CHAPTER 57
THEY looked the part.
An efficient little group of the Warlord, her captive, and two scarf-swaddled guards. The kind of party that could travel swiftly, boldly. An entire army plausibly following in their wake.
Much of this was because of Koldo, who had two decades of experience in the art of this. Sweeping in under the cover of darkness. Navigating hairpin turns. Traveling like a grain of sand in the wind—quiet, nearly invisible, blink-and-miss-it kind of movement.
But, as the sun shimmered over the horizon and the spires of the Itspi were somewhere straight ahead, their clothing became just as crucial as their on-a-mission, breakneck pace.
Koldo, in the suntan-brown tunic and tights, cuffs at the wrists in leather matching the waist scabbard for her sword and dagger. Ula, swathed in the Warlord’s silken clothes and head covering—chin high, determined, obviously important, even when seen through the haze of dark before dawn. And Luca, dressed in the brimmed hat and sun-bleached canvas of all the Warlord’s bandits, a handkerchief around his neck. He transported the prisoner, strapped to him with rope in much the same way he’d been transported by Ula not long ago.
To play her part, they’d given Amarande clean prisoner garb to go along with the deceptively secure knots of rope at her wrists. She clung more tightly to Luca’s back—mindful of the wound he had there—than any of the rope clung to her. A quick twist of the wrists, and they would fall away. Better still, a dagger sat in her boot, an easy draw for her practiced fingers. Despite appearances, Amarande felt more in control and more certain than she had during any other time in this long and winding journey.
The plan wasn’t perfect, of course. Not like something her father would conceive, but it cleverly deployed their resources and an element of surprise, and it was what they had. That was not nothing.
What they did not have was rest. But that would come soon. In victory or in death.
There really wasn’t much in between.
As the narrow road wound before them, shifting from sleepy gray to a russet-pocked beige, Amarande snuggled into the warmth of Luca’s back, lifting her chin just enough to drop a kiss behind his ear. “There were times over the past few days when I was sure I’d reneged on my promise. That I wouldn’t see you again soon. Not ever…”
Her words trailed off.
“I knew I would see you. You never abandon your promises, Ama. To me, to your people, to the stars. You will find a way.”
Something heavy stuck in her throat. This—exactly this—was the manifestation of love Ula described in the Pyrenee tent that night, when Amarande’s despair squatted on her chest as she stared down the turn her life had taken with surrender to Renard.
Do you know how many times he told us you’d come for him? How much faith he had—has—in you? I could nearly pluck his love for you out of the air and slice it up for dinner, it was so solid. He loves you and you love him—true love, simple as that.
Amarande’s arms tightened around Luca’s body, her cheek nuzzled to the broad warmth of his back. His heartbeat thrummed against her ear, a torch carried not only for her but now for an entire people. He’d always had to share her with the people of Ardenia, and now she would share him with the people of Torrence. He was no longer hers alone.
Destinies mirrored—hers needed saving; his needed building.
And though she wished to somehow untwine her heart’s desires for him and her heart’s desires for her people, it would not be possible to tease them apart.
Not now. Not ever. Not with who they were.
Perhaps that was why love so often did not fit into the royal equation. But if they succeeded, they could change that.
Once it was full light, she couldn’t snuggle in like this. And so Amarande used the last moments she had. In subtle rotation, she pressed kisses anywhere she could reach. To his spine. His shoulder blade—one, and then the other. Up his neck. Again, behind the ear—one, two. She settled the curve of her throat over his shoulder, her chin coming to rest on his collarbone, parched lips at his ear.
“Luca, no matter what happens with my mother, with Inés, I love you. Please hear me when I say that if I fail, it wasn’t that I did not love you enough. I love you more than anything in this world, even if I didn’t say it until it was almost too late.”
He reached up and cupped her head with his hand, fingers laced in the fall of her hair. Her cheek pressed against the side of his neck, the brim of his hat shrugged away—stupid thing. Her lips met his jawbone, her chest pressed against his spine, her own heart pounding against the double layers of fabric wedged between their skin.
