The Golden Moon was loud tonight, full of court attendees who would be leaving tomorrow and didn’t seem to want to end their revelry one moment before they had to. Yeijiro and Corinne found a small table in the back corner of one of the common rooms, and the boisterous noise around them provided what felt like a shield of privacy in which they could lean in close and talk.

Yeijiro sipped at his first glass of beer, while Corinne was finishing her third. She seemed agitated, and hadn’t stopped talking since they’d sat down, filling him in on everything that had happened in the fortress while he’d been passed out in Tōru's room.

“Cécile said it was a mess. The legionnaires tried to arrest people quietly, but people fought back. Which was why it took forever for the fortress defenses to come online. It was too long with just the Phoenix Guard in the air.”

Yeijiro hadn’t missed the fact that the entire conversation had been a long string of ‘Cécile said’s. “What about you?” Yeijiro had learned that Corinne hated any trace of formality from him, so he kept his words as casual as his tone. “What were you doing in all this?”

Corinne didn’t immediately answer, draining the final drops of her beer.

Yeijiro raised a finger to one of the servers and pointed at the empty glass. “Corinne, what happened?”

Corinne sighed. “I’m not going to be able to fly for a while. My suit got…damaged in the fight.”

Corinne wasn’t any better at lying than Yeijiro. He caught the evasive shift of her eyes, the pause for breath. Something had happened more than she was telling him.

She leaned in, lowering her voice. “Turn and turn about. Care to expand on the story you gave me yesterday?”

A better Serpent would have had a lie ready, or a smooth deflection that would have changed the subject without Corinne even noticing. The best Yeijiro could do was, “I can’t talk about it.”

“Of course you can’t. Because nobody can talk about anything. It’s secrets all the way down, and I’m supposed to ignore that you just had to get to the Lord Marshal and then almost immediately after…”

“Corinne,” he said warningly, but she’d already paused, her eyebrows pulled down in a thoughtful furrow.

A server came by with another beer, which Corinne took, but told her, “You might as well bring us a whole pitcher.”

“So we’re serious about the drinking tonight,” Yeijiro said as the woman retreated.

“Was that not clear?” Corinne clinked her glass against his. “Okay, so if you can’t talk about real things, tell me this: why’d you freak out when you saw that Serpent with the legionnaires outside the Emperor’s door?”

“I hardly freaked out.”

“You absolutely freaked out. You froze like a rabbit.”

“I was surprised, is all.”

Corinne continued to stare at him, her eyes unblinking over the rim of her glass. “You’re a terrible liar,” she finally said.

“Yes, I know. And that’s…” His hands were clenched tight around his glass and Yeijiro forced them to relax, to try to hide his reaction to this entire line of conversation. “That’s the reason.”

Her eyebrows lifted and Yeijiro gave in. Might as well confess what everyone figured out eventually anyway. “I’m a terrible Serpent.” There, he’d said it out loud. The words he’d heard often enough. The words he’d thought often enough. “Bad enough I have no gifts. But I’m not good at most of the things my clan finds valuable. The future they had to offer me…it was nothing I wanted. I broke with tradition and they don’t love me for it.”

Now was when Corinne could call him selfish, or even arrogant for thinking he knew better than the clan leaders.

Instead, she nodded, like she understood. “My father has no gifts,” she said. “Which, as far as the Dragon are concerned, means you’re basically not a person. Except he wouldn’t let them ignore him. Wouldn’t let them shove him into some dark corner somewhere.”

“Well, I’m hardly your father.” Nita Girard was a genius, an akashic scholar of such importance that even Yeijiro had heard of him. “But I did want to serve in a way that would be meaningful. I wanted to do something with my life. So I joined the Imperial Marshals.”

There was more to the story, so much more. But those were Serpent secrets and not to be shared.

Corinne gave a twitch of a shrug. “So? That’s service to the Emperor. No one can have a problem with that.”

