Look to the Stars (The Orien Trilogy Book 1)

by Catherine Wilson

  The last of my words stumble from my mouth, and I hope he mistakes my folly for exhaustion and not the embarrassment that it truly is. I have no idea what kind of relationship he has with my mother, but it seems like a tight one at that. A horrible thought runs through my mind. Surely, he doesn’t fancy her. Oh, no. He couldn’t. He’s much too young, isn’t he?

  Aras sits up, too, effectively ruining my escape strategy. All at once, his alarmingly sweet scent of honey fruit and fresh rain envelope my personal space, and I curse the stars for all of its wrongness. How can something so nice come from something so not? If Aras senses my irritation, he doesn’t let on. Instead, he chooses to slide his arm dangerously close behind my back while he leans into my ear, pointing his free hand up into the sky above.

  “Did your papa ever tell you about that one?” he says, pointing to a familiar cluster of stars that I’ve nicknamed the flower. It’s the stars that stretch out into five clear petals with a small stem sprouting out from the bottom. Though I’ve never said it aloud, it’s always been my favorite.

  “No.” I sigh, trying to turn my face from the warm puffs of air that his words bring. “I can’t say that he has, considering I’ve never met him.”

  Aras doesn’t say anything at first, and I worry that my blunt words have pushed too far. If he wants to know what I’m really thinking, he’ll just have to get used to the fact that I don’t have much of a filter.

  “Don’t be so sassy,” he finally says, dropping his arm and looking at my face, his nose so close that it almost grazes my cheek. “You know what I mean. You have a father. He raised you. Just answer the question. You’re ruining my speech.”

  At his words, I can’t help the small smile that creeps across my lips. Even though we both know that Papa isn’t exactly who he says he is, Aras still believes it doesn’t change things. At least not the important things. Despite everything I’ve learned today, I can’t help but agree with him.

  “Anyway,” he continues, “that cluster of stars is Ingrid’s favorite. She first discovered them with your papa. I’m surprised Emory didn’t mention it.”

  I don’t say so, but it doesn’t surprise me. If Papa shared something special and more than likely forbidden with my mother, it was his, not mine. Besides, I discovered it on my own, and in some way, maybe that’s how it was meant to be.

  “Wherever she is tonight, if she can see the sky, I can guarantee she is looking at that exact same spot. Thinking of you—thinking of him.”

  His words do little to warm my heart, although I know he means them to. “She’s not in Orien,” I state, rather than ask.

  “No, and therein lies the beginning of our troubles. Had she not been in danger, you wouldn’t be without Emory.”

  I turn sharply, almost bumping our heads in the close proximity. Aras juts back, clearly embarrassed now that he’s not the one controlling our little game. “Are you saying that my papa left to save her? How could he have even known she was in trouble? The new season’s change isn’t until another week. You hadn’t—”

  “I did,” he says, cutting me off. “I called an early meeting with him. It was risky, but I didn’t know what else to do. Ingrid needed help, and if anyone deserved to know, it was him.” Pausing, he hangs his head until his chin nearly touches his chest. He blows out a breath, searching for what to say. “In the end, I think I just made it worse. For both of them.”

  His admission leaves me reeling, and I look away before he can see the deadly look I must have written across my face. He caused my papa to leave.

  “I know what you’re thinking, Bravest, but he would have eventually found out. I don’t know that the outcome would have been different. He would have gone either way.”

  “You would say that,” I fume.

  “Besides, it’s not Emory leaving that’s the problem; it’s what you did after he left.”

  This time, I turn to him, begging his eyes to meet my own. “How can my meeting with The Lost mean so much to the people of Orien?” And even though I don’t say it, I really mean him. How could it mean so much to him—the man who apparently wants me back? The one who thinks I am his own.

  “It wasn’t so much the meeting as it was what happened when you were there.” My brows furrow, and he lets out a frustrated sigh. “You were recognized, Bravest. You were like a bright light in an otherwise dark wood. To those who saw you, the past cannot be denied anymore. You heard Bates. He knows who you are.”

