The Last Queen: The Book of Kaels Vol. 1 (The Book of Kaels Series)

by Wendy Wang

  “Yes,” the young woman said, her voice dreamy and distant. “Peter would never endanger me. He loves me.”

  “Of course he does,” Neala said, glad her voice didn’t shake. Could Peter really love anyone other than himself? “What was your name again?”

  “Harbee,” the young woman said. “Harbee Fane.”

  “Harbee,” Neala repeated softly, holding the name in her mouth. Where did she know it from? “Do you know where Peter is, Harbee?”

  “Yes, he took that wretched girl downstairs to die.” The young woman said. Neala’s palms twitched and she balled her free hand into a fist to keep it from catching fire. “I’m to find something to paint with while he takes care of it.”

  “All right. I have paints downstairs.” Neala fought to keep her breathing even. She swallowed to stop her voice from trembling. “Would you like me to show you?”

  The young woman’s eyes focused on Neala’s face, and her pallid lips curved into a smile. “Yes. Please. I need them.”

  Neala reached out her empty hand. “Come, then. Take my hand. I’ll show you the way.”

  The young woman moved forward and placed her hand in Neala’s. Her cold skin sent a chill through Neala but she didn’t pull away. The woman smiled again—her eyes distant. “Cold hands, warm heart.”

  A shiver crawled its way down her back and Neala didn’t fight it as she turned and led Harbee Fane out of her room.

  Twenty-one

  Gordon walked close behind Neala and Harbee. She could feel his stiff body and the heaviness of his eyes on the back of her head. This was why Cai had chosen him as her personal guard. For all his good humor, Gordon took his job seriously. She wondered if he thought he could take on Peter and what was left of his men without her. She didn’t try to read him now. No point. He was as secretive with his thoughts as Cai.

  Harbee drifted through the halls of the palace in a dreamy trance. Sometimes her hand stretched out, and she brushed her fingertips over the silk wallpaper, but none of the dead bodies they passed seemed to catch her attention. Neala worked at not looking at the two fallen maids on the stairs. She kept her eyes straight, guiding them through the long corridors. Her heart wrenched as they crossed the grand hall—two columns lay in ruins and a crack across the frescoed ceiling made Neala’s stomach turn. Stone littered the floor and another body lay trapped beneath the weight of a marble wall that had given way.

  Harbee started to hum. What had happened to this woman to make her this way, so oblivious to the chaos and destruction surrounding them? Neala fought the urge to take the young woman and shake her by the shoulders. Instead, she followed her instincts. If it was paints that Harbee wanted then she must be a painter and like all painters that Neala knew, including herself, she liked to look at paintings.

  Neala moved them through the rubble, praying the gallery was still intact. After a few more twists and turns, they came to a tall, arched room with brightly colored frescoes painted on the ceiling and more paintings than a person could take in in a single day.

  Harbee’s humming stopped, her mouth agape as she held her arms out and twirled on her toes, like a child. “Can you hear them?” She threw her head back and stared at the ceiling.

  “No,” Neala said. “What are they saying?”

  “They’re not saying anything, silly.” Harbee laughed. “They’re singing.”

  “Tell me about the song they sing,” Neala said. Gordon pinched her hard above her left elbow. She glared at him as he mouthed, What are you doing?

  Harbee closed her eyes and wrapped her arms around her waist, hugging her body. “Come to me, sweet, come to me, dear, down to the edge of the water,” she sang softly. She tittered. “Peter doesn’t like the water.”

  “Do you? Like the water?” Neala asked edging closer. Harbee stopped singing and shrugged.

  “It’s just one of five to me. At least it used to be.” Harbee approached a painting of a woodland meadow. “This looks like home.” She closed her eyes and touched the painting with her fingertips. Swaying back and forth, the image began to shimmer. The hair on Neala’s arms stood up as she watched Harbee’s fingers move into the painting.

