Winterbourne's Daughter

by Stephanie Rabig

  She was curled on her side in the dirt, Vasya's hand steady on her back. Lisette slowly sat up, not turning to him yet, suddenly feeling almost shy. After all this, what was she supposed to say?

  Then the realization dawned that she didn't have to say anything, not yet, and she met his eyes, resting her palm against his cheek.

  In answer, he kissed her again, slowly this time, and she edged closer, scooting up to sit on his lap, her arms linked behind his neck.

  *~*~*

  "―and what were they saying?" Emeline asked, showing Vasya and Lisette into the Dwarves' former cabin.

  "Nothing good, I'm afraid," Lisette said. "They were complaining about how Ilari doesn't listen to them, how she's spending the new tax that was supposed to go toward rebuilding houses from last month's windstorm on statues of herself instead... they're going to bring all of this up at the next loyalists' meeting."

  "They'll surely decide to overthrow her," Emeline said. Which would mean Ilari's imprisonment at best, and her death at worst. She tried to call up some emotion at the idea, some grief and sympathy for her daughter. She couldn't. The only one she could truly focus on, the only one they might still be able to save, was Gennadi. "I can gather everything we might need from this cabin," she said, picking up the Dwarves' metal bracelet.

  "I'll search for food and fill the canteens," Vasya said, taking the three knapsacks that Emeline handed to him. "We could use more than nuts and berries for the walk back. I'll see if I can catch a scarlet quoll."

  "I'll stay here," Lisette said, moving to stand beside Emeline. Vasya nodded, then cupped her cheek and gave her a brief kiss before he left. Lisette smiled, and then her gaze focused on a bright orange insect crawling along the door frame.

  "I saw one of these," Lisette said quietly. "When I first ventured in here, as a little girl."

  "I'm sure Gennadi would be able to tell you exactly what it is," Emeline said. "He is... Lisette, do you truly think―"

  "We'll get him out," Lisette said. "He'll be all right." She smiled, though the expression was a little wobbly. "It's Gennadi. He's always all right. Besides, I... I took care of Grisha. He doesn't have to worry about him ever again, nor do any of the other prisoners."

  "I met his mother once," Emeline said quietly. "When we went to Village-by-the-Sea. She was a good woman."

  Lisette looked to the floor at that, and Emeline realized that her absentminded statement must have sounded like a condemnation to someone who surely had not undertaken her action lightly. Emeline pulled Lisette into her arms and hugged her tightly. After a brief, surprised moment of stillness, Lisette hugged her back.

  "You did what you needed to."

  "He was no threat to me, not at that moment. I―"

  "Lisette. Had you waited until he was a threat, you might well have lost. And I could not bear that."

  "I'm all right, Emeline," Lisette said gently, and it was only then that Emeline realized that tears were sliding down her face.

  "I know. But when I saw Vasya carrying you..."

  "It's all right."

  No, it wasn't, Emeline thought. She wasn't sure she would ever stop having nightmares of that. But she smiled regardless, smoothed Lisette's hair back from her forehead. "I love you so much."

  "And I you," Lisette said. She started to lean closer for a kiss, and Emeline watched her face as she visibly remembered and took a step back instead. "Sorry."

  "Don't apologize," Emeline said. "But I do have a favor to ask. Could you wait outside for a few moments? I need to pray, and I always felt better doing so in private."

  "Of course," Lisette said, and then a more genuine smile crept over her face. "Actually, I might stay outside for more than a few moments."

  "What do you―oh," Emeline said.

  "Precisely. Do you need my help in gathering anything before I go?"

  "No," Emeline said. "I'll take care of it."

  "Thank you."

  Emeline watched as Lisette hurried outside, closing the door behind her. Then she knelt on the wooden floor and took a small figurine out of her dress pocket. Ilari had chosen it on her Introduction.

  Within a few days, she had grown bored with it, and Emeline had found it lying half-under a chair in the dining hall. She had tucked it into her pocket and kept it with her every day since.

