Tied to the Crown

by Neha Yazmin

  Noticing that her guest was simply stirring her tea with a spoon, not touching any of the food or drink, Aaryana realised that Erisa might be suspicious of her.

  To put the girl at ease, she said, “I am so happy that you joined me this morning, Lady Erisa. I’ve been feeling a little lonely and I’m so glad for the company.” She inhaled deeply, as though it had been hard to admit that out loud.

  “You’re so far away from home, that’s understandable.” The girl did seem genuinely sympathetic.

  “I had a friend back home. My lady-in-waiting, actually. I miss her terribly, and worry about how she is, what she’s doing…” Tears filled her eyes. She lowered her head to hide them.

  “Can you not write to her?” Erisa placed her teacup on the table and came to sit beside her. She rubbed Aaryana’s back gently.

  “Exiles can’t write home,” Aaryana explained. “The punishment is most severe—”

  “I’m sure there are ways to sneak a letter…”

  “Trade ships from Roshdan don’t sail so far south,” Aaryana mumbled, wiping her eyes.

  “Yes, but it’s still possible—”

  “It might be next year by the time she receives it, the letter going from Island to Island. And another year for her reply to reach me. If she is brave enough to risk the punishment for contacting an exile.”

  “The ship that Wyett is sending to Adgar hasn’t left yet,” Erisa informed her. Aaryana was surprised that the crew hadn’t departed already. “Couldn’t they carry your letter? They sail straight for your Island. They will likely get there in under a month…”

  Aaryana lifted her head to see a friendly, encouraging smile on Erisa’s face. It wasn’t an act, that was clear. “It took me over two months to sail here…”

  Erisa nodded. “You came on a sailboat. Wyett is sending a seabird. It will have men rowing at all hours of the day and the sails propelling it at night.”

  That was probably the reason behind the delay. Gathering the crew and supplies for such a vessel.

  “Prince Wyett really wants to find out the truth about me.”

  “And what is the truth?” Erisa’s brows creased with curiosity.

  “I am not a threat to this Kingdom,” Aaryana replied evasively.

  After chewing on her bottom lip for a few seconds, Erisa confided in Aaryana, “You know, His Majesty has ordered everyone to refrain from asking you how they thought you’d cheated in your competition. If you willingly offered Wyett that information, maybe he will trust you.”

  “He wouldn’t believe me,” Aaryana murmured. “The Prince will want proof of my innocence. I don’t have that.”

  She didn’t say what she was really thinking: Wyett doesn’t want to believe there’s good in me. Nothing I say will sway him.

  “Well, you’ve clearly figured out how stubborn he is…” Erisa laughed indulgently. “I think you should write that letter, anyway. To your friend in Adgar. Write everything you want to tell her, ask everything you want to know. Write it, and your heart will feel lighter.”

  “Maybe you’re right. Thank you.” Aaryana sat up straight, squaring her shoulders bravely.

  Erisa gave her a warm smile.

  “Anyway, I was thinking of curling my hair,” Aaryana said in a forced cheery tone. “Do you know someone who would take on a disowned Princess-turned-guard as a client?” She laughed, obviously with great effort. “Or even be prepared to take my thin hair seriously. Yours has so much volume to it—is it natural?”

  Erisa’s throat bobbed; she swallowed as though her mouth was dry. She began babbling nervously. “Natural? Why, yes, of course, it’s natural. Doesn’t it look natural?”

  Aaryana babbled, too. “Yes. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply anything. I was just curious if I could get someone to make my sad hair look fuller, that’s all. I think your hair is beautiful. I wish I had black hair. It’s better than this… this white-blonde that would fit inside a newborn’s fist.”

  Yes, Aaryana’s hair was thin like an old woman’s. She would go bald before her fortieth birthday, she was sure of it.

  Erisa shook her head. “Your hair is fine. I mean, it’s very nice.”

  Aaryana chuckled. “Do you know anyone who could make it nicer?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t.” The girl rose to her feet, readying to leave. “But I think you look lovely the way you are. And I think you should write a letter to your friend; it will be good for you.”

