by Jaymin Eve
Rebecca bows her head and clears the way as Elise and I step into the room. The Storm Command forms an impenetrable barrier behind me and spreads out to guard the windows on either side.
I turn to Elise. “But that doesn’t mean everyone has to listen.”
“I understand.” Elise turns her hand to the side and passes it across the doorway as we step inside the room and I trust her to create a sound barrier between us and the watching elves.
Darian lifts his head while Mai reaches out a hand to me. Her skin is much paler than normal.
“Marbella,” she says. “I’m sorry to greet you in this state.”
I drop to my knees. “What happened, Mai?”
The concern on Darian’s face makes me envy the love between them. He allows her to lean against him, supporting her in an upright position.
He says, “She collapsed while she was gardening. I carried her in here, but then…”
He glances at her as if seeking her permission.
In response, Mai places her hand on his. “It’s all right… I can tell her.”
She turns to me. “I started to rain.”
Elise frowns beside me. “It started to rain?”
“No,” Mai says, “I started to rain.”
I’m sure I misheard. “You started to… what?”
In response, Mai leans back into Darian, turning her head into his shoulder, whispering, “Will you help me show them?”
“I will always help you,” he says, but he turns to us first, his expression stern. “She’s weak and I’ll only assist her to do this once. Then you have to get help.”
He wraps his arms around her waist and lifts her to her feet, pulling her upright. Her legs wobble, but he keeps her straight long enough for me to see what I need to see.
Her dress changes color halfway down, dark and saturated from her ribcage, but dry at her shoulders. Her hair, too, is completely dry, wispy strands floating around her. But her hands and feet…
Water drips from her fingertips and puddles around her feet. I can tell from how dry her head and shoulders are that the water isn’t falling from anywhere above her. It’s dripping from her fingers and toes. It’s coming from her.
I meet her eyes and I know there’s more. It was the rain that spoke to me in the Vault, and Mai always had an affinity with the rain.
Her fingers move. The change is so slight that I can barely perceive it, but then…
Everything slows around me. Elise is half-turning, her eyes wide, one arm rising to point at the water falling from Mai’s hands. Darian is about to speak, his mouth half-open. Then everything… stops.
Even the water droplets suspend in mid-air. Except for Mai and me.
“What did you do?” I ask, barely breathing.
“I used the power of the thunder to suspend time.”
“You what? But you’re not the Princess anymore. How can you channel the storm? That’s…”
“You have so much to learn about the power of the storm, but they won’t let me teach you. You’ll have to learn on your own like I had to.”
“Who won’t let you teach me?”
“Marbella, you need to listen to me. We only have a few moments. The rain spoke to me. Someone’s cursed the protocols.”
“It spoke to me, too!”
I edge toward her. Glimmers of lightning wrap around my fingers, but I push them down. Mai isn’t a threat to me.
She looks relieved that I already know. “Then you know your husband will be cursed to kill you.”
I suck in a deep breath. “The rain told me. But I don’t know what to do.”
She doesn’t hesitate. “You have to fight for yourself.”
“What?”
“Be your own champion. Win the challenges. Accept no male as your husband. It’s the only way.”
“But I need to bond. The storm’s getting stronger. It’s too strong for me.”
“No, Marbella, no. You already have everything you need to control it. The Elven Command wants you to believe that you aren’t enough—that you need to share the burden. But you’ll discover once you marry that it’s all a lie. The other Princesses weren’t alive to tell me, but I’m telling you. You are all you need.”
She glances at Darian. “I love him and I wouldn’t change my marriage for all the world and, yes, he has supported me and been my best friend, but the moment he stepped into the Vault it almost killed him!
“I’m forbidden to speak of it, Marbella. But the truth is that we are the Storm. Only us. Only our bodies. And now… the storm is choosing to connect with me again, trying to send you a message through me.”
“We have to get you help.”
She gently shakes her head. “Soon. I promise I’ll be okay. But you need to understand your power.”
“But… why? Why does the Elven Command make us marry if it doesn’t help us?”
“So that we are never seen to hold all of the power ourselves. So that we are not all-powerful.” She grimaces. “I can’t hold time much longer. Promise me you’ll fight for yourself. Promise me!”
I have so many more questions. So much else to ask her.
But at the heart of what she said is the answer to saving Baelen: I will fight for myself. Even though confusion whirls through me about everything Mai revealed to me, I’m filled with intense relief.
As everything speeds up around us, I say, “Thank you, dear friend.”
She nods and collapses against Darian.
I spin to Elise. My advisor shivers beside me, running her hand through her hair as if she’s pulling off cobwebs. She’s a gifted spellcaster and will be able to sense that something just happened, but she won’t understand how. She doesn’t know the power of the storm. As it turns out, I don’t either.
I know I should tell her what just happened, but Mai spoke only to me for a reason. I meet Rebecca’s eyes across the room. She’s Mai’s advisor—she would have seen what happened when Darian accompanied Mai into the Vault.
She must know the truth about the marriage protocol. Her lips are pressed together. I know she won’t speak a word of it.
