The Queen of Blood

by Sarah Beth Durst

  The trees began to grow, and she felt as if the growth was being pulled out of her own body. She swayed and felt hands on her shoulders, steadying her. She kept the pressure on the spirits as sweat poured down her forehead and trickled down her back.

  Build!

  The trees burgeoned wider and burst upward, stretching and soaring and twisting together. The spirits fused them and, laughing, spread the branches into a lacework canopy above. The wood was hollowed and peeled, its bark flayed and split, and she felt as if it were her flesh being peeled, and she felt her throat aching, as if she were screaming, but she couldn’t hear herself. She couldn’t hear anything. Couldn’t feel her own body. She was the trees, growing and widening and stretching.

  And then she felt nothing.

  She collapsed.

  WHEN DALEINA WOKE, HER FACE FELT CHILLED. SHE TOUCHED her cheeks and then, gently, her eyelids. The bandages were gone. Carefully, she opened her eyes and saw a yellowish glow above her. It was framed by blurred light green.

  “Good,” Hamon said. “You’re awake. Ven? She’s all right.”

  She saw a shadow shift beside her. A shadow! Eagerly, she tried to force it into a shape, but it stubbornly refused. “What happened? Is the village okay?”

  “You have an interesting mind,” Ven said. “I’m not sure anyone has ever controlled the spirits quite the way you do. No wonder you didn’t test well. You seem to be more effective when the spirits are already agitated.”

  “Did it work?” She struggled to sit up. Her head pounded, and she blinked. For once, it didn’t feel like knives slicing her. The yellowish glow stayed above her. Sunlight? She tried again to shape the shadows and glowing orbs into recognizable bodies and faces.

  “You turned the village into . . . well, I don’t know what it is. Spires? Towers? A palace?” Hamon said, awe in his voice.

  “I had to redirect them, and it had to be something big.”

  The shadow moved again, and she heard heavy footsteps on the bridge, felt the boards tremble—Ven’s footsteps, receding. She heard his voice, lower, muffled, and then another voice replied. He’d gone to talk to someone else.

  With his usual gentleness, Hamon helped her stand. All her muscles ached, and she couldn’t tell if it was from the trip across the forest or from the magic. She reached out with her mind, trying to feel for where the spirits had gone, and pain shot through her temples. She staggered backward, but Hamon didn’t let her fall. “How do you feel?” he asked.

  “I’ve felt worse.”

  “I’m sure you’ve felt better too.”

  “You’re not wrong.”

  “You might not want to do something like that again for a while.”

  She rubbed her temples. “Probably a good idea. How are the villagers?”

  “Three dead, fifteen injured, but the vast majority are safe, only minor injuries, and getting over their terror,” Hamon said. “Lean on me. You need a softer place to sit.”

  “You need to help the injured.”

  “Once you’re taken care of.”

  “I’m fine. Go, Hamon. This is why you’re here.”

  “I’m here for you. Because of you. No, for you.” He touched her cheek gently, and then he took his hand away and her cheek felt chilled without it.

  Softer, she said, “Go. If anything tries to hurt me, I’ll make it build a shed.”

  He insisted on helping her shuffle a few more feet, and then she sank onto the wood floor of whatever platform she was on—the village? her new building? a bridge?—so that he had to leave her and help the ones who needed it more.

  She lay on her side, cheek against the warm wood, and just breathed without trying to focus her mind on any particular thought, except how nice his touch was. The village smelled like an odd mix of burnt wood and freshly planted grasses. She heard lots of voices, talking, some crying, their words mixing together. She didn’t try to separate them out.

  “Hello? Are you dead?” It was a girl’s voice.

  “I don’t think so,” Daleina said, “but thanks for asking.”

  “Are you a queen?” she asked.

  “No, just a candidate.”

  “I thought only queens could build things.”

  “These spirits had a lot of energy,” Daleina said. “I told them to do something else with it.”

  “Oh. It’s pretty.”

