The back of Xanir’s note had held an alphabet made up of patterns of rectangles scrawled in charcoal, the carpet-code alphabet. She had memorised it before burning the paper with the lens of the glass under the sun on the window-ledge, carefully brushing every speck of ash out into the light breeze that nearly always encircled the top of the tower and scrubbing the stone with the sand the winds frequently carried in.
Yes, it was stark, uncomfortable and horribly lonely here in her tower, spending the endless days watching, reading lips and groupings, compressing as much information as possible into as few letters as possible. But a fierce pride kept her spirit alight; delighted, even. Alanna flicked one of the beads with a fingertip. She was still Xanir’s agent in the palace, watching his back. This eagle-eye view from this highest point in the city enabled her to see so much more of what was happening, pick out patterns that had been invisible in her rooms.
She just needed to get him word of what she had learned, and she wasn’t trusting this to any intermediary.
Her heart leaped as the merchant finished setting out his display and she strung the memorised letters together in her head: Xanir had reached Jaifa with his warships, Sianese fleet in pursuit, and set up a blockade to keep them out.
So Limaq had reached him in time? Zander must have intercepted Beguine and his mercenary sappers, or the city would most likely have already fallen. Damn the limitations of this form of communication. Limaq must have escaped the rope; that fire the following morning had had something to do with it, as she had suspected — the corpse had supposedly still been recognisable due to the pattern of scars, but his pretty face had been melted, so her malevolent maid had informed her.
Damn only getting snippets of information.
Distant, heavy footfalls tramping up the stone steps to the turret room drew Alanna’s head around. She blinked at the loss of the blinding light from outside, assessing. In the going on three months that she had been locked in here, her only visitors had been a taciturn guard every evening, accompanied by the slatternly maid with a tray of provisions who also did minimal cleaning, swopped out Alanna’s covered bucket for a clean one, and trying to provoke the prisoner with snide taunts. Who was coming at dawn? Sounded like more than two, also. Her stomach roiled.
But whoever it was still had sixty-seven steps left to go.
Shrugging, Alanna slid the spyglass closed, dropped it and her beautiful bracelet into the bag she took from around her neck, then wedged her way with practised ease up the tight stone V and reached up outside to slide her belongings carefully into the guttering below the eaves, queasily aware of the bright sunlight shining on her bare arm. Dropping with lithe grace back onto the tiny sill, she wafted her bare arm in the outside air some more, as she did upon occasion, both to cool down and to desensitize any watchers to her behaviour. This time, however, after circling her arm lazily for a few cycles, she moved it in the precise track of the ‘Alert’ signal for her father’s agent, then withdrew and dropped down onto the bare boards of her cell.
Her father would never leave her with only Xanir’s agent watching.
The footsteps were close now. Alanna backed into the rough wall by the window, her eyes on the sole door, heart thundering with hope and fear. Xanir had reached Jaifa with the fleet. Maybe someone was coming with good news? Maybe? Shivering, she hugged her midriff tightly.
Keys jingled and the clank of the lock heralded her jailor’s grim face, lips folded thin.
The maid panting beside him had the usual sneer on her face. The girl’s insolent eyes drifted down to Alanna’s crossed arms and she sniffed, “Protecting your bastard?”
Barely noticing the warning scowl the guard cast at the maid, Alanna gazed longingly at the clean, green swathe of material the girl was shaking out, one of the coverings the desert riders used. It must be for her: clean clothing, a sign that she was going to get out of this place.
Then: What? Alanna swayed, heart stopping, her eyes flying between the maid’s sneer to the male’s expressionless face. What?
Mind blank, she stared as a second maid with a downcast expression edged her way around the guard and through the doorway, stooping to plunk a chipped ceramic bowl holding a jug and sponge on the bare boards. “Wash,” she instructed quietly, straightening without looking at the prisoner.
Alanna’s mouth opened, and closed again silently, like a goldfish. She was pregnant? Her mind was reeling in shock. But she didn’t feel any different. Well, now she did. She was trembling violently.
“What?” she croaked.
“Wash,” repeated the guard, and turned his back. “Quickly.”
“Why?” demanded Alanna.
The first maid snorted and stepped forwards, grabbing the loose white shift that was all they gave her to wear, trying to yank it off over Alanna’s head.
Anger pierced the numb shock, and Alanna moved. The maid shot backwards with a wail, cradling her wrist and whined to the guard, “She hurt me.” Then, vindictively, “You take her shift off. We have very little time to get her ready.”
The guard snorted, not moving, not looking. He never had, whenever they had brought her a fresh smock, every week. Alanna’s eyes flashed at the maid, who stumbled even further backwards while the princess hauled the shift over her head and flung the sweaty, dusty fabric into the sullen face.
The second maid was shaking out a fresh shift, the simplicity of the lines the same, but in a plain green, and longer. Wondering, worried, still unable to focus beyond the bombshell the first maid had just dropped: was it true? How did they know? Alanna squatted to soak the sponge with the water in the bowl. With a little sigh of happiness, she wiped the water over her grimy skin, shivering in the coolness. Her mind was flickering between questions and blankness, she couldn’t seem to hold any thoughts together, plan. She was panicking, she realised.
She was pregnant. Now she knew why her stomach kept churning.
Her glazed eyes were unfocussed on the wall while swiftly, mechanically, she wiped the sweat and dust off her skin. Her throat was tightening: it was too dangerous to speak her thoughts — even, no, especially with this development. She flushed, fingers spreading across her belly. Xanir’s child.
She could stay with Xanir. Her flush deepened, colour rioting over her skin.
The first maid interrupted her thoughts, dropping a rough towel onto the floor by her feet. Alanna didn’t even look, flicking the dripping sponge into the stupid girl’s face before hooking up the towel with her toes and beginning to dry herself. Her mind was spreading out of control, flooding her with thoughts and emotions with the speed of the tidal race, then slamming to an abrupt halt, quivering in shock.
Did Xanir know?
Shuddering under the emotions eddying through her, Alanna pulled on the shift, then waited, staring silently at the doorway beyond the black, cold eyes of the guard while the angry maid wrapped her in the huge swathe of green cloth, winding the end over her head and shoulders. The thick layers felt strange after months in nothing but a loose, long shift.