I spin to Elise before she can say anything. “Mai needs help now. Call the healers, please.”
Elise waves her hand, lifting the cloak of silence around the room, and the message is relayed back through my Storm Command. Two of my elves separate from the others and sprint away, their lithe bodies a blur of movement. Of the ten, they are my message bearers, chosen for their speed. Every one of my Command is highly trained and hand picked to excel.
I’m afraid to touch Mai in case the power inside me could hurt her, but I kneel and lean as close as I can. “I’ll do as you say.”
I will fight for myself.
3
We leave Mai in the hands of the healers. I want to stay, but my Storm Command takes up so much space that I’ll hinder their efforts. There’s nothing else I can do to help. Mai gives me a nod and I’m grateful that she’ll accept help now.
I head for my quarters across the square with only ten minutes to spare before I’m supposed to meet Baelen in the War Room. There’s no way I can face him without a hot bath to calm my nerves and wash away the storm.
Elise takes one look at my face and sends one of the Storm Command ahead to prepare the bath, and another to the War Room to let Baelen know I’ll be late. I give her a grateful smile for both. It’s better that I don’t cause the House of Rath more offence than I already have today.
She leans in as we reach my quarters, her voice gentle. “Princess, once you deal with the Commander, we need to talk about what happened today.”
“Yes, thank you.” I appreciate the way she always remains calm. Sometimes it makes me wonder if there’s more to her simmering beneath the surface, but she never panics or becomes angry. As much as I hate all of the protocols, they definitely worked in my favor to give me an advisor who balances out my emotions.
Inside my room, I strip off the storm suit and hang it over its specia
l rack in the bathing room that adjoins my bedroom. I sink into the bathtub of water, immersing myself completely, even my head. The last of the cold rainwater washes out of my hair as I try to shake the image of Mai’s raining body and the way she suspended time.
The bath is the only place I’m allowed to be alone. Elise and Jordan wait for me in my bedroom and my Storm Command lines the hall outside. My home is more of a soldier’s barracks than a home. My room is the largest and sits in the center of the square structure. There’s only one door to my room but hallways on every side. My Storm Command sleeps in rooms all around me—twenty elves rotating on and off shift in such a way that I always have ten of them with me and get to see all of them throughout each week.
Light reaches me through two skylights—one in the bathroom and one in the bedroom.
I drop the mask of control I always wear and allow myself to accept the fear rising inside me.
Becoming my own champion means defeating the smartest, fastest, most skilled male elves in Erawind—elves who’ve been training for years for the chance to take my hand.
Every elven child is taught sword skills, archery, and hand-to-hand combat from an early age, but my training stopped when I became Storm Princess. Metal and lightning don’t mix so I’m forbidden from touching weapons containing iron or steel. On top of that, nobody is allowed to touch me, so even fighting with practice weapons like wooden swords is out of my reach.
The skills I learned as a child are rusty. After seven years without practice, I know how to wield lightning much better than I know how to wield a sword or shoot an arrow.
I want to scream in frustration. My promise to Mai suddenly seems empty. I can try to fight for myself, but how can I win?
I acknowledge my fear, dispelling it from my lungs, breathing it out as I lift my head out of the water again. Every elf in my Storm Command has a skill they can teach me. I just have to find a way for them to do it.
Nobody can know my intentions until the Heartstone Ceremony in a week’s time. The most difficult part will be learning all I need to know in such a short time. Impossible. But I have to try.
I dress as quickly as I can, choosing a flowing silk dress, and pull my hair into a loose braid that drapes between my shoulder blades and reaches my waist. I don’t have time to dry it, and it drips down my back, but it serves as a reminder of Mai and her message to me. For the same reason that I don’t touch weaponry, I also don’t wear a crown or other jewelry.
Elise and Jordan pace together outside my bathing room, their heads together in quiet conversation. They look up at the same time with identical expressions of concern.
“I know,” I say. “You can’t leave my side.”
In response, Jordan spins. “Storm Command! To the War Room.”
I stride within their circle, heading east until we reach a set of buildings not too far from my quarters. The War Room is located at one end. When we reach the big oak doors that open into the room I curse my height once again. I have no idea what awaits me.
Finally the protective circle stops and opens, spanning out like a wave on either side of me. Elise stands directly to my right and Jordan to my left.
I draw to a halt. I’m ten feet away from Baelen Rath who stands alone in front of the War Table. His advisor isn’t here this time. I keep my distance, my skirt swishing around my legs as I pause.
He catches me in his gaze, takes a step forward, but stops. For some reason he looks thrown, surprised, but then a blank mask drops over his expression. The only indication that anything’s wrong is that his jaw ticks at the side and a small crease appears between his eyes as he appraises me.
He’s dressed in light armor and looks right at home in this room dedicated to war strategy. I, on the other hand, had been so deep in thought about how to overcome my rusty battle skills that I hadn’t paid much attention to how I looked. I’m badly underdressed.
I lift my head high, overly conscious of my damp braid. “Commander Rath, please report.”