  The mention of Bates brings about a sour taste in my mouth, and I twist my lips, willing the image of his gray eyes to leave my sight. “And the man who wants me back believes he is my father?” I ask, knowing the answer, but hoping for the best all the same.

  “Without a doubt.”

  “Do I really look that much like him?” I ask, Aras’ words from earlier in the day ringing in my ears.

  “No.” He laughs. “You’re nothing like him, but you are everything like your mother.”

  For once, his words bring comfort. I’ve never been so happy to look like my mother in my life.

  “And this man,” I continue, “does he have a name?”

  Aras lips form a tight smile, and he looks as if it pains him to say the words. “Knox, Bravest, as in the king of Orien.”

  He watches me, judging my reaction to his words, although I can’t say I give him much. Even though I didn’t know his official name, Aras’ answer is just what I expected. It’s what I knew from the very second he said my mother’s name. Yes, every queen does have a king, but what’s so terrible about the king of Orien that would cause my mother to turn my entire life into a lie?

  “But none of this explains why. Why did it ever have to be this way to begin with?”

  And though I love my life with Papa, and I wouldn’t trade it for the world, there is something very unsettling about the fact that it has been my life at all. That maybe there is another one out there I should have been living all along. That maybe I should have at least been provided a choice.

  Aras shrugs before tilting his head back up to the sky, and I can already tell his response won’t hold the answers I want. “Life in Orien is much different than life in Ashen, and Knox isn’t exactly the friendliest man I’ve ever met. I can only speak for myself when I say that I have my reasons not to trust him. Of course, he has his reasons not to trust me, as well.”

  “Because she was protecting me from him, and you, in a way, are protecting me as well.”

  “Yes, that’s part of it,” he allows.

  For a moment, I say nothing, choosing instead to study his profile in the light of the stars. The dark shadows cast from the tall garden walls hide part of his face, but where his chin tips up, as if he’s drinking in the sky above, the light meets him, casting a warm glow across otherwise hidden features. I’ve never seen anything as beautiful and scary in all of my sheltered life. Aras represents everything I am not, yet everything that I am supposed to be. He holds himself with strength and unabashed courage, whereas I hide behind a name, pretending to be everything it represents. Papa always refused to call me anything different. He was my real strength.

  He’s my life.

  The thought of Papa causes my eyes to close, and I squeeze them tight, forgetting the image of Aras and all that I’m supposed to be. If I can just appease the Oriens, then maybe I have a shot at getting Papa back. However, to appease the Oriens, as terrible as it sounds, I’m going to need Aras.

  Aras. The new best friend whom I love to hate.

  “So tell me,” I say, my words but a whisper in the dark, “what is it that I need to do in order to get Papa back? I’m willing to do whatever it takes, so long as that’s the end result.”

  Aras doesn’t say anything at first. He leans back on his outstretched arms, his eyes closed to the world around him. The wait wears on my already-thinned patience. I’m about to knock one of his arms out from under him when he finally speaks again.

  “Just as I said before, the Oriens don’t have your fathe
r, but they do know where to find him. Not because they sent him there, but because that’s where Knox says your mother ran for safety when he discovered her betrayal. If I’m correct,” he stops to study me, “which I usually am, then Ingrid is over the northeastern mountain pass, in a territory known as Theron. The people of Theron have long been a thorn in Knox’s side, mainly because he can do nothing to control them. They’re immune to his style of ruling, so to speak.”

  My head tilts to the side, and though I can’t see it, I know my nose is scrunched into what Darcy calls my questionably rude face. “Why wouldn’t they be immune to his rule? They don’t live in his territory.”

  “That’s exactly what the Theron seem to think, but Knox is known for spreading his reach.” He pauses, looking over to catch my gaze. “And he usually gets what he wants.”

  At his words, I jump to my feet, a nervous ball of energy surrounded by four solid walls and nowhere to go but up. Or down, if the ground will so kindly take me until someone can come along and carry me to my bed.

  “But that doesn’t make any sense.” He starts to object, but I wave him off with my hand, pacing back and forth before him like a caged animal preparing for a fight. “I mean, Knox wanting more power, yes, but the people of Theron taking my mother in, no. Why would they want to be more involved than they already are? Why would they want to provoke him?”

