Mouse looked down into her muddy cup of wine. She had sampled every dish laid upon the table, hoping that at least one of them would be poisoned, so that she might have an excuse to drop down dead and partake no more of this woeful nonsense. The wine had been her last hope, but alas, she found her liver was still as strong as ever, and worse, that the drink had done little to dampen her displeasure.
The Empress had been late to arrive, meaning that Mouse had spent the first two hours of the even attempting to convince every half-blind feeble-minded lord in the hall that she was not the Empress and that there was, in fact, nothing she could do about the rising land taxes and the sudden increase in objectionable women making themselves known in the streets of every provincial town from Innswald to Yarbruck.
It was a practice not wholly unfamiliar to her, but with as little sleep as she had had, it had proven more tiresome than usual, and all that she wished for now was the quiet of her own chambers and the comfort of her own bed. Instead, she sat in the dim light of the great hall, tracing with her gaze, for the hundredth time, the silver thread woven through the tapestries that hung upon the wall and counting the sprigs of thistle and mallow that decorated the tables.
“Sit up straight, child,” Ludger chided, trying to rap Mouse with his staff but as it happened, only sending a bowl of brown peas clattering to the floor. But Mouse was sitting up straight; she was always sitting up straight. The old man’s eyes, however, had grown so glassy with drink that Mouse wondered if she did not look to him as if she were not only slouching in her chair, but perhaps floating about the room in it.
“Be quiet, old man,” said Mouse, knowing that the din of the banquet would drown out her words, “or I’ll have you heaved out the window.”
“What did you say?” Ludger garbled, his eyes squinting and head teetering as he leaned toward her.
“I said, it’s quite warm in here,” Mouse shouted into the old man’s ear. “Perhaps someone should open a window.”
“Ah! Aha!” Ludger laughed in amusement. To this, Mouse only could only shake her head and pray that if the old man were to fall from his seat, he would not fall on her.
To the other side of Mouse sat a number of the Empress’s ladies. They were all fair-haired and finely dressed, and Mouse could hear them chittering about which of the lords in attendance were the most handsome and gallant and which the most roguish. Mouse has little to say on such a matter, for was prepared to detest them all equally, but she did not think less of the others for it. After all, it was not as though they had no other matters to discuss, but they were clever enough to know that with so many in attendance, they had better guard their tongues and speak only of that which could betray no confidence and incur no possible offense. Johannes, Mouse saw, was bent over some flaxen-haired girl, pink with delight at the handsome nobleman’s attentions. His eyes lifted from his object briefly, happening upon Mouse’s as she looked his way, but she turned quickly, so as to avoid the waggish grin she knew would turn the corner of his mouth.
The great hall was crowded with nobles, Mouse saw, even more so than usual, and the windows, which were set high into the walls and therefore had to be opened and closed by a pole, had been unsealed, allowing the cool evening air to offer sweet relief from what otherwise was like to be an oppressive warmth. The braziers, she noticed now, had not been lit, in consideration of the heat, but to compensate for the loss of light, the low brass chandelier that hung near the front of the room had nearly twice as many candles in it as usual, all burning brightly and casting strange dancing shadows across the pale stone floors.
Ludger had prodded her, in one of their interviews, about what she thought of all the new faces at court. Mouse had ventured to guess that it was an appeasement on the part of the Empress, that the invitation was an attempt to placate and distract some of the nobles who may otherwise find themselves dissatisfied by the domestic downturn that had followed her father’s death. And though Ludger had not contradicted Mouse here, he had hinted at other motivations behind the growing number of peers in residence. “There will soon come a time,” he had said enigmatically, “when the Empress will need all the friends she can get. And what better way to keep a flock than to bring it within the walls.” At this, Mouse had waited for Ludger to turn his back before rolling her eyes. She did not care for his riddles any more than she cared for the spindly white hairs that sprouted from his ears.
Mouse swirled the sorry cup of wine in her hand and set it down upon the table without so much as a sip. She did not like the idea of losing her wits in such a setting. It made her feel exposed, somehow, vulnerable. She looked out across the hall, at the faces of a hundred people for whom she cared nothing and whom she was certain cared nothing for her, and wished that she could be down in the kitchens, where no one cared how straight she sat or how prettily she spoke or how much she looked like someone else.
It was while she was wishing this that she happened to notice a young man whom she had not seen before at court. He was tall and lean and dark from head to foot, and Mouse felt her heart begin to beat ever stronger the longer she gazed upon him. He lifted his cup to his lips, when suddenly, as if drawn by her gaze, he stopped and looked back at her. Their eyes met, across the dimly lit hall, and Mouse watched the young man’s features soften into a smile as he raised his cup to her. Mouse felt herself blush, and lifted her own cup to her lips, and suddenly wondered if perhaps she did not mind so much being at banquet.
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But in due course, the Empress rose, calling her ladies to attend her to her chambers, and before they had even left the hall, Mouse could see that her eyes had grown dark with discontent, as they often did when she had had too much to drink. Mouse followed diligently with the rest, but kept toward the rear of the retinue, for she knew that too much wine meant that the Empress would be quick to anger.
