Free Lance of Earth and Sky (The Chaos Knight Book Two) by Erin Hoffman

chaos—
    And three: Oneira had not just been Justinian's second. She had loved him, and likely he her.
    * It would explain how a director would be so foolish as to insist on a female second, * Ruby said, soft with emotion, all trace of her usual cynicism gone.
    Oneira's head jerked toward him, suspicion and confusion warring on her face.
    Ruby's stone went so cold Vidarian could feel it through the leather pouch at his side. * She can hear me? * Vidarian was equally baffled. Ruby's “voice” had been pitched for him alone.
    Before he could find a way to learn what Oneira had or hadn't heard, the door behind him opened. And before he could turn to discover the mysterious fourth guest, the emperor stood, a look of total stricken astonishment on his face. So trained were his features ordinarily that it took Vidarian several moments to recognize the expression for what it was: awe.
    Remembering himself, Vidarian stood, and turned toward the door.
    It was Calphille. But what a spell Renard had cast over her! The gown was green and black silk, tightly laced in the latest fashion, its shimmering skirts floating on voluminous petticoats. Her hair, which had been dark as shadowed leaves, now had a luster that took it from rich pine to spring bud, accented by tiny jeweled flowers that winked red and gold in the candlelight. The gown bared her shoulders, showing the chocolate smoothness of her skin dramatically, and powdered gold dust brought out the rich amber of her eyes. But eclipsing all of this was her wildness, which no cosseting could mask. If you were to wrap a tiger in finest silk, you would not notice the drape of the fabric; this was how Calphille shone through the countess's finery.
    The emperor had shaken off his reverie, and now crossed the floor quickly to offer Calphille his arm. Her eyes widened as he approached, but Renard must have also briefly schooled her in etiquette, for she dropped a graceful curtsey that spoke more of a doe in flight than a courtier. As he walked her to her chair, the emperor's eyes never left her, nor indeed when he took his own place opposite her.
    * He's smitten! * Ruby chirped, all of her sullenness lifted like evaporating fog. Vidarian hardly dared breathe; his obligation to Ruby, their macabre task, weighed all too heavily on his mind, and her long silences punctuated by dark moods he attributed solely to his failure thus far. But he could feel her attention now, oddly joyous, utterly on the emperor and Calphille—who, for her part, seemed equally in the emperor's thrall. She might drop her eyes demurely, but whenever the emperor spoke, her whole body oriented toward him like a leaf toward sunlight. * An intriguing development! *
    Again, when Ruby spoke, Oneira looked around surreptitiously, a crease of confusion subtle between her eyebrows. There was no doubt in Vidarian's mind that she could hear Ruby—but why, or what it meant, he had no idea. She, too, seemed intrigued with the energy that crackled between Calphille and the emperor, and, to Vidarian's intense relief, utterly without jealousy. He could feel the iron claws of court politics closing around them: the emperor and Calphille, transfixed with each other, while Vidarian, Oneira—and Ruby!—thought only of what this new power dynamic would do to their own schemes.
    More liveried servants entered the dining room, bearing glass cylinders of a frothy exotic fruit aperitif that did little to wash the unpleasant taste of politics from his tongue. Delicate cakes of fried shredded root vegetable followed, swimming in a pale cream redolent with far island spice. Though Vidarian prided himself on esoteric knowledge of foodstuffs from across the five seas, he could recognize only the basics of what came before them.
    Over a larger plate of poached tigerfish with tiny succulent tomatoes and an exquisite brown-butter eldergrass sauté, the emperor at last yielded Vidarian a polite opening. “In these strange times, I can only summon