I felt as though my stomach had just been ripped from my body. For a moment, I couldn’t speak.
“That’s not true,” I stammered. “I have a family. And they aren’t royalty or anything special. I have a mum and a pa and brothers and sisters back in Hazeldown. I don’t want anything to do with all this nonsense about royalty. I want to go home — to Hazeldown.”
Rath considered me thoughtfully. “You realize that nothing will be the same now, don’t you, Izayik? I left you with the Baines family because I knew they would keep you safe and nurture you in ways that I could not. But now, Safford knows where to find you. You aren’t safe there any longer.”
“Don’t call me Izayik.”
“Izzy?”
“Don!” I shouted. “My name is Don!” I flinched when my angry voice echoed through the empty streets.
“Live in denial if you wish, Izzy,” Rath said. “But you cannot change the facts. You know the truth now, and so do your enemies. If we return to Hazeldown, they will know exactly where to find you.”
“And my family—” My eyes widened with horror. “They know where to find my family!”
When they found that I was missing from the cellar, what would they do to my family?
“Take me home!” I commanded, seizing Rath’s arm.
“Ouch!” he cried. “That hurts!”
“Do your appear-and-disappear thing and take me home,” I commanded. Even through the sleeve of his coat, my hand burned.
“What ‘appear-and-disappear thing’?” Rath pulled away from me with a scowl. “Only the Insurgent’s Boots can travel that many steps so quickly. I do not have one of the boots.” He gestured to his footless leg. “Clearly.”
“But you’ve appeared to me before.”
“Yes.” He fastened his crutch to his back with a leather strap he wore over one shoulder. “But I can only Step to you and return from whence I came. I do not control the Stepping, and I do not carry passengers.”
“Ugh,” I groaned. “You’re useless.”
“Useless?” Rath’s eyes flared with indignation. “I am useless? You are welcome to wander back to your captors and fight them off yourself. Or maybe you can save your own life the next time you jump in front of a charging bull or dive into a frozen lake.”
I was proving to have quite a talent for sticking my own foot in my mouth.
“I’m sorry. You’re not useless.”
“Hm,” Rath grunted.
“We have to get back to Hazeldown. I have to protect my family. How far are we from the outlands?”
“If we can catch a ferry and bribe the ferryman to take us across the wake … about three days’ journey by foot.”
“Three days? He could slaughter them all before we get there.” I brandished the candle like a sword, reenacting my brother’s misfortune. “He nearly sliced my brother in half just to get me to surrender. I have to get home, Rath.”
“And do what, exactly? Let yourself get captured again?”
“I have to do something.”
“What would you like me to do, Izzy?” Rath asked. “I cannot Step. I can’t even run.”
“I can.”
We both jumped at the sound of the soldier-woman’s voice. Zarra stood at the end of the lane from which we had come, holding a lantern aloft to protect herself from the mist. How long had she been standing there?
“I can Step, I mean.”
“What do you want?” I demanded, side-stepping behind Rath. Don’t get me wrong; I wasn’t scared. I was just unarmed, and clearly, Rath wasn’t.
Zarra approached us, her mismatched boots making distinctly different noises on the cobblestones. She moved with a slightly awkward gait. Stomp, slap, stomp, slap. “I was sent to follow you when you left,” she said. “They was wanting me to kill you.”
“Good luck,” Rath drawled. “So far, all you’ve managed to do is rip my coat.”
“But see, I always kind of hoped that I was helping the real Izayik,” Zarra said. “I always wanted to believe he was you.” She rubbed her arm with her opposite hand. “My ma worked in the kitchens in the palace — in the old palace — back when the Delarens were in power.” She gave me a contemplative smile. “The queen’s consort — your pap — sent alla his men to guard the doors of the servants’ wing, so people like my ma could escape. He coulda saved himself, prob’ly, but he saved his servants instead.”
I glanced at Rath. His eyes were screwed closed, and his brow was furrowed.
