by Elise Kova
“But with your blessing.” She was reminded of her first vision of her father—the woman in all the bolts of draped silk must be the Queen of Meru.
“Yes.” Vi could see instantly how that would make Taavin powerful, even if he didn’t wield the power of the crown himself. “The Faithful also have a strong arm—Swords of Light. Though most call them merely ‘The Swords.’
“The man at their head… Lord Ulvarth, he is the one who keeps me here.”
“Why?” Vi whispered, though she could guess.
“Because if I were ever to leave—to splinter from him and the Faithful—his power would be diminished. He gets away with what he does because the people think his actions are based on directives that come from the Goddess herself, funneled through me.”
“And those directives don’t actually come from you or the Goddess… do they?” Vi said slowly, putting it together.
“They don’t,” he affirmed. “Well, not always. And if it is from me… I’m merely saying what Ulvarth wants me to in order to protect my own wellbeing.”
“How does Lord Ulvarth get away with that?” Though again, Vi suspected she knew the reason.
“By keeping me here. If he is the only one who may speak with me, then who is to know?”
“But the people, surely they—”
“The people have only seen me a handful of times.” Taavin gave her a tired smile. “I doubt they even remember my hair color, let alone what I would or wouldn’t say. I may be the Voice of the Goddess, but Ulvarth is the voice of me. He is the only truth they know.”
There were more layers to this; Vi could see them between his words even if she couldn’t quite understand them. But there was little she could do about his situation until she was with him. For the time being, all they had to make the hours a little more bearable was each other.
She ran her fingertip down the outline of his scar. Taavin’s eyes took on a worried expression. She barely had time to give him a reassuring smile before leaning in to kiss him once more.
He could have his secrets, for now.
The Crossroads were finally in sight.
The Western Waste had seemed like it would never end and then, suddenly, out of nowhere: civilization. The first sighting of it on the horizon was enough to set her heart racing. Now, every step closer filled her with apprehension and excitement.
This would be the end of her journey with her family, and the start of something a mere year ago she never would have expected.
“It will be similar to how it was when we came to get you,” Romulin said from her side. “We shall be in front, just behind some flag bearers this time. Then some more flag bearers on horses. A couple guards around. Then, the rest of the infantry.”
“Right,” Vi murmured, watching as said flag bearers assembled posts to make tall staffs, to which they affixed pennons emblazoned with the sun of the Empire. She fussed with the headscarf that had been keeping the heat off her brow. A heavy, rope-like braid fell down the center of her back.
“You’re not wearing your scarf anymore?” Andru asked from Romulin’s side. The two were together more often than not. And, while Romulin had yet to say anything outright, Vi was beginning to assume that Andru had mentioned she was in the know.
“No, not for when we enter. I’ve been told I look like my grandmother, Princess Fiera. I think showing my hair and face could only garner favor.”
“A brilliant idea, sister.”
“Thank you.” Vi gave her brother a smile. They had yet to really address what had happened two nights ago, but she took their easy rapport today as a sign they were headed toward some kind of peace—and that was the best she could hope for, before she set off for Meru. “I’ll take it out of the braid when we get closer, otherwise the wind will make it a knotted mess.”
“I admire that you learned the Southern braids from Mother,” Romulin said softly. “It was a nice gesture.”
Mother.
They hadn’t spoken much since Vi found out about her affliction. She stared at her mother’s back, at the cape bearing the blazing sun and lined in Western crimson. Vhalla rode strong and tall. If Vi hadn’t known better, she would’ve never suspected the illness ravaging her.
An hour later, they passed under the great northern gate of the Crossroads.
The Crossroads were unlike anything she’d ever seen. Certainly, the treetop cities of the North were magical and breathtaking in their own right, but the West was its own unique form of magic.
Canvas shades were pulled over the alleyways and streets to guard those below from the sun. The filtered light illuminated the white of the road ahead in reds and oranges. But the streets were mostly empty. Only a few lined their path forward, regarding them tiredly. Perhaps even warily.
