The Courtesy of Kings | ☑ Queenkiller, Kingmaker #2

23.2

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'Why have you come back here?'

Well it's a pleasure to see you, too, grandmother. Isla dropped her bags on the floor. It was a sparse room, fit for a rajini's favoured servant but no more. It overlooked the north-western garden of the estates, and the thicket of trees beyond that led off to the White Asraam.

'And with him, of all people.'

Clearly the rajini was not referring to Taeichi. 'Our interests happened to align.'

'It sounds like you speak more than a shared destination.'

A cunning strategist, Master Chendra had said of the rajini. Isla could use her supposedly brilliant mind, but if the rajini foiled a plot against the Maha Rama once in their youth, what was to stop her from doing it again?

After all, for decades the rajini knew of all the countless halfbloods hunted down and assassinated, and yet not once—save the one time it affected her direct flesh and blood—did she try to intervene. Not once had she attempted to discover the zealots behind it. Why would she start now?

Isla shrugged. 'We both want Rajini Dhvani captured and sentenced. He for what she has done to his mother, and I ... well, I just can't have any loose ends running around.'

'What do you call the Maharaj Kiet if not a loose end?'

What was her issue with Kiet, anyway? Or with his mother, for that matter? So what if Rajini Amarin stole the Maha Rama's affections? Rajini Chei did not seem the type to let jealousy get the best of her. 'Like I said, we share a common interest.'

The rajini lurched back where she stood, collecting herself quick enough to push the door shut behind her. 'You told him.'

'I—I didn't say—'

'Does he also know your true theurgy?'

'What does that have to do with—'

'And the part you played in his mother's death?'

Isla's mouth snapped shut. It was answer enough.

Rajini Chei took a step closer. Even in her age she stood a nose taller than Isla, not a touch of a droop on her slim shoulders. 'You have placed yourself and your sister at great risk. Now you might fancy him a friend, but what do you think might befall your common interests once he discovers your role in Amarin's murder?'

'He won't discover anything. I mean to come clean myself ... just ... at the right time. He isn't like his mother, he'll understand.'

The rajini's laughter cut through the damp room like a crisp autumn squall. 'Already two generations of my House has suffered the Lotus Mandala's betrayal. Do not become our third.'

What is that supposed to mean? 'I did not know Maha Rama Judhistir's favour meant this much to you.'

'Nor did I take my granddaughter for a naïf. Tell the maharaj nothing and hope Dhvani will never mention the salamander that led her there that night, and if you know what's good for you girl, you will take your sister and return to your handmaid.'

'Her name is Noi.' And she's safer without us. Isla took a deep breath. The rajini's decisive voice, the steep furrow of her brows, and suddenly she was staring up at her father, scolding her for swimming in the tadpole-infested creek. 'Your patronage of my sister and I has been greatly appreciated, rajini; her condition would not have improved so much without it. But I will not leave. You may be content allowing halfbloods die in the hands of faceless royalists. That isn't an option for me.'