Kingsbane

by Claire Legrand

  Eliana laughed. Carefully, she curled up beside Navi, wrapped her arms around her torso. Her throat tightened when she felt how thin her friend had become. She said Navi’s name again and again, and then, like a tower of children’s blocks stacked too high, the tension held in her chest gave way. She began to cry, her limbs heavy with fatigue, though she didn’t recognize her own tears until she felt Navi’s gentle fingers stroking her braid.

  “You’re so dramatic,” Navi said kindly. “I’m the one who should be crying. Oh, my dear Eliana. My dear, my dear.”

  Navi scooted farther down into the pillows, held up the edge of her soft gray quilt as the healers and nurses left the room. Eliana crawled beneath the blankets and cradled Navi against her, cupping her shorn head as she would a child’s. She kissed her forehead, her cheeks and temples.

  “I missed you,” she whispered, and then they said nothing else, legs and arms locked together, warm and cocooned. Sleep came for them gently.

  • • •

  They fell in and out of sleep for days, waking only to eat and talk, to stretch their limbs on the terrace outside Navi’s rooms, and then returning to bed once Navi started to tire, which happened quickly.

  Eliana was content to hide there for as long as Navi required. No one dared bother her, holed up in Navi’s rooms as she was. Not even Simon.

  Then, on the evening of the fourth day, Remy finally arrived.

  A soft knock announced his presence, and even before the guards outside spoke, Eliana knew him by the sound of his knuckles against the door. Stiffly, she climbed out of Navi’s bed to stand at the nearest window, her body clenched tight from toes to shoulders.

  Navi watched her, eyes soft. “He will forgive you, Eliana.”

  She could not find it in her to reply. When Remy entered and rushed merrily across the room toward Navi’s bed, his arms full of books, Eliana’s heart recoiled in its cage. She was suddenly all too aware of her fleshiness, her obviousness. How impossible it was to hide herself, no matter how rigidly she stood.

  Even so, Remy didn’t notice her until he had lowered the stack of books onto the floor and embraced Navi, his face bright and open.

  Then his eyes met Eliana’s, and everything about him—the spark in his eyes, the verve of his skinny limbs—closed and diminished.

  They stared at each other across Navi’s bed. Eliana regretted skulking near the curtains like a caught thief. She stepped back into the light, unsure of her own tongue.

  “Hello,” she said. “It’s good to see you.”

  She cringed even as the words left her lips. It’s good to see you? As if he were a mere acquaintance. But the distance between them, the days of silence, had left her unsure of how to talk to him.

  “I didn’t know you’d be here,” he said, his voice hollow. “Simon didn’t tell me you’d be here.”

  And yet Simon must have known she was here. She wasn’t sure whether to feel grateful or annoyed that he had staged this little reunion.

  “Well,” she said stupidly, “here I am.” She waited a beat, then dared to add, “I’ve missed you, Remy.” Another beat. A drawn breath, clenched fists. Bracing herself. “I’m so sorry.”

  He frowned, considering her. There was a seriousness to his face, a gravity that had not existed before he had learned the truth of Rozen’s death. It was as if he had aged months, even years, since learning the truth—faint shadows under his eyes, a hard thin set to his mouth.

  “You didn’t tell us where you’d gone,” he said, his words clipped. “You’re always doing that. You’re always leaving and not telling us where you’ve gone.”

  “There’s a market underground,” she began, unsure what else to say. “They call it the Nest, and it’s in the heart of Vintervok, deep beneath the mountains. They have—”

  “I know what you did, and where you went. Harkan told me. He told me about Zahra too.”

  Eliana’s hand flew automatically to the pocket of her tunic, where the box containing Zahra rested.

  Remy crossed his arms over his chest, folding into himself. “Can I see it?”

  She withdrew the box from her pocket, held it out flat on her palm.

  He crept closer, examining it—and maybe, Eliana thought, examining her casting as well. She hardly dared breathe; he was closer than he’d been in days. Her eyes filled. She wanted to reach for him, draw him into her arms, bury her face in the soft, hot tangle of dark hair on the crown of his head.

