The Alcazar

by Amy Ewing

  Leo felt another twist of guilt remembering all the times Eneas had offered him a compliment or a sweet or even just a jovial good morning. And all the times Leo had scoffed or rolled his eyes or wished he hadn’t.

  “Your father became cold and hateful,” Eneas continued, “and his hate was directed both at Ambrosine and at Pelago, at the country he felt had given him the only woman he had ever loved and then taken her away. Xavier was not going to look after you. It was left entirely to me.”

  He turned to Agnes. “But when you wanted to apply to the Academy of Sciences, I found I could not refuse you. I could not prevent you from living your life as you wanted it, the way your mother would have wanted you to. Even if it meant bringing you within your grandmother’s reach. I thought, so much time has passed. Perhaps she is not the same anymore, does not have the schemes she once did. Eighteen years and not a whisper of rebellion in the northern islands. I thought she might have given up on that plan.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “But once I left you at the Seaport, a growing fear took root inside me. I should have gone with them, I told myself. I should not have let them go alone. I purchased a berth on the first ship I could find.” Eneas placed a hand on top of Agnes’s. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “You should have known all of this, from the very beginning. I tried to protect you and I fear I only made things worse.”

  Agnes squeezed his hand. “It’s all right,” she said. She looked at Leo. “We know so much now. It’s better than never knowing at all.”

  Leo nodded. “But why risk coming here with Matthias?” he asked. “Won’t Ambrosine be furious if she finds out you’ve returned to Culinnon?”

  “Ah,” Eneas said, a clever smile spreading across his face. “But this is not the end of my journey. Or should I say, our journey.”

  “What do you mean?” Agnes asked.

  He gestured around at the cabin. “Matthias and I have brought you a ship.” He leaned forward, candlelight shining in his eyes. “We are going to get you to Braxos.”

  30

  Agnes

  AGNES CREPT INTO VADA’S ROOM AFTER SHE AND LEO returned from the ship.

  “Mmph?” Vada mumbled, rubbing her eyes. But she became alert once Agnes began whispering all that Eneas had said on the clipper. When she told Vada about Braxos, she sat straight up in bed.

  “When are we leaving?” she asked.

  “Soon,” Agnes said. “Matthias will let us know.”

  “Sera will be much relieved.”

  “Yes,” Agnes agreed, even as her heart sank at the thought of losing her Cerulean friend. It would be harder for Leo, though. She’d never seen her brother so content or relaxed as he had been these past few days on Culinnon.

  She wondered how Sera would feel, leaving him behind.

  Agnes slept in Vada’s bed that night—she’d grown accustomed to sleeping beside her on the Palma so it had felt strange to sleep alone. But it was a restless night. Braxos was so close now and Agnes didn’t want to wait a second more than necessary to start the journey there. She felt a little guilty at the thought of deceiving her grandmother, but Ambrosine wasn’t really the person Agnes had been dreaming of her whole life. And after the way she’d spoken to Matthias, and how she’d thrown her father into a terrifying cavern, and all that Eneas had told her . . . Agnes knew she would never be what Ambrosine wanted her to be. And Ambrosine wasn’t the connection to her mother Agnes had hoped for.

  But Matthias was. And Eneas was here. There was more to her mother’s family than just Ambrosine.

  The next afternoon, the four of them gathered in one of the sitting rooms. Vada was teaching Leo how to play dice while Sera sat listlessly braiding and unbraiding her hair, her eyes fixed on the glass walls that looked out over the ocean. Agnes was skimming a book on one of the past Byrne matriarchs, but her mind kept wandering to the fact that her father had actually loved her mother. She simply couldn’t fathom it and now that she knew, she wasn’t sure how she felt about it. It made her happy to know her mother had been happy, but it also made her resent her father even more for acting all these years as if he hated her.

  There was a light tap on the door and Agnes sat up. Bellamy hovered in the doorway, her shoulders hunched as if expecting someone to strike her.

  “Ambrosine wishes to see you,” she said. “All of you.”

