Throne of Shadows

by Emma Fenton

  “As Queen of Helhath, you’re considered the guardian of your people. Or did you not realize that your coronation ceremony is rooted in magic?”

  Ria froze, Peryn’s words from her own coronation night rushing back to her. Her chest felt tight, like air had been trapped in her lungs and was now going stale. Between everything Izan had been up to, the Elder Scholar’s cryptic prophecy, and dealing with the suitors, Ria had too much on her mind to think about what she’d thought were resolved conflicts.

  “I assure you, Councilman,” Peryn said, “I take the position very seriously.”

  But she’d been so stupid. Why had Peryn posed as a suitor himself? Why had he ceased his threats? Why hadn’t he brought up their deal in weeks? Because he can get what he wants if he becomes king, Ria thought, the realization hitting her like a bucket of ice water. Once he’s king, he’ll just take the souls himself. He won’t even need to ask.

  She stood up, chair scraping against the stone floor. Nasir, who had been lecturing about gods knew what, stopped mid-sentence, and everyone in the room turned to look at her. Ria knew she was about thirty seconds away from having a complete breakdown, something she didn’t want to do in front of anyone, especially not the demon.

  “Excuse me,” she said, barely squeezing the words up out of her throat. She managed to keep it together long enough to escape to her room, locking the door behind her. It wouldn’t do much, not against the person who she most needed to keep away. Peryn would find her sooner or later no matter where she went.

  The shock was wearing off, and in its place, an ugly fury grew. All this time, she thought, picking up the nearest item—a hairbrush—and chucking it against the wall. All this time, he’s just been playing me. The anger burned fiercely in her chest, expanding so rapidly it felt like she would burst. She screamed and swiped everything from the top of her desk. Papers and books and an unlit lantern clattered to the ground, the glass of the lantern shattering. It did little to dull the tightness in her chest, but before she could cause further destruction, the air shifted.

  “Ria, what’s—”

  She didn’t wait for him to finish. She pulled the knife from its sheath at her hip and spun towards him, slicing out. She didn’t care about the damned bond. Let it hurt me too, she thought as the very edge of the blade cut across his cheek shallowly. Her own cheek stung a moment later. I deserve it.

  Peryn cursed and disappeared, sliding back into the shadows. He was only gone for a second, though, because then he was behind her, arms wrapped around her to hold her in place.

  “What’s wrong with you?” he snapped. “Are you trying to die?”

  “Don’t pretend like you care,” she hissed through clenched teeth. She twisted out of his grip, putting a few steps between them, and pointed her knife—the knife he gave me—at him again. “You don’t have to anymore.”

  He frowned. “What? I don’t understand—”

  “Stop. Lying.” Anger getting the best of her, she lunged forward, swiping out at him. This time he was expecting it, and he darted out of the way.

  “I don’t even know what it is you think I’m lying about,” he shouted. He was keeping just enough distance between them that she couldn’t easily attack, and Ria wasn’t stupid enough to try to throw her knife at him, not when it was the only weapon she had.

  “Do you,” she said lowly, her temper only barely reined in, “or do you not intend to collect your ten thousand souls once you’re crowned king?”

  Peryn stared at her, open mouthed, so shocked that it would have been funny if she wasn’t so pissed off. They stood there, the two of them, in utter silence. His lack of denial was proof enough that she’d been right, and grief tinged her anger. How could she have trusted him? She had known what he was. She had known he was self-serving above all, and yet, somehow, she had let herself forget. She lowered her knife-arm to her side.

  “That’s what you’re mad about?” he said, tone bordering on incredulous.

  “You don’t deny it.”

  “You knew what I wanted from the beginning, Ria,” he said slowly, as if speaking to a child. “I’ve never lied to you.”

  “No,” she said, laughing bitterly. “You just conveniently forgot to tell the truth.”

  “I don’t see why you care. Ten thousand is nothing when there are two million in your country alone.” He rolled his eyes. “If it will appease you, I’ll even let you choose.”

