Astar’s sister, Stella, slipped a hand through the crook of his elbow, her presence a steady comfort. Sensitive to emotions and a powerful healer, his twin rarely touched anyone except for him. She’d often commented that putting a hand on his arm felt the same as putting one hand in the other, and he knew just what she meant. Without her, Astar often thought he’d drown in the turbulent sea of court intrigue.
“What do you think?” he asked under his breath, knowing she’d hear. They couldn’t exactly speak mind to mind—Astar didn’t have enough sorcery in him for that—but they did share a special twin language. It allowed them to have conversations too cryptic for anyone else to understand, so quietly that no one else could overhear. “Right before the footman arrived, you said that challenges lie ahead and nothing will ever be the same. It sounded like prophecy.”
“Something deeply unsettling happened—and the future suddenly shifted,” she replied. “So fast that I haven’t had time to track the possible patterns of events.”
“What are you two whispering about?” Zephyr asked, catching up to them after passing Lena a dangerously full flute of sparkling wine and sipping her own without spilling a drop. Conversations that almost no one else could hear, Astar mentally corrected himself. As astute as she was gorgeous, Zephyr picked up on all sorts of things most people didn’t—just as she could move with that inherent grace that let her carry brimming glasses of wine without spilling a drop.
“Speculating on Her Majesty’s emergency,” Astar answered with a smile.
Zephyr shrugged in the extravagant Tala style. “Who knows what mossbacks think is an emergency?”
“Hey,” Jak grumbled, “enough with the mossback insults.”
“Jak is right,” Stella agreed gently. “It’s unkind and hurtful. Shapeshifters are no better than anyone else.”
“And shapeshifters can be fried with lightning just like anyone else,” Lena put in with a broad smile, narrowing her eyes at Zephyr, who hmphed at her.
“Or have their throats cut,” Jak added, cheerfully spinning a silver dagger between his nimble fingers.
“All right, everyone,” Astar said, calling them to attention as they turned down the hall to the queen’s study. “I know we’ve all had a substantial amount of Jak’s mjed, but—”
“And your Branlian whiskey before that,” Rhy put in.
“As if your shapeshifter metabolism is even touched by it,” Lena muttered at him.
“Feeling tipsy, love? Perhaps we should go somewhere quiet to lie down,” he murmured suggestively, and she giggled.
“I know we wanted them to make up and start talking to each other again,” Gen said to no one in particular, “but isn’t this billing and cooing a league or two beyond that?”
“What I’m saying is,” Astar added authority and volume to his voice as Rhy and Lena protested and the others weighed with their opinions, “we all need to focus and take this situation seriously.” They’d reached the study and its closed doors—and Astar signaled the footman to wait before announcing them. “Despite close relationships to the people who are no doubt inside this room, this is an official audience before the High Queen of the Thirteen Kingdoms.”
“We’re not children,” Rhy grumbled.
“Then don’t act like children,” Astar retorted. “This is a serious situation.”
They all stared at him with wide eyes. Then Jak snickered, and they all broke into laughter, even Stella.
His sister patted his arm. “Don’t worry. They’re just nervous. Once the doors are open, they’ll behave.”
He could only hope so.
~ 2 ~
The footman opened the doors and announced their arrival, Astar leading the way, as he did so well. Much as Zeph liked to tease him about being too responsible, excessively noble, and honorable to a fault, he wore the mantle of heir to the high throne well. Especially considering how much the responsibility weighed on him ever since he was a boy.
Zeph sipped her sparkling wine, using the excuse to slow her steps so she fell to the back of the group. Nobody in this room wanted to see her, regardless of the terms of the summons. No one expected much of her. She didn’t have to be a mind reader to figure that out. Zeph was the person you called when you wanted to have fun, not to solve a secret and urgent emergency.
Her campaign to seduce Astar hadn’t helped endear her to the powers-that-be either. They all thought it was important to marry Astar off to some prim mossback princess so they could make royal babies and live inside walls, upholding laws and so forth. None of them cared about Astar being happy, not like Zeph did. All she wanted was for him to live a little before they locked the door on the cage.
