The Invasion of the Tearling

by Erika Johansen

  “Evelyn,” the girl murmured. “You’re Evelyn Raleigh. And I am sorry.”

  The Queen of Mortmesne closed her eyes.

  When Aisa and the other guards entered the Queen’s Wing, they found the rest of the Guard standing at attention. Even the night shift, who were now well past their bedtimes, had not retired. Bradshaw, the magician, was leaning against the wall, idly making a scarf vanish and then reappear. Maman was there too; Aisa spotted her standing at attention at the mouth of the hallway, as she always did while waiting for the Queen to come home. The sight of her made Aisa want to cry.

  The Mace stomped over to the dais, the grim cast of his face forestalling all questions. Aisa followed him, as quickly as she dared, keeping her hand on her knife. It was ridiculous, a twelve-year-old girl guarding the Mace, but the Queen had charged her to do so, and Aisa would never forget that moment, not if she lived a hundred years. Elston had taken the Queen’s charge seriously as well; he followed the Mace closely, alert for threats, and when he spotted Aisa doing the same, he gave her a jagged, approving grin. Pen was no help; he wandered behind the Mace as though lost. He had not wept, as Aisa would have expected a lovesick man to do. But he was not with them either.

  It was Wellmer who finally dared to ask, “Where’s the Queen?”

  “Gone.”

  “Dead?”

  The Mace searched the room until he found Maman at the entrance to the hallway. She shook her head.

  “Not dead,” the Mace replied. “Just gone.”

  Arliss was waiting at the foot of the dais. As the Mace approached, Arliss handed him a sheet of paper, and waited while the Mace read. Even when the Mace looked up at him with murderous eyes, Arliss did not flinch.

  “You knew.”

  Arliss nodded.

  “Why the hell—”

  “I don’t work for you, Mr. Mace. I serve the Queen. On her orders, nearly a hundred copies have already gone out. The thing’s done; you’re the Regent.”

  “Ah, God.” The Mace dropped the piece of paper and sat down on the third step of the dais, burying his head in his hands.

  “What will they do to her?” Wellmer asked.

  “They’ll take her to Demesne.”

  The voice was unfamiliar; Aisa whipped around, drawing her knife. Five hooded men stood in a group, just inside the closed doors of the Queen’s Wing.

  The Mace pulled his head from his hands, his keen eyes fixing on the leader. “Kibb! How did these men get into the wing?”

  Kibb splayed his hands. “I swear, sir, we shut the doors behind you.”

  The Mace nodded, returning his attention to the speaker. “I know your voice, rascal. So you do walk through walls, as the stories tell.”

  “We both do.” The leader shook back his hood, revealing a pleasing, dark-haired face and a tan that spoke of the south. “She’s valuable. The Red Queen won’t kill her.”

  Aisa wondered how the stranger could be so certain. What value could Queen Kelsea have to the Mort? They could ask for ransom, certainly, but what ransom? Maman said the Tear was poor in everything but people and lumber, but the Mort had their own forests, and the Queen would never agree to a trade for people.

  “It would be a smart move to kill the Queen,” the Mace replied. “Leave the Tear without an heir and throw us into chaos.”

  “All the same, she will not.”

  The Mace stared at the speaker for a long moment, his eyes measuring. Then he popped to his feet. “Then we need to start today.”

  The stranger smiled, and it transformed his face from merely pleasant to handsome. “You need people in the capital. I have many. You will have all the help I can give you.”

  Aisa peeked at the rest of the Guard and was shocked to see Pen smiling, though his eyes were filled with tears.

  “We need to get a message to Galen and Dyer in Demesne. And Kibb!” Mace shouted across the room. “You get down into the Wells and find that baker’s boy. Nick. Time to call in that favor.”

  Kibb nodded, a small smile creasing his face. “Going to be an undertaking, sir. You’re the Regent now.”

  “I can do both.”

  “Sir?” Ewen had stepped forward, his friendly face bewildered and his cheeks wet with tears. Aisa’s heart seemed to contract for him. Everyone knew that Ewen worshipped the Queen, and it seemed likely that he did not understand what had happened.

  “What is it, Ewen?” the Mace asked, his voice betraying only the slightest touch of impatience.