  The three Goddesses were carved out of a single chunk of wood, their black skin and colorful gowns hand-painted with exquisite care. Their wide bodies looked as though they might start moving any second. On the left, Nobaris wore blue and stared at her sternly, her brow furrowed in concentration. On the right, Miona wore pink, her mouth open in a passionate shout. And between them, joining them physically and symbolically, Calene, the Goddess of the Conscience, held each of their hands. She joined the Goddesses of the Heart and Mind, and she beamed at Emeline, her purple gown seeming to glow even in this poor sunlight.

  When she'd gone into the chapel to pray, normally the carving had simply stayed in her pocket―weekly prayers were short, rote things that didn't take much concentration, after all. But this...

  "I ask for strength from each one of you," she said, gently setting the figure on the ground before her. "Not only for me, but for one of the men I love. He's in danger, and I―" She paused for a moment, attempted to steady her voice. "Please, I ask that you keep him safe. I have nothing to offer you, no candles to burn or prayer stones to bury. But I promise, should I live through the days ahead, I will honor each one of you for the rest of my days. I fear that―I fear that when we get back I may have to fight my own child. I pray for your blessing," Emeline said, and then she fell silent, drawing what comfort she could from the sight of the Goddesses' familiar faces.

  *~*~*

  All right, Lisette thought, looking around. Hopefully this took care of everything. She'd laid out the cloak, had a sheet, a knife was nearby in case someone she wasn't expecting decided to come by, and Emeline was in the cabin...

  It all seemed like a perfectly splendid setup until she actually took off her clothes, wrapped the sheet around herself, and sat down to wait. Then she just felt very twitchy and vulnerable and wondered if the nearby knife was truly as close as it should be.

  Better than the alternative, she thought. However Gennadi said the Dwarves' story had ultimately ended, there was still absolutely no chance she was going to make love in their cabin. And while part of her wanted to wait until they were back home, sheltered by four walls, another part recognized what danger they would be heading into when they left these woods, and knew that waiting was a luxury she couldn't afford.

  Didn't want to afford, really.

  "Lisette?"

  She closed her eyes. She loved the way he said her name; she loved his voice, steady and strong, managing somehow to be comforting and arousing all at once. "I... I'm back here."

  Now, she thought. She'd rehearsed this a hundred times in her mind. As soon as he came into sight, she would give her best brazen smile and drop the sheet.

  Instead, she clutched it tighter, suddenly wondering if this had been the right way to go about things. Maybe she should have waited until they were back home. Now he was staring at her but he was all the way over near the cabin, and she couldn't quite tell from the expression on his face whether he liked what he saw or whether he was wondering exactly how crazy she'd gone. However much she knew she was a woman, the plain, irritating fact remained that she had to continually shave to keep her face smooth, that she had no breasts, that her lower parts didn't match those of most women. He might care for her, yes, but that didn't mean that this was something he was interested in.

  Then he walked toward her, and the very way he moved had changed; there was something distinctly predatory about it now. She swallowed hard. Well, she thought nervously, an answer to one question, at least. And it's not as if you can turn back now, so you'd might as well―

  Yes, she could. This wasn't anything like those wretched stories she'd heard about mandatory nights with someone of higher
ranking. She could say this had been a very ill-thought-out idea and go ahead and put on her clothes and he wouldn't stop her.

  "And what are you doing?" he asked, sitting down in front of her and oh, the look in his eyes...

  "Um," she managed. Quite eloquent, considering the circumstances, she decided. "Sitting out here enjoying the day?" she finally quipped.

  She expected him to say something back, maybe take her hand. Instead he leaned forward and hauled her into his arms, sheet and all, and she laughed, her head tilted back in an unspoken invitation that he wasted no time in accepting.

  Her body had never truly felt like her, like what she knew she was supposed to be. Probably never would. But the dresses and long hair helped, and now his hands on her skin looked exactly like she'd imagined, and that helped, too.

  Several moments later, they took turns laughing and cursing as they each struggled with one of his boots. They had forgotten about them in their initial hurry, resulting in a bit of a tangle.

  Then she was in his lap again, bare skin on bare skin now, and she kissed him hungrily before shifting her position, one leg on either side of his.

  He held her, one hand splayed wide on her back, the other buried in her hair. She had her head ducked down, hair falling in her face so he couldn't see her. When he pushed it back, he saw the glint of tears. "You all right?"