  “Is it hurting her to be in there?” he asked quietly. A moment of silence passed before he looked up at her, his gaze bright.

  Eliana shook her head. “I don’t know. I hope not.”

  Remy’s mouth wavered. He hesitated, swaying a little, as if ready to meet her halfway and end this horrible stilted vastness between them. Eliana’s breath caught in her throat.

  Then he moved away, turning his back on her.

  “I have to go,” he said, shoulders drawn up tight. He gestured at the books. “Navi, those are for you.”

  Eliana started forward. “Remy, wait, please—”

  But he hurried out of Navi’s apartment, not looking back. The bedroom was quiet until Navi said quietly, “Come here, Eliana. You look like you’re going to fall over.”

  But before Eliana could catch her breath, or even think of moving—for if she moved, she would shatter, her tears would erupt and leave her empty of all light—a deep-throated roar exploded across the mountains outside Navi’s windows.

  Three short, sharp blasts, followed by one longer blast. The urgent rhythm repeated, loud enough that Eliana felt it in her chest.

  A horn of some kind?

  Navi froze, her expression stricken.

  “What is that?” When Navi didn’t respond, Eliana rushed out onto the terrace, searching the skies. “It’s coming from the northwest, I think.”

  And then, her castings flared to life against her bandages, hot and urgent. She gasped, still unused to the feeling and her palms still tender beneath their bandages.

  “Navi?” She backed away from the terrace railing, the stone beneath her vibrating with each thunderous blast. “What does it mean? What’s that sound?”

  Navi reached for Eliana’s hand, her eyes lighting up with the same grim fire they’d shown the first night in Lord Arkelion’s maidensfold, when she’d strangled Eliana’s adatrox attacker with her necklace.

  “It’s the Horn of Veersa,” Navi said, her voice thin and hard. “It means enemies have been sighted on the Kaavalan Passage. It means invasion.”

  18

  Rielle

  “Well, it’s done. I’m a king, and I’ve never felt more ill-fitting in my own skin. Crowns are for warriors, like Ingrid, or charming diplomats, like Runa, or for great men who, most irritatingly, seem to do everything well. Like you, my maddening friend. Crowns are not for me. I’m a scholar, not a ruler. And yet here I stand, pretending smiles for my advisers, while Ingrid runs off to the Grenmark to investigate the most recent attacks there. At one of our outposts, Castle Vahjata—thirty-one soldiers dead. Two left alive. Oddly, that seems to be the pattern. Whenever an outpost is attacked, two are left alive to share the same story of shadows that attack unseen in the night. Soldiers left twisted and bone-white in the snow. Villagers left defenseless and terrified. And this is the land of which I am now king. Audric…I am frightened. What is it that’s coming for us all?”

  —A letter written by King Ilmaire Lysleva to Prince Audric Courverie, dated December 5, Year 998 of the Second Age

  Every morning, while on the road to Kirvaya, Rielle scanned the skies for Atheria’s silhouette and saw nothing but clouds.

  When they bedded down in the evenings, sore and sweaty after a hard day’s riding, their wingless horses wearily snuffling through the grasses nearby, Rielle held herself together until safely ensconced in the tent she shared with Audric
, their escort of three dozen guards standing watch outside the canvas.

  There, miserably, she wept, feeling like a child whose puppy had gone missing, and when she first confessed as much to Audric, he simply kissed her brow, her cheeks, her salty mouth. Smelling of horse and sweat and the bright summer tang of warm stone, he held her until she quieted. He murmured reassurances into her hair and patiently combed out every snarl with his fingers.

  One night, after he had soothed her tears, she lay beside him in their nest of furs and watched him quietly. The night air had grown cold so far north, but Audric’s bare chest was warm, and she gratefully clung to the solid heat of him.

  “Why do you love me?” she murmured after a time.

  He smiled, his eyes closed. “Because your kisses bring me to my knees. Because you excel at rubbing the knots out of my shoulders.”

  “I’m quite serious,” she replied, only realizing at that moment how desperately she needed to know the answer.

  Audric turned to face her. He touched her cheek, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

  “Because we are well-matched,” he said. “Like the sun and the moon. Like day and night. I am the shore and you are the sea, my darling. The wild, wild sea—ever-changing and mighty. I need your passion, and you need something steady to come home to. An anchor, warm and sunlit.”

