by Sara Wolf
To contrast all the opulence, a woman with a strict bun and sharp gaze stands before a regal statue of some very important dead man. Her dress is a sensible black, but she wears a gold-threaded mantle over her shoulders, hanging long past her waist. All court servants wear a mantle, and all of them are different colors to indicate their rank and job. A gold mantle marks her as Headkeeper—the overseer of every servant in the palace. If there’s anyone who knows the court’s dirty little secrets, it’s her. At her sides are other keepers in similar clothes, though their mantles are much less gaudy.
“Welcome, Bride,” she says, and bows. I almost bow in return but catch myself. “I am Ulla, Palace Headkeeper. We will wait for your fellows to reach us before entering the Hall of Time. Please make yourself comfortable.”
“Thank you. I’ll try my best. Comfort is a far dream in these shoes.” I sigh.
Ulla immediately claps her hands and barks, “Fetch the Bride a chair, quickly.”
Two men branch off, returning with a heavy ironwood chair. My eyebrows skyrocket at how fast they put it down just behind me.
“I didn’t mean— You didn’t have to—”
Ulla raises her own brow. Having the Headkeeper suspicious of me would be very bad. I put on a haughty face and sit, fighting my urge to thank the men as they retreat to Ulla’s side. The Steelrun girl is already here in a similar chair, her eyes avoiding mine. We wait. And by that I mean I stare at everything in the hall like a drooling newborn fascinated by the slightest glimmer, and the very obviously bored Steelrun girl taps her foot on the floor, impatient to meet her royal husband. I don’t have the heart—literally—to break the bad news to her, so I just smile when our eyes meet instead.
Ulla welcomes a well-dressed boy in a sea-green tunic, his shy smile ruddy. Two slender boys enter after him, twins by the look of their identical blond coifs and sallow skin and blue eyes. The boys are here as Spring Grooms—a much more celebrated title when a Princess is in line for the throne, but today they’ll simply be introduced to the court so they can begin their social life. Finally, a girl in a luxurious deer-hide dress joins us, panting and looking around happily, as if she’s thrilled to be here. All of the noble children have fine features and soft-looking, well-fed skin. They’ve never seen a day of work, let alone a day of hunger, and half of me pities them. How helpless would they be outside this mechanical city of extravagance?
How helpless would they be beneath your fangs? The hunger slithers around in my skull.
“Now that we’ve all assembled,” Ulla begins, “I will walk the Spring Grooms to the hall to be introduced first. Brides, please wait here until I fetch you. I’d ask you all to be on your best behavior, as this is your first introduction to the people you will call peers for the rest of your lives.”
“We know, old woman,” one of the twins drawls. “Our parents gave us this same talk, and much quicker than you.”
I can’t stand his tone, or the way Ulla simply takes his insult without so much as blinking.
“Someone woke up on the wrong side of the baby’s crib,” I drawl. The boy’s brother shoots me a venomous glare.
“I wasn’t aware gloomy little paupers like the Y’shennrias were allowed to speak,” he snarls.
“Shouldn’t you be at home, praying to your heretic god?” The first twin sneers at me.
“It looks like you two need to do a little praying of your own.” I smile. “First order of business: ask Kavar for some better insults.”
The smiley, deer-dress girl chokes on her laughter. The twins throw her a nasty glance and turn on me.
“You’ll watch yourself,” one of them says. “The Priseless have long memories.”
I look to Ulla, but she doesn’t move to interfere or stop us. Maybe she isn’t allowed to.
“Longer than your temper, I’d hope,” I say.
The other twin narrows his eyes. “You—”
“What’s all this ruckus?” a new voice booms down the hall. All of us turn to it, and everyone bows. Not wanting to look disrespectful to whomever this is, I quickly bow with them.
“Milord,” Ulla starts. “I was just about to take the Spring Grooms into the hall for introduction.”
