by J. E. Holmes
—Historical Lessons of Ruinism
Past the cracked and broken walkway down to Ediline’s house, up the shabby ladder, she found Javras waiting—with Wulfgar and Wien, having as quiet a chat as she’d ever witnessed from Wulfgar. She pulled herself up the ladder and looked between the three of them. “You know, it isn’t necessary to accompany us,” she said. “I think Javras trusts me.”
“We have always,” Wulfgar said. “This would be no different.”
“You . . . have?” Ediline twisted back to look at Wulfgar, then at Wien.
Wien raised an eyebrow.
“Ah, of course you have,” Ediline said, her face hot with embarrassment. They’d watched every moment, one or the other of them. Even when she had been on the balcony with Javras, Wulfgar had probably been observing her from within. That was why he’d been waiting to threaten her. She felt immensely stupid.
“I don’t see the need,” Javras said, “but they insist. I apologize.”
“Young Javras is our bakery,” Wulfgar said. He slapped Javras’s shoulder with a massive hand. “If we do not watch him with eyes like tireless eagle, we do not get bread.”
Wien rolled her eyes. “Now that you know, we need not be so subtle about it,” she said.
“But maybe sometimes you still will be, right?” Ediline said. She pushed to make her implication as clear as possible. After what had just happened inside her house, her repeated bungling of intimate moments, she was hoping to have a second chance, eventually.
“Yes, yes, Princess,” Wulfgar bellowed. “Sometimes we will leave you alone for fornaf ti lulúoneknabek truso ecécanaf.” He finished with a hearty guffaw. Wien paled and Javras went red. He must have said something incredibly lewd.
“That is enough, Wulfgar Balus Tatánen,” Wien said.
“Ah.” He looked at the floor. “The line. I have stepped past it?”
“Sprinted.”
“I am apologize to Javras and the princess.”
Javras, face still sunburnt-red, wouldn’t even look at Ediline. She hung back a moment and, voice hushed, asked Wulfgar what he’d said. When he approximated it in her language, she punched him in an arm that was as big around and as hard as a tree trunk, and he laughed harder. Her knuckles hurt.
“No,” Thule said.
Ediline drew back. She narrowed her brow and wore her best offended expression, but inside, her heart pounded and her stomach thrashed at her. He could still deny her? Even with Javras present? What would happen if word got out that Ediline the eighth had been denied entry?
“I command you to allow me to pass,” she said.
“Your mother—”
“Queen Alarica,” Ediline said.
“Yes. Her Brilliance has requested that no one be allowed to enter. Including her husband’s eighthborn child, Princess.” He raised an eyebrow. “Another time, please.”
That wouldn’t do. She could perhaps command him to fetch a directive from her mother, but then, if she did that, Javras might think her petty. She was being denied, and she could accept that. Her mother, after all, did have power above hers.
There was a recourse, although it made her sick to think of it. She bit down and asked the question. “And is my father in the manor?”
Thule paused and swallowed. “Your father is not here, in the North Wing.” He took another pause, as if bracing himself, as if preparing himself to say something he didn’t want to. “I could inquire, if it would please the princess.”
“It would.” She folded her arms and gave him an expectant look.
“As you wish, Princess.” Thule backed away and retreated down the hall and around the corner. An urge to run inside, with the guard away from his post, pushed her heels up from the ground. But she set them back down. There would be more guards, and it would look terrible in front of Javras.
They were alone in the small corridor just inside the North Wing. Wien and Wulfgar were outside the slightly ajar door. She looked at him, then away, and sort of swayed back and forth.
“I didn’t expect you to be turned away,” he said. “I thought you and your mother were close.”
Ediline shrugged, trying not to look put off by it. Her Presence could disguise what she was feeling; she just hoped she wasn’t sweating. There was no Inherence that could conceal that. “We were close during my childhood,” she said, “but as I grew older, I was allowed more freedom, and she retreated to her duties.”
“Are you and your twin your mother’s only children?”
