Havenfall

by Sara Holland

  That’s not precisely what I said, but I’m not about to argue. The delegates are listening to the Prince in a way they didn’t listen to me.

  “If anyone else attempts to go through the doorways, they will be arrested,” he says. “My soldiers and I are working with Madeline Morrow to close the Solarian door. Rest assured that you will be protected in the meantime.”

  He takes a step back, putting me at the forefront, exposed before the crowd. I feel so small, young, weak, but the Silver Prince continues.

  “It bears repeating that you will all consider Madeline Morrow vested with the full duty and authority of the Innkeeper. She is the Innkeeper.”

  The gaze of the crowd turns to me in the dark of the tunnel. I stand up straight and take it, but my eyes prickle with tears.

  It’s what I always wanted to hear.

  And it feels completely and utterly hollow.

  17

  The rising moon shines through Marcus’s window, the windowpanes casting cross-shaped shadows on the hardwood floor. The lamp on the bedside table seems dim and paltry by comparison. The mountains outside seem alien, cast in silver, like something out of a black-and-white photo. Marcus looks the same as he did this morning, his breathing shallow and quiet. But now, instead of Graylin, his visitors are me and the Silver Prince.

  An hour has passed since the chaos in the tunnels. The staff and the delegates—at least the delegates that didn’t flee to Fiordenkill—are in their rooms, kept there by a curfew the Prince laid down. Leftover adrenaline still trickles in my veins, making my heart race and my limbs ache to jump, to move, to do something.

  I’m aware of the Prince like I would be of a live wire in the room. He’s been sitting quietly with me, waiting for me to be ready to talk, but I don’t know how I can. I’m grateful that he stepped in earlier, I guess, or all the Fiorden delegates would have fled instead of just a third of them.

  I couldn’t have stopped them. I know that. But I feel … diminished somehow, after seeing the Silver Prince step up and take charge. Yet I don’t feel any safer. It would be crazy of me to think of the Prince’s actions as a power grab … but I can’t help feeling that way. Taya’s words from when she found out about the realms bounce around in my head. What if he was wrong? Or lying?

  I guess at the end of the day I don’t. But I do know that I need the Silver Prince on my side. Alone, I have no strength. No power.

  “Have you ever seen someone recover their soul after a Solarian attack?” I ask, gesturing at Marcus’s almost-still form.

  The Silver Prince shakes his head. “It’s strange. In all the other cases I’ve seen, the victims have either recovered by now or …” He trails off tactfully.

  “He’ll wake up soon,” I say, the words slipping out in my exhaustion like a fevered prayer. “He’s the Innkeeper, not me.”

  Because I need you … and I have questions.

  The Silver Prince looks questioningly at me. On edge as I am, it catches me off guard, and I blurt, “What is it?”

  He speaks slowly, measured, weighing each word carefully. “I had imagined you might aspire to the role yourself, permanently. Was I mistaken?”

  My cheeks burn with a mixture of shame and hurt. If this were a fairy tale, maybe my not-so-secret ambition to be Innkeeper could have sent Marcus into his sleep. But this isn’t a fairy tale, and I always thought Marcus meant for me to take his place someday.

  “Not now,” I say firmly. “And not like this. Not for years, not until he wanted to retire.”

  My stomach churns as I remember what the Heiress told me, about Marcus’s involvement in the magic black market. Why didn’t he tell me? Was it because he didn’t trust me, or because there were things he didn’t want me to know? Or both?

  “Even so …” The Prince’s words are quiet, but each one still lands heavy in the almost-silent room. “I think you’re underestimating yourself, Maddie. I think you could be a great Innkeeper. Maybe more than Marcus ever was.”

  A harsh bark of laughter escapes me. It’s loud and makes me flinch, and I press a hand to my mouth, but of course Marcus doesn’t stir.

  “Better than him?” I whisper incredulously, when I have control of my voice again. “I’ve been in charge for less than a week and everything’s falling apart.”

  “Because of decisions that he made.” The Prince’s glittering eyes cut to Marcus. “He built a tower on sand. That it has now started to fall is no fault of yours.”

