“Bear ye out no unkind deed upon the meek and fraught!

All beasts upon the earth esteem, their stature matters not.

Better to remove the hand that proves a wicked thought;

The blade that cut the mouse’s tail will not be soon forgot.

And when that clever trim-tailed creature scales the tower wall,

She will chew right through the old bell rope and send it to its fall.”

From The Bellman’s Elegy, Kuno of Yarbruck

Mouse sat in the corner of the council room, her eyelids drooping heavily in the unseasonable heat. The air of the chamber was stale and stifling, the windows closed tightly against a summerly breeze that would have been welcomed if not for the obvious threat of carrying council voices to unsanctioned ears. Her head tipped forward, bending to the oppressive warmth, before she was startled awake by the sharp bite of Ludger’s staff driving into the top of her foot. The old man did not need to look at her to find his target; his aim was seasoned by frequent practice. Mouse winced at the blow, stifling a groan of pain, but knew that she was like to have to pinch herself to avoid yet another. She pulled herself up straight in her chair and trained her ears to the conversation passing around the large oak table in the center of the room.

“And what would Your Majesty propose?” one of the councilors was saying, a thinly veiled note of vexation in his voice. “We have already increased taxes twice in a twelvemonth. To do so again—”

“Spare me your indignations, Lord Cook,” the Empress’s voice cut through the thick air. “Unless you are prepared to start shitting gold, it will have to come from somewhere.” The High Treasurer’s cheeks flared red at this, but he made no reply. Lord Cook had earned his nickname due to his well-fed stature and ample girth, with the Empress remarking that if he spent half as much time counting coins as he apparently did in the kitchens, the kingdom would be sure to have twice as much silver and thrice as much mince as it presently did.

Mouse liked Lord Cook, and she did not think him so terribly fat. But it did not matter what Mouse thought; all that mattered was that when the Empress cut her hair, Mouse cut her hair, and when the Empress’s caravan set out upon the road, it was Mouse who rode in the royal carriage and the Empress who sat safely among the linens.

“Majesty, may I suggest an alternative means of procuring the necessary sums?” Lord Eadic chimed in, his fingertips steepled together as he leaned forward in his chair.

“An alternative to what?” the Empress replied wryly, slouching back in her high-backed chair. “Lord Cook laying us a golden egg out of his fat arse?” This drew laughter from the others seated around the table, and even Mouse was forced to bite her lip, but the High Treasurer’s cheeks puffed out in anger and only Lord Rambert’s hand upon his shoulder kept him from rising in fury.

Lord Eadic waited for quiet before continuing, the fleshy tips of his fingers still pressed together. “Majesty, it has come to my attention that the Chatti pay only for imports what the rest of the empire pays,” he said. “And yet, these same imports come by way of Arosian roads, which, as I’m certain you know, are costly to maintain. A modest increase in what they pay for foreign goods—”

“As you say, Lord Eadic,” the Empress replied before the he could finish. The hook-nosed councilor bowed his head, unable to suppress a smile of satisfaction from creeping onto his lips. Mouse did not care for Lord Eadic. He was calculating, she thought, not unlike the Empress, and even for his station, wore too much self-importance upon his sleeve.

“Your Majesty,” Lord Cook protested urgently, “I cannot concede that—” But the Empress cut him off with an indolent yawn.

“That is all for today,” she drawled. “I am tired.” And rising from her chair, “Now for god’s sake, somebody feed Lord Cook before his testiness becomes a matter of national consequence.” If Lord Cook was angered before, he was incensed by this, but his power of speech seemed to have to abandoned him, and he sat in silent red-faced fury as the Empress made her exit. “Have Dag ready Wind’s Whip,” she said to the High Seneschal as she moved toward the door. “I should like to go for a ride.”

Though the perturbation of being adjourned so prematurely was plain on the faces of many of the High Councilors, Mouse, for one, was glad that the session had ended. She found sitting for hours in one of the hard wooden chairs of the chambers almost as uncomfortable as sitting a horse. Now she only need escape the Empress’s notice, lest she be forced to take up the saddle and ride alongside her. However, before the Empress had made her exit, she chanced to look at her heel and notice the absence of her beloved blue hound. Peticru had left his post by the Empress to lie languidly in the corner of the room near Mouse, his paws twitching from time to time, as if in chase as he slumbered upon the cool stone floor. “Up, you lazy dog,” Mouse whispered, nudging him with her foot in an attempt to rouse him before his master could miss him further. But Peticru merely picked up his head for a moment, looking at Mouse with all the indifference of a dog who had no better place to be than exactly where he was, before returning to repose.

