The Ring and the Crown

by Melissa de la Cruz

  “Good,” he said, standing up and walking behind her seat. He put a heavy, sweaty hand on her shoulder.

  Grateful.

  She had to be grateful for everything the royal family—those British usurpers—had given her. Grateful that her family had been allowed to keep their countryside estates after the Battle of Orleans. Grateful that they had been granted their lives and retained their titles, which assured that the Valois line would forever be prostrate to the throne. Forever grateful for scraps; forever in debt; forever losers.

  Grateful.

  Now both of Hugh’s hands were on her bare shoulders, and they were massaging her skin. He had never groped her so publicly before, and Isabelle couldn’t help but think it was due to her looming status as a woman without protection. If she wasn’t betrothed to Leopold, she was nobody; there would be no prince or royal family to answer to. No one would care what happened to her.

  “Leave her alone,” said the third person in the room, probably the only person in the world who did care what happened to her; he had remained silent until now. Isabelle glanced nervously at her other cousin, Louis-Philippe Beziers, who had grown up in the castle with her. His parents had been felled by the same wasting plague that had taken hers. Louis had finely chiseled features, dark hair and eyes, and would grow up to be strikingly handsome one day, but right now possessed a gangly, boyish awkwardness. Quiet and reflective, he was the only bright spot to her dark days. They clung to each other against a common enemy, but Louis had never dared speak up to Hugh until now.

  “What did you say to me, Jug Ears?” Hugh asked, turning to Louis with a dangerous look on his face. Their entire childhood, Hugh had been dismissive of Louis—continually mocking his interests, calling him names, and making it clear that he was nothing more than a burden. When they were younger, Louis had hardly ever spoken a word.

  “I said, leave her alone,” Louis said, rising from his chair and standing a foot taller than his cousin.

  But Hugh continued to massage Isabelle’s creamy shoulders, and she shook her head at Louis to tell him to back down. She didn’t want him to get hurt, and even if Louis was bigger than Hugh now, their wretched cousin was still their guardian, with the power to make life difficult for them.

  “It’s all right,” Isabelle said weakly. “Louis—it’s all right.”

  “See? It’s all right,” Hugh said with a smarmy smile. He gave her one last squeeze and left the room.

  “What am I going to do?” she despaired.

  “Don’t worry, Leo will never give you up,” Louis said. “He would be a fool to do so.”

  “If only that were true.” She sighed, looking out the window apprehensively, as if the answer to her dilemma could be found in the serene, rolling hills. “But perhaps you are right,” she said, thinking that it might be a good idea to see Leo face-to-face. Perhaps if he saw her, he would change his mind about this so-called peace treaty. Leo loved her. He would never willingly release her from their promise to each other. Once he laid eyes on her, he would change his mind. She would steam into London under the cover of the season, ostensibly to sign the papers destroying her future, but she would make certain to speak to him alone before that was necessary. That was all she needed—time alone with him.

  When she could be alone with Leo, as they had been just a month ago, there would be no king or country to contend with, only the two of them; and when they were alone, she would make him remember why he fell in love with her in the first place.

  Of course, she would have to be careful. If the Merlin or the queen knew what she was plotting, it would be treason; she had no desire to lose her head, she was quite fond of it. But if she were somehow able to make Leo think it was his own idea—his own love for her that was spurring him to honor their agreement—then the engagement with Marie-Victoria would be forgotten. She would be married to Leo as planned, safe from her lecherous relative. Besides, she had always been curious about the legendary Bal du Drap d’Or. Perhaps it was time to see it for herself.

  “Hugh is right,” she told Louis-Philippe, fanning herself with the queen’s letter. “I am grateful for this invitation.”

  If Aelwyn had any fears about the quality of her welcome, they evaporated the moment Marie walked into the room and caught sight of her. “Winnie!” her friend cried, crossing the length of the room in quick strides and enveloping her in a warm embrace. “Where have you been? Why has it taken you so long to come see me?”