  A trickle of cold goes down my spine, mirroring the edge of a chill that’s suddenly appeared in the Silver Prince’s voice.

  “What do you mean?”

  The Silver Prince turns on his chair to fully face me. The light of the lamp doesn’t seem to reach him; the moon reflects off his silvery skin and hair, catches the slight scale pattern ridging his cheeks.

  “You love the inn for what it is, not for how it can profit you,” he says. “The magic, the possibilities, the doorways. This life has been cruel to you, and so you take comfort in the knowledge that other life is there, even if you cannot access it. Byrnisians are much the same.”

  Something in his voice is sharp, like a razor floating in honey.

  “Marcus feels the same way,” I tell the Prince, defensive.

  “Possibly,” he replies, eyes steady on mine over the bed and Marcus’s form. “But you must know that he is not practical like you. He looks for good where there is none. He used to believe the Solarians could be redeemed. Even when it risked the peace of the Adjacent Realms. Even when it put his family in harm’s way.”

  I don’t understand what the Silver Prince is trying to tell me. I’ve never heard of Marcus looking kindly on Solarians. Why would he, after what happened to Mom and Nate?

  “What do you mean, his family?”

  “I mean the attack on your mother and brother,” the Silver Prince says, softly surprised. He looks down at Marcus, and now his eyes are cold. “Everyone knows it happened because your uncle invited a Solarian into the home. He tried to shelter it, and it killed your brother.”

  My blood is icy water in my veins, and my voice comes out a hoarse whisper. “Where did you hear that?”

  The Silver Prince dips his head, his eyes cutting to my uncle’s pale, blank face.

  The ice water turns to ice itself. I can’t move, I can’t think. For an instant, I’m in the cupboard again, Nate’s scream searing into me and leaving a burning brand on my heart. Then—

  “You’re wrong,” I choke out.

  Sympathy looks odd on the Silver Prince’s face, unnatural. “Maddie, I’m sorry. I thought you knew—”

  “I need to be alone right now,” I say.

  I instantly regret it. The Prince is the most powerful person here, possibly the only person keeping us from total chaos, and I need him. But he doesn’t appear angry. He doesn’t move either.

  I feel sick, feel emptied out as I stare down at Marcus. Even in sleep, his face is so familiar, so safe. Every summer, he’s come to pick me up at the crossroads, and when I saw him through the bus window and watched the smile break out over his face, that’s when I knew I was safe, I was home.

  He is compassionate; he’s always thinking of others first. Is it possible that what the Silver Prince is telling me is true, and that his boundless kindness extended even to Solarians, the monsters who killed my brother?

  There was the sound of breaking glass. There were a million shards sparkling on the linoleum kitchen floor. But thinking back now, I can’t remember if I heard the window break before Mom shoved me into the cupboard, when we were still just a normal family baking brownies, happy and together, or after, when the monster dragged Nate’s body through and into the night.

  Could Marcus have let a Solarian in?

  We were his family, Mom, Nate, Graylin, and me. We were supposed to come first.

  But now Nate is dead and Mom is locked away from me forever, and he’s wasting away, and there’s a monster out there in the woods. If the Prince is telling
the truth, Marcus’s foolish kindness has already demolished half our family, and might finish me and Graylin off any day now.

  How could he have let the monster in?

  “I’ll leave you be,” the Silver Prince says, snapping me back to the present. His voice is calm as a frozen landscape, without a touch of anger. “When you’re ready, come find me. We need to address the defection of the Fiorden delegates.”

  “What can we do about it?” I ask, my voice raw. “They’re gone.”

  “Exactly, and there must be repercussions.” His voice turns over from authoritative to gentle again. “This is the second time the Fiordens have betrayed Havenfall. Remember Brekken.”

  “I remember,” I say, because I don’t want to hear more about Brekken from the Prince. I know he thought he was acting for a good cause, stealing my keys to investigate Marcus’s involvement in the magic black market, but it still stings fiercely that he didn’t tell me. That he didn’t trust me. That he left me.

