Crush the King

by Estep, Jennifer

  “Wish us luck,” I said to Xenia.

  “No.”

  “No? What do you mean no?”

  Xenia shrugged. “Luck is a pointless expression and a silly sentiment. You work hard, and you train, and you prepare. Luck has nothing to do with your success or failure.”

  Paloma nodded her agreement. Traitor. I glared at my friend, but she shrugged at me much the same way Xenia had. “She’s right. Luck is for fools and children.”

  “You’re no fun either.”

  Paloma shrugged again. “I’m not here to be fun,” she said in a matter-of-fact tone that I both admired and hated. “I’m here to keep you alive.”

  I sighed, knowing I couldn’t win with either one of them. “Well, then, let’s get on with it.”

  I started to head toward the open doors, but Xenia raised her hand, stopping me.

  “I hope you find what you’re looking for, Evie,” she said in a kinder voice. “And that some part of your family has survived.”

  A sad, wistful expression flickered across her face. Once again, the scent of Xenia’s ashy heartbreak filled my nose, and she leaned on her cane a little more heavily than before, as if she really did need its support.

  “Thank you,” I said in a soft voice.

  She shrugged, then snapped up her cane and stabbed me in the arm with it. “But no matter what happens tonight, I expect you back here at the same time tomorrow for your next lesson.”

  Paloma snickered, and Xenia whipped around and poked the younger woman with her cane just like she had me.

  “And you too,” she ordered. “Even if you don’t know anything about your heritage, you can still learn the dances.”

  Paloma opened her mouth to argue, but Xenia stared her down, and my friend sighed. “Yes, my lady.”

  Xenia nodded in satisfaction and strolled away, tap-tap-tapping her cane on the floor.

  I slung my arm around Paloma’s shoulders. “Looks like I have a new dancing partner. Just think. This time tomorrow, Xenia will be stabbing you with her bloody cane.”

  My friend gave me a sour look. I laughed, and together we followed Xenia out of the dance hall.

  Chapter Two

  Xenia had some other business to take care of, so Paloma and I left her finishing school.

  It was almost six o’clock, and the sun was slowly sinking behind the Spire Mountains that ringed the city. The December air was already quite chilly, and it would turn even colder once the last golden rays vanished behind the high, rugged peaks and took their meager warmth along with them. My nose twitched. A faint metallic scent hung in the air, indicating that it would snow later tonight.

  Only a few people were walking on the side streets that flanked Xenia’s finishing school. Most had their heads down and their arms crossed over their chests, trying to stay as warm as possible in their hats, scarves, coats, and gloves, and no one gave Paloma and me a second look as we made our way over to one of the many enormous square plazas that could be found throughout Svalin.

  We stood in the shadows in a narrow alley that ran between two bakeries and looked out over the plaza. Brightly painted wooden carts manned by bakers, butchers, farmers, tailors, and other merchants lined all four sides of the area, while a large gray stone fountain of two girls holding hands bubbled merrily in the center.

  People of all shapes, sizes, stations, and ages moved across the gray cobblestones, going from one cart and merchant to the next and shopping for bread, meat, cheeses, and vegetables. Still more people cut through the plaza, bypassing the colorful carts and loud, squawking merchants, skirting around the gurgling fountain, and steadfastly trudging home after a long, hard day at work. Miners, mostly, wearing thick dark blue coveralls, boots, and hard, ridged helmets, all of which were coated with light gray fluorestone dust.

  I opened my mouth and drew in breath after breath, letting the air roll in over my tongue and using my mutt magic to taste all the scents swirling through the plaza. Fresh warm bread and almond-sugar cookies from the bakeries next to the alley. The coppery stench of blood from the meat on the butchers’ carts. The sharp, tangy cheeses. The bits of dirt on the farmers’ sweet potatoes and other produce. The fine layers of crushed, chalky stone clinging to the miners.

  I sensed all that and more, but the one thing I didn’t smell was magic.

  Normally, I would have welcomed its absence. More often than not I sensed the hot, caustic stench of magic only when someone was trying to kill me. But this evening, I found the lack of power disappointing.

