I ignored the scathing looks of my peers. They did not trust me.
“Let them come,” I told Adair.
He nodded. “Then we wait in the city. Prepare the city for siege.”
Adair was turning to leave when Layton said, “Your Majesty, let me lead a force. In order for them to reach Keisan, they will have to travel through the foothills. There are canyons and hidden valleys where we might be able to corner them and lessen their forces with a concentrated repeated attack. We might be able to weaken them at least a bit before they reach the city.”
I stared at Layton, wide-eyed; this was not the plan. That was a suicide mission. Layton was meant to stay in the city until after the promised day. If we lose Layton, we lose everything we’ve worked for.
Adair considered his offer, and I hoped he would not consent. He inclined his head. “Very well, I will trust you with this.”
Layton bowed. The council members filed out of the chamber, and I went to follow, but Adair grabbed my wrist and held me back. He held onto me until we were alone in the chamber once more.
“Is everything well with you?” he asked me. His hand hovered over my belly, but he did not touch me. He balled his hand in a fist and moved away.
“I am well enough,” I said. I was wary of his motives.
He faced away from me and instead stared at his council chair. “I have a difficult question to ask of you, and I hope you will look upon it with favor.”
My stomach squirmed with unease. “Oh?” I choked out.
He turned to face me once more. There was a strange conviction in his expression. “Maea, my mourning has ended at last, and my mind has turned to finding a new queen, someone who can help me raise my son—”
“No,” I said without thinking.
He looked at me as if he had been struck.
I shook my head and took his hand in mine, trying to cover up my visceral reaction. “I’m sorry. It just came as such as shock. Sabine’s death is still fresh in my mind, and it sounds as if you were asking me to marry you.”
“I told you long ago that I would have made you my wife if it were my choice. Well, I am the king now, and there is nothing stopping us from being together. You need a father for your child, and I need a queen.” He rubbed his fingers across mine. His very touch was repulsive to me, and I had to fight the urge to rip my hands from his.
“This is sudden…” I tried to look away.
He grabbed my chin and forced me to look at him. “Tell me you will.”
Never. I am going to kill you to save the man I love. I could not speak the truth, and instead I said, “I cannot marry you until my child is born.” He smiled and leaned in to kiss me. I pulled away at the last moment. “But I have to tell you the truth. This child I am carrying, it is Johai’s.”
He took a step back, and a complicated series of emotions crossed his face. “I see.”
“I did not want to tell you; I feared your reaction. But I know now, if I am to marry you, I should tell you the truth.”
He cleared his throat. “I appreciate your honesty. Perhaps we should discuss these things at a more opportune time.”
“You’re right. There’s a war to prepare for. Until then.” I smiled at him. The truth had the desired effect. He was repulsed and maybe a bit jealous.
“Yes, until then.” He clasped hands with me one last time before walking away. I watched him go. My fear was coiling around my stomach. The game was getting more dangerous with each step I took. The end is coming soon.
The next day, Layton and his forces prepared to march out and meet the combined strength of both the Biski and Neaux. I feared for him almost as much as I did myself. We managed one final meeting before he was to go.
“Be safe,” I said. There were so many other things I wanted to say, to ask him, but none of them seemed appropriate. I had to trust that he was doing the right thing.
He smiled in his cocky way. “Do you doubt my abilities, Maea?”
I smacked him gently. “Come back and become the king you deserve to be.”
He straightened up a bit more at that. “I will. You have no reason to doubt that.”
We embraced and then broke apart. I went up to the parapets after that to watch them march away. The wind was blowing, and it pulled at my shawl and tangled my gown about my ankles. I watched as Layton rode off into the shadow cast by the rising sun. The future of our kingdom rested with him. Further in the distance I could feel Johai coming ever nearer.
The promised day came. It was a hazy day. My lower back ached, and I massaged it as I rose from bed. My daughter was twisting and turning inside me. My head seemed to pound with the rhythm of drumbeats. The day is here. The palace was chaos. The Neaux and Biski forces had arrived during the night and were camped outside the palace walls. Elenna and I headed to the Sea Chamber. We slipped past panicked servants who were half mad with fear from the siege.
