Paladins of the Pickle Goddess

I woke to a bee perched on the end of my nose. “Ah!”

I jumped even though I knew it was stupid, holding back a sneeze as the bee wandered away, drifting back to the hive. I hadn’t meant to fall asleep. I’d taken a perch at the opposite end of the room, away from Prisca- she’d started asking me about speeches, and I certainly didn’t want any part of that- and somewhere in between one moment and the next, a blink had turned into a nap.

I reached up, pressed a hand to my back as I yawned. Ugh. The ache had gotten worse. I could feel a cramp starting in my legs, one that I had only started to work out in the baths. Maybe I should have stayed at my mother’s house after all.

No: I couldn’t dwell on my pathetic physical surroundings any longer. Focus, Elysia.

I swept my eyes over the room. The guards were still positioned at the doors. They had switched out at midnight, changing for another pair that looked exhausted. Duran had curled up on the floor, guarding the beehive with his body as if he was some sort of obstacle. The bees buzzed calmly around him.

I couldn’t see Apis over the wall. Presumably he was still there, unless he’d gotten taken back to his cell during my brief nap.

In the corner, Prisca was snoring. It was an alto whistling, uneven in, steady out. Amatus had sprawled out, flat on his back. His eyes were wide open. His chest rose and fell steadily. I watched them both for a moment before I stood and ventured to peer over the wall.

There; Apis, slumped against the wall. Eyes half-closed in sleep. As I leaned over, checking on him, he opened one. “Everyone still intact?”

“Shockingly,” I said. I wiped at the lower part of my cheek. I had a faint suspicion I had been drooling in my sleep.

There was a patter and hum of rain, a late-summer squall. An even dripping in the corner meant that the famous roof was proving true to its name and leaking. We both watched it for a moment as I leaned over the half wall.

Apis broke the silence first. “A pardon,” he said. “Where did you get one of those?”

We had spent most of the previous night arguing over different ideas to break into the Spire. I realized, at Apis’s question, that we had never progressed to details about Apis’s rescue before everyone had given up and retreated to try and catch some sleep before dawn arrived.

Amatus had recommended various siege weapons. I had finally interrupted him once he’d started sketching out plans for a trebuchet on the floor.

Prisca had wanted to create a riot and break in that way. Intriguing, I thought now, but too much chance to go wrong.

Besides, neither of them saw it the way I did. I wanted to get into the Spire because I thought I could switch them to my side. If I was right, Sylvia had tricked the Voice of Teuthida just as easily as she’d tricked me. If I could prove that she was a traitor, only working for her own benefit… combined, they ran half of the city. It wouldn’t serve me well to go storming in with a trebuchet, would it?

Well. It would be efficient. I kept the trebuchet idea firmly in the maybe column.

“Elysia?” Apis said. I blinked. I had forgotten to reply.

“My mother.” He raised an eyebrow in question. I cleared my throat. “She’ll probably send someone shortly. Best to just… go along with it. She agreed to help if I would stay with her. I’ve decided to invite all of you along, as well.” When Apis left a questioning silence, I dropped my eyes to the wall and continued speaking. “She’s strange, but some of her connections might be… useful.” I could have cleared this up easily by speaking to her first. Of course, that would have required suffering through speaking to her. In retrospect, I much preferred imprisonment in a quarantine boat.

“Does she know about…” He gestured vaguely. I squinted.

“The arson? Yes.”

“No, not the arson.”

“That you’re part of the temple? She’s technically law-affiliated, but nothing prevents her-”

“Not that either.”

“That you aren’t noble? She might pretend, but we’re hardly noble either, not really. If she wants to pretend, I’ll-”

“The bees,” said Apis. “Will she take them, too?”

“Oh!”

I looked down at the hive, buzzing softly. “She’d better. I’ll tell her they’re a holy relic. She’ll brag about it at parties forever.”

I expected Apis to gasp in shock at this, but when I looked back over the wall, he was smiling instead. “Thank you,” he said.

“Save your breath. She hasn’t shown up yet. My mother’s very slippery about this kind of thing.”

“It was clearly difficult for you,” he said. “But you spoke to her, for me. Even though you could have just left me in here.” He nodded his head towards the wall. “Your apprentice even rescued my bees. That means a lot to me.”

I cleared my throat and turned away to stare at Amatus, whose eyes were still wide open. Was it dawn yet? It had to be getting close. “You’ve helped us. It was only fair.”

“Still. Thank you.”

Before I had to confront that any further, a woman strolled in. She had her face covered by a beautiful silk scarf, multiple colors picked out in bright embroidery. She was followed by two servants, both of which I vaguely recognized, and wearing a fine dress. She was also wearing a dark cloak and winter gloves.

My mother stepped over Amatus’s body without a second glance (displaying a shocking lack of self-preservation) and ignored him, even as he woke in a flash and grabbed for his sword, unsheathing it. The guards in the corner yelled, pulling out their swords as well. As my mother walked up to me, face still cloaked, Prisca woke up with a snort.

Amatus had a sword to my mother’s back. The servants that had followed her in had both raised their hands, pinned in the doorway. One guard had a crossbow up and pointed at Amatus. The other had a blade out, pointed at the servants.

There was a rustling behind me. Apis was likely ducking for cover. Below me, Duran kept sleeping soundly. His face was calm.