“It doesn’t have to be this way,” I remembered remembering a younger Rath saying. “I can save you from this.”
Two chances to save himself, and Willian had taken advantage of neither opportunity. Had he wanted to die? Planned to die, perhaps?
“If that man was your pap,” Zarra said, “then I will gladly serve you.” She stuck her hand out for me to shake.
I flinched. What was I supposed to do? I looked to Rath for answers. He watched us grimly. When he noticed I was looking his way, he nodded solemnly. Accept this, embrace this, he seemed to say. Whether or not I believed I was the prince, we needed her help.
“I accept,” I said, shaking Zarra’s hand.
“Highness,” she said.
My stomach twisted.
The journey back to the outlands was even more painful than the journey away. I crumpled into a whimpering ball of uselessness as soon as we landed, not sure which of my hands needed more of my attention. We had landed in the barn behind the cottage. Gussie, Mum’s old cow, snorted in alarm when we appeared.
“Shh, shh…” Rath crooned. He touched Gussie’s forehead, and the cow instantly calmed.
“How was that for good aiming, huh?” Zarra stretched happily as she stood. “And with two passengers, too.”
Rath put a finger to his lips to warn us to be silent. He floated across the barn floor and grabbed the latch on the door.
“Help me open this,” he whispered to us, “and quietly.”
Zarra and I crept forward and reached for the heavy wooden bar. Rath unhooked the latch, and we gingerly lifted the bar out of place.
When we stepped out of the barn, I saw that every window of the cottage was blazing with light; the place was crowded with people. They might have been hosting a wedding for all the commotion and light. At the little front gate stood two soldiers, and two more were at the back gate, and even more on the path leading to Lord Brenden’s fields.
“What the—” I said.
“Hey!” A soldier hollered in our direction.
Rath grabbed my sleeve and dragged me back through the open barn door.
“Hey yourself!” Zarra called back. “Thought I heard something over here. It was only their old cow getting the jitters.”
Zarra was still dressed like a soldier. In the darkness of night, it wasn’t so obvious that her boots didn’t match. The man who had called her attention didn’t connect her with the soldier who had helped me escape. I breathed a sigh of relief. I heard Zarra move away from the barn toward the cottage, chatting with the soldier.
“So we’re home, but we’re outnumbered and surrounded,” I whispered. “What’s the plan?”
Rath shook his head and pressed a finger to his lips. I scooted away from the doorway and into the darkest corners of the barn. My heart leapt into my throat when I saw someone out of the corner of my eye. He stood in the darkness across from me, his features hidden in shadows.
“Oh,” I breathed. “Just one of you.” The man simply stared at me like they always did.
“One of who?” Rath asked. He hovered by the open door, peeking toward the cottage.
“People,” I tried to explain, but I couldn’t find the right words. “I see them sometimes in the dark — people who have gone already.”
Rath turned to face me. “You see spirits?”
“Yeah, I guess.” I hadn’t told anyone about the spirits in so long. Talking about it just felt wrong.
Rath nodded as if this was a perfectly normal conversation.
“Your mother saw them, too,” he said.
I didn’t respond. I wasn’t ready to accept that my parents were anyone other than Mum and Pa. But if the queen could see spirits, too, maybe it did make sense that I was her son.
“They say that’s why she went insane,” Rath said.
“What?” I swiveled my neck toward Rath so quickly it hurt. “Insane?”
Even in the dark, I could tell that Rath was studying me intensely. “Your mother, Aerona, she was … sick. That’s why your father ruled in the end. He wanted to protect her.”
“Oh.”
“Do the spirits speak to you?” Rath asked.
“No, never.”
“Good. Don’t let them talk to you.”
“Why?”
“And don’t look them in the eyes.”
“Why?”
“And don’t let them touch you.”
“Why? What will happen to me if they touch me?” I asked. “What could a spirit do to me?”
