“Stones and sky, you’re bleeding like a human,” my father muttered, his jaw tightening. Then in one violent motion, he rose to his feet and threw the pitcher against the wall in an explosion of glass. Going to the cold fireplace, he rested his arms on the mantle, head bowed.
And his back to me.
I inched my fingers down to the hidden knife, moving slowly so as not to catch his attention. I’d known without magic that he’d discount me as a threat, would lower his guard. And now was my chance.
Do it!
My hand closed around the hilt, slowly pulling it free.
“You should’ve told me about the debt,” he said. “I could’ve bargained with her. Given her what she wanted in exchange for letting you be.”
I froze.
“Though I suppose I can’t blame you for not trusting me. It was how you were raised.” He sighed deeply. “And now the Winter trickster is free to run around the Isle, slaughtering her enemy’s people at will with no one to stand in her way.”
She wasn’t free, but I’d made sure to make it to Trollus before any of his spies could bring word that she was trapped. It wouldn’t be long now, though, and as soon as he knew, I was sure he’d see through my plot.
Kill him.
I swallowed, my hand still gripping the hilt. “You could stand in her way. You have all of Trollus at your command.”
“I think we both know that’s not the case.”
I bit the inside of my cheeks, unsure of whether he doubted his capacity or his control.
“Besides,” he said. “I can’t leave. You aren’t the only one who’s had to pay the price of a desperate bargain, Tristan.”
Even with the curse broken, he was bound to Trollus. Knowing it was so was like the last piece of the puzzle falling into place, explaining why he hadn’t taken Trianon, why he hadn’t moved to stop Roland and the Duke, and why, given they finally had freedom in their grasp, that he’d locked the citizens of Trollus back in their underground cage. “Who holds this bargain?”
“Your aunt,” he said. “She threatened to drown your mother if I didn’t give my word never to leave Trollus, and for obvious reasons, I can’t kill her to free myself. No one plays the game better than her, and no one is less trusting.”
“Can you blame her?” Pain ricocheted through me as I climbed to my feet, using his desk as leverage. “No one forced you to be a tyrant. That was your choice, and these are the consequences.”
Laughing, he picked up a bottle of liquor sitting on the mantle and drank from it directly. “You remind me of myself at your age. Idealistic.” He took another swallow and grimaced. “So certain you know everything.”
“Since obviously I do not, perhaps you might enlighten me.” The clock was ticking, my chance to put an end to the man who had haunted my steps all my life growing smaller by the second. But I had to hear him out.
He drained the bottle, then turned to face me. “I hated my father as you hate me, perhaps more so, for he was a far worse creature. Perhaps the worst ever to rule, in that he relished in killing. Though they were bonded, he slaughtered your grandmother with his bare hands in front of the court for crossing him, and if it hurt him, he never once showed it.” He paused. “He and Roland were cut from the same cloth.”
I’d heard stories of my grandfather, but they were not given much breath. Why should they be when Trollus had to contend with a living and breathing tyrant king.
“Like you, I had a vision of a better Trollus. And as you have your friends and coconspirators, I had mine, your aunt being one of them. We dreamed of abolishing the enslavement of half-bloods, of setting laws that made everyone equals. That, if given the chance, trolls would choose their matches based on character and commonalities, not power. That, if given the chance to love as they wished, the classism of magic would cease to exist.” He snorted, then snatched up another bottle. “Hearing it now, it sounds like some sort of comedic nonsense a poet might spout.”
I wiped away the blood dripping into my eye as I struggled to come to terms with this vision he was painting.
“Of course, there was a girl.” He sat on a chair, the wood creaking. “There always is.”
“Lessa’s mother.”
His chin jerked up and down once. “Vivienne. She belonged to my mother and then to me, and I loved her. And she told me she loved me. That there was no one but me.”
Lost in memory, his eyes were distant and unseeing.
Kill him!
