The Reluctant Queen

by Sarah Beth Durst

  He saw a flash of gray in between the trees. Kneeling, he held his hand out, and a wolf trotted out, doglike, to sniff his fingers. He rubbed behind the wolf’s ears. Bayn didn’t like the capital, and Ven didn’t blame him. “I don’t suppose you have any power over spirits,” he said to Alet without turning around.

  She barked a humorless laugh. “Me? None. Hence developing the intense fighting skills.”

  No one knew why some were born with power and some weren’t. No one knew why it was only women, and no one knew why some had more power than others. Sometimes it was passed down, mother to daughter, and sometimes it wasn’t. Sometimes the power manifested early, and sometimes it didn’t. But every generation had at least a few women who had enough power to control the spirits and enough strength of mind to become queen. The problem was finding one. “We won’t find her here,” Ven said.

  Bayn was watching him steadily. He was an uncanny beast, so intelligent and aware that sometimes Ven forgot he was just an animal. Ven found himself looking at Bayn as if expecting him to think of the perfect solution, as if the wolf could even know what the problem was.

  “Give them a chance,” Alet said. “You don’t need to rush your choice. You have fourteen days—milady knew you’d need time. She’s sensible, even when others aren’t.”

  He heard the admiration in her voice and shared it. Daleina was extraordinary. This shouldn’t be happening to her. Balling his hand into a fist, he struck a tree. Bark flew away from his knuckles. He heard a growl behind him, and it wasn’t the wolf. Let them come, he thought savagely. He could use a fight.

  Alet caught his arm as he pulled back for another punch. “You’re angering the spirits.”

  “They anger me.” He could fight them, if he had to. Spirits were difficult to injure, but they hurt and they died, like all else, with enough effort. Still, it would be stupid to risk injury because of a temper tantrum, and the headmistress wouldn’t be happy if he caused a tree near the academy to die. He suppressed the urge to pummel the tree and instead climbed it. Alet followed him.

  Below, the spirit he’d woken with his punch stalked around the base of the tree. Roots thickened beneath its feet, and ferns unfurled. It snarled but didn’t pursue them. Bayn faded back into the underbrush.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Ven saw Alet speed up so that she climbed beside him, grabbing branches at the same time he did and hoisting herself higher. Soon, they had a rhythm—the boughs bent beneath them and then flung them upward as they leapt. “Ven, you have to choose a candidate. I know you don’t want to. I know it means admitting what we don’t want to be true, but you must. The queen needs you. She’s counting on you. You, Ven. You’re the one who found her. You’re the one she expects to find her heir.”

  “I’m not saying I’m not going to find one. I’m just not going to find her heir at an academy.” Standing on the top branch, he straightened until his shoulders and head were above the canopy. He looked out across the green sea, the top of the forests of Aratay.

  Climbing up, Alet stood beside him. “You don’t know that. One of the other academies—”

  “They will all be the same. Children, all of them.” There was no reason to think another academy would be any different. Northeast Academy was the finest. He’d be wasting his time. Daleina’s time, he corrected. “If I choose a child, she will die, and Aratay with her.” Ven shook his head as if that would clear his mind of the images of those children, torn apart by spirits. “It’s been a century or more since Aratay was heirless. And so I believe we must find our heir the old-fashioned way. Not through an academy.”

  Alet’s fists were on her hips as her feet straddled two branches. Wind slapped against her, shaking the tree, but she remained motionless, glaring at him. “You’re telling me you want to head blindly out into the forest, in search of a miracle?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  Chapter 5

  The forests of Aratay were as vast and deep as an ocean. There were dark paths that hadn’t seen sunlight in a century, as well as quiet groves of new saplings with trunks only as thick as a child’s finger. A few roads, glorified animal tracks, ran on the ground between the trees, and the wire paths ran through the upper canopy, but most towns were nestled in the branches, midforest level, and connected by bridges. Other towns and villages were within the trunks. A few others thrived on the forest floor, and a rare few men and women, primarily the canopy singers, lived in the top level, nearest the sun. Naelin and her family lived midforest in a loose collection of homes that counted as a village. When Naelin first moved there, the village hadn’t even been large enough to warrant a name, but now it was called East Everdale, as if tying it to the larger town of Everdale would lend it legitimacy. She liked it just as much with or without a name. It was home.