“I don’t know,” Rath said with a shrug. “But your mother did all of those things, and she died young.”
I didn’t bother to mention that the queen had been killed in a revolt, not by spirits. Because, really, what did I know? Maybe she had.
“Do we really have to do this right now?” My heart leapt at the sound of Mel’s voice at the barn door. I wanted to run to her and scoop her in my arms and never let go, but reason kept me rooted to the ground. She clearly wasn’t alone. Rath floated away from the door and disappeared behind two stacked hay bales.
“I saws it myself,” Zarra said as she pushed the barn door wider. “Your cow’s got mean old blisters, and she’s making a racket.”
“Seems pretty quiet to me,” Mel said, reaching for the lamp hanging by the door.
“Don’t light—” Zarra was too late. The soft glow of lamplight illuminated the two women at the door. And me.
“Don!” Mel dropped the basket she had been carrying. “Heaven’s Gate! You’re alive!” She kicked the basket over in her haste to get to me. Zarra put out the light at the same moment Mel’s body collided with mine. She had never hugged me with such force before. In fact, she had never hugged me at all. It took my breath away.
“Hello,” I said lamely.
“You’re alive!” Mel cupped my cheeks in her hands.
I could have died happy on the spot. I wondered how Rath would manage to save me from that.
“They said you disappeared,” Mel said. “I didn’t think I would ever see you again.”
Rath emerged from his hiding place behind the hay bales and cleared his throat loudly. We both jumped.
“What is she here for?” he asked Zarra.
“Right.” Mel stepped away from me, smiling an embarrassed smile. She cast a curious glance at Rath, but wisely refrained from asking too many questions. “You wanted me to take care of the cow?”
Zarra scoffed. She held up the basket Mel had brought with her. “No, I was lying. I need you to help this one.” She pointed at me. “Look at his hands.”
I held out my hands for Mel to see. Even in the darkness, it was clear that they were covered in blisters.
“What happened to you?” Mel gasped, gesturing Zarra closer and taking the basket from her.
“Zarra’s boot burned me,” I said. Mel frowned, but said nothing.
She rubbed a soothing ointment on my hands that my mum made from herbs we grew in the garden. It had been used on me many times before. I sighed with relief. Mel’s fingertips lingered over my palms.
“How is Marcus?” I asked, distracted.
“He’s fine. He’s been confined to his bed, but the cut wasn’t deep.”
“I’m glad. I was worried about him.”
“We were all worried about you.” She pressed hard on my hand.
“Ouch!”
“Sorry,” she mumbled. Her voice sounded tight, like she was trying not to cry.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
She snorted. Even in the dark, I could tell she was giving me a choice expression. “Nothing is wrong, Don. Marcus is injured, you were arrested, and now your pa’s going to get his head lopped off.”
“WHAT?!”
“Keep your voice down!” Rath hissed.
Mel reached for my wrists and adjusted my hands so she could work on them again. She busied herself wrapping rags around my blistered palms. “When you escaped…” she swallowed and avoided looking me in the eyes. “General Canron made an announcement yesterday. He said that he would behead someone every day until you reveal yourself.” She pulled the rags too tightly, her hands shaking. “The beheadings begin at dawn — with your Pa.”
The world turned upside-down. I swooned and caught myself against the barn wall.
“Pa,” I whispered.
“Highness,” Zarra warned, “don’t do anything deadbrained. This could be a bluff.”
“Highness?” Mel asked, glancing at Zarra.
“Not now,” I mumbled. I certainly didn’t want Mel and Zarra to fight about my identity, especially when I didn’t even know if I believed it yet. “We have to think of something. A plan. Anything. They can’t kill my pa.”
“Who’s there?” barked a voice from the doorway.
The four of us froze in horror. Slowly, we turned to face the new arrival. He was a soldier, a commander, it appeared, from the fancy headpiece he wore and the cape that draped over one shoulder. In one hand, he held a brightly lit lantern. The other rested at his hip on the hilt of his sword. He glared severely at us all, until his gaze fell upon Rath. Recognition flitted across his dark features. Then he looked at me, sizing me up.
