Northern Lights, Southern Stars

by C. S. Johnson

  “I am sure we can work out a good date as a compromise,” Rion says. “It is getting closer to the winter months, and I see no reason why the kingdom can’t look forward to a Christmas wedding.”

  “Yes, because the kingdom is your primary concern,” the Queen says. Her voice is grating, but she still does not object to our union.

  “Sometimes that means changing traditions,” Rion argues. “In the meantime, I do believe Ebony should move her quarters and settle into her future role.”

  I fully expect Queen Varyes to disagree, but she nods. “I will have the servants make the arrangements tonight,” she says. “And I will call on Fabrice in the morning, to make sure that the Princess has a new wardrobe.”

  Speechless, I stand there in awe, until the Queen excuses herself with Enri, and Rion and I are once more left alone.

  “I can’t believe this,” I say, feeling humble and exalted. “I didn’t think my life would ever be the same once my father died. But now ... oh, Rion, it’s so much better than I could’ve dreamed.”

  “Why wouldn’t it?”

  “I suppose you’re right.” I watch as Queen Varyes turns the corner, heading back into the palace. “Even your mother has said she is fine with us getting married.”

  “I had to corner her into it,” Rion says. “But I agree. She is accepting of her fate.”

  “Our fate,” I correct him softly, and Rion kisses my forehead gently as he squeezes my hand.

  “I know you’ve suffered quite a bit while I was not here,” he says. “But I know you’ve never lost hope, and now that we are engaged, and we will be together, I will do everything I can to make sure that your hope is rewarded.”

  I bury my face in his chest, too embarrassed to tell him that he is all the reward I need.

  Another throat clears behind us. “Your Highnesses.”

  Rion and I turn to see a Maruli gentlemen standing behind us.

  “Hello,” Rion says, as the man bows. “Have you come to offer your congratulations, too?”

  “No.” The man stands up straight. “If anything, I have come to offer you a word of warning.”

  “Warning?” I look up at Rion, uncertain.

  “There’s no need to do that.” Rion’s voice is kind and level, but I can tell that he is displeased by the man’s words.

  “You are not a stranger in this country,” the man says. “But I am.”

  “I assume you have a name?” Rion asks.

  “I am Dr. Merlacur, a member and supporter of the Refugee Return Movement.”

  Rion arches his brow. “I was not aware that anyone from that organization was coming. I’d only seen rejections from my invitations.”

  “I am still a respected citizen,” Dr. Merlacur says. “Or at least, among the other Maruli and Pomaruli.”

  “Pomaruli?” The word feels funny on my lips, but no one describes the term to me. Rion is already insisting that if the man does not approve of me, he is free to leave.

  “Your organization is known for transporting the Maruli across the sea, if nothing else,” Rion says. “If you’re in a position of good standing, you should be able to easily acquire passage.”

  “Some of us do not enjoy life as a second-class citizen in Pommier,” Dr. Merlacur replies. “You might dismiss my organization, but I seek to help my fellow Maruli who have made their home here in Pommier return to a better life, and because of that, I can say you are wrong to marry the Princess of my home nation.”

  I am surprised at Dr. Merlacur’s objection. The Maruli people have never expressed anything but their approval when it came to me. Even though I knew some wanted to return to Marula, I didn’t think they wanted to leave Pommier because of me.

  “What other reaction can you rightfully expect from us? The Princess has failed to lead us against the Queen’s discrimination,” Dr. Merlacur says, nodding toward me. “She agreed to her servitude and her status reduction.”

  “That’s not fair—” Rion attempts to defend me, but Dr. Merlacur cuts him off.

  “The Princess is unable to rule us,” the man says. “It is better if we return to the homeland and establish a new ruling class. One that understands us, not one that will neglect us and fall prey to Pommierian authority with the least provocation. What does she know about leading a nation? She hasn’t even been able to take care of herself.”

  “I believe you are gravely underestimating Princess Ebony,” Rion argues. “And at that, I will bid you goodnight, sir.”

  Rion starts to pull me away from Dr. Merlacur, leading me back into the palace. As we leave, Dr. Merlacur scowls at me.

