Chapter 14: What the Steward Carried

I had not set foot in the hall since I walked out of it with one suitcase.

The great doors stood open, and the water in the entry court was calm and green.

Everything smelled the way it always had, of salt and warm stone and the lamp oil Kyros liked.

It hurt more than I expected.

"He'll have gone to ground," said Kyros. "Thirty years in this house, he knows every cupboard."

"Then we search the cupboards."

"Melina."

"Halia," I said, and tried the name out loud for the first time.

It sat strangely in my mouth.

"I don't know her yet," I said. "Right now I only know a man who lied about me in front of my daughter."

Kyros nodded once.

We went down the long gallery with the blue lamps, and he opened every door.

The wine cellar. The map room. The linen store.

In the linen store, behind the last shelf, a shoe stuck out from under a stack of folded sheets.

It was old and cracked and very small.

"Come out, Steward," I said.

Nothing moved.

"I can wait. I wait very well. Ask anyone who raised a child alone for nine years."

The sheets shifted. The steward crawled out on his knees with dust in his hair.

He did not stand.

"My lady," he said. "My lord. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"Get up," said Kyros.

"I can't, my lord."

"Why?"

"Because if I stand up I'll run again."

That, at least, was honest.

I sat down on a crate in front of him so we were level.

"Were you in the lower passage on the dark moon?" I asked.

"No."

"Did I ask you to forget me?"

"No, my lady."

"Did anyone?"

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