by Sara Raasch
The dining room overlooked the lake, giving a miraculous view that Lu had once believed showed the whole of Grace Loray. Glass panes along the outer wall opened to let in waves of fresh lake air and sun-kissed billows of humidity. The table down the center held dozens of seats, and servants kept a smaller table off to the side fresh with fruit and pastries as visitors staggered in throughout the morning.
General councilmembers and a few of the Argridian contingent were present. Milo was not.
Lu’s parents sat at the main table. She took a chair across from Kari, Tom next to her, and let their presence serve as a reprieve.
Tom smiled at her over a cup of steaming Awacia, one of the most popular of the commonly used plants. It caused alertness and kept the taker awake for extended periods of time when dissolved in water. The earthy scent painted the air as he offered her his plate of food.
“We didn’t wake you when we left this morning, did we? You seemed as exhausted as if you’d been testing that sleeping tonic on yourself. You haven’t, have you?”
Lu yawned in response and took a saltfish fritter. “Of course not, Father. When does the Council reconvene?”
“Don’t worry about that,” Kari said. “You’ll return to the hospital? Tell Teo if he doesn’t stay with us tonight, I’ll drag him here myself. A hospital is no place for a healthy child.”
Lu managed a smile. “I will see if the promise of sleeping under the same roof as Devereux Bell will tempt him, but I doubt even that will pull him away from his sister.” She paused. “Speaking of—was a decision reached regarding Mr. Bell’s fate?”
“Hardly,” Tom sighed. “The Argridians refused to move forward with our treaty unless we agree to hang Bell. A move most of the Council was none too pleased with.”
“I spoke to him,” Lu said, picking the crispy breading off the saltfish fritter. Oil glistened on her fingers.
Kari’s eyes were on the door behind Lu. “Who, sweetheart?”
Lu looked at Tom. He hadn’t told Kari about her meeting with Devereux?
Raised voices broke through their conversation, drawing the attention of all in the dining room to the door. Lu spun as Branden Axel, captain of the castle guard, shoved his way ahead of the fuming Argridians.
Kari was on her feet immediately. Lazlo was the only other Senior present, and he joined her as she moved around the table to intercept Branden.
“Captain?”
Branden extended a closed fist to Kari and peeled back his fingers. Lu shot up from her chair, her eyes falling on the handkerchief that fluttered open across Branden’s palm. Inside, a ribbon looped plants in a bundle, their color indicating that someone had dried and steeped them.
Kari shook her head. “What is this? What’s happening?”
“An outrage!” an Argridian behind Branden shouted. “It’s beyond condemnable—”
Kari ignored him. “Captain, what—”
But it was Lu who said, “Drooping Fern?”
Branden looked at her. “That’s what it is? How do you know?”
Lu’s face heated at the accusation in his tone. How would a politician’s daughter recognize a dangerous plant on sight? But he might have been only anxious for the angry delegates behind him.
“I’ve studied Botanical Wonders,” she explained, not mentioning that she had Drooping Fern in her room at that moment. But she hadn’t steeped her supply—the plant was effective only when burned and the smoke inhaled.
“Drooping Fern? One of your despicable plants?” the Argridian spat. He looked liable to punch something, his hands in fists, everything tense. “Not only is he gone, he was poisoned?”
A wave of silence fell over the room. Lu went immobile as her mother asked, “Who is gone?”
“General Milo Ibarra,” Branden answered.
A beat, and the room exploded, questions overlapping in a tangle of anger.
Lu balked. Milo is . . . gone?
Kari raised her hands for silence that didn’t come as Branden offered more details. “The general hasn’t been seen for hours. The teapot on his table was upended, re-vealin’ the Drooping Fern. In his tea.”
Those details did nothing to soothe the room—in fact, the anger and questions grew. Why Milo? Who would do such a thing?
And, loudly, over and over: How dare Grace Loray allow this to happen?
Lu’s gut cramped. She pulled at Branden’s arm to see the Drooping Fern again, and she got one good look before her mother spoke.
