The Emperor's Daughter

by H M Angues

  She’d be handing her empire over to Ramsey if she went along with it. Public execution. That’s the bitch’s plan for killing her.

  Kainan... Ramsey said he’s Calla’s mate. I hadn’t wanted to believe it when I heard Katarina say it on the day of her son’s funeral. Kainan would become regent and rule temporarily until an heir can be located if Calla dies, according to the current laws of succession. She trusts him, he’s with us. He’ll take care of Namari for Calla, and she knows it, but no one could be the intelligent and selfless leader that Calla is. Which just gives her another reason to sacrifice herself.

  For me.

  She can’t give in. She can’t give in.

  She will give in, and that hurts more than the searing hot pain in my back.

  For the first time since my capture, I start to cry.

  Chapter 22

  Kainan

  My muscles flinch where the rain hits my cheeks and I can feel the swarm of the heat from the burning trees. Lightning is striking all around us, but it never hits near enough to cause any damage. Wind starts to pick up, the earth shakes.

  She’s so much more than Fireblood.

  I kneel before her, grabbing her face in my hands. Her skin is so hot it almost burns, but I shove the pain aside, focusing entirely on her.

  We all heard the video, heard the price she would have to pay to save her best friend.

  I can’t let her do it. Because she will, if no one stops her.

  “Cal,” I whisper so that only she can hear me. “Cal, stop. Calm down. You’re losing yourself. Control it, harness it.”

  When her eyes finally meet mine, they are swimming with every color that exists. Sea-green. Amber. Brown. Gray. Yellow. And many more.

  “Focus on me, Cal,” I say softly. She reaches up to grab my hands where they rest on her face. “Focus on me,” I repeat.

  The lightning stops. The earth stills. The wind calms. The fires die. The rain dulls until it is no more than a gentle sprinkle.

  I pull her to my chest and hug her close as she trembles. She only lets me hold her for a moment before she composes herself and rises to her feet.

  She turns, meeting the eyes of each spectator. Valek. The startled Guardsmen. Rysen. Bellamy. Finally, she says to me and Ryse, “Pack your things. We’re going to Jurynn. I need to have a chat with the Overseer.”

  ∞∞∞

  The Underground city in Morda is a much farther flight. It’s located deep in the uninhabited swamp lands of the Province. A small landing pad is hidden in the low-branched trees, and Calla expertly lands the Nighthawk on the small space. She presses a few buttons and the wings fold in on themselves, compacting the jet. We sit there for just a moment as the landing pad shifts and begins to sink down into the earth. It's a massive industrial elevator, I realize.

  As we descend, doors above us seal the entrance, drenching the hoverjet in absolute darkness. Only small lights line the concrete around us every few yards.

  Lower, lower, until we’re in a significantly smaller version of Drakonis’ hangar. The ceiling is much lower, and not nearly as many hoverjets and ground transports fill the space as they did in the Rorani city.

  We climb out of the jet and I'm slammed with a wall of heavy, damp swamp air. It seems the layers of earth above us aren’t enough to block out the nature of the swamp.

  Fayette greets us on the other side of the small hangar, but she’s warmest toward Rysen. The tall blonde leads us down an equally humid hallway. We pass several turns and corners in the labyrinthine underground. Jurynn, it seems, isn’t as city-like or magnificent as Drakonis.

  The Overseer’s office is similar to the one in the Underground capital, though there are no windows overlooking the hangar. Instead, a large aquarium filled with the exotic fish of Mordan lakes lines the wall where those windows would have been.

  “She has Blade,” Calla blurts as professionally as possible for how upset she is. She crosses her arms in front of the burly Underground leader.

  “We know. The Council and I have been devising several viable options to get him out.”

  “She proposed a trade, of sorts,” I add. “Blade for Calla.”

  The Overseer shakes his head furiously. “No. We won’t even consider it.”

  Calla slams the palms of her hands on his desk. “Yes, you will,” she says as she leans forward. “I want him back home alive, Jed.”

  He contemplates a moment before saying, “I think the Council could use this information about the deal Ramsey has presented. Perhaps it could be used to our advantage.”

