Untethered

by KayLynn Flanders

  Something about the poem—the clue—stayed with me, running through my mind. Three keys, two kingdoms, vineyards that touch the sky.

  The vineyards bit didn’t seem connected with the other part, yet it had been included. The script was different, shakier, than that of the poem. Like it had been added later, or by someone else.

  Whatever this poem was, it was important. One thing my father taught me was that when negotiating, it’s always better to have the upper hand, to have what the other person wants. I could be mistaken, but Koranth—Janiis’s ambassador—had helped the mages before. If this clue was valuable to the mages, maybe it would be valuable to Janiis. Maybe he’d be willing to trade it—or at least a piece of it—for my father.

  I cracked open another book, looking for any hint of keys or flax or vineyards or magic. Something to prove that this clue had value. Enough value to save my father.

  “Here you are,” Yesilia whispered right next to my ear, making me jump so high my tailbone hurt when I landed back in the chair.

  “Grandmother,” I scolded as I laughed. “Don’t scare me like that.”

  She chuckled and pulled over a chair from another table so she could sit with me. She held a tray—was it dinnertime already?

  “What has you holed up in here for so long?” She leaned closer, squinting at the tiny script in the books laid out before me. Her silver hair was up in her usual bun, held back by a blue scarf today.

  Would she help me? Or report me to Mother for skipping lessons? It was hard to tell with her sometimes. Her view of what was good varied.

  I scooted the books closer to me. “Just some research.”

  Her eyebrows raised. “Your tutor said you were sick. Said you were taking a respite from classes.”

  I pressed my lips together and lifted a shoulder. “I’m sick of lessons. And I am taking a respite from classes. This is…unrelated.”

  “Good.” Yesilia chuckled and nudged the books out of the way so the tray was in front of me. My shoulders relaxed. She wouldn’t make me stop reading. “Eat this, then we’ll talk.”

  Once I started eating, I found I was ravenous. “Any news?” I asked, twirling the noodles with basil and a hint of lemon around the tines of my fork. Keeping myself tucked away in the library had its advantages, and one of them was staying completely away from palace gossip.

  Yesilia shook her head. “Not until you’ve finished.”

  Once she decided, she never budged, no matter how I cajoled, so I shoveled the food into my mouth faster, even going so far as to slurp. Grandmother winked at me. We’d had slurping competitions when I was younger, seeing who could make the loudest, longest sound.

  When I pushed the empty tray to the corner of the table, Yesilia rested her hands on her stomach. I began to regret eating so much. “News?” I asked again, quieter now.

  Yesilia sighed. “Janiis answered the message your brother sent. He said he wasn’t aware of any delays, but that whoever had caused it must be a fool to impede the great Marko.”

  I wrinkled my nose. “Janiis is as slippery as they come.”

  “Agreed.”

  “Do the others think he’s behind it?”

  Yesilia tilted her head so she could better stare me down. “You would know if you hadn’t locked yourself away in here.”

  I sighed and tapped my fingers against the poem. “I need to do something. Everyone else has pressing demands on their time. I don’t.”

  Instead of insisting otherwise, like anyone else would, my grandmother nodded. “They see your potential, but don’t know how to use it, child. Tell me what you’re working on.”

  A coil inside me loosened the tiniest bit.

  I slid the poem in front of her, and she picked it up, holding it closer to the candle Romo had brought earlier. Her eyebrows rose higher the longer she read. She set the page back on the table and faced me, all hint of mirth gone from her eyes. “Where did you get this?”

  I folded my hands in my lap. “It’s from Jenna.” I explained about the book, the page I’d found in it. “I don’t know if she remembers it was there, but the poem was on the back. I thought…I thought perhaps it might be important.” I left off the part about trading the poem for Father. I wasn’t even sure what it meant. Didn’t want to raise a fuss if I was wrong.

  Yesilia’s gaze snapped back to the poem, her aged finger tracing the lines. “I recognize this line.”

  Vineyards that touch the sky.