  Agnes hadn’t spoken much to Hektor’s shy, skittish wife, but Sera had told her how she’d seen into Bellamy’s memories and that the woman had been devoted to her ever since. Agnes wished more people on this planet felt that way, instead of trying to control or trap or manipulate Sera for their own purposes.

  They followed Bellamy down through the halls until they came to a large circular room Agnes hadn’t seen before. The ceiling was glass but the walls were marble, pristine white with narrow, arched windows cut along them at intervals. There was an enormous chair that was more of a throne, upholstered in velvet with gilded wings, and two benches on either side. Matthias and Hektor were already there, seated on the right-hand bench. Bellamy scurried to sit beside her husband. Ambrosine, of course, was on the throne.

  “Come,” she said. “Sit.”

  The foursome dutifully took their seats on the left-hand bench, exchanging confused glances with each other. They heard footsteps down the hall and Agnes’s pulse thrummed in her ears.

  When her father and Kiernan were marched in, they looked awful: dark circles under their eyes, their hair wild, their faces gaunt. Kiernan’s whole body was shaking.

  “I trust you had an unpleasant evening,” Ambrosine said to Xavier, who stared at her with a steely expression despite his unruly appearance.

  “Mother, please—” Kiernan began, but Ambrosine held up a hand and he fell silent.

  “Be quiet, Ezra, the adults are talking.” She turned her focus back to Xavier. “Now. What judgment should be made on the man who stole my granddaughter and two of my prized possessions?”

  Agnes kept waiting for her father to look at them, either her or Leo, but he kept his gaze fixed on her grandmother.

  “I am a citizen of Kaolin,” he said. “You have no authority to pass judgment on me.”

  Ambrosine’s smile cut like a blade. “But you are far from home, Xavier. Your pitiful president and his silly navy have no power here. You should never have come back. Why did you? Was it to rescue your children?”

  Agnes’s heart twisted, sharp and painful, as her father, still not looking at them, said, “No.”

  “Yet you took Agnes away from me,” Ambrosine said. “Why? If you care so little for her, why not leave her here?”

  “I didn’t say I didn’t care,” Xavier shot back. “She wasn’t yours to keep. Alethea would never have wanted that.”

  “As if you knew what she wanted better than her own mother.”

  Xavier’s nostrils flared. “You didn’t know her at all. You only saw the Alethea you wanted to see.”

  “You only saw her money.”

  “I loved her!” Xavier snarled, suddenly turning as wild as his hair. His eyes bulged and a vein throbbed in his temple. “I loved her more than my own life and you killed her. You made her come here, you made her have them here. Why couldn’t you just leave her alone?”

  “You came too late!” Ambrosine shot back. “I told you. I told you, seven months at the very latest, but you had to wait to the last second, you arrogant bastard.”

  “It was your fault we had to come in the first place,” Xavier said.

  “Oh, please. You saw Culinnon and you wanted its treasures. Don’t turn yourself into a victim, Xavier, it doesn’t suit you. And you haven’t looked once at your children since you’ve entered this room. How do you think Alethea would feel about that?”

  Xavier’s face darkened and his throat bobbed up and down. “I . . . can’t,” he said.

  “Do you blame them for her death, as well as me?”

  Xavier said nothing. Agnes heard Leo shift on the bench. She felt a dull ringing in her ears.
r />   “So,” Ambrosine said, steepling her fingers, “Alethea’s death was everyone’s fault but yours. How so very Kaolin of you. Men don’t have to take responsibility for their actions where you come from, but here on Culinnon, you will be held accountable. So tell me again: Why are you here?”

  Xavier’s hands clenched into fists and for a moment, Agnes thought he might try to hit Ambrosine.

  “Braxos,” Kiernan cried, breaking the tension. “We came for Braxos.”

  Ambrosine’s turquoise eyes glinted like chips of ice. “Braxos,” she said. Then she sighed. “I admit, Xavier, I’m disappointed. I thought you would have some better motive than riches.”

