“Lied. Misled me. Failed to trust me,” he spat. “I’ve never given you cause to distrust me, especially with something that so profoundly affects Annfwn. Our kingdom. Even if you don’t trust me as a man, even if you no longer want me as your lover—do you also think I’m a weak king?”
“No!” Moranu take it, I couldn’t sit in bed for this. I flung aside the covers and stood, the polished stone cool on my bare feet. Pulling on the green silk dressing robe I’d dropped on the floor when I crawled exhausted into bed a few hours before, I tied the sash. My lack of a waist meant I had to snug it over the protruding round of my belly, which then made the lapels sag open obscenely over my heavy breasts. I glared at Rayfe, the irritation with my swollen body at least prodding me out of despondent guilt. “I’ve never thought you’re a weak king. I do trust you as a man, and I never stopped wanting you as my lover. How many times have I asked, even begged you to touch me these last months?”
“Until last night,” he hissed. “And now I know why you changed your mind.”
I set my teeth. “I wanted more than anything to say yes, but we’d made the plan. People—many people—were waiting for me, counting on me to do my part at the time I’d promised I’d do it. Would you want me to put a personal relationship, even with you, above my duties as queen?”
“No,” he replied in an even voice, the lethal predator in it. “I’d want you to tell me what’s going on in my own kingdom. To include me in this plan.” His voice had risen to a near shout, and he broke off and wiped a hand over his brow. “It would’ve been so simple to explain. You can’t imagine I would’ve objected. No, I would have helped you, but you had to shut me out of even that. Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I…” Moranu curse me to the deepest ocean, I couldn’t give him the real reason. “I couldn’t.”
He stared at me, waiting. Finally he set his jaw. “Is there more explanation or is that all you’re going to say?”
“The reasons I couldn’t tell you last night are the same reasons I can’t explain more today.”
“Even though I already know what you did.”
“Yes.”
He glared at me, frustration, insult, and stark heartbreak warring in him. “I don’t understand you at all. You can’t possibly believe I’d do anything to betray Annfwn or the Tala. Nor would I do anything to hurt you.”
When I didn’t have a ready reply to that, either, he shook his head. “I guess you don’t believe even that.”
“Rayfe.” I reached out a hand and laid it on his lean chest, the tension and rage vibrating through him. It seemed that the high priestess would win her gambit either way—I could keep him from knowing our plans, but then she’d drive us apart. I had to try to suture this wound. I looked up at him, letting him feel my pleading, my earnest apology. “I’m so sorry that I hurt you, but I’m asking you to trust me in this. I’m doing the best I can in a very difficult situation.”
“We all are,” he bit out, but he unclenched one fist enough to cover my hand with his. “All those years I waited for you, Andromeda, that I dreamed of what you’d be like, how our marriage would be—I never imagined that you would turn on me.”
“I haven’t turned on you. That’s not what’s going on.”
“Then what is?” he asked, half demand, half plea.
“It’s complicated, and I’m asking you to trust me, for just a little while longer.”
“I thought you and I, we made a good team. We might argue, but we agreed on the important things. Has that changed?”
“No.” I didn’t know how to prove that, so I stood on tiptoes, leaning both hands on his chest, and brushing his unresponsive lips with mine. “We still agree. If I could tell you, I would, and you would agree. Everything I’m doing is for Annfwn, for you, and our people. Please believe me. Please bear with me.”
He relented, at last, returning the kiss, though perfunctorily, without passion. He ran the fingers of his other hand through my hair, sorrow creasing his face. “I’ll try, Andromeda, I really will.”
“Thank you,” I whispered. “I love you so much.”
“Then give me something, anything.”
I tensed, sensing the change in him. The high priestess hadn’t been speaking through him before this. I hadn’t sensed her, and Rayfe’s outrage and hurt had been too real. She’d slipped in, from one moment to the next, like a disease. “Give you something?” I asked, managing to keep the smile from freezing on my face.
“Why did you compress the barrier only for a few leagues?”