  “I don’t like this,” Paloma muttered. “What if this rumor about another Blair is just a trick to get you out of the palace and into the city, where you’re more vulnerable? And leaving Xenia’s finishing school without any guards is just asking for trouble.”

  In addition to being my best friend, Paloma was also my personal guard, a job she took very seriously.

  “Coming here without any guards is part of the plan. We’re trying to blend in, remember?” I arched an eyebrow at her. “Besides, didn’t you once tell me that a gladiator and an ogre morph like yourself is worth twenty regular soldiers?”

  “That was Halvar.” Paloma’s chin lifted with pride. “But he was right. I am worth twenty soldiers.”

  Halvar was Xenia’s nephew and a powerful ogre morph. He and Paloma were good friends, along with Bjarni, another ogre morph. Halvar and Bjarni had also helped me more than once, and the two men were currently staying at Seven Spire palace and working with Captain Auster.

  I rolled my eyes. “Well, you might get a chance to prove how many soldiers you are worth. Xenia is just as skeptical about this rumor as you are. If the two of you are right, then we’re probably going to run into trouble.”

  Paloma’s eyes gleamed with anticipation, and the ogre on her neck grinned, showing off its jagged teeth. “I haven’t been in a real fight in a while.” She plucked her mace off her belt and gave it an experimental swing, making the spikes whistle through the air. “It’ll be good to get in some practice before the Regalia and knock the dust off Peony.”

  It took me a moment to realize who—or rather what—she was referring to. “You named your mace Peony?”

  She gave me an incredulous look, as if my question were utter gibberish. “Of course. Years ago. Haven’t you named your sword yet?”

  “No.”

  “Well, you should. And your dagger and shield too.”

  My hand dropped to the sword belted to my waist, and my fingers traced over the crown-of-shards crest in the hilt. The sharp points of the shards digging into my skin always comforted me. The sensation reminded me of all the other Bellonan queens—especially the Winter queens—who had come before me.

  Hmm. Maybe I should take Paloma’s advice and name my sword . . . Winter. Nah, that was too obvious, too on the nose, too cliché. I’d have to think of something more original.

  Paloma kept swinging her mace, as if she were warming up for a gladiator bout.

  “Why Peony?” I asked.

  She froze mid-swing and lowered the weapon to her side. “My mother always wore peony perfume,” she said in a low, raspy voice.

  The smell of salty grief gusted off Paloma, overpowering her own natural scent—soft peony perfume mixed with a hint of wet fur. Sympathy filled me, and I reached over and squeezed her shoulder. My friend gave me a small, sad smile, then turned her attention back to the plaza.

  “I still don’t like this,” she repeated. “You’re far too exposed and vulnerable, and that cloak is barely a disguise. At least put your hood up so people can’t see your face so clearly.”

  I opened my mouth to point out that half the people in the plaza were wearing cloaks and that her swinging that giant mace made her far more noticeable than me, but Paloma and her inner ogre both gave me a fierce glare. So I bit back my words and pulled up my hood, hiding my black hair and casting my face in shadow.

  “I don’t know why you’re so worried,” I said. “It’s not like we came here alone.”
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  I waved my hand at the fountain in the center of the plaza. A forty-something woman with slicked-back blond hair, tan skin, and a scar at the corner of one of her dark blue eyes was tossing pennies into the fountain, as though she were making wishes. She was wearing a black cloak, although her white tunic with its distinctive black-swan crest peeked out from beneath the flowing fabric. She also had a tearstone sword and dagger belted to her waist, just like I did.

  Serilda Swanson, the leader of the Black Swan gladiator troupe and one of my advisors, discreetly waved at me, then pointed her finger to her right.

  I looked in that direction and focused on a forty-something man with glossy black hair, black eyes, golden skin, and a lean, muscled body on the far side of the plaza. He too was wearing a black cloak over a red jacket and a ruffled white shirt. A sword and a dagger hung off his belt as well, and a morph mark was visible on his neck—a dragon face with ruby-red scales and gleaming black eyes.