  “That’s just it,” he answers, jumping up and pulling me to a stop. My heart pounds wildly in my chest, and for a second, I think I’ve actually scared him. “The Theron would never be involved, but Knox swears that they are. He says they took her to prove something to him—to prove something to the Oriens.”

  His words bring clarity to my cluttered mind, and I pull my arms from his grip, turning my back and looking out into the open garden before me. “He means to say that they want war, even if they really don’t.”

  “That’s right,” Aras whispers. “Even if they really don’t.”

  It all makes sense, in a very creepy sort of way. Why wouldn’t the Oriens want to seek vengeance on a territory that they believe has kidnapped their queen? And here I thought I had a normal father growing up, when all along, I’ve been shielded from a lunatic who would endanger his own wife for the chance to rule a foreign land.

  “But you don’t believe they have her?” I ask, already knowing the answer.

  “No, not in the sense that they are keeping her prisoner anyway, but I do know that the closer we are to Knox and Theron, the closer we will be to finding her and Emory.” He pauses, and the soft pad of dirt sounds its way to my side. “It’s why we have to go through with Bates’ orders, Bravest. Even if you don’t want to go, we have to cooperate.” Then he smiles, his shoulder playfully nudging my own. “Or at least pretend to, anyway.”

  I fight off a smile, secretly glad he already knows that cooperation isn’t exactly in my nature. But there’s still one thing I can’t let go of. One thing that still seems off, more than anything else that’s happened in my shattered life. “That still doesn’t answer the question of why Knox needs me. Sure, he thinks he’s my father, but what does it matter? It’s been eighteen long years. Why couldn’t he just let me go?”

  Aras’ lips tip down and he runs a hand through his tousled and now slightly dirt-tinged hair. “You heard the kind of man he is, Bravest. He wants what is not his own, but he’ll kill for what is. Your mother and Emory deceived him, and now, well, now he’s taking you back.”

  I tilt my head, jaw jutting out in the small space between us. “I’ll never stay. I’ll get what I want, and then I’ll leave. He can’t keep me there.”

  Aras’ shoulders rise in a subtle shrug, and smugness fills what was once open air between us. “You are a princess, Bravest, but certainly not of Ashen. Things have changed, whether you like it or not. You’d do well to remember that.”

  He turns on his heel, leaving me both stunned and breathless. Before he can make it to the stone path that leads back inside, I yell out, causing him to stop in his tracks. “Are you saying that I can’t help him? That there’s nothing I can do for my papa? For her?”

  His back stiffens, and the muscles cord in his neck. “No, I’m saying that once you help them, you won’t be able to help yourself.”

  And with that, he leaves me standing alone with the weeds and the Silver Leiths, with nothing but their soft whispers of comfort to keep me from falling apart.

  Twelve

  I know I should have left the gardens sooner, but the sun is just barely up by the time I drag myself to my eagerly awaiting bed. When I open the door to my room, Crisp waits, uncomfortably propped on the blue chair in the corner. His soft snores fill the room.

  Oh, Crisp. He must have waited. And waited. And waited.

  Guilt floods my chest, and I hurry to the bed, throwing the sheets over my head in a wild flourish. Maybe if I pretend to be asleep, he’ll think I’ve been here most the night, instead of out in the garden, pining away my soul on broken promises and good intentions. How my parents have deceived me so. The three of them. My life is a mess.

  I spend the next few moments listening carefully through the sheets, preparing myself for any movement from Crisp’s end, but all I find are the adorable breaths of a deep and exhausted sleep. The very kind I should be having right now. Unfortunately, thoughts of Papa invade my mind, along with the incessant worry of what Knox will do if he finds him. He and Papa can’t be on the best of terms, hidden child or not.

  Suddenly, a thought hits me hard in the gut, and I launch up, the sheets falling away like a blanket of rain. If Papa is from Ashen, how did he ever meet my mother? Not only that, but how did they have time to fall in love? As an unwritten code, the people of Ashen never leave the safety of our borders, not even for trade. It’s what has kept us strong all of these years. We are a small, close-knit community that doesn’t take well to influences from the outside. If my papa ever left for trade, he certainly wouldn’t have met with the queen of Orien to do it. It can all only lead to one conclusion.