Her eyes scanned over their heads, to the buildings behind them. Mostly squat and constructed of a smooth stone that looked almost like the sand itself, they had square windows and ashen timbers jutting out between floors.
Vi’s attention settled on the doors. Painted in a rough hand over a few was a white circle. Others bore an X.
“The White Death,” she muttered. She’d seen a similar mark in the North.
“Slightly different from the Northerners. Here, the circle marks places where the afflicted live… the X marks somewhere with a confirmed death. They haven’t set up any kind of central clinic,” Jayme said solemnly from Vi’s side. “When I came through a few months ago, I don’t recall seeing half as many marks.”
“The plague has hit the West the hardest so far,” Romulin agreed. His tone just as grim. “This is a better turnout than we had on our way up, if you can believe it. Though they look even less happy to see us…”
“Do you know how many?”
“How many the West has lost? Or how many have turned out to greet us?”
“The former,” Vi clarified.
“Elecia will have more up-to-date numbers… last I heard, it was in the range of twenty thousand.”
Vi gripped her reins so tightly the horse’s head jerked sideways. She hastily loosened her fingers and gave her mount an apologetic pat.
“There must be a cure.” Vi turned to Romulin, giving him a hard stare. His eyes darted between her and the people. She was putting him on the spot, confronting the harsh reality of their circumstances, but she didn’t care.
“If only,” Andru said softly. “I think hope of one passed with our Late Emperor.”
The Imperial party marched into the center of the Crossroads—the center of the world.
It was a large square, lined with buildings easily three floors higher than the rest. Every building seemed to be more ostentatious than the last, as if in a competition for which could be the highest, or have the most windows, balconies, or adornments. If Vi had to pick a winner, it would be the one toward her right, straight behind a platform in the center of the square. The building had three large, circular, stained-glass windows stacked on each other. Vi could only imagine how much it must have cost for an architect to conceive.
At the center of the square where the two main roads of the Empire met—the Great Southern Road and East-West Way—was a blazing sun in gold, cardinal directions pointing out toward each of the four departure points from the square.
The square was more filled with people than the road had been. Civilians stood to meet the approaching party, though it did not feel like a greeting. It felt more like a squaring off. They regarded the Imperial parade with shadowed eyes and slumped shoulders.
Surrounding them at the edge of the square was another small army, outfitted in Western crimson. They had been brought by the Lady of the West, who stood on a large platform in the center of the square, clad in black armor trimmed in red. Elecia had her hair undone, corkscrew curls standing in all directions like a crown that encircled her whole face. It was not unlike how Ellene had worn her hair, and Vi’s heart ached at the comparison.
“It is my honor,” Elecia’s voice boomed over the square, “t
o welcome her highness, Vi Solaris, on her historical march home.”
“Liberate us!” a woman screamed at Vi, lunging against the line of soldiers. “Liberate yourself and us from the tyranny of Solaris, reclaim your Ci’Dan name!”
Vi kept her eyes forward, focused solely on Elecia. She remembered the incident with the man during the solstice. As soon as chaos gained a foothold, there was no room left for reason.
“It is my honor to return to the home of my forefathers,” Vi proclaimed, trying to speak over the growing whispers. “On my path home to Solarin.”
“That is not your home!” a man shouted.
“Not your home!”
“Not your home!” The chant was picked up by the crowd.
Vi contained a bitter smile. They were right. She had no home, and she never would.
“The sooner we can end this, sister…” Romulin whispered, looking warily at those gathered. The crowd was beginning to shift, growing tenser by the moment.
Vi dismounted and guards pushed through the crowd ahead of her, creating a path to the platform. Jayme remained glued to her side, directing the other soldiers with waves of her left hand, her right on the hilt of her sword. The people forced themselves against the guards, trying to reach her. Jayme stepped in front whenever one stretched a hand too close.