  “We all want to believe the best of intentions in others,” the Prince says. Sitting still as a statue, casting a shadow even taller and thinner than he is, he seems older, more the eerie, powerful magical being he is. “But it’s not always the truth.”

  Even if he doesn’t know Brekken’s real motivations, he’s not wrong about me. I trust too easily, too soon, and now that flaw has put in danger not only me, but the whole inn and everyone in it. I feel frozen.

  “What should we do?”

  The Silver Prince’s lips pull up in a small, regretful smile of acknowledgment. “Fiordenkill must face sanctions,” he says. “They’ve disturbed the balance of the doorways, and the Solarian door has opened wider. My elemental soldiers have it blocked off with a barricade of iron, but if more Solarians come through, even that may not hold.” He leans forward, elbows on his knees, seeming to see straight into my soul. “So what do you think is an appropriate price for the danger they have put us all in, Innkeeper?”

  I close my eyes, trying to think. “There’s not much I can do. I can’t prohibit entry back into Havenfall or cut off trade. Not as long as they’re part of the alliance in the Accords.”

  “Alliances can be changed.” He speaks quietly, but every word is clear on the still air. “Treaties can be changed.”

  For a second, my heart seems to stop in my chest. “Cut Fiordenkill out? But the Three-Realm Alliance has stood for a hundred years.”

  “A hundred years is not so very long a time to some of us,” the Prince says. “And what else can we do? Would you bring back the executions, which your great-great-grandmother used to impose upon traitors?”

  My breath catches in my throat. I didn’t know my ancestors had killed people. I have a sudden vision of standing on the lawn with a sword in my hand, someone with copper penny hair kneeling before me with their head down, and my heart lurches so violently I have to lean forward and put my head in my hands for a second.

  “I need time to think.”

  He glides to his feet and to the door. “Time is scarce, Innkeeper.”

  A shudder of mixed thrill and disgust goes through me at the word. “I will get you an answer soon. I swear.”

  “Very well,” he says. But his eyes stay on me. “Don’t doubt yourself, Maddie. You have what Marcus doesn’t. You’re strong enough to make hard choices in service of a greater good.”

  Then he’s gone.

  I want to cry, but I can’t. The tears aren’t there, and they won’t come. It’s like someone’s scooped my insides out and left me empty except for dust and echoes.

  I sit hunched over with my face in my hands, still except for my slowly beating heart and breathing that hurts with each inhale. That’s how Graylin finds me when he walks in, yawning, a few minutes later.

  Graylin stops for a second when he sees me. Then his shoulders loosen, and he comes over and sits by Marcus. Graylin was supposed to be taking a nap, but he doesn’t look very well rested.

  “How is he?” Graylin asks, running his fingers over the back of Marcus’s hand. The words, though, sound moot, not something he expects an answer to.

  I can’t tell him what the Prince said about Marcus fostering Solarians. Not when Marcus isn’t awake to explain his side of the story. Graylin is already carrying so much; I can’t put this on him too.

  My voice comes out croaky. “He’s not getting any better.”

  A silence.

  “No, he isn’t,” Graylin says at length. “At least, not that I can see.”

  “Isn’t there anything else we can do?” I ask desperately. Of course I want Marcus to get better. But I also need answers. About the silver trade. About Solarians and my mother and Nate. And Marcus has those answers. He must.

  “If there was, I would have done it already.” Graylin’s voice is a mirror of how I feel. Brittle, like the slightest blow could break us entirely.

  When I shift in my chair, my spine makes a muffled crack. My muscles ache. I feel old, and that makes me think of the Heiress again. I still need to ask her why my mother’s name appears on Marcus’s list of HOSTS. I think about the magical objects in the Heiress’s room, the rows of gleaming silver things marching over her desk like ants, and the ledger with the tightly scrawled descriptions of the magic each one had. Magic like healing.

  I reach into my pocket and my fingertips meet cool, smooth metal. I pull out the silver dish I took from the Heiress’s room and hold it up for Graylin to see. The one with the inlaid gold symbol of two snakes wound around a winged staff. I googled the symbol yesterday—it’s a caduceus, something to do with Asclepius, the ancient Greek god of medicine. Maybe the Fiordens have their own versions of our myths, or maybe our ancient stories have permeated all the realms. Maybe they made their way to us from another world long ago.

