The Queen of Blood

by Sarah Beth Durst

  She was the outsider, she supposed—the only girl from the outer villages. For the last five years, she’d been the assistant to Mistress Baria, the local hedgewitch in the village her family had settled in, tasked with gathering herbs and mixing charms and keeping the shop clean, because the hedgewitch’s joints bothered her. She was only allowed to practice commands once a week, while Mistress Baria monitored her attempts, in order to make sure she summoned only small, stupid spirits with weak wills, who could be easily dismissed with a few words and charms. Outside the academy, waiting with the other girls, Daleina was acutely aware that her training was, at best, minimal.

  But that’s why I’m here—to change that, to learn, to test myself. To be more.

  Looking up in the stands, Daleina met Arin’s eyes. Bouncing in her seat, Arin waved with both arms. It was Arin who had convinced her she was ready. The hedgewitch said she wasn’t, but Arin argued she just didn’t want to lose her assistant. Daleina had been paid in lessons, a bargain for the hedgewitch. She’ll just have to dust her own cobwebs, Arin had said, or make friends with the spiders. You’re supposed to be a student, not a servant. You have to do this!

  And so Daleina had announced to her parents that she was ready, and here they all were.

  Daleina couldn’t help wondering if Mistress Baria was right. She didn’t feel ready anymore. She studied the row of judges: five older women, all in black, with hair slicked away from their faces. One had a scar on her cheek. Another had tattoos across her neck, obscuring bunched tissue from old burns. The oldest woman only had one arm. The other empty sleeve was pinned to her blouse. Other teachers were lined up on the side—they’d be the ones to administer the exam. All of them sported scars too and wore uniforms that emphasized them: the ones with arm scars were sleeveless, one with a scar across her stomach wore an open tunic that exposed it, and another had painted her false leg a brilliant red, broadcasting how dangerous this life was. Not very subtle, Daleina thought, and looked instead at the other girls again. One with gleaming black hair and a brittle smile stood out. She was at the center of the pack, and every time she spoke, the others rotated to listen to her, as if she were the sun and they were in orbit. Briefly, as if she felt Daleina looking at her, the black-haired girl met her eyes. Daleina tried a smile, but the girl focused instead on another applicant and laughed at words that Daleina couldn’t hear.

  High up in the trees, a bell rang. Several birds startled from the branches and fled upward, breaking the canopy above the academy. Daleina wondered what the academy looked like inside—it was supposed to be breathtakingly beautiful, as lovely as the palace itself. If she passed, she’d see it for herself before the end of the day. If not, she’d never know.

  A woman walked out from a gap in the wall of trees. She wore a black gown edged with dark-green lace. Her white-gray hair was knotted on top of her head. She had no visible scars, but her dress fell to her ankles and the sleeves covered her hands. She carried a slim, unsheathed knife with a jeweled handle. “Applicants, I am Headmistress Hanna. Welcome to the entrance examination for Northeast Academy.”

  Daleina straightened. This was the headmistress! The woman who had trained Queen Fara before she was chosen. The woman who had predicted and survived the Massacre of the Oaks. The woman who had presided over three coronation ceremonies and witnessed the deaths of two queens. She’d had songs written about her. Daleina wondered if it was wonderful or tedious to listen to songs about yourself.

  I suppose it depends on how well they’re sung.

  Pacing in front of the girls, the headmistress studied each of them in turn. Daleina told herself not to flinch as Headmistress Hanna’s eyes landed on her, then passed on. “You are here to begin on the path to a glorious destiny, but not all of you will walk that path. Be full of courage, full of strength, full of cleverness, and full of compassion, and you will thrive.”

  Daleina let the words roll over her and fill her. She would be fearless! She would be strong! She wouldn’t fail! And yet even as she thought that, she couldn’t help but hope her mother didn’t embroider the headmistress’s words on a pillow. Mama liked to embroider, especially after she finished a difficult whittling job. Their house was filled with platitudes, embellished with tiny roses and stars. Words comforted her, she said, when wood failed to.

