Page 30 of Oracle's Reign
Eleven
???
Yslie and Peroenwere awake and dressed, enjoying a breakfast of fruit and yogurt, when someone knocked on Peroen’s door. Frowning, Peroen rose and crossed the room to see who it was.
Sophenie peeked around him the instant the door swung wide enough. She met Yslie’s eyes. “Good, you’re here.”
“Sophenie?” Peroen stepped back, wordlessly inviting her inside. “Our session doesn’t start for another quarter of an hour.”
“I know. But I was afraid we wouldn’t be able to find Yslie if I waited that long. She needs to come with us to the archives.”
Yslie wiped her hands and stood. “You saw something?”
Sophenie shrugged. “Too many things, as always. But most of the futures I saw included the guards telling us to leave too soon. If you come, then there is more distraction while you and the prince argue with the guards and I gain a few more minutes to look at everything.”
“The guards are going to cause problems?” Peroen asked sharply.
“They’ll let us in if you are convincing enough,” Sophenie replied. “But once we are in, one of them will run and tattle to the Emperor, who will give orders to have us removed.”
“Is this going to be dangerous?” Yslie didn’t mind providing a diversion, but Sophenie’s explanation made her nervous.
“Not so long as we don’t physically resist. Don’t worry, unless I have truly misjudged your personalities, the most likely futures don’t get any worse than some ugly words.”
Peroen looked at Yslie and she shrugged. He had agreed to take Sophenie to the archives. They’d have to trust she had judged the probabilities accurately.
“Let’s go, then.”
???
Two guards stoodoutside the archives. Peroen walked past them and opened the door without trouble, but the instant Sophenie moved to follow him, one of the guards blocked the way. “The Imperial Archives are not open to the public.”
Peroen spun around to face him. “Sophenie and Yslie are not the public. They are my guests.”
“They are not members of the imperial family.”
“But either of them could be very soon.”
“Soon is not now.”
Peroen drew himself up to his full height. “They are my guests,” he repeated. “As I am the imperial heir, if I say they are welcome in the archives, then they are welcome in the archives. Step aside.”
Grudgingly, the guard moved. Peroen gestured the two women into the room ahead of him, then pulled the door shut with enough force that if anyone other than an imperial prince had done it, it would have been called a slam.
“I strongly suspect we have taken a path that results in the guards acting very quickly to inform the Emperor of our presence,” Sophenie warned as she ventured deeper into the large room.
Yslie shared a look with Peroen, and then they drifted around the room at a slower pace. If she had thought Sophenie was looking for a particular document, rather than wantingaccess to it all, Yslie would have offered to help her search. As it was, she instead picked up journals and books at random, turning a few pages, then putting them back.
There were memoirs written by emperors, empresses, and their advisors. Ancient ledgers detailing the expenses of the empire. Reports that undoubtedly contained data Sophenie would tell her was critically important, but that Yslie couldn’t make heads nor tails of.
When she came across a small journal nearly lost between larger tomes, its pages yellowing with age, Yslie carefully cracked it open. The writing was faded, yet easier to read than in many of the other books she had picked up. There were no fanciful flourishes. This wasn’t an account penned by a lifelong scribe. Rather, it was a personal journal, with the writer’s name signed on the front page. Daitano Tjawer. Not a scholar, but a warrior—the warlord who had united the empire.
Yslie didn’t slide this book back like she had every other after identifying the contents. She went to turn the page, wondering what the first emperor had written about, but the first sheets stuck together. She wondered if it would be possible to separate the pages without damaging the journal.
A commotion at the door had her snapping the cover closed and hiding the journal behind her back, an instinctive reaction. Yslie was supposed to delay the guards to give Sophenie more time, but she wanted more time, too. Angling so that her actions couldn’t be seen from the door, she slipped the small book into her pocket. Between the loose fit of her trousers and the length of her tunic, no one would notice it.
Then she took her spot at Peroen’s side.
A woman had joined the two guards from earlier. Yslie didn’t remember her name, but she recognized her. Dressed all in black, from her sheer veil, to her short bodice and billowing trousers, the woman was a member of the Emperor’s Will. Notjust any member, either. She was the one who always stood behind Emperor Envaho’s left shoulder. The First of His Will.