But I would’ve soon as stabbed my own heart as struck him down, because he was telling his story. And his story was my story.
“I was going to change all the laws of Trollus so that I could bond her and make her my queen. And in doing so, I believed I would start our world on a better path. I kept our relationship a secret, and when she became pregnant – as will happen easily with any girl with human blood,” he gave me a pointed look, “I hid her in the city until she had Lessa. Until I was ready to act.”
“But grandfather found you out?” I asked, fascinated by the notion that my father had not always been infallible. I knew he had killed his own father, but never considered there was a greater reason than a desire for the crown. I was beginning to believe I’d been very much mistaken in that.
“He always knew.” A bitter smile crossed his face. “It seems a universal flaw of youth to believe one’s elders oblivious to one’s undertakings.”
I waited silently for him to say more, curiosity making me forget the pain of my battered body.
“I went looking for her one day and could not find her.”
I tensed, certain that my grandfather had killed Vivienne to make a point, as my own father had done to the human peddler I’d once been so fond of.
But it was worse.
“Whispers and rumors led me to find her in my father’s bedchamber. She was his lover, and had been for some time. It had all been a plot to put me in my place, Vivienne only playing a part, every one of her words a lie. And he laughed in my face, and told me I was a fool for putting my faith in something so weak. And he did not mean just her.”
Hatred that was more than a memory filled his eyes, and I wondered if that was how I looked when I spoke of him.
“When I was done, the only way they were able to identify them was by their absence.” His jaw tightened. “After that, I turned my back on my foolish dreams, and Trollus learned to fear a new king.”
Lies or no lies, Lessa’s mother would’ve had little choice in her actions. When you were property, and especially when you were the property of a king, “no” was not part of your vocabulary, if you valued your life. But I said nothing, because he knew that as well as I, half a lifetime of regret and guilt lining his face in this rare moment of honesty.
“There was no going back after that,” he said, meeting my gaze. “At least, not for me. But I knew early where your sympathies resided, and so began over a decade of planning. I would be the people’s tyrant so that you could become their savior. Their liberator.”
I swayed on my feet, the scratch of my fingernails on the desk barely registering in my ears. “What do you mean?”
A massive concussion shattered the air, and the ground shook, both of us staggering. Righting himself, my father swore. “Stay here.”
I caught his sleeve. “Wait, you have to tell me what you meant.”
He shoved me back into the office, the door slamming shut, locked in place with magic. “Father, wait,” I screamed, but it was to no avail. I knew what that concussion had been: Roland. Too late I remembered Cécile’s repeated words of Angoulême’s strategy; too late I understood why they planned to go first after my father, who had the might of Trollus at his disposal, rather than me. Because the Duke had seen what I had not: my father would defend my life to the bitter end, whereas I’d stand back and watch him die. I couldn’t let that happen. I needed to hear more, needed to understand why he’d done what he’d done.
Picking up a chair, I slammed it against the door,
wood splintering and breaking, but the magic holding strong. “Help! Someone open the door.”
Nothing.
I spun in a circle, desperate for a way out. But I knew this room well, and there were no windows. No doors. The walls were solid stone and without magic, I wasn’t strong enough to break through them. I looked up. The ceiling was polished wood, and that, that I could break.
Ignoring the pain in my body, I snatched up a piece of the broken chair. Leaping onto the desk, I slammed it against the panels until one of them broke, then I used it as a lever to pull free enough boards for me to fit through. Splinters catching and tearing at my clothes, I climbed into the narrow space, wriggling on my belly until I was certain the hallway was beneath me.
Breaking through, I dropped into the ground and started running. “The King?” I shouted at the first troll I came across. “Which way did he go?”
The troll stared at me in astonishment, and I grabbed his shirt, slamming him against the wall. “Which way?”
He pointed, and I took off in that direction.
The halls of the palace were a familiar maze, and I soon guessed his path. Even deprived of my own, I could still feel the weight of his magic, and I pursued it, catching sight of him right as he slammed open the doors to the gardens. “Father!”