“And they can’t manage to control themselves for even that long?” The man who steps forward is tall, nowhere near a witch’s height, but the way he carries himself makes it seem that way. He’s clean-shaven, a long mane of silver hair trailing down his back. I recognize that hair, and my stomach goes cold. It’s Archduke Gavik Himintell, the man who led the purge the other day. His eyes are blue and watery, yet his smile is harder than ice. Everything about him screams precision and calculation. He wears a white tunic with long sleeves, a mantle on his shoulders much like Ulla’s—though his is gray and encrusted with quartz flakes: a Minister’s mantle. On his hip is the same sword he pointed at the crowd.
“Sir,” the Priseless twins bark a greeting. The archduke smiles at them.
“We’ve always spoken of manners, haven’t we boys? Show a pleasant face, even to your worst enemy. Decorum is—”
“The demolisher of opposition!” the twins echo, their expressions enraptured. They clearly admire the archduke, to the point that all their anger at me is left by the wayside. The archduke chuckles, and then fixes his blue gaze on me.
“Now here’s a fresh face I’m unfamiliar with.”
I make a small bow. He might be the Minster of the Blade and an archduke leagues above my lady status, but Himintell is a Firstblood family equal with the Y’shennrias.
“Archduke Himintell,” I say. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m Zera Y’shennria, Lady Y’shennria’s niece.”
“So you know who I am? How is that, considering this is your first time at court?”
A mistake. Of course I wouldn’t know who he is if I’ve never seen him before. But I have. Y’shennria warned me to stay on my toes at all times around him. If I play the stupid little girl act, I might be able to hide my real intentions from him.
“My aunt told me to look for the handsomest man at court.” I pepper my words with an eyelash bat or twelve. He’s quiet, and for a second I think I’ve offended him.
“Of course.” His smile is just as bright as mine. We’re both forcing ourselves. “Lady Y’shennria spoke of your discovery with such happiness the last time I saw her. It’s good she retrieved you safely. Let us hope you merit her joy.”
“I plan to, milord.”
He doesn’t blink, and neither do I. It feels like he’s sizing me up, trying to see into my inner workings. It’s all I can do to keep my face clean of the rage I’ve bottled up at him ever since the purge. Thankfully, he breaks our stare-down first and turns to the others.
“I hope you are all prepared to meet the court,” he says. “The Brides especially.”
“Ready as we can be, milord.” The Steelrun girl curtsies.
Gavik nods. “You need all the readiness you can muster if you’re to be dealing with Prince Lucien.” The way he says it is touched with just enough disdain. He clearly doesn’t like the prince much. “If you would excuse me, then, I should’ve been gathered in the Hall with the rest of the court long ago.”
“Of course,” Ulla says, and bows deeply. “Good day, milord.”
We all bow with her, my eyes lingering on the Minister as he passes me. Ulla leaves with the Spring Grooms. And finally it comes our time to enter the Hall. As I follow Ulla with the rest of the girls, I try not to ogle the gold filigree on the doors, the luscious oil portraits of hounds and lions, of Kavar himself, depicted as a young man with eye symbols all over his skin, holding a scale of justice in one hand and a sword in the other. He’s both sinister and awe-inducing at once. Nightsinger’s books were insistent a witch should never presume to know what the Old God’s physical form might look like, and yet here the humans are, painting their New God with abandon. Banners of jade-green silk waterfall from the tops of the spotless windows, the silver serpent logo stitched there catching t
he sun. The palace’s pure grandeur makes Y’shennria’s manor look small and modest.
Ulla takes us down a vast hall with walls made entirely of colored glass. The sun shafts through, dyeing our skin all colors of sunset and twilight. It takes me a shameful few seconds to understand that the colors depict scenes from history—the humans first building Vetris, important polymaths inventing things like watertells and sandclocks, the Eight Winters’ War when Helkyris was our bitter enemy fighting for control of the Tollmount-Kilstead mountains, and finally, in the most recent section, the Sunless War. It stretches on all around me—armored battalions of celeons and humans viciously fighting tall, dark-eyed figures with darkened hands and nails—witches. And in front of them, a horde of fanged monsters, each depicted with a red chasm where their hearts should be.