“Yes,” she said. “My other seven siblings are from my father’s previous three wives. I believe I said something about that on our first encounter?”
He hid a smile and turned a little rosier. “I believe you used some colorful words.”
“I’m glad you remember.” She jabbed him a little. He was less formal with her now, and she with him. She liked that, because it felt less like lying to him. Even so, after her botched attempt at kissing him, there was an awkwardness that stung her through the air between them. She should just grab him and kiss him. That would fix it, an indelicate solution. Right now.
Thule came back around the corner, and she banished the thought.
He cleared his throat. “His Dominance King Maxen is in the Defense Room, with the princes.”
“Which princes?”
“All of them.”
Blood drained from her face. That was a lot of people to pretend in front of. But she couldn’t just turn Javras around and walk him home. She would feel so stupid. No way to go but forward.
“Thank you, Thule—wait, the Defense Room?”
“Yes,” he said, “where things related to, um, defense are planned.”
“You mean the War Room.”
He frowned at her. “Tithelk is not at war,” he said firmly. “We have no need for a War Room, but every nation and city needs to consider its defenses, even against themselves.”
Javras said, “I understand that Tithelk continues to maintain a standing military force, despite the Era of Peace Accord.” His voice was like the edge of his sword, like stone struck with a mallet. “For defense, even against itself. Does your king distrust his people so much that he needs an army to defend himself from them?”
This was headed for nowhere good. Ediline jumped in. “We can spend hours tonight talking about that one,” she said. “We’ll have a heated debate, you and I, alone.” She set her hands on Javras’s chest. She looked back at the guard. “Thank you, Thule. Have a good night, safe and free from shadows.”
“You as well, Princess.”
She pushed Javras out the door and shut it behind her. Outside, Wulfgar was dangling from the walkway above, repeatedly pulling himself up and touching his chin to the floorboards. Wien waited nearby, presumably in case Wulfgar slipped and plummeted.
Javras’s jaw was set, his eyes elsewhere.
“What was that about?” Ediline said. She couldn’t allow outrage to reach her voice. She didn’t fully disagree with him, and the outrage didn’t feel like it was hers to have, but it still wrapped tight around her throat and squeezed to be heard.
“I should apologize,” Javras said. He took a deep breath and let it out. “I shouldn’t have spoken out like that. It was not my place.”
“No, it wasn’t.”
His chin dipped. “And that guard was not the one who should hear it.”
“Neither should my father be,” Ediline said. If he spoke out, she didn’t know what would happen, but her stomach dropped thinking about it. “If your father is going to say something about our standing military, please allow him to say it. It should not come from you. Those are the words of an emissary, not his son.” The edge in her voice softened. The outrage began to release her.
Javras only clenched his jaw further and turned sharply away from her.
“Javras—”
“Perhaps I should not accompany you to see your father,” he said.
If he didn’t, there was no chance she could get in. I
t was either abandon going to her father or potentially risk an international crisis. “Then we won’t go,” she said. “I don’t care about going. It isn’t that important to me.”
He nodded as if he didn’t believe her, as if he thought she was just placating him. If only he knew. Lords, how many times had she thought that?
“We’ll just go for a walk,” she said. “Or a climb? It seems Wulfgar has started already.”
Wulfgar laughed and dropped back down to their walkway. The floorboards shook with the thud. “I have trained many months on jagged mountainsides,” he said. “I will climb faster than young Javras or his delicate princess companion.”
Ediline couldn’t help but take his bait. The inaction, her inability to get to her mother, had left her frustrated. She narrowed a glare, sucked in a breath, and kicked her voice up an octave. “Delicate? Okay, time to climb, Wulfgar Balus Tatánen. You think scaling this manor is like climbing the side of a mountain? Prepare to eat your words.”
“Oho, my words are tasty. Let us make interesting, yes?”
“As interesting as you’d like!”
“Ediline,” Javras said, edging forward, “maybe this is a bad idea.”
