The Tears of the Rose

by Jeffe Kennedy

  Instead, they showed me to my mother’s old suite.

  Marin bustled in, finding a space to brew her teas for me. As always, anticipating my need. Ursula stayed beside me in the doorway, equally astonished, I think. The rooms had been cleaned but otherwise were much the same. So far as I could tell—I’d been in here only a few times, when the three of us snuck in to poke around, to learn what we could of our mother.

  Until Uorsin had found us out and ordered them locked and sealed.

  “Did you know about this?” I asked Ursula under my breath.

  “No. I would have warned you.”

  “It was my idea,” Lady Zevondeth cackled out behind us, making us both jump like the guilty girls we’d been so long ago. “I informed the chatelaine that these rooms should be prepared for you, Princess Amelia. As a widow and the future Queen of Avonlidgh, no others are worthy of your rank. Let it never be said that Ordnung does not follow proper etiquette. Especially for our own.”

  “Until our father finds out,” Ursula observed in a dry tone.

  “I’ll handle Uorsin,” Zevondeth said, painfully hobbling the circuit of the outer room, examining the few artifacts of our mother that remained. Like Andi, our mother had never been much for books—something I knew because Ursula used to tease Andi so about it—but there the shelves held a surprising number of them. Zevondeth pulled a chair up to the newly kindled fire and bade a serving girl to build the blaze hotter and to give her an extra lap blanket. Oh, and to bring her tea. Then she cocked her head at us, milky eyes finding us unerringly. “Come, come, girls. We have things to discuss and I don’t want to miss my regular afternoon nap.”

  Obediently, as if we were still girls and attending her for lessons in manners and elocution, we settled ourselves in chairs near her, Ursula perching on the edge of one to accommodate her sword. Zevondeth scowled at her.

  “It’s unladylike to wear a sword in the first place, Miss Ursula—much less indoors, and with a gown.”

  Ursula smiled, affection in it that surprised me. “I cannot wear pants in court and I cannot appear as less than any of the men or I lose their respect. This is my compromise. If you have another that meets the same criteria, I’ll entertain it.”

  Zevondeth snorted. “By the sound of it, losing the men’s respect is the least of your worries. Uorsin barely stopped short of disinheriting you entirely.”

  Ursula lightly brushed the jewel in the hilt of her sword. That was her other reason for wearing it all the time, I knew. It was her talisman, that jewel that had belonged to Salena. Ursula thought I didn’t know, but bratty little sisters have ways of finding out such things. I’d kept the secret, biding my time until I could use it against her. Then I grew up and the moment never came.

  Or had it?

  “He’ll come around.” Ursula spoke reflectively, almost more to herself than to Zevondeth. “This is a difficult time—losing Andi to the Tala, the implications that she and Annfwn might be forever beyond his reach, on top of the crop failures and various forms of unrest. The advent of this new, male heir came at exactly the right moment for him to seize upon this as the road to a better era.”

  “Uorsin never did get over Salena’s providing him with only girls,” Zevondeth agreed. “In you, Amelia, he sees his chance to thwart her machinations.”

  “What do you mean?” Her redemption, surely, not her machinations? “No woman can control the sex of her babe.”

  “Can’t she?” Zevondeth laughed that cackling sound that put my small hairs on end. Marin handed me her special tea and a plate of thin toasts with fruit spread. “Salena was no ordinary woman; make no mistake of that, little Ami.”

  “You speak of power that belongs to Glorianna alone—not to any human. Or demon.”

  “I speak of what Andromeda is learning, following in her mother’s very powerful footsteps. Watch that you’re not left in the dust.”

  “I wish for nothing more to do with her. Except justice.” The tea scalded my tongue and I almost welcomed the burn. Everyone saw me as worthless, powerless. And here Zevondeth was talking like Andi was so wonderful when she was nothing more than a murderess and traitor. “She killed Hugh.”

  “Did she?” Zevondeth cast a white-eyeballed glance in Ursula’s direction, and to my surprise, Ursula fidgeted. Was that . . . guilt? The sour scent of it drifted through the air.