Vi looked at their harrowed and strained expressions. These were not subjects looking to their sovereign in delight—but a people demanding answers from the party they deemed responsible for immense troubles.
“Lead the West to its former glory!”
“Will you help us?”
“Leave Solaris!”
She made it to the stairs, and had one foot on the bottom step when a shout stole her attention.
“They say Adela knows the cure! She killed Emperor Solaris for it. She’ll sell it back to us, at a price. Is it true?”
Vi scanned the crowd as murmurs increased.
“Your highness,” Jayme whispered hurriedly. “We shouldn’t linger right now.”
Vi quickly finished her way up the stairs.
“Her future Empress and I shall be discussing matters of the White Death, as we know—” Elecia attempted to speak over the growing unrest.
“Solaris is complacent!”
“No, the Easterner is!” Attention swept to Vhalla. “She was the one who made Prince Aldrik weak. She was the one who distracted him from his birthright when he could’ve seated himself in Mhashan during the rise of the Mad King.”
“Remove the Easterner—” A voice seemed to echo off every building, booming over every other, silencing the masses. “And let Ci’Dan rule once more!”
A glint of light caught Vi’s eye from a rooftop. Vi jerked her head in the direction, squinting against the sun. An archer.
“Mother! The roof—” Vi didn’t get to finish, but luckily she’d said enough.
Her mother swept a hand upward even before her head turned. Wind gusted upward all around her, ripping a pennon from its flagpole. The fabric fluttered through the air, tangling with the arrow that had been blown off-course along with it.
As if the assassination attempt were a cue, the mayhem began.
Chapter Fifteen
“Mother!” Vi started for Vhalla.
“No, this way.” Jayme grabbed her arm. Vi swung around, glaring at her friend. “I know you want to protect her, but you are useless dead. Trust the soldiers to do their jobs and get to the hotel. The sooner you’re protected, the more we can focus on your mother and brother.”
Vi looked back. The crowd had broken through the line of soldiers Vi had left behind her. A small group condensed around Romulin’s horse. They brandished weapons at the encroaching masses. Vi watched as someone leaned down, picking up a rock to volley at him.
“Romu—” Before Vi could call out, a soldier lunged into the fray and Vi watched in horror as the square was plunged further down a spiral of violence.
“Listen to your guard, Vi. Leave it to the soldiers.” Elecia started down the other side of the stair, her own guard quickly surrounding her.
Jayme gave a firm tug on her arm. Pulled off balance, Vi staggered along, half dragged down the other side of the platform.
“Vi Ci’Dan, come with me.” A man lunged for her. “The Knights of Jadar are ready to be loyal once more to your rule.”
Jayme drew her sword in a second, stepping in the man’s way.
A wall of stone shot up from the ground between Vi, the assailant, and Jayme. Vi felt magic crackling around Elecia. It was not unlike Ellene’s, though it was far more focused, more precise.
Vi looked behind her, free of Jayme and Elecia’s attention for a brief second. Had her brother dismounted? Where was her mother in the mob? She knew she needed to be protected, but she couldn’t abandon them either.
Yet abandonment had been her plan all along.
If she couldn’t trust them to be protected in this moment, how could she leave them? Her thoughts mirrored the noise around her—shouts and cries with no logic to string them together.
She took a step, and two strong arms closed around her shoulders, practically hoisting her off the ground.
“Let me—” Vi began to shout, silenced and chilled by the voice in her ear.
“Go? No, we must get you to safety, princess.”
Fallor.
“Unhand me.” Vi pushed against his forearm. “This is no way to carry your princess.”
“I’m merely doing what’s safe for her highness. You seem to have been separated from your guard.”
Vi looked frantically for Jayme and Elecia. She couldn’t find the former in the chaos of the crowd. The latter was already up the stairs of what had long been the Imperial hotel in the Crossroads. Elecia turned, her eyes scanning, no doubt looking for Vi. But Fallor turned away. With his back to Elecia, there was no way Vi would be visible.
