“…I give you Her Royal Highness, Ashley Rebecca Carrington, Queen of Merlin,” he announced.
Darius turned, extending his hand to her, and Cornelius’ arm carried her forward even as confusion chased itself around her face.
And then the expression melted as the hundreds of wizards filling the parking lot came into view.
For a heartbeat, their eyes locked on her.
The rooftop shook from their cheers.
Her legs were like water and she wanted to fall through the floor. To hide. To grab her gun and run like the wind to escape the hordes of people suddenly convinced she was something she could not possibly be.
Queen. Royalty. And her father had been a freelancer. A researcher. The others were farmhands. They’d been wizards, and they’d died because of the war, but this was insane.
Absolutely insane.
“Breathe…” Cornelius murmured, his voice barely audible above the roar.
Air forced itself into her lungs in response to the command, and nausea followed on its heels. In a blur of words, Darius concluded his speech, and below her, the crowd poured into the building like a flood breaking through a levee. Gripping her arm, Cornelius nodded to the council as they flowed past and returned to the door.
“The guards will protect you,” Cornelius told her quietly. “They will keep the crowd at bay. Your only responsibility is to walk forward. Keep your eyes straight ahead. Show nothing of your emotions or fear. Do you understand?”
She looked up at him, words escaping her.
“You can do this.”
“But…”
“You are their queen. Whether you believe it or not. And you have to show them strength. Confidence. Someone worthy of the fight it has taken for our people to survive.” He paused. “They need this, Ashe. For your father’s sake, do not disappoint them.”
She swallowed hard. “But…”
He gripped her arm. Her feet worked where her mind could not, obeying the pressure to move as he led her back to the door.
The factory floor was crammed.
Smashed up to the walls and shoved against the barrier of guards lining the narrow space through the center of the throng, people filled every inch of the room. By the bottom of the stairway, the council waited, and as she reached the steps, Cornelius dropped his arm from hers.
“Walk forward,” he said again, his words a low murmur.
Her feet obeyed.
On legs held up by motion alone, she reached the base of the stairs. At the landing, the council stepped aside, clearing her path. She faltered and fought frantically to keep her face as emotionless as possible as she looked to Darius in alarm.
The barest tinge of sympathy showed past the regal expression on his face. His gaze slid to the side, motioning her along.
She walked forward.
Standing shoulder to shoulder, guards walled a straight path through the crowd, their impassive eyes gazing out at the middle distance while behind them, the mass of wizard humanity stared.
“Long live Merlin! Long live the queen!”
She flinched and, an instant later, the shout reverberated off the walls as the crowd picked up the cheer. Her knees wanted to buckle at the din, but her eyes locked on the stairway, clinging to it as a lifeline. With each step it drew closer, and it took every shred of willpower she possessed to keep from breaking into a run.
The guards at the stairs bowed and then stepped aside as she approached. Gripping the banister, she climbed the steps, finally reaching the walkway.
“To the left, your majesty,” Darius said behind her.
She followed the direction, and turned when he quietly said the word.
The chanting died into expectant silence.
Her heart scrambled into her throat, choking her completely.
“Nod, my lady,” Darius murmured, his lips motionless.
Her head dipped toward the crowd. The roar of cheering returned, even stronger than before. Darius and the other council members echoed her motion, and then he gestured for her to exit via the hall.
Fighting the urge to bolt, she turned and walked into the narrow corridor as behind her, Darius began speaking about coronation ceremonies and other such lunacy to the throng. Beyond the corner, the next hall was blessedly empty and without hesitation, her feet picked up speed, rushing her back to her room.
The door slammed behind her. Heart pounding, she started forward and then stumbled, her legs unwilling to carry her farther. Her knees met the ground with a painful jolt as her arms wrapped around her middle in desperate attempt to stop the trembling.
This couldn’t be happening. This was stupid. This was insane. This was…
A dry sob choked her. Twenty-four hours ago, she’d watched Carter die. Thirty-six hours ago, she’d killed a wizard to save Spider’s life. Three days ago, she’d been living at the Abbey.
One month ago, she’d been a farm kid in Montana, putting up pinwheels with her eight-year-old sister while planning what kind of cake to have for her seventeenth birthday.
Her hand hit the floor to keep her from falling, and her fingers pressed into the concrete.
This wasn’t real.
She had to get out of here.
This was psychotic and insane and–
The door opened and she spun, terrified.
Cornelius stared. Carefully, he eased the door shut behind him, never looking away from her. “Your majesty…?”
A gasping noise escaped her, and she shook her head. “Don’t call me that.”
He paused.
“Don’t…” she continued, holding a hand up to stave off the words as her gaze dropped to the ground. “Don’t…”
“It is who you are,” he said slowly.
“No, it’s not!”
Fire rushed out of her, bursting against his defenses before fading as quickly as it had come.
Choking on her own air, she crushed the magic down, staring at the floor.
