Crown of Oblivion

by Julie Eshbaugh

  “Do you remember the day Renya and I had to attend the ballet on behalf of our parents?” he asks, his voice a whisper. “Our father was called away on some official duties, and our mother was too sick to leave her bed.”

  The ceiling up here on the mezzanine is low, and the air is still and stifling. Beads of sweat tickle the back of my neck before sliding down my spine. “Last year,” I say. “It was when the trees were flowering—”

  “You were so sick from the pollen.” I let my eyes move to his. I don’t know where he’s going with this story, but I want to get out of here. I wonder if Renya has noticed us missing. “You wore a pink dress that belonged to Renya, because the theater objected to Outsiders attending. They said Renya and I were too old to need surrogates along—”

  “To be fair, I’d tend to agree.”

  Lars lets a small laugh escape. “I was eighteen. Perhaps that’s too old to be accompanied by a surrogate. And Renya was sixteen. But you know that Renya doesn’t want to go anywhere without you, and our parents weren’t there to stop her. But you were miserable. You sneezed through the whole first act. If you weren’t in the royal box, I think the other patrons would have picked you up and tossed you out.” His eyes sweep over me, from my face down to the hem of my borrowed gown. “You look lovely in this. It suits you.”

  Something reaches me from Lars. An emotion slips past his defenses, and my Cientia picks up a longing in him.

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  “Because it was one of the first times I realized how much I want to protect you. I felt so defensive of you that evening. I could perceive the anger in those Enchanted snobs all around us, and it infuriated me. That was one of the first times I realized that I . . . that I had feelings for you.”

  The fear that started when I first found myself tucked away in a corner with Lars spikes at this confession from him. It’s not a confession, though. It can be nothing but a lie. I remember that evening. The other patrons at the ballet had shown contempt for me, but Lars had felt the same way. I remember his anger—not at the other Enchanted, but at his sister for insisting I come along.

  I can’t help but challenge him, even if I’m putting myself in danger. “Feelings for me? I have to say, I’m surprised. I remember that evening so differently—”

  “Oblivion,” he says, as if this one word erases his blatant lie. “Haven’t you been told? When memories return after Oblivion steals them, they’re often distorted or inaccurate. You may think you remember things from your past, but you may very well have the details wrong.”

  “So . . . ,” I stammer, my mind racing. This can’t be true. If it were true, Renya would have told me. This can only be another trick by Lars to deceive and manipulate me. “You say that was the first time you realized your feelings?”

  “If I’m completely truthful,” he says, dropping his eyes as if he’s embarrassed, “the first time I realized I had feelings for you was when Kit asked me to let him take the whip.” One of his hands rises to my throat. A fingertip traces over the scar where my embed once was. “I was so relieved to be able to put it in someone else’s hand. I just couldn’t stand to strike you anymore.”

  The touch of his hand on my throat sends a shiver of loathing through me. I wonder if he feels it, and I honestly don’t care if he does. He is a liar, and I know it. He can try to mislead me with his own version of that day. It won’t work.

  “But let’s not dwell on that tonight,” he says, finally withdrawing his hand. “After all, you will be a citizen now. You will never find yourself under the whip again.”

  “I’m looking forward to that,” I say. My eyes meet his, and in my glare, I hope my message is clear. You have lost your power over me. I won the Crown of Oblivion, and everyone knows it. I will be a citizen and you will never be able to threaten me again.

  Lars returns my stare. His eyes are fearsome, like the eyes of a snake about to strike.

  And then he does.

  “And your brother. He’s still missing, isn’t he? That must be terrible for you. I’ve already put the best people to work on the search, investigating this rumor you heard that he’d been snatched away by King’s Knights. I won’t rest until he’s found.”

  And there it is. The leverage he still has over me.

