by Hannah West
I scowled.
“Are you that desperate for a reason not to go?”.
“You know what happened there, don’t you?” I asked, my voice a little hoarse. “My parents?”
Mercer nodded solemnly. His broad hands rested on my shoulders. “But King Myron executed the murderers. He promised that Perispos would leave its superstitions about elicromancers in the past. Isn’t that why he wanted to marry you or Ambrosine? To symbolize that his kingdom no longer held any prejudice against our kind?”
“Yes, but we haven’t exactly sent our best.” I kneaded my temples. Just a moment ago, I’d longed to flee far from the palace in Pontaval, but now I only wanted to return to my bed and sink into it like a sugar cube melting in warm tea. “What if I find that Ambrosine has somehow worked around her probation? Isn’t it better if Valory goes when she’s back, to confiscate Ambrosine’s elicrin stone if needed?”
“You agreed—we all did—that Valory should wield her power over others as seldom as possible,” Mercer said, dropping his warm hands from my shoulders. “If she goes to Perispos, it will provoke unease and alarm. If you go, it will look like nothing more than an overdue family visit.”
“I suppose I could bring Perennia with me to ease the tension. Ambrosine adores her as much as I do.” I crossed my arms and turned a flat expression to the snowy mountain spines snaking off into the distance. “Perhaps a voyage will cool my people’s anger—as long as they don’t think I’m absconding.”
A dimple hollowed out in his right cheek. “You, running away from a fight? Never.”
I gave him a wry smile. “I’ll throttle you if you’ve sent me to Perispos over nothing. Give my best to the others.”
“Stay safe.”
In a whisper of wind, Mercer was gone.
The solitude was less alluring than it had seemed moments ago, and the enduring tower a great deal more ominous.
FOUR
GLISETTE
PONTAVAL, VOLARRE
THE next morning the courtyard was almost shockingly quiet. When I’d returned, Hubert reported that the riot had been “handled.” Out of fear of what that meant, I posed no further questions.
But now, as the soles of my silk slippers whispered across the stones, I wondered what might have happened to the boy who had been yanked from his perch by one of my armed defenders.
“My father enjoyed traveling to Perispos before he lost his ships in the wave,” Larabelle said, cradling a hefty tome as she and Devorian waited to see us off. “He used to bring gifts like black truffles and olives and beautiful paintings. They were such treats for my sisters and me.”
I had tasted black truffles and olives brought from Perispos, and I cared for neither, nor did I much care for the muted, dusky color palettes of the paintings my parents had received as gifts from Perispi nobles. But Larabelle was only hoping to put me in a sunnier mood about the impending journey, so I offered her a smile. “We’ll be sure to bring you some.”
Larabelle blushed and offered me the book. “I found this in the library. It’s about the Agrimas religion. Devorian said you stopped your Perispi language and culture lessons after your parents died. I thought you might want to brush up.”
“Lovely,” I said, accepting the gift and staggering a little with the weight of it. “I so enjoy reading about how elicromancers were spawned by an evil deity.”
“Clever as she is, Glisette never learned the words ‘thank you,’” Devorian said derisively. His soft waves were bound with a bit of blue fabric, and he looked so much like Father—except that Father was never derisive.
“Is that why some of them hate us?” Perennia asked. “They think we spawned from an evil being?”
“Only a few zealots still believe that,” Devorian explained. “Most are very accepting. One of my former lady callers”—he paused to glance down at Larabelle, who gave him a charitable half smile—“said that her family was more devout than most, but even they viewed Agrimas as more of a tradition than religion. Not to say they were completely without prejudice; she said imagining their disapproval of me made our tryst all the more thrilling.”
“Is that necessary to your point?” I demanded. Devorian’s magical gift of omnilingualism had made it easier for him to sample faraway places without leaving his den of debauchery. I’d always known how he busied himself in the nearby abandoned palace before Valory cursed him with a beastly form, but I didn’t want to hear the particulars.