The journey to the Sea Chamber was more arduous than ever before. We had to take several breaks, and Elenna made sure I rested as much as possible. When we reached the bottom of the stairs, I felt the pull. I moved into the chamber, which was pitch black. The drumming sound echoed loud enough to split my head in two. I went to the basin, where images were flickering chaotically across the surface. Inside my head I felt a buzzing, something different than before. Then I heard laughter as the image of Johai filled my mind. He rode a white stallion at the head of a column of warriors. He laughed and joked as they marched to war, and then he looked in my direction as if I were standing beside him, and said, “I’m coming, Maea. Wait for me.”
Whatever had been keeping me from visions of Johai snapped in that moment, and I was taken from the Sea Chamber and into the dream world. I rode by Johai’s side as if I were a soldier within their army. I watched as Johai, hair streaming behind him, surveyed his army. They were an amalgamation of two different nations. Among them were the olive-skinned Neaux proudly waving their crimson banners on the wind, and beside them but separate were the Biski. They were wild, and their hair was tangled and tied with feathers and beads. They carried deadly looking spears and rode shaggy horses, which were sturdy but stockier than the sleek warhorses the Neaux soldiers rode.
Behind the mounted riders were thousands of soldiers on foot. They were an undulating mass of bodies. I could see, from their perspective, Keisan in the distance. It was illuminated by the dawn light. The white walls were turned pink by the rising sunbeams, and the walls bristled with soldiers. They were like hundreds of small ants running across an anthill.
“They’ve led us right to the palace,” a gravelly voice said.
Johai turned to the man at his side. Aland sat astride his shaggy horse. He wore no more armor than a thin leather vest, and his wild hair was tied back from his face. He had a fierce-looking axe strapped across his back.
“All the easier to take their kingdom from them, don’t you think?” Johai said with a smile.
A third figure rode up to them. He wore a crimson cloak over his shoulders, and when they approached, he removed his helmet to reveal that he was no man at all but Queen Arlene. She was scowling at the palace in front of them.
“So it comes back to this. The treaty seems a distant memory, does it not?” she said to the two men.
“A tad ironic,” Johai said with a cruel twist of his mouth. The other two leaders did not seem to understand the irony. I, however, knew different; this was where he planned to betray them all. He would knock out three powerful leaders with one battle and become victorious. Or so he hopes.
“Ready the siege towers, and prepare the battering ram. Your Majesty, I would have your men start digging down to the south. Aland, prepare the battering rams. I will not let this siege continue overlong.”
“What will you be doing?” Aland asked.
“I will be going to get what belongs to me.”
He looked up at the sky. The clouds were a heavy gray full of ominous promise. He smiled and laughed quietly to himself.
>
He wheeled his horse around and went down the rows of tents. The men called out to him, and he waved and smiled as he went. They were all entranced by his supernatural charms. None of them suspected the evil that lurked beneath the surface. He rode to the back of the camp; there was a group of men mounted and waiting for him. Among them was Beau. He wore light armor and mail.
“Are you ready?” Johai asked him as he reined back his horse.
Beau nodded. “Yes. Everything is in preparation.”
“Good, we shall ride north within the hour. Have the men at the ready.”
Johai’s unit moved north. They stuck to the coast and moved with stealth. Then in a bay just a few miles north of the palace, they met a man in black who loaded them onto a boat. The boat pushed off from the shore and continued south towards the palace. I remembered that desperate row away from Keisan; now Johai returned with every intention of coming for me. The end was painfully near. I felt my heart beating in my conscious body. Fearful. Prepared. Determined.
I am waiting for you, I thought. The sun had risen high in the sky and dissipated some of the cloud cover overhead. The time was approaching. I could feel it. A half-crescent shape had blotted out part of the sun.