  Erisa left the room, a sad but hopeful smile on her youthful face. And Aaryana wrote the letter. Her heart didn’t feel lighter upon scribbling those handful of words, but her head did clear.

  She sealed the piece of parchment in an envelope and slid it under her pillow. Then she dressed in her brown jacket and pants. She wouldn’t be sleeping today, not after all the tea she’d consumed, and had much to do.

  Mostly, she didn’t mind being one of the Queen’s ladies-in-waiting. Mostly. It was better than being locked up in the dungeons. Better than having no job or purpose. Myraa wouldn’t have starved if she’d refused to join Queen Leesha’s staff; her family was still one of the wealthiest in Adgar. Her brothers would have taken her in. Found her a nice Lord or Duke to marry. She would have lived a good life.

  Yes, Myraa had been imprisoned in the dungeons, but she had, by no means, been disgraced or frowned upon for it. Her support for Princess Aaryana during the trial had been seen as heroic rather than shameful. She would have been quite alright, she thought, if the newly coronated Queen had set her free instead of offering her a position in her Court.

  Well, ‘offering’ was a very polite way of putting it. Leesha had freed Myraa as soon as she’d ascended the Throne, and it was obviously because she didn’t want any negativity to fester in peoples’ hearts towards her so early in her reign. Her subjects wouldn’t appreciate it if she left their beloved Princess’s innocent, loyal friend to rot in a stone cell. The Queen had appointed Myraa her lady-in-waiting to make people think that she was not only forgiving, but also generous, happy to allow Myraa to serve a Queen, just as she’d always expected to do.

  The other reason, Myraa knew, was the Queen’s desire to keep an eye on Princess Aaryana’s closest ally—and torture her for it.

  Waiting on Leesha was nothing like serving her sister. Sure, Myraa didn’t mind it, most of the time, but she definitely didn’t like it. It was deplorable, the disgusting things the Queen made her do on a daily basis. Myraa only obliged because she, too, wanted to keep an eye on Leesha and Parth. She would watch and listen and gather information, anything that Princess Aaryana might find useful when it came to claiming her Throne upon her return to Adgar.

  Princess Aaryana will return. When she did, Myraa would be ready for her.

  Today was not the day for investigating the Nidiyans in their mountains. Today, Aaryana was indulging in the sightseeing activities that wouldn’t arouse any suspicions. The busy markets. The glassy lakes. The lush green fields where her warhorse could run free.

  She had no doubt whatsoever that Wyett had men trailing her. If the first place she explored in Roshdan was the home of Nidiya’s descendants, he’d link it to her odd reaction to the story about the higher sea folk that had lived in this land centuries ago. She didn’t want to make obvious just how interested she was in the Nidiyans. Couldn’t let Wyett make a connection between Nidiya and Aaryana’s heritage.

  Tomorrow, she’d head north and find herself some Nidiyans to speak to. For now, she made do with riding from one place of interest to another, looking bored and unimpressed by what she saw and eager to discover something more spectacular at her next stop. But she couldn’t honestly say that Roshdan wasn’t beautiful. She had thought that the trees and fields and meadows and grass in Adgar was green, but the foliage here was greener, as though untouched by the sun.

  Everything in Adgar was tinted a sunny yellow; Roshdan had a cool-blue overlay, sometimes grey.

  The day was cloudy but not chilly. It wasn’t warm, either, but
at least it wasn’t raining. Yet. The late afternoon sky was dark enough that she wouldn’t be surprised if the sky opened by nightfall. Something about this Island made her think that it would be a pretty sight, watching the raindrops splashing on the bouncy grass, rolling off the vibrant leaves.

  Should she have invited Erisa to accompany her? It would’ve been nice to have someone showing her around, taking her to the nicest places. The girl had seemed pleasant enough this morning. She may have left abruptly—without eating or drinking anything—but she’d been easy to talk to. With a little probing, Erisa would have divulged whatever she knew about Seth’s illness. Nice as she was, she wouldn’t shy away from telling Wyett that Aaryana was poking her nose in Seth’s business.