  “What aren’t you two telling me?” I demanded, setting the plate aside. Then I snagged one of the toasts anyway, so ravenous for food, I couldn’t resist.

  “Is Ami’s babe truly a boy?” Ursula asked. She wasn’t avoiding the subject, however. I could see that much. She seemed to need the answer.

  “Why? Did you have other intelligence?” Zevondeth smiled, the sweet old granny no one would ever mistake her for.

  I snorted. “Andi seems to think she’s some sort of prophetess now—she told Ursula that I was pregnant with a girl.”

  Ursula focused her keen gaze on me, raising her hawklike brows at me gobbling more of the toast. Glorianna help me—if I wasn’t puking, I was eating.

  “A little fact she knew before you did, I might point out.”

  “What else did Andromeda tell you?”

  “We didn’t have much time to talk,” Ursula hedged.

  “Ami, dear, would you send your midwife and ladies away?”

  I nearly refused Zevondeth her demand, though we both pretended it was a request. In truth, however, the old woman scared me. Some things you never outgrow.

  After the ladies withdrew, Ursula stood and moved away from the fire. Always more comfortable moving, she paced the chamber as she spoke. “She showed me the border to Annfwn and bade me—”

  “Fancy name for a dismal place,” I remarked. “It just means the Wild Lands. It’s not even a real word.”

  “It means ‘paradise,’ in the old language.” Zevondeth folded her hands over the top of her cane. “Make no mistake, Princess—Uorsin’s appetite for the place has never diminished, though Salena led him away from it. And a man does not hunger for the undesirable.”

  “Well, it sounds dismal.” They ignored me, as if I hadn’t spoken.

  “She bade me to try to cross the border,” Ursula continued.

  “And?” Zevondeth licked her brittle old lips. “What happened when you tried?”

  Ursula shrugged, holding up her palms in bewilderment. “I could not.”

  “But the Tala could.”

  “Yes.”

  Zevondeth thumped her cane on the floor, face flushed with triumph. “That’s my girl. She’s truly taken the reins of her mother’s power, then.”

  “I wouldn’t have believed such a thing was possible if I hadn’t experienced it myself,” Ursula said.

  “Well, I don’t believe it.” I poured myself more tea, to give myself something to do. All of this was absurd. “Need I remind you that she’s a traitor and a murderess? Our mother would disown her if she could.”

  Zevondeth reached over and patted my knee. “You have been through much, young Amelia, and you are distraught.”

  “That doesn’t mean I’ve lost my wits!” I looked accusingly at Ursula. “Surely you don’t expect us to believe such a wild tale.”

  Ursula tucked her hands behind her back, spreading her legs into a solid stance—all wrong for the way she was dressed. She regarded me gravely. “I do expect you to believe it. It is the truth, whether the High King wishes it to be so or not.”

  I snorted, sipping the much cooler tea. I was not so empty-headed, and I knew things they did not. “He’ll find a way. If not him, King Erich will. We will have justice. It’s Glorianna’s will that we reclaim Annfwn for Her. A goddess is far more powerful than some Tala trickster.”

  Neither said anything, and I looked up to find them exchanging a speaking look. “What? It’s true.”

  “Are you speaking as Glorianna’s avatar?” Ursula’s lips twitched.

  “Do you mock me?” I set down the teacup. How I could feel the sting of su
ch a thing, while the great, unanswered, and unshed weight of my grief crushed everything else, I didn’t know.

  “Well, let’s see. She appeared to you in a vision when you were five, saying that you should have a new pony. And was it when you were eight that she said you should eat only pastries and sweets?” She ran a thumb over the cabochon jewel. “Don’t you think you’re a bit old for this—and the circumstances particularly dire for your little games?”

  Games? So like her, to forever treat me like a child. I was a woman grown, a queen, and I would assume my rightful place as Glorianna’s avatar. “Yes. I am speaking as the avatar of the goddess, as everyone but you acknowledges me to be! High Priest Kir himself said that—”

  She barked out a laugh and scrubbed her hands through her hair, clearly having forgotten the pins, which fell to the floor. “I should have known better than to give him access to you. You need to learn not to listen to every bit of flattery lobbed in your direction.”