  “I’m listening.” The emperor crosses her arms again.

  Jed looks to me, his one unmarred eye boring into my own. “Leave us.”

  “We can trust—”

  The Overseer cuts her off. “I trust him. But this is something that should only be known by those who absolutely need to know.”

  “Very well.” Calla nods to me, and I step outside the office with Fayette and Ryse.

  ∞∞∞

  “Is it bad that I don’t want her to get him back?” Fayette says to Ryse after almost a half hour of painful silence.

  I glare at her. “Yeah, that’s bad.”

  “I wasn’t talking to you,” she snaps. She relaxes again, turning back to Ryse. “I get what he sees in her. She’s beautiful. And an emperor. And strong, I guess.”

  “That she is,” Ryse replies.

  “I’m strong too,” she says meekly.

  “I never said you weren’t, but didn't you say you were over Blade?”

  This conversation is getting painfully dull and awkward to listen to. I lean my head back against the wall with a quiet groan.

  “I told myself—and Calla—that I was over it. I guess I’m not. I’m just... angry. At him, and at her.” A pause. “Everybody is so drawn to her, so in love with her.” Her pathetic stare falls to the floor.

  I can’t bring myself to feel any empathy. “Stop wallowing in self-pity, and maybe someone will stick around.” It’s harsh, but I continue. “Love yourself before trying to get other people to love you. I find your lack of confidence annoying. Despite everything that she has gone through, Calla’s always been confident in herself, in her strength. Try to be like her, in that sense, and stop basing your value on what guys think of you. You’re a pretty girl, and you have to be smart or else you wouldn’t be a Commander in the Underground. The only thing bringing you down is yourself.”

  She meets my gaze with her icy blue eyes, finally lifting her chin. “Okay,” she says softly.

  Just then, Calla explodes through the office doors. “Well?” I implore her as I follow the obviously seething emperor down the dank corridor.

  “We have a plan.”

  “Care to enlighten me?” Ryse asks.

  “I can’t tell you everything, but I can tell you that it doesn’t involve any sort of trade. Jed is sending her a message, hopefully it gets through.”

  “And if it does?” We pause when we reach the hangar.

  “Then we’re going to Darinthe Manor to tell Ramsey she can take her little deal and shove it down her throat.”

  Calla strides toward the hoverjet confidently, Rysen trailing enthusiastically behind her, but I don’t follow.

  Just now, I saw what was in her head. I know what she’s really planning.

  So, before she can say a word, I dart back through the hallways and into Jed’s office, slamming my palms on his desk just like Calla had moments ago. He looks up at me slowly, curiously. The loud bang of my hands on the wood didn’t even phase him.

  “I have a better plan,” I say, out of breath from running all the way here.

  He folds his hands on his desk. “Let’s hear it, then.”

  ∞∞∞

  Ramsey takes her time sending her reply.

  Almost a month passes with no word. Tiladen and Roran are in her control, but things have sort of died down. Even the war in the Borderlands is showing signs of easing up a bit.

  The la
ck of action has Calla antsy. Who knows what’s happening to Blade as time goes on? I know it’s eating at her, clawing her apart from the inside. I feel it, too. I’m just as anxious as she, pacing constantly and never able to sit still for more than a couple of minutes.

  To take the edge off, Calla trains Bellamy every day, showing her newfound half-sister how to control her flame. She’s a quick learner, and incredibly skilled. During these sessions, Rysen and I sit aside to watch. My brother thankfully keeps his distance from all of us, especially Bellamy. The youngest Renald sister despises him, and he doesn’t want to push his limits with Calla, it seems.

  Good.

  When Calla isn’t coaching Bellamy, she’s being coached herself by High Lady Katarina in Oceanus arts. Her other abilities that showed themselves that day she called her own storm—Tempest and Lectric—have yet to manifest themselves again, as much as Calla tries.

  “Again,” her grandmother demands one day as Cal tries to summon her rain. We're standing outside of Jurynn, on the Mordan surface, in the middle of the uninhabited swamp.