  “You were culled, weren’t you?” Neala said softly. Harbee stopped moving and bowed her head. Her long hair rustled from the wind in the painting. “That’s why—”

  “Yes, she was.” Peter’s voice rang out behind them and Neala and Gordon both rounded on him, weapons drawn. He grinned, but not at Neala. His eyes focused somewhere past her shoulder. “She’s beautiful, isn’t she? I’ve loved her since she and I were eight. My mother kept saying I’d outgrow it, until I didn’t and she had Harbee culled. She told me she was just following the law because Harbee could command them all.”

  “How old was she?” Neala asked.

  “Fourteen.” Peter’s mouth flattened into a straight line and he glowered at her. “Too old.”

  “My mother doesn’t approve of culling.” Neala’s voice squeaked on the word approve. “That’s why I was never—”

  “I know she didn’t but she didn’t change the law, either. And my mother used it to her advantage. She knew the possible outcome. Counted on it. Thought if Harbee lost her mind, somehow I would love her less.” His eyes softened and a smile twitched at the corners of his lips.

  “I don’t understand. I thought you approved of culling. Of the old ways,” Neala said. He had been so convincing that first day they met. What a fool she’d been. Taken in by a smile and a kiss. All of it leading to this day.

  Peter shook his head and held his hand out. “Harbee, sweetie, please come to me.”

  “Peter, look what I did,” Harbee said. “It’s home.”

  “Yes, it is. We should go there. Y’Ana is waiting on us,” Peter’s said, his voice filled with patience. “I’m sure she misses her mama.”

  “I must get to her, then.” Harbee’s tone changed from dreamy and vacant to concerned and for a second, a thought flashed into Neala’s head and she saw a crying little girl with white-blonde hair and glassy, blue eyes. Y’Ana Fane. Peter and Harbee’s daughter. Neala felt sick knowing what must be done. Neala grabbed Harbee around the waist and stuck her blade to the young woman’s throat.

  “No one is going anywhere,” Neala said in a tight, controlled voice. “Not until you tell me where my sister is.”

  “Put the blade down, Neala.” Peter aimed his baton at her.

  “Now, now, Peter.” Gordon pushed in between them. “I wouldn’t be too hasty there.”

  “Stay out of this, Gordon. This isn’t your fight.”

  “You kill my Queen, almost kill my Commander and now threaten my charge. How is this not my fight?” Gordon’s shoulders stiffened and the hand hanging at his side trembled, but Neala didn’t sense fear. Bursts of red light sparked before her eyes and for the first time, the dark shroud over Gordon lifted from his mind and she glimpsed inside before he yanked it closed again. “This is every warden’s fight. And we will fight you and we will win.”

  “Peter?” Harbee’s tiny body quaked and her hand tightened around Neala’s forearm.

  “Let her go,” Peter warned.

  “So this was all some sort of revenge?” Neala said, incredulous.

  “No,” Peter said. “Revenge was just extra. I always meant to take the realms. I still mean to.”

  “I almost ruined it, didn’t I? You had planned to marry me—take Tamarik from within. You didn’t expect my loyalty to my mother,” Neala said.

  “What are you—? What is she saying, Peter? Marry her? You can’t marry her, you’re married to me.” Harbee’s shoulders slumped and Neala tightened her grip. The young woman sounded so hurt. Betrayed. Neala almost felt sorry for her.

  “She doesn’t know what she’s saying, my love. She’s just guessing. Trying to figure me out.” Peter scowled.

  “Don’t lie to her,” Neala scoffed. “You said it to me not more than an hour ago. We could still be a match.” Neala practically spit the words at him
. Peter inched forward, his eyes full of murderous hate.

  “Ah, ah, ah,” Gordon warned.

  “Harbee, choc a dwyrme,” Peter sang to her and she went limp in Neala’s arms. Even though the young woman was small, her dead weight was too much and Neala dropped her to the floor. Everything exploded around her then as Peter fired on them. He aimed at the ceiling and the frescoes rained large chunks of plaster and stone down on them. Neala squatted to the ground and instinctively covered her head with her hands. As the dust and smoke settled, she spotted Gordon lying beneath a pile of rubble.

  Her heart wrenched as she crawled towards him. She could not lose him, too. He moaned as she touched her dagger to the mix of debris covering his body, forcing it off to the side. An angry gash in his forehead leaked and blood covered half his face.

  “Gordon?” she said.