They reached the cliff base, and they swung hooks up to the top. They clinked on solid rock, and quietly, their movements hidden by the roar of the ocean, the men began to climb. I knew everyone would be focused upon the fighting; no one would know they were climbing. I had to pull away from the vision to prepare for Johai’s arrival, but I was unable to break away. He reached the top of the rise first. The garden was hushed but for the occasional shout of soldiers in the distance. Beau reached the summit, and Johai signaled to him.
“I’ll go ahead. You bring the men up and do as you were instructed.”
Beau nodded, and Johai slipped off into the halls of the palace. Only then did the vision leave me.
I collapsed onto my knees. I had been transfixed, waiting and watching him this entire time, and I felt as if I had ridden beside him and rowed with them in the boats during those long hours. My body was tired, and I had my most important task yet to complete.
Elenna was at my side, helping me to my feet. “You were in the vision for a long time. What did you see?”
“Johai is in the palace. We have to prepare. We should call for—”
I stopped speaking. And Elenna turned around to see our intruder.
“Adair, I was going to summon you. Johai is within the palace walls. We need to stop him before there is a massacre.”
He laughed. “I know he’s in the palace, and you helped him get here.” Adair strolled over to me.
“What are you saying? I came here to help you defeat Johai. How could you accuse me of such a thing?” I asked. My voice was high and false. It was too late to continue the charade. Just a little longer, I only need to wait a few more moments; the time is here. I could feel the power building. The water was singing to me, begging me to look within, but I resisted the urge. I had to remain attached to the world of the living or be lost when the crucial moment came.
He smiled. “Don’t you know, Maea? I am here to fulfill the prophecy.”
He cannot possibly know what I have planned. “What do you mean? The prophecy?”
He shook his head. “Don’t be coy. You’ve done so much planning; I don’t want to take your big moment away.”
Elenna was standing between Adair and me. She circled about, not letting him get any closer to me. I held onto the edge of the basin for support.
“Have you come to give your life to open the gateway, then?” I asked.
“Oh no, I will not be dying today; I’ll be reborn.” He paced around me, watching me, his blue eyes dark and malicious as he moved. “I’ve known about your little plot for some time. You plan to put Layton on the throne in my place. You’ve even won a few of my dukes over to your side. I’m impressed, but you were never one made for intrigue, Maea.”
“Why didn’t you stop me if you knew?” This was a trick; he was playing with me.
He only laughed. “Because I needed you, and it amused me to watch you both flounder about. Do you think Layton chose to go on that suicide mission? That was my idea. I told him he could die a hero or die a traitor. Like the fool he is, he chose a hero’s death.”
I felt sick to my stomach. “He was your best friend.”
“Who plotted to kill me. Friends are not worth much to me. Enough of this talk. Let me ask the questions now. Do you know where the specter comes from?”
I hesitated; how much more did I dare reveal to him? I looked at Elenna, who inclined her head towards me. “He was the first king, who grew too powerful and was sealed away by the first of my kind,” I replied. I just need to draw out time until Johai gets here and the ceremony can begin.
“Yes. And do you know how you summon him to this realm?”
“I could not say since I have never done it.”
“No, I suppose you wouldn’t.” Adair paced around the edge of the room.
I followed him with my eyes. Elenna remained between us like a guard dog.
“A sacrifice opens the portal and unleashes his power. The more blood you spill, the greater the power. If you kill a close relative, for example, the closer the better, you can gain even more power from the specter. That’s what my uncle Garrison learned when he discovered the old text. But what he didn’t know was we are tied to the specter. He is our birthright; he is a part of House Raleban.”
“You’re insane. The specter would use your body and leave you as a shallow husk.”
He waggled his finger at me. “That’s where you’re wrong, Maea. I killed my uncle, as you may remember, and in doing so I made myself the rightful heir to my family’s legacy. Don’t you see? All of this—Sabine, the war—all of it has been leading me here to my destiny, even you. The first king loved a diviner; you were meant to be my true queen.”
“You’re mad. You do not know anything.”
“You only know what you have seen from Johai. He was weak and easily overcome. Once the specter and I become one, you will see what true power is.” His eyes gleamed. “Now it’s time for you to open the portal.”