  His smile broadens. “It would be my pleasure to see to it that your brother came home to you, safe and sound. Of course, even with the best people searching, there can be no guarantees he’ll be found alive. Bad things sometimes happen to people who enter the Race of Oblivion. You know that. But I promise you this. . . .” He reaches for my right hand and brings it to his lips. I shudder, and this time I know he feels it. His hand tightens around mine. “I promise I will personally oversee the search. I will do that for you, as a friend. As long as you are my friend, Astrid, I will be yours, and you will never have to worry about your brother.”

  Thirty-Six

  Here is his threat, disguised as a promise. Because of course, by promising to help my brother as long as we are friends, he’s made it abundantly clear that he can hurt my brother if we are not friends.

  Voices filter up from the stairs. People are coming this way. Lars releases my hand, and though I try not to jerk it away, as soon as I am free of his grasp, I can’t help but recoil.

  I feel like a fish freed from the hook, but still not back in the water.

  “We should go back,” I say to Lars. “Your guests are going to notice you’re gone.”

  “Me? You are the guest of honor. I would think it’s more likely they would notice your absence.”

  When we return to the party, Lars’s hand still hovering on the small of my back like a gun stuck in my ribs, I finally spot Darius. He’s across the room, watching me. Lars whispers into my ear, “I think we should dance. As the guest of honor, you should be seen.” I feel Darius’s stare as Lars leads me out to the dance floor. I feel it, but I don’t see it, because I can’t look at Darius’s face as he watches me dance with Lars.

  The song is slow, but it doesn’t matter. Even slow steps are painful steps. The weight of Darius’s stare burdens me even more, and I’m forced to tell Lars I have to sit down.

  “You’re hurting,” he says.

  “A little.”

  “Let me find the doctor—”

  “I just need rest—”

  “Nonsense. You need something for the pain. I saw the doctor come in with her husband. Let me ask one of the staff to find her.”

  Something for the pain amounts to something Lars could dose me with. I’m the one person who knows he killed his father. He has plenty of motive to eliminate me. But before I can waste another breath objecting, Renya comes rushing up like a gust of wind. “Astrid, let me help you. We’ll just step into the ladies’ lounge and take a peek under that knee brace. You look a bit winded.” Maybe it’s because it will free him up to look for the doctor, maybe it’s because Renya never takes no for an answer, but Lars gives in.

  “Fine,” Lars says, but even though his words say he’s relenting, his posture says he’s not. As he folds his arms across his chest, he elbows a couple dancing nearby. He doesn’t notice. “But let me know how it looks. If we need to get the doctor . . .”

  The rest of Lars’s words are swallowed up by the sound of the crowd as Renya leads me away. “Kit was looking for you,” she whispers as we cross the threshold into the outer room of the ladies’ lounge. The room is filled with overstuffed couches and love seats—the perfect place to rest and prop my leg up—but it’s crowded. Renya gives my knee a quick look. A few women wince at the blood that’s oozed out from under my brace, which is embarrassing, but a few others fill up with pity, which is worse. “It’s fine. A little blood but nothing terrible. I think you’re just tired,” Renya says, before whispering into my ear, “Let’s go. I’ll deflect my brother while you find Kit.”

  It doesn’t take long to find him. As soon as we are through the door and into the hall, Darius intercepts us. And though I’d
seen his face from across the room, up close I notice how he has been transformed for the ball. Not so much changed as . . . revealed.

  He is dressed in a black suit of soft silk, almost as fine as the prince’s, with an ivory cape draped over his shoulders. His hair has been trimmed on the sides and in the back, but long tendrils of curls still frame his face. When his eyes meet mine—those hazel eyes I’ve come to know—I lose my breath.

  I curse myself for it. For wanting to accept everything he told me in the Wheel of Fire about the day he hurt me. For wanting to try to forgive. Because now the fact that he held the whip is all the more complicated.

  Now I know he is the boy who wrote the letters that started it all.

  “Kit,” Renya says, “we were just coming to look for you.” She turns to me and adds, “I’ll go let my brother know you won’t be needing the doctor.” Then she floats away.

  “The doctor?”

  “It’s nothing,” I say. “I overdid it, I guess.”