“You didn’t have to say it, Ama. I always knew. Even when I never thought I had a chance to say it back. I love you.”
“Masks up. The castle looms.” Koldo’s voice was low and direct and sent Amarande jerking back and away from Luca, as if they’d already been spotted.
Ula and Koldo pulled the linen tighter to their faces, obscuring their eyes, which had been left bare for faster negotiation of the rocks and roots along the hairpin trails. Luca shrugged up the handkerchief at his neck, covering his nose and mouth—his eyes his only discernible feature.
Amarande bent forward and pressed one more kiss to the nape of his neck and then set herself back, so that only the insides of her bound arms touched him, a manufactured sliver of space between her torso and the swoop-and-curve of his back.
Dawn had spread into true morning now, the sky a vibrant blue canvas for the red spires of the Itspi. Amarande craned her neck to peer over Luca’s shoulder at the first glimpse of her home. “It will be crawling with guards—new recruits for the king.”
“The princess is correct,” Koldo intoned. “The guards are novices, yes, but they have eyes. We will be spotted long before we reach the gates. I suspect Geneva has a rider prepared to greet us. From this moment forward, we must assume we are being watched.”
The hourglass was now turned, sand pouring through, marking the time between this moment and when that first mark must be made. Luca had worked with resistance leaders to create waves of fighters, who would follow them. But even the first wave would not arrive until at least two hours after they did.
Thus, they had to assume they were facing this alone. Any aid would come late or not at all. At best, it would be to a triumphant victory. At worst, it would be a funeral march.
It was too much to ask, Amarande knew, for all of this to be hammered out in parley and negotiations. In verbal promises and then decrees, and the trial and imprisonment of her mother for the atrocities she’d committed as Warlord.
No. It started with blood. It would end with blood.
On the next hill, it became so much worse.
“Hold.” Koldo’s voice came crisply, sharply against the wind.
The party fell into line at the crest of an overlook, detailing not just the spires but the entirety of the rolling grounds of the Itspi. They were bathed in the unflinching sun of a new day, parched grasses and rocky grades stamped down with summer—and hundreds, perhaps thousands, of men and women in full garnet-and-gold regalia.
They stomped across the yard, grounds, arena. A cluster of them even ran drills in the meadow Luca and Amarande had long called theirs. These men and women lined the parapet of the wall ringing the Itspi, arrow quivers glittering in the sun. Pockets of them stood outside the entrance, far more in number and far more menacing than the green guards and closed gate Amarande met in the day before her brother’s introduction and coronation.
Stars.
“That … is a much larger number of guards than we encountered days ago.” Ula adjusted the linen about her face for a better look.
“Those aren’t guards; those are soldiers.” Amarande wished she were wrong.
“A lot of soldiers,” Luca amended, glancing to Koldo for confirmation. “At least a regiment’s worth.”
Anger flashed about Koldo’s stern features, jaw muscles flickering as she ground her teeth, her s
tare boring down the hill. “I told them not to recall my soldiers from the borders. Clearly they did anyway.”
They meant Amarande’s mother. Or Ferdinand acting on her behalf.
The Warlord always had her most trained soldiers surrounding her at all times, the strongest ring of protection a halo of her person, her tent, her carriage. Thus, this adjustment was in line with what Geneva would have been accustomed to in that role. And it was lucky, given Inés’s approach by sea instead of land.
But from their point of view, this added protection presented a significant problem.
“I am suddenly feeling far less confident about our plan,” Ula announced.
“Perhaps we wait until the resistance arrives,” Luca offered. “All of it. Not simply the first wave.”
Koldo shook her head. “No. They’re on alert for Inés. See those clusters? They’re forming parties to send into the countryside, on the lookout for any signs of movement from Inés.”
Amarande swallowed. “They aren’t just going to wait for her in the harbor?”
“Not when they know she can dock ships nearby and send a whole regiment on foot to create a helpful obstruction between the port and her arrival at the castle.”
