Beyond the Shadowed Earth

by Joanna Ruth Meyer

A wind whipped up, smelling strongly of rain, and the air seemed to crackle with power. The guards grunted, bending their heads into the wind and tightening their grips on the palanquin.

  At the top, a second army of attendants waited. Eda tried not to let her eyes wander to Niren’s grave as they folded back her veil, touched up her cosmetics, smoothed her dress, and rubbed out invisible specs of dust. One of them fed Eda strawberries while another cursed in frustration that no one had brought rain canopies.

  Thunder growled in the distance as Eda stood there, lonely in the sea of people. The sun rose behind the clouds, a riot of color against the dark. The elephant arrived, lumbering over the brow of the hill. Its hide was painted with blue and gold whorls, and it wore a headdress of tinkling bells. The elephant keeper spoke a word to the beast and it dropped to its knees in a cloud of dust. Attendants slid a set of steps up to it, and what seemed like a hundred different arms helped Eda climb them. She settled herself in the high saddle, one final attendant climbing up with her and folding the veil back over her head before scampering down again.

  And then it was time.

  Bells sounded from down in the city, and bright silver trumpets pierced through the roar of the rising wind.

  The elephant keeper spoke a word in the beast’s ear and it lumbered forward, winding the long way back down the hill.

  Eda had ridden an elephant once before, the day of her coronation. It had been hot and dusty, and the motion of the creature had made her sick to her stomach. That day had been filled with triumph. This one was tainted with regret.

  She held tight to the front of the saddle and focused on looking like a goddess of old, untouchable, unshakeable.

  When Ileem was her husband and bound to her as he was to their god, would Tuer come to her at last? Or was her deal at an end, now that Tuer had taken what she’d promised him? She would gladly trade away her Empire for Niren to be returned to her, hale and whole.

  The procession wound down the hill and past the gates of the city, where all of Eddenahr was waiting. They rang little bells and waved scarves and threw flowers in the elephant’s path.

  As they approached the newly completed temple, the clouds blotted out the sun and the rain broke, driving and heavy. It shredded Eda’s veil, plastered her priceless gown against her body, ruined her elaborate hair.

  But something tight inside of her eased, because Ileem was waiting for her on the temple steps. He was dressed all in silver, and shone like the moon.

  He is sun and moon both, she thought. A thrill went through her. If she had never made her deal with Tuer, would she even have met Ileem? Certainly she wouldn’t be marrying him this morning. Was her friend’s life worth this? Worth him?

  Everything moved far too slowly for her after that. The Odans sang a hymn as attendants brought out another set of steps and helped Eda down from the elephant, holding rain canopies over her head that were rather too late to do any good. One of the new priestesses hung a garland of flowers around her neck and brushed a line of oil and ashes across her forehead.

  The ancient priest from the mountain took Eda’s arm and walked with her up the steps. It took an eternity to reach Ileem at the top, but finally, finally they did.

  Eda took Ileem’s hands in both of her own and tried to remember to breathe. It was almost cold, up there in the wind and the rain, but Ileem’s presence warmed every part of her.

  The ceremony was long, melding together Denlahn and Enduenan marriage traditions. The speeches and pledges filled up half the morning, and her legs began to ache from standing there for such an extended period.

  At last the priest came to the formal words of binding. “As the Stars shone with one light, may you be one. As the Tree flourished upon the earth, may you flourish. Until the last Star falls from heaven, may your love endure. Until death parts you, may you be true. Until time itself is ended, may you be of one mind and one heart and one soul.”

  A shiver passed through her, her hands trembling in Ileem’s, and she knew in her heart of hearts that this, at least, Niren would not blame her for.

  “Do you bind yourself to this man?” the priest asked Eda. “To guard him and keep him for all of time?”

  “I bind myself,” she said, her voice swallowed up in the echoing rain. “For all of time.”

  “Do you bind yourself to this woman?” the priest asked Ileem. “To guard her and keep her for all of time?”

  Ileem smiled, smoothing his thumb across Eda’s skin. “I bind myself, for all of time.”

  “Then by the will of the gods and the One who created them, let it be so.”

  And then, then—Ileem was hers.

