The True Queen

by Zen Cho

  They were great, racking coughs; each rumbled through her body like an earthquake. Muna heard Sakti and Henrietta’s voices raised in concern, but she held up her hand, warding them off. A crisis approached. She was almost at the point—almost—

  She clapped a hand over her mouth, her eyes streaming, and brought up the scale.

  “Stand back,” she gasped when she could speak.

  Muna straightened up, holding out her hand to the naga. Rollo Threlfall’s scale gleamed wetly on her palm.

  “That’s disgusting!” exclaimed Sakti. “What is it?”

  But before she could look closer, the naga’s head darted out on her long neck. A rough tongue flicked over Muna’s palm. Muna snatched her hand away with a cry, but fortunately her fingers were intact. Georgiana had only plucked the scale off her palm.

  The naga swallowed and said, “This is Rollo’s!”

  “Yes,” said Muna. Georgiana seemed less cross than might have been expected, but all the same Muna was glad Sakti stood between her and the naga. “He lent it to me so that I could find your cavern and rescue Mr. Damerell.”

  “That is how you got around my wards, is it? Let us go to Britain, by all means,” said Georgiana grimly. “I am sure Rollo is there, and I shall have a great deal to say to him!”

  “Have you sufficient magic now?” said Sakti.

  “There was some good Threlfall magic in that scale,” Georgiana allowed. “Still, Rollo was the runt of his litter. A whole mortal would settle the point beyond doubt.”

  She directed a hungry glance towards Henrietta and Muna, but Henrietta was looking away.

  “Did you hear that?” she said.

  When they had all fallen silent, they could hear metal chiming against metal, and the heavy tread of many feet—the noise of an advancing crowd.

  “The Queen’s Guard,” said Sakti, turning pale.

  “You have been betrayed,” said Georgiana. She glared at the stone trees. “I’d wager it was one of these disreputable creatures that did it. I should set fire to the lot if I were you!”

  Even as she spoke, Georgiana was transforming, expanding at a remarkable rate. First she was the size of a donkey, then a water buffalo, then finally a small elephant—though she stopped there, short of her original size.

  “Come along, now,” the naga said. “There is no time to waste!” As they stared, she added, “To ride a Threlfall is an honour not many people have survived. I shall expect a queenly reward for this, Saktimuna!”

  “You shall have it,” said Sakti. But she did not climb up onto the naga. Instead she said to Muna, “Go on, kak. I will come—after I have seen to the trees!”

  “What is there to see to?” Muna protested.

  But Sakti had already disappeared into the dark spaces between the pillars. Muna hesitated, wondering whether to follow her, but Georgiana snapped:

  “Do you wish to be devoured by the Fairy Queen?”

  “I shall only be a moment!” cried Sakti’s voice from among the trees.

  “Shall we go, Muna?” said Henrietta. Her voice was steady. She would not admit to being afraid, but her hand was cold on Muna’s arm, and it trembled like a leaf in the wind.

  They climbed onto the naga’s back together, helping each other up as the army of spirits approached. Chittering voices could now be heard, interspersed with the occasional uncanny howl.

  “Banshees!” said Georgiana. Her scales were dry and smooth, like those of a snake, covering muscles that quivered with tension as Muna crawled over them.

  Sakti appeared in a gap between the trees, looking dissatisfied.

  “It was not them who gave us away,” she said. “Oh, this will vex me!”

  “What does it matter?” said Muna. She leant over the naga’s side, holding out her hands. “Come along!”

  Sakti shinned up the naga’s flank with a practised air; she might have ridden a dragon dozens of times before. Muna reached for her hand.

  But all at once the cavern swarmed with spirits, their shrieks so piercing that Muna clapped her hands to her ears. In the darkness she could only see the spirits in brief flashes—here a ghostly visage framed by streaming hair; there a gaping mouth limned with blood. All else was a nightmarish muddle of bodies and limbs, hands and paws clutching at Georgiana.