Well, and she wanted him in her bed for a few selfish reasons, too.
Naturally, his keepers didn’t want her to succeed. Goddesses forbid their golden prince get the idea that there was more to life than following the rules. What if he got all disobedient about whatever marriage of state they settled on for him? A ridiculous thought, as Astar would never shirk his duty to the high throne—and it wasn’t as if he’d ever marry her. Astar was far too committed to the good of the realm to do anything that reckless. He knew as well as Zeph did what a terrible queen she’d be.
Besides, Tala weren’t the marrying type. She just wanted to enjoy Astar while he was still unmarried. Once he said actual marriage vows, Astar would die a painful death before breaking them. Unfortunately, he also seemed virtuously intent on not dallying before that unhappy day either. Zeph had finally concluded that she’d have to play dirty if she wanted into his pants. Which she absolutely did—especially the ones he was currently wearing. The powder-blue velvet clung to his perfect ass with delicious results, also showing off his lean hips and muscular thighs. Astar had been training with a heavier broadsword in the last year, which had broadened his shoulders and developed his chest muscles to a delectable degree. With his summer-sky-blue eyes and golden hair, Astar was a beautiful man regardless, but in that outfit, he looked downright edible.
Enough to make her mouth water.
“Stop staring at Astar’s behind,” Gen hissed in her ear.
“How did you know I was?” she whispered back, sliding an arm around Gen’s slim waist. “Unless you were looking, too.”
Gen blushed furiously, which never ceased to amaze Zeph. They were first cousins who were close as sisters. But, though Gen had inherited her Tala mother’s extraordinary shapeshifting talent, Gen took after her mossback father in many ways, conservative to the point of primness at times. “I can’t believe you’re so irreverent,” Gen chided, glaring in disapproval.
“And yet you’ve known me my whole life,” Zeph retorted.
“Silence.” High Queen Ursula’s steely voice rang out, cutting through their whispered chatter. Standing from her chair at the end of the long table, Her Majesty pulled the light in the room to her, the gleaming sheath of her argent gown making her—already a lean blade of a woman—look like a lethal sword herself.
Zeph took in the three people waiting for them. Beside High Queen Ursula sat her sister, Queen Andromeda, whose sorcery made her scary imposing, her eyes silvery with shimmering magic. On the other side of the high queen sat Dafne, the high queen’s spymaster, intently marking a large document with notes and calculations.
Zeph wasn’t any expert on politics, but even she could recognize that a meeting with this trio—and no one else—meant something serious indeed. They were keeping the pool of people who knew about this secret and urgent happening very small—and they’d decided to more than double the number by summoning the seven of them. Ursula never did anything capriciously, but what under Moranu’s shadowy gaze could possibly involve Zeph?
A chill of foreboding ran up her spine, the delightful fizz of the wine evaporating from her bloodstream.
“I apologize for pulling you away from the celebration,” Ursula continued in a more even tone, “but something unprecedented has occurred, and we must take immediate steps.
Andi?”
Queen Andromeda rose from her chair, layered gown rustling like the night itself and glinting with silver threads like moonlight. She’d acted as Moranu’s avatar at midnight, and the goddess’s hand still sat heavily upon her, numinous and full of shadows. “Just now, over the Strait of K’van, there was a full lunar eclipse.”
An astonished silence fell, everyone’s expressions far too serious for this to be a joke.
“But,” Lena said, nearly stammering as she struggled to grasp that news, “that’s… not possible. What could possibly occlude the crystalline full moon? There’s nothing even close that could tonight. I know. I studied everything in preparation for the viewing tonight and—”
“Lena,” Dafne, who was also Lena’s mother, gently but firmly cut off Lena’s perilously rising tone, “no one knows why, only that it happened. Something unknown and possibly malicious briefly obscured the full moon.”