My mother leaned in and put both hands on my shoulders. “This,” she said, in a whisper loud enough to echo, “was not part of our deal! You never came to speak to me! Now, to be forced into a den of horrors?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said. “This is a public building. Also, that scarf is muffling your voice.”

She didn’t move it. She stepped back, towards the point of Amatus’s sword. Every weapon rustled. My mother, protected by her bubble of assumed nobility, never turned her head enough to notice.

“Don’t be ridiculous? I am not the ridiculous one! Come home at once! You will be late! To the breakfast!”

“What breakfast?”

“A little get-together I arranged.” She reached out and straightened my collar. I slapped her hand away. “To celebrate your survival. As the guest of honor, you must be there.”

“You could have told me about this. I would have planned around it.” I tried to keep my tone even as I spoke.

This was another one of my mother’s little quirks. I hadn’t run away from home as an impetuous teen. I had been well into my twenties. If you asked my mother, I had barely been a child. Certainly not capable of making decisions for myself. I closed my eyes in frustration as she began tutting again. There were only two states of being in my mother’s eyes; complete insanity and child. It seemed I had gone back to childhood again.

“You didn’t need to know. I know you get anxious about social affairs.” She darted her head back and forth. “It’s good that I got here in time, however. We simply must see to your wardrobe.”

“I won’t leave without my companions,” I said. “The pardon. Arrange for it.”

Focus. If I could get her to focus, something could still be achieved. I couldn’t let myself get distracted with the same argument I’d been having since I was seventeen.

“The pardon,” she twittered. “Hmm. It’s just very scandalous, and with you having just come back…”

“If you don’t manage to get a pardon, I’ll get myself arrested,” I said. I didn’t really have a plan for it, but it couldn’t be that hard, surely. “Then where will you be?”

The scarf across her face shifted in dissatisfaction. Behind her, Amatus made a gesture. A finger drawn across his throat. I shook my head vigorously.

My mother spoke again. “Why must you demand such a- a criminal be involved?”

“You wanted me back,” I said. “I demand him. He can be my-” I thought wildly. “My taster. For poison.”

“Your poison taster? What century do you think this is?”

“It never hurts to be too careful.”

There was a faint twanging motion as the crossbow guard adjusted her stance. My mother, noticing the sound, finally looked over her shoulder. I watched a brow twitch slightly.

One of the servants, an older man, let out something like a squeak.

“Just the pardon,” I said. “And both companions. All three of us will be very well behaved at breakfast.”

“All three of you?”

“And the hive!”

“The-”

The bees buzzed. My mother looked down, then up. “Absolutely not.”

The guard shifted the paperwork on the desk, then looked up. My mother had pulled the scarf even higher up over her eyes as the bees buzzed closer and closer, but it was hurting her instead of helping. The bees seemed to love the brightly colored flowers on her scarf and continued to follow her, landing all over her head until she had a crown to rival Andrena’s.

“Thanks for your generous donation, Lady Ferrers,” he said. “Release of the prisoner is being processed now.”

Behind us, we could hear clanking, buzzing, and muffled swearing.

The guard slipped more paper to the side and dipped his quill into an ink-pot. “Did you wish to process any more donations with the prison today?”

“No,” said my mother. “Thank you! And if you could not mention-”

“That would be an additional donation,” said the guard. He offered her a form. She looked down, then up. Her eyes narrowed.

“This is daylight robbery.”

“It’s actually bribery. Are you going to pay, or not?”

Duran yawned as my Mother muttered about prices back in her day. Amatus chimed in- supporting her opinion- and I watched as she shut her mouth so quickly her teeth clicked. She signed off on the other bribe with a swipe of the quill. A servant stepped forward and put a bag of gold on the desk with a thump.

“The rest will follow shortly,” said my Mother. “This deposit for surety.”

“Of course,” said the guard. He took the paper and ripped it into four pieces, eating them one by one. I felt my eyebrows raise, but no one else reacted to it. My mother instead turned to the door, foot tapping impatiently. “This had better be worth it.”

“I’ve never been poisoned while eating with Apis.”

“The bees are nice!”

My mother glanced towards Duran again with mild horror.

“You’re sure he isn’t yours?”

“Quite.”

Before we could investigate that any further, the door behind the desk opened, and Apis stepped out. Free again. He looked like he’d been sleeping in a ship for days, tired and rumpled and smelling of the ocean. He could probably use ten hours in the baths.

I still felt myself smiling back for a half-second before I remembered all of the work still ahead. At least something had worked.

While my smile faded as we walked out, however, his stayed beaming. “I know it must be good to leave prison,” I said, “But you should be realistic. We’ve got an impossible task ahead, and one day to do it. We have to break into the spire, force everyone to confront the realities of Sylvia’s lies- which I’m not even sure about myself- and achieve justice. Then I have to either find my husband and divorce him, or leave the city-”

“You’re not focusing on the important facts,” said Apis. Duran had walked ahead with my mother and was attempting to put the beehive into the carriage, fighting against her protests. That left us, on the steps of the prison.

“What? What facts.” I folded my arms. “If you have some clue-”

“There is a breakfast approaching,” he said, “And you’ve arranged it so I get to eat everything. I am so hungry.”

The rain was slowing. I stepped through a puddle and into the carriage as we left the prison.

One day left. I had the people. Did I have the information I needed?