  I leaned forward and gripped the table. “I’ve been searching everywhere for a similar reference, but haven’t found anything!”

  Her head bobbed and she traced the lines again. “Our ancestors lived along the cliffs, long before Riiga was formed, long before our people moved inland. They used every inch of the land, every resource they had. They even developed a method of farming on the cliffs. I saw it when I was much younger, and there were indeed vineyards that seemed to grow straight into the sky.” She slowly pushed back her chair and stood. “I think I can show you. Wait here.”

  She went into the shadows between the shelves and I turned back to the poem. I pulled another book, this one on the mages of old, toward me. I flipped to where I’d seen a line about how the Mages’ Library was hidden at the edge of the world. Riiga. The cliffs.

  “Look,” Yesilia said, settling a large book on top of the other ones. Across the spread of pages, an illustration, faded and smudged, showed the cliffs, with terraces cut into the face, and rows and rows of vineyards climbing into the sky.

  “This is amazing,” I whispered. I turned to the preceding page and squinted at the tiny script, my tired eyes watering as I deciphered the location and uses of the terraced vineyards. When I turned to the page following the illustration, my gaze fell on an inscription in familiar looping script in the wide margin.

  The final key, not a key at all: behind the falling door, that gives life, but takes it more.

  Need blood.

  A shiver went through me at the mention of blood. “Three,” I muttered. Grandmother leaned closer to peer over my shoulder. “Three!” I placed the illustration of the Turian ring on top of the book. “ ‘One in snow, the heart of attack’—a Hálendian key. And this”—I traced the ring, noting a small triangle along one edge—“is the Turian key.”

  “But there’s another,” Grandmother said, a sparkle entering her eyes for the first time since Luc had announced my father—her son—was missing.

  “And it’s hidden behind a falling door.” I didn’t know what that meant, or the blood part, but it was a start. “The third key.” The mages had one. I hoped Hálendi still had theirs—maybe I could ask Jenna.

  Grandmother rubbed her leg like she always did when it ached or when she was thinking. “Something is hidden there.”

  I straightened my shoulders and stopped fidgeting. Called on every deportment lesson I’d ever had. Anyone else would brush me off, but maybe not her.

  “Grandmother, what if we could use this to trade for Father’s life? Give the clue, or part of it, to Janiis?”

  She sighed and sat back, taking her time to think it through. “Perhaps.”

  The weight inside me lifted so fast I almost rose out of my chair. “You really think so?” I whispered, barely daring to utter the words.

  She tapped the ragged corner. “But even more valuable would be whatever this clue leads to. Maybe we—”

  “I want to go!” I blurted out. Yesilia looked at me, studied me like my father always did, and I missed him with a sharp ache. “Everyone else has duties to attend to. Riiga will grant me passage down the cliffs the same as Cynthia. Luc said himself that Turia needs its king before Janiis’s wedding.”

  My grandmother shook her head slowly. “It’s too dangerous for you to go alone.”

  I’d never been this impulsive in my life. I stayed where I was s
upposed to, did what was expected of me. But for my father? For him I’d scour every inch of the Plateau. Even Riiga.

  “Please, Grandmother, I’ll—”

  She tapped her fingers against the table. “I’m coming with you.”

  My mouth froze half-open, the words on my tongue dissipating into the air. “You’d go with me?” I asked, disbelieving. “But, your duties. You’re the best healer in the palace—”

  “There are other healers, and more sickness in the wide world.” Her sharp eyes cut to me. “Nobody messes with my boy.”

  A sound escaped my throat, a whoop that echoed through the library. My guard shifted at the door. I covered my mouth with both hands, holding back the laugh. We were doing this. Finding a way to save my father. “I don’t think we should tell the others,” I warned. Would she tell them anyway? It was the responsible thing to do, but Enzo would stop us before we’d even begun.

  Yesilia rose slowly. “I agree. We leave tomorrow before dawn.”