“I’m just me,” she whispered. “I’m not… I’m just…”
Warily, he lowered the barrier of energy surrounding him as she trailed off. For a moment, he remained motionless, and then slowly, he crossed the room and sank down onto the bedside.
“Your father never wanted to be king either, you know,” he said softly.
Trembling, she glanced up at him.
A touch of a rueful smile ghosted over his lips. “He was second in line to the throne,” Cornelius continued. “And he was happy to keep it that way. Your uncle, Alexander… now he wanted to be king. He’d been born to it. At least, that’s what your father used to say.”
He looked down at her, seeing the questions in her eyes.
“My family has been close to the throne for generations,” he explained. “And as a result, every so often, your father confided in me. He trusted me.” A pensive look crossed his face. “Most of the time.”
He drew a breath. “I do not know if you remember,” he said. “I know what happened to you at the start of the war. But I was there the night most of the royal family died. I stayed with you and your sister.”
She nodded faintly. “I remember,” she whispered.
“It scared your father, what happened to you. That much magic, ripping through a young child… it left your sister stripped of everything but a shadow of her power, and you nearly a vegetable. For hours, he refused to leave your side, even to address the needs of his people, suddenly embroiled in a war. In the end, he had twenty of us stand guard that night, though I was the only one out in the open.”
Her brow drifted down. “‘That much magic’?” she repeated.
“The spell. Or truly, the backlash of it. God knows how much magic, hundreds of years old, released in a single moment when the Taliesin king shattered the spell. The binding that held their magic was tied to your line, carried on specifically by those who remained part of the royal family itself. And in a moment, most of them were gone. The effects rebounded through the survivors, almost incapacitating
Patrick and sending you into a short-lived coma.
“He thought you were dead. And I do not think he was ever as relieved as in the moment when you woke, even in the midst of everything else occurring at the time.”
Cornelius fell silent, remembering, and Ashe looked away.
“Must’ve been convenient…” she whispered after a moment.
His brow drew down in confusion and she gestured distractedly to herself.
“You mean what happened to your memories,” he said, only partly asking.
She didn’t answer. For a few seconds, he was quiet.
“Yes,” he replied. She glanced at him. “But not for the reasons you think. Darius was not entirely correct in his description of why your father kept you from the war. It’s true a bound wizard is not as noticeable as an unbound one, and that some part of the emergency plan consisted of you and your sister hiding till help could arrive.
“But that was not his true purpose.
“Your father hated what happened to you. It tortured him inside. But it gave him the chance to protect you in a way that otherwise would never have been possible. The king believed that if he helped you remember what it was to be part of our world – and if you had access to all you could do – sooner or later you would insist on being involved in the war. You would want to help him. And that meant watching you fight. Kill. And possibly lose your life.
“He couldn’t stand the thought of you or your sister being part of this, because you were his children more than just heirs to his throne. He was protecting you, not out of disrespect, but love. So yes, he used what happened to you, but he believed that more than being to his advantage, it was to yours.
“His plan had always been to end the war, and then restore your magic to you. He wanted to introduce you to our world at peace, and teach you what you needed to know to rule. But until that could happen, his goal was to give you the best life possible, far from violence and bloodshed, even if he could not be there to share it with you.”
She looked away, remembering. Stress from his job had carved new lines on his face whenever he came home, and most nights found him pacing his room while clutching the phone.
Work calls, she thought distantly. Right.
“I don’t believe this,” she whispered. Her gaze darted around the room as though to encompass everything. “Any of it. It’s crazy. Crazier than wizards and cripples and I just… I don’t… ”
He paused. “You do not have a choice.”
She closed her eyes, wanting to tell him she did. She could leave. Run right now and just forget any of this ever happened.
Even though she knew it wasn’t really true.
“So what am I supposed to do?” she asked softly.
“Become the leader your father would have wanted you to be.”
A scoff escaped her.
“I mean it, Ashe.”
She looked up at him, seeing the quiet insistence in his eyes.
And she turned away, wishing more than anything for it to be the day before yesterday, when the world had still sucked, but not like this.
“You are not alone here,” Cornelius said. “You have the council. Almost as much as the royal family, we have guided our people through the past five hundred years. We are your allies. We can teach you what you need to know.”
She didn’t answer, knowing he wouldn’t understand anything she wanted to say. The whole mess of their world was psychotic, and acknowledging even a fraction of it just meant agreeing on some level that any of it was sane.
And that’d never been why she’d come here.
She took a breath, focusing back on the one measure of stability left in the world. “I’m still telling them about the Blood.”
“Your majesty–”
“Carter told me to,” she interrupted. “And yes, they’re real. They’re out there right now and you have to let me tell people the truth.” She paused. “They killed my dad, Cornelius.”
He closed his eyes. “It will not go well.”
She watched him. “But will you try to stop me?”
A heartbeat passed. “No.”
She hesitated at the reluctance in his voice. “Then when can I meet with them?”
Cornelius sighed. “Most of the council will continue to participate in the festivities for a few more hours,” he allowed. “If you would like, I can arrange for them to meet you after that time.”
She nodded.