“You’re not a Serpent. Loyalty, obedience, that’s drilled into us from the moment we’re capable of understanding words. A Serpent’s first duty is to the clan. When I joined the marshals, I did it without being told. I pledged my loyalty to someone on the outside.”

Corinne rolled her eyes, clearly expressing what she thought of that.

“That Miyōshi Shō was standing outside the door meant Lord Miyōshi was inside. I didn’t want…I wasn’t ready…” He still wasn’t. After two brief conversations and a night in Tōru's bed, a part of Yeijiro still froze at the thought of an actual confrontation with the lord of his clan.

“What are you afraid of? You’re a marshal now, right? It’s not like he can do anything to you.”

It was a strange comfort to think that, as bad as Yeijiro was at politics, Corinne might be even worse. “There’s plenty he can do. If he decided he wanted to make an example of me, if he decided what I’ve done is a betrayal… He’s the Lord of the Serpent. He can do anything. No one would ever know.”

“And I thought my people were fucked up.” A pitcher of beer had been brought to the table at some point while they’d been talking. Yeijiro hadn’t even noticed. But Corinne took this opportunity to refill both their glasses. “But I get it. It’s not like I’m not terrified of my mother.”

How much of that confession was driven by the beer Corinne had consumed? “I imagine that makes things complicated.”

“Truthfully, she would have been pissed if I’d joined the marshals. Bad enough I’m on the Phoenix Guard, but at least that’s elite enough she can give it a pass. But even then she…she meddles.”

It was so clear that there was something Corinne wanted to say—that she’d wanted to say since she sat down at the table. So Yeijiro waited, giving her space. Letting his silence be its own pressure.

Corinne leaned forward, took a breath. “What do you know about—”

“Marshal Miyōshi?” A different member of the house staff, who’d made a quiet approach and sounded very apologetic for the interruption. He held out a round gold token with a moon stamped onto its face. “This is for you.”

Yeijiro looked at Corinne, who shrugged. “I didn’t do it.”

Yeijiro had never received a coin like this, but he knew what it meant. An invitation. A promise. A private room that someone had paid for. An assignation, perhaps. Except there was no one at this court—in the entire Empire—who would set something like that up with Yeijiro.

The man had backed away, waiting at a discreet distance, but Yeijiro couldn’t be sure he wasn’t still listening. “I don’t know anyone…” he trailed off, looking meaningfully at the coin.

“A secret admirer?”

Yeijiro was entirely sure he didn’t have any of those.

“A threat?” Corinne sat up straighter. “Could this have to do with…” she trailed off meaningfully.

It seemed equally unlikely. Whatever it was, he was curious. He wrapped his hand around the coin and stood.

“Let me know what happens,” Corinne said. Her eyes locked on him, intense, with the clear added message of, let me know that you’re safe.

As he followed through twisting, silk-draped halls, Yeijiro readjusted his belt, making sure his sword would be easy and quick to draw if this were an ambush. He was still on edge from his adventure and had come armed to the Golden Moon, even though he was off duty. Now he was glad of that decision.

Not that he really expected danger, but still, better to be safe.

The man opened a door and gestured for him to go in. At a glance, no one waited for him inside. The door behind him closed, leaving him alone.

Pleasure houses in Dragon territory were a different experience than the ones back on Tacitus. Decadence was high art to the Serpent, studied and perfected. The Dragon house seemed austere by comparison. Even this room, which was obviously meant to be luxurious. The bed was large and deep, but with a simple coverlet, rather the sort of thick, satin or velvety blanket you could sink into until it surrounded your whole body in a cloud of cool softness. The floor was a beautiful tile pattern, but it would be cold and hard beneath bare feet. Or knees. An artful waterfall cascaded down one wall, defying gravity in obviously nima-driven patterns. But there were no mirrors. No curtains. Nothing to bring variety or fun to the most basic element of two people looking at each other.