  Aelwyn had no answer to that. It had been a week since she had returned to the palace, and she had been meaning to call on her old friend, but had been overtaken by a sudden shyness. Her last memory of the princess was of her ash-and-tear-streaked face as her bedroom burned. Aelwyn had only meant to make a few sparklers for her and Marie to play with truly, but instead had set the entire east wing ablaze. It had been an epic disaster, a scandal. Her father had paid for it politically, as the queen had insisted that she could not rest unless Emrys sent his daughter away, which he had done without question.

  In truth, Aelwyn was also ashamed of what she had done—put the princess in mortal danger—and she had doubted that Marie would even want to see her. What if her friend shared her mother’s paranoia? When they had first been separated, they had written letters to each other: long, detailed missives about the injustice that had befallen them, along with their daily tribulations. Marie wrote about the tedium of court life, and Aelwyn regaled her with stories of the strange and fascinating creatures she encountered on the island. But as the years went by, the letters dwindled, until it was only through the crystal glass that Aelwyn was able to keep up with Marie, to sneak a peek into her life. In the past year, though, she’d barely ever bothered, although she had been worried when she heard the princess’s health had deteriorated.

  Her best friend was a stranger, and even the palace was unfamiliar. Was this really where she had spent her childhood—where she had played hide-and-seek in the secret passageways, stolen pies from the kitchen, and giggled over dolls? This was a stranger’s castle, unfamiliar in every way—the ceilings felt lower, hallways narrower. Murals that had for centuries graced soaring barrel vaults were newly restored, but they were repainted in garish colors, hues too bright for the palace’s drab interior. Doors replaced blind archways, halls supplanted galleries, leaving St. James neither old nor new, but somewhere in between. Back then, her compatriot had been a gangly, awkward girl in a helmet and a back brace; Marie was now the princess of the land. Aelwyn had always known Marie was special, but it had not stopped her from thinking they were equals when they were younger.

  Although to be honest, she did not find her much changed. Marie-Victoria was taller and thinner, maybe, pale as usual, the sickness showing in her sallow color and sunken eyes, but she was as warm and welcoming as ever. “I am so glad you are back. Look,” she said, placing a gold foil truffle in the palm of Aelwyn’s hand. “Hazelnut, your favorite.” In an instant, it was as if they were both twelve years old again, conspiring to nab extra cream puffs from the dessert buffets.

  Aelwyn beamed at Marie. “Father said I was to see to your glimmer before the reception,” she said. “Send your ladies away. I shall take care of you, Princess.”

  “Don’t call me that! You’re being so silly,” Marie said, shooing her ladies out the door. “And you don’t have to wait on me.”

  “Yes, I do. No arguments, now,” Aelwyn said, leading Marie to the mirrored vanity and picking up a comb.

  “Can you believe I’m to marry Leo? That little squirt you used to chase down the hallways? That is, if his people find me acceptable this morning,” said Marie.

  “Which they will, I guarantee it,” Aelwyn said cheerfully, even as she noticed her friend’s face fall in the mirror. She ran the comb gently through Marie’s fine brown hair, untangling snarls and whispering a few words to give it some luster. She eased into the familiarity of the act, remembering the hours they had spent learning to braid each other’s hair when they were young
er. This was just like before, except, in a nagging corner of her mind, Aelwyn knew it wasn’t. Even if Marie hadn’t changed, everything else had, including Aelwyn Myrddyn herself. She was no longer the orphan girl of the kitchens, with a dirty face and tangled hair, but a full-grown sorceress in control of her magic. She was an enchanter trained in the ways of Avalon, able to command wind, water, air, and stone—and what was she doing?

  Combing hair.

  “Make her look pretty. She will be queen one day, and no one wants to be reminded their queen is ill,” her father had ordered before dismissing her that morning. She received the message loud and clear: You are a servant to the throne. While you might command the power of magic, the royal family has command over you. Your power is theirs.

  In Avalon, Viviane had explained the reasoning behind her brother’s decision to bow down to the sovereign. “He did it for our protection. Emrys believes that unless we submit ourselves to their rule, they would hunt and kill us for the rest of our lives. There are too many of them and too few of us. Before the Order was established and the rules set in place, mages like us were tortured and killed. Magic is unpredictable, but try explaining that to a pining lover or the mother of a sick child.”

