Page 28

"How exactly?"

"You aren't sneaking in early this time! The city will be under siege, and Con is there. That insufferable idiota is going to die in his attempt to save it," Phaidros said with a sound of derision. "You are only going to try to stop him, and I can't let you do it alone because he will no doubt convince you of something even more idiotic, and you will both die."

Alexis was quiet because Phaidros had hit on the thing he feared would happen when he got to Constantinople. Saying no to Con wasn't something he had ever been good at.

"It's not Con I worry about," Phaidros went on. "Con can take care of his own death. He will pick it the way he picks horses, with bad judgment and great enthusiasm. I worry about what you will do when you try to stop him."

Alexis went back to the chart. He smoothed the parchment with the side of his hand and thought about the ways they could get in undetected.

Phaidros moved beside him. "Whatever we do, we have to make sure no one tells Aelia."

"Phaidros, you can't ask me to keep this from her."

"I'm not asking. I'm telling you." Phaidros met his eyes. "If Aelia hears Con is in that city, she will be there by the end of the week. You know that. She would arrive in good faith, ask Con to leave with her, and Con would refuse. She would in turn refuse to leave him, and we would have two of them in the wreckage instead of one. I'm not bringing her into this."

Alexis rubbed at the back of his neck. "If she went about kidnapping to get him out, he would never forget it or forgive her, and I can't be responsible for that."

"If anyone will blab to her, it will be Zo," Phaidros pointed out.

Alexis paused. "Zo won't be happy about it, but he won't tell her for the same reason he won't come with us. He won't cross Con and will trust that he is strong enough not to die when the city does."

Phaidros's mouth turned at the corner, half affection, half resignation.

"Exactly, which is why I will go. Con's particular brand of charm has never worked on me. I might be able to convince you not to follow Con's madness, but I won't be able to do that with all three of you."

They stood with the chart between them. Outside, the fog was lifting off the canal, slow as breath, and the dawn was starting to break.

"Fine. I'll take you with me," Alexis relented.

"Va bene," Phaidros said, clapping his hands together. "I'll go and pack. What boat are we taking?"

"The Hésperos." The evening. She was one of many boats Alexis had built with his own hands, and the second he had named for a part of the day. He liked the symmetry.

"You finished her?"

"Last month."

"Suspiciously good timing, Defender." Phaidros gave him an unimpressed look. "And you wonder why I have to come with you to stop you from doing something stupid. Do you actually have a plan on how you are going to convince Con to leave with us?"

"Not exactly, but I know I need to try," Alexis said, folding his arms. "I'll have you knock him out, and I'll lock him in one of Arslan's cells if I have to. He can cool off in there until it's over, and he can't go down in a blaze of misplaced glory."

"Cazzo," Phaidros said softly. "All right, but you do know that his glory has always been misplaced, and it hasn't stopped him before."

Alexis's lips twitched. "I'm aware."

"All right." Phaidros lifted a hand from the doorframe. "I'll go and pack. You can break the news to Zo, because I'm not drunk enough to deal with that."

He went down the stairs, humming a new tune under his breath.

Alexis stood at the worktable for a long moment before he stuffed Con's letter into his pocket and went to find Zo.

* * *

Zo was in the kitchen up to his elbows in dough, with a bottle of red wine open on the counter beside a half-eaten pomegranate. The kitchen smelled of yeast, rosemary, and the salt of the lagoon coming in through the cracked-open window.

Zo looked up. He was wearing the apron with the burned-through pocket he refused to let anyone replace, and his sleeves were pushed up over forearms that had thrown bread for thousands of years.

"You finally read Con's letter?" he asked.