  And the Crown Prince would petition for her beheading.

  If only Seth would just come say hello to her. If only he’d bumped into her as she was leaving the castle today. That way, he definitely would have insisted on joining her. Of course, she’d have told him that Wyett had ordered her to keep her distance, but Seth wouldn’t have let that stop him. Aaryana would have been blameless if Seth followed her despite her protests and warnings, and he wouldn’t have let Aaryana get into trouble with Wyett, either.

  With time and growing friendship between the two of them, Seth would confide in her about his sickness without her having to bring it up. And the more she knew about his symptoms, the more knowledge she’d be armed with when trying to find a cure for him. She didn’t know when she’d vowed to do that, why she’d vowed to do it, but she knew she’d do her best to rid Seth of his illness if it was the only good thing she did before returning to Adgar.

  Perhaps she should have pressed Jeena more about Seth’s condition, what he went through, what triggered the symptoms, instead of bringing up Micah. Now, her maid would refrain from answering questions on topics that she’d previously thought harmless.

  Despite Jeena’s pointed silence, the girl hadn’t forgotten about booking Aaryana an appointment with the worst beautician in the land. Before Aaryana had left her rooms this morning, the girl had handed her a note with the address of a woman called Renchal, with directions on how to find her cosmetics shop in the grimier part of the market. It was there that Aaryana dismounted her horse now, her finale in the first leg of her tour of Roshdan.

  Her shift was three hours away, so she had plenty of time to get the beauty treatments she was after, have a bite to eat, and catch a few snippets of gossip before heading back to the castle. Then again, if Renchal’s was the worst place to have your hair and face done, there might not be anyone there to provide the gossip.

  Hopefully Renchal had what she needed. And as she stepped inside the shop, she wondered what Wyett would make of her when he saw her outside his door tonight, hopefully sporting a brand-new hairstyle.

  Wyett stopped still. He couldn’t help it. He was halfway down the short, too-narrow passage that led to his bedchamber when his eyes noted the difference in the Adgari’s appearance. It was such a shocking change that his steps halted completely. Unintentionally.

  Each time he made his way down this hallway, Wyett made sure to refrain from acknowledging the guard standing outside his bedroom door, made like she wasn’t even there, but it didn’t mean that he looked down at his feet or up at the ceiling. He faced forward, taking in everything; he didn’t avert his gaze from her. He was a Prince, the Crown Prince, and he wasn’t going to let this Adgari alter the way he held himself in his own quarters.

  But she’d made him stop and frown at her now. Made him look at her long enough to determine all the things that were different about her tonight. Her pale blonde hair was more gold than silver now, he could tell even in the light of the torches on the wall. Well, half of it was; the bottom half of her tresses had been dyed a rich red-brown, and curled. She looked like a completely different person, her curls curtaining most of her cheeks.

  It wasn’t practical, wearing her hair down like this while on duty; the tight ponytails she’d worn all week were more suited to her job. Wyett would have commented on it, or complained about it to the Head of the Royal Guards, but it would be too petty. Laughable, even.

  So, he clenched his jaws and walked to his door, deciding not to say anything to anyone about her hair.

  Renchal had turned out to be a man. A fine-boned, tall, and lean-looking gentleman in his mid-thirties. He had taken one look at Aaryana and exclaimed, “Oh, I know exactly what to do with you!”

  The two-tone hair was his idea; the curls were hers. Renchal had advised against going ahead with both styles, saying it would be too much. “I want too much,” had been her response. After all, she’d already told one person that she was looking to get her hair curled to give it some volume.

  “Since you seem more interested in hair dyes, I would suggest you simply colour your hair,” he’d reiterated.

  Indeed, she’d asked him a lot of questions about his dyes and that of his competitors in Roshdan. The colourants were all derived from plants, he said—leaves, fruits, and certain vegetables. Depending on the exact dye used, the colour of your hair would fade away within a few days or a couple of weeks. Nothing permanent.