  I gathered everything on the table, tucking the poem into Jenna’s book and then the book into my pocket. No one here would miss us. The mages wouldn’t care about us, a grandmother and her granddaughter traveling south. And if we didn’t end up finding anything, no one would be the wiser.

  “Can you evade your guard?” she asked softly.

  I grinned. “I’ve learned a few tricks from Mari over the years.”

  Yesilia rubbed her bony hands together and cackled. “It’s about time I had an adventure.”

  I smiled and slipped her hand into the crook of my elbow. “It’s about time we both did.”

  Ren

  The letter from home caught flame in the morning’s remaining embers and burned to ash in the grate. Jenna would have told me to keep it, but I didn’t care. I’d been in Turiana a week, and news that Isarr had pled her case convincingly and that the two assassins I’d healed weren’t talking wasn’t much motivation to go home.

  Edda reported that the council wasn’t taking my departure well. I couldn’t do anything about that; she would tell them about the provision we’d signed when she deemed it necessary.

  Had I made the wrong choice to come? Marko wasn’t here to advise me; I’d been too late for that. Jenna was busy with wedding preparations—enough to ensure I wouldn’t marry for a long while yet, not if it required that many details.

  And yet, to be as happy as Jenna was with Enzo…But I’d have to wade through a thousand Isarrs to find such happiness.

  I growled and poked at the fire with the long stick next to the hearth. But poking the fire wasn’t enough. I grabbed my sword and buckled it on, jammed my feet into my boots, and stomped outside.

  The door to the palace’s practice ring groaned in protest as I shouldered it open. Scuffling feet sounded from within—someone had beat me to the ring.

  “Fancy seeing you here, Your Majesty.” My sister executed a deep court bow, more mocking than anything.

  I ignored the prickle in my chest at the reminder of my new title and laughed at Jenna, the only person I knew who trained more than I did. “Shouldn’t you be doing something princessy?”

  She rolled her eyes and tossed a staff at me. “I needed to move. Besides, this is the only time I have to myself now.”

  I understood the feeling. We stretched and started slow, building to our favorite fight. Swinging, moving, dancing around each other as our staffs thunked together in the silence.

  “Why did you come alone?” Jenna asked between breaths. “I mean, besides Adri.”

  I shrugged and swung my staff down hard. She blocked the strike and stepped away, waiting for an answer. “There aren’t many I can trust.”

  She nodded, accepting what I’d said. She stepped into the fight again. “Tell me.”

  A single, mirthless laugh escaped me as we circled each other. She swung at me, and our staffs banged together. “The council second-guesses every word I say. Most of them support Leland’s views and are trying to push me to break our agreement with Turia. They want me to bring you back and end your betrothal to Enzo.”

  She stumbled. “What?”

  “They want your magic to strengthen Hálendi.” I made sure to roll my eyes hard enough to start a headache so she’d know how I felt about that one, in case the tethers weren’t clear.

  A long pause followed. Too long. “Any word on Cris? Has anyone found him?”

  I swallowed the bile that always came with his name and swung harder at my sister. “If he enjoys his health, he’d better never be found.”

  My jaw clenched at the memory of Cris in the tent after the mages’ attack. How he’d drawn his sword on me. Of Leland’s dagger sunk to the hilt in Enzo’s side.

  I’d been weak from healing Jenna, and I’d known I didn’t have enough magic to heal Enzo from such a deep wound. But she’d begged me to try. So I’d placed my hands on him and let my magic work. Even though I knew I didn’t have enough, knew there was a very good chance I’d die in his place.

  But then I felt the tether that Jenna had lived with her entire life. A brief, bright glimpse of our connection. Jenna’s magic had flowed through it into me, healing Enzo, and saving us both. I didn’t think she realized how close I’d come to giving too much.

  “The Medallion guided you here,” Jenna said, circling me, trying to find a weak spot. “Has there been any change since you’ve come?”

