rage.
“I would know who was on that train,” she said through clenched teeth.
“We’ll pull the records and excise the bloodlines from our employ,” Taye said calmly.
“Soren had the antidote. He administered it to me in time. Breathe easy, my Lady Mother. I yet live,” Vanya said.
Zakariya accepted the napkin Taye handed her and cleaned off her hand. “We’ll finish this conversation in private.”
Basri lingered only long enough to finish his healing, prescribe some medicine from his apothecary that Vanya would take with his next meal, and then took his leave.
“Quiet killer,” Zakariya said flatly once they were alone.
Vanya nodded, settling deeper onto the chaise, enjoying the absence of the ache in his bones. “In my chai.”
“Tell us.”
Vanya did, leaving nothing out. He was meticulous in his recollection, and Soren loomed large over the past few days of memories.
Zakariya studied him across the food and cold wine between them, expression impossible to read. “Wardens are outside our laws. This debt you owe can be forgotten.”
“Iwill remember, and I will not owe him,” Vanya said sharply. “He deserves more than my thanks. I would be dead without Soren’s help.”
And he knew that Soren should not have technically interfered at all, but the warden hadn’t known at the time it was Vanya in that train carriage. The revenants had been enough to draw his attention and keep him there, giving aid and unknowingly indebting Vanya to him.
“Your life is priceless to me. If it was a House who had aided you, it would cripple ours.”
“Then we are lucky it was only a House that tried to murder me.”
Zakariya sighed before reaching for a glass of the cold red wine. “The marriage contract was void upon your death. We will need to inform the barristers they must revive it.”
“We cannot be certain the House of Kimathi had no hand in this travesty,” Taye warned.
“The train and all evidence was burned with starfire. A pity, that, but I would have made the same decision if quiet killer was on my tongue.” His mother’s gaze cut his way. “But an heir must be secured, and this will allow us some measure of control over that gods-forsaken House.”
Vanya inclined his head at his parents. “I will abide by your will.”