He turned at my voice. “Go back.”
Instead I pressed forward, grabbing hold of the front of his coat. “Roland’s come to kill you.”
His eyes bored into mine, then he looked away. “What does it matter? Without magic, they won’t follow you. All that I’ve done…” He shook his head. “It was for nothing.”
“It wasn’t.” I tried and failed to pull him back into the hallway. “If you would just listen.”
Then he stiffened, eyes going wide with shock. Fear. Pain. “Tristan–” he gasped, then he collapsed to the floor at my feet.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Cécile
I sank to my heels, bracing a hand against the slick rock of the tunnel. Deprived of my magic… It had been the Winter Queen who’d taken it. Who else could accomplish such a feat? And in all likelihood, it was my fault for putting myself in danger. Why else would he step outside the safety of the castle walls?
But why, knowing I was all right, had he continued into Trollus? Was he here to make an alliance with his father? To surrender? Or another reason all together?
I couldn’t see Martin’s face in the darkness, but his breathing was loud enough for me to reach out and pull him close. “You need to go to the twins,” I whispered. “Tell them where to find the Duke – they might be able to defeat him.” I swiftly gave instructions to the camp and the signals to use so they’d know he was no foe.
“What about you?”
I gave him a gentle shove down the road. “I’m going after Tristan.”
* * *
The gate stood open, Guilluame’s corpse and one other lying next to it in a pool of blood. Though it had been hours since I’d left the king fighting the sluag, the streets were still empty, the citizens of Trollus bound by curfew.
Pulling up my hood, I kept to the shadows, avoiding the patrols of guards armed with sluag spears. The main gates to the palace were flanked by armed trolls, as were the side entrances. Sitting on my haunches next to one of the towering pillars of the stone tree, I contemplated how I might get inside. Then, from behind the palace, blossomed a familiar glow.
The glass gardens.
Only royals and members of the Artisan’s Guild were allowed to light the gardens. The guild members would be subject to curfew, and I sincerely doubted Thibault was in the mood for a whimsical stroll. Which left only one, or rather, two, other candidates. And they might just be willing to help me.
I entered through the hidden gate at the rear that Tristan had once shown me, the glass brilliant with the unearthly beauty of troll-light. I dreamed of them often, but even the limitless bounds of imagination had failed to capture their beauty. It was a place one needed to be in order to experience, and though I’d explored them countless times during my time in Trollus, I knew that if I spent the rest of my life walking through them, there would always a new detail to discover. The curve of an unknown flower. The vaulting height of a tree. A dewdrop balanced on the tip of a leaf.
As I searched the paths and courtyards for the Queen and the Duchesse, the waterfall roaring as it toppled from the heights, little memories layered themselves across the present. The places I had lingered, deep in thought. The songs that I had sung. The maze of hedgerows I had walked with Tristan shadowing my steps, both of us deeply aware of the other. Listening. Watching. Wanting. But neither of us daring to hope there might be a chance for us.
My chest ached as I remembered those moments. The enchantment of Trollus. Leaving had been like waking from a dream, and no matter how many nights I slept, I could never find my way back. And even if I did, it would never be the same. I stopped in my tracks, resting a hand against a tree trunk while I gave the profoundness of that loss its due.
Then I heard them.
The Queen and the Duchesse were arguing; more accurately, the Duchesse was lecturing while her sister protested with soft sounds of dismay.
I crept closer, so focused on the placement of my feet that I did not notice my sleeve catch on a bush.
Snap.
A twig, little more than a filament of glass, broke away. I reached for it, but my hand was too slow and it shattered against the ground.
The faces of both trolls snapped my direction, and I hunched down, holding my breath. Not that there was any point.
Magic wrapped around my waist, lifting me up and over the foliage, depositing me in front of the two women. “Why am I not surprised,” Sylvie said, crossing her arms. “We keep sending you away, but back you come.”