His voice is a low growl. “The gargoyles are on the move.”
It’s the last thing I expected him to say. Shock ripples through every member of my Storm Command. The gargoyles haven’t made a move in hundreds of years.
All my other worries disappear in an instant. Nothing is more important than defending Erawind against another attack.
I stride toward the War Table and circle behind it. Its top is carved into an elaborate map of our country, Erawind, and the gargoyle’s country, Erador. “Show me.”
He moves to stand beside me. Again, he stands much closer than anyone else would dare. If I reached out my arm, I could brush his. I’m close enough to feel his body warmth. He seems completely unaware of how many rules he’s breaking, and it’s distracting in ways that send shivers through me.
He’s focused on the map. “The mountains on the border behind Rath land have always been our weakest point.”
I nod. It’s one of the reasons that all descendants of the House of Rath are trained mercilessly for battle—even if they don’t want to be. While other Houses indulge their children’s interests, sons and daughters of the House of Rath were never given a choice.
For a moment, I remember Baelen sitting at the edge of the cliff behind his home, legs dangling over the edge like it wasn’t thousands of feet into the air, pencil and paper in his hands. He’d turned and given me that half smile that lifted only one corner of his mouth but somehow lit my world like sunshine. He’d handed me his drawing book. “You may as well see it before my father burns it.”
Now, Baelen’s forehead is creased in concentration as his hand sweeps the map, pointing at various spots in the mountain ranges. “We’ve known for a while that the gargoyles are nesting on the western side of the peaks—inside their own border and as far from our side as possible. We’ve tolerated their presence there because they kept away from the east. But in the last week there have been sightings as close as Baldor Peak.
I frown. “But that’s on our side of the border.”
He nods and points at another mountain that rests within the boundaries of Rath land. “Last week, a full nest was found here.”
I can’t stop the shiver of surprise that shoots through me. “That’s only fifty miles away from us here in the city. What are the chances they’ll form an attack?”
“Unlikely in the next six moons. Reconnaissance across the border tells us the encroachment into our territory is sporadic right now. They aren’t swarming behind their border and the nests so far are fledgling and spread too far apart to indicate that an attack is imminent.”
“But it’s possible… when? Within the next year?”
“Yes. Which is why the Elven Command decided it was time to appoint a permanent Commander of the armed forces. I know this is the last thing you want to hear right now, but we need to prepare for war.”
He pauses. “You need to be ready for war.”
His gaze returns to me. He’s frowning again. Fierce, this time.
Is it because I kept him waiting? With news this important, I can understand that the delay must have been frustrating. I try to find my voice as his gaze burns the sound right out of my throat.
“I apologize that I was late. I understand this is very important.”
His frown remains. “Mai Reverie was ill. You did the right thing attending to her. ”
I chew my lip. “Then… I’ve done something else wrong.”
“It’s…”
I wait for him to finish his sentence. “Commander Rath?”
“I wasn’t expecting you to be so unguarded. When you came out of the Storm Vault you were prepared for battle. You were as I expected you to be—the Storm Princess—but now…”
I frown, glancing left and right at the swarm of warrior elves around me. The War Room is big enough to accommodate a hundred guards. Five of the Storm Command have already moved to stand behind me while the other five remain watching us from the other side of the table.
I say, “I’m always guarded.”
“No. This.” He gestures. I try to ignore the fact that he stretches his hand out far enough that it almost brushes my arm and he’s still standing much too close to me.
He says, “The storm’s power is gone but you aren’t wearing armor. No body shield. You don’t carry any weapons.”
It’s true that I look like I could be out for a stroll. It’s a far cry from the storm suit he saw me in earlier and I already know I’m underdressed. Still, I frown. “You expected me to come here prepared for battle? You’re not my enemy, Baelen.”
His expression becomes even more concerned. “Of course not. But you’re too trusting. What if I meant to harm you?”
I blink at him in surprise. “Do you?”
“No.”
“Then I’m glad we got that out of the way. In future you will refrain from commenting on my choice of clothing.”
“No, I will not.”
I pause, my blood boiling now. Elise and Jordan both stiffen on the opposite side of the table. Elise’s hand twitches at her side and I guess she’s two seconds away from teaching him a lesson for his insolence.
But it wouldn’t be good for her to strike the Commander of the army, even in the defense of my pride. I gesture for her to stand down as I draw away from Baelen, putting a good few feet between us. “No?”
“My job is to protect Erawind and that means protecting you. You can’t trust anybody. Not even me. You may have an excellent guard—”
“I do have an excellent guard.”
His jaw clenches. Emotion enters his voice for the first time. “But that doesn’t mean they can’t be breached or defeated. The gargoyles killed our most powerful spellcasters and decimated an army of our most skilled warriors. My entire family was wiped out. The Raths were fierce, unbreakable, but the gargoyles got through. They can defeat your guard too.”
I don’t want to accept that he’s right. I want to believe that he’s being disrespectful, commenting on my clothing, because that would give me the right to be angry. But the gargoyles nearly wiped out our race.