  “Needing rescue from a lowly doctor,” he scoffs. “Congratulations on your engagement, Princess. It seems you’ll be able to have someone take care of you better now, and I suppose that is a reason for any Maruli to celebrate.”

  My mouth drops open in shock and hurt, and I am unable to say anything as Rion walks with me.

  Rion notices, and hurries to comfort me. “Don’t listen to him. If he’s part of the Refugee Return Movement, he wouldn’t want you to be a good ruler. He’d prefer that you went back to Marula and stayed there.”

  “I suppose.” My mouth feels dry and my tongue feels thick; I don’t want to admit how right Dr. Merlacur was about me.

  “At least Mother has given her consent,” Rion adds, trying to cheer me. “She is the harder audience to appease. We’ll work on the rest of the nation as the wedding is prepared. You’ll see.”

  “Yes.” I nod, having no other answer.

  “It’ll be all right, Ebony.” Rion grins at me. “You’ll see. Your father taught me that the smallest deeds can help prepare for the throne.”

  “I hope you’re right.”

  “Well, good,” Rion says kindly. “There’s no need to worry then, is there? Your hope has not failed you yet.”

  “You’re right,” I agree, cheered up by his kindness. I lean against him. “There’s always hope.”

  *11*

  Ebony

  “OH, EBONY, YOU’RE SO pretty!”

  As the days go by, and I further embrace my role as Rion’s future wife and the future princess of the Pommierian Empire, Damaris’ sighs and swoons only seem to increase in sound and frequency.

  “You look lovely, too,” I tell her, but she waves my compliments aside. She is in her new maidservant outfit, but Damaris seems more enthusiastic about my new wardrobe additions from the Queen.

  She is right to be excited, too. The outfits are lovely, with their damask and silk, even some brocade. There are traces of lace and ribbons and ruffles, the frilly additions that seem to me, after years of simple petticoats, completely unnecessary.

  “You should enjoy them, Miss Ebony,” Viola says from the mirror in my room.

  “I am,” I assure Vi, who grimaces in return.

  “They are pretty, but you’ll soon change your mind.”

  I frown, holding up the latest green and ivory-colored dress Fabrice delivered just moments ago. “What do you mean?”

  “The Queen wants you to wear the whale bone corset today.”

  “Not another corset,” I mutter. “I almost fainted from the last one, and right in front of the whole farewell party!”

  Several of the ambassadors, having spent the last few weeks celebrating with Rion and me, were set to return home. The Queen hosted a breakfast for them, and not only had I been unable to eat, I had barely been able to breathe while we were there. Rion had been held up for a good hour with some of the spice traders who came to the palace, and if he hadn’t come and excused me, I would’ve made an egregious social faux pas.

  The lines in Vi’s older face increase. “Today’s venture is for the presentation of the newest ship in Her Majesty’s fleet.”

  “Another public appearance?” I sigh. “The Queen never went out of the palace if she could help it before Rion and I were engaged.”

  Vi shrugs. “Perhaps this is part of your punishment for letting Rion secure your hand.”


  “Oh, pish!” Damaris puts her hands on her hips and squares herself before Vi’s ghostly reflection. “These gowns are lovely, and so far, Ebony’s been able to wear them without trouble.”

  I pull out the whale bone corset that Viola referred to, and I have to admit, I am a little distressed. The lacing looks uncomfortable, to say the least, and the dress will add several pounds worth of clothing.

  “But I almost didn’t last on our last excursion,” I say, recalling the charity calls down in the villages surrounding the palace.

  “The Queen didn’t know how warm it would be and sending up those wool undergarments was just a precaution,” Damaris says. “You managed to make it back to the palace in one piece.”

  I don’t want to relive the sweating and other symptoms of heat exhaustion I’d almost succumbed to while we’d been out. I knew Queen Varyes would never allow me to forget it. And after Dr. Merlacur’s comments at the ball, I didn’t need another reason to feel like a useless prop beside Rion.

  “It’s not like you had any other issues,” Damaris says. “I mean, just the clothes, right?”