  Headmistress Hanna was still talking. Pay attention, Daleina scolded herself. She shot another look at her parents and sister. Part of her wished she were still home in bed, surrounded by Mama’s embroidered pillows. “. . . begin your path, you must find your path,” Headmistress Hanna was saying. “Your exam is simple: find your way through the maze.” As the onlookers gasped, the headmistress plunged her blade into the nearest tree. It sank in, and sap oozed. Above, an unseen spirit shrieked, and a crack spread below and above the knife blade.

  With an echoing snap, the tree split apart, and the crack yawned open. The knife clattered to the ground at the base of the gap. Whispering to one another, the girls clustered together and inched forward.

  The gap was only wide enough to fit one at a time, and through it was darkness. Daleina looked up. She couldn’t see beyond the thick weave of branches to tell what was on the other side of the gap: open sunlight or suffocating shadows, towering trees or a snarl of brambles.

  “Who will enter first?” Headmistress Hanna asked.

  Daleina squared her shoulders, took three deep breaths, tried not to look back at her family, and prepared to take a step forward—but the black-haired girl was already striding through the clump of applicants, elbowing the others out of her way. She stopped in front of the headmistress. “My name is Merecot,” the girl said, “and I will conquer your maze.”

  “That’s excellent,” the headmistress said, “but I don’t care who you are until you come out the other side. Leave any weapons behind. You go in with only your mind, heart, and soul.”

  The black-haired girl, Merecot, pulled a knife out of her waistband, then bent down and removed a dagger that had been secured to her ankle. Raising her tunic, she unstrapped another from her thigh. Her eyes fixed on the headmistress, she also extracted a needle-thin blade from within her hair and then removed a coil of metal from around her upper arm. She dropped it all in a pile her feet. Daleina had only one knife. She again felt unprepared.

  “One other thing: you will be timed,” the headmistress said. “Go now.”

  Merecot pivoted and ran into the maze.

  Another followed her, leaving a sword behind, and then another.

  And then all the remaining girls pressed forward, pushing to be next into the maze, and Daleina was elbowed back. She entered third to last.

  As soon as she crossed the threshold, she was in darkness. Shadows enveloped her, and she faced a wall. Right or left? She listened for sounds of the others—there was a scream to the right, thin and sharp. She went left instead.

  Hand on the wall, she half walked, half jogged down the left path. Leaves crunched under her feet. The ground was uneven, full of roots and rocks. She slowed as the last tendril of light from the entrance faded behind her. Feeling her way forward, she found a turn in the maze and took it. If she kept her hand on the wall, she could at least feel the shape of this place.

  Ahead, she saw a sliver of amber light. Aha, daylight!

  She hurried toward it and then plowed directly into another girl. The other girl scrambled past her, a tangle of arms, knocking Daleina down, and then the girl continued running in the opposite direction without a word.

  Getting to her feet, Daleina didn’t move. She held still and listened.

  Ahead she heard a whoosh, whoosh, like a breath of wind, but rhythmic. The amber sliver of light bobbed up and down.

  Not daylight, she thought. Fire spirit.

  Rather than staying to determine how large a fire spirit it was, Daleina backtracked to the last intersection. Switching to another wall, she headed into a different dark tunnel. Of course there are spirits here. This was supposed to be an aptitud
e test. All the judges must have seeded the maze with them and were watching to see how the applicants would react. It occurred to her that she hadn’t displayed any power or bravery or brilliance by running, but at least she’d showed common sense. That’s a valuable trait.

  Right?

  Through the maze walls, she heard the footsteps of the other applicants. Occasional screams. A thud. And ahead, a trickle. Water spirit? There was more light here, streaming from a slit above, and she tried to keep her footsteps silent so that she could hear the direction of the drips.

  The maze walls were smooth wood that stretched up to the canopy. No footholds, no hooks, no anchors, no ladders. The floor was a mass of roots. As she turned another corner, the roots felt squishier—moss. So maybe the trickle wasn’t a spirit. Maybe it was water, and that’s why there was moss. Listening, she didn’t hear any of the other applicants near her. She seemed to be alone in this stretch of the maze. She wondered how large the maze was and if any of the others had found their way through yet, and she pictured her parents and Arin, out in the bleachers, worried. She’d better find her way through, fast.