  “I’m not an idiot.”

  “No, you just behave like one.”

  I stood, automatically smoothing my skirts. “As these are my rooms, I think you both should leave.”

  “Sit yourself down and hear your sister out,” Zevondeth snapped, shocking me. “You always were a willful thing, and the way Uorsin spoiled you made it worse. Tell me what else Andi said.”

  Tears pricked my eyes and I thought I might weep at last. But no. Unable to do anything else, I sat, feeling small and miserable and unloved.

  “She also said to find the dolls our mother made for us,” Ursula continued in an even tone.

  “Clearly forgetting that our mother died birthing me, so there was never one for me, no matter what Ursula thinks.”

  A small stillness settled into the room. Ursula stared hard at Zevondeth, who actually looked uncomfortable. And much older. “She also said that you knew the truth and would tell us.”

  “And did she tell you the price of such information?” Zevondeth’s opaque gaze rested on the gnarled hands folded on her cane.

  “She did not mention, no.”

  “However,” I inserted, “she did mention that she thought I should, in addition to this wild-goose chase after a mythical doll, send my infant daughter to her.” I laughed, and the hysterical edge to it scratched my throat. Neither of them seemed to find it funny—just watched me with that pitying concerned look everyone seemed to have for me these days. Be nice to the poor, delusional, and grieving princess, whose life is already over before it fully began. “What kind of a fool does she think I am?” I spat out. “Maybe I should go to paradisiacal ‘Annfwn’ and let her plunge her dagger into my breast. At least she’d have to look me in the eye instead of sneaking around to kill everyone I love behind my back!”

  “Did Zevondeth call you overwrought?” Ursula demanded.

  “Because you’re behaving like a crazy woman.”

  “You’re protecting her,” I hissed, my fingers curving into claws and digging into my gown. “Giving me nice stories about how my dead mother left me some toy when we all know perfectly well she left me nothing!” I’d forgotten which of them I was talking about, but it didn’t matter. They’d all left me, even my beloved Hugh.

  Had he loved me at all?

  “Call the midwife for her.” Zevondeth creaked to her feet, leaning heavily on the cane. “Tell her the Princess needs something to calm her nerves, lest she do the baby ill.”

  I wanted to protest, even as Ursula moved to do her bidding, as if she were one of the servants. But I felt overwhelmingly tired—and there the nausea rose again. If only I could shed tears as easily as I brought up the contents of my stomach.

  “Come, Amelia.” Ursula was at my elbow, urging me to rise. I hadn’t noticed her return. “Come lie down and rest. We can talk more later. Isn’t that right, Lady Zevondeth?” I heard the command in Ursula’s voice and knew she wouldn’t stop until we’d gone over and over our mother’s death. I, for one, didn’t want to know. Had never wanted to.

  “I don’t feel good,” I protested, sounding whiny and weak, even to myself. How I detested this new me. Ugly and ill and . . . maybe crazy.

  “I know, honey.” Ursula wrapped an arm around my waist and led me into the bedroom. “I’m sorry I was cruel to you. Rest now.”

  “You only care about the babe,” I complained, but I settled onto the bed where she showed me, my body crying out with relief to offer up its exhaustion.

  “That’s never true. Look at me, Amelia.” Ursula clasped my hand in hers and stared fiercely at me. Her eyes looked almost silver, ringed by a darker gray border. “Never believe that. You and I are together in this. Andi is beyond our reach for the time being, but you and I are sisters. First and foremost. Now and forever. I love you, Amelia, with all the power of my heart.”

  “Andi loved me once.” Sleep was surging up to drag me under. I couldn’t hold my eyes open.

  “She loves you still. All will be well.”

  “Do you believe that, too?”

  “Yes.” Ursula’s conviction cut through my fog. “It has to be.”

  7

  When I awoke, the winter night had fallen hard and the lanterns were lit. Marin sat in a chair nearby, knitting needles flashing as always, catching the red-gold glints from the fireplace.

  As had become my recent habit upon awakening, I took a mental assessment of my body, waiting to see if I needed to reach for the nearby basin.