  But the naga was not to be so easily caught. Her muscles bunched and she leapt off the ground. Muna would have fallen from her perch if not for Henrietta. The Englishwoman had seized the naga’s neck with one hand and Muna with the other.

  Muna saw Sakti slide off the naga’s back into the seething crowd.

  “Adik!” Muna lunged forward, or tried to, but Henrietta’s arm was like a band of steel around Muna’s person.

  “Wait, wait,” cried Henrietta. “Mistress Threlfall, wait!”

  Her voice was drowned out by Georgiana’s roar. The naga unhinged her jaw, issuing a crimson jet of flame. The spirits fell back, wailing, and the naga rose in the air.

  It seemed they must inevitably come to grief against the ceiling. Muna was distantly conscious of Henrietta flinching, but Muna was not afraid for herself. She was vainly trying to make out Sakti in the crowd below when the stone ceiling parted above them, as though it were nothing more than mist blown away by a gust of wind.

  Georgiana’s wings flapped once, twice, and then they were out—not in the Palace of the Unseen, but out of doors. Above them stretched a dark sky, with a few stars scattered across its surface. Half-veiled by cloud, the serene white face of the moon watched as Georgiana sailed across the sky, flinging off the weight of the Unseen with every powerful beat of her wings.

  Muna saw none of this. She could only see Sakti’s face, surprised and slightly indignant as she went down under the crush of spirits. She could hear someone weeping, making an extraordinary racket, but she could not spare any attention for them. It was of vital importance that she get down and find Sakti, but something held her in place—an iron grip.

  As she struggled, she could feel the grip weaken. She would break free in a moment—

  “Hold on to me, Muna,” pleaded a voice. It was familiar, though distorted by distress. It was Henrietta who spoke.

  “You must help me,” said Henrietta, “or we shall both fall!”

  The urgency in her voice penetrated through Muna’s horror. Muna’s vision cleared.

  They were high in the sky—miles, at least, from the cavern where they had left Sakti. The Palace was nowhere to be seen. And it was Muna herself who was making that woebegone noise, something between a sob and a wail.

  She stopped struggling. She could not quite suppress the noise, but she must have contrived to moderate it, for Georgiana said irritably:

  “Has she returned to her senses? I never heard such a caterwauling in my life!”

  Muna tried to swallow the caterwauling, but it stuck in her throat, unwieldy as her grief. She looked down. Her hands hung limp, shaking uncontrollably. Underneath them lay a slumbering dark country.

  “This is England,” said Henrietta. “We are home!”

  Behind them was the night sky, the clouds bright with reflected moonlight. Muna could see no trace of the path Georgiana had opened from Fairy to England—nothing marking the boundary between the seen and unseen worlds. On the other side of that imperceptible border was Sakti—lost to her, now, forever.

  23

  The Lady Maria Wythe Academy for the Instruction of Females in Practical Thaumaturgy, England

  HENRIETTA AND MUNA’S arrival in England was attended by as much fuss and rejoicing as can be imagined. Perhaps it was Zacharias Wythe who was made happiest by their reappearance, for Mrs. Wythe’s wild plans for rescuing them from Fairy’s clutches had been the cause of domestic discord since Damerell and Rollo had returned from Threlfall, bringing the news of what Georgiana intended.

  But Prunella, too, o
verflowed with delight. She was so glad to have Henrietta back, and to be relieved of the need to report Muna’s disappearance to Mak Genggang, that it troubled her not at all when Georgiana declared her intention of remaining in England for the next few days:

  “For Rollo and I have a great deal to discuss,” she said, with a gleam in her eye that made Mr. Threlfall shudder.

  “Certainly!” cried Prunella. “You must stay with us—or no”—she corrected herself at a look from Zacharias—“we have the Duke with us, of course. It might occasion some awkwardness if he knew you were in England. You will not mind staying at the Academy?”

  “Best you do, aunt,” said Rollo eagerly. “Far more comfortable for you!”

