“Tell your mistress that I offer her many thanks and will come at the appointed hour.”

The servant gave no sign of surprise except for a very slight hesitation before bowing and retreating, but Tzoja knew she had managed an unexpected maneuver. She could only hope that either it would intrigue Khimabu enough to convince her to hold off a little longer, or that the dinner was only meant to be an exploratory gambit anyway, the opening of a cat-and-mouse game that could keep the lady of the house cheerfully occupied during the early days of her husband’s absence.

Still, Tzoja knew it was a very dangerous gamble on her own part. She was not entirely helpless: She had a poison-stone to protect her, one she had brought with her from her days in the household of Valada Roskva, so many long years ago—or so many to Tzoja, at any rate. But poison was only one of many ways the mistress of the house could remove Tzoja as a rival.

All the centuries the Norns have lived in this dark mountain, she thought. How can a people live this way—hiding from the sunshine, barely sipping at the light as though it were some dangerously potent liquor? But it was no good to yearn after sunlight, however much she missed it now. This mountain was where Tzoja would have to make her stand if she was to survive. And the most dangerous skirmish yet was only hours away.

She began to take garments from the cedar wood chest. Dressing to confront a rival was a difficult chore in any situation, but dressing for a rival who embodied a race with a history and outlook so different from hers, a rival who also wanted her dead, made the choices even more complicated.

As she held up and considered two possible gowns, Tzoja wondered if she dared to carry her poison-stone with her. If she did, she would need a place to hide it, a billowing sleeve or something similar where she could reach it quickly when the situation presented itself, and then hide it away again just as swiftly. She lifted it from the secret box where she kept the few mementos of her previous life and held it up to the flickering light of her lamp so she could see its tiny holes, delicate as Perdruinese lace. She was certain it had saved her at least once, when she had first arrived in the household, and she certainly would feel much safer with it somewhere near her hand tonight. But to be caught with such a thing would be a mortal insult; if it were discovered, Khimabu would not need to destroy her in secret, but could claim that Tzoja was carrying it because she herself had put something poisonous in the meal. At the very least, Khimabu could send Tzoja back to the slave barracks without Viyeki’s protection, making her available to any Hikeda’ya male who wished to claim her. She did not doubt that in such a situation, Lady Khimabu would be happy to send a few suitors Tzoja’s way, the rough sort who might have an accident with a fragile mortal woman.

Reluctantly, she set the poison-stone back in the small box and hid it once more behind the panel. If she truly was to dine at Khimabu’s table, it would be without protection. She would be staking everything on one throw of the dice. Still, what chance did she have otherwise? The lady of the house, especially a lady as well born and well connected as Khimabu, always had all the power. Tzoja, as usual, would only have her wits.

Such an uneven contest, she thought. But is life itself any different? That is a game nobody wins. Even the Hikeda’ya eventually must die.

Except for the queen, of course, Tzoja reminded herself. In any country, in any time, the Norn Queen remained the exception to all rules.

•   •   •

“I give you greetings in the name of the Queen and the Garden.” Lady Khimabu did not rise from her low couch. Her pet ermine poked its head out of her voluminous sleeve and gave Tzoja a brief, critical appraisal before disappearing once more.

“As do I, great lady,” Tzoja replied. “I thank you for inviting one such as me to your table. The honor is above me.” She waited to be asked to sit, although since there were only two couches set out, it was fairly obvious where her place was to be.

Khimabu did not seem in a great hurry to indulge her. “No need for false modesty, dear younger sister Tzoja. All know the great service you have performed for our master’s house. But I see you have dressed with a modesty that befits your humility.”

Tzoja bowed. She had put on her finest gown, of course, an intricate weave of flowing, faintly shimmering spinsilk beaded with tiny pearls. This was just Khimabu’s way of poking at her, reminding her of her low station in the household. The gown was not showy, it was true, but no auxiliary wife, still less a mortal one, would make the mistake of outdressing the mistress of the household. Khimabu wore a beautiful, billowing swirl of pale green with gold tones that glowed beneath the outer fabric, the whole garment covered with an elaborate fretwork of knotted cords in darker green. Donning such a gown was the work of several servants over a goodly amount of time. Khimabu’s beauteous swirl of dark hair and her peerless face had also been brought to perfection with the help of many trained hands.

“Come, sit, Tzoja,” she said. “There is no need for such formality with me. The sort of intimacy we share makes us family!” Khimabu spread her long fingers just below her chin, an ancient formal gesture called “the fan” that indicated a kind of pleasure at the speaker’s own daring.

As Tzoja lowered herself onto the couch with as much grace as she could manage—none of the half-dozen servants came forward to help her—the ermine poked its head out of Khimabu’s sleeve again. Its eyes were like black stones set into the white fur of the face. It abruptly slithered across its mistress and vanished into her other sleeve. The creature’s brief reappearance gave Tzoja the beginning of an idea.

“You are most kind, my lady,” she said out loud. “It is an honor to join you. I have always thought this was one of the most beautiful rooms in this beautiful house.”

In truth, the dining salon was quite striking, a room many times as high as it was wide, not uncommon among the Hikeda’ya, whose greatest sign of wealth and privilege was access to the light wells that stretched across the northern and southern faces of Do’Nakkiga—the mountain Tzoja had once called Stormspike. Never in her childhood had she ever dreamed that she would one day be living in such a terrifying, infamous place.

The salon’s stone walls were softened ever so slightly by long hangings decorated with what Tzoja had come to understand was a sort of poetry, bits of old tales about the Garden or praise of the Queen, painted in ways Viyeki’s people found pleasing to the eye. The few pieces of furniture in the room were spare, made from polished black and gray stone, another habit of the Hikeda’ya, who largely shunned color in their homes, though not always on their persons: the green gown her enemy wore would be considered a very daring thing to wear outside of this house.

Khimabu was beautiful. There was no doubting it. Tzoja had grown up among people who thought the Norns demons and monsters, but if they could see Khimabu’s sculpted features, her long, regal nose, her splendid high cheekbones and large, liquid black eyes, they would have had to admit she was a lovely demon indeed.

“You stare at me,” Khimabu said, and made the fan sign again, but this time with a small twist at the end that suggested a certain impatience. “Has it really been so long since we have spent time together, dear younger sister, that you have forgotten how I look? I know that time seems to pass more swiftly for your people.” A glint in the eye, the meaning quite clear. “Forgive me if I have been forgetful.”

“No, Lady. I am, as always, astonished to find your beauty is even greater in life than it was in my memory.”