The Alcazar

by Amy Ewing

  Alethea’s red curls fell freely down her back and she wore a dress of silver and green scales. She was young, perhaps no more than eighteen.

  “Rise,” the bone queen commanded. “Not that I don’t love the sight of a Byrne on her knees.”

  Alethea got to her feet, her turquoise eyes flashing. “I thank you, Your Grace.”

  “So you have come to Ithilia,” the Renalt said. “Is this another one of Ambrosine’s chess moves? Is she trying to infiltrate our ranks now?”

  “No one is trying to infiltrate anything,” Alethea said. “My mother does not even know I am here and she would be furious if she did.” She turned to the scarlet queen almost shyly. “My brother Matthias thinks the world of you, Your Grace, and greatly admires your wisdom. He is only fourteen, but he has a brilliant mind and a sharp wit. I have told him that perhaps one day he might come to Ithilia and meet the Lekke himself.”

  The bone queen snorted but the Lekke looked pleased. “I would be honored to receive him,” she said.

  “But why are you here?” the Renalt asked. “We were surprised to receive your letter and have, after much consideration, allowed you an audience.”

  “Yes, let’s get to the point,” the bone queen, who must be the Aerin, snapped.

  Alethea took a deep breath. “I have come to ask—to beg—that you leave my mother alone. Not for her sake but for yours. The squabbling between all of our families has gone on for centuries. Isn’t it time for it to end?”

  “And you believe we should just forget all the wrongs, all the insults?” the Renalt asked.

  “If you do not, you are only giving her what she wants. Invite her to Banrissa. Form a truce. Show the northern islands that the Triumvirate is wise as well as powerful, and able to overlook the past.”

  The Aerin let out a sound of disgust. “The northern islands do not frighten me,” she said.

  “They should,” Alethea replied sharply. “And they are your subjects, as much as those who live on Cairan or Thaetus or any of the other islands of Pelago. It is the working women and men who suffer most from these petty feuds. The more you fight her, the more her position strengthens in the north.”

  “And what is her position, exactly?” the Lekke asked.

  “Domination,” Alethea said. “She wishes to rule.”

  There was silence and then the Aerin let out a barking laugh and the Renalt chuckled.

  “She will never rule Pelago,” the Renalt said.

  “She may try to rule some of it,” Alethea said.

  “You are a very brave child,” the Lekke said kindly. “But Ambrosine has no hope of ruling over anything but Culinnon. And we cannot reach out an olive branch to someone who has so steadfastly antagonized us. Unless she would be willing to make amends? Apologize for her past behaviors and pledge not to repeat her mistakes?”

  Alethea pursed her lips and she looked down at the floor.

  “Ah,” the Lekke said. “I thought not.”

  “Go back to Culinnon,” the Aerin said. “Go back to where you belong.”

  “No,” Alethea said.

  “Then you may remain in Ithilia,” the Renalt said as the Aerin muttered something to herself, annoyed. “On the condition that you leave your mother’s beliefs and attitudes behind you.”

  “As you have so astutely pointed out, Your Grace,” Alethea said, “they are my mother’s beliefs. Not mine.” She bowed low. “I thank you, Triumvirate, for your time. May the goddesses go with you.”

  “And with you,” the three queens replied.

  Once she had gone, the Lekke turned to the other two.

  “She is not her mother’s daughter, that’s for certain,” she said.

  “No,” the Renalt mused. “Perhaps when she inherits Culinnon, there can finally be peace between the Byrnes and the Triumvirate.”

  “Perhaps,” the Aerin said doubtfully.

  The memory dissolved and Agnes returned to the present, gasping for breath. The Renalt was staring at Sera, stunned. For several moments there was only the sound of the waves lapping against the shore and the murmurs of the Misarros who had been frozen and were now shaking their heads or flexing their fingers or running their hands over their chests.

  “What . . . was that?” the Renalt said in a daze.

  “I am a Cerulean,” Sera said. “My blood is magic. And Agnes is more like her mother than her grandmother. The opportunity presented itself once before. Alethea’s request was wiser than you realized. How much death and pain could have been avoided, if you had listened to her then and forged a truce with Ambrosine?”