  “And what do you believe?” Aelwyn had asked.

  Viviane had smiled ruefully. “I believe, my child, that servants or not, they will find a way to use—or kill—us anyway. My brother thinks he can manipulate time and history to remain among the mortals, but he will be proven wrong. Magic has no place in their world, as the glass has shown us time and time again.” Aelwyn had seen the other time lines her aunt was speaking about. She had peeked into the crystal and had seen visions of strange, foreign worlds. In one, the very earth had frozen over in ice, its mages destroyed—literally rotting from their own magic.

  Aelwyn ruminated on her aunt’s words as she continued to comb the princess’s hair, so dry and brittle, unlike her own lustrous locks. The difference between them was striking: Marie was frail and delicate, while Aelwyn was tall and voluptuous, her hair a rich, dark red that complemented her cat-like green eyes. She wore the garb of the Order she would soon join—an apprentice spellcaster’s midnight blue tunic and long skirt. The uniform was meant to be deliberately drab, but even in such dull clothing her figure was stunning.

  Since she had arrived at court the other week, the sight of her had caused pages to run into doors, and lords and knights to stammer and stare. Even the footman who’d carried her bags to her room the first day had hinted that if she ever desired company, he would be happy to provide it. She had turned them all down with a sweet but firm hand. If she was to take a lover—a privilege sorceresses were granted freely, as those of the invisible orders were bonded to the throne and forbidden to wed—she would choose a great man indeed, a man worthy and able to bear the weight of her love. Unlike her last choice. But now was not the time to think of that mistake.

  “Mama told you to make me beautiful for the Prussian ambassador, didn’t she? Perhaps if you fail, they will turn me down,” Marie said suddenly.

  “Shush, now,” Aelwyn said, disliking Marie’s defeatism in the face of such privilege. “You are to marry a handsome prince, and live happily ever after like a real fairy tale. You will dazzle them.”

  “I am not fishing for compliments. They will call me beautiful enough when they see me, I am sure. The Prussians want to end this war and seal this alliance as badly as my mother and your father do. I used to think I was the only one who thought Mama looked old, since everyone around me always talked about how young and beautiful she was, until I realized they were all lying—they were so afraid of her. For the longest time I thought I was out of my mind as well as my health, because no one ever told me the truth.”

  Aelwyn stared at her. “You see the queen as she really is?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The courtiers talk about the queen being young and beautiful because to them she is young and beautiful. It is a glamour spell of some sort, but even I cannot see through it,” Aelwyn said.

  “Do you mean you do not see her as an old crone, as I do?”

  “No, not at all.”

  “How strange,” Marie said.

  “Perhaps it is your gift.” Aelwyn smiled. “That you can see things others don’t.” She placed a few pins in the princess’s hair to hold it away from her face, thinking it would look more striking that way.

  Marie nodded. “I am sorry we lost touch—Mother said I was not to bother you anymore. That you were to make your own decision about your future, without me hounding you. But I am so glad you chose to return to us, instead of staying in Avalon! Was it hard to leave Viviane? And you never told me—is Lanselin as handsome as they say?”

  “I too am glad to be back, and my cousin is very handsome indeed,” Aelwyn said lightly. They were cousins in name only, as Lans was the child Viviane had raised as her own, but he was not of her blood. He had taken to reminding her of that when they were together. “I heard your Leo has grown up to be very handsome as well.”

  “I suppose. Handsome is as handsome does.” Marie shrugged.

  “Why are you so against the idea of Leo? You never liked him, even when we were little,” Aelwyn said, as she waved an amethyst stone over Marie’s hair to create vermilion highlights. “Oh, I remember now—you always preferred the younger one. What was his name again?”

  “Wolf,” Marie said softly. “I didn’t ‘prefer’ him. We were friends. Or we used to be, before the Merlin declared war on his family. It was awful during the war; I was always worried he would be killed, although my mother assured me she would only take the royal family hostage, then put them to death if it came down to it. Apparently there’s no need to start a precedent of spilling royal blood. Never mind that they were our friends and distant family, and we shouldn’t murder them.”

