One Dark Throne

by Kendare Blake

  “It’s not all right,” the girl snarls. “I saw what you did at the Beltane Festival. How you protected that elemental queen. Traitor!” She spits again. “Mainlander!” She turns to walk away but warns him over her shoulder, “Next time it won’t be spit. Next time it’ll be a knife between your ribs.”

  “That tears it,” Jules says, and Camden leaps. She knocks the girl to the ground and pins her to the worn stones of the street with her one good paw.

  Underneath the cougar, the girl trembles. The whiskey-courage is gone now, but she manages to curl her lip.

  “What are you going to do?” she challenges.

  “Anyone who touches Joseph will answer to me,” Jules says. “Or maybe to the queen. And her bear.”

  Jules motions with her head, and Camden backs off.

  “You shouldn’t protect him,” one of the girl’s friends says as they help her up.

  “Disloyal,” says another as they back away and turn down the street toward their homes.

  “You shouldn’t have done that, Jules,” Joseph says when they are alone.

  “Don’t tell me what I should and shouldn’t do. No one’s going to touch you as long as I’m around. No one’s going to so much as look at you wrong.”

  “And here you were worried that you and Camden would seem weak with your matching limps. I think they give you a wider berth even than before.”

  “They must sense that we’re more ill-tempered now,” Jules says wryly.

  Joseph steps close and tucks a lock of wavy brown hair behind her ear. He kisses her softly.

  “You don’t seem so ill-tempered to me.”

  ROLANTH

  “Are the preparations made?” Mirabella asks.

  “Your guards and the decoy carriage will be ready tonight,” replies High Priestess Luca. “Though the people would have you wait until morning for a proper send-off.”

  Queen Mirabella’s heart thumps. She is seated on one of Luca’s small sofas, elbow-deep in striped silk pillows, and looks for all the world to be a queen at ease. But she has been waiting for this night ever since Arsinoe betrayed her by sending the bear across the Quickening stages.

  The door of Luca’s chamber opens, and Elizabeth enters. She closes the door quickly behind her to shut out the ruckus from the rest of the temple. There is no peace to be found in Rolanth Temple anymore, except for the quiet space of Luca’s personal rooms. Everywhere else is busy from sunrise to after dark. The apse bustles with visitors lighting candles for their elemental queen or leaving offerings of scented water dyed to a bright blue or dark black. The priestesses are constantly occupied with sorting the gifts and crates of supplies arriving in the city daily: all they will need to lavishly entertain the coming suitors.

  Luca tells the queen that they are sorting the supplies. But everyone knows that since Katharine has returned, they are checking each parcel for poison.

  “Elizabeth,” Luca says. “What kept you? The tea is nearly cold.”

  “Forgive me, High Priestess. I wanted to bring some honey from the apiary.” She sets a small clear jar on Luca’s table, half-filled with fresh honey still leaking from a piece of comb. Luca dips a spoon into the jar and sweetens their cups as Elizabeth brushes dirt from her initiate robes and takes a seat. Her cheeks are rosy from hurrying, and a fine glow of sweat sits on her deeply tanned forehead.

  “You smell like the garden and hot summer air,” Mirabella says. “What is that in your pocket?”

  Elizabeth reaches into the skirt of her robes and pulls out a small spade fitted with a leather cup and bracelet.

  “I had it made in the central district. It affixes directly to my stump.” She holds her arm up so Mirabella can see the scarred end of her left wrist where the priestesses cut her hand off as punishment for aiding Mirabella’s escape from the city. “I can buckle it one-handed, and it makes tending the vegetables much easier.”

  “That is wonderful,” Mirabella says, but her eyes linger on the scars.

  Luca sets their teacups before them.

  “So,” Elizabeth says. “We are leaving in the morning, then?” She sips her tea and studies the High Priestess over the rim of her cup. “Don’t be worried, High Priestess. Bree and I will keep her safe until we find Queen Arsinoe in her woods.”

  Mirabella tenses.

  “I do not need to be kept safe. I need to find my sister and to do my duty by her. And I would not wait for morning, Luca. I would leave tonight.”

  Luca takes a sip of tea, using the cup to hide her smile.