“Why do you say malicious?” Astar asked, frowning. He’d be taking responsibility for this himself, trying to fix it for them all.
“At the moment of this unnatural eclipse, a vision of the future assailed me, rather violently,” Queen Andromeda said, a tremor in her voice, which she immediately suppressed. “I cannot give you all specifics without risking even worse future scenarios, but I can say that unless we act now, we face certain disaster.”
Lena’s brown skin had paled to a sickly amber, twin spots of color rising to her cheekbones. “A lunar eclipse. Did I… did I do something to cause this?”
“No,” Queen Andromeda replied firmly, then gave Lena a rueful smile. “This doesn’t have the feel of your magic or mine, I can determine that much. The timing is suspicious, however, so we cannot escape that our magic working at midnight is somehow connected. Still, you were working under my guidance, so I bear all responsibility. This is most emphatically not your fault.”
Lena nodded, though she had tears in her eyes, and Rhy, standing beside her, looked like he wanted to kill someone to protect her. Dafne tipped down her spectacles to perch on the tip of her nose and looked over the top of them at her daughter. “Correlation is not causation, and cause and effect do not imply fault, Lena. Remember that.”
“Besides which,” Ursula inserted crisply, “I was the one to ask Lena to work her weather magic so that we could enjoy and celebrate the rare appearance of the crystalline moon. The ultimate responsibility rests with me.”
“You give yourself far too much credit,” Queen Andromeda said to her sister with some impatience. “No one could have predicted this result from the magic we worked, not even me—and I did look at the futures, as a basic precaution. This is something far beyond our ken, and control. Something so far beyond the normal flow of time that it wasn’t there to be seen until now.”
That was far from comforting news, and judging by everyone else’s expressions, Zeph wasn’t the only one to feel that way.
“I’ve sent for reports from people I have in the region, to gather data on the phenomenon—and any attendant aftereffects,” Dafne said into the fraught silence.
“Until then—and likely even then—I have only Andi’s vision to go on,” Ursula said crisply.
“And mine,” Stella offered in a soft voice.
Queen Andromeda looked to Stella, something about that startling her. “You had a vision, too?”
Stella nodded, her gaze troubled. “I saw many things I can’t quite understand, but all… horrible.”
“Yes.” Andromeda bowed her head briefly, then lifted it, purpose in her expression. “I could use your insight. The future is shifting by the moment, and fracturing into multiple paths too rapidly for me to trace the patterns beyond a certain nexus in time in the near future. What I can tell you all is that the nexus in time seems to focus around the formation of some sort of metaphysical rift in the north, centered in the Strait of K’van, and running in either direction through the Thirteen Kingdoms and beyond.”
“For those of us who don’t speak sorcery,” Jak said with a frown, “what is a metaphysical rift?”
Queen Andromeda held up her palms, a line between her brows. “That’s the best way I can describe it. It’s like a fault line—the sort that causes earthquakes and opens chasms in the ground—but on a nonphysical plane. From what I can see of the future, it causes fluctuations in magic, producing effects like I’ve never seen before. Allowing creatures into our realm that have existed only in mythology.”
“Or allowing unexpected objects to cause a lunar eclipse,” Astar murmured, and Zeph had to suppress another shiver. What could possibly block the moon?
“I’ve been transcribing Andi’s near-future predictions onto this map,” Dafne put in, practical as ever. “From what she’s been able to detail so far, the rift seems to be capable of spilling magic at volatile intervals. Those levels might be increasing exponentially, though I haven’t been able to complete all the calculations yet—and, of course, I have no empirical data, only anecdotes and projections. And it keeps changing.”
Zeph didn’t quite follow all of that, but whatever Dafne had said, it had Queen Andromeda glaring at her. “I can’t control the future, only tell you what I see. Forecasting the future is more art than science.”
“Besides which, it’s early hours yet,” Ursula interrupted. “As Andi says, there’s a great deal of work to be done to sort out what may occur in the near or distant future. Still, from what she has been able to determine and relate to me, there is a single step we can take at this time that will tilt the progression of events in our favor. Which brings us to why I have summoned the seven of you—and pledge you to secrecy.”