  Naelin loved the forest, all the layers and shades of green, so many shades that there weren’t words to describe them all—a spectrum of green, from the hopeful green of new leaves to the contemplative moss green on the forest floor, so dark it was nearly black. She wished she were a poet to capture in words the way the forest changed as the light changed. She had to content herself with just drinking the colors in as she stole a few precious moments alone before her husband came home for dinner. She settled into the crook of a branch above the roof of her home, a torn shirt on her lap and a needle with thread in her hand.

  Below her, inside the house, she heard the voices of her children: Erian and Llor. As they clomped inside, Llor was bragging about how many squirrels he’d shot with his new bow. Erian praised him and then told him to skin the squirrels himself, because Mama would be so impressed if he did. Naelin smiled. She’d done right there. She heard her own voice echoed in her daughter’s. Naelin listened as Erian patiently coached Llor through the steps for preparing the meat. He squealed and eww-ed, and soon both children were laughing. Picking up the torn shirt, Naelin added a few more stitches, and then she froze.

  She sniffed the air.

  The forest smelled stronger, as if it had recently rained.

  With her foot, she thumped on the roof of their house. “Erian, did your father put out the fresh charms for the spirits?” she called.

  “Yes, he said he did . . .”

  He says a lot of things, Naelin thought. Some of them are even true. “Would you check, please?” She kept her voice light and pleasant. “Look on the shelf and see if they’re still there.”

  Naelin heard rustling, as if Erian were sorting through the herb shelf. Familiar prickles walked up and down her skin—she was being watched by flat eyes, spirit eyes. Multiple sets of them. They weren’t close enough to see yet, but she could sense them.

  “Erian?”

  He hadn’t done it. Naelin was certain.

  “Erian, I won’t be angry. Tell me the truth, baby. When were the charms last laid?”

  Erian’s voice was a wail, rising through the roof. “I don’t know! Father said he did today’s and yesterday’s. . . . But the basket is still here, and the herbs are dry. I’ll take it now—”

  Naelin jumped to her feet, dumping the half-mended shirt off her. “No! Stay inside, both of you. Close the shutters, lock the doors, and hide yourselves. You know where. Not a peep.”

  She heard Llor begin to cry. She hadn’t meant to scare them, except that yes, she did. They should be scared. Scared children hid, and she needed them to hide right now.

  The cities and towns had organized protection, but on the outskirts, everyone looked after their own—they’d lived through enough queens to know you couldn’t always depend on their protection, no matter what the songs and tales gleefully promised. Songs were written by canopy dwellers and tales by city folk. The spirits out here were bolder. Despite this, she’d always done fine. She had a knack for making the charms that repelled the spirits. There hadn’t been a problem since before the children were born.

  But something about today felt very, very wrong.

  Crouching, Naelin scanned the forest. From t
he scent, she thought there were at least two tree spirits nearby, drawing closer, past where her husband usually hung the charms. She inhaled deeply. And maybe . . . yes, an earth spirit as well. Her breath caught in her throat. Two kinds of spirits at once.

  The forest was not merciful today.

  Reaching into her pockets, she clutched the bundle of herbs she’d prepared for herself. The herb charm was meant to discourage spirits, to fool them into thinking that she was just a part of the forest—benign, rather than one of the humans they hated. It wasn’t strong enough to force them away once they’d taken an interest in her.

  Silently, she cursed her husband. And she cursed herself. She should have taken care of the charms herself. But the last time she’d tried, he’d taken it as a grave insult, accusing her of sabotaging their marriage, of playing the martyr, of not allowing him a role in protecting their family. Wives make the charms; husbands lay them out—that’s how it was always done in Everdale, never mind that it was different in other villages and never mind that she had done it herself for years after her parents died and before she married Renet.

