Shifting Loyalties

by Melissa McShane

  She scrawled out a few lines, hoping her handwriting was legible enough for them to read. Fury filled her, poured down her arm and through her pen into words she barely remembered writing: forcing me to stay—don’t come after me—will speak to the king. That last made her realize it was possible her parents would prevent that, too, so she added another line: You should probably request an audience with the king on my behalf, just in case. She threw the pen to stick quivering, point-first, in the plaster of the wall, and blew on the page to dry the ink, then folded it in thirds and looked around for sealing wax.

  “That won’t be necessary,” Papa said when she picked up the stick of green wax. “No one’s going to read it.”

  “It’s for their peace of mind, not mine,” she said curtly, and used her spark to melt the wax. She dribbled it over the seam and swiftly pressed her thumb to the soft wax. It was better than a seal that had nothing to do with who she really was.

  She handed the sealed paper to her father, who stood, followed by her mother. “Let me show you to your room,” Mother said. “And you really will want to bathe before dinner.”

  That was too much. “You can lock me in,” Sienne said. “You can prevent me seeing my friends. You can even force me to sleep here. But I’ll be damned if I eat dinner with you and pretend this is all normal. I’d rather starve.”

  Mother’s eyes narrowed. “You dare speak to me—”

  “Clarie,” Papa said. “Enough. Sienne, if you want to eat in your room, we’ll send something up.”

  “I said I’d rather starve.”

  “That’s up to you.”

  “I suppose you’re going to lock me into the bedroom for my own good, too?”

  “The door has a lock. We’ll give you the key.”

  It was like fighting a wall of wet sand, oozing back into place wherever she made headway against it. “I want to speak with the king,” she said, hating how weak she sounded.

  “We’ll talk about that later,” Papa said. “Excuse me. I’ll have this sent.”

  Sienne’s mother followed him out. “Your room is on the third floor,” she told Sienne, gesturing toward the stairs at the back of the entry hall.

  “So I won’t climb out and run away, you mean?” Sienne responded.

  Mother began climbing the stairs. “Because that’s where the spare room is,” she said.

  The stairs ended at the second floor, where a brightly-lit hallway extended from the landing in both directions. Mother led the way to the left, but stopped, startled, as a door opened and Liliana came out. “Sienne!” she shouted, and flung herself on her sister. “You came! Are you here to fix my dress? You were gone a long time. Was it an exciting adventure?”

  Sienne extricated herself from Liliana’s embrace and clamped down hard on a cruel retort, barely aware that Liliana, brat or not, didn’t deserve the anger that rightfully belonged to two other people. “Later,” she said. “I’m…going to take a bath.”

  Liliana’s nose wrinkled. “Good, because you need one. Are you…” She looked more closely at Sienne. “Are you crying?”

  Sienne hadn’t realized she was. She swiped furiously at the tears spilling from her eyes and said, “Something got in my eye. I’m fine. I’ll talk to you later.” She strode off down the hall, past her mother, and found another set of stairs leading up.

  The third floor was darker than the second, but still well-lit enough that Sienne could make out several doors. Her parents must have struggled to find a house with enough bedrooms for their ravening horde. She realized she didn’t know where to go just as her mother came up beside her and said, “Second on the right. I’ll have someone find the key for you.”

  “I thought that was a lie.”

  “We wouldn’t lie to you, Sienne.”

  “No. You’d just ruin my life. Again.”

  “Stop being so dramatic,” Mother said, grabbing Sienne’s shoulder and swinging her around to face her. “You think you’re the only one who’s given up things for the sake of the dukedom? Think of Felice—”

  “Felice is happy not to be heir. Did she tell you her plans? That she’s moving here to—” In time Sienne remembered that her mother might not be privy to Felice’s romantic secrets. “To live? That she doesn’t love Rance and is happy to be free of him? Don’t you dare tell me about what she’s given up.”

  “That’s not what I meant. But it’s none of your business.” Sienne’s mother threw the door open. “The bath is at the end of the hall. Someone will bring you a tray in a few hours, if you’re really set on making a farce of your life.”

