Broken Crowns

by Lauren DeStefano

“You’ll get to see your parents and brother again,” I offer, trying to be optimistic. But I worry the words sound bitter. My own mother is gone, and I have no way of knowing whether my father is still alive, or if he’s being tortured by the king for his treason.

  “Whatever we face, we’ll get through it,” is all Basil says.

  “I’m not scared to go home,” I say. It’s the truth. Whatever dread I might harbor for that jet ride back home is less than the anticipation and the not knowing. “It’s Pen I’m worried about. I’ve got to go in there and tell her I’m going to leave her behind.”

  Basil has nothing to say to this. He has always had words of comfort for me in the past, no matter how bad things were, and no matter how undeserving I may have been of his patience at the time. But for this one thing there are no words of comfort.

  Tears threaten again. I ball my hands into fists and I refuse to let them free. I take a deep breath. “Best to get this over with, then,” I say, and climb the steps and push open the door.

  6

  Everyone is in the lobby with questions for us. Everyone but my brother, who never leaves his room, and Pen.

  Basil offers to tell everyone what’s happened, freeing me to look for Pen so that I might speak to her alone.

  I find her upstairs on her bed, staring at one of Birdie’s old catalogs.

  “These drawings are magnificent,” Pen says without looking up. She traces the outline of a plumed hat. “They could almost be images. I’m envious of the realism.”

  “I much prefer your drawings,” I say. “Pen?”

  She turns the page.

  “Pen, there’s something I need to speak to you about.”

  “I will say I don’t understand all the plaids,” she says. “It’s all the men wear. It gets boring. Do they not see that? Back home I always thought Thomas looked more handsome in pinstripes. Well, not handsome, but, you know—acceptable.”

  I sit on the edge of her bed, and she winces. “Pen.”

  She closes the catalog and places her hands down on the cover, as though she is trying to keep something trapped within the pages. With difficulty, she says, “What is it?”

  Now it’s my turn to look at the cover of the catalog in her lap. The drawing of the woman is lifelike. She has dark lips and white teeth, and she’s wearing a coat that looks three sizes too big, with pockets big enough to smuggle melons. But in her own way she’s glamorous, without a care, much like the Piper children’s mother hiding behind the cemetery trees at Riles’s funeral. “Do you think Birdie would mind if I kept that?” I ask.

  In answer, Pen tosses it into my lap.

  “Thank you,” I say. I trace my index finger from corner to corner. “Pen, King Ingram is sending Basil and me back to Internment alone.”

  She is very still, the way she gets some nights when Thomas looks in on her and she pretends to be sleeping. After a moment she reminds herself to breathe, as though waking from a trance, and it’s a sharp painful sound.

  “I knew it was going to be that,” she says.

  “He means to use Basil and me as war symbols. He thinks people in Havalais and Internment will be more trusting of two young people in love. He thinks it will give everyone something to hope for.”

  “Are you in love now?” Pen says. “That’s news to me.”

  “I don’t know. That isn’t the point.”

  “Isn’t it?” she says coolly. “If two kingdoms are going to rest their hopes on two young people in love, shouldn’t they be in love?”

  “I love Basil, you know that I do.”

  “But that’s not quite the same thing as being in love, is it?”

  I press my lips together, hard. I don’t want to fight with her.

  I don’t think Pen wants to fight either, and in the silence that falls between us, I feel her anger melting away. “When will you leave?”

  “The king is planning festivities this week for Prince Azure’s arrival. I suspect it will be after that.”

  “When will you be back?”

  “He didn’t say.”

  “Will you be back?”

  I don’t want to say the words, but I have to, not just for Pen, but for myself, so I can accept what is happening. “I don’t know.”

  There is no color left in Pen’s cheeks, no life in her eyes. There was a single day back on Internment when I disappeared and she was told I was dead. She was broken when I found her again, but this is worse than that. She betrays no signs of life now, save for a bottom lip that has begun quivering.