  Cho Yamato, the Black Swan ringmaster, was leaning against a bakery cart, nibbling on an apricot cookie. Cho had a serious sweet tooth, as did his inner dragon. He noticed my gaze and winked at me, then gestured up at the roof of a building across the plaza.

  A man was standing next to a silver spire that decorated one corner of the roof. He was tall and handsome, with dark brown hair, bright blue eyes, tan skin, and a bit of stubble that clung to his strong jaw. A midnight-blue cloak was draped over his shoulders, and his black tunic was perfectly tailored to his muscled chest. He too was wearing a sword and a dagger, although he kept flexing his fingers, ready to unleash his lightning magic at the first sign of trouble.

  I drew in a deep breath. Even among all the floral perfumes and musky colognes swirling through the plaza, I could still pick out his unique scent—clean, cold vanilla with just a hint of warm spice.

  Thanks to my mutt magic, scents and memories were often tangled together in my mind, and his rich, heady aroma made my heart quicken, my stomach clench, and hot, liquid desire scorch through my veins. All sorts of images and sensations washed over me. My lips on his, our tongues dueling back and forth, my fingers sliding through his thick, silky hair, my palms skimming down his bare muscled chest, then going lower and lower, even as his hands slid across my skin . . .

  Lucas Sullivan, the magier enforcer of the Black Swan troupe and my unofficial consort, grinned, as if he knew exactly what I was thinking about and couldn’t wait to return to the palace to make it a reality.

  I grinned back at him. That made two of us.

  “Oh, quit mooning at Lucas,” Paloma grumbled. “That will get you killed quicker than anything else.”

  I gestured at the plaza again. “See? The others are in position, and I am perfectly safe. Now we just have to wait and see if anyone shows up.”

  In addition to hearing whispers that another Blair might still be alive, Xenia and her many sources had started spreading their own rumor in return—that any Blair who came to this plaza tonight would be taken in and guaranteed safety at Seven Spire palace.

  Xenia and her network of spies had been spreading the rumor for about two weeks, and my friends and I had come to see if anyone would take the bait.

  Paloma eyed the people moving through the plaza. “Even if this woman, this supposed Blair, does show up, how are we going to find her? There are hundreds of people here. We might not even see her.”

  “I don’t have to see her.” I tapped my nose. “My magic will let me sense hers.”

  “But you don’t even know what she is,” Paloma pointed out. “She could be a magier or a master or a morph. Or she might just be a mutt like you are. It might not even be a woman. Maybe it’s a man.”

  I shrugged. “Magic is magic. I can always smell it, no matter what kind it is or who it belongs to. Besides, if there’s even the smallest bit of truth to the rumor . . .”

  My voice trailed off, and a hard knot of emotion clogged my throat. That treacherous hope was rising up in me again, but I pushed it back down.

  “You still need to be careful,” Paloma continued. “It wouldn’t surprise me if Maeven started this rumor to lure you here so she and the rest of the Bastard Brigade can try to kill you again.”

  Maeven was the bastard sister of the Mortan king and the one who had orchestrated the Seven Spire massacre. She was also the leader of the Bastard Brigade, a group of bastard relatives of the king and the other legitimate Mortan royals. Over the past several months, Maeven and her Bastard Brigade had tried to murder me numerous times, although I had managed to thwart most of their schemes and stay alive—so far.

  “You might be right,” I admitted. “Maeven is certainly clever and devious enough to float a rumor about another Blair to get me here, but I have to learn for myself whether it’s true. And if it is a plot, then we’ll kill her assassins, just like we have before.”

  “And if it’s not another Mortan plot?” Paloma asked.

  “Then we’ll find out exactly who this person is, where they’ve been hiding, and how they’ve managed to stay alive. And especially why they didn’t come to Seven Spire after I took the throne and decreed that Blair survivors should return to the palace.”

  Part of me was happy that one of my cousins had potentially survived the slaughter, but part of me was also dreading the family reunion. I was only queen because all the other Blairs were dead. What if this mysterious cousin was higher in line for the throne? What if they had a better claim on the crown? What if they had more magic?