  “Choose?” she repeated, the anger building up in her yet again. “Choose? Like they’re pigs for slaughter? Like their lives are meaningless?”

  “They are meaningless,” he said dismissively. “They’re mortals. Their lives were always going to be finite, Ria. What does it matter if they don’t get to live an extra ten, fifteen years?”

  “We don’t get to decide who dies and when, Peryn. That’s not our decision.”

  “I suppose you think it’s not right,” he said with a sneer. “That’s your problem. You let your morals get in the way of doing what needs to be done. Do you know, Izan wouldn’t be a threat right now if you weren’t so insistent on doing the right thing?”

  “Don’t make this about me,” she snarled, fists clenched. “Just because I won’t forfeit someone’s life on a whim—”

  “You insist on playing fair even when no one else is.” His magic flared wildly, harmless but clearly agitated. She hated the way it tingled across her skin even from the other side of the room. “It makes you weak.”

  “I’m sure as a demon you’re used to wreaking havoc and leaving the clean up to someone else,” Ria snapped. “Not all of us are lucky enough to escape the consequences of our choices.”

  She knew it was the wrong thing to say the moment the words were out of her mouth. His normally expressive face shuttered into a blank mask, eyes cold and devoid of their usual emotion. It seemed as if even the anger and frustration he’d been alive with only seconds ago was shoved somewhere deep inside.

  “Lucky,” he spat, voice dangerously low. From the tenseness of his shoulders and the way his fingers dug into his own palms, it looked like he was only barely restraining himself. His magic had been tightly reined in, but she could almost feel the way it struggled against his control. “I have paid the price for my choices for hundreds of years. I will never be free of these consequences. Don’t speak of things you don’t know anything about.”

  Before she could say anything in response, he slipped back into the shadows and left. Ria stared at the spot where he had been until the anger bled from her chest, leaving her feeling strangely hollow.

  ***

  The week passed in a blur for Ria. She stayed in bed every morning until Sofi came to fetch her. Ria let Sofi do everything: brush her hair, braid it, dress her. Sofi even took to forcing her to eat, especially because Ria refused to go down to the dining hall or even leave her room on most days. She didn’t want to see Peryn, and it was clear the demon had no desire to see her either since he never once came back to her room.

  When she bothered to leave her chambers, she only ever went to the library where she skimmed through books on marriage law, praying to the gods she would find a clause that said foreign spouses couldn’t be crowned even if they married the presiding monarch. She could stomach her marriage to Peryn—despite everything, she still preferred him to Izan, and she knew if she tried to cancel the wedding now, the Coucnil would only put Izan in Peryn’s place—but if she could prevent him from being given the power he desired, she would.

  But as the week dragged on, it became increasingly apparent that Helhath had no such laws. The king and queen were meant to stand as equals in all ways, and while Ria normally would have admired the concept, it was currently working against her. More than ever, she missed the Elder Scholar’s guidance. Would he have encouraged her to push forward with the marriage even knowing what it would cost her people? Beware the price that must be paid, Ria thought bitterly. He had warned her in his own way. And she’d been too stupid to listen.


  I could always run away, she thought, though the idea was a fantasy more than anything. Anywhere she ran, Peryn would follow. And she couldn’t abandon her country to Izan’s will. Peryn would take lives, yes, but it would be cold, efficient. Izan would drag her country through war, devastate hundreds of thousands of people and potentially bankrupt Helhath. The effects of a war would last for generations.

  And so, on the morning of the wedding, Ria allowed herself to be pulled from her bed early in the morning. She let Sofi spend hours twisting and braiding her hair into something lovely, let the girl dust her skin with crushed minerals until she glittered in the candlelight. Ria put on the dress that the Council had commissioned for her: an elegant, white gown entirely covered in delicate swirls of glass beads. Her veil was beaded as well, and when Ria looked in the mirror, she felt like she was looking at a painting of a goddess: ethereal, draped in white, glistening in the soft light like something holy.

  She had never looked more beautiful. She had never felt less like herself.