  She smiled. "Yes," she said, quickly wiping at her eyes. "It's silly. I just never thought we'd get this. I thought you saw me as a nuisance and―"

  "Oh, I do."

  She started to say something right back, and instead gave an experimental rock of her hips, smiling triumphantly when he closed his eyes and groaned. "Not so ready to tease me now, are you?"

  "Darling, if that's the sort of response I get... I will tease you the entire damn day."

  Chapter Eighteen

  Ilari carried the Mirror down to the Silence, a wide grin on her face.

  She couldn't believe she hadn't thought of this before.

  She passed the Great Hall where the loud voices of the loyalists echoed off the walls. They were quarreling about policies and what should be changed again. She was tired of it. It was endlessly boring, and she had better things to do. She'd ask one of the loyalists to give her the high points later and see if any of them actually had good ideas for once.

  There was no one she could talk to about things that needed done. She didn't trust the guards―it had taken them far too long to free her from that cursed wardrobe―and her grandmother had been wandering around like a ghost ever since Emeline's disappearance.

  Which was ridiculous. There hadn't been any love lost between Sidonie and her daughter; most of the time they'd gone out of their way to avoid each other.

  But soon she would have a trusted confidante, one who could keep her ahead of anything that might happen.

  Her father had been so uncreative, she thought, as she opened the door to one of the Silence, where a bathtub full of blood sat waiting. In the end, it wasn't servants she'd ordered drained, but protesters, angry little peasants who'd been brought in by the guards for shouting derogatory things during the king's burial ceremony. If King Nazar had thought to follow simple logic... the power he could have held.

  Touching the Mirror's surface with blood could call up power. Therefore, submerging it?

  She dipped a hand into the blood and swiped it across the glass, waking the Mirror. The face inside smiled. "Greetings, friend."

  Ilari smiled back, and shoved the Mirror down into the blood.

  The liquid bubbled, rapidly heating, and Ilari jerked her hands back out before they could burn. A skeletal figure emerged, dripping crimson, and she reached for a blanket she'd had brought down for just such an eventuality. "And greetings to you," she said. "What should I call you?"

  "I'm Eshanti's Shadow." When she just stared, puzzled, it went on. "Your mother tried to tell you the story when you were small. I doubt you remember. It had nothing to do with you, after all." It smiled, gaping hole for a mouth and black liquid eyes. "Until now."

  "I've just set you free," Ilari said, retreating slightly but not turning for the door, feeling certain that this creature would be on her before she could reach the hallway. "We are allies, you and I."

  "Are we? I've overseen the demise of kingdom upon kingdom, because rulers always believe that just because I'm magic and seem to listen to them, I have their best interests at heart. If your fool of a father had bothered to truly look inside that book he was so eager to obtain, he might have realized what he was dealing with."

  "We can help each other," she said, voice growing desperate. "Rule beside me, Shadow. We can―"

  Then her body spasmed, jerking forwards and back, blood streaming from her mouth as the Shadow detached itself from what remained of the bloody mirror and attached itself to her. Some of it flowed into Ilari's mouth and split her face apart while other pieces of it wrapped around her arms and legs, tearing them from her body, ripping off the skin and growing darker, growing larger, at contact with her blood.

  Then the shredded pieces of the young queen flowed back together, and the thing inside her smiled and walked to the door.

  Ilari herself seemed to float above all of this, watching as the creature that had overtaken her body left the room.

  Then another figure was there. Tall, long dark hair, a familiar face but a completely unfamiliar expression in the eyes. No worry, no pain. Just love and hope.

  "Mom?"

  "I was going to name you Gisele," she whispered.

  And suddenly Ilari understood. The Goddesses gave her knowledge beyond that which she'd had in life, and she saw her life, her actions, not through her own eyes but through the eyes of those she'd affected. Saw her mortal time as it had been, and as it could have been.

  She saw how everything would have happened had she just let her mother finish her sentence that day, tell her of her true name. If she had listened rather than run to her false father.

