The Queen Will Betray You

by Sarah Henning

  Amarande hesitated, and Ferdinand held up a hand.

  “I trust you, Sister. If you do not trust me, that is a danger I am willing to live with to help Ardenia survive this.”

  CHAPTER 59

  KING Sendoa always had a plan.

  That knowledge had both comforted and vexed Amarande since his death.

  She tried to live in his image as he made it—to be strong, thoughtful, confident—and though Ferdinand knew nothing of the man, it was clear he was the type to make plans, too.

  Previously: to kill the false Warlord and her seconds and arrive with Amarande in hand and demand changes, leveraging their father’s blood to both the Royal Council and Geneva.

  Now: to arrive with Koldo at his side, triumphant in her rescue of Amarande from the Warlord, and leverage their blood just the same but with the general in the room and on their side.

  However, neither plan worked for Amarande, or Luca.

  “We must be together,” the princess announced, as all of them stood in a circle, their conversation and horses moved into the juniper groves that crawled up the mountains lining the final stretch to the Itspi. “That is how it is.”

  “I will not leave her side,” Luca added, gripping her uninjured hand firmly.

  Amarande returned a squeeze to his fingers in equal measure. Together forever now, never to be apart again. That’s what they’d agreed at the start of all this—and the next move they made certainly could be the end.

  And, if the stars agreed, maybe a beginning, too.

  “You can’t blame them,” Ula said, extra fabric yanked away from her face. She herself had not moved away from Urtzi’s side.

  The king and his mother chewed on this—their faces pulling taut in the same thoughtful way. Osana stood at Ferdinand’s other side, hugging herself tightly.

  In turns, Luca and Ferdinand had explained the story of Osana and Urtzi—sent by Luca to collect Amarande but tossed in the dungeons by Geneva. It was a wonder she didn’t kill them on the spot. Perhaps the way Osana leaned her shoulder against Ferdinand had something to do with it. Or perhaps it was her blood and previous occupation. Amarande still wasn’t sure.

  They didn’t have much time to rework the plan—the soldiers would be leaving the gates soon, if they hadn’t already—eyes out for signs of Inés as diplomacy churned but ears to the ground for anything unusual, including the king by the side of the road. It was a wonder Ferdinand had gotten out of the castle at all.

  Koldo spun the possibilities round and made her choice. “My king, perhaps the best course of action here is twofold. You can parade Amarande and Luca through the grounds of the Itspi as hostages you saved from the Warlord—the castle inhabitants will rejoice in this—and then present them behind closed doors to the Queen Mother as hostages you collected for her. Geneva will be delighted to lay eyes on the two people threatening her immediate power, rather than simply one.”

  Amarande’s heart leapt.

  Yes. This was the plan. Just as her father would devise. Playing the angles, all the facets covered, as best they could be, using the advantages they had.

  She caught eyes with Koldo and her brother. “Perfect. Let’s go. Before Inés complicates matters.”

  Ferdinand frowned, still tossing about Koldo’s spin—not perfect in his mind, no. “It would help both Amarande and me to have you in the room as we negotiate with Geneva and the council. This group does not much like the opinions of those they consider both figureheads and children.”

  Amarande almost grinned—perhaps gender couldn’t protect even a boy with the shoulders of a man from the council’s opinions of participation from children.

  Koldo put up a hand.

  “I will be there. As will the others. Listen close; this is what we will do.”

  CHAPTER 60

  THE Itspi was completely different from when Luca had last laid eyes on it.

  Then: open gates, commoners and highborn alike in mourning, the grounds sunny despite the heaviness of King Sendoa’s funeral.

  Now: closed gates, soldiers marching in military precision, every square inch of the grounds flooded with a bloodred mass of bodies, sprawled across the rock-bitten hills and summer dry grass.

  One last breath from Sendoa and truly everything had changed. A thousand years of peace bought with brutal patriarchy, and in the scheme of a fortnight all pieces shifted.

  For the better, Luca hoped.

