“We’ll wait here,” she told the two men who had taken up positions on either side of her. As always, Phinersa’s look seemed to flitter about the outskirts of her form. Captain Imhailas, on the other hand, was a study in contrast. He could stare with decisive constancy—too decisive, Esmenet sometimes thought. The man always seemed to be communicating urges he scarcely knew he possessed. Sometimes an arrogant curiosity would creep into his look, and he would press his manner to the very brink of transgression, standing almost too close, speaking in a way that was almost too familiar, and smiling at thoughts to which only he was privy. And as every prostitute knew, the only thing more threatening than eyes that had too many qualms were eyes that had too few. What had the strength to seize also had the strength to choke.

Moments afterwards, Maithanet appeared in the doorway, stepping carefully to avoid the clotted threads and buttons of blood. He was dressed plainly: no felt-shouldered vestments, no hems swaying with stitched gold, only a tunic possessing the satin gloss of a horse on parade. Ochre-coloured, it etched the contours of his limbs and torso in detail, revealing the kind of chest and shoulders that stirred some feminine instinct to climb. For the first time, it seemed, Esmenet realized how much the intimation of sheer physical strength contributed to his sometimes overawing presence.

The Shriah of the Thousand Temples was a man who could break necks with ease.

Both Phinersa and Imhailas fell to their knees, bowed as low as jnan required of them.

“I came as soon as I heard,” he said. To better cultivate the distinction between the political and the spiritual organs of the Empire, Maithanet always resided in the Cmiral temple-complex, never the Imperial Precincts, when he stayed in Momemn.

“I knew you would,” Esmenet replied.

“My brother—”

“Gone,” she snapped. “Shortly before word of . . . of this . . . arrived. I ordered the area sealed as soon as I heard of it. I knew you would want to see for yourself.”

His look was long and penetrating. It seemed to concede her worst fears.

“How, Maitha? How could they reach so deep? A mere Cult. The Mother of Birth, no less!”

The Shriah scratched his beard, glanced at the two men flanking her. “The Narindar, perhaps. They possess the skills … perhaps.”

The Narindar. The famed Cultic assassins of yore.

“But you don’t believe as much, do you?”

“I don’t know what to believe. It was a shrewd move, that much is certain. Figurehead or not, Sharacinth was our royal road, our means of seizing control of the Yatwerians from within, or at the very least setting them at war from within …”

Phinersa nodded appreciatively. “She has become their weapon now.”