“What do you mean?”
“Did you hope to make it much smaller, but then the high priestess stopped you?”
Oh yes, definitely her asking that question. I’d told nobody that I’d encountered the high priestess out there. This was an opportunity, the kind Ursula would’ve crafted if she could. I had to master the turmoil of emotion to feed her the most useful lies, and to keep her talking so I could assess how she occupied his mind. I might not be able to free him now, but I could be ready to do it at a moment’s notice.
“To prove myself to you, I’ll tell you what happened with the barrier,” I said, making a show of grimacing ruefully.
I had to think like a warrior, like a sorceress, in this very personal battle, to let go of worry about the effects on Rayfe, on our relationship and marriage. I must remember that I spoke to my enemy and nemesis, not my husband and lover. You’re not doing this to him.
Except that he’d remember every word of this, and my heart broke for that. Nevertheless, I invaded Rayfe’s mind again, extending those tendrils of thought as I’d done before, tasting and testing with a delicate touch.
“I started to shrink the barrier, but she stopped me, and I dropped it in a random place,” I continued saying as I explored.
This was different from what she’d done to Karyn. That had been encompassing, the vile stench of Deyrr wound all through her heart and mind. This was far more subtle, probably all the better to fool me—and to keep me from wresting control back, as I’d done with Karyn. That process had been brutal and painfully wrenching. I could only guess how much worse it would be extracting Rayfe from these many tentacles digging deeply into him. The high priestess was skilled and clever.
I would have to be better.
“She’s so much stronger than I am, Rayfe,” I added, just to lure her in a bit more.
He nodded, expression sharp and eager. Her face, showing through his. Revolting and infuriating. “I’ve tried to warn you that you have no chance of defeating her.”
“She’s so powerful, and she knows so much that I don’t.”
“It’s true.” He stroked my hair and I had to restrain the shudder of revulsion. “It’s not fair of everyone to expect you to stand up to her.”
“She doesn’t have the Star of Annfwn, though,” I said, watching for a reaction, planting my seeds carefully. “That’s an advantage she doesn’t have.”
“Do you even know to use it though?” he demanded. “The n’Andanans destroyed so much information.”
“I just know that the Star could make all the difference between victory and defeat.” I shrugged, pretended to restlessness and paced away, tugging my robe tightly closed. It was too awful, touching him while the high priestess spoke through him, looked at me through his eyes. “She offered to teach me,” I confessed, then bit my lip as if torn. “If I’d come to her side, she’d instruct me in sorcery, things I could never learn anywhere else.”
“What did you say?” he asked.
“I said no, of course. My duty is here. To you, and to Annfwn.”
“If you think about it, though, the Tala, the n’Andanans, and Deyrr were once all one, all on the same side,” he pointed out. A dangerous gambit of hers. Rayfe would never say anything like that. A miscalculation born of her disregard for the Tala, the way she thought of them as mindless animals.
There was another key difference in this possession. With Karyn, the high priestess had cozene
d her, warped her wants to fit with Deyrr’s cause. What she’d done with Rayfe was both subtler and more straightforward. She’d taken over his will as she did with the more active sleeper spies, using him like a puppet. I could sense the strings clearly now. What I didn’t know was how much Rayfe was an impotent bystander. From what he said when he was himself, he experienced her control like a dream, half-forgotten. Too much remembered.
“If Moranu created us all,” Rayfe continued, “maybe we should all be one again, not fighting each other.”
“I just don’t know. Everything is so confusing.”
“We could stop many deaths by surrendering,” he said. “I’ve been thinking about that more and more.”
“Ursula would never agree to a surrender,” I replied, nearly holding my breath in anticipation of what the high priestess might reveal.
“Your sister has bigger problems with the Dasnarians,” Rayfe confided. “If the Twelve Kingdoms ships fall to them, we might have to reconsider our stance with Deyrr. There’s no shame in yielding to inevitability. We could save ourselves, even if she won’t.”