Yeijiro was utterly inexperienced and had spent the last few years of his life in the rigorous and basically monastic life of an Imperial Marshal in training. If he could think of better ways to design this room for seduction, then the Dragon needed some serious help.

And Yeijiro still didn’t know why he was here.

Sex was an important part of the game of the Imperial Court. It was said that Swans won their battles on the dueling field while Serpents won theirs in the bedroom, but that wasn’t true. Everyone in court fought on every front they could.

Yeijiro had never been part of those games. No one had ever invited him to play. If that was what this was—who could have summoned Yeijiro here? Other than Corinne, who at this court had even noticed Yeijiro existed?

The wall across from Yeijiro slid open, and Yeijiro’s mind froze. If it had been an assassin, he would have been dead. But it wasn’t an assassin. It was someone even more dangerous.

Yeijiro dropped to his knees and bowed to Miyōshi Tōru.

Tōru was dressed in simple black robes, but his mask was pure art. A serpent’s face looked down on Yeijiro, its scales made of tiny jewels—rubies and black sapphires, dusted with gold. Beautiful, but its lines and shape suggested the cold, deadly look of a snake ready to strike.

“Yeijiro,” Tōru said, turning his name to silk.

This was danger. This was a trap. But along with the thrill of fear running through him, Yeijiro felt a burning curiosity. Tōru had summoned him. Yeijiro wanted to know why.

Which made him bold. “Have I caused Lord Miyōshi more trouble?”

Tōru stepped forward, held out his hand. In it, he held the datastick Yeijiro had handed to the Emperor just last night. “This is yours.”

A simple thing that communicated so much. That it was Tōru, not Roderich, who had ended up with custody of the information. That in this investigation, there truly were no secrets that had been kept from him. At least, no secrets that belonged to Yeijiro.

Nothing that Roderich knew that Tōru couldn’t find out. That had been the claim.

Yeijiro took the stick, slid it into a pocket. He waited, silent.

Tōru didn’t move away. He stayed at an arm’s length. As before, all Yeijiro could see of Tōru's face was his eyes, and those eyes were studying him. What exactly were they looking for?

Yeijiro took a sharp breath as Tōru reached out again to touch his collar, running a thumb over the Miyōshi crest. “I read through all the information you gathered. I see how most of the connections were made. What I cannot figure out is how you found the trail to begin with.”

Tōru's knuckles were so close to his throat, Yeijiro could feel the warmth of Tōru's skin, but the only point of contact was the slight pull of fabric as Tōru tugged at the crest. A reminder? A warning? Something else? Yeijiro held perfectly still, hardly daring to breathe.

But he had to answer. Even if his answer was one Tōru wouldn’t like. “Nothing has changed. I still lack permission from the Lord Marshal to speak of this. Even with my lord.”

Tōru continued to trace the lines of the snake as he regarded Yeijiro. “Roderich will be pleased with your work. But he won’t understand it. All he knows is results; all he’ll see is the barest surface of what you’ve done. He won’t appreciate the beauty, the complexity of you’ve accomplished.”

How appropriate, the snake mask that Tōru wore, as Yeijiro was starting to feel hypnotized by Tōru's eyes, by his low, even, voice. “He will recognized that I protected the Emperor.”

“Is that all you want? Recognition? Glory?”

Yeijiro felt heat rise to his face. He did want those things. Recognition of his value. Acknowledgement that his service was worth something. But somehow Tōru had twisted the question to make it all sound shallow.

His blush, it seemed, was answer enough. Tōru moved on to a new question, tugging once more at Yeijiro’s crest. “Why do you wear this?”

“Because I am a Serpent.”

“A Serpent who does not serve as he was told.”

“No. That isn’t—” Yeijiro caught himself. Arguing with the Lord of his clan was unforgivable.

But Tōru's head gave an almost imperceptible tilt. A gesture more curious than angry. “Isn’t what?” he pressed.

Yeijiro hesitated, unsure how much he dared to say.