  “What are we going to do, sir?” Ewen asked, and Aisa saw that she had been wrong: he did understand.

  The Mace descended the dais, clapping Ewen gently on the back. “We’re going to do the only thing we can do. We’re going to get her back.”

  I’m sorry,” Kelsea repeated. She could feel that terrible side of herself, hovering, gleeful, waiting to be unleashed on the woman who stood before her. A different Kelsea, that one, a Kelsea who saw death as the most complete and effective solution to all problems.

  She expected the Red Queen to fall to her knees, but she did not, and a moment later Kelsea realized that this was a woman who would never beg. It was easy to see, to browse through the woman’s life in much the same way she browsed through Lily’s, to see patterns forming. Evelyn Raleigh, the child, had begged, and it had gained her nothing. The woman would never beg again. Many memories sailed through Kelsea’s mind: playing with a set of toy soldiers on the ruined flagstones of a floor; staring with longing at the blue pendulum of a jewel as it rested on a woman’s chest; watching from behind a curtain as well-dressed men and women danced in a room that Kelsea recognized easily as her own audience chamber. Evelyn Raleigh had been desperate to be noticed, to matter to others . . . but in all of those childhood memories, she was alone.

  It was the adult memories that Kelsea shrank from. In fragments and pieces, she saw a terrible story: how the disfavored child had risen from obscurity into her own conception of greatness, channeling all of that hurt and disappointment into authoritarianism. Row Finn had helped her, taught her to do her own form of magic, but Kelsea also sensed an innate emptiness in the grown woman before her, a certainty that an accident of birth had deprived her of greater opportunities, and the loss of the sapphires was a particular sore spot. There was a portrait there, too, in the jumble, and though Kelsea glimpsed it for only a moment, she recognized Lily with no difficulty at all. The Red Queen didn’t know Lily from Adam, but she felt a deep connection to her, all the same, and now Kelsea saw that Thorne and Row Finn had only been partly correct. The Red Queen did wish for immortality, but she did not need to live forever. She did not fear death. She only wanted to be invulnerable, to decide her own destiny without being subject to the whims of others. The child, Evelyn, had enjoyed no control over her own life. The Red Queen was determined to control it all.

  Kelsea took a step back, trying to disengage from this. A greater understanding of others was always valuable, so Carlin said, but understanding the Red Queen would not make the task at hand any easier. For the first time in several weeks Kelsea thought of Mhurn, whom she had effectively anesthetized before his execution. She had no drugs for the Red Queen, but she could at least make it a quick death, not the protracted nightmare she had inflicted on Thorne.

  But even as Kelsea tried to pull away, she caught and held on a memory: the young Evelyn, perhaps only eleven or twelve, standing in front of a mirror. This memory was closely guarded, so closely that when Kelsea began to examine it, the Red Queen’s entire body jerked in refusal, and she leapt at Kelsea, her hands hooked into claws. She went right for the sapphires, but Kelsea ducked and shoved her away. The Red Queen flew across the room, bouncing with a hiss off the wall of the tent. Kelsea followed her, still digging, for she sensed the pain that surrounded the memory, exacerbating it, like a wound that had never been cleaned. Evelyn stood in front of a mirror, staring at herself, in the throes of a terrible revelation:

  I will never be beautiful.

  Ke
lsea recoiled, feeling as though she’d been bitten, slapping the memory away from her as though it were a pernicious insect. But Evelyn’s pain did not go easily; Kelsea felt as though it had embedded hooks in her mind. The woman in front of her was beautiful, as beautiful as Kelsea was now . . . but she had created that beauty, cobbled it together somehow, just as Kelsea had. Deep down, the plain girl still reigned supreme; the Red Queen had never been able to outdistance her, to leave her behind, and in this, Kelsea saw a terrible phantom outline of her own future.

  The Red Queen was leaning against the wall of the tent now, her breathing labored. But she looked up at Kelsea with furious eyes. “Get out. You have no right.”