  “I’m all right,” he said, trying to push up onto his elbow.

  “Don’t try to move,” she said. Gordon’s eyes closed slowly and he laid back on the floor.

  “Don’t let him get away with it, Highness,” Gordon whispered. He pushed his hand inside his ripped coat and she could see the breastplate like Cai’s. Something silver glinted and he pinched it between his thumb and forefinger, pulling it from inside a pocket carved into the layers of leather. The throwing stars she’d made. “Take them. They have your blood in them. They can kill him. They can kill any Kael.” He pushed them towards her. She used the tail of her silk dress to wipe the blood from his face. An errant tear, hot and itchy, threatened to fall from the tip of her nose. “Take them.”

  Her hand brushed over the stars she’d formed from iron and steel and blood. She gripped the three stars by one of their pointed tips and threw a glance over her shoulder. Peter knelt beside Harbee, shaking her by the shoulders, trying to awaken her. Neala jumped to her feet, rushing towards Peter, not caring if she lived or died, only that this ended. Today. When he saw that she was coming at them, he stood up, pointed his baton at her and fired. She swiped at the fire ball, slicing it in half.

  He grabbed Harbee by the arm and started dragging her limp body towards the painting on the wall, the one she had somehow breathed life and passage into, the one that would take them someplace else.

  Neala reared back and threw the first star. It lodged in Peter’s shoulder and he dropped Harbee’s hand, howling with shock and pain. Yanking out the bloody star, he dropped it to the ground and took aim. The force of the fireball knocked her over even though she stopped it from hitting her directly. Her head banged against a stone and for a few seconds, red stars danced before her eyes. By the time she could see straight again, Peter had scooped Harbee up into his arms and was pushing her through the painting to safety. The rage boiled over and Neala threw the next star, aiming at the wire holding the painting in place. The sharp blades of the throwing star sliced the wire and it fell to the ground just as Harbee disappeared. Neala blasted the frame with fire and it engulfed the painting within a few moments.

  “You’re not going to win, Princess,” Peter shouted from behind a fallen column. “You should just give up now.”

  “Nobody’s giving up till you tell me where my sister is!” Her fingertips burst into flames.

  Peter turned on her, firing again and again and again. Neala staved him off for the moment, getting a few shots of her own in before he raised his baton to the ceiling bringing more stone down between them. The dust choked and blinded her for a moment, but she got to her feet and followed him through the corridor and down the steps.

  Neala rounded the corner and saw the door to the courtyard hanging open. A small streak of blood on the handle gave him away. She crept to the door and peered out the glass panes. Where had his men gone? She couldn’t stop and ponder for long. Gripping the hilt of her dagger, she headed towards the courtyard.

  The eerie stillness sent a chill across her skin, making her arms break into goosebumps, and she scanned the garden for any sign of him. The table holding her paints, brushes and blank canvases had been flipped on its side and the pots of pigment – some liquid, some powder – stained the brick in a rainbow of color. Her easel lay on its side, broken. The paintings which she’d left covered with a tarp were scattered amongst brushes. Some of the paintings were nothing more than a smoldering frame—their canvases burned away. Others had been turned over and sliced across the back—just as she’d shown her mother and sister to do before she left for Nydia. Francie had been here, but where was she now? Three paintings remained untouched. A splatter of blood was on the ground next to the painting she did of the Nydian beach. Its waves crashed silently. She bent down next to it and saw the trail of bloody drops heading towards the doors beneath the portico.

  A sharp pain radiated across her back and it took a moment before she felt him on top of her. He pinned one of her hands, the one holding her dagger, beneath his knee and wrapped his strong claws around her throat. Squeezing, he choked the breath from her body. She stiffened her neck as much as she could and flailed her free arm. She would not die like this. Not alone in the courtyard garden at the hands of this man. Her fingers found his face, and she felt the give of his skin as she raked her nails across his cheek. He cried out and loosened his grip a little when she pressed her thumb into his eye. She fought, despite her pinned hand. She clamped her mouth on to his wrist, biting until she tasted blood.