“Captain Axel, have your men search the premises,” Kari tried. “We will bring to light whatever has happened!”
“This abduction was no coincidence!” one of the Argridians countered.
The Drooping Fern hadn’t been burned. If it had, the plant would have been charred, unrecognizable, or at least singed in part—but the plant Lu had seen was whole, if not damp.
Either someone had intended to use the plant to knock Milo unconscious but hidden it in the teapot after changing their plan, or the Drooping Fern had been placed there to make others think he had been drugged.
Lu glared at the Argridians, her gut twisting with wariness.
Councilmembers gathered, talking with heads together, and Tom swung away to join one group.
Lu took his arm. “Father, it wasn’t—”
“Lu—I can’t—”
“Listen!” She forced him to look at her. “Drooping Fern isn’t administered through drinking. It must be burned and inhaled—”
Lazlo lifted his hands. “Silence! Order!”
Another Argridian diplomat leaped onto a chair. “Yes, you’d love for us to be silent! Why else would the man leading the charge against your island disappear?”
“Enough, sir!” Kari shouted. Lu froze. Her mother rarely, if ever, raised her voice. “You will not accuse Grace Loray of such a crime!”
“An Argridian has gone missing! This is why we demanded you rid your island of stream raiders. They have no respect for authority and have clearly abducted the general to protest the proposed bill. The raiders are a danger to you, and to Argrid as well, and we will not be silent! Non máis silencio!”
The other diplomats picked up his chant in proper Argridian, an obvious rebuff of the Council: “No more silence!”
“While I’m concerned for General Ibarra,” Kari said, “I am also concerned that we have misplaced our outrage. This could be a misunderstanding—”
“Then where is Ibarra?” an Argridian shouted.
“The raiders took him!” another exclaimed, as if they each took turns carrying the cause. “Head Pilkvist was here yesterday making threats! Who else would use a dangerous plant like Drooping Fern? This is why we must eliminate them. This is why we must take action!”
That chant started up again: “Non máis silencio!”
“We will investigate Ibarra’s disappearance!” Kari tried. “But we will do so with careful deliberation!”
Lazlo faced her. “If we discover that Ibarra was indeed abducted by raiders, what would you have us do—deliberate as well? Particularly now, when we are so close to peace with Argrid, and the raiders jeopardize that! Perhaps Ibarra was right—perhaps it is time to take action against the raiders!”
“If Drooping Fern in tea is the only cause to believe Ibarra was abducted,” said Tom, “and there is no other proof, one might ask why our Argridian delegates have leaped so quickly to fury.”
“What are you saying?” shouted one delegate.
“I’m saying”—Tom took a breath—“if this abduction was staged, and Ibarra had a hand in his own disappearance to further Argrid’s causes—what would you have us do then?”
Kari’s eyes went round in horror. Lu jerked back, hips slamming into her chair.
The moment Tom made that accusation, the Argridians erupted in fury again.
“How dare you!”
“You would accuse us of treachery!”
“ENOUGH!” One Argridian stood above the rest, arms spread. “When we agreed to this tre
aty, we believed we could have peace. You undermined every bill we proposed, and you undermine us when we call for justice!”
A few Argridians peppered the air with enthusiastic agreement.
“I say enough!” he continued. “Prove your dedication to peace—regain control of your island. We will be silent about these dangers no longer! Non máis silencio!”
“Non máis silencio!” the Argridians echoed.
The Seniors and councilmembers stared, some shocked, others fearful.
Lu had grown up with arguments such as these, and fear such as this. They had left the same feeling on her skin, tingles of urgency and action. But it had been more than five years since she had felt this—and all it had taken was two days to stoke such incendiary attitudes again?
Lu paused. All this had happened in two days. Milo’s plan to oppose the stream raider syndicates; his abduction. Did Devereux’s capture fit into it? There was still the matter of the Drooping Fern—drinking it in tea could not have made Milo unconscious.
Something more was at work. Was Argrid behind this? Was Milo?