Lord Eadic, taking notice of this, quipped, “Peticru may be no hunting hound, but he certainly seems to have become something of a mouser.” Some of the other Councilors laughed at the jest, and even the Empress’s lips curled into a smile. But Mouse did not laugh. It was a stupid thing to say, she thought, made stupider by the fact that her name was not even Mouse. It was merely another of the Empress’s unkind nicknames bestowed for her own amusement.

“Come now, my beasties,” the Empress beckoned, as much to Mouse as to the dog. But Ludger was quick to interpose: “Perhaps Your Majesty can spare the girl. For, you see, it has come to my attention—”

The Empress silenced him with a hand. “I have heard enough speeches from the mouths of old men for one day,” she sighed. “Take her. Besides,” she smirked, “it is just as well, for I dare say Johannes shall be eager to join me, even if it is the horse I sit astride.” And with that, she turned and departed.

The High Councilors filed out the chamber, with Mouse, as usual, the last to leave. She hated attending council session. They were boring at best, and more often than not ended in flared tempers, offended sensibilities, and curses being slung back and forth across the table. They were grown men, all of them, learned and practiced in their respective spheres, yet they were often too busy vying for the Empress’s favor to make any attempt to actually bring prosperity to the Empire. Worst of all, the Empress would sit at the head of the table with a supercilious smile upon her lips and some insensible witticism at the ready, as if it were not her own people who suffered for the ineptitude of her council. Though she was not yet twenty, she had already held the throne for three years, and for three years, Mouse had watched her disregard grow. The Empire had loved her father, and it was perhaps for this reason that she was able to hold her seat with so little resistance, but only a fool would fail to recognize that her sins would not go unpunished forever.

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But such was Mouse's lot, for she was the Empress's lady-in-waiting, and as perhaps the closest person to her, it was her duty to make herself intimately familiar with all the proceedings of the court. She did not only write letters and commit the names and faces of every nobleman and his mistress to memory, she was also required to attend every council meeting, every conference, and not just to listen, but to understand what passed therein.

If enduring this all was not bad enough, Mouse would then be forced to sit in conference with Ludger, where he would prod her with questions, the answer to which she never seemed able to adequately produce and the point of which she could little understand, for his questions were of a far more critical nature than Mouse could think necessary. Though she spent much time under his instruction, Mouse could make no claim to be particularly fond of the old man, but at least, she reminded herself, he was a better jailer than the Empress, whose careless speech, changeable temperament, and unchecked arrogance were difficult to tolerate.

Mouse paused at the door for a moment, wondering what would happen if instead of following Ludger out into the hall, she were to yank the heavy wooden door shut behind him and force open one of the heavy glass windows. She wondered how long it would take her to drag a chair across the room, climb out the window, and scale the southern wall, making her way to the piked gate and darting through Sallowman’s alley before disappearing down the cobbled streets of the village outside.

But what then? she asked herself. How long would it be before she missed the safety of the castle walls, the warmth of her chambers, and the taste of food cooked by someone who did not suffer from a chronic case of pox?

She could become an archer, she told herself, take up her bow and join a neighboring army. She had decent aim, after all. But that, she supposed, might require her to ride, and she gave up the idea almost as quickly as it had come to her. A fletcher, then, she thought. She did not mind working with her hands, and she would always have plenty of shafts. Perhaps she could even use the plumage of some exotic bird to fetch a handsome price for her work. She might not know how to fletch an arrow yet, but she could learn.

Or, she wondered, she might simply travel about from land to land. She could meet interesting people from far away places. She could listen to their stories and sing their songs. She could sit at an inn or around a campfire rather than in stuffy council chambers and tedious banquets. But she did not have much time to wonder, for Ludger was waiting, and Mouse knew that the longer he waited, the more tightly his boney fingers would dig into her elbow as she walked alongside him down the hallway to his offices.

“Come, child,” his voice rasped impatiently as Mouse hesitated to cross the threshold. But at last, she steeled herself and stepped reluctantly through the door, past the guards. She could feel their eyes on her, her skin prickling with unease. The guards could not look at the Empress—not the way they looked at other women—but they could look at Mouse, and there was never a time she regretted the fact that her appearance so resembled the other than when she was the last to pass by them.

The sound of Ludger’s staff ringing against the stone floors echoed off the vaulted ceilings as the two strode side by side down the hall toward the Golden Tower. There was nothing lavish about the Golden Tower; it had been named not for its opulence, but rather, for the way the pale stone of the walls seemed to glow a warm golden hue in the light of the setting sun. It was far more beautiful outside than within, Mouse reflected, glancing at the untended braziers mounted on the walls, but she would take a golden sunset over a gilded gallery any day of her life.