“As you wish, your majesty,” he said, rising to his feet.
At the title, she grimaced.
He glanced back when he reached the door, catching sight of the expression. “It is who you are, Ashe,” he repeated.
The door closed as he left the room.
She shook her head. “No,” she whispered assuredly. “It’s not.”
Chapter Four
With an arm curled beneath her head and her body propped up by a pile of pillows, she waited. The gun lay behind her, and through the walls, the distant noises of revelry filtered, the sounds occasionally drowned beneath a faint hum every time the air conditioner kicked on.
And finally, a knock came.
She pushed to her feet, and tucked the weapon into the back of her jeans as she crossed to the door. Cornelius stood outside.
“They are ready.”
She followed him down the hall.
Guards bowed as she passed, their murmured ‘your majesties’ trailing her. Partiers still filled the factory floor, and scattered cheers rose as she emerged onto the walkway. With her eyes locked on Cornelius’ back, she forced herself to keep breathing as she strode after him into the conference room.
Stepping to one side, he waited as she entered and then closed the door, his magic sealing out the sound from the factory.
The council watched her.
“You wished to speak with us, your majesty?” Darius asked.
Her gaze darted to the side as Cornelius slipped around her and circled the table to take his seat to the left of Darius. Keeping her face solidly expressionless, she nodded once and then took a chair as well.
“I wanted to talk to you about why I’m here,” she said.
A few people glanced to Cornelius in confusion, but he’d long since locked his eyes on a spot somewhere beyond the tabletop and didn’t look away.
“The Taliesin weren’t responsible for my father’s death,” she continued. “Or Lily’s. Not entirely. The man who ordered their deaths didn’t look like a Merlin wizard, or a Taliesin. And he didn’t have an absence of magic inside him like a cripple. He was something else. He looked human, but he had magic too.
“He was from a group that calls themselves the Blood.”
Around the table, grimaces twisted the faces of several council members. At Darius’ side, Sebastian looked away, nearly rolling his eyes with impatient disbelief.
Cornelius didn’t take his gaze from the table.
“I know you’ve heard of them before,” she said. “Josiah Carter tried to tell you about them eight years ago. But I’m here to confirm that they’re real. I’ve seen them. This man, Mason Brogan; he attacked me with magic two nights ago. And he nearly killed me with it before I took it from him.
“The cripples saw him for what he was. They recognized those like him from crowds that just seemed like regular people to me.”
She glanced at Cornelius, but he didn’t look up.
“Carter and the others weren’t lying. They weren’t delusional or insane. I’ve seen ferals. Wizards. Cripples. And I’m telling you, these monsters are something else. They hunted down my father and sister, and even though Brogan’s gone… the rest are still out there. They’re killing people with almost no chance of being stopped because the wizards who could help fight them don’t believe they’re real.
“So I’m here to ask you to change that. Go back to the cripples and work with them to stop these monsters. The Blood aren’t just a threat to the cripples; they’re a threat to all of us. But with your help, they don’t have
to be anymore.”
Exhaling slowly, she fell silent, watching the council for their reactions.
For a minor eternity, none came. Gazes darted from one side of the table to the other, and beneath their imperious masks, hints of expressions surfaced too quickly to be identified. But no one said a word.
And then Katherine cleared her throat. “Your majesty…” she started delicately. “As you say, this information is not new. But… it is not quite as you describe.”
Ashe waited, barely breathing.
“Since the start of the war, there have been rumors. Weapons, designed by Taliesin, to aid those without magic in wielding powers like our own. It is understandable, given their binding for so many years, that wizards of Taliesin’s breed would have attempted such a thing.” She hesitated. “But it came to nothing, your majesty. What you describe cannot be done.”
Ashe shook her head. “I’m not saying they had weapons, and I’m not saying they were human. I’m saying they had magic. That they glow to the cripples. Visibly. Unmistakably. And they were leading Taliesin wizards, not working for them.”
Katherine grimaced, but before she could speak, another council member interrupted. “Your highness,” the portly man said in a tone edging toward condescension. “We know one another as wizards because we possess magical skill. Cripples have none, and thus are fortunate to be aware of us at all. Given the facts, it makes no sense for them to be able to perceive anything of magic that we cannot.”
“I watched them do it.”
“You watched them do something,” Sebastian cut in. “And most likely that thing was manipulate you.”
“Excuse me?”
From his position at Darius’ right hand, the suit-clad man glanced to the other councilors and then gave her a look tinged with pity. “With all due respect, your majesty, you’re young. Inexperienced. Your father bound your magic at age eight, and you haven’t grown up in this world. Everyone at this table knows the cripples could have told you any number of stories, and you would have had no reason to disbelieve them, because everything here is new to you anyway.” He shook his head at her. “You were an easy target, your highness. They saw a chance to convince a naïve young wizard to attack random humans on the street in an effort to corroborate their fantasies, and they took it. I’m not saying it’s your fault, but try to be reasonable now.”
Taliesin Ascendant (The Children and the Blood) Page 6
