Lift popped out of the grips of the guards, stepping up to stand on one of their backs, which gave her a good view of the desk. The spanreed was writing.

“Took them long enough,” she said, then hopped off the guards and sat in the chair.

The guard stood up behind her, cursing.

“Stop, Captain!” the fat scribe said. She looked at the spindly scribe in yellow. “Go get another spanreed to the Azish palace. Get two! We need confirmation.”

“For what?” the scribe said, walking to the desk. The guard captain joined them, reading what the pen wrote.

Then, slowly, all three looked up at Lift with wide eyes.

“‘To whom it may concern,’” Wyndle read, spreading his vines up onto the table over the paper. “‘It is decreed that I—Prime Aqasix Yanagawn the First, emperor of all Makabak—proclaim that the young woman known as Lift is to be shown every courtesy and measure of respect.

“‘You will obey her as you would myself, and bill to the imperial account any charges that might be incurred by her … foray in your city. What follows is a description of the woman, and two questions only she can answer, as proof of authentication. But know this—if she is harmed or impeded in any way, you will know imperial wrath.’”

“Thanks, Gawx,” Lift said, then looked up at the scribes and guards. “That means you gotta do what I say!”

“And … what is it you want?” the fat scribe asked.

“Depends,” Lift said. “What were you going to have for lunch today?”

Chapter 14

14

THREE hours later, Lift sat in the center of the fat scribe’s desk, eating pancakes with her hands and wearing the spindly scribe’s hat.

A swarm of lesser scribes searched through reports on the ground in front of her, piles of books scattered about like broken crab shells after a fine feast. The fat scribe stood beside the desk, reading to Lift from the spanreed that wrote Gawx’s end of their conversation. The woman had finally pulled down her face wrap, and it turned out she was pretty and a lot younger than Lift had assumed.

“‘I’m worried, Lift,’” the fat scribe read to her. “‘Everyone here is worried. There are reports coming in from the west now. Steen and Alm have seen the new storm. It’s happening like the Alethi warlord said it would. A storm of red lightning, blowing the wrong direction.’”

The woman looked up at Lift. “He’s right about that, um…”

“Say it,” Lift said.

“Your Pancakefulness.”

“Rolls right off the tongue, doesn’t it?”

“His Imperial Excellency is correct about the arrival of a strange new storm. We have independent confirmation of that from contacts in Shinovar and Iri. An enormous storm with red lightning, blowing in from the west.”

“And the monsters?” Lift said. “Things with red eyes in the darkness?”