The small amount of time Amarande had spent in the council room over the last year had yielded some insight into her father’s strategic mind, but not this. “What shall we do, Koldo?”
“What we don’t do is our plan,” Ula answered, out of turn. “See those archers? Ten arrows in my back the second I identify myself. Geneva didn’t intend to negotiate; she intended to kill her puppet and gain her prize.”
Ula was correct. Arrows would be coming for Koldo and Luca, too. The princess put the possibility of her being left standing at one-to-one. It depended greatly on the narrative Geneva and Ferdinand planned to deploy against Inés. Though Amarande very much doubted Inés would back off an invasion simply because Ardenia offered to extradite its fugitive princess.
Amarande bit her lip. “Okay, new plan. Koldo, these men and women would know you on sight, wouldn’t they? They would listen to you, let us through, obey if you gave them a command?”
The wind kicked up as the general worked through the scenarios, her dark eyes searching the grounds. “Perhaps, but we have no way of knowing how they’ve been instructed by the Queen Mother, who recalled them. I do not put it past Geneva to name me a threat as easily as she might name you, Princess, if it is to her advantage and the king is not within earshot.” She inhaled deeply. “I think perhaps our best course of action is through you, Princess. If you speak, they will listen.”
“Koldo, they think I’m dead.”
“Exactly.” Koldo’s tone remained even and direct, but now contained the power of confidence she’d clearly lacked during their earlier planning. “These are my soldiers. They attended the king’s funeral before striking out for the borders. They know your face, your voice, your reputation. They will believe you when you confirm your identity, and know they’ve been lied to. It’s imperfect, but if I can shelter Ferdinand from any ill will to come from this—”
“Shelter me from what, Mother?”
All eyes snapped to the sound of a new voice. And there, rounding the bend at the bottom of the hill, was the king himself.
CHAPTER 58
STARS, he’s a ghost.
For the second time on this journey, Luca had nearly the same thought. This time, seeing someone whose life he knew rather than someone whose end he’d given.
Luca stared down the hill at the boy on the horse, his lips falling open, no sound coming out. Amarande stiffened against him, the space between them erased. Her heart rattled against her rib cage in a fluttering cadence against his spine. The rhythm repetitive, and nearly words themselves. Friend or foe? Friend or foe?
Luca’s own heart lurched simply in making eye contact with this boy. The spitting image of King Sendoa, twenty years younger. At first, Luca hadn’t understood how Geneva had strode into the Itspi with this boy and managed to claim the kingdom and dispossess Amarande at the same time.
Now it was clear.
Luca knew what the councilors saw. What the people saw from the stands still warm from Sendoa’s funeral. Who those soldiers saw when they’d been called to defend the Itspi.
Their king. Back. Anew. Here and safe, and protective, against all of the fear and uncertainty and change that Amarande’s ascension to the throne might have wrought.
Luca’s attention slid to Koldo. The boy’s true mother. And before the stars and strangers, he’d called her that in the open.
“My king, as commanded, I have retrieved the princess,” the general announced almost mechanically, as if an archer would strike her dead if she didn’t follow the script.
They’d agreed that Koldo would deal with Ferdinand, but staring him down, this ghost of the tiger who prowled the grounds of his childhood, keeping him safe, planning his destiny, all the while bearing the guilt for destroying his family—it was much for Luca to take in.
The strap of linen covering Amarande’s injured hand fluttered in the breeze. A reminder of what Ferdinand could do, even to someone as strong as her.
Luca’s palm flattened across the hilt of his sword.
“I—Mother, please stop. It is unnecessary.” Ferdinand’s eyes swept about the group. “As an effort of good faith, please see who I’ve brought with me.”
The boy king advanced, straight-backed and regal on a black stallion—Marcel, sibling to Amarande’s beloved Mira. It was possible the boy knew this, and if not, the coincidence was stark. No cadre of guards flanked him. Rather, a thin rope ran around the bend, and within a few breaths another horse made the turn—Ana, the gray mare, with two riders smashed together atop a single saddle.