  “Well ... ” I glance back at Vi, who lets out an inaudible sigh. “There was the comb she’d sent with that one gown.”

  “What’s wrong with a hairbrush?” Damaris asks.

  “It straightened my knots, but it managed to pull out some of my hair, remember?” I mindlessly run my hands through my puffy hair, thinking about it. I had almost lost more than I’d ever wanted to, thanks to that comb from the Queen.

  Thankfully, I had thick hair, and it was used to hardship in Pommier’s humid clime. A maid had been combing through the longer ends of my hair, when we noticed that the comb causing more knots than getting rid of them. I’d had to get the bottom of my hair cut to my shoulders in order to even it out.

  It was more defiant and bouncy than ever, and I was glad when Damaris and some of her sisters came to braid it up for me in tight rows. The Queen demanded, after a few days, that I get rid of the style, saying that, while it represented the Maruli, a Princess could hardly be expected to keep the same hairstyle for more than a day or two.

  “Oh.” Damaris goes quiet. “I thought that was an accident, too.”

  I nod. “I’m sure it’s not something the Queen is used to looking out for,” I say carefully.

  Damaris and Vi both look at me, and they know I am being too kind.

  But seeing each little kindness from the Queen, after a lifetime of her apathy and years of her harshness and neglect, I don’t want to believe they are acts of punishment or retribution, especially at her vehement insistence that the maids or someone else should’ve known better than to cause me any pain, even if it was accidental pain.

  In addition, the Queen has allowed me to move into the Princess’ rooms of the palace, I am invited to dinner, my body has been washed, renewed to a shining perfection thanks to her maids and the other servants. Several of them are my friends, and I didn’t experience anything negative from any one of them. Indeed, many of them were so happy for me, I felt humbled by their response to my good news.

  Damaris snatches the whale corset out of my hands. “Here,” she says. “I’ll help you today.”

  “I might need an older maid to help me with the lacing—Oh!” I put my hand over my mouth as Damaris grabs some shears and pokes the blade through the corset at the top, breaking the loops where the laces would hold my figure. “Damaris.”

  She tosses the corset away. “There. You can’t wear it now, and you can just tell Queen Varyes that one of your servants discovered a hole in it if she’s really concerned.”

  I glance back at Vi, knowing she has to report on me back to the Queen when Horatio demands it. “What do you think?” I ask.

  “I can’t do anything about it now,” Vi says. “Just get the dress on and get down there. If you can, without the smaller figure.”

  Thankfully, I am still able to squeeze into the dress, although it is an uncomfortable fit. From all my years as a servant, lifting heavy objects and working long hours, my figure is a little more box-like than the hourglass that is preferred by the court. Damaris manages to tie a ribbon around my waist, synching in my middle, and it allows me to appear thinner at the waist.

  “Thank you,” I say, grabbing onto her and hugging her. I glance over at Vi. “You are both such wonderful friends to me.”

  Vi says nothing, while Damaris lets out a cheer. With their support behind me, I head out of my room and prepare to meet with the Queen and Prince Rion.

  *12*

  Varyes

  “HORATIO!”

  My fist hits the hard wood of my bureau, and I bite back a cry of pain as my speciavo appears in the mirror before me.

  His ghostly face has made me glad all these years; even before I punished him, with Hortensia’s help, I was attracted to the strong angle of his chin and the fierce blue of his eyes. He has been with me all these years, ever since he was punished to life as a mirror-slave for rejecting my advances.

  Rejecting the Queen is a threat to her rule, and, as such, the charge of treason seemed only reasonable. For years, he has been cursed to only tell the truth and, as he’s admitted to me the bitterness he carries for the rest of the free world, I have no reason to distrust him.

  I like to think we would be friends, if mirror-slaves and queens could be friends.

  But now, I wonder ... I wonder if he would think of betraying me, too.

  My son had no qualms, and even before him, King Maru had denied me, too.

  “Horatio!” I yell. “Tell me. How is the progress coming for my plans?”

  “It is on schedule, Your Majesty,” he assures me. His youthful, dulcet tone relaxes me, if only a little, and I stand up straight before him.