I nodded, trying to seem both reluctant and eager. “Maybe so. I’ll think about it. Maybe we can suggest that at the strategy meeting. You’re coming?”
“Of course. What is the backup plan, since moving the barrier failed?”
“We’ll have to discuss that. I should clean up and get dressed.”
“Good idea.” He looked me over. “I’m sure you’ll feel better if you do something with your hair.”
I nearly rolled my eyes at her. Rayfe had never once complained about my hair, unless it was to encourage me to grow it longer. Her ambition, enormous ego, overconfidence—and enormous vanity—made her careless. I simply had to find a way to use that against her.
The next wave of ships had gone out on schedule, well before we convened the strategy session that was mostly an elaborate play for Rayfe and the spy inside him. Ursula turned out to be excellent at that sort of subterfuge—no surprise there—making it seem as if our navy had been deployed to attack n’Andana. All that remained, she declared, was for us to determine the remaining details of the attack.
I affected careless confidence about the barrier, emulating the high priestess’s ego and attitude, assuring them all that the Dasnarians posed zero threat, and we could safely ignore them. Mostly Ursula and the others argued about how big of a force to send by air, which would arrive ahead of the ships, and how soon to follow up with foot soldiers.
Using that cover, hating myself for the paranoia, I scanned each of them for the markers of the high priestess’s influence. I nearly sagged with relief when all but Rayfe came up clean. Even Karyn showed none of the markers of the high priestess’s passage—though I could detect the shadow of her past occupation, a stain that Karyn would likely carry forever, along with the black thorns inked into the skin of her arm.
Ursula adeptly adjusted to the points Rayfe insisted on—Dafne noting them down in a special column—appearing to defer in the moment, so that we could be sure to do the reverse. All in all, it didn’t take long. Fortunate, as we had real battle plans to make, and as a hole wore its way through my stomach every time I helped lie to my husband. Occasionally I caught glimpses of his true self, but for the most part the high priestess kept the upper hand, growing increasingly careless in her certainty that she’d fooled us.
Once we had Rayfe convinced we planned to begin sending aerial troops that afternoon to commence a slow, three-day journey with many rest and refueling stops, we pretended to adjourn.
It was Ash’s turn to keep Rayfe occupied, so they went off to rally the ground forces. He’d report to us on what the high priestess did to undermine us there. As we wouldn’t be truly moving them any time soon, we should be able to repair any damage.
Once Ash reported via Djakos to me that Rayfe was safely away, we crept back like traitors to finalize our true plan. They wouldn’t need me to open a portal in the barrier for the first of the Dasnarian ships to enter until later in the afternoon. Harlan and Ursula were still debating how many to string through the opening to begin with. He wanted to allow more to enter unhindered, to appear to lose to them, so that more ships would commit. She, of course, wanted as few intact and active Dasnarian battleships inside the barrier as possible. Kral—via staymach message—had weighed in with Harlan, and that made Ursula dig in even more as she didn’t trust Kral’s motives still. Knowing her as I did, I suspected appearing to lose went more against her grain than she’d admit.
I gave them an edited version of my conversation with Rayfe earlier in the morning, then left them to argue about the battle with the Dasnarians, and went to the Heart to retrieve the Star.
Though I’d only left it hours before, it felt good to enter the depthless silence of the Heart, to absorb that life-giving magic. All the power of the Star and the Heart at your command… and you lack the knowledge, the skill to use the tools you have. She wasn’t wrong. I had the ability to tap into both, could catch a glimpse of the potential there, but I didn’t have more than surface understanding.
You’ve only scratched the surface. You are a danger only to yourself—and to the people too stupid to get out of the way.
The high priestess’s analogy of the toddler with a broadsword was uncomfortably apt. I knew enough to recognize the potency of the weapon, and that I lacked the strength and skill to wield it. She was dead wrong, however, that the people around me were too stupid to duck. They wouldn’t protect themselves because loved and trusted that I wouldn’t harm them.
That meant it was up to me to master my fearsome weapon, and quickly.