  In that life, she hugged her mother instead of turning her in. She worked with her, and grew to love Lisette like a sister and Vasya like a father. She and Gennadi sparred and laughed, and she never once would've dreamed of hurting him. She regarded Grisha with fear rather than lust. And when the Shadow emerged in that world―because, better world or not, such maliciousness could not be contained forever―she fought alongside her family and won.

  She had no true eyes anymore and no true lungs, but Ilari gasped in a hollow breath, phantom tears sliding down transparent cheeks.

  *~*~*

  So many gathered here today, the Shadow thought. It was time to feast.

  The first caught were the two guards keeping watch over the entrance to the Silence. They screamed and screamed. The Shadow smiled, reveling in the sound.

  It had been far too long.

  *~*~*

  "What if it's entirely walled up?" Lisette asked.

  "I doubt Ilari would have bothered with an order like that," Emeline said. "Why would she? She knew that her story about me trying to bring rebels in through the door was a lie. Now that she has what she wants, she probably hasn't given another moment's thought to the Silence. At the most, there may be extra guards―"

  "We can fight through them," Vasya said. The three of them had discussed every hidden passage into the castle that Emeline knew about, and they had settled on the one entering the Silence because it was closest to the dungeon. If all went well, they would rescue Gennadi and then make their way to Village-by-the-Sea. If Queen Damayanti didn't want to commit to a full war against Ilari, Emeline had said, she would at least be willing to offer them sanctuary.

  "Are you sure you want to come with us?" Vasya asked Emeline. "We don't... we don't know what we'll find. If the worst has happened, then you don't need to see."

  "Neither do the two of you," Emeline said. "I'm not staying here." Even as she said the words, she wondered if it was the right decision. She was the one, after all, who'd suggested they wait at the outskirts of thi
s village to see if Princess Jyotsana would visit her former seamstress today. Sati had moved from Village-by-the-Sea to Winterbourne six years ago, and one of the first things Jyotsana had asked upon her arrival to the castle was which village Sati lived in now. The two of them had once been close friends, and she traveled to see her at least twice a week. Emeline had assumed that the frequency of her visitations might well go up with Ilari holding the throne, but so far there had been no sign.

  Then, just as she was about to suggest that they go to the tunnel entrance and take their chances, they saw a familiar carriage come into sight, drawn by four of the castle's armorharts.

  The driver's eyes widened at the sight of them as they hurried up to the carriage, but he made no move to confront them. Jyotsana opened the carriage doors, motioning for the guard sitting across from her to keep his seat. "It's all right, Jai. It's Emeline."

  The guard nodded and climbed out of the carriage, holding out his hand. Emeline pressed her palm to it in greeting, and then he moved away from the carriage, letting the three of them climb in.

  As soon as they were all inside, Jyotsana leaned forward and pulled Emeline into a hug. "You're all right! Oh, I've been so worried." Then she fully looked at Vasya and Lisette, and her mouth dropped open. "You... but I thought–"

  "I did, too," Lisette said. "Princess, we need to get back into the castle. Will the guards check this carriage upon your return?"

  "I'm afraid so," Jyotsana said.

  "All right. Is there any way you can get down to the Silence? Unbar the door if it's been blocked or distract the guards somehow?"

  "Perhaps," Jyotsana said. "I will do what I can."

  "Thank you," Emeline said. "Have you... have you heard anything about Gennadi? Is he–?"

  "He lives," Jyotsana said, tears filling her eyes. "I have gone to him when I'm able, tried to bring him food and drink. I... it was perhaps unwise of us, but after I spoke to Alexei about your time in my home, he and I made a request to Ilari, asked him to spare Gennadi's life. She... she replied by saying she would end his suffering. He is to be put to death immediately after our wedding ceremony. Oh, Emeline, I lied to you before, when you asked if I was happy," she sobbed. "I want to go home. Everyone is so cold here; I miss my family. I miss the sea. I do love Alexei but I am not sure it's worth this. Ilari wants to speak to me of Asho―of Grisha constantly, and other loyalists shun me because I will not change my name, and since Ilari became queen I've been so scared, I..." She gulped in a breath and tried to calm down. "I am sorry. I know these problems are paltry compared to what he is facing. But there may be few guards in the dungeon today; most will be outside the doors of the loyalists' meeting. I'll clear the way for you."