by Brian Farrey
The Chorister seemed impressed. “Oooh, now that was an interesting answer. Very well. I’ll tell you. There is only one thing you need to know in order to be queen. It has nothing to do with etiquette or diplomacy. You need only know the price of happiness in your Monarchy.
“Your people will thrive and prosper. They will never need. Your name will be hallowed. In exchange . . .” The Chorister paused to run his hand across the bark that framed Aon’s father’s face. “In exchange, you consent that a single person each season will bear the ills meant for all. The Crimson Hoods will continue to harvest willing volunteers to become dreadwillows. These four people will suffer unimaginable pain. The Carse will flourish, each dark bud and bloom growing healthier with every unshed tear.
“But . . . thousands and thousands will continue to live in bliss. And you, Your Highness, you will be beloved. You will be the greatest monarch who ever lived.”
“They’re only ‘willing volunteers’ because they’ve been lied to,” Aon pointed out.
“The Monarchy cannot know unhappiness,” the Chorister said. “Tell any commoner the truth. They’ll still go willingly because they can’t comprehend how a dreadwillow suffers.”
“This is what the warning means, isn’t it?” Jeniah asked. “I wasn’t supposed to find out about this, because if I did, I’d end it. Right?”
“That presumes,” the Chorister said, “that you’re the first to face the choice.”
“What?”
“Every monarch has come to me,” he said. “Every single one. None could resist the warning to keep out.”
“I don’t believe you,” the princess said. Of course she’d seen the shades of the past monarchs. She knew they’d been in the Carse. But they couldn’t have come this far. They couldn’t have known about the horrors in the heart of the Carse and allowed them to continue.
Could they?
Aon stepped away from the dreadwillow. “When I first arrived, the creatures here thought I was you. They said they were expecting you. They knew you’d come.”
Jeniah felt ill. Every monarch. They’d all known exactly what was going on. Even her own mother. And in the name of peace, in the name of prosperity, they’d all agreed to let the terrible ritual continue.
“Then why the warning?” Jeniah asked. “If every monarch was meant to come here, why warn us off?”
The Chorister shambled over to a tree stump and took a seat. “If your mother had brought you here, held you by the hand and explained the pact, and then beseeched you to consent and thus maintain the everlasting bliss of the Monarchy, would you have done so?”
“Without question,” Jeniah said immediately.
“And that,” the Chorister said, holding out his hands, “is the reason for the warning. This is not a decision anyone else can make for you. The warning forces you to find your own path here, and that path gives you all you need to know to make the decision.”
Aon placed a hand on the princess’s elbow. The anger had left her face, replaced with sad understanding. “This is why the royal family can feel something other than happiness. It’s why you’re immune to the effects of the Carse.”
Jeniah nodded. “The decision is too important to be made by someone who knows only happiness. The monarch has to understand pain and loss, or the choice is meaningless. But why can you feel sad, Aon?”
The girl glanced at the Chorister. “It’s . . . in my blood.”
Thoughts—like a swarm of angry bees—clouded Jeniah’s mind. It was heartless. Why should she pay for the legacy of her ancestor? She shouldn’t be the one making this choice. She was just twelve. She wrung her hands, her fingertip grazing the opal ring she wore.
No. She was Queen Ascendant. And she had a duty.
“If I consent,” Jeniah said, “the Monarchy continues as it always has. If I break the pact, the Monarchy falls.”
“If you break the pact,” the Chorister said, “pain and sorrow will return to the land. The Monarchy, as you’ve always known it—as anyone alive has ever known it—will cease to be. It will be a new age. You will still be queen. But of what, I wonder? A realm of people whose joy is tainted by fears and problems? A land of plenty no more? The destruction of everything Isaar worked so hard for?”
Jeniah pictured the resulting chaos. That’s why the Monarchy keeps an army. With the return of pain would come fear. And with fear, the potential for war. The soldiers would be needed to restore the peace.