  Daleina didn’t know what to say to that. “Good.” She wasn’t sure exactly what she’d done or what the spirits had built. Opening her eyes, she tried to focus on the girl. She saw a blob that bobbed in front of her. It seemed vaguely girl-like in shape.

  “You’re pretty too.”

  “Uh, good?”

  “Except for the blood. I got a cut too. See?”

  “I hurt my eyes a while ago, and I can’t see very well.” Or at all. Except that she could at least see glows and shadows and blobs. She tried to squint at the blobs, and her head ached as if her skull were a bell hit by a hammer.

  “My granddaddy can’t see very well either. He mostly stays inside. But that’s because his knees hurt him too. I don’t know if he’s dead.”

  “Is your mother or father nearby?” She hoped the spirits hadn’t made the girl an orphan.

  “My mommy is talking to the green man. He scared the spirits away from my little brother. I’m glad the spirits didn’t eat my little brother, even if he fusses a lot. Mommy said we’re going to be great friends when we get bigger, but I don’t think that’s true. I never wanted a brother. I wanted a sister so we could play queens together. Do you want to be a queen?”

  It was hard to follow the tumbling words with the way her head was pounding. “Yes, I do.”

  “Mommy says that people who want to be queen don’t live very long, so I don’t really want to be queen. I want to be a woodcarver and make beautiful butterflies out of wood. But I need a lot of charms to do that without angering the spirits, and I don’t have very much money. Mommy says maybe I can apprentice when I’m older. Are you an apprentice?”

  “Sort of. Yes. I am.”

  “Do you think Mommy will let me live in the spires if I ask her?”

  “I don’t know.” Daleina thought about sitting up and then decided it was nice lying right where she was. At least while the child was talking, she knew nothing bad was happening. She was certain she couldn’t handle another attack right now. She wasn’t even sure she could command her legs to move, much less command a spirit. “Can you tell me what it looks like?”

  “It’s like a palace!” In a happy burble, the little girl described six trees, fused together and spiraling up to pierce the canopy. The bark was stretched smooth, like skin pulled taut. “Like this,” the girl said, and Daleina guessed she was demonstrating. She then continued to describe the soaring structure that Daleina had pictured in her mind.

  It had actually worked. She’d done it.

  Maybe she was meant to do this.

  SPRAWLED ON A DIVAN, THE OWL WOMAN LICKED CHOCOLATE OFF A spoon. “He brought a woman with him this time, a powerful one.”

  Queen Fara sipped her pine tea and schooled her face to show only pleasant interest. “Oh? I hope this woman didn’t cause problems. Please, have more.”

  Discarding the spoon, the owl woman dipped her hand into the chocolate and then licked her many-jointed fingers, one at a time. Each finger ended in a talon. “My spirits were not displeased. With the addition of the woman, they were able to create both death and life.”

  Fara knew perfectly well who “he” was, but she hadn’t known he’d chosen a new candidate. She made a mental note to have her gatherers make inquiries, discreetly. “I am glad everything was satisfactory, despite the disruption.”

  “Indeed.” She shifted, her wings fluttering, then lying flat on her human back. “But today is not for talk of business. I came to play.” Before dawn, on the night of the first full moon, was the time for bargains—lately, the owl woman preferred the poetry of it.

  “But of course.” F
ara studied the garden. A few gardeners toiled in the flower beds, creating spreads of blossoms to complement her topiaries. Her latest addition was a miyan set, comprised of snarls of branches tethered to the ground by vines. As long as the vines were intact, the living game pieces could be moved. Flicking a finger, she sent an order to a small, docile spirit next to her piece. It cajoled the plant to pull the piece three spaces.

  The owl woman twitched the feathers on her shoulders, and one of her game pieces shifted to the left. “Still . . . The young woman must have been very strong, to have placated my spirits. I am curious why you allow yet another to grow in power, knowing she will only hunger for your death.”

  Fara stood and crossed to the table behind the divan to pour herself more tea. Her cup was already three-quarters full, but the owl woman reeked of churned mud from a marsh in summer. She should have known the conversation would shift this way. It was her own fault for opening the door to the possibility. This spirit was far more intelligent than any other she’d encountered—and ambitious, Fara thought. Unnervingly so. “It’s tradition.”

