A_Shadow_in_the_Ember_Amazon

by Armentrout, Jennifer L.

  “I may already have one foot in the Vale, but I haven’t lost my mind.” Her breath was faint and shallow. “Or my vision.”

  I glanced down at my hand, hovering so close to her skin. I jerked it to my chest, my heart still pounding. “I think you’re seeing things, Odetta.”

  A dry, cracked laugh parted her lips. “Seraphena,” she said, startling me. Only she ever used my full name. “Look at me.”

  Shoving my hands between my knees, I looked at her, never knowing a time when her face was free of the heavy lines of age. “What?”

  “Do not play coy with me, girl. I know what you were about,” she rasped. Denial rose, but she was having none of it. “What have I told you? All these years? Have you forgotten? What have I told you?” she repeated.

  Feeling as if I were a small child perched on a stool, I shifted uncomfortably. “To never do that again.”

  “And what do you think would’ve happened if you’d done that? You were lucky when you were a child, girl. You won’t get lucky again. You’d bring the wrath of the Primal onto yourself.”

  I nodded, even though I had gotten lucky more than once since I was a child and had picked up Butters. Not once had my…gift captured the attention of the Primal of Death. And I…

  I didn’t know what I had been about to do.

  Shaken, I slid my hands from between my knees and looked at them. They looked normal now. Just like everything about me did. I exhaled raggedly. “I thought you were gone—”

  “And I will be gone, Seraphena. Soon,” Odetta predicted, drawing my gaze once more to hers. Was it my imagination, or did she look even smaller under that blanket? Thinner. “I have lived long enough. I’m ready.”

  I bit my lip as it started to tremble and nodded.

  Those eyes might be dull, but they still held the power to hold mine.

  “I know,” I said, clasping my hands and keeping them firmly in my lap.

  She eyed me through half-open lids. “Is there a reason you’re in here, other than to disturb me?”

  “I wanted to check on you.” And that was true, but I did have another reason. A question. One that had been preying on my mind for a while. “And I wanted to ask you something if you’re up for it.”

  “I’m not doing anything but lying here, waiting for you to leave,” she groused.

  I cracked a grin at that, but it quickly faded as my stomach started jumping and twisting. “You said something a long time ago, and I wanted to know what you meant—what it meant.” The breath I took was shallow. “You said I was touched by death and life. What does that mean? To be touched by both.”

  Odetta coughed out a raspy laugh. “After all these years, now you’re going to ask?”

  I nodded.

  “There a reason you’re asking now?”

  “Not really.” I shrugged. “It’s just something I’ve always wondered about.”

  “And you thought you’d ask before I kicked the bucket?”

  I frowned. “No—” White, bushy brows crept up on her forehead. I sighed. “Okay. Maybe.”

  Her laugh was dry and raspy, but her eyes brightened with a sharpness that erased much of the dullness. “I hate to disappoint you, child, but that’s not a question I can answer. It’s what the Fates claimed upon your birth. Only the Fates can tell you what that means.”

  Chapter 5

  Stifling a yawn the following morning, I entered the quiet, candlelit room through the door often used by servants. My steps were a bit sluggish as I crossed the stillness of the Queen’s sitting room. Between the annoying headache that hadn’t gone away until this morning, and trying to figure out Odetta’s vague non-answer to my question, I hadn’t slept well the night before.

  I didn’t even know why I tried to understand what Odetta had meant. That wasn’t the first time she’d spoken in what reminded me of a riddle. And to be honest, half of the time, I truly believed she was simply embellishing whatever she was saying. Like the Fates—the Arae—claiming that both life and death had touched me upon my birth. How would Odetta even know that? She wouldn’t.

  Shaking my head, I passed the plush ivory settees, my steps silent against the thick carpet. I made my way to the back of the long, narrow chamber on the second floor, where two candelabras burned. I’d never known a time when those candles hadn’t been lit.

  In the still, rose-scented chamber, I looked up at the painting of King Lamont Mierel and took the time to really soak in his image, knowing my mother would be at brunch at this time. It was safe to look upon him now.