The princess considered. The Chorister was right about one thing: she had no idea about the war that had torn the land apart all those years ago. No one did. How could she condone bringing back the possibility of war when she didn’t fully understand its horrors?
“And would you care to advise your sovereign?” The Chorister turned and addressed Aon.
Aon started, surprised. “The princess has to choose. Why are you asking me?”
“The only way to save your father is by choosing someone to take his place. That can’t happen if the princess ends the pact.”
“Is it true?” Jeniah asked. “Can you save her father if I consent to the pact?”
“For an exchange . . .” The Chorister looked meaningfully at Aon. The girl bowed her head. She wasn’t about to say a word.
Jeniah weighed her options. She could agree and allow her subjects to continue living in a gilded paradise. And it would almost certainly mean that the guilt of allowing those four people every year to become dreadwillows would eat at her, as it did her mother. And her grandmother before. And nearly every monarch in the family line.
But this wasn’t about what it would do to her. It was about the Monarchy. The Chorister was offering exactly what she’d always wanted: to be loved as the monarch who kept the peace. She could have magic and be a great ruler. The price seemed small in comparison to the gain. A queen should be willing to make sacrifices for the good of her people. Shouldn’t she?
Overhead, a faint caw pierced the silence. Jeniah looked up. A falcon soared high above the trees, chasing a flash of red in the dim light. A rubywing.
Yes. She needed to make a sacrifice for her people. All her people.
Jeniah made her decision. She turned to face the Crimson Hoods.
“I am Jeniah, Queen Ascendant of the Monarchy. My family has ruled this land since the very highest mountains were mere pebbles. You were set this task by my ancestors—each renewing the bond as the Monarchy changed hands—and you have done your duties faithfully and served your monarchs well. But that ends here and now with me. I dismiss you.”
The Crimson Hoods stood impassively for so long that Jeniah began to suspect they hadn’t heard her. Or they were being disobedient. Then, without a word, without so much as a gesture, they both turned on their heels and walked away. As they marched deeper into the Carse, the mire rose up to swallow them slowly. The mists curled around their robes like a final embrace. Soon, they were gone.
The air rent with a sound like a great curtain tearing. White and orange sparks burst up out of the briar, racing along and igniting every branch and thorn, until the entire wall surrounding the heart of the Carse was consumed with fire. Like all the other magic Jeniah had witnessed in the Carse, the flames were thoroughly destructive. They twisted and danced until, all at once, the briar crumbled to a cloud of ash. The fire vanished as quickly as it had risen. When the cloud had cleared, Jeniah looked around.
“And as for you, Chorister . . .”
But the Chorister was nowhere to be seen.
Chapter Twenty-four
THE SUN HAD JUST STARTED TO RISE ON EMBERFELL WHEN AON AND Jeniah emerged from the Carse. They hadn’t spoken a word to each other on the trip out. The silence itself said all that needed saying.
Aon couldn’t stop staring at her hands. They’d returned to normal, as had the rest of her, when Jeniah broke the Carse’s power. But even though she was no longer changing, she couldn’t shake the feeling that there was still an imp inside her. She liked the idea.
“
Are you angry with me?” Jeniah’s words came out in a nervous rush.
“Angry? No.”
“But you were.”
Aon chose her words carefully. “I was angry with your family. But they thought they were doing what was best: sacrificing a small number so many more would be happy. And when the Chorister offered me a similar choice, I couldn’t make a decision at all. You made a brave choice. I don’t know how you did it.”
“That’s the decision I made today,” Jeniah said. “Yesterday, I may have chosen differently. I can’t stop thinking that if I’d agreed to the bargain, I could have saved your father.”
“But then someone else would have to be chosen,” Aon said. “I’d like to believe that if my father weren’t under the influence of the Carse, he would never allow someone else to suffer for his own freedom.”
Jeniah shook her head. “There’s not always going to be one, true answer. I guess I’ll have to get used to that.”
They paused on the corner of Emberfell’s town square. Aon could have lain right there on the baker’s front stoop and fallen asleep. Exhaustion pulled at her more strongly than the Carse’s heaviness ever had. But first, she had work to do.