  “For so long I waited for you to find the heart to kill your sisters,” she says. “And now I worry that you are too rash.”

  “I am not rash. I am ready. Arsinoe sent her bear for me, and it killed our people and our priestesses. It cannot go unanswered.”

  “But the Ascension Year has barely begun. We could make opportunities for you. Just as the Arrons are sure to arrange for Katharine.”

  Mirabella’s mouth tightens. Luca practically raised her. Mirabella knows the tone in her voice, and she knows when she is being tested.

  “I will not waver in this,” she says. “And this Ascension will be over far sooner than any anticipated.”

  “Well then.” Luca nods. “Take my mare at least.”

  “Crackle?” Elizabeth asks.

  “I know she is not as fine as the white horses of the temple,” Luca says, “nor as beautiful as the black horses who will draw your decoy carriage to Indrid Down, but she is tough and fast and has been my trusted mount for many years.”

  “Tough and fast,” Mirabella muses. “You think I will need to run.”

  “No,” Luca replies softly. “But I must still try to protect you where I can.” She reaches across the table to lay her hand atop the queen’s, when a shriek cuts through the walls of the chamber. All three quickly stand.

  “What was that?” Elizabeth asks.

  “Stay here,” Luca orders, but Mirabella and Elizabeth follow her, down the stairs and through the door to the long east hall and the upper storerooms.

  “The main storeroom!” Elizabeth points.

  The scream tears through the hall again. It is so full of panic and pain. Priestesses are shouting, barking frightened orders. When Mirabella bursts through the door it is chaos, white robes flashing as priestesses run back and forth.

  In the corner of the room, a young initiate jerks and cries, held still by four shouting novices. She is practically a child, perhaps fourteen at most, and Mirabella’s stomach goes cold at the sound of her screams. It goes colder when Rho, the war-gifted priestess with the bloodred hair, takes the initiate by the shoulder.

  “You little fool!” Rho shouts. Baskets of goods topple; voices grow louder, talking over one another to soothe and question the girl.

  Mirabella’s voice rings out over the erupting room.

  “What has happened? Is she all right?”

  “Stay back, Mirabella, stay back!” Luca says, and rushes to the corner. “Rho, what is it?”

  Rho grasps the novice by the neck and jerks her arm upright. It is bloody to the wrist. Blisters rise and burst as they watch, traveling farther down the arm as the poison makes its way deeper into her body. Toward her heart.

  “She has put her hand into a poisoned glove,” Rho says. “Stop squirming, girl!”

  “Stop it!” the initiate begs. “Please, make it stop!”

  Rho grimaces in frustration. There is no saving the girl’s hand. She holds up her serrated knife, considers it a moment, then tosses it clattering to the floor.

  “Someone bring me an axe!” She bends the girl down across a table. “Hold out your arm, child. Quickly. We can take it at the elbow now. Do not make it worse.”

  More priestesses join Rho to hold the girl and shush her gently. A priestess runs past Mirabella with a small silver hatchet.

  “It was all I could find,” she says.

  Rho grips it and flips it over, testing its weight.

  “Turn her face away.
” She raises the blade to strike.

  “Turn yours as well, Elizabeth,” Mirabella says, and pulls her trembling friend close to hide her eyes and tuck the edge of her hood closed so the tiny, tufted woodpecker nestled in Elizabeth’s collar cannot fly out and be seen.

  The hatchet comes down, one hard, chopping thud into the table. It is a testament to Rho’s war gift that she did not need to strike twice. The surrounding priestesses wrap the poor girl’s bleeding arm and steal her away to be tended. Perhaps they have saved her. Perhaps the poison, meant for Mirabella, has been stopped.

  Mirabella clenches her teeth to keep from screaming. It was Katharine who did this. Sweet little Katharine, who Mirabella knows not at all. But Mirabella is smarter now. She made the mistake of sentimentality with Arsinoe. She will not make it again.

  “When she is healed, I will have a spade fashioned for her. Just like mine. We will tend the gardens together. She will not miss her arm at all,” Elizabeth says tearfully.

  “That is kind of you, Elizabeth.” Mirabella says. “And when I am finished with Arsinoe, I will silence Katharine so no one will have to fear poisoned gloves out of the capital ever again.”