  At once the Academy was plunged into the business of making Georgiana comfortable. Servants and scholars rushed around, their arms full of linens and spells respectively, for the Sorceress Royal thought it wise to fortify the wards around the Academy. Fortunately, accommodating Georgiana was an easier task than it would have been before the Fairy Queen had got to her—the journey to England had exhausted the remaining magic in Rollo’s scale, and Georgiana had reverted to the size of a civet upon arrival.

  The bustle passed over Muna as a wave of inconsequential noise. Later she would have little recollection of the evening, save the pressure of Henrietta’s hand on hers, and Henrietta’s voice, repeating patiently but with immovable firmness:

  “Miss Muna is tired. She must be allowed to rest. We will talk tomorrow.”

  By some alchemy Henrietta contrived to detach herself and Muna from the Sorceress Royal well before Prunella was done feeding and exclaiming over them. She brought Muna to her bedchamber, lingering even as Muna sat heavily on the bed.

  “I am sorry, Muna!” said Henrietta.

  Muna only nodded. “Thank you.”

  Henrietta must have seen that Muna had nothing left to give. She said no more, but touched Muna’s hand and—thankfully—went.

  Muna ached all over. Her eyes were dry and burning. She longed for nothing so much as to collapse and forget everything, but instead she reached under the bed.

  She felt a flicker of relief when her fumbling hand grasped the bottle—who knew if some conscientious servant might not have found it? She held it up to the light.

  As ever there was no sign of the polong. Muna saw only her own face reflected in the glass. It looked young and unformed, but the expression was as old and tired as Muna felt.

  “Kur, soul!” she whispered.

  Though she had surrendered the magic she had borrowed from Rollo, somehow she did not doubt that the polong would appear.

  Perhaps great need was a form of magic in itself. Red smoke billowed from the mouth of the bottle, coalescing into the polong’s trim figure.

  “Now what do you want?” she snapped, but then she saw Muna’s face. “Child! What has happened?”

  “I went to the Palace of the Unseen,” said Muna. “My sister was there. My sister—she—”

  But this was as far as she could go.

  The polong clicked her tongue, half in sympathy and half censure, as Muna wept. “There, did not I tell you not to go to that wicked place? Now you are sorry, but the rice has turned to gruel, so what is the good of tears?”

  It was just the same scolding tone Mak Genggang adopted when she wished to comfort anyone, but Muna was beyond being consoled by such small familiarities. When she continued to cry, the polong said, “What has become of your sister?”

  “She was taken by the spirits in the Palace of the Unseen,” said Muna. She scrubbed her eyes with her sleeve. She must not be diverted by useless emotion. “I must save her, if I can.”

  If there is anything left to save, thought Muna, but she could not attend to the counsels of despair, or she did not know what she would do.

  “I need your assistance, kak,” she said.

  The polong looked alarmed. “It is a pity about your sister, but I told you I would not start any quarrels with the Queen of the Djinns!”

  “I would not ask so much of you,” said Muna. “It is a task you will not mind, I think. It is the sort of thing Mak Genggang would never command you to do.”

  A spark of interest flashed across the polong’s countenance.

  “Indeed?” she said guardedly.

  “Tell me, kak,” said Muna. “Would not you like to commit a larceny?”

  * * *

  • • •

  MUNA would not have believed that she could sleep that night. She had planned to wait for the polong to return from her assignment, which the spirit had accepted with a ready will. But England was colder than Muna had remembered. Waiting in an armchair by the dying embers of the fire, she began to shiver, and to keep warm she climbed into her bed.

  Once she was there, weariness did the rest. She slept, and for a few hours forgot her troubles.

  Golden sunlight was streaming through the window when Muna woke. For a fleeting moment she did not remember where she was. She lay gazing at the rectangle of sunshine on the floor, wondering that her heart did not rise at the sight, for it seemed to her that it had been some time since she had seen the sun.

  Then she remembered. Her fingers curled on the sheet.

  “Oh,” said Muna. She turned her face into the pillow.

  She only raised her head when the knock came at the door.

  It was Henrietta. “May I speak with you?”