  Surprisingly, I didn’t. I felt energized and more clearheaded than earlier. I hadn’t handled that well, but Ursula and Lady Zevondeth shouldn’t have ambushed me that way. If I was to be taken seriously as Glorianna’s avatar, I needed to have a better strategy.

  “I’m thinking you’ll be hungry, Princess,” Marin said in a quiet tone, the click of her needles soothing and unceasing in their rhythm.

  “Yes.” I was. Of course.

  “Good. I took the liberty of asking that dinner be sent up to your rooms, so that you could lie abed quietly tonight. I sent word that you require this time to rest and recover from your journey. Of course, if you prefer to join the court in the feasting hall, I can call your ladies. There’s still time.”

  Once I would have insisted on going. What, and miss all the fun? Now I seized upon the excuse gratefully. Growing another human being apparently took more work than it appeared.

  “I think I’ll do that. Stay in. And I am starving. What’s for dinner?”

  “I asked for a number of things for you to try. You’re getting to the stage where the child will tell you what it needs. The best way to discover that is to smell and taste. What you crave will be the right thing.”

  She set her knitting aside and helped me mound the pillows so I could sit up comfortably. It felt like being mothered might have, and her concern touched me. Marin, at least, cared for how I felt.

  “Thank you for being so good to me.”

  She clucked at me, a mother hen calling her chicks. “I have a stake in the child you carry, too, Princess. I’m not above making it clear that you should be treated with the utmost care. I’d like to see him or her born strong and well—and at Windroven, as is meant.”

  “You don’t believe the babe will be a boy?”

  “It matters not to me. All children are equal in Glorianna’s eyes.”

  “Too bad Glorianna has no teachings for pregnant women—I have no idea what I’m doing.”

  “Ah, but She does, Princess.”

  “I’ve never heard any.” Shouldn’t I know everything about Glorianna?

  “That’s because Her priests are less interested in the goddess as a mother. But in the old tales and the small chapels, where Glorianna’s children worship Her in the quiet places, they pass along other stories.”

  “Will you tell me one?”

  “Yes, Princess. While we wait for your supper to arrive, I’ll tell you the tale of Glorianna and the birth of Her first daughter.” She sat back in her chair, taking up her knitting and setting the rhythm of it be
fore she began.

  “Long ago, when all the gods and goddesses walked the earth, and lived in Annfwn together, none lacked for anything. The sun shone warm each day. The rains fell and soaked the earth. The fruits and vegetables grew jewel bright and the fish swam in the warm waters of the Onyx Ocean.

  “Glorianna took a new lover. He was a beautiful human man, with all the strength and radiance of the rising sun. She loved him for his red-gold hair, like the light of dawn, for the bronzed noonday strength of his body, for the twilight blue of his eyes and the midnight smokiness of his lust for Her.

  “Though it was frowned upon to dally with human beings—for they are fragile in their short lives and their hearts are easily broken—Glorianna could not resist this young man. Her sisters, Moranu and Danu, understood and helped in Their ways. Night after night, She returned to his bed and Moranu’s moon smiled upon them, lighting their lovemaking. When they played on the beach and swam in the Onyx Ocean, Danu’s sun warmed them, never burning.

  “In time, as such things happen, Glorianna’s womb quickened. The other gods and goddesses mocked Her, for the babe could never be immortal. It would be forever a half-breed, belonging to neither race, forever doomed to be neither fully one thing nor the other.

  “But Glorianna didn’t care. She loved her unborn child—perhaps even more so because it carried the human blood that made Her lover all She so admired in him. So She went to Her sisters.

  “Danu cautioned Her that the others would seek to kill the child, out of spite and jealousy, to show they could. Danu offered Her spotless integrity and Her bright blade to guard the child. Glorianna accepted with gratitude.

  “Moranu said that the child would need special gifts, in order to survive the trials ahead, so She offered the tricks of the night, the magic of the shadows. Glorianna accepted that gift, also.

  “Glorianna, however, had no gift to give Her child, save the nourishment of Her own body. She knew that, once the child was separated from Her, that She would no longer be able to protect the infant from the world, as mortal babes require.