“I’m merely saying you’ll be welcomed warmly, and everything will be fine,” Devorian said, tugging on one of Perennia’s curls. “And don’t let Glissy fool you. Perispi language and culture used to be her favorite subject. I once caught her reading a book about Agrimas that hadn’t even been translated into Nisseran.”
“I was fascinated by how gullible people can be,” I explained. “Their simplistic creed of virtues and vices sounded like a tale to make children behave.”
“We should be going,” Perennia said, squinting at the sun. “We don’t want to miss launch.”
I sighed and looked at Devorian. “Use the hand mirror locked in Father’s desk to tell Ambrosine we’re coming, but be sure to put it back. I want her eyes and ears nowhere near state business.”
“Of course,” Devorian said, understanding the need to be careful. Ambrosine could still access any mirrors she had enchanted. She had taken one with her to communicate with us, and we had destroyed all but one here. We rarely used it.
Perennia and I passed through the open courtyard gates. We would materialize to the eastern shore and board a ship to Perispos. Mortals thought materializing solved every inconvenience, but materializing great distances to unfamiliar lands was too dangerous to attempt. If we found ourselves in the middle of the ocean and somehow lost our elicrin stones in the commotion, we would be stranded.
Oliva shuffled forward to hand off our velvet-coated suitcases. We kissed Devorian and Larabelle farewell and materialized to a predetermined location, atop a green hill overlooking the eastern port city of Eriewal.
The sun burst through dramatic clouds and the distant gray sea swayed, smacking the rocky bases of the rolling hills. Salty air was sharp in my nostrils.
“Why in the world would I want to lug this monstrous thing around?” I asked, shifting the weight of the book to retain a tenuous hold on my suitcase. “It’ll sink our ship straight to the seabed.”
“You’re such a sorehead this morning!” Perennia extracted the book from my grip as though it were a living thing I had mistreated.
Someone cleared his throat behind us. We turned to find four royal guards bowing their heads. Hubert had arranged our travel accommodations via magical missives, and he must have asked for local escorts. I scowled as one relieved me of my light burden. I then started along the uneven path winding downhill to the dock market. Perennia and the guards followed.
Our ship was called the Soaring Heart, and from here I could see the majestic vessel rocking gently in the bay, its mighty masts jutting toward the clouds. As we walked through the market toward the docking slip where a ferry waited to bear us hence, subjects recognized us and stepped aside, presenting bows and curtsies. The aroma of brined fish and the whining of a fiddle plucked at my nerves.
We passed a shop selling wood paintings of me and my siblings, inferior likenesses of the official portraits displayed in the great hall back home, which the mediocre artist must have had occasion to study. If I had known back then that I would be queen someday, I would have worn something more subdued and austere than the circlet of pearls and layered lilac gown.
But I didn’t have much time to regret past wardrobe choices. Something hot and wet struck me across the jaw.
I used my fingers to scrape away what appeared to be meat pie filling and pastry crust. Gasps sliced through the sudden silence. Two of my escorts hedged in around me, tense and tall and suffocating, so I could not see where the next pie came from, only where it exploded: on the face of my portrait hanging in the s
hop doorway.
The other two escorts shoved through the crowd and grabbed the perpetrator—a middle-aged woman with a tired face and the sinewy arms of a hard worker. She held her chin high as they dragged her toward me.
“That’s for the children who starved because of you and your family,” she spat.
Indignation, embarrassment, animus boiled in my blood. Slap her face, a vicious voice inside me said. Toss her in prison or lock her in the pillory.
But with a pang of shame, I thought of the young boy who had thrown the rock at the window, the way my guards had rushed to defend me, no questions asked. They would slay this woman on the spot if I commanded it.
It was a power I was duty-bound to wield with compassion.
But that didn’t mean I had to roll over like a submissive dog.
I slid my thumb down my cheek, gathering warm filling that smelled of black pepper and cloves, which I made a show of sucking off while staring at the woman. My guards each sported one rapier and one dagger, and I reached for the nearest one’s dagger, sliding it from the scabbard engraved with our kingdom’s lily crest.