“Away from me, wench!” Mouse heard her roar at the girl who had tried to lend her arm to steady the Empress. She recognized the girl as the flaxen-haired beauty whom Johannes had been entertaining, Lady Agatha she was called, and suddenly understood the cause of the Empress’s wrath. The girl shrank away, hiding her tears in her sleeve, and walked the rest of the way down the hall with her eyes upon her feet.
Once they reached the Empress’s chambers, they were all of them dismissed, all but one. “Away with you,” she bellowed. “All but my Mouse.” Mouse swallowed a sigh of disappointment and followed the Empress through the heavy, gilded door of her bedchamber. It was not uncommon for the Empress to call for Mouse alone, especially when she was so deep in her cups as she was this evening. In fact, any time she was at all cross or tired or ill, Mouse was the most like to attend her. It was not because there was any love between the two, for Mouse doubted whether the Empress was even capable of love, but because Mouse had remained dutifully by her side these many years, doing her bidding and bearing her abuses without so much as a word of protest and without ever opening her lips as to what passed behind closed door. Mouse supposed that the Empress trusted her, in a way, though again, she doubted whether the Empress was truly capable of trusting anyone. Resent her as she may, there were times when she could not help but feel sorry for the Empress, for hers was a life even Mouse could not envy.
The Empress threw herself down into the blue embroidered chair across her painted table and waited for Mouse to unclasp her jewelry and brush out her hair. “Beggars, all of them,” she muttered as Mouse unfastened her necklace, placing it gently in a silver tray upon the table. “Grasping, gaping fools. All the land in the empire could not satisfy them, nor all the food fill their greedy bellies.” Mouse remained silent, taking up an ornate ivory comb which she began to work through the ends of the Empress’s long, dark tresses. “No, they must have titles and consequence,” the Empress went on bitterly. “They are nobles, after all, aren’t they? Though I doubt if they could produce a single noble thought among them,” she scoffed. Mouse changed the comb for a soft-bristled brush of polished brass that she pulled gently over the Empress’s hair. “No wonder my father died when he did,” the Empress said in a low, sardonic voice. “He was probably unwitted by mere proximation, his brain rotted from listening to such drivel as I’ve just endured, and his lungs collapsed from uttering conciliations.” She pushed the brush away and stood, nearly knocking the chair over as she did, and raised her arms so that Mouse might undress her. Mouse set about the fastenings, quickly and deftly, before tugging gently at the dress and pulling it carefully over the Empress’s head.
“What is it to rule over such mummery?” the Empress laughed as Mouse folded down the blankets of the bed. “What is it to wear the crown when those who serve you seek only to serve themselves?” Mouse waited for the Empress to climb atop the feathers and settle herself among her pillows before folding the blankets up over her. She knew no answer was expected of her, so she only stood quietly by the bed, awaiting the Empress’s command.
“Ring for some tea, Mouse,” the Empress said, leaning her head back onto the pillows and closing her eyes. “I cannot sleep until I have had some tea.” Mouse crossed the room and tugged on the red silk rope that hung by the Empress’s setting table. She knew that the Empress would be fast asleep before the tea ever came, but still she rang, lest it be discovered that she hadn’t done as she was bade. “And see that you stay here tonight,” the Empress called drearily. “I should not like to sleep alone.”
Mouse waited by the door for the tea to be delivered, opening it to a gap-toothed serving girl called Pritha who appeared with a silver tea tray in her hands shortly after she had rung.
“Will you be down later?” Pritha asked in an excited whisper when she saw Mouse. “Jasper has stowed away a few flagons and we’re going to go bird watching. Drunk as dullards they are tonight,” the girl grinned. “Bird watching” was the term they used for watching the nobles stumble around drunk, struggling haplessly to find their way across the green or sneak into someone else’s bedchambers undetected. More often than not, it ended with at least one in the bush, and as its name suggested, it was best done in the early hours of the morning.
“I’m afraid I’m wanted here,” Mouse said, shaking her head. “If Her Majesty wakes and finds me gone—”
“Oh certainly,” Pritha said in mock airs, “we would not wish to displease Her Majesty.”
Mouse offered a conciliatory smile to the girl as she bade her a good night and took the tray from her, setting in gently, quietly upon the table. One by one, she doused the candles about the room, disrobing quietly in the dark before drawing the heavy, blue embroidered bed hangings tightly closed and crawling under the blankets. It was too dark to see the Empress on the other side of the feathers, but she could hear her breath, the soft snore characteristic of one who had overindulged her thirst. It was strange, Mouse thought, as closed her eyes and pulled the blankets close around her, that two who looked so similar could be so different in nearly every other way. One was proud where the other was meek. One held all the power known to man while the other lived only to serve. It was a cruel trick of fate, thought Mouse as she drifted off to sleep, though who was the more miserable between them, it was impossible to say.