  My father.

  There was a tightness in my chest, a pressure that I thought could be grief, but I wasn’t sure how I could mourn someone I’d never met.

  He’d died shortly after my birth, having leapt from Wayfair’s east tower. No one had ever said why. No one ever spoke of it. But I often wondered if my birth—the reminder of what his forefather had done—had driven him to it.

  I swallowed as I took in the image of him captured in such detail it was as if he stood before me in white and plum robes, the golden crown of leaves resting upon hair the color of the richest red wine.

  His hair fell in loose waves to his shoulders while my hair was, well, a mess of tight and loose curls…and knots that tangled their way down to my hips. Our brows were shaped the same, arching in a manner that gave me the appearance that I was questioning or judging something. The curve of our mouths was identical, but somehow his had been captured with the corners tilted upward in a soft smile, while according to the Queen on more than one occasion, I looked sullen. He had a smattering of freckles along the bridge of his nose, but it looked like someone had dipped a brush in brown paint and flicked tiny brown spots all over my face. His eyes were a forest green like mine, but it was how those eyes had been painted that always got to me.

  There was no light in his stare, no glimmer of life or hidden mirth to match the curve of his mouth. His eyes were haunted, and I wasn’t sure how an artist could capture such emotion with oils, but clearly, they had.

  Looking into those eyes was hard.

  Looking at him at all was difficult. He had more masculine, far more refined features than I did, but we shared so much that I wondered long before I’d failed if that was one of the reasons my mother had struggled to gaze upon me for any length of time. Because I knew she’d loved him. That a large part of her still did, even if she had found space to hold tender feelings for King Ernald. That was why those candles were never extinguished. It was why King Ernald never entered this sitting room and why when the painful headaches struck my mother, she retreated to here instead of to the chambers she shared with her husband. It was why she often spent hours in here, alone with this painting of Lamont.

  I often wondered if they were mates of the heart—if there was even such a thing that was written about in poems and songs. Two halves of a whole. It was said that the touch between one was full of energy and that their souls would recognize one another. It was even said that they could walk in the dreams of another, and that the loss of one wasn’t something repairable.

  If mates of the heart were something more than legend, then I believed that was what my mother and father had been to one another.

  A heaviness settled in my chest, cold and aching. Sometimes, I also wondered if my mother blamed me for his death. Maybe if he’d fathered a son. If he had, would he still be alive? Instead, he was gone, and I didn’t care what the Priests of the Primal of Life may believe or claim. He had to be in the Vale, finding whatever peace he hadn’t been able to attain in life.

  In the center of the aching coldness was a spark of heat—anger. That was another reason it was so hard to look upon him. I didn’t want to be angry because it seemed wrong to feel that, but he’d left me before I even had a chance to know him.

  The doors to the sitting room suddenly creaked, causing my stomach to drop. I spun, knowing there was no way I could make it to the servants’ door in time. Any hope that it would be one of my mother’s Ladi
es vanished at the sound of her voice. A storm of emotions whipped through me. Dread over how she’d respond to finding me here. Hope that she wouldn’t take issue with my presence. Bitterness that warned I was foolish to hold onto such hope. I locked up as the Queen of Lasania swept inside, a force of flowing lilac skirts and sparkling gems. Behind her, Lady Kala and a seamstress stood, the latter clutching a gown.

  I couldn’t help but stare at my mother. I hadn’t seen her since the night the Vodina Isles Lords had rejected the offer of allegiance. Did she look different? The creases at the corners of her eyes appeared deeper. She looked slimmer, and I wondered if it was the gown or if she struggled with her appetite. If she were ill…

  “Thank you so much for finishing the gown—” My mother drew up short, the yellow-jeweled comb pinning her curls in place glittering in the lamplight. Her gaze landed on me, widening slightly and then narrowing. My shoulders straightened as I braced myself. “What are you doing in here?” she demanded.