  Once he’d coloured her hair and started curling the ends, talking her through the process so that she or her maid would be able to achieve the curls every morning, Aaryana asked him how often she might need to come back to him to re-dye her hair.

  “You should be good for a week-and-a-half,” he told her, “maybe two, if you don’t use too much soap on it.”

  “Will the repeated colouring damage my hair?” she asked anxiously.

  “Not with this blend,” he assured her confidently. “But certain dyes can dry the hair, make it coarse even. Not all plants are nourishing.”

  When she asked him which colours were the most abrasive, she wasn’t surprised with the answer.

  She didn’t push for any Court gossip, though, didn’t mention Seth or the rebels, or all the other things on hair dyes that she wanted to know. There would be time for that in subsequent appointments. She paid him a handsome tip as she left his premises, and he’d been genuinely touched when she insisted on paying him at the same rate that Madam Varda charge her clients.

  She couldn’t rest in her rooms for too long before her shift—she’d been required to keep the dyes in her hair longer than she’d anticipated—but she drank two very strong cups of black sugary tea to keep sleep at bay. While changing into her uniform, she checked under her pillow.

  Her letter to Myraa was gone.

  Chapter 3

  It was a last-minute decision, bound to backfire, but the idea seemed sound in the early hours of the morning, and so she went with it. The moment the day guards came to relieve her on Saturday morning, she set off at a hurried walk to the stables to get her warhorse.

  Later, she would regret not making a trip to her chambers to ask Jeena to find her some furs and thicker boots, but as she settled into the saddle of her horse, she felt a rush of excitement, thinking about where she was going. The Nidiyan Mountains, where Nidiya’s descendants had more or less exiled themselves. One exile was going to meet several others.

  She rode north, not asking anyone for directions, not stopping for a cup of tea—the cool breeze, which became colder and then icy the further north she travelled, blew away all chances of sleep pulling her under. Aaryana wasn’t sure if it was against the rules to wear her guard uniform when she wasn’t on duty, to wear it outside the castle, but she’d find out soon enough, she supposed.

  Her teeth were chattering long before she neared the foothills, and she finally remembered what Wyett had said about the adopted home of the Nidiyans: it’s always winter in the mountains. But she’d covered a lot of ground, was too close to stop now, to go back and rip a cloak from the first person she saw, so Aaryana and her warhorse pushed on. Pushed north, where the midday sun didn’t seem to reach them.

  No one had followed her, she knew that. She had left the castle early enough that Wyett’
s men probably assumed she was in her room, eating breakfast or napping after her shift.

  The Nidiyans couldn’t know who she really was, lest it somehow got back to the Palace. The King had been kind to her—she didn’t want him to know she was keeping things from him. Things about her heritage.

  Wyett had spoken of the Nidiyans with neutrality but he hadn’t revealed what he actually felt towards them. The Roshdani people may not be hunting the Nidiyans anymore, but she didn’t know if they still saw them as their enemy. Even if there was utter peace between the two groups, Aaryana didn’t want anyone to know her true identity.

  Erisa came running into the dining hall, red-faced and puffy-eyed, just as Wyett had risen from the table. Everyone eased to their feet when they spotted the distressed girl.

  “What is it, Erisa?” Wyett asked, her name on his lips sounding foreign from the lack of usage in recent years.

  His childhood friend—former friend?—seemed momentarily surprised by the fact that he’d spoken to her, as though her name sounded strange in his voice. She inclined her head to Wyett but turned to his father.

  “Your Majesty,” she said with forced calm, “I apologise for interrupting lunch, but I don’t know what else to do.” Erisa wiped her face with her hands, trying to make herself look more presentable to the King.

  “What’s happened? Where’s your mother?” The King walked around the table to the girl, Seth following. Both of Erisa’s parents had been friends with the King, and he’d doted on Erisa before Quin was born.

  “Your Majesty, it’s about my mother,” Erisa explained, taking a deep breath to steady her voice. Still, she spoke in a rush. “We were at the tailors, getting our dresses fitted for your birthday ball. She went into the changing room and never came out.”

  “What do you mean, never came out?” Wyett demanded with a frown.