  I am a fool.

  The smell was growing stronger. She saw a branch twitch, and then another. Naelin pivoted, trying to watch all the branches at once. Below, through the leaves, she saw an earth spirit sniff around the base of their tree. It was covered in fur and had a face like a squeezed walnut. It raised its face to look at her, and she shuddered. Its teeth were exposed, and it ran a black tongue over its fangs. “You cannot touch us,” she told it. “I will not let you.”

  Reaching for the knife at her belt, she realized she wasn’t armed except with a sewing needle. She hadn’t expected to need to defend herself on the roof of her own home. But even if she’d had her knife, she was skilled with chopping up herbs, not fighting multiple spirits.

  “Go away!” she yelled. “Leave us alone!”

  Stupid, she told herself. Damn his pride. She should have known better. But lately, he’d been trying so hard to be a better husband, and the kids hated it when they fought. . . .

  One of the branches bowed only a few feet in front of her. A tree spirit clung to it. The spirit leered at her. It was in the shape of a monkey with pale green fur, but it had a child’s face.

  She filled her lungs and shouted, “Help! Someone, help!”

  But no one was going to come. No one could come. There wasn’t anyone close enough, and even if there had been, they’d run in the opposite direction to save their own skin. She wouldn’t even blame them. Better one die than many, as the saying went.

  Below her, she heard the door rattle. Looking down, she saw a larger spirit—a tree spirit with long arms like sticks and hair of grass, shaking the door. “No! Stay out!” She lunged forward toward the lip of the roof, and the monkeylike spirit dropped in front of her.

  She froze.

  Cackling, the spirit dragged its nails along her skin, lightly without breaking the flesh. She couldn’t make her voice work. Her throat felt clogged. Stop! she wanted to scream, throwing the thought out of her as if it were a shout.

  The spirit frowned and withdrew an inch, its nails hovering just above the surface of her flesh. Below, the rattling ceased.

  Horror squeezed her heart. They had heard her.

  She wanted to draw back the thought. She licked her lips. “I didn’t . . . You couldn’t . . . I’m not . . .” Oh, what have I done? She knew full well how it worked: use your power, and more will come. Use your power again, and even more will follow. And then more and more, until at last they number more than you can control. And then they kill all they find. It had happened to her mother. Hidden beneath the floor of her childhood home, Naelin had been the sole survivor. She’d heard it all: her mother trying to stop them, to defend herself, to protect them all. She’d heard her father die, and her brother and sisters. She’d been the only one to make it to the hiding place, and she’d stayed there long after the spirits had gone.

  No one had come to help. No one had come to see if anyone was left alive.

  She’d buried what remained of her family alone, and she’d locked the house behind her. She’d been nine years old, the same age as Erian was now. She’d had a little brother the same age as Llor was: six, and she’d had twin baby sisters.

  She’d sworn to never make the same mistake that her mother had made. Never let the spirits hear her. Never give them reason to notice her family. Stay silent, stay secret, and stay safe. It had kept them well for all these years. But now . . . There had to be another way to repel them.

  The monkeylike tree spirit watched her as she leaned forward to see down her family’s tree. Around the base, three earth spirits circled the roots and sniffed at the bark. She looked up and saw more eyes in the trees.

  There is no other way, she thought dully. They will kill you now, or you will stop them now and they will kill you later. That is the choice. What do you choose? She stared into the empty, emotionless eyes of the monkeylike tree spirit. The forest was silent. No birds. No wind. It felt as if everything were holding its breath—as if the spirits were waiting for her to choose.

  Naelin felt tears on her cheeks. She took a deep breath and focused all her fear, all her determination, all her love for her children into words that she forced silently outward into the forest:

  You will not hurt us.

  You will leave.