  The owl woman twisted her head more than one hundred eighty degrees to look at Fara. “You’re the queen. You set tradition.”

  Fara tried not to show how disturbing she found the owl woman’s statement. Bound by their own instincts, most spirits would never think to question tradition. Spirits weren’t supposed to be aware enough to question the way things were. “An heir must always be ready. If I should die—”

  “They would rejoice, but I would mourn my dearest friend.” Without any obvious signal from the owl woman, one of the game pieces shifted two spaces diagonally, blocking Fara’s move. “Truly, if you must have heirs, why must it be one trained by the very man you hate and who hates you?”

  Fara bit back a bitter laugh. “Be honest, dearest friend: you’re trying to manipulate me.” She considered the game board again. In three moves, she could capture the spirit’s token. Two, if she risked exposing her own token. She wondered if the owl woman would predict the maneuver. Hidden from the sight of the gardeners, she didn’t have as clear a view of the garden. Fara made her move.

  “They are simply so very eager, always meddling where they shouldn’t. You and I have an understanding, dear heart. The heirs are like bumbling babies. It would be simpler and safer for you and for us if they weren’t in the game.” The owl woman took Fara’s token, sliding another game piece in from the side. “You left yourself exposed.”

  “As did you,” Fara said, taking her token as well, tying the game. She told the spirits on the board to unroll the vines, and they did, snaking them around the pieces in the pattern that her moves had laid out. The longest unbroken vine would win.

  Other vines chased across the board, tangling and twisting around Fara’s. For a moment, they were both silent, concentrating, and then the owl woman said, “She will plot against you. They all will.”

  “If they do, I will act.”

  “Ahh, but then it may be too late. You must know they are only waiting for you to die. Until then, they must taste the drink of unfulfilled destiny, and it is bitter, my love.” The owl woman flicked her finger, and a game piece that had been tucked to the side swept forward to corner Queen Fara’s token. The queen’s token fell.

  Fara smiled, though it felt like her cheeks would crack to smile at this monster. “Well played. But I believe you distracted me with talk of business, despite your love of the full moon.”

  The owl woman laughed, a sound like talons scraping against rock. “Perhaps I did. But I spoke only truth. You will see. Call for the trials, and he will bring her, the woman he has trained to replace you. Call them now, and then judge for yourself who is a danger. If you wish it, I will swear to protect you from her and all those who covet your crown, as would every spirit who answers to me.” Opening her hand, the owl woman sliced her own palm with her talon-like nail and let three drops of blood fall onto the floor, a sign of her sincerity. The blood sank into the floor as if the wood were drinking it. A rose blossomed from between the wood tiles. With a sweep of her wing, the owl woman plucked it and handed it to Fara. It was an unsubtle reminder of the way to make a blood oath: drink three drops of blood to seal a bargain.

  Fara inhaled the rose’s scent. “Lovely. Another game?”

  CHAPTER 18

  Training intensified.

  “You do best if you don’t try to control them,” Champion Ven said outside the village the night they left, after the funerals and the celebrations and the wretched attempts to immortalize the events in song—Daleina sincerely hoped everyone forgot the lyrics by morning—“which explains your test results at the academy—they teach students to command, control, and coerce, but your strength is in redirection, as you so clearly demonstrated in North Garat. So tell me, what do the spirits most want?”

  “To grow, and to kill.”

  “Douse the fire,” Ven said. “Your way.”

  Daleina shifted to kick dirt on their campfire but stopped when she felt his hand on her wrist. “Oh, we’re done with the magical theory discussion? Of course we are.” Settling herself, she considered the task—he didn’t want her to reach for fire spirits the way she’d been taught: fire to handle fire. Instead, she reached into the earth and located a small earth spirit burrowing under a nearby root. She invited him to come, showed him what she wanted him to do, and then watched as he crawled from beneath the fire and covered it with dirt, creating a mound in its place.