  She squeezes her ocean-colored eyes shut, straining to bring the water down. That’s when I see the problem.

  “The rain isn’t an Oceanus ability,” I say, thinking about the indoor downpour she had told me about. “It’s a Tempest power, and she’s trying to tap into the Oceanus side.”

  “I don’t know how else to access it. It’s like a hallway with different doors. I can identify the Oceanus door, but not the Tempest one,” she explains.

  “Just try it,” I say.

  She tenses her muscles, focusing hard. When Calla’s eyes finally shift to a dark storm-gray, clouds begin to move overhead in the once cloudless sky. A steady downpour falls, but our group is protected by her ability. The drops cascade around us, bouncing off an invisible dome she created. It’s marvelous; a true spectacle.

  Three days after that, at the end of the month, we finally hear from Ramsey. She’ll open up the manor and allow our visit, so long as the three of us—Rysen, Calla, and me—are all in attendance, and we leave our Guardsmen at the border.

  We depart the next day, climbing into the back of a ground transport that moves smoothly over the paved road. It takes nearly an hour to reach the border of Morda and Roran, where we’re met by armed men bearing the Uprising’s red and black flag.

  We transfer our bodies to their transport and continue on. It takes another two-and-a-half hours to reach Darinthe Manor.

  I’m taken aback by the sight of my former home. The once meticulous gardens have been left to nature's will, vines and flowers and trees overgrowing their place, extending up the sides of the manor’s exterior.

  It doesn’t pain me to see what was once my home in such disarray. My father did unspeakable things to me behind its closed doors. And I’ll never forget Ramsey’s hands on me each night and wanting to bathe myself in acid just to get the wretched, invading feel of her off my skin. It just surprises me. What was once so perfect on the outside is now just as wretched as what it holds within.

  Once we’ve been escorted inside, the interior strikes me even harder. It was once elaborately decorated with expensive furnishings, paintings, and sculptures, all at the expense of Rorani taxpayers, who vehemently opposed my father's expenditures. Now, all of that has been wiped out, leaving nothing but bare walls and plain furnishings. The once colorful walls have been painted a dull gray. The ruby-red rugs along the floors are the only things of color in the manor.

  The formerly grand gathering room, which is like a type of throne room, is just as bare as the rest of the place. Even Ramsey’s attire—black leggings with leather boots and a white button-up shirt—is incredibly plain for someone with as elaborate dreams of grandeur as she.

  Just as I remember, she is goddess-like in person, with smooth and flawless skin, a perfect heart-shaped mouth, and cheekbones that seem to be sculpted from stone. She’s standing on incredibly long legs as we approach. Ramsey is at least six feet tall, made even taller where she is perched on the raised dais. Stunning to most, but looking at her only brings me pain.

  I level my eyes on the spot between Calla’s shoulder blades. I hold my gaze there as I slip inside her head. My Flame knows what I’m feeling and gives me a safe space inside her mind. Cal sends imaginary images of the two of us laughing together, dancing, just being happy. I feel my anxiety slowly slip away, and though some of it lingers, I find myself exponentially more level-headed.

  When we near the throne she made for herself, Ramsey takes her seat in a simple, yet gracefully smooth, motion. A wave of her hand catches my attention. From behind the royal seat, one of her men drags a beaten and bloody Blade. There are chains binding his hands, and he slumps next to his captor, barely able to look up.

  When he finally does, I see his heart break in his eyes at the sight of Calla. “No,” he breathes, barely able to get the word out.

  I always liked Blade, but I admire him even more now for his willingness to die at Ramsey’s hand in Calla’s stead. Even though the emperor would never allow it.

  “So, you’ve made a decision,” Ramsey purrs, stroking Blade’s dark hair with long, slender fingers.

  I wait for Calla to tell her off, to say she will make no deals with the leader of the rebellion. Instead, Cal reaches for the obsidian crown nestled on her black hair and tosses it to Ramsey’s feet.

  Calla Renald, first of her name and Emperor of Namari, kneels before Ramsey’s throne, offering her own life to save Blade’s.

  Just as I knew she would.