  Papa is not originally from here either.

  As if he senses my inner turmoil, a low groan sounds from the corner of the room, and Crisp stretches his long arms above his head before fluffing his straight, blond hair with a violent shake. He’s always reminded me of an endearing puppy when he wakes from a nap, although I’d never dare tell him so.

  “You’re back,” he says, rubbing his palms across his eyes before standing to stretch beside the chair. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep. You should have woken me.”

  I smile, happy to be speaking to someone who has always put me at ease for a change. “Never. You looked way too comfy, and besides, I think you might have needed the sleep.”

  He eyes me sheepishly, which is a surprise, because he’s always been so confident in the past. What could have changed?

  “Did you find the answers that you needed last night?”

  And there it is. Apparently, a lot has changed. Starting with the fact that he saw me with Aras in the garden. For some reason, an awful pang fills my chest. I can’t begin to imagine what it must have looked like to someone from afar. Well, actually I can, and I don’t like it one bit.

  “I don’t know, Crisp,” I say, choosing to be honest. “With Aras, you never know exactly what you’re getting. I think he likes it that way. Besides, you probably know him better than me.”

  He frowns deeply, and I immediately decide it’s not a look that I like to see. Not on him, and not when it’s caused by me. “I’m sorry, Brave. I never have liked keeping secrets from you, but I don’t like to see you hurt either. I couldn’t have it both ways; you know that.”

  Nodding my head, I flop back on the pillows, choosing to let my actions do the talking. I never have been one for deep conversations, especially not with Crisp. He’s always held a special place in my heart, one I’ve saved just for him. He is my friend, but my protector, too. On most days, he considers himself my protector first. After all I’ve learned, perhaps now I ca
n stop resenting him for it. Underneath the shielded and tough exterior, he is also just a boy—just a friend. And I need him.

  “Don’t worry, Crisp. Before Papa left, he told me not to harass you too much. I guess that means I also can’t be mad at you for too long.” I peek up at him as he crosses the room, a wide smirk across his face as he stops before my bed. “Plus, you’re such a bother to be around when you think I’m unhappy. I should at least be allowed to enjoy my last days in Ashen with a smile on my face, shouldn’t I?”

  “Oh, I’ll give you a smile,” he says.

  Before I can even raise my hands in defense, he grabs one of my pillows and slams it playfully against my face. Wild laughter fills the room, and it takes me a moment to realize that it’s my own.

  ↄ

  I never asked him to, but Crisp sat down at the foot of my bed and waited for sleep to take me. He was an ever-reassuring presence that I needed more than anything. Now as my eyes open to find the room flooded with the bright light of the midday sky, I fight back a wave of disappointment to discover that I am also alone. We had barely spoken, Crisp and I, but as things have always been between us, it was enough. Good friendships just have that way about them, it seems.

  Stretching with a terrible yawn, I ease out of bed with the strength of a woman who has seen far better days and decide to forgo a much-needed soak. Today is my last day to spend in Ashen, and if I want any of my questions answered, I’m going to have to look elsewhere to do it. Dressing quickly in black pants and a soft white tunic, I opt for a light blue cloak with a large hood to conceal my otherwise grungy hair. Though the air has turned warmer of late, the added weight won’t be too much to carry. Besides, if I’m going to make it there alone, I’ll have to be quick.

  With speed of utmost importance, I glide to the outside balcony, searching for my trusty rope. I always keep it hidden in an old flowerpot, with a small tarp covering it like a precious jewel. It’s just for show anyway. Everyone knows it’s here, and they don’t have the heart to take it away from me. Even Darcy, who says I have a penchant for breaking my neck, leaves it be. I think that deep down, despite how unbecoming it seemed, they could all agree that I needed some skill of escape in my life. I always thought they were just humoring me and my wild ways, but now I know better. Now I know they thought I might actually need it.