  Kelsea withdrew, disengaging from the woman’s mind. The Red Queen sagged to the ground, huddling there, her arms wrapped around her knees. Kelsea wanted to apologize, for she saw, now, the great ugliness of what she had done. But the Red Queen had closed her eyes, dismissing Kelsea somehow; the clear certainty that she would die had permeated the woman’s thoughts, calming the tides that lapped there. The Red Queen had lived a long and terrible life, defined by her own casual brutality, and it would be easy, so easy, to dismiss the child who wandered inside her. The dark side of Kelsea wanted to ignore that child; murder hovered in her mind, ravenous, like a dog straining to be let from the leash. But Kelsea paused, suddenly confronted by a nuance she had never considered. The woman in front of her deserved heavy punishment for the acts she had committed, the terror she had inflicted on the world. But the child Evelyn was not responsible for what had been done to her, and the experiences of the child had forever shaped the woman. Kelsea’s mind clamored, hectoring, demanding that she do something, that she act. But still she hesitated, staring at the crouching woman before her.

  The problems of the past. Her own voice echoed in her mind, and Kelsea wished Mace were there, for she felt that she could finally explain this particular conundrum, present him with a concrete example of how the problems of the past, uncorrected, inevitably became the problems of the future.

  I can’t kill her, Kelsea realized. An army surrounded them, an army that would enter New London and lay it waste. This was Kelsea’s only option, her only chance . . . but she could not bring herself to do the act. Compassion had ruined everything.

  “Open your eyes,” Kelsea commanded, and as she spoke the words, she felt the dark shadow inside her crumple and limp away, its wings tattered. It might circle her mind forever, seeking advantage, but at that moment, Kelsea knew that it would never control her again.

  The Red Queen opened her eyes, and the rage Kelsea saw there made her flinch. She had intruded where she had no right to be, and this woman would always hate her for what she had discovered there. Again Kelsea considered apologizing, but the memory of William Tear intruded.

  The main prize!

  “I propose a trade. I will give you my sapphires.”

  “In exchange for what?” After a moment of initial surprise, the Red Queen’s face smoothed over, and Kelsea felt unwilling admiration. So she, too, had the power to wipe away the past when it served no purpose, when it would only be a distraction. Kelsea would earn no points for sparing the Red Queen’s life, that expression said; this woman would drive a hard bargain.

  “Autonomy for the Tear.”

  The Queen chuckled, but sobered quickly when she saw Kelsea’s expression. “You are serious?”

  “Yes. I will give you the necklaces, take them off willingly, and you will withdraw your army and not return for five years. During this time, you will not place one toe in my kingdom. You will demand nothing. You will leave my people alone.”

  “Five years’ worth of lost profits from the shipment? You must be out of your mind.”

  But beneath the smooth face of the hard bargainer, Kelsea read a different story. Here, at least, Thorne and Finn had been right: the Red Queen wanted the jewels very badly.

  “I promise you, if you refuse to trade with me, you will never have my sapphires. I may rot and wither to nothing, and you will still never be able to take them off me without facing the consequences. They belong to me.”

  “Five years is too long.”

  “Majesty!” Ducarte blurted out. Kelsea had forgotten he was there, crouched in the far corner of the tent. “You cannot!”

  “Shut up, Benin.”

  “Majesty, I will not.” Ducarte stood up, and Kelsea saw that he too was furious . . . but not with her. “The army has been incredibly patient with the lack of plunder, but it cannot last forever. New London is their reward, poorly defended, full of women and children. They have earned that.”

  “You’ll get your ten percent, Benin. I’ll pay you out of my own pocket.”

  Ducarte shook his head. “You will, Majesty, but that will not solve the issue. The army is already angry. To be withdrawn at the moment of victory—”

  Kelsea was on the point of silencing him; she did not need his interference, not when she sensed her opponent weakening. But there was no need. The Red Queen turned to him and Ducarte blanched, falling silent.

  “You think my army would defy me, Benin?”

  “No, Majesty, no,” Ducarte backpedaled. “But they are already discontented. Poor morale makes poor soldiers, this is established.”

  “They will tamp down their discontent, if they know what’s good for them.” The Red Queen turned back to Kelsea, her eyes gleaming, dark pupils flicking between Kelsea’s face and the sapphires. “Two years.”

  “You must not want them very badly.”

  “Five years is too long,” the Red Queen repeated, a hint of sullenness in her voice. “Three years.”