At last, the old man stopped at a tall wooden door, whereupon he produced a key from within his robes, and, leaning on his staff, waited for Mouse to unlatch the lock. She did not understand why he could not unlock it himself, but there were a great many things that Ludger did which she did not understand, and Mouse knew that asking too many questions would get her nothing more than a swift cuff of the staff and a bruised shin the next morning.

Once inside, Mouse returned the key to the old man’s wrinkled palm and climbed up into her usual seat in the window. It was her one small victory, to be able to sit against the glass and look down at the archery grounds below, hoping to catch a glimpse of some young yeomen at practice on the pitch. Noblemen practiced archery there from time to time as well, but they were not as fun to watch, or so Mouse thought, for they lacked the patience to do anything truly impressive and the imagination to do anything truly interesting. It was not just the way they practiced archery either. Mouse found nobles to be damp and disappointing almost as a rule. They all made the same pilgrimages, only to complain about the weather or the length of the journey. They all danced the same dances, only to whinge that their feet hurt and moan that the room was too crowded. Mouse found being in their company day and night nigh insufferable, but worse still was knowing that she was, in a way, one of them.

Mouse had been orphaned in infancy and had never known her parents, but she had been brought up in the castle, along with some other distant cousins of the crown who were all of an age with the Empress. She had been brought to the young Empress with the intention that she would one day serve as one of her ladies, but it soon became clear that she was destined for something more. For while the other girls all stayed fair, only Mouse grew dark like the Empress, and it was not long before she had been singled out for the role she now occupied, not just as the Empress’s lady-in-waiting, but also her decoy.

Though Mouse had certainly never wished for such a life, she knew that things could have turned out much worse than they had. She could have been thrown out into the streets before she could walk or sold to some disgusting pig of a man. She could have been cast into the gutter of Sallowman’s alley to starve or freeze or rot of some putrid disease. When she considered this, she had little of which to complain. But there were many times, especially as she grew to know the selfishness and unkind nature that hid beneath the Empress’s regal exterior, when she felt little gratitude for the stars that crossed her, and she often wondered what her life might have been like if she had stayed fair like the other girls.

“What did you learn today, child?” The sound of Ludger’s voice traveled across the room to the window where Mouse sat, but she did not bother to turn and face him.

“That the council is as useless as ever, and the Empress as impassive,” she answered, at once sardonic and sincere. But no sooner had the words left her mouth than she felt herself begin to shrivel under the embarrassment of her own fatuous remark. She looked down at her lap, ashamed of the bitterness which echoed in her words, and thought for a few moments before speaking again.

“Her Majesty is preoccupied with our current economic troubles,” she said at last, “but she sees them only as temporary. That is why she is so willing to jeopardize our relationship with the Chatti, to make them pay more than what they rightfully should.” She paused for a moment. “She does not want to be bothered with seeking a long-term solution; she prefers to pass the problem on to those who cannot contest her rule.”

“Hmm,” Ludger grunted. “And what do you think?”

“‘Returns come only from investments, not remediations,’” Mouse answered, quoting one of the tomes that sat on the shelf across from her. “Expecting the Chatti to pay for the crown’s unscrupulous spending will only serve to injure the peace.”

The old man said nothing, and Mouse was left to wonder once again if she had just said something very stupid or whether she had said something of which the old man approved.

His steely grey eyes seemed to consider her for a moment, and then he slipped a hand under the dark acacia desk, and when he pulled it back out, held something within it. It was a wooden box, one that, if Mouse was not mistaken, resembled that which the Empress kept on the painted table of her vanity. The old man rose from his chair, and walking around the side of the desk, held it out before placing it in Mouse’s hands. Mouse looked down at the box, running a thumb over brass latch that held it shut. The wood was smooth and there was ivy engraved along the lid. She was overwhelmed with curiosity, but she dared not open it without being bade do so.

“Keep it safe, somewhere no one will find it,” Ludger said as Mouse traced a finger along the engraving of the lid, wondering what was inside, “and after the next council meeting, go and fetch it before coming here. But do not carry it openly. You must conceal it. Do you understand?” Mouse looked up at him and nodded. “Good,” the old man said. “Now, do not open it until you have returned here.” Mouse felt a wave of disappointment at these words and nearly opened her mouth to protest. She was desperate to know what was inside, to know why Ludger had given this to her. But instead, she swallowed her disappointment and nodded once again at the old man, for if there was one thing Mouse excelled at, it was doing as she was told.