“Your Highness . . . Jeniah, the dreadwillows fed on the Monarchy’s misery. Without it, they’ll die out. It might not happen for a while—trees are stubborn and can live a long time—but they’ll need someone to ease their pain now that the Chorister is gone. I’d like that to be me.”
Jeniah smiled. “I think that’s an excellent idea. But the Carse is very big.”
“The Chorister said the oldest trees aren’t people anymore. I only need to care for the ones in the heart. Like Father. And then there are Pirep and Tali.”
“Then, as my second royal proclamation, I name you the Monarchy’s Caretaker. You will have everything you need to tend the Carse. Ease their suffering, Aon, in any way you can. It won’t make up for what’s been allowed to go on there all these years . . .”
“But it means a lot,” Aon said. “Thank you. If you hadn’t sent me into the Carse, I would never have found my father.”
The princess lowered her eyes. “Aon—” she started.
But Aon held up her hand. “I’ll be okay. The Grandwyns are very nice. Or at least they were. Now that they can feel something more than happiness, who knows what they’ll be like? But I’m sure we’ll get along fine.”
“When I’m queen,” Jeniah said, “I’ll send scouts to explore the lands beyond the Monarchy, looking for your mother.”
It hurt Aon to think about her mother alone, so far away from her loved ones. She prayed her mother had found some sort of peace.
“When they find her,” Jeniah continued, “they’ll say how the Monarchy has changed. And they’ll tell of the important role you played in that change. She’ll come back for you, Aon.”
That single thought replenished all the hope the Carse had siphoned from Aon. She imagined her mother back at the forge in the barn. They would stand side by side, blowing hourglasses and vases and sculptures. Maybe Mother would help her tend Father’s tree. Or maybe the Carse would be long gone by then, no longer able to feed off misery. There was no telling how long it would take to find her mother, after all. But knowing Jeniah would stop at nothing to find Mother convinced Aon that it would happen. Someday.
Slowly, people emerged from their houses. They made their way to work, greeting one another with a nod. Merchants swept away the cobwebs from their windows. To Aon, it all looked like the same Emberfell. But she knew it wasn’t and would never be again.
“I wonder what it’s going to be like,” Aon said, surveying the town. “To wake up with emotions you never experienced. It would be like having a new sense.”
“Or maybe just learning who you really are,” Jeniah said.
I know now who I really am and who I can never be. Aon’s mother’s words returned like a long-lost echo, and Aon understood them at last. Her mother could never be the kind of person to accept what was happening in the Carse.
“It’s not going to be easy,” Aon said. “You heard the Chorister: ‘Pain and sorrow will return to the land.’ ”
“But the joy will be there, too. They get it all. The good, the bad . . . People will return to what they were always meant to be. People will be like you, Aon.”
Aon laughed. It felt good. “Are you sure that’s a good thing?”
Jeniah took her friend’s hand. “You’re the reason I broke the pact, Aon.”
“What do you mean?”
“People are supposed to feel sad. They’re supposed to get angry. Being happy all the time . . . It isn’t real. But you . . . You’re real. And you’re wonderful. You have to know fear to be brave. And I think you’re the bravest person I’ve ever met. The Monarchy needs more people like you.”
Aon had never thought of herself as brave. Of all the feelings she’d hidden away from the people around her, courage was something she’d never considered.
Jeniah hugged Aon. The two friends stood there, letting silence speak for their hearts.
Then Aon stepped back and bowed low. Jeniah giggled and nodded regally. Eyes connected, they backed away from each other slowly, neither wanting to be the first to turn and face this strange, new Monarchy without the other. Finally, the princess squared her shoulders and wove her way through the growing crowd on the street, on her way back to Nine Towers.
“Constable!”
The shrill cry from up the street made people nearby jump in surprise. Aon turned to see Laius, still in his nightshirt, running barefoot down the cobblestone. His familiar, friendly smile was gone. Now, his brow was furrowed, and a look of sheer terror twisted his face.