“No, no,” she said. Her face was hot, her blood pumping. This was just what she needed. “What is the kind of thing you always say to Wien?” She cleared her throat and made her voice go as deep as it could. “Wulfgar likes so much to lose that he wants to bet his fancy fancy knife that he can climb faster than the princess.”
He boomed with laughter. “I will do this! If I wager knife, what does Princess wager?”
She didn’t really have anything. Money, as much of it as she wanted to ask for, and maybe Wulfgar would be pleased with that, but the Tithelken in her couldn’t do that. He was willing to wager a personal item, something he had carried a thousand miles from his home.
“I don’t have anything as precious as your knife,” she said. “But I have a taki, a traditional Tithelken short spear, that I carved myself from a strong shaft of ironwood. I’ll bet that, and as much money as will cover the difference in value.”
Wulfgar grinned. “I accept spear for knife, Princess.”
She turned around to Javras. The effects of his frustration, the crease to his brow and the tightness of his jaw, as well as the flare in his eyes, had faded. His current expression—a mix of concern, confusion, admiration, and amusement—was far better. “Ediline,” he said, “I think you might be making a mistake.”
“I know this manor,” she said. “I’ve climbed all over it.” She patted his shoulder. “Take Wien, find a guard, ask him to direct you toward Princess Isbeil’s house, and tell him I asked you to meet me there. It’s the highest point of the manor. If you’re refused, ask a different one.”
“You’ll really be all right?”
She grinned. “I’m about to win myself a knife.”
Javras hesitated, concern written from his brow to his lip. “Good luck,” he said. He departed with a nod, and Wien followed without a word. That left Wulfgar and Ediline on the wooden walkway outside the North Wing, the bustle of which was still distantly audible. Anticipation itched up Ediline’s legs. “Well?” she said.
“No cheating with emblems, yes, Princess?” Wulfgar said. “You are of Grace? No windsurge moss.”
“Of course. No surefoot root for you, either, o Mighty one.”
He laughed. “Point to me which way we are going.”
Ediline beckoned him over the side of the walkway, where she leaned out and he did the same. Craning her neck, peering up past the grandeur of Sladt’s myriad walkways and platforms and pitched rooftops, she spotted and pointed toward a narrow tower. The highest point in the manor. “My sister lives there,” she said. “The tower at the top. See it?”
“I see it,” Wulfgar said. “It calls to me, with sweet bells of victory.” He stood back up fully. “Is Princess ready to lose? I will give her first start.”
In her head, she was already running. She’d never made the climb from the North Wing—too close to those who were too eager to end her fun—but she could bolt down this ramp and make a running leap onto the rooftop over the Balkex Corridor that cut through Sladt’s center at this height. From there, she had a number of possible routes up to Isbeil’s.
“I am ready to win,” she said. “And when I do—”
Wulfgar lunged for the bannister they’d just leaned over and—with incredible alacrity— perched atop it. He pivoted as if with the poise of Grace and leapt. Then he put his Might to work. His arms and shoulders bulged as he hauled his bulk straight up, legs dangling, and grunted as he lurched toward the walkway straight above their heads.
“Princess should have used first start with legs and not words,” he grunted. “I will be seeing you at the top, Princess!”
Ediline took off, cursing under her breath. The downhill slant of the walkway carried her. She was faster, but if Wulfgar could just scale the manor straight up . . . she might not be able to outrun him. A nobleman flattened himself to the wall to get out of Ediline’s way, his entourage surrounding him. He exclaimed in surprise, and his servants cursed at the sprinting Princess, but she was too fast and too far away to pay them any mind.
The Balkex rooftop came into view. Her legs pumped. She soared between steps. At the height of each lunge, the air buoying her, she felt as if she would never come back down, as if all the stress of pretending to be something she wasn’t and all the worry of Ashwin’s impending arrival washed off her, and she was airborne and free. She kicked off and leapt, sailing over the downhill ramp into the Corridor. When her foot hit the roofing, she did not slip. She fell right in step and continued the race. There were so few things remaining in her control, and this was one of them. She would win.