  He wrapped his hands around her chin and drew her to him, kissing her long and deeply in the sight of everyone watching below.

  Eda stepped back from him, joy pushing past her anger and her grief, filling her up. There was only one thing left.

  She turned to the crowd, and called her Barons to join her at the top of the temple steps. Domin was still in Evalla, managing Rescarin’s affairs, but Lohnin, Dyar, and Tuell were there, Lohnin holding a cedar box stamped with the emblem of the Empire.

  None of the Barons were smiling. They looked as cross as wet hens. They looked like cross wet hens.

  Eda accepted the box from Lohnin, and gazed out into the crowd. “Today I, Imperial Majesty Eda Mairin-Draive, Empress of Enduena and Ryn and Od, hereby crown as my equal in power His Highness Ileem Emohri, Prince of Denlahn.”

  She opened the box and took out the crown.

  Ileem knelt before her, and she lowered it onto his head.

  “Rise, Imperial Majesty Ileem Emohri, Emperor of Enduena and Ryn and Od. Long may you reign beside me.”

  Ileem grinned. Ileem laughed, and Eda hauled him to his feet. They turned together to the crowd and raised their joined hands.

  They descended the temple steps side by side, and climbed up onto the elephant, Eda first, Ileem after her.

  The rain slacked off as the beast lumbered back toward the city. Ileem wrapped his arms around Eda’s middle and pulled her tight against him. He kissed her ear, her neck, her jaw, and heat shivered through her.

  “You’re mine, my darling,” she whispered.

  He laughed into her hair. “As you are mine.”

  The feasting lasted until evening, when the sun sank away westward and stars awoke once more in the dark. Ileem escorted Eda to the ballroom, hand locked tight in hers, and she marveled anew that he was her husband, that she never again had to face the world or her Barons or her Empire alone.

  She’d changed after the ceremony, her attendants repairing as much of the damage done by the rain as they could, but her attempt to emulate the goddess Ahdairon was ruined. Eda didn’t care. She had other things to think about.

  She trailed her fingers up Ileem’s arm to his neck, pulling his face to hers for a kiss. “How long must we dance, my darling? You are Emperor, now. I don’t intend to return to my chamber alone tonight.”

  Ileem gave her a slow smile, but his eyes flitted around the ballroom, to the balcony and the door and then back to her. He seemed distracted. Nervous. There was tension in his shoulders.

  A sense of uneasiness awoke in the pit of her stomach. “Ileem, are you all right?”

  “Fine, Eda.” He kissed her forehead, then drew her to the center of the room. “It’s not every day we are married. Dance with me.”

  They wheeled about in time to the music, Enduenan instrumentalists having taken the place of the Odan singers. A harp and a flute twined together in an intricate counterpoint, chased by a pulsing drumbeat that echoed through the chamber.

  Ileem’s hand was tight against the small of her back. He gripped her other hand so hard it hurt.

  “Ileem.”

  He kept looking toward the balcony, his usually steady feet stumbling over the simplest steps.

  The uneasiness took root. “Tell me what’s wrong. Please, Ileem.”

  And then suddenly bells began to ring down
in the lower city, a clamoring chaos of noise.

  Alarm bells.

  Eda was thrown back all at once to the night over a year ago when she’d burst into the ballroom with an army at her back to stop her rival from taking the Empire. For an instant she thought she saw Tuer, his tall, shadowy form striding through the dancers. But then she blinked and he was gone.

  Eda looked sharply at her husband. “What’s going on?”

  Ileem smiled, the tension melting out of him. “My god is here. He blesses me once again.”

  The bells rang louder, wilder.

  The dancing and the music stopped.

  Eda stared at Ileem, stared and stared. Her mind understood what was happening, but her heart refused to believe it.

  And she didn’t believe it.

  Not until she felt the sudden prick of pain beneath her jaw and found Ileem’s dagger at her throat.

  “There are three ways to appease a god, once you’ve made a deal with them,” said Eda’s father. They had climbed together to the top of the limestone tower, where a rooftop garden awaited them below a fierce spray of stars. The air smelled like the garden’s herbs, mingled with the sharp spice of tea steaming on a low table, and the ever-present salty tang of the sea.