  ∞∞∞

  Ramsey decides to drag out Calla’s torture before she kills her.

  Each day, one of us is brought to the small, cramped cell in Louvelle Prison. It’s Roran’s provincial prison, just few miles from Darinthe Manor.

  Two of Ramey’s guards—I call them Dick and Prick since they lack the hospitality to even introduce themselves—drag me out of my own stone-walled, medieval-looking cell and escort me through the labyrinthine corridors that make up Louvelle. It was built before the unification of the Provinces, which is demonstrated by the stone walls, iron bars, stale air, and the primeval torture devices that can be glimpsed through half-open doors.

  This prison doesn’t see much use compared to its ancient days, but I can still see traces of recent inhabitants. It seems it’s been cleared out recently, though. My guess: Ramsey killed them to create more space for the plethora of prisoners I imagine she plans to bring here.

  I give up trying to keep track of the turns we make, how many cells we pass, or the number of stairwells Dick and Prick practically shove me down. If I remember anything from my limited history lessons on my home Province, it’s that the old Rorani believed greater evils should be kept farthest below, which is why they built this prison so deep into the ground. As we descend farther and farther, the air grows stuffy and damp, and a lump forms in my throat. Only the most horrendous and truly terrifying of Eterrans were ever held this far down.

  Calla’s cell is at the far end of a dimly-lit corridor. Moisture fills the air and coats the walls, and I already feel sweat begin to drip down my brow and the nape of my neck. Dick, the larger and hairier of the pair, shoves me forward and I stumble into the iron bars with a clang. The sight of Calla slumped on the ground makes breathing even more difficult. My hands curl into tight fists around the bars, knuckles turning white.

  She’s powerless here, with Ramsey’s Sanguinus abilities suppressing Calla’s own, suffocating the fire and water and storm and earth and all the other powers swarming inside her. She’s weak, barely able to sit up straight. I know she’s suffering more than the rest of us, but she’d never say it out loud.

  “He gets ten,” Prick grumbles. “I’ll keep a close watch on the girl.”

  Prick and his orange-topped head stomp into the cell. Calla doesn’t even look at him. With a grunt, he snatches her hair in his fist and jerks her head back, forcing her look up at him. Her expression is fierce, lips pursed, but I can
tell there is little fight left in her.

  “All right, take him in.”

  Dick does as he is told, dragging me just across the way to an Old Era torture chamber. I can hear Calla’s strained grunts and shuffling as she fights her captor’s attempts to drag her along with him. There’s a thud, followed by a crack and the scuffling comes to a stop. Hot, angry tears pool in my eyes, but Dick forces me onto my knees and chains me to a post before I can do anything.

  Blood drips from her lip when I see her, further fueling my rage. Prick tosses her to the floor where she lands in a heap of short limbs and tangled curls. She’s clutching her ribs. So, that was the crack.

  Prick and Dick exchange a nod and approving grunts. The former tears open the back of my thin shirt, the latter moving to stand by Cal.

  “Say a word, princess,” Dick hisses, “and you take his place.”

  I try to soothe her mind as best I can, and the pain I feel there tells me that more than one rib is broken.

  Prick hasn’t even brought down the first of the lashings when Calla, in her characteristic snarkiness, says, “You must be dumber than you look if you thought that would keep me quiet.”

  Dick’s face contorts with fury and he reaches down to grab her, but Prick interjects. “She said not to touch her anymore. We scarred her up pretty bad when we brought her in with the big black-haired kid.”

  Blade.

  “Give him a break, Prick, I’m sure it’s been a long time since either of you have been this close to a girl,” she says, pressing their buttons even more.

  “Cal, stop,” I beg, but I know that the emperor of Namari won’t bother listening to me.

  “Screw what the boss says,” Dick grumbles. He drags Calla across the stone to the whipping post and chains her to it, undoing my own restraints. Hesitantly, Prick follows along, taking me to the other side of the small, torch-lit chamber.

  Calla’s black shirt is already torn, and Dick simply pushes the shredded fabric aside as he curls his meaty fingers around the hilt of the lash.