  “Right. So listen,” he says, and he looks a bit stricken, like he did when he had to admit to me that he had come to find me because I had the bike. “I know you saw the letters. Renya told me she told you the truth. . . .” He pauses to collect himself, dropping his gaze to his hands. “The truth about us.”

  “About you both being involved with the OLA?” I say. “She told me. I can’t say I’m not rattled. I . . . So did you know Jayden when we met him? When we boarded the train?”

  “I didn’t. I’d never met him before. None of them. Aengus was my only contact—he was in the race. The boy with the red hair.” I nod. “He recruited me. Me, and then Renya,” he says.

  “I thought you were the one who recruited Renya. I thought the letters . . .”

  “Astrid, those letters . . .” He crosses his arms, defensive. He wipes a hand over his face. “Those letters were written by a boy who was young and naive. A boy who was passionate about a forbidden girl, about a forbidden cause. We both made mistakes, Renya and I, but it was you who paid for those mistakes. I’ll never forgive myself for that. I don’t know if she will, either. We hardly spoke to each other after that. The whole silly romance was over—”

  “But . . .” I hate to say this, but I have to. “You were forced apart. So you must still have feelings—”

  “It was a flirtation,” Darius says, cutting me off. His tone is so adamant, it seals my lips. “It ended as quickly as it began. It’s behind us. I have no feelings for her anymore, and I know she has none for me.”

  There’s a sweetness in the air. The scent of perfume, and of flowers, but also of truth. Of course, I know much of what Darius is telling me is verifiable. The rest of it will require trust. “How do you know she has no feelings for you?”

  “She’s told me. In fact, she’s admitted to having fallen in love with someone else.”

  Someone else? I can’t stop myself from blurting, “Who?”

  He only shrugs. And the fact he doesn’t know makes it easier for me to accept his claim of being over her, too. “I’m sorry for treating you so badly. For never befriending you,” he says. His brow creases and his eyes go dark. “I’ve always felt like I should steer clear of you. The royals exploit the bond between you and Renya, so I avoided any bonds at all. Especially with you, after what happened in the whipping room that day. I’m afraid that will be with us forever, like a ghost.”

  He pauses, maybe hoping I will jump in and say he’s wrong, but I can’t. The truth is, I’m afraid he could be right.

  “Even today, even believing you and I had formed a bond in the race, I’ve been afraid of what would happen now that we’re back in the place where we were never friends. The place where you hated the sight of me.”

  I allow a small smirk to turn up the corners of my lips. “I did hate the sight of you. That’s quite true.”

  He takes the smallest step toward me, but it changes things. A moment before, we were two people standing together talking, but now he’s so close, when he sighs, I feel his breath on my cheek. A ringlet obscures one of his eyes, and I don’t stop myself when impulse tells me to push it back into place.

  “But those letters you wrote,” I say. I hate to talk about them now, with him standing so close, but I have to ask. “Did you think you loved Renya when you wrote them?”

  “I did,” he says. And I shift my weight away from him. I’m glad he’s being honest. “But I could no longer remember her while I was in the race. And while I was outside the control of my memories—all my complex memories that controlled how I treated so many people—I developed feelings for someone else. And in comparison to those feelings, my past feelings for the princess, my past feelings for anyone, are nothing but vapor.”

  That rebellious curl falls loose across his forehead again. I let my fingertips brush across his brow, and touching him feels so right. My heart races as my fingers trace across his cheekbone, his jaw. . . . I draw in a deep breath as if I’m standing at the edge of a cliff, about to step off. And then I do. I give into the urge to thread my arms around his neck. My breath catches in my throat, as if I’m actually falling.

  But I can’t fall, because Darius’s hands grip my waist and pull me against him. A gasp escapes my lips just before he leans in and covers them with his own.

  Darius’s kiss is tentative, but if he’s questioning, I kiss him back with an urgency meant to silence all his doubts. His arms tighten around me, and when he finally lifts his head, his lips brush down my throat, coming to rest on the curve at the inside of my shoulder.