Sweat trickled down Lu’s spine. The Grace Lorayan and Argridian delegates had spent the past month negotiating for peace—why would Argrid throw that away? The revolution had drained them; their country was nearly bankrupt, and Argrid had lost many soldiers, too. Grace Loray was not the only country that would be damaged by another war—
The pieces snapped into place, and Lu gasped. With Grace Loray at war with the raiders, with itself, Argrid would be free and intact. The island would crumble, leaving it open for Argrid to do with it as they willed.
Lu surveyed the room, seeing it as if from a distance. The shouts for justice, the divide between the Argridians and the Grace Lorayans.
“Non máis silencio!” the Argridians chanted. “Non máis silencio!”
Vex had never cared much about politics. As an orphan during the war, he’d only cared what reactions he could get from people and how he could use those reactions in his favor. Which, someone told him once, was how the governments of the world operated—through manipulation.
He’d nearly behaved. He wasn’t manipulating anyone. He stole only from people who were awful; he didn’t overcharge when he sold plants; and he’d never gone to the lengths other raiders did when someone wronged them. It was why he’d never joined a syndicate. He was, for all his obvious humility, better than them.
But what good had that done him?
“You hear about the commotion?” A new soldier came to relieve one of the two guarding Vex that night, and he jutted his chin at his comrade in greeting. “One of the visiting Argridians is missing. That general, Milo Ibarra.”
The other guard’s eyebrows shot up. “What? How?”
“Abducted, they think.” The new guard folded his arms and cut a look into Vex’s cell. “The day after he proposed a bill to get rid of stream raiders.”
Vex stayed where he was, reclined on the bench again. But every muscle stilled as he strained to listen.
“Shit,” the other said. “Wasn’t Pilkvist here just yesterday? The Council thinking Ibarra got snatched by him?”
“Maybe, but it’d be awful obvious, wouldn’t it?”
Vex rolled his eye. Duh, but also, Pilkvist wasn’t that resourceful.
“Bet it was a raider, though. Another syndicate, or even filth like this one.” The new guard kicked the bars to Vex’s cell, and Vex flinched. “Hate to say it, but Argrid was right—we need to clean up this island. My pop’s storefront got a rat problem a few years back. Getting rid of ’em was a struggle, but it’d have gotten worse the longer we waited. Gotta eradicate vermin before they really get out of hand.”
Vex forced his eye to stay on the dingy ceiling.
He’d heard the word eradicated before. The Church had spewed it—eradicate evil magic; eradicate those who use it; eradicate the impurities from your soul.
A pressure built in Vex’s chest, but he didn’t let himself shiver or fall into memories that were always one slip away from consuming him. Memories of the war, of soldiers seizing him and declaring him a heretic and other words he was too young to understand, much less be.
He knew Argrid wanted Grace Loray back. Why else would they put so much effort into exploiting raiders? Why else would they have noted Vex’s faults when he was in that damn prison years ago and used them to blackmail him?
They knew they’d lost the war because of their weak military. This way, they’d break the Council, split the island apart, and make it easier to take control. Prayers and hymns and pyres would choke this island of free markets and magic-filled rivers.
Vex had known all along. Ignored it, because all he had was his smart mouth, Nayeli’s penchant for explosives, Edda’s muscles, and their steamer, the Rapid Meander. How could they fight an empire? They could barely keep Argrid off their own backs, and all they’d wanted was to carve out a home away from Grace Loray’s mess and Argrid’s too. Away from war and cleansing.
But listening to that guard say eradicated, Vex should’ve done something. He should’ve . . . he didn’t know. What would that girl have done? She’d cared so much about this island in that one conversation that he’d almost fallen in love with her for her passion alone.
She’d have done something by now. She wasn’t some useless unaligned raider, living off notoriety for things that didn’t matter.
Lu’s balcony door swung open.
She pushed herself upright, wincing as the muscles in her neck spasmed. Beneath her, the pieces of her sleeping concoction were arranged over the top of her desk. Mortars and pestles; empty vials; two cloths on which she’d laid out the Drooping Fern and Narcotium Creeper. She had felt so smug when she’d thought of the glass bell jar, the perfect vessel in which to trap the Drooping Fern’s tranquilizing smoke. She had lit a leaf and placed it under the glass, intending to infuse the Narcotium Creeper with it and create a tonic.