  “You know that all of this young-lovers nonsense is a lie King Ingram is telling you and the rest of the two kingdoms,” she says.

  “Yes,” I say.

  “You know that he’s probably done something horrible to the princess. Maybe she’s even dead.”

  Sickness in my stomach. “Yes. I know.”

  Her voice cracks. “You know that whatever he’s done to the princess to make her disappear, he’s going to do the same to you and Basil.”

  “We’re not going to play this game,” I say. “We’re just going to see what happens.”

  “No, you’ll see what happens. I’ll be down here wondering. I’ll always wonder and I’ll never know if you’re hurt, or—or dead, or—”

  “Or perfectly fine. Stop it.”

  There are tears glittering in her eyelashes, and she draws one quick breath after another. I grab her hands, clammy, ice cold. It takes all my strength not to fall apart too, not because of what horrors may or may not await me in the sky, but because I don’t want to leave her on the ground in this state.

  She nods at the floor. “Okay,” she says. “Okay, this is what we wanted, isn’t it? A way to go back. So I wasn’t invited. You’ll just have to cause a big enough commotion for the both of us.”

  I smile at her. “There’s my girl,” I say. “See? It will all work out. You and I can go over all of your notes. I’ll memorize as much as I can. They can’t confiscate plans that are in my head, yes? And whatever happens up in the sky, Basil and I will handle it.”

  There’s a knock on the open door, and Pen turns away, sniffling.

  “Hey.” It’s Judas, standing on the threshold. “Did I come at a bad time?”

  “It’s always a bad time in this awful place,” Pen says.

  “I just heard about the king’s plans to send you back,” he says. He’s looking right at me. “I wanted to make sure you were okay. That’s all.”

  Pen laughs incredulously. “You really have some nerve,” she says. She gets to her feet and paces out of the room, making a big show of avoiding him as she passes through the doorway.

  “Sorry,” I say, even though I understand Pen completely. As far as we’ve fallen from home, she still believes in our traditions. She may think less of me for it, but she still disapproves of Judas taking the liberty to kiss me. Down here in this world, sins are contagious, but someone from home should know better.

  A frown tugs at the corner of his mouth. “Be careful, okay?” he says. “Be more than careful. Be clever. Be aware. This king is no more a friend to you than the one who had you poisoned.”

  I nod. “I know, and Basil knows it, too.”

  I drop my eyes to the catalog in my lap. I will keep it with me when I go home, a token of this world. Maybe I’ll be able to show my father and tell him of the things I’ve seen.

  It hurts to let myself hope.

  Judas stands there for a long time. “I wanted to say good-bye.”

  My heart is pounding. “I’m not leaving yet. There will be time for good-byes later, I’m sure.”

  “I wanted to say it now. Sometimes you think you’ll get a chance later, but then you don’t.”

  I understand. Daphne. And now he’s got me thinking about the enormity of all this. Leaving. Possibly never coming back. All the good-byes I have the opportunity, but not the courage, to say. I push it all down, away, out of sight. It’s the only way I can bear to keep myself breathing.

  But t
here is one thing I’m bold enough to ask, since I may never get another chance. I look at Judas. “Do I remind you of her? Is that it?”

  “Is that it?” he retorts, offended.

  “Is that why you kissed me? Is that why you always look at me when you think I’m not paying attention?”

  “No, it’s not—” He lowers his voice to a whisper, steps into the room. “No it’s not why I kissed you. Does there have to be a reason?”

  “Customarily when you kiss a person, there is a reason, yes.”

  Judas shifts his weight uncomfortably. He is tall and thin, and always seems astonished by his limbs, as though he finds the very concept of having a body perplexing. “I don’t want you to think I betrayed Daphne,” he says. “It isn’t like that. She would want me to go on living. She would be proud to know I was defying betrothal laws after her death, rather than dooming myself to never feel anything for another person again. And it isn’t that you remind me of her at all. It wasn’t about her. She wasn’t there. In that moment it was just you.”