Just before Laius reached the constable’s door, he caught sight of Aon and stopped. Aon waved at him. The boy looked dumbstruck. Then he turned and barreled straight at his adopted sister, nearly knocking her over with a powerful hug.
“You’re safe!” he cried. “The princess found you. I’m so glad. When I woke up this morning and realized you weren’t home, I was . . . I was . . .”
“ ‘Worried,’ ” Aon said, teaching him one of Mother’s secret words. Well, secret no longer. “You were worried. Thank you, Laius.”
“What happened to you in there?” he demanded. He suddenly seemed quite cross that Aon had worried him. And she loved that.
“I’ve been to the heart of the Carse,” she announced. “In fact, the princess has placed me in charge of its care. And I’m going to need your help.”
“Me?”
“Yes. Forget about glassblowing. I need your natural talents. Listen.” Aon hummed the strange waltz that the Chorister sang to ease the dreadwillows’ pain. The boy nodded, and then he repeated the tune back with his glorious singing voice. “Perfect.”
“How will my singing help?” Laius asked.
“Let’s go home,” she said, taking his arm. “I’ll explain there.”
Together, they walked back. Aon took a deep breath of air filled with the scents of the baker’s scones and hay from the nearby livery stable. Something about this morning seemed more . . . in focus than any other. She felt like she’d finally wiped away a haze through which she’d been seeing life all these years. The reds on the fall leaves now glowed like hot coals. The droning chatter of the villagers starting the day changed to a glorious symphony of voices: happy, sad, and everything in between.
The princess was right. Nothing would be the same. And that was a good thing. This new world came with new feelings. For Aon, they were emotions she’d felt for a long, long time. But even Aon found herself feeling something brand-new.
I’m not broken.
The words pulsed in Aon’s head, foreign and peculiar. Like some ancient tongue that had lost all meaning. And at the same time, they radiated within, thawing all that remained of the Carse’s frigid heaviness.
I’m not broken, and I never have been.
Chapter Twenty-five
JENIAH CONTINUED TO WATCH THE SU
NRISE FROM THE BALCONY IN her bedroom. She ached for sleep, but she had to see it. The rest of the Monarchy, much like Emberfell, looked unaffected by what had happened in the Carse. Great volcanoes hadn’t erupted. Monsters hadn’t crawled up over the mountains and devoured the towns and villages. The Monarchy had not fallen.
And yet, it had. Everything that had made the Monarchy work for a thousand years was gone. The warning had been right after all. But something new would rise from this fall. Jeniah swore to that. It really was a very different place. And maybe, the princess thought, it’s time for a very different kind of queen.
The door to Jeniah’s bedroom flew open, slamming into the wall with the sound of a cannon’s report. Jeniah glanced over her shoulder to find Skonas storming in, a great sack slung over one shoulder, Gerheart, the falcon, on the other. When he spotted her, he grunted and overturned the sack. Mounds of books fell to the floor.
“Well,” the tutor said scornfully, “it seems we have some work to do. The healers assure me your mother doesn’t have much time left. You need to learn to be queen and soon. And since you refuse to set the fourth lesson, we’ll resort to these books. You like books? Well, grand! Start with that red one. It tells you all about diplomacy. Very dry and boring. Not unlike you.”
It was as if the conversation they’d shared in the servants’ tower was nothing more than a dream. Gone was his earlier kindness. This was again the Skonas she first knew: mercurial, cold, and demanding.
Jeniah forgot her fatigue. “How dare you! You have had more than ample time to teach me. Instead, you did nothing. You sat by, wasting time you knew my mother didn’t have.”
“You wasted that time,” Skonas snapped back. “What thanks did I get for the help I gave? None. No thanks at all from the spoiled princess. You want to be a great queen? I don’t see how that can happen until you learn to stop thinking solely of yourself.”
“I’ve been thinking of the people of this Monarchy,” she said. “In fact, I—”