  Koldo’s plan was a solid one. All the tactical brilliance he’d only witnessed tangentially on display. It was exactly the best course of action to negate the threat of Geneva so that they might focus upon the threat of Inés and her new power, churning in the harbor.

  What she was waiting for, Luca didn’t know. Inés was simply a named storm, power gathering on the horizon.

  Hand looped in hers, Luca held tight to Amarande as they wound through the grounds, trailing her brother’s lifted chin, sunset hair, oxen shoulders. Luca wondered how Amarande could set her eyes upon Ferdinand—even from his position adjacent to the family, it was unsettling to be within the king’s orbit.

  So familiar yet so much not. Not Sendoa. Not someone either of them really knew at all.

  Amarande had made it clear that she’d literally spent about ten minutes with her brother, only a few tense sentences between them. Luca knew he’d trusted many—most recently Tala—with less than that because it was his nature. The fact that Amarande, always so suspicious, was not made him apprehensive, to say the least.

  “Ama,” he whispered, as Ferdinand greeted the guards stationed at the entrance to the inner walls of the Itspi, the winding sandstone and marble halls beyond, “I know it is not usually my role to be wary, but do you trust him? Really?”

  Amarande licked her lips, not meeting Luca’s eyes, only watching her brother ahead, saying all the prepared things to the castle guards carefully eyeing the pair of them. “I have you. If he breaks our trust, we will fight our way out together. Yes?”

  His thumb swept across the top of the hand that twined with his. “Always, Princess.”

  The king signaled them to follow. “The Queen Mother will receive us in the council room.”

  That was not the plan.

  It had been to meet in the throne room. Or the red hall. Somewhere with space to fight and more than one exit for escape if things went south.

  Uncertainty clawed at Luca. The dagger in his boot pressed against the tendons at his ankle as he took step after step toward a swiftly pivoting plan. They would not receive the Queen Mother alone. The Royal Council and their opinions would be there. Along with the external threat of Inés, the internal threat of Geneva’s status as Warlord, and whatever secrets hid within the king.

  It was impossible to say if he truly was more loyal to his natural mother or the one who’d raised him. If Ferdinand were actually his father, this conundrum would be much easier to parse. If the king turned out to be as greedy and backstabbing and brutal as every other royal in the Sand and Sky, Amarande would likely be the one to take him out herself.

  The party wound through the castle, past guards running this way and that. As they passed the red hall, the great tiger’s head doors swung open, revealing officers bent over lines of tables, carved wooden figurines of the sigils of each of the kingdoms of Sand and Sky.

  Geneva first.

  Inés second.

  That was the plan, though it was difficult not to be distracted by the buzz of unease and anticipation wafting from the red hall and into the stones at their feet. Luca hoped this would be quick. And if not, that it could be effectively tabled as they united for a common enemy, the subject of which crown sat on whose head saved for later.

  They moved swiftly up the stairs of the north tower. Luca’s heart thumped wildly as they pushed into the council room, four guards stationed at the entrance. He’d never been allowed within before. Yet here it was, all regal tapestries and dark window light, the Royal Council positioned as a tribunal at a highly polished table.
The doors swung shut.

  “I have returned with Princess Amarande,” Ferdinand announced. The line was what had been rehearsed and seemed a little stilted and obvious, but he delivered it, shoulders back as he stood tall before them—the three council members and the Queen Mother, who resembled Amarande so much, Luca’s breath caught.

  “Our princess, returned to us. What a surprise. And Luca by her side,” Garbine cooed. The older councilor’s voice was one of show. As if everyone in the room did not know what they’d done to Amarande when she’d last appeared in this place.

  Amarande cleared her throat. “Before you lock me away, we have much to discuss. No, not discuss. You have much to hear from us, if you can bother to listen.”

  Satordi tented his fingers, elbows smashing down the parchment he’d been reading.

  “Welcome back, Princess; I did miss your gift of conversation.” Satordi’s dry admonishment of Amarande earned him a wry smile from Garbine. Joseba wilted farther into his robes, appearing as if he wanted to melt into the marble floor.

  The princess bared her teeth.