  And if any of that were true, then came the biggest question of all: Should I step aside?

  That was what protocol and tradition would dictate I do. But what was best for Bellona? Because I couldn’t imagine anyone else—Blair or otherwise—who wanted to protect my kingdom and her people more than I did.

  I hadn’t wanted to be queen, but now that I had finally secured my position, I didn’t want to give it up just because someone else had had the good fortune to survive the massacre. If I was being brutally honest, I also didn’t want to give up all the power and privileges that came with being queen. It was heady and thrilling to be respected and even feared, especially since I had spent years being the royal stand-in, the royal puppet, at Seven Spire. Perhaps that made me petty and selfish, just like Vasilia had been.

  But most of all, I didn’t want to give up the throne because of how it would impact my chances of finally taking my revenge on Maeven and the Mortan king. I wanted to make them suffer for what they’d done to the Blairs, to my family, to me, and I had a far better chance of getting that revenge as queen, rather than going back to just being Lady Everleigh.

  “Well, I hope this person shows up soon,” Paloma grumbled, breaking into my turbulent thoughts. “I don’t want to stand around in the cold all night.”

  She stamped her feet and pulled her green cloak a little tighter around her body. Autumn had already come and gone, and winter was quickly taking hold in the Spire Mountains. In addition to the impending snow tonight, the wind had a bitter chill that promised even colder, harsher weather was on its way.

  “Don’t worry. Xenia and her spies said to meet at this fountain at six o’clock, and it’s that time now. Someone should show up soon.”

  Paloma sighed and stamped her feet again, but the two of us held our position in the alley, and Serilda, Cho, and Sullivan remained in their spots around and above the plaza.

  As the sun set, fluorestones flared to life inside the surrounding buildings, as well as in the streetlamps that lined the plaza. The soft golden lights must have made the goods look even more attractive, because the merchants were still doing a brisk business, and it was hard to pick out anyone suspicious, much less a familiar face.

  Ever since Xenia had told me that one of my cousins might still be alive, I had been racking my mind trying to figure out who it could be, but I hadn’t come up with any possibilities. So I stared out into the plaza, peering at everyone who walked by.

  I was so busy studying the faces of the adults that
I almost missed the girl.

  She was young, fourteen or so, and dressed in several layers of thin, grubby rags. Her clothes might have been dark blue at one time but were now almost black with grime. Her face wasn’t much better. Dirt streaked across her pale cheeks, and her nose was red from the cold. A gray winter hat covered her head, although her dark brown hair stuck up at odd angles through the gaping holes in the knit fabric.

  The girl stopped about twenty feet away from us, next to a bakery cart. Her head snapped back and forth, as if she were looking for someone, although she soon focused on the area around the fountain. She tapped her hand on her thigh in a nervous rhythm and shifted on her feet, like she was ready to run away at any moment. A few red-hot sparks flashed on her fingertips, flickering in time to her uneasy motions, but she quickly curled her hand into a fist, snuffing out the telltale signs of magic.

  I drew in a breath, letting the air roll over my tongue and tasting all the scents in it again. The warm bread, the sweet cookies, the bloody cuts of meat, the chalky fluorestone dust. I pushed aside all those aromas and concentrated on the girl. My nose twitched, and I finally got a whiff of her scent—the hot, caustic stench of magic mixed with a sweet, rosy note.

  “There,” I whispered, pointing out the girl to Paloma. “I think it might be her.”

  Paloma peered in that direction. “Who is she? Do you recognize her?”

  “No. I’ve never seen her before, but I can smell her magic. She’s definitely a fire magier.” I hesitated, trying to push down my treacherous hope yet again. “She could be a Summer queen. Lots of them had fire magic.”

  “Then what is she waiting for?” Paloma asked. “Serilda is still throwing pennies into the fountain. That’s the signal.”

  It had been Xenia’s idea to say that any Blair seeking refuge should approach the blond woman tossing pennies into the fountain. The girl had come to the right plaza at the right time, so she must have heard the information, but she still didn’t approach the fountain.

  Instead, she stared at Serilda a second longer, then turned around and ran away.