Zeph glanced at Stella, who nodded in regretful affirmation. Stella understood the intricacies of prophecy far better than anyone but Queen Andromeda herself, but Zeph knew enough to guess the implications. Andi had seen enough of the near future to know that the seven of them would be neck deep in it. Predicting the future wasn’t easy; acting on it was even more difficult, full of precarious dangers.
Sure enough, Ursula continued, leveling a steely gaze on their rapidly sobering group. “The primary reason for this meeting is to put the seven of you on notice that we will be sending you north first thing tomorrow.”
“Even me?” Jak asked in genuine surprise. “I’m just a sailor. No royal blood, sorcery, or shapeshifting in me. Not like the rest of this lot.”
Queen Andromeda gave Jak a half-smile. “Especially you, Jak. I realize that I’m asking a great deal of all of you, to trust in something we can’t—and won’t—fully explain. You’ve read your histories, if only because Dafne forced you.” She cast a grin at Dafne, who shrugged without remorse. “So, you all understand how foresight works. I can’t give you information that might affect decisions you make in the moment. I can only point you in the general direction that will lead to the most positive outcome for us all.”
“Which is why everyone hates prophecies,” Jak muttered.
“And understandably so,” Queen Andromeda replied wearily. “Suffice to say that I wouldn’t have sounded this alarm if the futures currently condensing didn’t spell disaster. I wouldn’t have advised Her Majesty to send the seven of you on this quest if I didn’t believe that you are our one chance to avert a cataclysm that will eventually tear our world stone from stone, until nothing remains.”
~ 3 ~
An even heavier burden than usual slammed down on Astar’s shoulders. Ever since the war ended when he was but a toddler, the world had been more or less at peace. Sure, magic had been released to spill out everywhere instead of being contained in Annfwn, which had caused all kinds of ripple effects. But those ripples were mostly along the lines of the odd creature cropping up in a forgotten lake or ancestral sorcery reappearing in people who’d lived ordinary lives until then.
Nothing world ending.
Astar had done his time being schooled by Dafne, as they all had. As even Jak had, when he wasn’t off sailing the seas. The former librarian had taught them as m
uch as she could get them to sit still for, and Astar had sat still for more than most. Between Dafne and High Queen Ursula, they’d stuffed as much information into Astar’s head as it could hold—which was never as much as they liked. Of course, dealing with high expectations, including and especially his own, was part of being heir to the high throne.
Not that realizing that particular truth made it any easier for him. Sometimes Astar wished he’d gotten Rhy’s life, or Jak’s. They both did pretty much as they pleased—though Astar wouldn’t wish his life on them, nor were either of them foolish enough to envy his. He could also wish that Ursula had decided to have children of her own, rather than depending on her nephew Astar to be her heir.
Though they’d cleaned up that history somewhat, Astar knew that the late, unlamented tyrant of a high king, Uorsin, had named his grandson Astar as heir to the high throne upon Astar’s birth. And Uorsin had done so entirely to undermine his firstborn, Ursula. One would think that Ursula would’ve picked anyone else to be her heir once she ascended to the high throne, but no—she’d upheld her father’s decision and set to molding Astar to be the kind of high king she believed her precious realm deserved.
Thus, he knew from many conversations on long-term strategy to protect and nurture the Thirteen Kingdoms, that Dafne had been concerned for years that the magic unleashed upon the world would continue to grow in unexpected ways. She’d studied every text on magic she could find, and she’d developed a theory that magic behaved more like an organic force than a physical one. She theorized that magic could feed on itself, acting as its own fuel to essentially reproduce like a living organism. He didn’t think she’d predicted anything like this.
Something far beyond our ken, and control. Something so far beyond the normal flow of time that it wasn’t there to be seen until now.
The Golden Gryphon and the Bear Prince: An Epic Fantasy Romance (Heirs of Magic Book 1) Page 2