  “My life was fine before you intruded on it.”

  “I suppose your next words will be to tell me you’re sorry you were born into this family.”

  “You said it. Not me.”

  Mother spun on her heel and stormed off toward the stairs. Sienne went into her cell and slammed the door shut. The latch didn’t catch, and the door rebounded almost in her face. She caught it and slammed it again, less forcefully. This time it stayed closed. She leaned against it face-first and waited for the tears to fall. They didn’t. Instead, she felt weariness seep into every muscle. Banned from her friends, banned from Alaric, trapped in this horrible life…would they even let her request an audience with the king? They might see it as one more way in which she would defy them, and forbid her to make the attempt. For her own good, probably.

  Unfortunately, her audience with the king wasn’t just for her anymore. Without her, how likely was it that the others could get in to see him? The werebears’ plea would go unheard, and their people unprotected, just because her parents thought they knew better than anyone else how the world should run. It was vital she see the king, and she would have to find a way to convince her parents of it. Maybe she could make it a deal: she’d acquiesce to their wishes if they gave her one last appeal. They might respond to that.

  She turned to survey her cell. It was nice, not at all an afterthought like most spare rooms, with a bed big enough for two—

  Now the tears came.

  21

  The bathroom, tiled in blue and white, was chilly even in the heart of true summer. It would no doubt be glacial in winter. It didn’t matter, because whatever happened, Sienne wouldn’t be there to find out. She pumped the tub full and heated the water as hot as she could stand, scrubbed herself clean, then washed and dried her clothes. It wasn’t as good a job as a laundry would have done, but she wasn’t going to go begging to her parents for a change of clothing, and the thought of wearing her road-grimed shirt and trousers over her clean body made her cringe. She tried not to think of the rest of her wardrobe, safely tucked away in her dresser back at Master Tersus’s house. It would be hers again, soon enough.

  She went back to her cell and stood looking out the window for a while. The room looked out over the Plaza of Sighs and the chapel of Gavant, busy even at this hour, when most people were still at work. Of course, Gavant was most worshiped by the well-to-do, who could afford not to work, so maybe that made sense. She wondered if they put on that light show every night. Possibly they used different confusions, to keep the worshippers from becoming jaded. She scowled. That one, she would be around to see.

  She tried to remember the wording of the message she’d sent her team. Would Alaric try to break her out regardless? She hoped not. If he were arrested for assaulting her parents’ servants, it would be that much harder for them to see the king. She was sure she’d made that clear, but Alaric, otherwise sensible, often didn’t display common sense when it came to her safety. She turned away from the window. There was nothing she could do about that now.

  In addition to the large four-poster bed with heavy red velvet drapes, the room contained a small round table barely big enough for fancy work, a wingback chair, a clothespress, and a heavily embroidered footstool. The clothespress was full of clothes, mostly gowns in rich brocaded satin or fine silk, scented with the lavender sprigs tucked between their folds. Suspicious, Sienne pulled a
gown out and held it up to herself. Her own size. One more part of her parents’ evil plan. Was it a warning, or a bribe? Well, she’d wear her own clothes to rags before she donned any of it. But they went to so much trouble, a tiny part of her said, and she felt a flash of guilt at rejecting their offering. Her weakness infuriated her so much she slammed the lid of the clothespress, then opened it and slammed it again a few more times until she felt better.

  The armchair was more comfortable than the one in the drawing room, which angered her all over again, so she sat on the bed, which she’d been avoiding ever since she’d stopped crying, and opened her spellbook. There had to be something she could do to get out of here. Really, her parents were either stupid or naïve to leave her with the ability to do wizardry. The window was large enough for her to climb out, so…drift, to let her leap weightlessly to the ground, vanish, so no one would see her do it, and she still had the wand, so silence, in case the guards were unusually alert. It made sense to wait until everyone had gone to bed, even so.

  Having a plan cheered her. She got up and went back to the window, to test the fit. She’d have to squeeze to get through, but she was flexible and it wouldn’t be too much of a challenge.