  He paused, an embarrassed smile tugging at his lips, his gaze half-lidded and bleary. “When I’m tired, I become rather poetic, it seems.”

  “And I love you for it.” Rielle kissed the skin beneath his eyes, shadowed from lack of sleep and reddened from the bitter wind of the western Kirvayan plains. She held his weary head to her breast until sleep turned him heavy in her arms.

  Then she sent a thought to Ludivine’s tent, which stood a few paces from her own. Since leaving home, I haven’t slept through a single night without seeing him.

  I know, came Ludivine’s reply, thin with fatigue. The scar’s growth had slowed, but its presence still seemed to sap much of Ludivine’s strength.

  Does Audric know?

  No, Ludivine said after a pause. But he wonders. And he worries.

  Rielle tightened her arms around Audric and pressed her lips to his curls. He was as warm as her dreams of Corien were cold. Ice-bitten, black-edged, and frosted with snow, every night they became clearer.

  A mountain path. A dark château on white cliffs. A tall, hooded figure in furs, arms open wide as if to welcome her home.

  Already the dream was coming, edging into her mind along with the first reaches of sleep.

  Rielle squeezed her eyes shut and waited for its arrival—so she could gather clues, she told herself. Each dream brought with it a clearer image of whatever wintry mountain Corien was leading her to. It was only logical to welcome the knowledge brought by her dreams. It was, in fact, what Audric wanted. As Sun Queen, it was her duty to investigate.

  Be careful, Rielle, came Ludivine’s faint whisper.

  But Rielle was already stepping into the dream snow, her ears ringing with the howl of an eager wind that carried the ghost of her name inside it.

  • • •

  After three weeks of hard traveling, they arrived in the Kirvayan capital of Genzhar to find it turned gold and glittering in their honor.

  It was a city dressed for children of the sun. Amber and ivory silks decorated every shop front. Banners bearing the shimmering sigil of the House of Light hung from burnished towers. White petals and gold-hemmed scarves littered the streets.

  The broad central avenue teemed with cheering crowds far larger than any Rielle had ever seen in me de la Terre, even at the height of her trials. Amid the raucous din, she picked out her own name, Audric’s name, Saint Katell’s name. She heard cries of Sun Queen! in Celdarian, in Kirvayan, in the common tongue—all amid a clamor of temple bells, the reedy trill of Kirvayan fiddles, the small tin drums of children.

  At the avenue’s apex, near the base of a long, low building of scarlet stone etched with elaborate carvings of flames, a narrow iron gate stood open to a vast stone yard, beyond which stood Zheminask, the palace of the Kirvayan queen. Several times larger than Baingarde, it was crowned with dozens of elegant white towers, their domes gleaming like fresh coins.

  Before the gate stood an entourage, splendid and imposing in fine, embroidered robes that made Rielle feel shabby by comparison, her own clothes rumpled and travel-worn. She lifted her chin as they approached. Once she’d had the chance to bathe and change into one of her gowns, it was these people who would feel shabby in her presence.

  Three figures stepped forward to greet them. The first was a tall, dark-skinned man in robes of white and gold, whom Rielle assumed to be the Grand Magister of the House of Light. The second was a guard in attractive but simple garb, with light-brown skin and soft brown eyes. The guard scanned the Celdarian escort for a moment before stepping aside to reveal their third greeter—a girl no older than perhaps thirteen. Her skin was a pale, warm brown, and her hair, elaborately pinned within a ruby-scattered golden net, was white as fresh snow.

  Rielle knew her at once. The newly chosen queen, Obritsa Nevemskaya. According to Audric, the girl was something of an aberration. Kirvaya had not had a human queen in centuries. Typically, a young firebrand girl was chosen from the temples erected throughout the country in honor of Saint Marzana—holy schools that groomed girls who had the potential to someday be appointed queen. Audric assumed the selection of Obritsa had been a strategic choice on the part of Kirvaya’s Magisterial Council. What with unrest brewing throughout the kingdom, and small bands of human slaves rebelling left and right, it was wise to appoint a human as queen—especially one who so uncannily resembled Saint Marzana herself.