  “It’s not about riches,” Xavier said. “You think she didn’t tell me? About the stories, about the scrolls?” He pulled at his hair and for a moment, Agnes wondered if he’d gone completely mad. “She’s supposed to be there!” he cried. “She said . . . the island where you could speak to the dead. She said so, she told me! Past, present, and future, all together, all at once. I just . . .” Suddenly he crumpled to his knees, and this frightened Agnes more than the shouting. “She can’t be gone forever,” he said. “She’s supposed to be there. Everything else I had is gone. My work, my company, my children, all of it, gone.” He glared up at Ambrosine. “Does that make you happy? You won. You’ve got everything now. But not her. I can still have her. If I can just get to Braxos.”

  For a moment there was nothing but a ringing silence. Xavier’s chest heaved and even Ambrosine seemed at a loss for words.

  “Your children are here, Xavier,” Matthias said softly. “Look at them. You never lost her.”

  Xavier turned his head away and Agnes felt her chest collapse. But then, to her great surprise, Sera stood.

  “I can show her to you,” she said, and Xavier gaped at her, at his ability to understand her as much as at her words. “I can show you Alethea.”

  Her skin began to glow faintly and her eyes burned. Agnes felt a gentle wind wash over her body and her muscles seized up, just the way Leo had described the sensation, and she knew that Sera was calling up their veils of life, of memory. Part of her wanted to cry out and say no, don’t let Ambrosine or my father know of this power, but she was frozen and could not speak.

  And then the memory came.

  Alethea was in the brownstone on Creekwater Row. She was trying to hang a mobile over a crib in the nursery, hugely pregnant, her red curls pulled up in a messy bun. She stood on a stool on her tiptoes, her legs wobbling.

  “Alethea!” Xavier cried when he came in. “Let me do that.”

  She grinned and pecked him on the cheek as he took the mobile, stars and clouds and little golden ships. “I think our daughter will like this. It reminds me of sailing with Matthias in the summers.” She spoke Kaolish with the faintest trace of a Pelagan accent.

  “What about our son?” Xavier asked. “Is his mobile made of gloom and doom like Hektor?”

  Alethea laughed and slapped him playfully on the arm. Then she bent down and picked up a different one, trees and fish and a yellow sun in its center.

  “His will be his mother’s home,” she said.

  “But you hate Culinnon.”

  Alethea sighed and let Xavier hang the mobile over the second crib. “I don’t hate it,” she said. “I wish it were different. Not so isolated or secret. I think that island has made my family crazy.”

  Xavier kissed her on the forehead. “Good thing I stole you away before you lost your marbles then.” He made a wild, exaggerated face and she laughed again.

  “It’s good they will be born there,” she said as he rubbed her stomach. “You were right. Our children are of two worlds and we should not shy away from that.” She made a face. “Mother must be ecstatic.”

  “Eneas and I will be with you the whole time,” Xavier promised. “I’ll take any barbs she throws at you.”

  Alethea pretended to swoon. “My hero,” she said. Xavier caught her and dipped her back, and she shrieked with delight.

  “Oh, my feet,” she said. She looked down and sighed. “Someday I’ll be able to see them again.”

  “I’ll have Swansea heat some water,” Xavier said. “A good soak is just what they need.”

  “Mmm, yes,” she said, wrapping her arms around his waist. “That sounds perfect.” She gazed up at him. “I love you, you know.”

  Xavier’s smile was brighter than the sun. “I love you too.”

  The scene dissolved and the marble room returned, and Agnes had the impulse to reach out as if she could somehow grasp the memory in her hand and keep it with her. Her face was wet, and when she looked at her brother, she saw tears streaming down his cheeks.

  “Bring her back,” Xavier said as the whole room seemed to come to life.

  “What just happened?” Matthias said, dazed, running a hand over his face and then down his arms. Agnes knew he had not seen Xavier’s memory—only she and Leo had that power with Sera’s magic inside them. But everyone had felt the strange breeze and the unpleasant sensation of being held in place, unable to even lift a finger. Ambrosine sucked in a huge breath, her whole body trembling.

  “Bring her back,” Xavier cried, scrambling to his feet. Leo was up in an instant and moving to protect Sera.