  Under my tunic, the Medallion shifted against my chest. “I don’t know. Nothing feels right anymore. It started getting hot again yesterday. But nothing’s changed, so I don’t know what the warning meant. There’s not exactly a guide that goes with it.”

  Jenna rolled her shoulders back and tightened her grip on her staff, no doubt feeling my tension through her tethers. “You’ll figure it out, Ren.” She swung at my knees, then stumbled back one step. I flicked my staff up against hers. It flew out of her hands and landed heavily in the dust as she stumbled back again.

  My brow furrowed. “What’s wrong? I haven’t beaten you with a staff in years.” I picked up her staff and set them both against the wall.

  She was breathing heavily, her hand at her stomach. “Enzo’s worried.”

  “The tethers?” I asked. She nodded. So it was with more than just Marko. “I thought the bond was to protect family…” I drifted off and shoveled the hurt away before she could sense it. Enzo would be her new family. They all would. “Can you do that?”

  “There’s no guide.” She shrugged. “But I am.”

  My hands twitched at my side. I clenched my fingers into fists to keep them from trembling. We were in so far over our heads. How could we manage to win against two ancient mages with centuries of knowledge?

  Jenna went to a closet I hadn’t seen in the shadowed corner and pulled out two wooden practice swords. “You beat me one round. Let’s see if you can do it again.”

  “You just want to avoid choosing which tapestries to display for the wedding,” I said to keep things light. She didn’t need to feel worse because I couldn’t get my emotions under control.

  “You’re right.” She shrugged and held up her sword, but the tip wobbled. Was she keeping her troubles from me? She never used to. “Maybe I should have taken you up on your offer to run away to the countryside.”

  It had been only a few months since I’d joked about that, but three lifetimes had passed. If only I could go back and make good on the offer.

  * * *

  Jenna must have needed that release because she annihilated me. Afterward, I’d bathed and attended a meeting with Enzo. But the council had only wanted me to briefly consult about the state of our port in Osta, and then I’d been summarily excused. Not that I minded. I’d been holed up in a study ever since with a stack of notes on what I’d need to address when I returned to Hálendi.

  I’d have to return soon. The entire trip had been poi
ntless—I’d been too late to help Marko, which had to be what the Medallion urged me here for. Jenna didn’t need me any longer. In fact, my presence was probably making things worse for her—Turia didn’t want another Hálendian in the palace.

  But I didn’t want to return yet. Especially not as a failure.

  I was about to dump the entire stack of paper into the grate when Mari burst into the room. “Ren!”

  I folded my hands over the papers and leaned across the desk. “To what do I owe the pleasure of your company, Miss Mari? Have you finally come to steal a dance with me? Because I accept.” I pulled one of her crazy curls and watched it bounce back into place.

  But instead of laughing at my teasing, Mari bit her lip and rubbed her arm.

  “What is it?” I asked, my heart dropping at her seriousness. “Your mother?” Cora’s health had become more fragile the longer we went without any word—she still hadn’t left her chambers and wasn’t eating much.

  Mari shook her head and her curls slapped her face. “It’s Chiara.”

  I scooted away from the desk and waved her closer. “What’s wrong with Chiara?” My stomach tied itself into knots. She’d been crying the last time I saw her a couple of days ago—not actual tears, but the effects of it had been all over her face.

  “She…she’s not here. I can’t find her, and I can find anyone!”

  I blinked twice. “What do you mean, she’s not here?”

  Mari tucked her elbows in tight. “I mean, she’s not anywhere. I’ve searched and searched.”

  “Has anyone seen her? Maybe she just—”

  “Her maids haven’t seen her in two days.”

  On my chest, the Medallion lay dormant. “Did she just get up early? What about her tutors?”

  “No!” Mari took my face in her small hands. Tears began running down her cheeks. “She’s. Not. Here.”

  I pulled her into a hug as my mind raced through possibilities. “Find Yesilia. Ask her to help you search Chiara’s room. Look for a note. See if her traveling cloak is still in her closet. But don’t tell anyone what you’re doing.”