  That night, Mirabella and Bree and Sara Westwood meet Luca and the priestesses before the temple courtyard. Mirabella’s black dress is covered in a soft, brown cloak, and her riding boots are laced up tight. Bree, Elizabeth, and her escort of guards and scouts are all similarly outfitted. Anyone who sees them pass might mistake them for traveling merchants.

  Mirabella strokes the muzzle of one of the long-legged black horses who will pull the decoy carriage toward Katharine and Indrid Down. The carriage is a beautiful, empty shell, lacquered and trimmed in silver, the horses so dark they would be shadows if not for the shine off their bits and buckles. They will be enough of a distraction for Katharine and the Arrons. Just enough to keep them from interfering with her in Wolf Spring.

  “Here is Crackle,” Luca says, and places her stout brown mare’s reins into Mirabella’s palm. “She will not fail you.”

  “I have no doubt.” Mirabella scratches the horse beneath the forelock. Then she moves to Crackle’s side and swings into the saddle.

  “What are these?”

  Mirabella turns. Her party is mounted, but one of the priestesses is tugging on Bree’s saddlebags.

  “Leave off!” Bree nudges her horse a step forward. “They are pears.”

  “We have not inspected any pears,” the priestess says.

  “That is because I picked them myself, from the orchard at the edge of Moorgate Park.”

  “They should not go,” the priestess says to Luca.

  “And yet they are going,” Bree insists. “Queen Katharine is not so devious as to poison these three particular pears from one particular tree in one particular orchard in one of the many parks in Rolanth. And if she is,” she says to Mirabella through the side of her mouth, “then she deserves to win.”

  Mirabella and Elizabeth suppress their smiles. But there is not much light; the moon is waning, and what slice is left is obscured by clouds. So perhaps the priestesses will not see how their sides shake.

  “Ride fast,” says Rho. She has taken down her hood, and dark red hair spills over her shoulder. “And quietly. We have heard reports of another bear mauling near Wolf Spring. A man and his boy, disemboweled and necks broken. Your sister does not have control of her familiar. Or she does and is wicked. Either way there is no time to waste.”

  Mirabella takes up her reins and whirls Crackle onto the road.

  “For the first time, Rho, you and I are in agreement.”

  INDRID DOWN

  Katharine’s horse’s hooves slide on the cobblestones on the way toward Indrid Down Temple, and she pulls his head up sharply. She loves to ride fast through the capital, through the middle of the streets as people jump out of her way, her black hair and Half Moon’s tail streaming behind like flags. Half Moon is the gamest, most agile horse in Greavesdrake’s stables. Bertrand Roman, the boorish guard that Natalia appointed on Genevieve’s recommendation, cannot hope to keep up.

  She reaches the temple and signals to an initiate priestess standing in the shadows, earning her black bracelets by serving at the temple door. The initiate comes forward immediately as Half Moon comes to a hopping stop and Katharine dismounts.

  “Shall I take him to the stable, Queen Katharine?”

  “No thank you. I won’t be long. Just walk him, and he would not mind some sugar if you have some handy.” She turns away and smiles as she hears Bertrand Roman approaching, huffing and puffing on the back of his black mare.

  Katharine does not wait. She walks through the doors, out of the bright heat of Indrid Down June and into the nave, which always smells of smoky incense and wood polish. The exterior of Indrid Down Temple may be as dramatic as the rest of the city, a facade of black marble and spitting gargoyles, but the interior is surprisingly austere: only a scant path of well-worn black mosaic on the floor, wooden benches for the devotees, and bright white light streaming from the upper-level windows.

  Katharine waves to Cora, the head priestess, and loosens the collar of her black riding jacket.

  “Some cool water for the queen,” Cora calls, and a novice scurries for a pitcher.

  “You should not ride so far ahead of your guard,” Cora says, and bows.

  “Do not worry about me, Priestess,” Katharine replies. “Natalia has eyes and ears in every corner of the island. If there had been any movement out of Wolf Spring or Rolanth, you can be sure I would be locked up tight.”