  She hurried forward, rounded a corner, and then halted. Suspended across the path was a cat-size translucent spider with a child’s face. Its legs were braced against the walls of the maze, and tears poured from its eyes.

  Definitely a water spirit.

  Daleina froze, unsure what to do. She’d run from the fire spirit, but what if that wasn’t the right choice? What if she was supposed to go through it? What if the only way through the maze was through the spirits? The more she thought about it, the more logical it seemed.

  Carefully, the way the hedgewitch had taught her, she shaped a thought. One word was easiest, if you didn’t know a specific chant for what you wanted. You had to hold the word in your mind, wrap it in your feelings, and then send it out. One word was an arrow she could aim.

  Down, she thought.

  She sent the thought spinning out of her.

  The spiderlike spirit scuttled its legs as if half of them wanted to crawl down and half wanted to reach toward her.

  Down.

  It sank its head lower and opened its mouth. Water gushed out of its mouth and pooled on the moss below. Daleina walked forward.

  Down.

  It hulked down, its legs still braced but twitching, and then slowly it began to inch down toward the ground. Holding its gaze, Daleina kept walking, though she wanted to turn and run the other way—as soon as she had that thought, her hold on the command word faltered, and the spirit straightened and scurried upward.

  Down!

  It dropped down onto the moss. Curling its legs into its torso, it huddled in a ball. Daleina kept to the wall and skirted around it. “Thank you,” she told it as she passed. Only when she reached the next corner did she dare turn her back on it, as she stepped around the corner and into mud.

  Hands grasped her ankle.

  Mud hands that rose disembodied out of the wet earth.

  She bit back a scream. Earth spirit! Ahead, in the mud, she saw the shape of two girls, pinned by the mud to the earth. The closest one was trying to claw her way forward, her body stuck from the waist down. The farther one was trapped up to her neck. She’d tilted her head up and was muttering, “Free me, free me, free me,” but it was clear that she was panicking instead of concentrating. Concentrate, Daleina told herself, as the mud stretched up her calf to her thigh. It encased her leg as she pulled against it. She wished she had some charms. If the spirit would retract even a bit, she could think! Stop, she tried. Down! Release!

  “For spirits’ sake, are you all idiots?” It was Merecot, the black-haired girl. As she ran past Daleina, she grabbed her arm and pulled. Daleina felt the mud hands tighten around her thighs, holding her in place. Spinning, Merecot commanded, “Water!”

  Behind her, Daleina heard a trickle and then a rush. And then a torrent of knee-high water raced around the corner, ridden by the spiderlike water spirit. It swept through the mud, washing it away. Free, Daleina ran to the other girls and helped pull them out of the diluted mud. They gasped for air and leaned against the walls as the earth spirit slunk back into the ground, the last of the mud burping behind it. Looking up to thank Merecot, Daleina watched the black-haired girl disappear at a run around the next corner.

  “I’m surprised she helped us,” one of the girls said. “Perhaps I misjudged her.”

  “Are you all right?” Daleina asked.

  “She’s just trying to make herself look good,” the second girl said. “We’d better go. I’m Revi, by the way.” She was short, with bark-brown skin and clipped brown hair.

  “I’m Linna,” the first girl said. She tried to wipe some of the muck off her shirt. Beneath all the mud, Linna was a beautiful green-skinned girl with curled hair and yellow eyes. She had jewels woven into her hair, like a courtier or a palace artist favored by the queen, and her voice had a hint of an accent.

  “Daleina. Do either of you have any idea which way to go?”

  Revi shook her head. “I can tell you five ways not to go. Don’t follow me. I have terrible luck. I keep finding dead ends, like this one.”

  “I’m not sure it is a dead end,” Daleina said—after all, the girl Merecot had kept running and hadn’t returned. “I think maybe we’re supposed to go through the spirits. Part of the test.”

  “So they can see which one eats us?” Revi asked. “Whoever dies in the least embarrassing way passes? Great, sounds like a fun plan.”