  We are not far off the main hall, and the music and voices seem to be growing louder and louder the longer we stay here. My eyes move to the center of the room, and I pull back. “People are approaching,” I say, and Darius steps back, too. My leg quivers a bit when I shift my weight onto it again.

  “Are you all right?” he asks.

  “I should sit,” I say, but he’s already leading me to a chair. An Outsider passes by with a tray filled with crystal goblets. Darius takes two and puts one in my hand—something dark red and sweet and completely unfamiliar. Darius drinks his quickly and, remembering the corn vodka, I do the same. He laughs when he sees my drained glass.

  “Well, I guess you were thirsty.” He takes my glass and then something shifts in him. His playfulness dissolves. Willfulness, dark and heavy, fills the space between us. “I don’t want to push you, but . . . there’s somewhere I want to go, and I want you to come with me.”

  “Where?”

  “Downstairs. To the room with the whipping post—”

  “In the middle of this ball?” I ask, getting to my feet.

  “I need to confront it,” he says. He glances around, as if he’s worried we might be overheard. “There’s a shadow over all my memories—the shadow of that post. I need to confront it to be able to overcome it—”

  A couple dressed in matching silks dyed the color of wine approach us, their hands extended. Hasty introductions are made—they are Duke and Duchess of Something-or-Other, and they are so honored to meet us. Both gush about our great accomplishment in winning the Crown of Oblivion, and as they lavish Darius and me with compliments, the duke lifts the back of my hand to his lips. His paper-white cheeks appear almost transparent beside my sun-darkened skin. His wife’s perfume stings my throat. As soon as they step away, Darius turns his gaze back to me. “I’ll go alone,” he says. His eyes are as cold as stone.

  I know there’s no changing his mind.

  “No,” I say. “I’ll go.” I think my words surprise me more than Darius, but I hate the idea of him leaving me here even more than the idea of going with him to that horrible room. “But I don’t understand this at all.”

  Getting to the doorway of the ballroom is the easy part. But just as we reach it, I see Lars moving through the crowd, his head turning from side to side. Could he be searching for us? His eyes land on Renya, and he takes off toward her. “We need to hurry,” I say.

  When we make it to the second cellar, g
oose bumps spring up on my arms. The air is damp and chilly compared to the warm stuffiness of the ballroom. I rub my hands over my arms, and Darius takes off his cape and drapes it over me.

  Our feet move along the corridor floor soundlessly. This might be the first time I have ever approached this room without the echo of heavy boots ringing in my ears. Still, my pulse pounds in my temples. I fear this room, the way I might fear a lion’s den. Does that mean I fear the post, as if it were a lion, waiting to devour me? The closer we draw to the darkened doorway, the greater my understanding of Darius’s need to come here.

  He was right. We need to face it. To take away its power to threaten us.

  A quiet click of the light switch brings the room into view, and it’s surprising how something so small can loom so large. The floor can’t be bigger than ten square feet, the walls bleached clean of even a trace of blood. The post itself is nothing more than a block of wood. How can something so benign command so much fear?

  Not through any strength of its own.

  Yet if you lined up all the memories that have awoken in me, from the strongest to the faintest, the memories of this room would be at the head of the line. Before memories of teaching my brother Marlon how to read. Before memories of long motorbike rides through the countryside with Renya. Before almost every happy moment I can recall. I wish Darius’s plan of confronting this place could change that, but I don’t think it can.

  It can’t change the past, and the past haunts me. It haunts us both.

  “It hurts just to look at it,” Darius says. “Like the pain has somehow become a living thing that swims within my veins. When I look at that post, I feel it clawing at me from the inside.”

  I don’t know what to say, so I reach for his hand. The comfort his touch gives lasts only a moment, though. We both jump when we hear footsteps echo from the other end of the hall.

  Stepping in out of the doorway, Darius and I both stand with our backs pressed against the wall. The cold seeps through the fabric of the cape Darius wrapped around me, chilling my scarred skin. I shiver. But then Renya steps through the door, carrying an ax.