  “If you’d like a conversation, then you must consider me a participant, even if you do not like what I’m about to say,” she shot back. “Hear me now, or stave me off with your put-downs until Inés’s arrows fly through the window. I do not care. You may consider me a danger, but in truth I am far less of one now than what will be at your doorstep once Inés steps off that ship.”

  “With all due respect, Princess Amarande, this is not your council room. It is King Ferdinand’s—”

  “And it is my wish that she continues,” the king announced placidly from his position next to Amarande. Geneva stood from the great chair at the head of the table—one that only could have belonged to King Sendoa in life—and offered it to the current king with a wave of her hand. He did not take it.

  Amarande swiftly produced a slip of parchment, the king’s knife-slash signature unmistakable at the bottom. “My father’s will was that I be made regent of my own kingdom until I desired to marry.”

  Satordi squinted across the distance. “Where did you get that?”

  “It does not matter. All that matters is that the Royal Council who served my father so closely for years did not serve him in the end. Amending his wishes as it best suited them.”

  Satordi held up a hand. “That is not what happened, Your Highness. We simply didn’t believe it was prudent—”

  “To listen to my father? This man who inspected every facet. Sought every angle. Only flexed his muscle when he needed to, avoiding blood whenever possible. He always had a plan. A good plan. Instead, you carved it to pieces, and then tossed more bad decisions into the stew.”

  “Princess, we worked with what we had.”

  “What you had was his plan and me until a woman you hadn’t seen in fifteen years conveniently appeared with a male bastard and a plan of her own in your time of need.”

  “Princess, the general confirmed—”

  “I am not finished.” Amarande dared Satordi to continue, but his thin lips sealed shut. “You were so enamored with your luck, you didn’t even bother to ask the right questions.”

  “Princess, look at the bigger picture. I implore you.” Amarande tensed against Luca’s hand—Satordi had tried this before on her, the well of his experience being flaunted about in the same breath that firmly shut her out and away.

  “You are always imploring me, but you do not listen.”

  Luca gripped her hand tighter, palm pressed against the linen about her wound, his upper arm touching her now, too—his strength was her strength and he wanted her to use it. “If this council had abided by my father’s last wishes rather than conveniently ignoring the majority of his last will and testament while strong-arming Koldo into regency, there likely would not have been war at our doorstep now.”

  “No, it would’ve happened anyway,” Geneva disagreed, dismissive. “Bear, Mountain Lion, Shark, Tiger”—her eyes slid to Luca’s—“Black Wolf. All sigils in the Sand and Sky are predators by design. Trade one for the other and you still get the teeth.”

  Though Geneva had been subtle in her open threat to Luca, the passage of his identity and hers ships in the night, Amarande aimed her next question at the council while having eyes only for her mother. “You didn’t ask the Runaway Queen where she’d been, did you?”

  The council was silent.

  “Now is the time for answers, not silence. That question was not rhetorical—answer me. I want to know.” Amarande met each one in the eye, left to right—Joseba, Satordi, Garbine.

  Satordi drew in a thin breath. “We cannot properly deal with caveats to succession, not with war nearly at our door. We need to be united, and the cleanest way to do that is to unite under our king, not squabble over the particulars of previous actions—mine, yours, hers, King Sendoa’s. The answer does not matter with an armada making demands in our harbor.”

  He thrust a hand out to gesture to the polished table before him, littered with maps, yellowed directives to the kingdoms of the Sand and Sky, and a fresh slip of parchment, stamped with three seals—Mountain Lion, Bear, Shark. Inés’s opening parry, to be sure.

  “The answer does matter. Here, I’ll give it for you,” Ferdinand replied, arms wide. “You did not.”

  Sunlight danced across the shoulders of the council’s ivory robes, their lack of defense an answer in itself.

  Amarande turned to Geneva. “Would you like me to tell them or will you? Or perhaps our king will do it—he’s partial to the truth.”

  Their mother smiled at first, as if to mock her children. One for her brashness, the other for his perceived weaknesses. Neither of them grinned back, twin frowns in return. Finally, Ferdinand said to Geneva, “You tell them or I will.”