  Eda sat down at the table, tucking her legs underneath her, and took a sip of tea: it was very strong and very sweet, just as she liked it.

  Her father sat across from her, his smooth face shining. “The first way is to fulfill your end of the bargain and accept whatever unexpected consequences come your way.”

  “Why would there be unexpected consequences?”

  He smiled. “Because normally only fools make deals with gods. And they don’t think through every detail before offering their vows. The gods can see much more than we can—they have a fuller picture of the world. They can twist our words, so that we think we have vowed something very different than we actually did.”

  “Then why make a deal at all?” Eda asked.

  “Because mankind wants power. We always have, and we always will. The gods have that power. They are that power, and sometimes we’re willing to make the sacrifice necessary to attain a piece of it.”

  Eda gulped more tea. She wished her mother had come up here with them, but she’d gone to bed early with a headache.

  Her father coughed, suddenly and violently, and it was a moment before he stopped. Sweat beaded on his brow.

  “Are you all right, Father?”

  “Just tired, I fear. Perhaps we should end early tonight, little one.”

  “Not before you finish your story! What is the second way?”

  He coughed again, but smiled at her reassuringly. “The second way is a little grim: take your own life.”

  Eda shuddered. A wisp of cloud seemed to come out of nowhere, dimming the light of the stars. She didn’t want to admit it to herself, but she was beginning to feel unwell, too.

  “And the third way?” “The third way,” her father said, “is to kill the god.”

  Part Two

  SHADOW AND BLADE

  They forged the blade of iron, imbued it with Starlight, and crafted the handle from the Tree shard.

  Chapter Nineteen

  THE DAGGER BIT HARDER. BLOOD TRICKLED WARM and wet down her neck. She couldn’t stop staring at Ileem.

  There was cruelty in his eyes and the curve of his lip. Cruelty that he’d hidden from her.

  “What are you doing?” she whispered. She hated that tears pressed behind her eyes. She hated how weak she felt, when she’d fought so hard to be strong.

  “I’m meting out my god’s judgment, accepting the gift he gave to me,” he said. “I’m taking the Empire. I’m avenging my father. And I’m making every last Enduenan dog bow at my feet and beg for Rudion’s mercy. That includes you, my traitorous, blasphemous wife.”

  The ballroom doors burst open and Denlahn soldiers flooded in. Blades flashed in the light of the chandeliers. People screamed and fell to the gold and white marble floor, throats cut, blood gushing scarlet.

  Eda stared with a kind of distant numbness, not fully comprehending what was happening. Ileem’s fingernails dug into her wrist and her own blood continued to seep slowly into the neckline of her gown.

  She didn’t understand. Gods gods gods she didn’t understand.

  “You’ve asked me more than once why Rudion speaks to me and not to you,” Ileem spat. “It’s because I’m his faithful servant—his voice, his hand. You are nothing but a blasphemous dog who dared to raise herself to the position of a goddess. And that, above every other thing you’ve done, is why you will die, here, tonight: a blood sacrifice to my god, who laughs at your temples and scorns your offerings as he squashes you like the pathetic worm we both know you to be.”

  She blinked and saw Tuer’s Shadow in the midst of the Denlahn soldiers, a blade in his outstretched hand that was wet with blood.

  “Rudion is here,” she breathed.

  “Of course he is. Who do you think guides my hand? Who do you think clothed my soldiers in protection and silence as they crept through the city unseen? Who do you think put the crown on my head?”

  “I did that,” said Eda furiously.

  “No. It is and always was my god. And now you will die, as he decrees, your miserable soul perishing forever in the black emptiness of the void.”

  “But … but the treaty.” The words were more than foolish, and she knew it.

  Ileem looked at her with obvious scorn. “The treaty was a ruse, Your Majesty,” he hissed. “Now come with me. It’s time our marriage was formally terminated.” He dragged Eda toward the dais where a Denlahn soldier waited, a naked blade in his outstretched hand—she didn’t have to imagine its purpose.

  Her haze of shock broke, and she was suddenly glad she’d never demonstrated her weapons skills to Ileem.

  She twisted out from under his arm, kneed him in the groin, and drove her own dagger into his leg, slipping and sliding across the bloody floor.