As she ran and leapt and climbed, she stayed to the side of the manor where Wulfgar made his vertical ascent, watching him from the corner of her eye. His strength she had assumed. The agility, though, the ability to haul his whole body up on the power of nothing but momentum and his muscles—it awed her. But not so much that she wouldn’t win, and gloat after doing so.
Her feet slapped the wooden roof of Sladt, and she angled for the next jump. She sailed and struck a walkway at her upper thigh. Blunt pain thumped through her, a swollen ache. The rest of her was rattled, but she couldn’t stop. Her legs were stiff under her as she popped up and ran. She had to. She bolted up the incline of the platform, jumped and swung up the ladder. Isbeil’s landing was just ahead of her. The exultation of the race, the thrill of the nearness of the win, soared through her.
A grunt. As she reached the top of the ladder, she saw a massive forearm reach up from over the edge and, hand balled into a fist, bear down against the wood. Her breath halted. She was still several lengths down the ramp. This was it. She bore down and sprinted. An elbow and shoulder rose, then a head of short red hair and Wulfgar’s face, pink with exertion. She broke into a wild grin and laughed even as thrilling fear roared inside her. Her feet fell even faster. Wulfgar saw her, and he brought up his other arm, slamming it down. Both of his shoulders were above even with the walkway. He dipped down, briefly, then swung upward, and his entire torso slammed onto the walkway.
Ediline slid to a halt, huffing, and offered him a hand.
“The Princess is fast,” he said. He wasn’t as out of breath as she was. He couldn’t have been holding back. Everything she’d seen of Wulfgar led her to believe he loved to win. Still, he took her hand. Pulling him up onto the walkway outside Isbeil’s tower was like dragging a fallen tree out of the mire.
She put her hands on her knees, bent forward, and struggled to find her breath.
“Oh?” he said. “Maybe if you are too tired to speak, you are too tired to claim your—”
“I,” she said, “win.”
He just grinned and handed over his sheathed knife. Perhaps he didn’t know its full worth. Perhaps he had ten others. A blade entirely forged of steel was as valuable as any precious gem in
Tithelk. But Ediline didn’t want it for its value. She wanted it for what it was—a beautiful weapon she would have no hope of getting on her own. And she would cherish it, after she learned how to wield it.
She cast a glance around. The topmost walkway of Sladt was quiet around them. It wasn’t a surprise that Wien and Javras hadn’t arrived yet.
Wulfgar stood fully and wiped his brow. “You climb like monkey.”
“I suppose that’s a compliment,” she said between breaths.
“Do not worry, you do not look like monkey,” he said, and he made a strange face. “Monkey is ugly, Princess is lovely. My young Javras thinks so.”
A smile was difficult to conceal. Wulfgar laughed. He looked back and forth, and then at the blue door to Isbeil’s house.
“Your sister is nice?”
“Nice enough.”
“Is she lovely, like you?”
“Much lovelier. But she is a difficult woman to impress,” Ediline said. “She is more impressed by a mind than by climbing skills, Wulfgar, and I don’t know if you’re her type.”
“Maybe she is not my type, either. But my mind is like hunting knife.”
“Sharp?”
“Good for only a few things.”
She laughed at the joke, and when she stopped, she saw that his expression had grown serious. “What is it?” she said.
“Princess, Javras very much likes you,” Wulfgar said, his voice level. “He was upset, when he did not see you. I know his heart is pulled.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“It is difficult for him, because this thing he has come here to do.”
Her heart threatened to stop. “What is he—?”
“I saw the princess win,” Wien called across the rooftop. She strode up the walkway a few paces ahead of Javras.
No, don’t interrupt yet! “Wulfgar,” she said, hushed, “what is it he’s come here to do?”
He shook his head. “It is something for later.”
Lords damn the timing. If only she’d climbed a little faster, if only—
The blue door swung open, and Isbeil stomped out. Her hair flowed freely over her shoulders and down the front of her sleeping gown. Her feet were slippered, and her expression was one of utter, unconfined indignation. “What is all this damn noise about?” she hissed.