  Muna looked back at the windows, still fogged by sleep and grief. With a sun so bright, the day must be considerably advanced. “Will not we be late for breakfast?”

  “It is almost noon,” said Henrietta. “We did not like to wake you. How do you feel? Would you like to take a sup of something?”

  She was not asking about the state of Muna’s appetite alone, but Muna was in no humour to talk about how she felt. She shook her head. “I am not hungry. What did you wish to speak of?”

  Henrietta waited till Muna had shut the door to begin.

  “I have spent the morning rowing with Prunella,” she said. “But I have won my point—and she will be in a better mood presently. Once she has calmed down she will see it is all for the best.”

  “Is Mrs. Wythe quarrelling with you already?” said Muna in disapproval. “One might think she would be better pleased to have the friend of her childhood restored to her!”

  “Oh, it is my fault,” said Henrietta. “I ought to have waited to tell her what I intended. Mornings don’t agree with Prunella. But I didn’t wish to put it off, for I mean to leave as soon as I can get away.”

  “Leave?” cried Muna, briefly forgetting her various preoccupations.

  Henrietta looked pale but resolute. “Yes. I promised I should not implicate Britain if I was discovered in Fairy, and I mean to keep my word. The Fairy Queen is bound to pursue us here. If she finds us in England, it will confirm her belief in England’s guilt—so I must do what I can to direct her attention elsewhere.”

  “Where will you go?” said Muna. “Not France?” She knew nothing of France save that it was at war with Britain. Confused images rose before her, of grim-faced soldiers bearing guns and spears, people fleeing from burning villages . . .

  “No. Lady Wythe has a friend in Scotland; I shall go to her first,” said Henrietta. “But we shall put about a story that I have run away to France with a Comte—that will fit with what I told the Fairy Queen. Then the news will follow that I was abandoned by my”—she cleared her throat, blushing—“by my lover, and Prunella will tell everyone I flung myself into the Seine!”

  “Good gracious!”

  “I thought a body should be found,” said Henrietta. “I could create a simulacrum of myself for the purpose. But Prunella thinks it unnecessary. She says she would rather not see my corpse—it would distress her, even if she knew it was not real.”

  “But how will you return?” said Mun
a, wishing her wits were not so muddled. Things were moving altogether too fast. “If it is given out that you are dead . . .”

  “It will make a return awkward,” agreed Henrietta. “That was what made Prunella so cross. But I brought her around in time. She could not deny it is awkward for her to have us on her hands, with an irate Fairy Queen in hot pursuit. For myself, I shall not mind being in hiding. I shall assume a new name and disguise my features, and I mean to travel. I should like to learn more of foreign magics.”

  She glanced shyly at Muna, but Muna was still digesting the implications of the scheme.

  “What of your relations?” said Muna. “It will give them a great deal of distress to believe you dead.” This came too near matters she would rather avoid thinking of. Her heart contracted painfully, and she put her hand to her chest.

  The light in Henrietta’s face dimmed.

  “Yes,” she said soberly. “And if I run away, my engagement with Mr. Hobday will be broken. I believe Papa has already borrowed a considerable sum from him. But”—she clasped her hands—“it cannot be helped! I have thought and thought about it all night, and I believe my first duty is to my country. After all, my family would suffer as much as everyone else if Fairy were to declare war on us. Besides . . .”

  She fell silent.

  “Besides?” echoed Muna.

  “It will sound strange!” said Henrietta. She had a distant look in her eyes. “It is not as though I liked being gaoled by the Fairy Queen. But visiting Fairy, tasting its magic and speaking with dragons on terms of near equality . . . it brought home to me the meanness of my existence here. If I remained in England with my family, still I should be obliged to live in hiding all my life. I could never call myself a magicienne, nor publish a spell in the Gazette under my own name. Why, I am good at devising spells! Better even than Prunella, for when she has done something new she can never tell you how she did it.”

  Henrietta paused.

  “And if I stayed,” she said, “I should have to marry.”