  “Done.” Kelsea held the jewels out, but kept the chains around her neck. “Take hold of them.”

  The Red Queen eyed her warily. “Why?”

  “It’s a trick I learned from our mutual friend.” Kelsea smiled at her. “I need to make sure you won’t back out of the deal.”

  The Red Queen’s eyes widened, suddenly fearful, and Kelsea saw that she had meant to do exactly that. Ah, she was smart, this woman, clever enough to drive a hard bargain on a promise she meant to break.

  “I know you now, Evelyn. Three years, that’s the honest bargain.” Kelsea lifted the sapphires, offering them. “Promise to leave my kingdom alone.”

  The Red Queen took the sapphires on her palm, and Kelsea was relieved to see a myriad of conflicting emotions cross her face: lust, anger, anxiety, regret. She knew about Row Finn, then. Perhaps she had even seen his real face.

  “Majesty!” Ducarte hissed. “Do not!”

  The Red Queen’s face twisted, and a moment later Ducarte was curled in a fetal position, moaning, on the floor. The woman’s eyes were fixed on the sapphires now, and when Kelsea hunted for her pulse, she found it ratcheted sky-high. Lust had overtaken judgment. The Red Queen paused, clearly framing her words before she spoke.

  “If you give me both Tear sapphires, freely, of your own will, I swear to remove my army from the Tearling, and to refrain from interfering with the Tearling for the next three years.”

  Kelsea smiled, feeling tears spill down her cheeks.

  “You leak like a faucet,” the Red Queen snapped. “Give me the jewels.”

  Three years, Kelsea thought. They were safe now, all of them, from the farmers in the Almont to Andalie’s children in the Keep, safe in Mace’s good hands, and that knowledge allowed Kelsea to reach up and pull the chains over her head. She expected the necklaces to fight her hand, or inflict some terrible physical punishment when she tried to remove them, but they came off easily, and when the Red Queen snatched them away, Kelsea felt almost nothing . . . only a small pang for Lily, for the end of Lily’s story that she would never see. But even that loss was drowned under the great gain of this moment. Three years was a lifetime.

  The Red Queen put on both necklaces and then turned away, huddling over the sapphires like a miser with his gold. It occurred to Kelsea in that moment that she might escape; Ducarte was still incapac
itated, and she could duck out of the tent, perhaps take them all by surprise. But no, the jewels were lost to her now, and without them she was just an ordinary prisoner. She would make it no more than five feet before getting killed, or worse, and anyway, the bridge was broken. Kelsea had done it as a defensive measure, but now she wondered if she hadn’t really been trying to ensure that there was no going back.

  The Red Queen turned, and Kelsea braced herself for the triumph on the woman’s face, the vengeance that would surely follow. The Tearling was safe, and she meant to die a queen.

  But the Red Queen’s eyes were wide with outrage, her nostrils flaring. Her outstretched fist had closed around the jewels, squeezing so tightly that her knuckles had turned white. Her mouth worked, opening and closing. Her other hand had clenched into a claw, and it reached for Kelsea, clutching madly.

  And then, somehow, Kelsea knew.

  She began to laugh, wild, hysterical laughter that bounced off the gleaming red walls of the tent. She barely felt the bruising grip of the woman’s hand on her shoulder.

  Of course it didn’t hurt when I took them off. Of course not, because—

  “They’re mine.”

  The Red Queen screamed with fury, a wordless howl that seemed as though it should shred the walls of the tent. Her hand ground into Kelsea’s shoulder so hard that Kelsea thought it might break, but she couldn’t stop laughing.

  “They don’t work for you, do they?” She leaned toward the Red Queen until their faces were only inches apart. “You can’t use them. They’re mine.”

  The Queen hauled back and slapped Kelsea again, knocking her to the ground. But even this couldn’t stop Kelsea’s laughter; indeed, it seemed to feed it. She thought of the long night past . . . Lily, William Tear, Pen, Jonathan, Mace . . . and it suddenly seemed that they were there with her, all of them, even the dead. Kelsea had hoped to emerge victorious, but here was an outcome she had never imagined. The jewels were lost to her; she would never find out how Lily’s story had ended. But neither would anyone else.