  I’m finding it difficult to breathe. All this time, I felt certain that Judas’s attraction to me was brought on by the madness of being alone. He still mourns her; I know he does.

  “I didn’t expect that to be your answer,” I manage.

  “Please believe me, if you never believe another word I say.”

  “I do. It’s just, I—” I clear my throat, turn myself on the bed so that I’m away from him. But that doesn’t ease the anxiety or the guilt. It doesn’t make this any easier, and I know that I must face him. I stand and take a few steps toward him. “While Daphne may not have been in that moment, Basil was.” I press my hand against my chest. “He’s very much a part of me. I can’t betray him. I won’t. Not again.”

  Judas is looking into my eyes, and I question what I’ve just said. Was Basil with me in that moment? The real truth is that everything in the worlds fell away. He kissed me, but I kissed back. And now, if he cares for me at all, he will go along with my lie. He will let me pretend that there is nothing between us, until one day it’s the truth.

  “Okay,” he says. Scratches the back of his head. Turns for the door. “Just—okay.”

  As he crosses the threshold, I say, “Good-bye, Judas.”

  He pauses, his back to me. Then he walks away without a word. He has already said good-bye.

  In the span of a single day, everything has begun to fall apart. I spend much of the day outside, avoiding everybody. And it’s only when I’m alone in one of the teacups at the empty amusement park that I allow myself at last to cry. I lie back, sobbing, and stare at Internment’s pale purple form in the cloudless sky. I sob for my mother, whose body was likely burnt in secret with all the other victims of the king, without a proper send-off and without anyone to say so much as a few final words. Is her spirit still trapped there, looking for my brother and me? Does she wonder why we’ve left her?

  It is not a pain I’ve allowed myself to feel. I was so caught up in the danger and the mystery of our journey. I have worn this cloth of grieving tied around my wrist all this time—it is tattered and dirtied—but I have not truly grieved.

  Now it comes all at once.

  And my father—I have to believe he’s alive and whole and safe. I have to.

  I shall have to speak to Thomas about Pen. She and I have never been apart for more than a day, and I’ve seen what loss can do to her. I don’t want to return to the ground and find that she has drunk herself into illness. That’s what I’ll tell Thomas. Make sure she isn’t hoarding bottles. Make sure she isn’t going off alone. She can be quite deceitful, so be vigilant. I want to see her well when I get back.

  When I get back.

  That’s what I’ll say.

  7

  The festivities are a blur. The king’s seamstress and tailor have created clothes for Basil and the prince and me that are a mix of what we wore back home and what people wear in Havalais.

  Prince Azure goes up to the podium before us, and he reads the words that have been prepared for him in neat typewritten letters on small squares of paper. Words about joining the kingdoms and ending the war with Dastor. But it is not Prince Azure’s war, and it is not Internment’s war, and I know that there is anger behind the prince’s dazzling smiles.

  I never get a chance to ask him about that anger. Nor do I get a chance to ask why he has denied Pen her chance to go to Internment with me. She is the one with the knowledge he needs. The moment after his speech, he is whisked off into the crowd, escorted by two of King Ingram’s men, to reassure the people.

  Charming the people is nothing new for Prince Azure. Back on Internment there was little else for him to do in public. He is tall and attractive and rather eloquent, even if all his words have been prepared for him.

  I sit up on the stage, holding Basil’s hand, doing my best not to look terrified.

  Eventually the king sends us out into the crowd. He has not given us an exact script, but we know what he wants us to say. Everything will be well. Internment is happy to help. The war will be over soon. Dastor is the enemy but soon they’ll leave us alone, once the phosane makes us the more powerful kingdom.

  The others don’t approach us. Pen and Judas and Amy and Nim. But I see them sometimes in the crowd, watching Basil and me. I see Judas’s expressionless face that hides so much, and I see Pen’s worried eyes.

  I swallow a lump in my throat, and I go on speaking lies.