“I won’t open the gate. I refuse.” I was biding my time. The apex of the eclipse was approaching. The power was coursing through me, and the edges of my vision were beginning to blur. I saw images of a hundred different pasts, presents, and futures all mashing together into a series of broken images. I saw Sabine’s son, Leonel, dark and brooding, sitting upon a dark throne. There was the golden woman beside him, her hand resting on his shoulder. I saw myself running after four children, among them was Sabine’s son as a small boy, and then finally I saw Johai with a crown of twisted silver and gold upon his brow, and his throne rested upon the bodies of thousands.
“Then I’ll kill you. Do not defy me again, Maea. I will not forgive you a second time.”
I glanced at Elenna. She was drawing closer to Adair, but he did not see her. His gaze was fixed on me. I saw the glitter of the blade in her hand.
“No!” I shouted, too late.
Elenna lunged at Adair. He spun around and caught her by the wrist. She was of a height with him, but Adair had better muscle strength, and he easily overpowered her. The dagger in her hand went skidding across the floor and thunked against the base of the basin. I squatted down to pick it up.
“Don’t you dare,” he snapped, “touch that blade or I will open up her gut.” Adair had a sword crossing Elenna’s abdomen.
Elenna nodded, and I stood up slowly.
Adair smiled and crept closer to me. “Good,” he said as he approached me with Elenna pinned against him. She did not fight nor struggle. Adair strolled over to the basin and stared at the midnight water. “How do we open the portal?”
I touched the hidden dagger inside a pocket in my gown. My hands trembled. I cannot do this. I am no murderer. My fingers closed around the handle, my palms were slippery. I have to do this or Johai wi
ll die.
I spoke while looking at the basin. “It requires blood. In order to unleash the specter fully, we have to open the gateway between the world of the living and dead. Someone has to die.”
Adair was leaning over Elenna, peering into the water. The blade was pressed against her gut. If he moved any more, he would cut into her. Now, I have to do it now before I lose my resolve.
Adair grunted, and I looked up to see that Elenna was no longer in Adair’s grip. She was behind him with the dagger in her hand. In a swift motion she drew the blade across Adair’s throat. His blood sprayed across the surface of the water in the basin, and light glimmered on the surface where his blood had fallen. Adair looked at me in wide-eyed surprise. How Elenna had managed to break free, I would never know. It had to be some magic the Biski had that I was not aware of.
“The time has come, Maea,” Elenna shouted. “But I am sorry it will not be you that opens the gateway.”
The water glowed a vibrant violet color, and from within the water, a hand reached out. Elenna clasped hands with it. She pulled out a woman glowing with white and violet light. The woman stood inside the basin and looked around the room, to Adair’s body, which was bleeding on the floor. The glowing woman stepped down from the basin and came to Elenna, who held her hands open to embrace her. The two melded into one.
“Why?” I croaked.
Elenna smiled. Power poured forth from her. Her eyes were a blazing violet. Her very skin seemed to light up the entire chamber. “I had to become the gateway for you. The gateway would have consumed you and your daughter; this is my sacrifice.”
High cold laughter filled the chamber. I slid my gaze from Elenna to Johai, who was standing in the doorway. “It seems you have begun without me.”
Chapter Twenty Two
Johai strode into the chamber. Power rolled off him, filling the space between us. His cruel black eyes were trained on me. I held onto the basin for support. I was not sure I would be able to remain standing otherwise. Elenna stood beside me. The light from her was warm and illuminated the water’s surface. For once it was empty; there were no images to taunt me, no half-glimpsed futures. The water is silent. I could feel the eclipse reaching its zenith. Elenna had made the gateway; all that remained was to bring Johai beyond it. Does Elenna think to lead the specter to the underworld? I looked to Elenna. She did not move but stared at Johai. I cannot let her do this. Defeating the specter is my destiny. The stench of blood was thick in the air. I had never imagined the final moments would be like this, yet it seemed appropriate. Adair was dead as we had planned; all that remained was for me to defeat the specter and save Johai. It had all seemed so easy in my mind.
[fan] diviners trilogy - complete series Page 85