  “Good,” I say with a huff. “After my patient planning, and all the arrangements Enri and Alfonse have made, I would hate to think this won’t work. You’re sure the Mopana have taken the bait?”

  “Alfonse came last night and he’s on his way to give the message to the prince,” Horatio says. “He should be here before too long.”

  I run my hand through my loosened hair. I see more white hair gleam in the small amount of light coming into my room and frown.

  It is bad enough that my first husband died, leaving me all alone in the world, and then Rion and Maru rejected me in favor of Ebony. Did my beauty have to flee from me, too?

  Reaching out, I grab some of the magic powder that Hortensia made for me. I touch it to my face and then splatter it through my hair. Instantly, the wrinkles on my face and the black bags under my tired eyes are hidden, and the white in my hair darkens to my former blonde.

  I grab other makeup, too, outlining my eyes with kohl as Horatio continues to tell me Enri’s preparation and the deals he struck with the Mopana.

  “Any idea of when Alfonse will be here?” I ask. “I hate to leave him and his brother on their own for too long. Fools, both of them, and, if they weren’t useful, I’d have had them killed.”

  “Just like King Maru?” Horatio asks.

  His voice is innocent enough, but I glare at him. “I’ve told you before, King Maru ate one of my wishing apples. He was content to die and be reunited with his first Queen. That’s not my fault.”

  “Oh, yes.” Horatio smirks. “I’m sure handing him the apple, after you’d had Hortensia prepare it for him was merely a miscalculation on your part.”

  He is not wrong, but I prefer not to think of the incident. King Maru was dead, and he really only had himself to blame for it. When I remind Horatio of that truth, he nods.

  “I understand, Majesty.” Horatio smirks.

  “Then you will understand I don’t want to hear King Maru’s name from your frothy mouth ever again.”

  Horatio was right to call Maru’s death a miscalculation, just as it had been a miscalculation to wed him in the first place. I refuse to admit it to anyone, even Horatio or Hortensia, but I can understand Rion’s obsession with the Maruli and Ebo
ny. Seeing Maru for the first time, and then hearing him sing for his dead wife’s memorial, I had succumbed to a fever of love I never thought I’d feel again. When he’d failed to love me as I wanted, after all the years we’d been together, I gave him a choice: Sing, or eat the apple.

  He did not want to give me the gift of song, so he took my apple instead, saying if it was my desire to give him an apple from the heart of my garden, it was the least he could do to enjoy it.

  He took it and ate it as my gift to him, and as he died, he gave me a kind smile and told me he was sorry he’d disappointed me; the fool didn’t even know as he was dying that it’d been poisoned.

  No, I do not want to hear about King Maru ever again. And especially not from Horatio.

  I narrow my eyes at my mirror-slave again. “Now, tell me. Have you seen Alfonse?”

  “You might not even have to go to the new ship’s christening today.”

  “Oh, that’s wonderful,” I mutter, grabbing another one of Hortensia’s creams. “I’ve been using extra-powerful spells to get me through the time I have to be nice to that Maruli brat.”

  “It’s good that you’ve made your commitment to honoring your son convincing,” Horatio says.

  He pauses here for a moment, and I cock my eyebrow at him while I brush rouge along my cheekbones. “Yes?” I say. “You want to say more?”

  “I did warn you that your little tricks wouldn’t succeed,” Horatio says. There is a pleased hint of malice in his words. “Ebony is not likely to trust you entirely, but for Rion’s sake she is giving you the benefit of the doubt.”

  “Well, if there’s one good thing about my son’s rebellion, it’s that I can use it to exploit his weakness—and hers, too.”

  I pull out the paint for my lips, ignoring Horatio’s gloating look.

  “It will be easier to catch her off guard when you go to murder her if you didn’t encourage her doubt,” he adds.

  “Enri and Alfonse have assured me they will enjoy killing her, no matter what she’s like,” I say. “Enri is happy to have my word for his social advancement, and Alfonse was easy enough to buy off with the promise of riches and pleasure.”