  I opened my mouth, but any ability to form words left me as she stalked forward, leaving Lady Kala and the seamstress by the door.

  She stopped several feet from me, her chest rising sharply. Tension bracketed the Queen’s lips as she turned away from me. “I’m sorry, Andreia,” she said, speaking to the seamstress. Andreia. I thought I’d recognized her. Joanis was her last name. She had a clothing shop in Stonehill frequented by many of the noblemen and women. “I know your time is very valuable. I wasn’t aware that my handmaiden would be here.”

  Handmaiden.

  Lady Kala’s gaze dropped to the floor as the seamstress shook her head. “It is fine, Your Grace. I will just go ahead and get set up.”

  My focus shifted from my mother to the seamstress. Andreia had dark shadows under her eyes, and stray brown hairs escaped the neat bun at her neck. I was willing to bet she had spent many long nights finishing the froth of ivory silk and pearls she carried. A muscle ticked at the corner of my mouth as I thought of how many coins that gown must’ve cost. Andreia’s services didn’t come cheap. Meanwhile, thousands—if not more—were starving.

  But my mother needed a new gown that could feed dozens of families or the entire orphanage for months—if not longer.

  “I’m not sure why you’re in here,” the Queen advised under her breath, having drifted closer to me in that often-eerie, silent way of hers while I watched the seamstress hang the gown from a hook on the wall. “But quite honestly, at this moment, I do not care.”

  I looked at her, not even bothering to search for any glint of warmth in her features. That brief glimmer of hope was already long gone. “I did not expect you to be here.”

  “For some reason, I feel as if that is a lie, and you’re here just to be a disturbance.” The creases at the corners of her eyes were far more noticeable now as she too, watched Andreia root around in the bag she’d brought with her. “After all, I am sure the seamstress is currently questioning why a handmaiden would be dressed as a stable hand while in one of my private quarters. This possible catastrophe has your name written all over it, having willed it into being.”

  I stared at her, stuck between disbelief and amusement. “If I had the ability to will things into being, it would not be this.”

  “No, I suppose you’re right,” she remarked in a flat, icy tone I’d never heard her use with anyone else. “You would use that gift for something far more harmful.”

  My skin flamed hot as the insinuation struck a chord. There was no doubt in my mind that she was horrified by what I’d become. I really couldn’t blame her. The knowledge that her firstborn child murdered people on the regular had to haunt her. Except it was far too often upon her request.

  I told myself not to respond. There was no point. But I rarely heeded that voice of reason. “I’m only capable of what is expected of me.”

  “And yet, you stand here beside me, having failed what was expected of you,” she replied quietly. “While our people continue to starve and die.”

  The skin along the back of my neck prickled as I forced my voice low. “You care for the people?”

  The Queen watched Andreia in silence for several seconds. “They are all I ever think about.”

  A low, harsh laugh fought its way out of me, and she looked at me then, but I didn’t think she saw me. “What is so funny?” she asked.

  “You,” I whispered, and the skin under her right eye twitched. “If you care for the starving people, then why didn’t you take the coin spent on yet another gown and give it to those who need it?”

  Her shoulders stiffened. “I wouldn’t need to keep up appearances and spend coin on yet another gown if you had fulfilled your duty, now, would I? No more Rot. No starvation.”

  Her words fell upon me as if they were made of the numerous sharp pins that jutted from the ball of material Andreia had placed on a nearby table.

  “Instead, I am called the Beggar Queen by kingdoms that once prayed for an alliance with Lasania.” My mother cast her gaze to mine. “So, please, do go and find another area of this vast property to haunt.”

  “Then I suppose I will go roam the woods and join those spirits there,” I muttered.

  Queen Calliphe’s mouth tightened until her lips were bloodless. “If that is what you’d prefer.”