  “Well, we can’t stay here,” Linna said, and Daleina was able to place her accent. Definitely court-bred, most likely raised with speech trainers and etiquette masters. Courtiers were supposed to sound musical when they spoke, their laughter like a harp chord and their sneezes like notes on a flute, or so she’d heard. “They’re timing us.”

  Together, the three of them trotted forward. We need some kind of plan. Her current approach—choosing random directions and bumbling into spirits—wasn’t working. “If we could only see the maze from above . . .” Daleina began.

  “Easy, if you’re part squirrel,” Revi said. “I haven’t seen a single thing to climb. Unless you’re that water spirit. Ever seen one that looked like a spider before?” She shuddered. “Horrifying. I’ll be having nightmares about that one for weeks, thank you very much.”

  “Why do this if spirits give you nightmares?” Linna asked.

  “Because spirits give me nightmares,” Revi said promptly.

  Daleina thought about her own nightmares and had to agree. Not doing this would be letting the nightmares win, and she’d promised Arin years ago that that wouldn’t happen. Arin told her often enough that she slept well because she knew Daleina could protect her, but after five years with the hedgewitch, Daleina knew she didn’t know enough yet to protect anyone. The academy was the answer.

  She heard a crackle up ahead. “Stop.”

  The others obeyed. Linna whispered, “What is it?”

  “Something unpleasant,” Revi answered. “I can feel it. Can’t you? Like a shiver in the air.” She crept forward and peered around the corner, then retreated. “Yes, I was right. This one’s an air spirit. They’re trying them all out on us. I’m not good with air yet. Are either of you?”

  Daleina wasn’t sure if she was or not. She’d never succeeded in summoning an air spirit, but then Mistress Baria had never let her try. She’d only proven an affinity for earth and wood.

  Linna raised her hand. “I am.”

  “Can you make it leave?” Daleina asked.

  Inching forward, Linna peeked at it then returned. “It’s small. Hummingbird small. I think I can do it. But I can’t see what’s beyond it. It could be a dead end or another trap. I won’t be able to react to that if I’m controlling the air spirit.”

  Revi nodded. “We’ll prepare for the next whatever, if you take this one.”

  Daleina caught Linna’s arm as she started to move. “Wait. How good is your control? If it’s an air spi
rit, it can fly. It can see the way through the maze. You could make it lead us.”

  Revi swore like a forest-floor woodsman. “Why didn’t I think of that?”

  “Can you do it?” Daleina asked.

  Linna smiled—a sweet bow-shaped smile. Courtier’s daughter, Daleina thought, and wondered how her family had felt when Linna displayed an affinity for spirits. Most courtier families never left the palace, a fortune paid to train their children in courtly graces. “I can try.”

  “Let’s go together,” Daleina said. “You take the air spirit. Revi and I will watch for other spirits who try to stop us.”

  Side by side, the three girls rounded the corner. Thrusting her hands forward, Linna concentrated on the air spirit. It was a six-inch-tall man-shaped spirit with luminous dragonfly wings, and it did not look pleased to see them. In fact, it held a tiny blade that looked like a bee stinger, except that it grew from the spirit’s fist. Linna walked toward it, resolutely, step by step. The air spirit squirmed, writhed, and zigzagged back and forth. Linna raised her hands in the air, and the spirit soared upward. They watched him as he reached the top of the maze.

  Sweat glistened on Linna’s forehead. Her delicate hands began to shake. Daleina saw her jaw was clenched so tightly that the veins in her temple throbbed. And the air spirit dove down, hovered in front of them, and then zipped forward.

  The three girls ran after him.

  Right, left, straight . . . Left, straight . . . And then they burst through a narrow opening and were again in the practice arena in front of the academy. Seeing them, the audience clapped and cheered. Daleina saw her family in the stands, Arin jumping up and down, and her parents hugging each other. Several girls were already out, in a clump by the judges’ table. Most of them were stained with mud, drenched in water and shivering, or sporting scrapes and fresh bruises . . . except for Merecot, who was spotless, as she drank a cup of water.