  She felt the words exit her like arrows from a bow, and her hands flew over her mouth, as if she were keeping the rest of her inside, as her lungs and heart and stomach wanted to follow the words into the air. Her head began to pound, but she repeated the thought, stronger and louder: You will not hurt us!

  You will LEAVE!

  With cries and calls, the spirits fled. The branches shook, leaves quivered as they leapt and soared and vanished in between the trees. The scent of forest receded, and the pressure inside her head lessened. She sagged backward against the curve of the trunk.

  She’d done it.

  She should feel triumphant, but she didn’t. Closing her eyes, she pictured again her parents and siblings in the moments before the spirits attacked, heard the sounds as her mother was overwhelmed, heard the delighted shrieks of the spirits as they tore Naelin’s world apart. Rocking forward, Naelin buried her face in her hands. “What have I done?”

  “You saved them!” a familiar voice crowed from below.

  She jumped to her feet.

  Below, on the forest floor, was her husband, Renet. “I saw it! You were magnificent! They fled from you like . . . like . . . You did it! I knew you could! I knew you had it in you!”

  Lowering herself to the front of her house, Naelin didn’t trust herself to speak. She didn’t want praise, not for this, never for this. Her hands were trembling as she unlatched the door. “Erian? Llor? It’s safe now. You can come out.”

  For a brief, terrible instant, she thought she’d failed—that the spirits had broken in, found them, while she dithered over whether to use her power or not—but then Erian flung open the trapdoor in the floor. Her daughter helped Llor climb out.

  Dropping to her knees, Naelin gathered up her children in her arms and held them close. They threw their arms around her neck and clung to her as if they were both still toddlers, afraid of the dark. “They’re gone,” she whispered into Erian’s hair. She breathed in the scent of her children, felt the warmth of their bodies.

  Behind her, she heard Renet climb the ladder and burst into the house.

  “I knew you could do it,” he repeated.

  Slowly, Naelin lifted her face from her children to look at her husband. “What,” she said carefully, not yelling, no anger in her voice, but calm careful words, “do you mean you ‘knew’?”

  “I didn’t know, but I suspected.” He dropped to his knees beside them, his face alight with excitement. “And it’s true. You have power!”

  She stared at him and tried very hard not to let her entire body clench. “Tell me you are not saying you wanted this to happen.
Tell me you didn’t ‘forget’ the charms on purpose. Tell me—” She stopped herself. Llor was sobbing into her shirt, and her brave Erian was shaking as if she was crying as well. She hugged her children tighter and tried to think calmly, rationally. The spirits knew what she could do now. They’d come again. How soon? And how many?

  Belatedly, she realized Renet was talking again. “. . . the champion will be in Everdale as soon as tomorrow!”

  “Is that why you did this?” she demanded. “You think a champion—”

  “—is looking for you! Yes! Or he will be, once he knows that you have the power. I heard he’s searching for a candidate, village to village, the way they used to a hundred years ago. Oh, Naelin, don’t you see? This is our chance!”

  “Chance? Chance for what—to be the target of every spirit in the forest?” She tried to keep down the anger, her children a reminder that she did love this man. But . . .

  “No, no, a million times no! Renet, promise you won’t tell the champion about me. I don’t want to be a candidate. I refuse to be.” Just thinking about it made her squeeze her children tighter. If this champion chose her, he’d take her away from them, from Renet, from her home, from her life. Leaving Erian and Llor would be like leaving her soul behind.

  Burying her face in her children’s hair, she breathed in and out, trying to calm herself enough to think. They’d have a little time before the spirits dared return. She’d make as many charms as she could. She’d cover the house with them, not just the nearby trees; she’d shove them in between the shingles and around the windows and in the fireplace. They’d all take precautions. She’d make herb packets for them all to carry. She’d refresh the charms herself and double-check them, in case Renet had any more reckless ideas to “test” her.

  Eventually, if they were careful, if she didn’t use her powers again, if they didn’t give the spirits cause to come to them, the spirits would forget and move on. And then Erian and Llor would be safe again. And she would have her home and life back.