“What’s in there?” A voice called from outside. More soldiers approached.
None of us moved as the commander stared at us. We didn’t even breathe.
The commander held up his hand. The sounds of footsteps ceased. His eyes lingered on me as he said, “Nothing. There’s no one here but the servant, tending the cow.” With a jerk of his chin, he summoned Mel to him. “Get inside, girl,” he said. “This is no night for chores.”
Mel cast a glance back at me, full of apprehension. But she squared her shoulders and said, “Yessem,” and let the soldiers lead her back to the cottage. The commander remained in the doorway.
He stared at me as he addressed Rath. “Roth-Scheen,” he said.
I stiffened. Roth-Scheen? There was that name again — the one Rath wouldn’t let me use. The one Willian had given him.
“Shyronn,” Rath responded.
“How is your leg?”
“Gone. Thanks for asking.”
Shyronn nodded tightly. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“So am I.” Rath’s tone was flat and humorless. I couldn’t tell if these two men liked each other or were sworn enemies.
The commander had been staring intently at me through the whole exchange. Finally, he addressed me.
“You look so much like your father,” he said.
I didn’t know how to respond to that, so I just sort of awkwardly bobbed my head.
“If you prove to be half the man that your father was,” Shyronn said, “you will be a giant among men.” The commander turned to leave, but hesitated. Turning back to me, he added, “Your father never put himself first — it was his fatal flaw. He died defending his queen, but his character made him immortal. There were many who loved him. Remember that tomorrow.”
He nodded curtly at Rath and left us, closing the barn door behind him.
Rath, Zarra, and I let out the breaths we had been holding in one collective sigh of relief.
“Who was that?” I asked Rath.
Rath was still staring at the barn door where the man had been standing. “Shyronn Belvarde,” he said. “He was a friend of your father’s.”
My hand found a pitchfork my brother Ken had left leaning against the wall after his morning chores. Despite the pain in my hand, I grabbed the pitchfork and leaned my head against the cool metal tines. Commander Shyronn’s w
ords swirled in my mind. He seemed to be telling me to do something. But what? Turn myself in? Was that the honorable thing to do, though I was innocent? Would my pa die if I kept my silence? My head hurt. Until today, my greatest concern had been impressing Mel by defeating a deadman.
Now I worried that I would soon become one.
A light rain misted the ground as dawn approached. I took advantage of the weather to don my pa’s old traveling cloak, hung and abandoned long ago in the barn. I pulled the hood over my head to obscure my face and hoped that no one would look too closely at me. In my hands, I clutched the pitchfork I had found in the barn. I needed something to cling to.
I went unnoticed as I joined my neighbors in the crowded town square. I had grown up with all these folks, and now they were gathered to watch my pa die in my name.
Zarra was nowhere to be seen. I imagined she was playing it safe, fearful that someone would recognize her as the one who helped me escape from the cellar. My agonized scream when her boot burned my hand had blown her cover. She was sure to be in trouble if she was caught.
Rath hung behind at the back of the crowd, hobbling about on his crutch, but I pushed my way toward the front. I expected a lot of noise and commotion with so many people crammed together in the town square, but all was surprisingly quiet. Not even the babies cried.
The platform Lord Brenden had erected for town meetings and announcements was crowded with people.
I wished it would collapse beneath their weight. Then at least I would have something to laugh about.
A line of soldiers toward the rear of the platform stood at attention, their hands ready to grasp their weapons. In front of the soldiers stood General Canron, who spoke with a man wearing a black hood and a wooden mask: the executioner. He was a surprisingly small man. I had always imagined executioners to be big, terrifying giants. This man, behind his mask and hood, was just like everyone else in Aldrin. For some reason, the executioner’s plainness made me even angrier.
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