The people in the crowd gasped again. Perennia uttered my name in a cautious tone. Since I’d pulled the blade out facing down, I twirled the weapon’s handle over my fingers to deftly reverse the grip, something I’d casually practiced but wasn’t sure I could do without flubbing it until that very moment. I took one step, then another, until I towered over the insolent woman, who appeared more ill at ease with every beat that passed.
But I didn’t press the blade’s edge to her throat as my pride desired, nor did I take it to one of her knobby fingers, greasy from the pies, as Uncle Mathis might have done. Instead, I turned and strode back toward the portrait of me, smeared with oozing filling, and dragged the blade over the wood and cheap paint until a gash marred one eye.
When that was done, I lightly tossed it back to my guard. He caught it by the handle, sheathing it along with the brief flicker of surprise that crossed his face. The crowd gave me a wide berth as I walked away.
On the ferry, Perennia sat silent and tense at my side. After we reached the merchant ship and strode up the gangplank, crewmembers waved us past the captain’s cabin to the private guest cabin. It was installed with a desk, a dining table, and a curtained bed tucked into an alcove. Six windows curved with the shape of the ship’s stern, looking out on the gyrating sea.
I sighed and dropped my belongings beside the bed, eager to access the cruet of brandy on the dining table. Perennia sank onto the mattress and hugged Larabelle’s book to her chest, staring at me.
“What?” I asked as I splashed brandy into a pear-shaped crystal goblet. “Did you think I was going to execute her?”
“No,” Perennia muttered. But I wasn’t convinced. She pried open the dense book and began to read. I took a few swigs and looked outside again, thinking how long a fortnight would feel undulating over an endless sea.
“That’s interesting,” Perennia mused after what seemed a long while.
When she didn’t elaborate, I indulged her. “What?”
“In Perispos, they build edifices to honor both the good and evil deities, whom they call the Holies and the Fallen. The Holy edifices are on top of hills and the Fallen edifices are underground.”
“Yes, I’ve heard. Quite fascinating.”
“The Holy edifices are for praise and prayer, but the Fallen edifices are for self-reflection,” she explained, disregarding my sarcasm. “The former feature murals depicting joy and redemption, and the latter, suffering and carnage.”
“And elicromancers spawning from demons, I suppose?”
Perennia frowned. “Why are you acting this way?”
“Why aren’t you? This nonsense inspired those zealots to kill our parents.” My tone had gone so cold so as to become brittle, and it broke over the last two words.
My younger sister furrowed her fair brow. “Just because some believers interpret the holy text that way doesn’t mean the whole religion is worthy of ridicule.”
I plunked down my goblet, already feeling the warmth of the spirit settle in my chest. “You are more forgiving than I am. I’ve no curiosity about their edifices or their deities. I only want to make sure Ambrosine hasn’t set her new kingdom on a course for disaster. And then I want to go home.”
“Home, where everything is going so well?” Perennia asked.
I wanted to bristle at the irony in her tone, yet I knew she wasn’t using it to wound, as my other siblings and I often did. She watched sadness clear the bitterness from my expression. She stood.
“Don’t,” I said from across the cabin, splaying a hand to stop her from using her Solacer power to relieve me of my taxing emotions. “I don’t need you to take this away.”
She set her brow in determination, but merely strode to the dining table and sloshed brandy into another crystal goblet. “When Father was troubled, I used to hear Mother tell him this: ‘It’s easy to find fault with whoever wears the crown, but harder to wear it.’ You’ve taken on a role that has never been easy for anyone, Glisette. And it will be even more difficult if you let your prejudices stand in the way of ruling justly. Mother and Father wouldn’t have wanted us to judge an entire religion based on the actions of a few.” She raised her goblet of amber liquid. “To finding your stride as a benevolent queen.”
I clinked my crystal against hers and swallowed the rest of my serving. Perennia took a sip and grimaced in disgust. “How do you drink that, and so early in the morning?”