I had no time to grow up, no sword master to teach me the necessary skills. But I wouldn’t fail to use my best weapon, and not only because the high priestess clearly wanted that. She wanted me so afraid that I’d hesitate to use the power at my hands. I couldn’t worry about cutting myself. After all, a toddler without a sword was defenseless.
Holding the Star in the palm of my hand, I lingered a while on that abalone throne where so many sorceresses before me had sat. Back when I’d been ostensibly heir to the High Throne after Ursula, I’d thought that having my butt on a throne would mean the world would have fallen apart beyond repair. Funny, that. Though, even then, untrained and living in a land starved of magic, I’d had some of my native abilities. I’d glimpsed the future without knowing what it was.
Perhaps it was true that I’d only scratched the surface of a world of magic so immense and rich that I couldn’t comprehend it, but I still understood worlds beyond what I had before. I’d been born to this, and my mother had known exactly what she was doing. Perhaps that’s what that vision had meant, when Moranu showed me Salena looking down the years at us with pride and satisfaction.
I might not have learned to wield that sword like a master, but I could lift it. Because it was mine, and it was in me to do this thing.
Studying the Star, I reinforced my connection to it, following my intuition. My inner teacher was the only one available to me, and I knew who that was. Ami had said it and Shaman had confirmed it: Moranu would guide me. The goddess of shadows and magic would be the greatest teacher.
I would do what was required, but one thing I was certain of: I would only sacrifice myself. I wouldn’t give her my child.
I waited for the goddess to argue otherwise. Or to give any sign at all. How do you try to listen? That had to be the most unhelpful advice ever. When Moranu offered no insight, no demands or gripping visions, I tested the futures surrounding the Star, recoiling at the many scenarios where I failed to strike the high priestess effectively and she used it to amplify the power of Deyrr with devastating results. And yet… I could also see futures where our plan worked.
There: the high priestess crumpling to ash, becoming the corpse she should’ve been centuries ago.
There: the high priestess directing an army that clogged the seas, skies, and land, the Star in her triumphant clasp.
It began to bother me, the differences between the scenarios. Could I be seeing successive futures? Something wasn’t right.
In the end, I took the Star with me, but when I took on human form—and human dress—I stowed the Star in one pocket and the high priestess’s lesser jewel in the other. Hopefully Moranu would eventually guide me to the right choice. The goddess’s silence was not reassuring.
The four going to n’Andana awaited me on the beach, Zynda and Zyr in human form. Karyn and Marskal wore fighting leathers, along with plenty of weapons. Karyn sported at least two bows that I saw. Their supplies sat nearby in orderly piles, ready to be strapped on to Zynda as soon as she took dragon form. That would allow Zyr to carry only Karyn and no other weight. I considered arguing again that it would spare his lighter gríobhth form if Karyn also rode Zynda, but one look at him, at the wildness of his First Form riding high beneath his skin, and I knew he’d never allow Karyn to be so close to Marskal.
That animal nature had kept Zyr from being king, as it would always override his better judgment. Rayfe, on the other hand… surely he had become king because he had been able to control the wolf. He’d had the intelligence, resolve, and cunning to come after me, to bring back a queen for Annfwn. The high priestess might have a leash on his will, on Rayfe’s mind and heart, but he was a man to be reckoned with. I would trust in that.
They all greeted me, their excited anticipation humming in the air, and I used the flurry of conversation to check them all once more for the high priestess’s strings. Just in case. Fortunately, they remained untainted and we didn’t need to alter the plan. I hadn’t had an alternative for what we’d do if any of this team had been compromised. Send only one pair, I supposed, which could’ve explained several disasters I’d glimpsed.
Not something to I needed to worry about now.
“Are you all clear on the plan?” I asked.
They exchanged glances.
“There’s an actual plan?” Zyr made a shocked face. “I thought we were to fling ourselves upon the dark waters of destiny and sacrifice our very lives for the greater good.”
The Fate of the Tala Page 22