One, a head taller, all dark curls and burnished brown skin. The other, dark haired and petite.
Urtzi. Osana.
Both gagged, bound, and summarily led.
Luca’s pounding heart plummeted to his boots. On his order, they’d gone to the castle. And, even though he was not yet sure of Osana’s loyalties, they’d paid the price.
Ula drew her sword with a deadly clang and a whisper of Urtzi’s name. The king threw up his hands, the sword and dagger about his hip scabbard untouched. “Understand they are not my captives. They only appear to be.”
To punctuate the point, Osana reached for her gag and pulled it down easily. Either it had been poorly tied or it was just as much for show as Amarande’s own ropes. “We’re better than we’ve been in days. Please, listen to Ferdinand.”
The pronouncement of his given name from Osana was a surprise and a confirmation.
Osana. The watcher. Sister of the regent Warlord. Of course she knew Ferdinand. Luca was still not sure of her loyalties, and yet here she was, begging.
Next, Urtzi shrugged out of his gag. “Ula. Listen, please.”
That was … unusual coming from him.
“My king,” Koldo said, “we are listening.”
His green gaze swept the four of them, clearly picking up much from their glances beyond him, to the bend, and through the junipers pressing in along the road.
“First and foremost, I am alone. We can speak freely. And to prove it, I will start.” Ferdinand took a deep breath. “I was sent by Geneva to meet the Warlord. A fact I assume by how you are dressed you already know, along with the fact that Geneva was and still is the Warlord. The one with the caravan, Celia, is a mere puppet.”
No one answered him.
“I was to negotiate with her for Amarande, dangling her sister’s life before her. As, again, I assume you can guess by Osana’s presence.”
Osana and Urtzi meant nothing to Koldo, but everything to the rest of them. At Luca’s back, Amarande swallowed, her arms squeezing his sides, as if shielding him.
“Geneva had no real intention of negotiation. I was to come with soldiers at my side, and slay Celia and her guards for her insolence in believing she could siphon power with blackmail.�
� He caught Amarande’s eyes over Luca’s shoulder. “And then I was to march my sister back to the Itspi, to be dealt with after the coming attack from Queen Inés, who is hovering like a storm cloud in our port, shuttling demands in a way that makes it clear she believes Ardenia is already hers.”
All the air left Luca’s lungs.
They were too late. The resistance would be too late, as well. War was at Ardenia’s shores.
“She’s here?” Amarande asked.
“Yes, Sister. But the good news is you are, too.” He looked to Koldo. “And you, Mother. I cannot emphasize how much we need you.” Ferdinand caught eyes with each of them. “We need all of you.” Now he looked to the girl holding the single drawn weapon. “I can only assume by that sword and palpable vengeance that you are Ula.”
Ula’s blade did not waver.
“A handy double for Celia, for sure,” he continued. Osana read Ula’s hands. “And if Celia is not here, and her clothing is available, am I correct in guessing you, my good sir, are none other than Luca, the Otsakumea?”
In answer, Luca drew his own sword.
A smile tugged at the king’s pursed lips. “My sister hugging you as tightly as life itself is a dead giveaway.”
Ferdinand knew everything. How did he know everything?
“My king,” Koldo started, her voice more unsure than Luca had ever heard it, “what is your intention for us?”
“Mother, you know I have a preference for honesty, and understand that what I am about to say is the truth.” Koldo nodded. “My plan was this: Remove Osana from our dungeons—and her friend, Urtzi, as well—rescue Amarande from a tyrant, and confront Geneva with an ultimatum that would put my sister in power.”
“What?” Amarande’s voice was breathless. “You would cede to me?”
Luca knew nothing of Ferdinand, but anyone with royal blood lacking ambition on this continent was certainly someone to be suspicious of.
“Sister, Ardenia needs you. I need you. I hate the lie I’ve been told to live, and Ardenia wilts under the weight of it. Queen Inés is in our harbor, preparing her attack, and if Ardenia is going to fight, I want you by my side.”
The Queen Will Betray You Page 34