Queen Matilde’s eyes were wide, her full lips slightly parted. “Oh, Cécile, you look dreadful.” She shook her head. “This will not do.”
My scalp prickled, and seconds later, little bits of black rained to the ground. “Better,” she said, slender fingers plucking at one of my shortened curls, which was crimson once more. Pulling a pin from her own hair, she carefully twisted mine back from my face and smiled.
“Can’t remember what she had for lunch, but she can do that.” Sylvie’s face was sour. “Why are you here, Cécile? Thibault sent you to Trianon.”
“I didn’t go,” I said. “I had to come back.”
“Why is that?”
“Tristan’s here,” I blurted out. “He’s lost his magic.”
“What?” Sylvie barked even as Matilde exclaimed, “Where?” She rotated in a circle, eyes searching the gardens.
“Matilde, stand still!”
I swiftly explained as much as I could, along with my suspicion that it had been Winter who’d taken his power. “He walked in here of his own accord.” My eyes were burning, and I blinked furiously. “I think he’s given up and surrendered.”
Sylvie’s eyes lost focus, shifting back and forth as she delved into the problem, the expression eerily reminiscent of Tristan’s when he was deep in thought. “No,” she said. “He hasn’t. But he is about to make a mistake.”
The ground shook and I was flung against the corner of a stone bench. I fought the urge to curl up in pain, struggling instead to my feet. “Is it her? Is it Winter?” I gasped.
Magic lifted me up into the air. “Tell me what you see,” Sylvie ordered, lifting me higher and higher.
The air was filled with dust mixed with frost, and I coughed, covering my mouth with my sleeve as I peered toward the end of the valley. “There’s no one at the gate.” Other than the bodies of the guards.
She lowered me so swiftly, I might as well have fallen, my spine shuddering as my heels hit the ground. “Stay here,” she said; then to the Queen: “Matilde, find Thibault now. Hurry!”
In a blink, they were gone.
I stared in the direction they’d gone for another heartbeat, then I took off after them.
/> Keeping up with the troll queen was impossible, but she was heading toward the palace, so I took the shortest way I knew. There was probably nothing I could do to help, but Tristan was in there without any way to protect himself, whereas I still had magic. If Thibault or Matilde would lend their power, I suspected my spells would be just as affective against the Winter Queen as any troll.
“Mother?”
I skidded to a halt just shy of a bend in the hedgerows, my skin breaking out in a cold sweat at the sound of that familiar voice. Pressed my arm to my mouth to muffle my ragged breathing, I squatted down making myself as small as possible.
“Roland!” The Queen’s voice was serene and sweet.
“Matilde, no! Matilde!” The Duchesse screamed the warning, but it was too late. A cry of pain cut through my ears, then the rustle of silken skirts and a thud.
Tears streamed down my face, but I knew better than to move. If Roland saw me, I was dead and would be no help to anyone. But if I waited until he was gone, then there was a chance I could save Matilde and Sylvie.
“Cécile?”
I flinched at the Duchesse’s voice.
“There is no chance you stayed where I told you to, so you can come out now. Roland is gone.”
Mustering my courage, I peered around the corner. The Queen lay on her side, silver eyes blank and unseeing, blood pooling on the white stone beneath her. The hilt of a knife stuck out of her chest, the blade embedded in her heart. Without having seen it, I knew she’d reached for her son with open arms, innocent and unsuspecting.
And he’d killed her. Not because of anything she’d done, but to put an end to his father. To take the throne.
My mind was awash with Tristan’s emotion, and I shook my head to clear it as I approached. Sylvie hung limply from her twin’s back, but she was alive. For how long, I could not guess. Touching the knife at my waist, I silently contemplated whether it would be possible to separate the two, and if it was, whether I had the mettle to do it.
“No.”
I jumped at the coldness in her voice.
Warrior Witch: Malediction Trilogy Book Three Page 19