  She unlatched the window and pushed on it. It didn’t move.

  Stunned, she shoved harder. Nothing. She stood on the footstool, balancing carefully on its overstuffed cushion, and examined where the window met the casing. Someone had nailed it shut. She ran her fingers over the nail heads, sunk so deeply they didn’t protrude at all, and the anger that had faded with the slamming and the tears rushed through her with a white heat that found voice in a terrible scream a howler would envy. She slammed her fist against the window and screamed again, longer and louder until her throat hurt. Then she threw herself face down on the bed and beat her fists against the counterpane. They dared treat her like a prisoner? Never mind that she’d been planning an escape that justified their actions—she was their daughter, supposedly their heir, and they’d locked her up like some animal.

  “Sienne?”

  Sienne sat up. Liliana stood in the doorway, a bundle of midnight blue fabric in her arms. Her eyes were wide and her face pale. “Are you all right? You didn’t hear me knock, so I came in anyway. I was hoping you’d fit my dress for me, but I can come back later…”

  Sienne calmed her breathing. “No. It’s fine. Come in and shut the door.” She sat up as Liliana closed the door, and added, “Sorry you had to wait so long. I didn’t have time before we went on that last job.”

  “It’s all right. Was it exciting? I wish I could do exciting things. But I don’t want to be a scrapper.”

  “Go ahead and put the dress on. Why don’t you want to be a scrapper?”

  Liliana took off the dress she was wearing and shrugged into the midnight blue confection. “I don’t know. Probably because they go into the Empty Lands. I’m scared of the wilderness.”

  “It’s not that scary. You don’t really encounter many monsters, and when you do, you have your team to help you fight them.” The dress was only a little too big. Sienne opened her spellbook to fit and prepared to read.

  “You don’t really wish you were born to a different family, do you?”

  Surprised, Sienne lowered the spellbook and said, “Why would you say that?”

  “I heard you and Mother arguing. How did she ruin your life?”

  “Liliana, were you eavesdropping?”

  “I never learn anything unless I do.” Liliana scowled. “People think I’m too young to know anything, but I’m twelve now and that’s old enough to know the truth. You don’t want to be heir, do you?”

  “No. I don’t.” Anger resurfaced, and she quashed it ruthlessly.

  “Then why don’t you run away again?”

  She’d been planning just that, before the nailed-up window. “I…it’s complicated.”

  “That’s what people tell me when they don’t want to explain. I’m not stupid, Sienne. I just don’t understand why the heir has to be the oldest. Or the next oldest. Or why Papa can’t just say which of us he wants to be heir. I think he’d choose Quent. He talks to him most.”

  “I don’t really know why not. I think it’s because, if he could choose, we’d all fight about it, trying to prove who was the best choice.”

  “Except you don’t want to, and Felice doesn’t want to, and I’m not sure I want to either. I don’t know what I do want, but being duchess isn’t it.”

  “You’re so lucky it won’t be you. Now, stand still.” Sienne read the fit spell, shaping it with her thoughts, and the dress shrank to fit Liliana perfectly. It looked good on her, the dark blue fabric flattering her fair complexion. Liliana twirled to make the skirt flare and twinkle.

  “Thank you. I love it most of all my presents.” Liliana flopped down on the bed and propped herself on her elbows. “I knew Felice didn’t love Rance. They never kissed or held hands the way lovers do. And Rance likes someone else. I saw them kissing in the shadows on the verandah back home.”

  So Rance had a lover on the side. It didn’t surprise her. “Who was it?”

  “I don’t know. It was too dark.”

  “Too bad. Mother and Papa might be able to do something about the marriage settlement if they could prove Rance was unfaithful.” Sienne closed her spellbook and sat on the edge of the bed. “They probably want me to marry him.”

  “But you don’t love him.”

  “I am fairly certain Mother and Papa don’t give a damn about my feelings at this point.”

  “Why not? Sienne, why are you fighting with them?”

