The Alchemical Child

Chapter Thirteen

Sage stood before the palace and tried to expel every emotion from her body. She wriggled her toes in her socks, clenched her fingers and puffed out a breath. The silk curtains fluttered. It had snowed through the night but the palace, risen on its plinth above the pavement, was immaculate. Sage peered up at the spires, but they were lost amongst flurries and fog. When her eyes drifted back to the pillars, she saw Walter waiting for her.

"Good morning," said Sage.

The Steward inclined his head, and then they were walking once again across the palace's marble floor. Instead of an archway, Walter turned down a narrow passage that Sage hadn't noticed the day before. The white walls were lined with portraits of Council members, past and present. While all of the men were mortal, they smiled out from golden frames with golden plaques declaring their names. When Sage read Councilor L. Abbott, she averted her eyes. Like his son, Councilor Abbott smiled with his teeth.

They emerged into a small, hexagonal antechamber. On the walls either side of the door were two, full-length portraits of the late King and Queen, both draped in indigo velvet with a gold circlet on their brow. The Queen was painted with child, though she wasn't smiling, and Sage couldn't help but wonder if her flat eyes had foreseen the eventual demise of her son. On the other three walls were fine-spun tapestries; the first depicting a snake, the second an anatomical heart, and the last a key tied with ribbon. The tapestries covered their walls entirely, and the closer Sage came, the more intricacies emerged within their threading. In all her years walking through the city's Artisan District, Sage had never seen any designs more enchanting.

As Walter lifted the corner of the second tapestry, Sage had a last glimpse of the heart, tangled around in veins with a scarlet brocade. But then a frigid wind struck her hard in the face. Walter waited patiently as Sage blinked up a stone stairwell, before taking a tentative step into the shadows. She began climbing, the noises from the palace all fading apart from Walter's footsteps behind her. The stairwell curved, guiding them into a dense darkness, until a window appeared above. The palace had disoriented Sage, but as she peered through the glass, she realised they were on the far side from the city, where muddy fields and faint hills disappeared into the fog.

The stairwell kept winding higher and higher, the wind growing strong enough to rattle the windows. And then the bells rang. Sage's hands went immediately to her ears and she swore, which Walter either didn't hear or politely ignored.

"They're so loud," Sage said after the ringing had ended. Or perhaps she had shouted.

"You'll get used to it in a couple of weeks," Walter replied. "Take the door on your left."

They were standing on a landing with a tall, thin window and a door on either side. The stairwell continued upwards, but Sage was glad for the long climb to be over with. She reached for the doorknob, which felt as cool and smooth as porcelain, but Walter stopped her from turning it.

"First," he said pointedly, "one must knock."

"Right," Sage replied, blushing as she knocked clumsily on the door. It looked to be carved from a single slab of rosewood. Her knuckles stung.

"Enter as you like," the speaker beyond said with a voice so soft and solemn that Sage doubted she was welcome past the door at all. But with Walter at her back, she had nowhere to hide.

The door opened into an airy room with a beamed ceiling and more of the tall windows. It was freezing. At first, Sage thought one side of the room had no wall at all, but then she saw the sliding door which led to a wide balcony overlooking the fields. It was there that a woman sat, bare thighs on stone and feet stretched into the wind. Her golden hair was a wild tangle around her head, tossing this way and that as she pressed her gloved hands against the balustrade.