  “Ambrosine would have broken any pact that was made,” the Renalt said, and Agnes knew that was true.

  “Perhaps,” said Sera. “But she is dead and Agnes is here. Isn’t it time to put aside old grudges? Isn’t it better for Pelago to be united rather than divided?”

  “The Lekke would agree,” Matthias said, rising to his feet. “And the Aerin would not be able to protest, not with two votes in favor. Let us move forward into a new future, Your Grace. One where our families can live in peace.”

  “And how can I be certain that Agnes is truly the woman you say she is?” the Renalt asked.

  Agnes had a sudden flash of an idea. “I told you, Braxos holds no magic or fortune. The jewels you see beneath the water are illusions. The only power here belongs to these women, to these Cerulean, and it will fade when they leave. But there is something I can offer you, something you have long coveted.” She steeled herself, wondering how her uncles would react. “I will share the riches of Culinnon with you.”

  Matthias gasped and Hektor made a choking sound. Leo was smiling at her grimly, nodding his head.

  “The Byrnes have hoarded its wealth for generations,” he said. “We’ll give it back to Pelago.” He jutted out his chin. “Kaolin too. The secrets of Culinnon were never meant for one country alone. They should be shared with this whole planet.”

  Sera was beaming at him. “Yes,” she said.

  Eneas dabbed at his eyes with the cuff of his shirt and Matthias looked moved to tears. The Renalt stared at Leo for a long moment.

  “You really do look just like her,” she said.

  “I know,” Leo replied, and for the first time Agnes heard a ring of pride in his voice as he said it.

  Agnes turned to Matthias. “You should go with the Renalt, back to Banrissa,” she said. “To ensure the Lekke’s support.”

  Matthias gave Agnes a low bow. “As you command.” Then he winked at her. “I’ll see you at the university.” Agnes felt a tingle run through her veins, but then she pushed the thought of the school aside. Now was not the moment to celebrate. Not yet. She turned to Hektor. “We’ll take the clandestines back to Culinnon. There are plans to be made.”

  Hektor held her eyes for a moment, then bowed low like his brother had done. “As you command,” he said, echoing Matthias.

  Agnes looked at Sera. “What are all these Cerulean doing here?”

  Sera smiled wide. “We are here to give back some of what we took. Come with me.”

  37

  Sera

  SERA LED LEO AND AGNES AWAY FROM THE RENALT, WHO was calling upon her Misarros to ready their ships to sail for Banrissa.

  Leela came with them and the cluster of Cerulean stared in awe, at Leo especially, as they approached. She noticed her mothers exchange looks of curiosity mixed with delight.

  “We have stopped the fighting between the humans,” Sera announced. “Now we must do our duty and return some of our magic to this planet.” She looked at Leo and Agnes, her heart thrumming with joy. “My friends will do the rest once we have gone.”

  She was so happy to think that the Arboreals and mertags would be freed from Culinnon, and that they would at last find their true purpose. Not to be sold, like Xavier wanted, or hoarded, like Ambrosine had done. Cerulean magic was meant to be shared. The planet would be replenished.

  Sera felt a sharp twinge in her chest—she wished she could b
e here to see it, to help.

  Leela was instructing the Cerulean on how to self blood bond. “Our minds are as powerful as our magic,” she was saying. “Look within yourselves. The fruit has made you strong, the way you should have been all along. Look inside and release some of this power. A gift for what was taken.”

  One by one, Cerulean eyes lit up like fires. Daina gasped and Freeda sucked in a hard breath and Koreen made a sound like a giggle and a cough. Sera’s mothers looked fierce, as Sera had never seen them before.

  “Now walk the beaches,” Leela said, and Sera knew she was thinking of Wyllin’s memory, of the Cerulean wandering through the forests of Orial. “And give back.”