  Cora smiles nervously. They are all so afraid. As if Mirabella will appear out of nowhere and shake the temple to the ground, or Arsinoe will storm the city astride her bear. As if they would dare.

  Katharine walks between the aisles, squeezing the hands of temple visitors in her black-gloved fingers. The temple is nearly full, even at this odd hour. Perhaps it is as Natalia says and the Ascension brings people back to the Goddess. Or perhaps they are there for a glimpse of their Undead Queen.

  “We will have a suitor here in the capital soon, is that not so?” Cora asks.

  “Yes,” Katharine replies. “Nicolas Martel. Natalia is preparing the banquet to welcome him, to be held at the Highbern Hotel.”

  “We will be honored to receive him at the temple. Can you recommend any decoration?”

  “Indrid Down Temple is elegant enough as it is,” Katharine says distractedly. “Though Natalia likes poison flowers. Something pretty, but nothing that can be absorbed through the skin.”

  Cora nods, and walks with Katharine as they approach the apse and the altar. There, behind a silver chain, lies the Goddess Stone, a great, curved circle of obsidian set into the floor. It shines brightly even in the low light. Looking into its depths feels to Katharine like looking into the blackness of the Breccia Domain.

  “It is very beautiful,” Katharine whispers.

  “Yes. It is. Very beautiful, and very sacred.”

  They say it was taken from the eastern side of Mount Horn. That the mountain opened up one day, like an eye, for them to claim it. Katharine does not know if that is true. But it is a good story.

  She reaches down and takes Cora by the wrist. The head priestess’s tattooed black bracelets are old and faded, though Cora cannot be more than forty. She must have come to the temple so young.

  “Such devotion,” Katharine says, and rubs the tattoo with her leather-clad thumb.

  In the back of the temple, the doors open and close around Bertrand Roman’s clomping boots. Katharine purses her lips.

  “A moment alone with her, perhaps,” she says.

  “Of course.” The head priestess bows and turns to clear the room. “Everyone, please, quickly,” she says. Clothes rustle and footsteps hurry along the aisles. Katharine is still until the door thuds closed and all is silent.

  “You too, Bertrand,” she says, irritated. “Wait for me outside.”

  The door opens and closes again.

/>   Katharine smiles and slips quietly beneath the silver chain. She can feel the Goddess Stone watching as she approaches.

  “Do you know us?” Katharine whispers to it. “Do we still smell of the rock and the deep, damp earth that you threw us down into?”

  She kneels and places her hands on the marble floor. She leans across. The Goddess Stone lays before her curved and black, showing her pale reflection.

  “You will not have your way this time,” Katharine says, her lips close enough to the obsidian to kiss it. “We are coming for you.”

  Katharine strips off her glove and places her hand against the cold, hard surface. Perhaps it is only her imagination, but she could swear that she feels the Goddess Stone shudder.

  WOLF SPRING

  Arsinoe, Jules, and Joseph arrive at Luke’s bookshop to find a service of tea and fried fish sandwiches already set out on his oval table on the landing overlooking the main floor. Luke sent his black-and-green rooster, Hank, up the twisting hill road to the Milone house to collect them early that afternoon. Jules still has the bird tucked under her arm (he demanded to be carried back), and drops him to the floor in a puff of feathers.

  “What’s all this?” Arsinoe asks. “Why the official rooster summons?”

  Before Luke can answer, Joseph nudges her in the ribs and nods toward the dress hanging in the shop window: the gown that Luke is making for Arsinoe to wear at her crowning. A bit of lace has been added to the bodice, and Arsinoe winces. Luke will have to take it off again if he ever wants to see her in it.

  “Come,” Luke says. “Sit. Eat.”

  The three share a heavy look. Even Camden seems suspicious, her tail swishing nervously against the rug. But they climb the stairs and take their seats, and stuff fish sandwiches into their mouths.

  “Mirabella is planning a strike,” Luke says.

  Arsinoe feels their eyes upon her and is glad the black mask hides so much of her expression.

  “How do you know?” Joseph asks.

  “A tailor friend traveling from Rolanth. He saw them readying two caravans. One is a decoy. To drive toward Indrid Down and ensure that Katharine stays put.”