As though Tōru could read his mind, he murmured, “Speak, Yeijiro. So long as you are honest, there is nothing you need fear to say to me.”

In all Yeijiro’s imaginings, no conversation had ever gone like this. He still didn’t know what game Tōru was playing, what Tōru wanted, and it was foolish to believe he’d be able to figure it out if Tōru didn’t want him to.

Perhaps the best path, the only path, was surrender. Honesty was Yeijiro’s instinct. His curse. His foundational flaw—as had been explained to him over and over for so many years. If he was to be damned, let him be damned for the truth.

With that decision made, all his fear drained away. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, found that he was calm. When he looked up again, when he met Tōru's eyes—eyes so deep and dark he could drown in them—he was able to answer.

“My birth mother was—is—a spy. In service to Lord Oshiro. Her quite reasonable expectation was that I would be no more than a brief interruption to her career. She took excellent care of me until I turned five, and then she sent me to school.”

So far, the same story as every Serpent child would tell. “She couldn’t return to her work until after I’d been placed, of course. But I turned six, and then seven, and my adaptations never appeared. I scored poorly on a number of aptitude tests. I had…difficulties with my classmates.”

It sounded like nothing when reduced to a few brief sentences. At the time, it had been endless misery. Trapped in the boarding school, singled out for his lack of gifts, mocked and bullied for his inability to succeed at the games of subterfuge and deception that were how Serpent children figured out their pecking order.

“I stayed in primary school as long as they would have me. When I turned thirteen, they sent me home. No one had claimed me. And my mother—she had never wanted me back.

“She couldn’t apprentice me herself. Even if she’d wanted to. All that was left was to petition the clan leadership to find me a place. But to do that would have been to admit my failure and hers.”

Which she hadn’t wanted to do. Yeijiro had come by his pride honestly.

“So when I told her I wanted to go to the City of Gardens, to enroll in the Imperial School, she bought my train ticket.”

It had been the last time he’d seen her. The last time they’d spoken.

“If anyone had—” wanted me, he didn’t say. “If I’d been given a path, a position, a family, I would have done as I was told.” Yeijiro believed that. Even knowing he probably would have been miserable. “But in the absence of a place being offered, I chose one for myself. A place where my service can be valuable. But I don’t believe that changes who I am, or where I came from.”

Now that his confession was over, Yeijiro closed his eyes, preparing for whatever would come next. Tōru's anger, or rejection, or dismissal.

Tōru's response was something different. The brush of a finger down Yeijiro’s cheek. “Your face hides nothing. If you are determined to be one of them,” his voice cooled on the word, “you’ll have to learn to do better.”

Tōru's light touch, the weight of his presence, made it difficult to think. “It doesn’t matter,” Yeijiro said. “No one watches me.”

“You just saved the Emperor’s life. From here on out, everyone will be watching you.”

“Including you?”

The question had slipped out. Too personal, and embarrassingly revealing. But Yeijiro couldn’t lie to himself any better than he could to anyone else, and he couldn’t deny the power of Tōru's attention.

Tōru stepped forward, close enough his booted feet rested on either side of Yeijiro’s knees. In a low voice, he asked, “What is it you want, Yeijiro?”

That, at least, was an easy question. “To serve my lord, to serve my clan, and to serve the Emperor.”

Tōru caught Yeijiro’s chin, lifted his face to meet Tōru's eyes. “How, precisely, would you serve me?”

Yeijiro lost the understanding of how to breathe, to make words. Tōru's voice was low, suggestive, with just an edge of threat. Too much like something out of his fantasies for Yeijiro to know what to say.

Tōru's thumb stroked down Yeijiro’s cheek and Yeijiro couldn’t help but lean his head into the touch.

Tōru released him and turned, walking back towards the door he had come in. “We will speak again,” he said. Then he was gone.

Alone again, Yeijiro didn’t know what to think. Whether he’d done well, or somehow made his position worse.

And the terrifying belief that both those things might be true.