  Faint wisps of magic emanated out from Acolyte Endaria as she took the first steps. Acolyte Imima followed after, then Sera’s mothers, then Koreen, then all the travelers were walking the white sand, leaving the faintest trace of silver trailing out from behind them.

  Sera beamed, so proud of her people.

  Until she realized someone was missing.

  “The High Priestess,” she gasped.

  “Where could she have gone?” Leela asked.

  Sera’s eyes turned upward to the ruins of the Alcazar. “Wyllin,” she said.

  She and Leela left the others on the beach, Agnes, Leo, and Elorin coming with them. Leela was breathing heavily by the time they reached the top of the cliff.

  “I never dreamed I’d see a planet,” Elorin said, gazing out over the ocean. “It’s not quite what I thought.”

  Sera grinned. “What did you think it would be like?”

  Elorin paused. “Smaller,” she said. “And not so green.”

  “The city we come from isn’t as green as this,” Agnes said.

  “No,” Sera agreed. “And there were dwellings as tall as the temple piled up next to each other, made of all sorts of materials, with hardly any trees.”

  Leela wore a curious expression, one that made Sera’s stomach twinge with an inexplicable sense of foreboding. “You have seen so much,” she said.

  “I suppose there will be even more to see when we leave this planet,” Sera said, trying to sound brave. She saw Leo flinch out of the corner of her eye but could not bring herself to look at him. She’d have to leave him. Again.

  They passed through the doors to the Alcazar and made their way back to the courtyard. And there, by the fountain, was the High Priestess. She and Wyllin stood several feet apart.

  “You abandoned me,” Wyllin was saying, though there was no anger in her tone.

  The High Priestess crumpled. “Forgive me, Wyllin. I didn’t know how it would work, not really. I was frightened. I thought I was doing what was right.”

  “I know,” Wyllin said. Her eyes caught Sera’s and then she pointed. The High Priestess turned to find Leo and Agnes gaping at her.

  “Do you see?” Wyllin said. “These humans are devoted to Sera. There is hope after all. Not every planet is Orial. Mistakes can be made and atoned for, but not like this. Not this way. We have lived for so long, you and I. Too long. It is time now. You have carried this burden for years more than you expected. You cling to life the way you cling to power. Aren’t you tired, Elysse? All the fears you had no longer exist. Not all planets are safe, but they are not all as dangerous as you think. And we are killing this one. By staying here, we are draining it dry. It is time to let go.”

  “I don’t know how,” the High Priestess said, and she sounded small and pitiful.

  “Together,” Wyllin said. “We will let go together.”

  Tears filled the High Priestess’s eyes. “I’m frightened.”

  Sera did not think she would ever be able to feel sympathy for the High Priestess, but as she looked at her now, she could not help thinking what a sad creature she was, and how lonely she must have been all those centuries. It did not excuse her actions, but it helped to smooth the rough edges of Sera’s grief for her City.

  “I know,” Wyllin said, walking forward to clasp her hands. “But balance must be returned. By keeping the secret of the Great Sadness, you deprived the City of its very right to choose its fate for itself. How many travelers and tether-tenders and planet-keepers have been denied their true purpose because they did not know it was an option at all? How many different types of love have you prevented? I know you were only trying to keep them safe. But they are safe. And they deserve to be themselves, whatever that may mean. It is time for the City to move on. It is time for you and me to join Mother Sun in her endless embrace. It is time, Elysse. Can’t you feel it?”

  The High Priestess swallowed. “I don’t know how,” she said again. “I don’t know how to let go.”

  Wyllin smiled at her. “I do.” She bent and kissed their hands where they joined. “I forgive you,” she said. At that, the High Priestess seemed to shatter, hunching over as tears fell, leaving tiny imprints on the floor of the courtyard. Wyllin rubbed her back and murmured soothing words.

  “So will she be the sacrifice to break the tether?” Leela asked.

  Wyllin turned and Sera felt a thrill run from the tips of her toes to the ends of her hair. Then, to her surprise, the High Priestess straightened and spoke.