She kicked, struggling against his crushing grasp. His arms dug into her ribs, making her wheeze.
“What are you doing?” Vi twisted in his arms. “The hotel is that way.”
Fallor looked ahead, a stupid smirk on his face as he manhandled her.
“Let me go or I will—” She pushed against his forearm, trying to wriggle free, but then stopped all movement.
“You’ll what?” Her stillness must’ve been more intriguing to him than her struggles.
Vi’s eyes were glued to the exposed skin of his wrist. Barely visible were three lines, tattooed in dark ink, jagged and gently curving. If those three points met… if the center line continued, then it would be…
A trident tattoo.
The mark of Adela.
Before she could finish her threat, or he could realize what she’d seen, Jayme sprinted into view. She had her sword at the ready, pointed over Vi’s shoulder and right in Fallor’s face. Vi had never seen a more fearsome expression on her friend’s face.
“Drop her.”
“Thank the Mother,” he said stiffly, the expression sticking to his tongue in his odd accent. “I’m glad you saw us. Who knows what could’ve happened to the crown princess if you hadn’t? I was merely trying to shield her from the rabble.”
The lines on Jayme’s face only deepened as Fallor let Vi down with sudden delicacy.
“You would do well never to manhandle—”
“Thank you, Fallor,” Vi interrupted. Whatever threat Jayme was about to lob at Fallor would have been justifiable but ill-placed. The tattoo was still seared in her vision and she was eager to get away from the man, the sooner the better. “Let’s go, Jayme.”
Jayme gave a small nod and then hooked her arm with Vi’s, before rushing through openings to get to the Imperial hotel. Luckily, the crowd was beginning to disperse, and the worst of the violence seemed to have ended.
“What—”
“I’ll tell you later,” Vi whispered hastily. There wasn’t time to discuss now—they were already ascending the stairs. “Just know that I was right about him.”
�
�Well this is a mess,” Elecia muttered. The mob had been short-lived and not too bloody. Vi saw only one body lying face-down in a puddle of blood, and she hoped it was the archer who had tried to shoot down her mother. “You should get inside.”
“Moth—”
“Her and Romulin are ahead of you, Jax and I are behind,” Elecia answered before she could ask.
With that, Vi and Jayme stepped inside the lobby of the stately hotel, the whole staff standing at uncomfortable attention. As Elecia had said, her mother and brother were together in the far corner, by the stairs, talking with a silver haired man. Thankfully neither had visible wounds.
“… most regretful, forgive them, your highness,” the man was saying. “They don’t fully understand their actions. It is not the crown they hate, but this miserable plague.”
“They will see mercy,” Vhalla assured him. “It is a difficult time for all of us, Lord Etton. The crown understands that as much as any.”
Vi stepped off to the side, pulling Jayme with her before she could unlink their arms. They faced the wall, rather than the group.
“Fallor is a pirate,” Vi said hastily. There may not be another chance to tell her.
Jayme blinked at her. “What?”
“I saw a trident tattoo on his wrist when he tried to kidnap me.” At least, she was pretty sure it was a trident tattoo. She hadn’t seen all of it.
“You’re right, it didn’t look like he was merely trying to protect you…” Jayme murmured. The words had Vi’s heart soaring that her friend finally believed her suspicions.
“He wasn’t,” Vi hissed. “Have you found out anything about him?”
“Not yet. I’m working on it…”
“Be diligent. I want you to find a reason to get him ousted from the army, for Romulin’s safety. I don’t know what he’s up to, or why a pirate is so far from the sea, but I want none of it near my family.”
“Romulin’s safety? Your family’s? What about yours?”
“I’ll be—”
“Your highness,” a maid interrupted. She was dressed from toe to chin, bound in tightly tailored fashions of the West that left so little to the imagination, it seemed slightly scandalous. “I am to show you to your room.”