I smiled a little as she forced herself to drain her serving, finishing it off with a gag. She crossed back to the bed and settled in to read while I stared at the rising sun sparkling over the waters.
At last I heard the distant hollers of crewmembers and felt the boat gently shift. “I think we’re leaving,” I said, but turned to find Perennia asleep sitting up, the book sprawled on the coverlet beside her. The brandy must have gone to her head.
I tented my fingers against my smile for a moment, hoping to hide it should she notice me staring tenderly at her. But she didn’t awaken. I padded toward her, shedding my lightweight spring mantle to spread over her shoulders.
As I pulled away, an illustration within the book caught my eye. It was a crude relief printing depicting miserable humans writhing in darkness, their mouths open wide with tormented screams I could almost hear. In the background stood four shadowy figures.
It took a few beats for what I’d learned in lessons to return, sloshing a little with the brandy. I didn’t even need to squint and read the script at the foot of the illustration that provided the names for each Fallen deity. I remembered.
The first was Themera, meaning Cruelty. She wore a crown of knives. The second was Silimos, or Apathy. A thin veil covered her emaciated form. The third went by the name Robivoros, or Depravity. Teeth grew from unnatural places all over his sinewy body. And the fourth was called Nexantius, or Vainglory. His flesh sparkled like diamonds, but his face was featureless, a reflective mask.
My gaze traced the final masculine silhouette. Nexantius, the Fallen of Vainglory, was the one who was believed to have spawned elicromancers. He was, in their view, our creator. That was how the Perispis viewed us: superior, mighty, boastful, conceited.
And Ambrosine would do absolutely nothing to convince them otherwise.
It was hard to swallow around a growing lump of regret. I had been so ready to rid Pontaval of my sister’s overbearing presence. I knew she might try to bleed the king dry with her love of fine things, but I hadn’t pondered how her moral shortcomings might undo Perispos’ acceptance of our kind.
I snapped the book shut and determined not to think of Fallen deities.
I didn’t know much about sea travel or navigation, but I could feel the pull of the wind’s might, our vessel resisting the northeasterly blasts that tried to push us off course.
Slipping out the door of our cabin, I made my way up to the quarterdeck, past sailors tugging and t
ying ropes, to where the stocky young captain stood stiffly at the ship’s wheel. He bowed his head as I joined him, and I returned the gesture.
Hooking a hand on the railing to keep my balance, I turned away from Volarre’s green shores to the rising sun.
“Admiring the view, Your Majesty?” the captain asked.
“Something like that,” I said, and released the railing to splay my palms at my sides. I could feel the power stirring in the depths of the elicrin stone resting against my sternum. My breaths and the wild winds became one, together, the same, and the air grew bitter and chilling.
The captain shivered as my icy gale swept over us, driving into the sails until they swelled, until we were gliding easily and speedily downwind. The icy wind laced over my scalp. My golden hair blinded me as it thrashed like the Volarian flags fixed to the masts.
When the wind fell still, the sailors stared at me, huddling into their coats. I heaved out one last sigh. When I turned, we could no longer see Volarre’s shores in the distance.
“Fetch me if you need further assistance,” I said, and strode back to the passage leading belowdecks.
FIVE
KADRI
BEYRIAN, YORTH
AN hour before the other Realm Alliance leaders would arrive, I donned a leaf-green skirt with a matching midriff-baring bodice and bundled my black hair into a high knot. I set my emerald-studded crown on my head and felt silly somehow, like a child playing dress-up—or maybe that feeling resulted from the elicrin stone hiding beneath my collar.
I descended to the veranda and surveyed the table set for seven. A bittersweet mood swept over me. On the one hand, the lingering sense of victory was empowering. We had survived. We had conquered. We had begun rebuilding.
On the other, the road to recovery seemed littered with stumbling blocks.
I realized I was gripping the back of a chair so tightly that my palms had begun to sweat. Releasing it, I turned to cross back through the banquet hall so I could greet the guests as they arrived.