  Sienne sighed. “They’re making me abandon my friends, my whole life, because it’s not befitting the heir to Beneddo.”

  “But you can’t be a scrapper if you go back to Beneddo, and you have to go back to Beneddo to be the heir.”

  “I’m going to ask the king to disinherit me. Then I won’t be the heir and I can go on living my life my way.”

  Liliana’s eyes went wide again. “Would he do that?”

  “I don’t know. But I have to try. Do you—have you ever had something in your life that made you…complete? More yourself than anything else? That’s what I have with my friends. If I have to give that up just to rule a dukedom, especially when I don’t have any idea how to do that, I’ll die inside.” It was dramatic, but it was so true she felt tears rising inside her. She blinked them away and added, “Alcander will be a much better choice to rule.”

  “He won’t like it either. He wants to be a law-speaker.”

  “There’s no reason he can’t do both. It’s only scrapping that’s incompatible with ruling.”

  “I guess that’s true.” Liliana rolled onto her back. “So what are you going to do?”

  “I was going to escape. I’m afraid Papa won’t let me speak to the king. But they nailed the damn window shut.”

  “Were you going to fly? Sienne, can you fly?”

  “Sort of. I was going to make myself invisible and then float to the ground.”

  “Oh! You can use my window!”

  Startled, Sienne said, “I can’t do that!”

  “Why not? It’s not nailed shut. You can come to my room after everyone’s asleep and escape that way!”

  “But you’d get in trouble when they find out I’m missing. You know what Mother is like—she’ll ferret it out somehow.”

  “I don’t care. It’s not fair what they’re doing to you. And it’s an exciting adventure!” Liliana bounced a couple of times.

  Sienne hesitated. Then she stood. “Let’s look at your window.”

  Like Sienne’s, Liliana’s second-floor room faced the plaza. The sky was darkening, and figures were gathered around the chapel steps, waiting for the nightly worship. Her father was probably one of them, and Alcander and Quent.

  Sienne pushed on the window and breathed in the fresh, warm evening air. She hadn’t realized how stuffy her room was until she felt breezes on her face. The window was bigger than he
rs, more than half her height, easily tall and wide enough for her to fit through. She leaned out to examine the front door, but it was sheltered by a narrow roof that blocked her view. It wasn’t wide enough to obscure the two guards who stood at the bottom of the steps leading up to it. She closed the window and pursed her lips in thought.

  “Will it work?” Liliana said.

  “It will, but…” Her anger had subsided thanks to her excitement at once again finding her escape plan possible, and she could think more rationally. With her wizardry, escaping would be trivial. She could run home, collect her friends, and apply to the palace for sanctuary and an audience with the king. The problem was, her parents had the law on their side—the same unjust laws that allowed Lysander Delucco to annul Perrin’s marriage and prohibit him from seeing his children. The king wouldn’t grant her sanctuary if he knew the story, and with nearly three weeks to plan this, Sienne was sure the king knew the story, or at least her parents’ side of it. She’d be lucky to get an audience with the king at all.

  All right, so she’d run away instead. With her friends’ help, she could disappear thoroughly, go to Tagliaveno or Marisse or all the way to Concord if she had to. Problem solved. And yet…she remembered how Dianthe had been on the run for nine years, how hard it had been for her, and she hadn’t been the heir to a dukedom. Sienne would never see her siblings again. And she’d leave Beneddo in turmoil, because so long as they couldn’t prove she was dead, she’d still be the heir, and when her father died…no. She couldn’t run away.

  She closed her eyes and breathed out a curse. “I can’t,” she said. “The only way out of this is to see the king. And if he denies me…”

  “But you can’t give up! Don’t you love Alaric? You can’t be with him if you marry someone else!” Liliana exclaimed.

  “I know.” Sienne opened her eyes, but everything was blurry, so she closed them again and blotted away tears. “I have to hope the king will listen to me. I’m not the only one whose fate is on the line.” She’d temporarily forgotten the werebears’ plight. Their problem was even more important than hers.