Heartless.
I clench my fists. Is that how they really see us? Is this how terrifying we look to them? We’re hunched and wild-eyed, moving like animals instead of people. During the War, Heartless were on the front lines, making up the bulk of the witch army, whether they wanted to fight or not. I don’t doubt the witches commanded their Heartless to protect them. And on top of being surrounded by all those humans? Their hungers probably ran rampant, transforming them into bestial monsters that cared little for human behavior. I’ve felt it sometimes, deep down; the darkest part of the hunger waits for me to weaken, to lose. And this mural reminds me, painfully and vibrantly, exactly what losing means.
It would be so easy, the hunger insists. Just a moment, and it would be all over. You’d never have to worry about anything again—
Orange and yellow glass engulfs the Heartless. Flames. The humans learned, early on, that there weren’t many ways to slow Heartless down save for burning them. It takes a witch much longer to heal charred flesh. It’s their preferred way of dealing with us. Water for a witch, fire for their thralls, the baron had said. I shudder at the thought of the pain, of enduring that much agony for so long. Pain is bearable only when you know with absolute certainty it’ll end quickly. And that’s how I spent the last three years—certain. Now? Now nothing at all is certain.
“What are you staring at?” the deer-dress girl asks me quietly. I skitter my eyes away.
“N-Nothing.”
She doesn’t seem to believe me, staring at the Heartless over my shoulder.
“It’s okay,” she leans in and whispers. “I feel sorry for them, too, sometimes.”
She turns her back to me quickly. Her admission is so hushed, so forbidden in these halls. But it tugs at my chest regardless. To think a human could pity me—us—after everything we’ve done, everything I’ve done. I shake my head. If she knew what I really was, she’d run far and fast from me. She’d cheer as I was burned and my witch purged on the archduke’s stage.
Ulla stops us before a door of glass and knocks twice. Uptight-looking guards open it. The sound of a crowd carries on the chilly air coming from the entrance. Ulla turns to us, proffering several silken veils attached to filigree headbands.
“You will wear these, and walk down the center of the Hall, abreast one another. Do not take them off until instructed to do so by the royal family. In addition, you will speak only when you are addressed by the royal family.”
“We aren’t children, Ulla. We’ve seen this done for years now. We know how it goes,” the Steelrun girl says, breaking her silence for the first time. Her back is so ramrod-straight, her every step graceful. I don’t know her first name, but Grace will do in my head.
“I’m simply repeating it, milady. Some of us”—Ulla’s eyes flicker to me—“are newer here than others.”
“And some of us don’t have the patience to babysit country bumpkins.” Grace holds her head high and steps through the door. The other girl follows, timid, flashing me a charming smile nonetheless. Charm. That’s a good head-name for her. Ulla ushers me after Grace and Charm, and I take my first steps into the dark hall. It’s narrow and low, my scalp almost scraping the stonework, but then it opens up into a vaulted cavern. Whoever made this carved it straight out of the stone, stately pillars as big as ancient trees punctuating the otherwise airy space. Light spills from a perfectly round glass-covered hole in the cavern’s ceiling. It shines bright sunlight on a stone platform in the center of the room, upon which an ostentatious glass throne sits. And the people are, regrettably, everywhere. A crowd hangs at the sides of our walkway, tittering softly and melding with the shadows of the cavern. I can’t see their faces, but their dresses and tunics stand out in all colors. Their voices, though soft, echo eerily off the high ceiling.
We approach the throne. It isn’t glass at all, but crystal shimmering with rainbow opalescence. How clever! Make the throne shine, and all your subjects will be in awe of you. No gold or jewels can compare to the light the king’s seat gives off. No human lawguard can compare to the intimidating celeon guards standing at the foot of the throne. They’re the tallest celeons I’ve ever seen, armed to the teeth with razor-sharp halberds. Grace waltzes right through their parted weapons, and Charm and I scrabble as gracefully as we can to catch up with her. My mouth goes dry when one of the celeon looks at me too long—I know they have good noses; can she smell my Heartlessness? No, Zera, that would be stupid. If they could do that, Vetris would’ve won the Sunless War much earlier.