  The dress felt as heavy as Ria herself and walking in it took an obscene amount of concentration. The paranoid part of her mind complained at the lack of mobility and the way it was nearly impossible to reach the knife strapped to her thigh under her skirts. Sofi had tried to make her leave the blade back in the room, but Ria had grown accustomed to always having it with her, and even her anger at Peryn wouldn’t persuade her to leave it behind.

  Paavo was waiting for her at the doors to the great hall, which had been cleared out and decorated for the ceremony. He smiled upon seeing her.

  “You look just like your mother did on her wedding day,” he said softly, eyes wet with unshed tears as he clasped her hands in his. For a moment, Ria felt like a little girl again, when she was so desperate to be like her mother, and Paavo would call her princesza, and nothing seemed as bad as it really was. “Are you ready, my Queen?”

  No, she wanted to say. But she’d already made her choice and it was far too late to turn back now. It had been too late months ago. She’d already damned her country and herself the night she summoned a demon in the forest, she just hadn’t known it then.

  Instead, she merely nodded and Paavo opened the doors for her. It was almost reminiscent of her coronation: the room filled to the brim with nobles, all turning to stare at her, to whisper, and Ria, once again, feeling like she did not belong. The main difference now was that Peryn stood at the other end of the aisle before her, also dressed completely in white and in clothes in traditional Helish style. It was a shock to see him in something that wasn’t black, unnatural almost. Peryn belonged in darkness; the white didn’t suit him.

  She stepped forward, walking far slower than any normal person on their wedding day. A choir in the background sang an eerily beautiful high-pitched hymn from the very back of the room, but it sounded strange when mixed with the loud thump of her own heartbeat in her ears. The walk seemed far too short, and soon she stood across from her intended.

  He smiled so beautifully at her—the fake smile he always put on for Keffleton and Izan—and it was like a knife to her chest. She had always been grateful to be exempt from his charming masks and false manners, grateful to know the person underneath. It stung to see his pleasant façade directed at her now. But she forced a smile back. She hoped it was convincing enough for the crowd.

  “Lords and Ladies,” the high priest said, his voice echoing loudly in the large room. “We are gathered here today to celebrate the union of our Queen, Honoria Ramadani, and Lord Peryn Hollbrook of Etheri. Join me in asking the gods to bless their matrimony with holy love.”

  Ria and Peryn bowed their heads with the crowd as the high priest raised his arms skyward. Asking the gods to bless a demon, she thought, fighting back a bout of hysterical laughter. And a sinner. Neither of them deserved the gods’ favor.

  “Gods, rejoice. Today, two souls bind themselves together, body and spirit, under your ever-merciful gaze. We ask that you bestow upon them your guidance in times of need, your patience in times of strife, and your forgiveness in times of weakness. Let them never falter in their devotion to each other. We ask this of you and give thanks.”

  If you’re listening, Ria prayed, I have only ever done what I thought was right. Don’t punish my people for my mistakes.

  “Rise. Let us join these two through the ceremony of our ancestors.” The high priest held out a pearl-handled knife to Ria, who took it gingerly. “May you trust each other unconditionally.”

  Ria took Peryn’s right hand gently and held the blade over his palm. It was unfortunate that the Helish marriage ceremony required bloodshed, but not unexpected. Still, it would require a crafty bit of subtle magic to make sure none of their secrets were revealed. Ria took the knife and sliced a shallow cut across Peryn’s palm. It bled only a little, just a few drops of inky blood that so clearly marked him as non-human, but in the dim lighting, no one would notice.

  He took the knife from her, using his magic to heal the stinging cut that had appeared in her own palm when his hand grazed hers. He then took her left hand and did the same, creating the shallowest of cuts right over the scar already on her palm. Without waiting for the high priest’s instructions, they clasped their bleeding hands together.

  She hated how comfortable her hand felt in his. She hated how his magic buzzed between them, how it tingled pleasantly on her skin where their hands met and seemed to sink into her bones. She hated how it felt as soothing as a lullaby, how her first thought when their fingers laced together was, I missed this.