  “Exactly,” Ven said.

  He set her to tasks: seeking out the nearby spirits and guiding them to tasks that they wanted to do. It didn’t feel like commands, not precisely. More like suggestions. In truth, it wasn’t so different from what she’d always instinctively done, but now she studied and honed her skill instead of treating it like a backup plan or a kind of shameful trick. Soon, she began to have a feel for which spirits would be guided and which resisted. The younger, smaller ones were eager for direction. Older, stronger spirits ignored her, and at Ven’s direction, she let them, for now, focusing instead on the ones that she could influence.

  “Power won’t always be a problem,” Ven said. “When you’re crowned queen, the spirits will confer power on you. You need to master technique.”

  “It won’t matter how much power I’ll have afterward if I don’t have enough before. To be crowned queen, you need power. The spirits always choose the heir who projects the strongest command. But even before the coronation ceremony, the queen will expect me to command at the trials.”

  “She’ll expect you to survive.”

  Hamon was puttering nearby. She heard him chopping herbs and mashing them into his various medicines. It was a familiar sound. All the rare plants he collected while they trained—he crafted them into salves and poultices that he traded for bread and other items in the surrounding villages, except for those he kept for his own studies, like the nightend berries and the clippings of glory vine. “You must. I didn’t go through the effort of putting you back in one piece just for you to be torn apart again.”

  “You will survive,” Ven said, “but you’ll do it your way. Even a handful of gravel is a useful weapon when thrown at the right time. My mother embroidered that on a pillow.”

  “She did?”

  He shook his head. “You are still so naïve.”

  “It’s only that you never talk about your family.” She couldn’t picture Ven as a child. He seemed as if he’d been born in green armor, a knife in his hand. “Plus my mother embroiders sayings all the time. Every pillow bears a platitude.”

  “Our mothers are nothing alike. Start a new fire. I’ll be back with dinner.” She heard his boots hit the ground as he stood, and then she heard branches and leaves rustle and knew he was climbing up, higher from their midforest camp.

  “Don’t mind him,” Hamon said. “He enjoys being an enigma.” She felt his hands touch the bandage around her eyes and begin to unwind it. “Let’s check on how you’re doing. The sun is dow
n, so it shouldn’t hurt to try. If you face me, you won’t be looking directly into the fire.”

  She sat still as he unwrapped the bandage. Her eyes didn’t hurt anymore, or maybe their pain was overshadowed by the pain of her scrapes and bruises from clambering around the forest.

  “Ven’s mother used to be a champion,” Hamon said.

  “Really? Used to be?” She hadn’t known anyone ever quit being a champion. Most kept the title until they died.

  “Do you know ‘The Song of Sorrowfield’?” Softly, in his baritone voice, he sang:

  Dearest, do you hear them, calling through the trees?

  Calling me to Sorrowfield,

  Dearest, can you feel them, coming through the trees?

  Taking me to Sorrowfield,

  Dearest, can you take me there, lay me down,

  Carry me to Sorrowfield, before they come around. . .

  It was about an elderly queen and the champion who helped her end her life. Her power was fading, and she wanted to choose the time of her death—it had a soaring melody leading to the moment she drank the juice of a dozen deadly nightend berries while lying on a bed of flowers in a field. The new queen caused a forest to grow where the field had been, to honor the old queen’s courage in dying before she was killed. It was one of those songs that was seldom sung but everyone knew.

  “That was her, the champion?” Daleina asked.

  “She quit being champion after the queen’s death. But she raised her children with the expectation that one of them would follow her footsteps and serve Aratay. One became a border guard, one a canopy singer, and then there was Ven, the youngest. When he was disgraced . . . Suffice it to say that he has not seen his family in a long while.”

  She felt the last piece of bandage fall from her eyes. “How do you know this?”

  “My former teacher, Master Popol, researched him thoroughly before hiring him. Master Popol liked to talk.” He shrugged, and she was close enough that she could feel the movement. “Open your eyes and tell me what you see.”