  “That stands to reason,” Aelwyn nodded. “Now, Leo can’t be too different from his brother, can he?”

  “Yes, he is,” Marie said, annoyed. “Wolf is sweet and smart and kind, but everyone thinks he’s a troublemaker, while everyone thinks Leo is perfect.” She made a face in the mirror.

  “Did it ever occur to you that maybe Leopold is perfect?” Aelwyn smiled, remembering the handsome young man who used to visit.

  “Maybe you should marry him, then.” Marie sighed. “I don’t know, there’s just something about him. He’s always so proper and polite and, well, perfect.” Perhaps she did hold it against him a little, because she’d had such a rough start in life.

  Aelwyn considered that. “You’re not just saying that because there’s someone else, are you?” she asked.

  This time Marie wouldn’t meet her gaze. Aelwyn realized they weren’t twelve years old anymore, passing notes to the young princes who came to court and laughing when one of them tried to kiss them during dancing lessons. Marie was seventeen now, a girl with desires and secrets of her own.

  “Marie, who is he?” Aelwyn asked. It had been years, but in the space of a few minutes they had eased back into their familiar intimacy. “You can tell me.”

  “There’s no one,” Marie said flatly.

  Aelwyn was relieved, until Marie spoke again all in a rush. “It doesn’t matter. He’s gone now. He was a soldier—a member of the Queen’s Guard, actually. But he was sent to the northern front. I don’t know when he’ll be back, or even if he’ll ever return. He just…disappeared…one day. They said he only went on leave, but I wrote to him, and I never got a letter back,” she said, covering her face with her hands.

  “Oh, Marie.” Aelwyn finished with the highlights and put the stone back in her bag. “This isn’t good.”

  “Like I said, it doesn’t matter now. I don’t know where he is. I don’t even know if he’s all right. I wish someone would tell me what’s happened to him, but no one will.”

  Marie had always been so obedient, so agreeable, and Aelwyn felt a pang to see her so low. She loved Marie like a sister, even if she had always been
just a tiny bit jealous and resentful of her position. The court fawned over her, and Marie always got the best of everything—the largest piece of cake, the best cut of meat at the table, the prettiest dresses, the most toys, the largest stack of gifts, the white pony at the stables—while Aelwyn always had to make do with hand-me-downs and scraps, never quite knowing her place, never quite having a real home. She was the bastard daughter of the Merlin, and magicians were not allowed to have children. Her whole existence was a mistake, even if her father never said so. It was only now that she truly understood that Marie was as trapped in her life as she was; that she had little choice or freedom to shape her own destiny. That, like her, she was a prisoner of her fate. “You have to forget about him. You know that, right?”

  In answer, Marie kept her face covered with her hands.

  “You haven’t seen Leo in years. I know you’ve never liked him much, but you need to give him a chance.”

  “I suppose you are right,” Marie sighed. “You know, they call him the Hero of Lamac, because it was he who unleashed the Pandora’s Box that won the battle.”

  Aelwyn held the comb in midair and shuddered. Viviane was uninterested in the mortal realm, but even in Avalon they had heard the gruesome news. The stones made by the witch Pandora could conjure the horrors of Gilgamesh, Tartarus, and Doomsday all at once. They were stones that held the power of the Dark, of the Terrible. They had the ability to unleash a million hungry mouths with blades for teeth—monstrous creatures, rotten and soulless. She pitied the soldiers that had been on the battlefield that day. No wonder the empire had agreed to a truce, to a wedding. Anything to erase the memory of that dreadful battle, and—it remained unsaid, but it was clear—anything to make sure it never happened again. “However did the Prussians get their hands on one?” she asked.

  “No one knows.” Marie shrugged.

  “Because only a mage tutored in the dark arts could unleash the power of Pandora’s curse,” Aelywyn said. “And the most powerful enchanters of the world are in service to the queen, and work for the empire.”