  Sera, however, did not seem afraid. “I see you, Xavier McLellan,” she said. “And I pity you. Matthias is right. She has been here all along. You do not need Braxos to see her. She lives in Leo and in Agnes. And she lives inside you.”

  “Please,” Xavier said, breathing heavily, still refusing to look at his son. “I can’t . . . bring her back!”

  “No,” Sera said simply.

  Suddenly, from outside, there came the long blast of a horn. Then another.

  “The Renalt,” Hektor gasped.

  Ambrosine was on her feet in an instant. “Get the Misarros,” she snapped at Hektor. “Ready the ships.” She turned to Sera. “Once I have dealt with this queen,” she said, hunger in her eyes, “you and I are going to have a chat.”

  She strode out of the room, Hektor at her heels. “Lock them back up,” she said on her way out, waving in the direction of Xavier and Kiernan.

  Agnes found her voice at last. “Father,” she cried, and finally he looked at her. He seemed empty, lifeless. Agnes didn’t know what to say. That she forgave him? She didn’t. That she understood him now? She didn’t think that was true either.

  “We could have been a family,” she said. “A real family. You could have told us about her. You didn’t need to be so angry, so cruel.”

  Xavier’s face clouded over. “You do not know what it is like to lose what I lost,” he said.

  “But I do,” Matthias said, stepping forward. “And if you cannot see that you must change your ways, Xavier . . .” He gestured to Leo and Agnes. “You will lose what little you have left of her.”

  Then the Misarros were pulling them from the room, and the last Agnes saw of her father was a look of shame and grief etched across his face.

  “We’ve got to leave,” Matthias said. “Now.”

  They ran through the halls and out into the forested area toward the dock, but when they got there, they saw the clipper was being guarded by five Misarros.

  “What do we do?” Agnes asked.

  “I’ll distract them,” Bellamy said. Agnes hadn’t even noticed she had come with them. Her thoughts were all tangled up in that memory.

  Bellamy touched Sera lightly on the arm. “Good luck,” she said. Then she ran out into the open. “The Renalt has come!” she cried. “Quickly, your mistress needs you!”

  The Misarros jumped to attention, following Bellamy as she led them in the opposite direction and out of sight. Their group hurried to board the clipper, Eneas emerging from below.

  “Can you sail this alone?” Leo asked Matthias.

  “Not alone,” Vada said.

  “I can sail,” Sera reminded him.

  “Eneas can too,” Matthias said. “Quick, there’s no time to was
te.”

  “Has the Renalt truly come?” Eneas asked as Vada and Sera scrambled up the masts to release the sails.

  “She has,” Matthias said. “And we’d best be getting out of here while my mother is distracted.”

  Agnes leaned over the rail and called out, “Errol!”

  The mertag’s head popped up as if he’d been waiting. His lights flashed anxious indigo and umber.

  “It’s time, Errol,” she said. “Braxos. It’s time to go to Braxos.”

  Errol snapped his teeth at her and a gust of wind caught the sails, pulling the ship out into the water and away from Culinnon. Agnes had one last fleeting thought of her father and her grandmother and everything she was leaving behind.

  Then she turned around and set her sights on the horizon, on Braxos and all that waited there.

  31

  Sera

  ONCE CULINNON WAS SAFELY OFF IN THE DISTANCE, SERA climbed down from the mast.

  Errol was swimming alongside the clipper, his lights flashing excitedly when he saw her.

  “Braxos, Sera Lighthaven! Off to Braxos at last,” he crowed.

  Sera’s stomach flip-flopped. She was eager to reach the tether and return home, and yet she would miss her friends on this planet. She wished she could help the Arboreals and the mertags too, free them from Culinnon and Ambrosine Byrne. And she wanted to help heal the wounds between Leo and Agnes and their father. What she had seen inside Xavier’s memory only inspired pity—the sort of man he used to be, the sort of man he could be again.

  Leo came up beside her, snaking one arm around her waist.

  “Ready to go home?” he asked, and though his voice was steady, she felt his hand quiver.