  The councilors’ attention was fixed on her now. Geneva sat up, spine straight. Then, with a heavy sigh, the Queen Mother stood and yanked down her lace sleeve, revealing a tattoo on the underside of her wrist. The leaping bouquet of flames—the fire pit in distinct, satiny relief, the same kind of ink that sat upon his chest.

  “For the past ten years, I hid in plain sight, as the third ruler to carry the name the Warlord.”

  The distinct flush fled Joseba’s cheeks. Garbine shrunk away. Satordi, to his credit, leaned in for a closer look. Luca held his breath. Here was the moment of truth. Only this blow could come from Ferdinand if it was to land properly.

  “Are, Mother,” Ferdinand corrected. “You are the Warlord. I was there—for the negotiation, the orders, the plan. Council, my mother never intended to cede her power.”

  “Ferdinand, you misunderstood—”

  “I did not and do not. The Warlord’s power did not change hands. And the person handpicked to wield power in your stead is dead. You are still the Warlord as much as I am king.”

  “My king,”—Geneva’s teeth flashed—“you twist my words.”

  “I do not.”

  Geneva scoffed. “Shall I retrieve the letter and detail the plan you devised in the study within your chambers?”

  Satordi bit. “What letter?”

  “This one.” The king pulled a slip of parchment from his pocket, as smoothly as Amarande had. “It is in cipher, but what it is, is an attempt at extortion—the princess for permanent power transferred to the temporary Warlord. Exactly what happens when loyalties are divided.”

  The king let that accusation hang, and it sucked nearly all the air out of the room. Was this what it had been like when Amarande had stood with Koldo by her side, demanding these same people change the laws so she could access her own power and not be beholden to laws that served only the vipers surrounding her?

  Luca had never known his mother—the queen or his surrogate mother, Lygia—but he did know the chiding look Geneva gave the boy she raised as her son. It said he was silly, a child, one who did not understand the weight of what his words meant. “You killed her. To obtain the princess and her stableboy for the good of Ardenia. Is that what
all this is about, Ferdinand? Did you want credit for your bravery in saving your sister? Rather than to keep it just between us? Well, now everyone knows how loyal you are to the sister who sees you as a threat.”

  Amarande took a step forward and Ferdinand thrust out a hand to hold her back.

  “Mother.” Even with Ferdinand’s Koldo-like calm, frustration bit at the word. “I did not kill her, but she is dead.”

  “The semantics of this person’s life do not matter,” Satordi announced.

  “Geneva’s loyalties are divided, yes, and the semantics of this person’s life do matter,” Amarande assured him, the pressure of her shoulder against Luca’s body increasing. Now she was supporting him—and Luca’s heartbeat sped up accordingly. “Because the person believed to be the Warlord by her own people was killed when the Warlord’s camp was ambushed and claimed by the rightful leader of the Kingdom of Torrence.”

  Geneva did not betray a hint of surprise, other than to coolly set her attention on Luca. He swallowed but gave it to her right back, staring down the Warlord now, free of her secrets and masks, everything now in the open.

  Joseba’s erudite voice entered the fray. “The Otxoa were the rightful leaders of the Kingdom of Torrence—and they are extinct.”

  “I assure you they are not.”

  Satordi squinted at Amarande. “How—”

  “As a prisoner in the Warlord’s camp, I saw the whole thing with my own eyes,” Amarande answered. “The ambush, the attack, the symbolic Warlord plummeting to her death in her own fire pit. And then, her people’s retreat and surrender, to the rightful king.”

  Here, Luca’s love turned to him, looked him straight in the eye, and made sure none of these people would call him stableboy again. “Luca, the rightful heir of the Otxoa, sheltered here at the Itspi by King Sendoa, all these years.”

  Amarande smiled at him then, and he shared it as the weight of every eye in the room pressed in upon him. “And before you ask, Satordi, we have proof. Proof that Luca is heir, proof that King Sendoa knew. And proof that he’d planned to not only alert Luca to his destiny but help him fulfill it, by attacking the Warlord, whom he knew to be his Runaway Queen.”