  “STOP HER!” Ileem roared.

  But no one heard him over the chaos of the ballroom, courtiers screaming and fighting back against the Denlahns as best as they could.

  Eda tore her crown off and ducked into the writhing crowd, grabbing a fallen sword and fighting her way to the door.

  Somehow, no one seemed to take much notice of her.

  Somehow, she made it out to the corridor.

  She ran until she was about to collapse, and ducked behind a pillar to catch her breath. Her mind was working furiously, trying to calculate her options, figure out her escape route. Her garrison of Imperial soldiers was stationed just outside the city. She would go to them, and they would break upon the palace like an ocean wave and have it back under her control before dawn.

  That’s what she would do. She forced breath into her shuddering body.

  Someone seized her arm and hauled her into a hidden alcove.

  Eda looked straight into Liahstorion’s face. The Denlahn Princess was holding a sword of her own, grim determination pressed into her forehead. She stood in the archway, blocking Eda’s path.

  “Let me by,” said Eda, forcing her voice not to shake. “Let me pass.”

  But Liahstorion didn’t move. “You can’t go to the garrison.”

  “What?”

  “The garrison. That’s where I would go if I were in your place, but you can’t. My brother poisoned every soldier during the wedding ceremony and even now is burning the whole place to the ground. There are men waiting for you there. You’ll be dragged back to the palace and executed—Ileem doesn’t mean for you to make it through the night alive. Now that he’s been crowned Emperor, he doesn’t need you anymore.”

  Eda stared, trying to comprehend what Liahstorion was saying.

  The other girl grabbed her by the shoulders, shook her hard. “Are you listening, Eda? Your garrison is gone. My brother means to kill you. You have to leave, and you have to leave now. Do you understand?”

  There was a roaring in Eda�
��s ears, and around her the world seemed to shake.

  Something in Liah’s face softened. “Do you have somewhere to go?”

  It wasn’t the world that was shaking. It was Eda. “You’re not taking me back to him. You’re not handing me over to … to your brother.”

  “Not to my brother, and not to his god. I never wanted to come here, I never wanted to betray you. But Ileem wouldn’t be dissuaded. He couldn’t let go of his anger over our father, but more than that he—he thrives on chaos and confusion. He thrives on hurting people, and his god drives him to it, more and more.”

  A headache pressed between Eda’s eyes. “But he—but he married me. He loved me. He swore on Tuer we were one.”

  Liah shook her head. “Eda. Listen to me. If you’re going to survive you have to be steady. You have to use your head, and you can’t let any of my brother’s lies distract you. His one and only goal in coming here was to destroy you. You have to remember that. Can you?”

  Eda forced herself to nod. She pressed her fingers against the wound in her throat and found it was still bleeding. Liahstorion ripped off a piece of her Enduenan-style sash and gave it to Eda to press against the cut.

  “All right?” said Liahstorion, a storm of emotion in her dark eyes.

  “All right,” said Eda.

  “Good. I’ll distract Ileem as long as I can.”

  Eda took a deep breath. “Why are you helping me?”

  A shadow of a smile touched Liahstorion’s lips. “Because no matter what you’ve done or haven’t done, no one deserves to die in the dark. And because I made a vow of peace—a true one. Now go.”

  Eda pressed Liahstorion’s hand and ducked out of the antechamber, darting from shadow to shadow down the corridors, then through a servant’s entrance and out into the night. The courtyard was still damp from the day’s long rain. She stumbled over a stone and landed face-first in a puddle slick with mud, then picked herself up and barreled into the stable.

  She had a moment’s hesitation over whether or not to take an inconspicuous horse, but in the end she saddled Naia. Right now, Eda needed speed, and Naia could give that to her. She let a couple other horses loose for good measure, thinking maybe Naia wouldn’t be noticed in the confusion. There was a pile of rags in the tack room; she grabbed one of the larger ones and pulled it over her hair, tying it at the nape of her neck. It smelled like hay and saddle oil and damp earth. There was nothing to be done for her blue beaded gown or her calfskin sandals; probably the mud would disguise them better than anything. She didn’t even consider parting with her arm cuff—it meant too much to her, and she couldn’t bear the thought of abandoning it in the muck.