  On our last night in Havalais, Basil and I arrive at the castle for a feast being held in our honor. A send-off. Roasted animals of every variety and vegetables that weren’t cut out of a can, for once in this world. I force myself to eat. Everything tastes like paste. All I want is to go home, and I’m not sure where that is anymore.

  “Ghastly party, isn’t it?” Prince Azure says, stepping up from behind me. He’s holding two long-stemmed glasses of sparkling tonic and he hands one to me. “I think that’s an entire pig on that table over there with—what is that in its mouth?”

  “I don’t know,” I say, because I’m too nauseated to look.

  “Tomorrow’s the big day,” the prince says. “I have been waiting all week to have a moment alone with you. Looks like now’s our only chance.” He nods to the opened glass doors that lead to the balcony.

  I look to Basil, trapped in a conversation between the king and one of his guests.

  “Hurry, before the king forces us to recite another line from one of his scripts.” Despite his glibness, I can hear in his tone that he’s serious, and I let him lead me onto the balcony.

  The hot and humid air is hardly better than that of the stale party, but Prince Azure seems relieved. He pauses for a moment to breathe it in.

  “So that was him?” Prince Azure says. “That boy with the glass over his eyes? The one my sister is so in love with?”

  “Nimble Piper,” I say. “That was him.”

  Prince Azure huffs. “I expected something more extraordinary, to hear the way she spoke on about him. He hardly seems like a prince, although I’ll hand it to him, he is doing a brilliant job concealing his lineage.”

  “For what it’s worth, he’s kind,” I say.

  Prince Azure stares out at the sky. “That is worth something.”

  “Is Celeste—is she all right?” I say.

  “She’s taken ill,” Prince Azure says. “She was in no condition to be flying between worlds. King Ingram meant to drag her to Havalais anyway, but Father put his foot down and sent me instead.”

  “But she’s alive,” I think aloud.

  Prince Azure throws me a frosty glare. “Yes. And she had all manner of kind things to say about you. For that and so many other reasons, I think the ground caused her to go mad.”

  “Is that why you’ve advised the king to send Basil and me back to Internment?” I say. “Pen would be valuable to Internment, and if you’re trying to keep her down here out of spite—”

  “I am trying to keep her alive,” he says. “Do
I care for her? No. She tried to kill me and I don’t especially like what she does with her hair. But her value is not lost on me. I know that she is the one who figured it all out about the phosane, or as we call it back home, sunstone. I know that she has an engineer’s head on her shoulders. And if my father knew this, she’d be on her way to the clock tower as soon as you touched ground, and she would spend what’s left of her life there, working for him.”

  “Pen would never,” I say.

  “She would, or she would be tortured. Drowned within a sliver of death. Cut. Hung by her wrists.”

  I force the imagery from my mind and keep my steady gaze on him. “Is that the sort of torture you saw at the attraction camp? For people who are attracted to the same sex?”

  He pales at that. Swallows a hard lump in his throat and goes on, “When King Ingram asked which one of you should be used as symbols, I chose the pair of you because of your dumb expressions. Look at you—you’re utterly harmless. Nobody would suspect you had a valuable thought in your head. But that friend of yours is another story. My sister told me all about how brilliant she is and on this front, I believe her.”

  “Why did you choose me, then? If you want to save Internment so badly and Pen’s so valuable?”

  Prince Azure closes his eyes for a long, painful moment. “Because I do not want her helping my father. Or King Ingram. I no longer believe either of them can do what’s best for Internment.”

  “We agree, then,” I say. “Your father is doing more harm than good.”

  Prince Azure waves his hand. “Fine. Let’s be candid. Yes, I agree with you. My father’s way may have been sinister at times, but it worked when Internment was self-contained. He had people killed in the interest of suppressing riots that would have destroyed the city. But now things have changed. I need you and that betrothed of yours to go up there with your dumb expressions and play the part of two harmless idiots. I need you to talk to my sister. She’ll know what needs to be done. And moreover, I need you to look after her.”

  I blink. “I thought you were coming back with us.”