We line up before the throne and curtsy deeply to the man on it.
King Sref of Cavanos watches me with the deadened eyes of a raven circling a corpse.
It’s just one analogy about the king’s worth being equal to a single potato. But it has the entire court gaping at me. Either these nobles are easily impressed, or they just don’t get out much. If I wasn’t a penniless monster in the midst of committing treason, I’d put money on the latter.
With the Brides presented, the ceremony draws to a close, and the king and queen leave the Hall of Time, their guards leaving with them. Prince Lucien stays, though. I watch the prince’s profile now that I’m not so nervous, the proud hawkishness of it striking. He isn’t as handsome as I first thought, not in the traditional sense, but he’s nothing if not arresting. His sharp features demand that you look, but only gently, for fear of cutting yourself on them. It’s then I notice with some rampant disgust that I’m not the only one staring at him—practically every woman in the crowd titters and coos at his every sigh of his, every motion of his hand. Did I somehow fall into a hole of vapid unreality between leaving Y’shennria’s manor and coming here? It’s almost absurd, laughable how much attention he’s getting, but then I remember he’s the heir to the largest country on the Mist Continent. If this is his everyday life, if he’s constantly watched and simpered over to this extent, it’s no wonder he harbors such distaste for the court. It reminds me of Whisper, almost. Whisper. He’s here somewhere, isn’t he? Excitement like static runs through me at the thought that he could be looking at me right now, but common sense dampens it. I’m here for the prince, not him.
I tear my eyes away from Prince Lucien promptly; I can’t afford to act like just another girl in the crowd. Charm and Grace, however, have no such compunctions as they try to parse the bored look on his face.
“Do you think he liked what I said?” Charm whimpers. Grace turns to me, face twisted.
“You think you’re clever, do you?”
“No.” I purse my lips and tilt my head. “I know I’m clever.”
“I thought she was wonderful.” Charm smiles at me. Grace scoffs.
“Oh, yes, wonderful. If you think insulting our king is a form of merriment, like some drunken commoner.”
“You clearly missed the point of my riveting analogy,” I say. “Which I will forgive. Subtlety isn’t for everyone. And neither is losing gracefully.”
“You arrogant little—” Grace begins to curl her lip, but a noblewoman approaches her with a smile, engaging her in conversation. Soon more nobles cluster around her, then Charm, then me, all of them complimenting us over one another.
“Howe
ver did you come up with something so prescient, Lady Zera?” A lady fans herself, wafting the smell of her my way. The hunger licks its lips, but I force it silent.
“Did you see how hard the king laughed?” A nobleman shakes his head. “I haven’t seen him so amused in years! Not since before the princess died.”
“Princess?” I start. The nobleman lowers his voice.
“Were you not told? Princess Varia died five years ago now.”
“That’s awful. How did she pass?”
The nobles look to one another before the nobleman leans in to whisper, “Heartless, milady. She was touring the provinces when a band of them ripped her entourage to shreds. It was a great tragedy. We mourned for months. The king never stopped, I think. He used to be so full of life, and yet that all faded when Princess Varia died. She’d always been his favorite. And don’t even get me started on poor Prince Lucien. He’s been devastated ever since.”
Prince Lucien lost his sister to Heartless? Something like pity tries to sprout in me, but I refuse to let it. He can’t be a person to me—only a goal.
“Indeed,” a noblewoman speaks from behind her gloved hand. “That’s why the prince goes on hunts so often.”
“Hunts?” I furrow my brows, but the nobles don’t say anything more, making some convenient excuse to drift off. The new information swirls in my brain. I only vaguely see Y’shennria come up beside me, face tense.
“You very nearly sabotaged yourself,” she murmurs.
“I took a chance,” I agree. Y’shennria’s icy mask doesn’t crack.
“Perhaps next time you’ll think twice before ‘taking a chance’ and stick to the stock phrases we rehearsed instead of spouting something terribly risky.”
