Her life had undoubtedly been hard and horrible in ways that Inos could not imagine, and yet somehow she had gained occult power. Now she was effectively ruler of a kingdom and could negotiate with warlocks. There was a great mystery there.
The corridor was barred eventually by massive double doors of metalwork and carven wood, inlaid with bright-fired jewels. Inos paused, irresolute. Should she knock or try to enter? Nestling amid writhing serpents and clawed reptilian monsters, the centerpiece of each great flap was a hideous demonic face with ivory tusks and eyes of some bright yellow stone that gleamed .ominously in the wavering light. Inos reached for one golden handle, and the two faces sprang into life. Four eyes rolled around to regard her. She froze.
Lips of mahogany writhed over sycamore fangs, and a sepulchral voice boomed from the face on the left. “State your name and business!”
Kade had warned her, but it was a moment before she found her voice. “I am Queen Inosolan of Krasnegar.”
The faces faded back into inanimate carvings, and the doors creaked open on their own.
She blinked, momentarily blinded by light that seemed as bright as noon. Then her eyes adjusted, and she blinked again. This was the same great circular bedchamber she had seen before, but now the jumble of ugly furniture and grotesque statuary had been removed.
Filmy draperies still floated around the same enormous fourposter bed at the far side, but everything else had changed. The wide expanse of mosaic floor was no longer concealed by rugs. Chairs and tables were few and elegant, vulgar clutter had been replaced by restrained good taste, and the tapestries on the walls now depicted landscapes or demure rural merrymaking. Inos recognized Angilki’s touch, even if at secondhand. Now she knew what Kade had been up to in her days with the sultana.
The moon hung beyond the windows, but its rays were drowned in a flood of what seemed to be sunlight streaming down the central stairwell. Rasha was not present and must therefore be waiting in the upper room. Determined that a queen would not be intimidated, Inos raised her chin in defiance and set off toward the stair. She heard a gentle thump as the doors closed behind her.
Climbing purposefully, she looked up and saw that the white dome itself was the source of the light, blazing as if the sun were directly overhead and shining through the stone. Evil-begotten sorcery! Her curving path brought her within sight of the top, and it was flanked by the basalt panther and the glittery gray wolf, their front paws hooked over the uppermost step, their shiny amber eyes fixed upon her. They continued to watch as she approached and passed between them, but they remained statues.
Kade had been busy in the upper chamber, also, transforming cluttered ugliness into elegance, letting the intrinsic beauty of the great circular space speak for itself. A few simple divans and tables assisted, and did not argue. Inos was impressed, thinking that the duke of Kinvale himself would have been hard put to do better, even with the same occult resources. She could see evidences of sorcery: a potted palm whose fronds were writhing more than the usual breeze could account for, a bronze bust that represented a different person every time she looked at it, a device like a blue birdcage that buzzed and hummed. She decided to ignore those.
Three windows imprisoned stars and moonlight within their darkened arches, while the fourth was obscured by the jeweled drapery of Rasha’s magic casement. Inos turned away quickly, oppressed by a sudden jolt of memory: Automatically she glanced over to the big looking glass in its silver frame—the glass that had told her of Rap’s death. Now it was reflecting a distant image of Inos herself, her fine gown of pale green, her golden hair piled high and seeming strangely alien in Arakkaran now, even to her.
A tall girl was standing near it, waiting in solitary grandeur. Inos took a deep breath and walked toward her.
It was Rasha, but so transformed as to be barely recognizable. She seemed little older than Inos herself, but now she was using youth and beauty to depict ice-maiden innocence instead of voluptuous seduction. The high-prowed djinn nose seemed somehow less conspicuous but no less arrogant; thick rosewood-colored hair was piled high and pinned with gems; her gown was a luxurious miracle of yew-green silk, patterned in scrolls of a million tiny rubies. When selecting a style for Inos’s gown, Kade had apparently held back from the extremes of Hub’s current fashion, but Rasha had not. Her scanty lace bodice did nothing to conceal the jutting curves of large and shapely breasts, nor their hot djinn coloring.
Inos could not imagine herself ever appearing in public like that—not in Hub, nor Kinvale, nor Arakkaran.
She can inflame any man to madness, Azak had said. Would men would prefer this challenge of haughty majesty or the previous brazen inducement? That might depend on the man, of course, and either would be effective. Much less allure than this had reduced Rap to a babbling jelly.
Inos stopped and curtsied.
Rasha nodded approvingly. “It suits you to perfection, child. You are a great beauty.” She had lost her harsh Zarkian accent. At a loss for words, Inos curtsied again and then blurted, “I shall not be noticed beside yourself, ma’am.”
Rasha registered faint amusement. “I certainly hope not! You know why I summoned you this evening?”
“To call on the warlock of the east, I understand.” Inos wished her mouth was not so shamefully dry, wished she dare clasp her hands to restrain their need to tremble.
“Oh, hardly!” Rasha’s laugh was a genteel tinkle, not the raucous mockery she had used before. “I would not fall into that trap! No, his Omnipotence will be calling on us!”
So Inos need not demand that Kade be summoned to accompany her! A deluge of relief told her how tense she had been at the prospect of arguing with the sorceress. That discovery annoyed her.
Rasha continued her calculating inspection of Inos. “However, he may send a votary in his place. As long as whoever comes is male, you will impress him, in that splendid Imperial style costume.” There was more than a hint of sarcasm in her tone.
Inos curtsied again.
Rasha sneered. “Think you can impress a warlock, do you?” Well . . . yes! Inos was a far more genuine queen than this upstart slattern before her. She had been trained to wear finery and converse with cultivated gentlemen.
“I repeat, your Majesty, that he will not even see me in your company.”
“That depends. If he materializes fully he will. That is why I arranged for your gown—your beauty is mundane and genuine, mine only occult artifice. Even if Olybmo does appear in person, he will probably send only a projection of himself, and in that case his ability to penetrate my glamour will be very limited. He will also be harmless.” She shrugged perfect shoulders. ”It works both ways, of course. I hardly expect him to reveal his true appearance. What good is sorcery, if it will not nurture vanity?”
“Come,” she said, and led the way across to a pair of divans, upholstered in ivory silk and set at an angle to each other. “Don’t be too proud, child. Warlocks are accustomed to gratifying their whims. If you do too good a job of impressing him, you may find yourself . . . surprisingly eager to accommodate his wishes, shall we say?” She laughed softly, but her eyes were mocking Inos’s shock. “Do sit, though. We have a little time to kill. Wine?”
“Er . . . thank you.” Inos sat and fussed at arranging her train, but eventually she forced herself to lift her chin and look across and meet the sultana’s scornful gaze.
“Your Majesty, I behaved very badly the last time I was in this room. I did not thank you for rescuing me from the imps. Truly I am grateful and I apologize again for my discourtesy.”
A slight movement of Rasha’s lip seemed to convey more than a whole shrug might have done. “You were overwrought, and besotted by a man. Girls are subject to such fits of insanity. I hope you have recovered by now?”
“I shall never forget Rap. What he did for—”
“Your aunt told me. Whatever he did, he did for one reason only. Everything men do is aimed at possessing and using women!”
In Zark that might be more true than Inos had first thought. Rather than argue, she just smiled.
“You don’t believe me?” The sorceress stretched out a hand and cupped the crystal goblet that stood on the table beside her. There was another on the table beside Inos, who had not previously noticed even the tables.
“You have much to learn, child,” Rasha said. “Now I must warn you of something.” She stabbed a stiletto fingernail toward a small rectangular rug. “Our visitor tonight will appear there.”