  “This tether is not like the others that have been created throughout our history,” she said. “It was not forged by death, and so need not be broken by it. If one has the courage. To fall again.” She looked up at the sky. “But she must live the rest of her days on this planet. She cannot return to the City.”

  “What?” Leela cried.

  Sera felt a heady sense of relief at odds with a crippling sorrow inside her.

  “You can’t,” Leo said, and the pain in his voice was palpable. Sera’s heart swelled. How selfless of him, to insist that she go. She could hardly recall the selfish, shallow person he had once been.

  “Sera, you don’t need to do this,” Agnes said. “You should go home.”

  But Sera remembered a fleeting bit of Leela’s memory, of the dream she’d had when Mother Sun had visited her as a will-o-the-wisp.

  Home is not always what we think it is when our journey begins. And it can change along the way.

  The word she’d seen written on the temple doors when she’d returned to the City held new meaning now.

  Home.

  “Home can be many things.” Sera touched the moonstone hanging around her neck. “I think . . . I think I have found a new one here.”

  “As long as you have a moonstone, you will be connected to the City Above the Sky,” Wyllin said. “You will never truly lose your people, your friends, or your mothers.”

  Sera’s heart was glad to hear it. Leela’s eyes shone with tears.

  “It will be all right,” Sera said, though she wasn’t sure those were the right words. It was all so bittersweet—no matter what choice she made, she would suffer loss.

  But the City needed to move. And she had sworn to herself that she would set it right, that she would break the tether even if it meant falling again. And at least this time, falling did not mean dying.

  The High Priestess seemed almost like the woman Sera had known all her life, confident and wise and strong. “If the City is to move,” she said, “it will need a new leader.”

  She walked up to Leela and held her gaze for a long time. Sera had the sense that there was something akin to a blood bond taking place between them. Leela seemed so much older now, taller even. She stood proud and unafraid, facing down the City’s oldest and most deceitful High Priestess where once she had been scared to sneak out of her house at night. Sera could not have been prouder of her friend.

  Then the bond broke. The High Priestess removed her circlet and held it out with trembling hands.

  “This belongs to you now,” she said. “The City’s new High Priestess.”

  Sera waited for Leela to protest, to insist that she was not meant for such an important role.

  But Leela simply reached out and took the circlet, clutching it in her hands, her jaw set. Elorin pressed her p
alms to her chest.

  The High Priestess turned to Sera. “There is something you will need,” she said. She deftly plucked a strand of hair from her head and bent to bury it in the earth. She put her hand over the mound of dirt and a tiny sapling no more than a foot tall sprang up from the ground, winding through her fingers—a miniature Arboreal. And from its slender branches, a golden fruit appeared, growing larger and larger until the tree bent beneath its weight. The High Priestess plucked it and offered it to Sera.

  “Eat this before you fall,” she said. Sera took the fruit, its skin soft, its flesh warm in her hand.

  Then the High Priestess walked back to Wyllin. “Together?” she said.

  Tears leaked from Wyllin’s eyes as the two ancient friends embraced. “Together,” she whispered.

  “It is time to go,” Leela said, turning her gaze to the beach. “We have given all we can, I think.”

  Sera nodded. Leela touched the moonstone in the circlet and Sera felt it beckoning, rippling through each moonstone on this planet, calling the Cerulean home. She turned to her human friends, looking scared and confused.

  “Will you wait for me here?” she asked, and her voice broke.

  Agnes was nodding and Leo said, “As long as it takes.”

  Sera looked up at the tether, the twinkling chain that had forever altered the course of her life. “I don’t think it will be long.”

  Then she called on her moonstone to take her to the City Above the Sky, one last time.

  The Night Gardens were quiet as Sera made her way to the dais.

  The High Priestess’s final fruit was running hot in her veins. Leela stood at the jutting glass balcony with Elorin beside her, an acolyte now that Klymthe had been stripped of her title. The circlet suited her best friend, Sera thought. It made her as powerful on the outside as she was on the inside. Cerulean bowed to Sera as she passed and the gesture of respect did not inspire insecurity and fear as it had before. This ceremony was so different from the last one.