  The apathy of her tone—the utter dismissiveness—was worse than if she had smacked me in the face. Anger stung my eyes, took root deep inside me, loosening my tongue as it had so many times before. I wasn’t always like this. I’d spent the better part of my life doing exactly what I was told, rarely refusing any request or order. I’d been quiet, whispering through the halls of Wayfair, so focused on capturing the attention—and maybe even the affection—of the Queen. But that had stopped three years ago. I’d stopped holding my tongue. Stopped trying. Stopped caring.

  Maybe that was the answer to what that damn god had asked. Why I ran so eagerly toward death.

  “You know, if begging for alliances is such a step down for you, you could always do what the Golden King did,” I pointed out, keeping my voice barely above a whisper. “Then you can continue standing by while everyone else cleans up whatever mess there may be.”

  Her gaze snapped back to mine. “One day, that mouth of yours is going to get you in the kind of trouble you won’t be able to talk your way out of.”

  “Wouldn’t that make you happy?” I challenged, aware of how Lady Kala and the seamstress were dutifully attempting to ignore us.

  Her gaze iced over. “Leave,” she ordered. “Now.”

  Brimming with anger and a heavier, suffocating emotion I refused to acknowledge, I dipped into an overly elaborate curtsy. My mother’s nostrils flared as she stared at me. “Your wish is my command, Your Grace,” I said, rising and crossing the room.

  “Close the door behind you so there are no more inconsequential interruptions,” Queen Calliphe stated.

  Closing my eyes, I shut the door without slamming it—a feat that took every bit of willpower I had as I reminded myself that her words could no longer reach me soon. In the hall, I drew in a long, deep breath and held it. Held it until my lungs burned, and my eyes started to water. Until tiny white bursts of light appeared behind my lids. Only then did I exhale. It was the only thing that stopped me from grabbing the door handle and slamming it over and over.

  Only when I was confident that I could trust my actions did I open my eyes. Two Royal Guards stood across from my mother’s chambers.

  Gods, they looked…absurd in their uniforms, like puffed-up peacocks.

  The two men stared straight ahead, their expressions bland despite the fact that I’d just stood in front of them for several moments, eyes closed while holding my breath. I supposed that wouldn’t even register on the scale of odd things they’d witnessed me do.

  The stinging in my eyes and the burn in my throat were still there as I started walking, rubbing the back of my left shoulder where the crescent-shaped birthmark tingled. It had to be the numerous sconces lighting the hall
. It had nothing to do with my mother. There was no way she could have any effect on me. Not when she wore her disappointment in me like a second skin.

  The balmy night air tugged at the hem of my surcoat, tossing it about my knees as I cut through the overflowing Primal Gardens that took up several acres around the outer wall. I then crossed the castle bridge, passing several jewel-adorned carriages heading in and out of Wayfair as water rushed underneath. Lifting the hood of the coat, I skirted the narrow district known as Eastfall, where one of the two Royal Citadels stood, as well as the dormitories where the guards trained and lived. The other Royal Citadel, the largest, was located on the outskirts of Carsodonia, facing the Willow Plains, and was where most of Lasania’s armies trained.

  I had no real destination in mind as I continued past the many vine tunnels of The Luxe, lifting my gaze to the right, not wanting to see what I would but unable to stop myself.

  The Shadow Temple sat in the foothills of the Cliffs of Sorrow, behind a thick stone wall that encircled the entire structure. It didn’t matter how many times my steps took me near the Temple I couldn’t get used to the imposing beauty of the twisting spires that stretched nearly as high as the cliffs, the slender turrets, and sleek, pitch-black walls made of polished shadowstone. It seemed to lure the stars from the sky at night, capturing them in the obsidian stone. The entire Temple glittered as if a hundred candles had been lit and placed throughout.

  There was no suppressing the shudder when I looked away and forced myself to keep walking. I tried not to go near the Shadow Temple. Four times in the past three years was more than enough. The last thing I needed to do tonight was dwell on what could’ve caused the Primal of Death to change his mind.

  An antsy, nervous energy had crept into me after I’d checked in on a sleeping, too-still Odetta. The thought of facing a long night of watching shadows creep across the ceiling had driven me from Wayfair.