  “May you protect each other as if you are of one body,” the high priest said. He pulled out a strip of white sea-silk and began winding it around their joined hands. He tied the two ends together. “May your bond be eternal.”

  It was funny, almost, how they had been bound together since their first meeting by the laws of magic, something much more permanent and powerful than the laws of man. And yet the vows they took now were the ones people cared about. It’s so strange, Ria thought, to value words and symbolism as the highest authority when marriage can be broken so easily compared to our magical bond.

  “And now for the sacred vows.”

  Before the high priest could continue, however, a loud bang rumbled throughout the room, slightly muffled in a way that indicated it came from just outside. Ria could hear the faint sound of metal clanking and the steady beat of footsteps. Is somebody late, she wondered. That’s rude. But then the doors to great hall burst open, and everyone in the room turned with shocked gasps at the sound.

  Lord Izan stood tall in the doorway, an uncountable number of armored soldiers at his back. From one look alone, Ria could tell these weren’t the palace guards, but Izan’s own army. Their uniforms bore his family crest: two birds flying over crossed swords. Unease roiled in her stomach. Nothing good would come of this.

  “Lord Izan, explain yourself,” she commanded, voice loud and clear even over the confused murmuring of the crowd. Peryn’s grip on her hand tightened ever so slightly.

  “My Lords and Ladies,” Izan said, addressing the crowd rather than her. “I have become aware of a most distressing plot.”

  Ria frowned as the crowd of nobles watched him wide eyes. Couldn’t he wait to reveal whatever information he’s using to start war with the Pesh? Maybe he thinks if he reveals it in public, I’ll have to concede to war.

  “Lord Hollbrook—” Izan said, turning his gaze on the demon. Ria tensed and felt Peryn do the same. “—has bewitched the queen.”

  What?

  “Arrest Lord Izan,” Ria said, glaring at the man coldly. “For slander against the crown and treason.”

  Izan sighed. “You’ll thank me, your majesty, when I return you to your right state of mind.”

  The palace guards moved forward to obey her order, but Izan’s soldiers came forth as well, flooding into the room. The nobles, apparently finally coming to the conclusion that it was no longer safe to remain in the great hall, rushed towards the main door
in a panic, pushing, and shoving, and nearly trampling each other in a panic to get out. Izan’s soldiers ignored them.

  “Can we kill him now?” Peryn hissed. Ria ignored him.

  For a single moment, it was merely a standstill: the palace guards standing between Lord Izan’s soldiers and Ria. And then chaos erupted. One of Izan’s soldiers pulled out a crossbow, and though a palace guard was already running towards him with his sword drawn, he wasn’t fast enough. The guard knocked into the man with the crossbow just as the shot was being fired. The arrow whizzed between Ria’s and Peryn’s faces, narrowly missing them both to land with a thud in the high priest’s forehead. The poor man didn’t even have time to scream.

  The high priest dropped to the floor, blood already spilling onto the white tile.

  “You could’ve killed the Queen!” one of the palace guards yelled. A sword went through his neck, and that was the last thing Ria saw because Peryn was already pulling her down from the dais. As they rushed past, she grabbed the ceremonial blade from where it lay on a small table. Her own knife would be impossible to reach unless she stopped and undressed, but she’d be damned if she waded into a fight completely unarmed.

  “Exits?” Peryn asked, eyes darting around, desperately searching for a way out.

  “Only the one.” Ria nodded to the large doors. Izan and all of his soldiers barred their way. They’d have to fight half the army just to get to the doors and she wasn’t certain what was waiting for them on the other side.

  Peryn nodded, grim. “Stay close.”

  “Not like I have a choice.” She held up their bound hands.

  Without warning, he yanked her behind him. Where she had been standing only a moment ago, one of Izan’s soldiers was swinging his sword. Ria blinked hard, fighting back images of Jaya with her knives looming over her. Now is not the time, she told herself. Peryn raised his hand, and with a twist of his wrist, snapped the man’s neck.