Read Online Empire in Black and Gold by Adrian Tchaikovsky - Free Book Online

realized. It was because he was proof against all her looks and smiles and subtle words. And he was a prince. There were tacticians’ sons aplenty in Collegium, and the heirs of industrialists, lords of commerce or of learning or strategy. None of them was a prince , though. The Lowlands did not possess any with that kind of cachet.
    She was wearing her favourite silks, that swept down from her throat and left her shoulders bare: clothes suitable for a lady’s private chamber. So many men would have given so much, she thought proudly, for the privilege of seeing her thus adorned, but Salma would just come in and throw himself straight on the couch, and not really care all that much about her looks.
    ‘Oh come in then, if you have to,’ she said, trying to sound annoyed by the intrusion. She supposed that she should at least be glad that it was always her he sought to alleviate his routine, but the thought didn’t help that much. It was not that he did not have an eye for girls. He had his choice, almost, of the female students, and choose he did. Towards her, though, he was . . . different.
    He sauntered in, pausing in the doorway to pass his robe to Stenwold’s long-suffering servant. ‘Well now, a work of art half-done,’ he commented, leaning against the doorframe. ‘Don’t let me stop you. I’m always one for watching an artist at work.’
    She gave a wry smile and turned her face towards him, seeing just the barest start of surprise break his poise.
    ‘Careless,’ he said. ‘How did that happen?’
    She touched the bruise which extended from cheekbone to chin on the left side of her face. ‘You’re the clever foreigner who knows all our ways inside out, Salma, so you tell me.’
    He rolled his eyes. ‘You didn’t.’
    ‘Didn’t I? Then how else did I get it, your royal principalness?’ She turned back to the glass. It was a Spider-made artefact. All the best ones were. It was not that the Spiderlands craftsmen had superior skill, more that they knew what to look for. Being so fond of their own image, as I am .
    ‘Piraeus.’ Salma stepped into the room at last, casting himself down on the couch.
    ‘I told you what I wanted with him,’ she confirmed. There was a whole alchemy of make-up spread out before her, Spider-harvested and prepared, all of it. She made several delicate passes across her face, first with one brush and then another.
    ‘And?’
    ‘And I told him I wanted to fight him, a duel, and he laughed at me. He looked at me down his nose, like the Mantids always do. I was beneath his notice, for I was a Spider. I was a thing of contempt, not fit to draw blade against.’
    ‘He said all that?’
    ‘Oh, posing, posing. You know how it is. I was talking too, though. When he finished speaking he had no more to say. When I finished he had agreed to meet me at the Forum.’
    ‘And that must have gone well,’ Salma noted dryly. She looked straight at him, over her shoulder.
    ‘He beat me. He beat me by two strikes to none,’ she admitted. ‘I’ve another bruise on my side that’s a little short of this one for size, but lovely for colour, like a flower bouquet. You can see it if, you want?’ She tilted her head, mockingly coquettish.
    He shrugged indifferently, one hand tracing patterns on the wall. ‘I’m no chirurgeon,’ he said with a blithe smile, ‘but if you want. So what, then? Or did you really think you could beat him?’
    ‘I wanted to see if I could make him fight , Salma. That was the object. This . . .’ she passed another brush over the bruise. ‘This is a medal for the sort of wars I’ll be fighting in.’
    ‘Spider wars.’
    ‘Your people don’t play that game, Salma?’
    She had him there, and he laughed. ‘Well, perhaps, but nobody plays as well as the Spider-kinden. Even one, it seems, brought up by Beetles. It must be in the blood.’
    ‘In the blood and in the Art,’ she agreed. ‘And I needed to know. Now that Stenwold’s come clean with me, with