Kaitlyn Sage Patterson - The Diminished

“He’s been wounded. Call for the stable master. He might need stiches.”

A groom gently took the reins out of my hands and led the horse away.

“Bo?” Penelope asked again, peering into my eyes. “Do you need to sit down?”

“I don’t know, honestly. I’m not injured. That poor horse, though...”

Penelope sighed in exasperation. “Honestly, Bo. Worried about a horse. The beast will be fine. It was only a scratch.”

“Do you think the Shriven will make a report to the Queen?”

“Why would they? They deal with the diminished all the time.” Penelope drew my arm through her crooked elbow and led me back toward the palace. “They must’ve gotten a tip that one of the dimmys was on the verge of breaking. We were in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

I stopped and drew back. “Why would you assume that it was one of the diminished? Those bullets were aimed at me. They hit my horse. It was an assassination attempt.”

“The Shriven were there. What more proof do you need that a dimmy was holding that rifle? It was, in all likelihood, simply an unfortunate coincidence, and one of the diminished lost control while we were in the park.”

“Why would Claes run off like that, then?”

Penelope’s eyes flicked down the path, and though Claes was inside the palace and well out of earshot at this point, she lowered her voice. “You know that coming into contact with the diminished has always upset Claes, but ever since our father...”

Her voice trailed off. There was no need for her to finish the sentence as we continued down the cobblestone path that led to the palace. The twins’ father was my mother’s eldest brother. When his twin died, the family had gathered to say their goodbyes, but their father didn’t do as was expected of him. He didn’t die. In fact, he seemed healthier and more full of life than ever. After several weeks passed, the family was caught between relief that they wouldn’t lose him as well, and fear of what would happen to their standing in society. Unfortunately, their fear was well-founded. They stopped receiving invitations and visitors, and before long, their social stock had fallen so appallingly low that the only place they were welcome was the palace—and there were whispers that even the Queen, with her liberal views on all social rules, would refuse to allow them to court, if only as a way of keeping herself safe should he lose his grip on the grief.

Not long after, Penelope and Claes had come to live with my family, and their parents immigrated to Ilor, where their social status would no longer threaten their children’s prospects. Claes lived in constant fear of learning that his father had finally succumbed to the grief and done something horrible.

I ducked my head. “We still don’t know if it was one of the diminished that fired that rifle. Surely the Shriven will tell Runa that much at least.”

A guard held open the side door, and Penelope paused, waiting for me to go first. The dimness of the inner hallway after the bright day was temporarily blinding. I stopped, blinking the starbursts of darkness out of my eyes.

“We shouldn’t mention this at the dinner tonight,” Penelope said. “Just in case.”

“In case I’m right, and it wasn’t one of the diminished?”

“In case it panics your already overwhelmed mother.”

I scoffed. “Mother is absolutely fine. A meteorite could demolish our house on the same day a tempest strikes Penby, and the only thing that would make her bat an eye is the potential impact on our profitable interests.”

“It isn’t a bad thing to be concerned about, Bo. Her careful business strategizing is the reason you’re kept in books and horses.”

I sighed in defeat. “I know. I ought to go study before dinner. Queen Runa is sure to quiz me about the kind of metal used to make the pipes on the sunships or something equally obscure, and I’d rather not be embarrassed in front of the rest of the singleborn. Check on Claes for me?”

Penelope nodded, a knowing smile playing around her eyes. “Of course. See you at dinner.”

* * *

State dinners were held in the same cavernous great room where all of the important royal ceremonies and celebrations had taken place since the cataclysm and Penby’s founding. That evening, with most of the Alskad singleborn and nobility in attendance and fires burning in the wide hearths, the room was warm and bright and full of jewels glittering in the light of the solar lamps. I peered through a crack between the doors and watched as Claes moved through the crowd, all dark, perfectly mussed hair and bright blue silk. His jacket was embroidered with silver thread and crystals in a pattern that made it look as though there were raindrops clinging to his shoulders. He was, by far, the most handsome young man in the room.

The whisper of footsteps snapped me out of my reverie, and I stepped away from the door just as the Queen said, “We can’t be spending the whole night in the doorway, mooning over some pretty young thing, Bo.”

“Apologies, Your Majesty.” I bowed.

The Queen adjusted the golden cuff bracelet on her wrist and made a face.

“You’d think that after all these years, I would have grown used to the ceaseless gossip and small talk these kinds of functions require. Yet every time I come to stand outside this room and wait to be announced, I find myself desperately wishing for a quiet night in the peace and comfort of my rooms.”

I nodded, grateful that I wasn’t alone in that feeling. Before I could respond, she went on.

“It’s the meaningless, petty gossip that I find intolerable. Most of the people in that room have no idea that the seemingly scandalous behavior of a wealthy member of the nobility will have mind-bogglingly little effect on the struggles and triumphs of the greater population. Sometimes I wish that the first queens of the empire had quashed the ambitions of the noble class in the very beginning. It’s those most innocuous and seemingly necessary things that will do the most damage in the long run.” She paused and looked at me wearily. “There’s a lesson in there somewhere, Bo.”

Queen Runa took a deep breath, and before I could reply, she asked that I be announced. The butler called out my name and titles, and as I entered, I realized this was the last time I would hear the titles I’d been given at birth spoken into a room in just that way. In a couple of days, I would turn sixteen, the Queen would declare me her true and rightful heir, and all of my titles would change. When the room quieted, the butler blew a triplicate call on the long, twisting horn, a relic of some long-extinct animal, and announced the Queen.

Runa swept into the room, all smiles and cheerful greetings for the courtiers who approached her, the irritation of moments before washed from her face. It didn’t seem to matter at all that she loathed these kinds of events—she played along beautifully. Waiters swept through the crowd, offering the guests flutes of sparkling wine, snifters of ouzel and appetizers as complex and intricate as they were small. The long table was laid with gilt-edged dishes and gold-plated flatware. Exotic hothouse flowers overflowed from tall vases, and each place setting had no less than five matching crystal glasses.

I snagged a glass of sparkling wine from a passing waiter and searched the room for the brilliant blue of Claes’s jacket. Before I spotted him, Patrise and Lisette descended on me. They wore matching looks of predatory delight, and with them came a cloud of rich perfume. Patrise’s dark brown eyes were crinkled in amusement, his sepia skin bore almost no wrinkles and his black hair was perfectly arranged, as usual—I’d never seen a single lock out of place on his head. But where he was all languid grace, lithe muscle and smoldering looks through suggestively lowered lashes, even I could appreciate that Lisette’s beauty was sumptuous: all elegance and not a hint of the deceptive and brilliant political maneuvering that came so easily to her. Her tawny skin and auburn hair glowed like amber in the soft light of the sunlamps. Claes had often made a great point of reminding me that there wasn’t a man or woman at court who wasn’t entirely under Lisette’s sway.