  He screamed and raised his fist to hit her, but before he could damage her more, she jerked her pinned arm free. She thrust her dagger into his side, finding it easier than she thought it would be. Maybe too easy. His arm floated down to his side and he gulped for air. She struggled to get from beneath him and he started for her again, but she dug the dagger deeper into him. It was only then that she slid out from under him. His blue eyes, once so beautiful to her, pleaded with her to just finish him.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, unable to get her voice above a whisper. She wasn’t sure if it was from his choking her or if it was what her mother had warned her about. Killing a real person would never be as easy as the conjured fighters in the tower. The dead would take a little part of her with him. A part she would never be able to get back. He flopped onto his back, his mouth opening wider, struggling to draw in more breath.

  Standing, she withdrew the blade from his body and glanced at the blood splatters leading off towards the portico doors. She didn’t have to go far to find what she was looking for—Francie leaned with her back against one of the gold-colored walls of the hallway. Her skin was ashen making the bruises on her jaw line look almost black. Neala knelt beside her sister and took her hand.

  “Francie?”

  Francie’s teeth chattered and her eyes blinked slowly before focusing on Neala’s face.

  “Neala,” Francie whispered. Blood tinged the inside of her lips, making her teeth pink.

  “I’m going to find a healer. We’re going to get you upstairs.” Neala turned to go, her mind making a list of the things to do to save her sister.

  “No.” Francie’s hand tightened around Neala’s keeping her in place. “Don’t leave me.”

  Neala sat back on her feet. “You’re cold.” Neala stripped off her coat dress, not caring that she was sitting in the middle of the hallway in just a camisole. She draped the generous fabric over Francie and took her hand again.

  “Mother’s dead, isn’t she?” Francie asked.

  Neala’s mouth filled with dry dust and the ache in her throat made it impossible to speak. All she could do was nod yes.

  “Queen for an hour,” Francie whispered, and smiled. Her lids grew heavier, closing for longer between blinks. Neala shook her hand.

  “Wake up, Francie. You have to stay with me.”

  Francie’s hand tightened infinitesimally around Neala’s and a smile tugged the corners of her mouth. “You’re going to be a great Queen.”

  Neala shook her head. “No. No,” she protested. “You’re Queen. We just have to get you to a healer. Then we’ll figure out what to do about the Nydia
ns and—”

  “You already know.” A blood-tinged bubble expanded through her partially opened—lips and a faint rasp of breath forced it to collapse. Her sister’s eyelids stopped mid-blink—all the life gone.

  “Francie?” Neala sat up and shook her sister’s shoulders. Francie’s head lolled to one side and Neala let her go. A dry, barking sob came from deep inside her gut.

  “Highness?” Gordon said quietly. He limped towards her and knelt down beside her. He placed his hand in the center of her back. “Where is Peter?”

  “I killed him.” Neala sniffed and wiped her face on her sleeve. “He’s lying in the courtyard.”

  “There’s no one in the courtyard,” Gordon said.

  “What? Yes. Yes there is.” Neala scrambled to her feet and ran back to the place where she’d left him. “He was right here. He was—”

  Bloody drag marks lead to the painting of the Nydian beach. Neala started towards it but Gordon grabbed her around the waist and yanked her back.

  “Let me go, Captain,” she hissed.

  “No, Majesty.” His meaty arm loosened a little as he captured her arms and held them to her body. His tone was soothing, against the top of her head. “There will be plenty of time to fight. And we will fight for you, but first we must re-group.”

  After several moments of breathing in and out, she calmed and he finally let her go. She rounded on him, ready to argue, but he took a step back, his dark green eyes solemn. She gaped as he struggled to kneel down on one knee. Her heart leapt into her throat as she watched his fist land over his heart and the bow of his head to her. His deep voice resonated to her bones when he said, “Long live the Queen.”

  She wanted to burst into tears, to scream, to shout, to pull him to his feet and shake him for his blasphemy. Her mother was Queen. Then her sister. Not her. It was never meant to be her. She wanted to run as far from this place as she could.

  “I can’t be Queen, Captain.” The words rasped across her lips. An itchy tear burned a path down her cheek and she swiped at it, blinking at him. Gordon’s gaze settled on her, unwavering.