She had been tired, though, and clumsy, and all it had taken was one jab of her elbow. The bell jar had toppled, releasing its smoke, and she hadn’t had the foresight to put Awacia within reach to neutralize the Drooping Fern. Unconsciousness had taken her.
Lu leaned back in her chair, digging the heels of her palms into her eyes. That was the problem with Drooping Fern—it caused unconsciousness, but not restful unconsciousness. She was no more refreshed now than she had been before she had fainted on her desk.
Wait—what had awoken her?
She blinked around her dark room. The gauzy curtains over her open balcony doors rippled in the heady midnight breeze. Beyond, the murmur of Lake Regolith’s waves infused the lull. Had the wind pushed the door open? She had shut it tight since Milo’s abduction. . . .
Lu flew upright, barefoot on the cool marble tiles, heart racing. All she wore was a thin shift, and its airiness made her feel naked as the eerie sensation of being watched crept down her back like a bead of sweat.
Someone was in her room.
Lu had spent the day after Milo’s abduction in Council meetings, leaving to attend Annalisa in short snatches. Waiting, hoping for word of a resolution, but all the Council and the Argridians agreed on was that they didn’t agree on anything.
Milo is unaccounted for, her terror whispered. No one knows where he is. . . .
Lu scrambled over her desk, sorting through vials whose labels she couldn’t read in the blackness. The sensation of being watched grew, and Lu grabbed a handful of the vials, intending to smash them on the floor.
But a voice stopped her cold.
“Lu? I’m sorry, but . . .”
Soft shoes padded on the marble; hands tugged at her nightdress.
Lu saw it, then. Teo was always climbing on things, hanging from rafters in the barn, far too nimble and quick for his own good; his agility—and sorrow—could have propelled him up the two stories to her balcony.
An aching hole opened in her gut as Lu fell to her knees, the vials of plants tumbling to the floor. She cupped Teo’s f
ace, but it was too dark to see him—she could feel him, though, the tears on his cheeks.
“She’s . . . gone, Lu,” he gasped. “Like mama. They’re both gone. . . .”
He toppled into her, sobbing.
It’s all right, Tee, she tried to tell him, but she could only hear Annalisa, from long ago.
“It’ll be all right,” Annalisa had whispered as they huddled under the bed, stomping boots and gunshots filling the safe house. “It’ll be all right, it’ll be all right, it’ll be—”
Fingers had bruised Lu’s arm and yanked her out from under the bed. The attacker flung her into the shelves that lined the room. Books rained around her, and as she heard the pistol click, she grabbed the nearest one and raised it like a shield.
“It’ll be all right,” Lu had said, repeating those words because she couldn’t fathom anything else as she stared into the pistol’s barrel. “It’ll be all right—”
The war had ended that night. But nothing had been all right.
Lu prodded at the ache in her heart, at the weeks of watching Annalisa deteriorate. She didn’t feel anything other than a sobbing child in her lap and an emptiness that made her blink dumbly as light filled her room.
Kari swung through the doorway, a thin robe wafting around her nightgown. She didn’t say a word as she knelt and curled her arms around both Teo and Lu, the scent of coconut rising through her loose black hair, gone to thick curls in the humidity.
The smell swept Lu away, for a heartbeat, for a breath.
Kari had learned the concoction from her own mother, a Tuncian immigrant: Healica, to restore the skin; coconut, to mask the Healica’s odor; and various spices from Tuncay that were said to do everything from increase energy to ward off negative thoughts. Lu was overcome by the nutty, rich aroma, which made her recall falling asleep in her mother’s lap as a child.
Tom stepped into the room, and over Kari’s shoulder, Lu watched him rest a lit candelabrum and pistol on her desk.
The comfort of the moment broke. Lu stared at the weapon, every nerve screaming, No! Get that away!
Decorum didn’t matter, though—let there be a dozen rifles in her room, let her world be nothing but weapons and blood again.