  But however the symbol of medicine came to be stamped on this hunk of silver, it can only be a good thing, right? The dish looks almost ordinary, except for the faint glow that seems to rise off the metal, visible only now that it’s dark. I still don’t understand how it’s possible for magic to live in such a mundane object. But why not try it? It’s not like things can get much worse.

  Graylin looks at it and blinks. He straightens, like he’s coming fully awake. He sees the glow too.

  “What is it?”

  “Um … Brekken gave it to me a long time ago,” I improvise. “He said it had Fiorden healing magic.” If I can’t protect anyone from real danger, at least I can shield Graylin from this whole tangled mess a little longer. Let him focus on healing my uncle so we can learn the actual truth.

  Graylin breathes in sharply when I put the dish in his outstretched hand. He holds it up to the lamplight, turning it this way and that, looking for I don’t know what.

  “Well?” I ask.

  Graylin’s brow furrows. “I don’t understand this,” he says, half to himself. When he looks back at me, there’s something wary in his gaze. “You said Brekken gave this to you?”

  I nod, hoping he doesn’t see the lie on my face. Marcus would, but Graylin’s always let me get away with more. Saliva pools in my mouth but I make myself not swallow.

  “The magic is there. I can feel it.”

  Graylin turns the dish over and over, and I catch quick slashes of reflection in it—the dim lamplight, Graylin’s brown face, guilt in my own eyes. “But I don’t understand how it was bound here. It feels … alive.”

  I shrug, careful to keep my face expressionless. “Who knows. But do you think you can use it?”

  “I can, but the question is whether I should.” Graylin lets his hand drop and looks hard at me. “Maddie, Brekken betrayed us. You know that.”

  No, he didn’t, I want to say.

  Marcus did.

  I can’t meet Graylin’s eyes, so I look down at my hands instead, fidgeting against my jeans. “I know. But if there was something wrong with the magic, couldn’t you feel it?”

  “Maybe.” His voice frays, agitation creeping in. “But I don’t know where this cam
e from. I don’t know anything anymore. I thought I could heal Marcus myself and look what’s happened—”

  His voice cracks, and he falls silent, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath. I can’t seem to breathe as I watch him try to collect himself.

  There’s a very specific kind of splintering feeling that comes with seeing the people you trust fall short or fall apart. They are the ones who are supposed to take care of you. I’ve felt it twice in a major way, with Mom and with Marcus, and a hundred lesser times, whenever Dad was too tired to see that something was wrong, or my teachers ignored the ugly chants that followed me around the playground. I know it’s not Graylin’s fault; I can’t expect him to stay calm and collected when his husband won’t wake. But I still feel very alone in this moment.

  After a long time, Graylin speaks. “I’ll try to use this magic.” He closes his fingers around the dish, his eyes flickering between it and Marcus. “But no promises.”

  “Of course.”

  Suddenly, a new wave of exhaustion rolls over me, stronger than any of the ones before. If I stay here any longer, I’ll keel over in my chair, and I won’t be any use to Marcus then. Not that I am now, but still. I stand.

  “Get some sleep,” Graylin tells me as I head for the door. “It’ll be okay.”

  But he doesn’t sound convinced.

  I’m walking back to my room when I catch a glimpse, out of the corner of my eye, of movement outside the window. Instinctively, I freeze, then inch closer, keeping to the side of the frame so that if whoever—or whatever—is on the lawn decides to look up, they won’t see me.

  My heart contracts when I see a familiar small figure skirting the trees, her pale hair shining in the moonlight. Taya. She looks over her shoulder every few seconds, and sticks to the shadow of the trees, like she doesn’t want to be seen. She has some kind of tool or weapon in one hand, but I can’t make it out at this distance.

  Hot anger curls suddenly through my insides. She knows the Solarian is on the loose. It’s already attacked her. She saw what happened to Max. So what is she doing? Without wanting to, I imagine her lying in the infirmary, bandaged and unresponsive.