  Audric bowed before the girl, and the rest of their escort followed suit.

  But the queen waved them all back to their feet.

  “Please, rise,” she said, hurrying toward Rielle. Evyline and Ivaine stepped forward to halt her passage.

  Rielle barely managed to hide her smile at the expression on Obritsa’s face. She doubted this girl queen was used to anything blocking her way.

  “Let her pass,” commanded Rielle, and when they obeyed, Obritsa approached with a broad smile and clasped Rielle’s hands in hers.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever been so excited to meet another person in my entire life,” the girl said breathlessly, practically bouncing on the balls of her feet. Some of the tension drained from Rielle’s body. This aberrant queen was merely a child, excitable and guileless, and would clearly need little urging to do whatever Rielle requested of her—even if said request involved handing over Marzana’s casting.

  Rielle bowed once more and pressed her lips to Obritsa’s hand. The girl grinned, her eyes wide and bright.

  “It is an honor to meet you, Your Majesty,” Rielle said and then looked sheepishly down at her dust-covered skirts. “I apologize for immediately asking a favor of you, but might we be shown to our rooms? I confess, I feel rather small and shabby in the presence of your loveliness.”

  “Oh, nonsense!” Obritsa gestured dismissively at her glittering gown. “These fussy old-lady clothes pale in comparison to your beauty, Lady Rielle. Come! You must all rest before tonight’s feast. You poor, weary dears. Such a long journey you’ve had.” She clucked her tongue like a fussing mother—or rather, like a child pretending at mothering. Rielle barely swallowed her smile when she noticed the disgruntled expressions the queen’s magisters wore. Surely this was not the dignified greeting they had been hoping for.

  But Obritsa glided on, ignoring them completely. Still grasping Rielle’s hand, as if they were old friends rushing off to gossip, she chattered away, carelessly careening between topics of discussion—features of the palace architecture, the health and happiness of Queen Genoveve, how excited the palace servants were to meet the Sun Queen. For they had all, of course, heard the storie
s about the trials and that terrible tidal wave that had nearly flattened Styrdalleen. Had Rielle really stopped the wave with her own two hands? This hand, the very one Obritsa was holding right now?

  Rielle glanced over her shoulder at Audric and raised an eyebrow. He smiled behind his hand, his face lit with amusement.

  Ludivine, however, was not so entertained. Be wary of her. She’s hiding something.

  But the sensation of Ludivine’s thoughts felt uncertain, faltering, as if she herself wasn’t sure of the validity of her own warning.

  Rielle put it quickly out of mind. It was a delight to be so fawned over, after the long weeks on the road. If she was to worry about Queen Obritsa, she would do so eventually, but only after she had enjoyed a bath.

  • • •

  That night, they dined in the palace’s largest hall—a grand, lavish space with high, arched rafters, walls rich with tapestries, and what must have been thousands of candles.

  They hung from iron chandeliers bolted to the ceilings and in gilded brackets affixed to the walls. Fiery bouquets flickered cheerfully along each long, polished table. Every piece of furniture and span of wall had been decorated in shades of scarlet, gold, and white—a blending of Saint Marzana’s colors with Saint Katell’s. The overall effect was one of such brilliance that Rielle soon felt a headache pulsing behind her eyes, and wished passionately for bed and the safe cocoon of Audric’s arms.

  But bed she would not have for some time, for the entire hall of feathered courtiers and wide-eyed servants was watching her, waiting.

  The current fashion in the capital apparently centered around a firebird aesthetic, in honor of Saint Marzana’s godsbeast. Feathers dyed violet, ruby, bright tangerine, and glittering gold hung from jackets and sashes. They had been woven into braids and gathered into fans.

  The sight of them, dazzling and bold amid a room lined with fire, reminded Rielle uncomfortably of her final trial, and how she had transformed the flames trapping Tal into harmless feathers. Many times since that day, she had attempted to perform another such transformation—pens into knives, forks into flowers. But all she had managed was to send the targeted objects bursting into flames or shatter them into pieces too tiny to repair.