The Sinister Regent

by Hope Erica Schultz

  Jes had used every example of “bad language” she knew on her way into North Waveborn. Now, not one of them felt bad enough for this, not even all of them over and over.

  “Amalia, she’s sent someone to the control room. As soon as they enter it, it and all these tunnels are going to start to flood.”

  Expressions of surprise, respect, and then realization chased each other across Amalia’s face. “I’ll take your pack,” she said. She slung it over one shoulder then took Jes’s hand. “Let’s run.”

  When she hadn’t been walking for hours and hours, Jes could manage a short run without difficulty. Games of tag. One flight of stairs, up or down. She had never seen any use in running just to get from here to there, and she’d carefully avoided any punishment that involved it.

  Now, as the light of Amalia’s torch flickered off the stone walls, only her cousin’s hand around hers kept Jes going, on and on. The breath started to come from her lungs in painful gasps. There was a stitch in her side, and her legs felt like they were made of lead.

  If I stop, I’ll drown. That wasn’t as much motivation as she’d hoped. Jes tried again. If I stop, Amalia won’t leave me, and she’ll drown. Better, but that was wearing down too. If I stop, there’s no one to protect my people.

  It felt like forever, and then there was a rumble of stone shifting. Amalia’s hand tightened around hers, and they kept running as the sound of rushing water echoed in the stone tunnels.

  The quiet slap of boots on stone was like her heartbeat. When the sound changed, it felt like her heart did, too—splash, slosh. Splash, slosh. The water was up to their ankles. Up to their calves. They could swim, but that would be too slow. Once the tunnels filled, there wouldn’t be any air.

  The water was up to Jes’s waist, chest deep on Amalia, when they spotted the stairs. Amalia continued to drag her forward, even though she was almost underwater herself, and then Amalia was above her, pulling her up, one step at a time, and Jes thought they might make it. A wave of water came thundering down the tunnel, filling it, covering her, and her eyes closed in surprise.

  The grip on her hand shifted, became two hands, pulling her through the water, up, up, until her head broke free into air. It was so dark she wasn’t certain she had opened her eyes at first, but Amalia was still pulling her up the stairs as the water tried to sweep her away. Her feet settled on the steps, and she was climbing again.

  “You—you saved my life,” Jes coughed.

  “Well, that’s what friends are for.” Amalia released her hands and patted her on one arm. “Hopefully we can open the trapdoor in the dark.”

  They walked beside each other, feeling the walls on either side for controls or openings, until Jes clipped her head on the ceiling at the top. The latch was the same as the other two had been, and they eased it up together, climbing out to stand dripping on the stones.

  It was dark, but there was enough light to see the figure in front of them, weapon held out to threaten. “Halt, in the name of the king!”

  4

  Chris,” Amalia sighed. “It’s us.”

  There was the sound of a gaslight hissing on, and then Jes could see that Amalia was right. Chris sheathed his sword with a sheepish shrug.

  “Hey, you were breaking into my castle before dawn. It’s my job to keep an eye on things while Mom and Dad are gone.”

  Jes collapsed on the stone floor in a wet heap. “Of course they are. Did you get sent a regent, too?”

  Chris scowled. “Yeah, this grumpy woman called Lady Indigo. I really don’t like her.”

  “Does she have black hair and creepy pale skin and a really sharp nose and chin?” Jes asked.

  “And a voice like nails on a chalkboard?” Amalia added.

  “Oh, you’ve met her!” Chris nodded. “Can’t stand her.”

  Jes shook her head. “I don’t buy identical triplets. Something weird is going on. Oh, and whoever they are, they’re planning on taking over the islands.”

  Jes felt her eyes closing while Amalia filled Chris in and then argued with him about the best way of dispatching their foes. After a bit, Amalia shook her awake. “Chris is going to hide us in his top bunk and get us dry clothes. We need to sleep before we try anything else.”

  How can you hide someone in a top bunk? Jes kept the question to herself, too focused on putting one foot in front of the other. When Chris had snuck them up to his room, the question was answered. The room was a good fifteen feet high, and his bed doubled as a play pirate ship. The top bunk was reached by ladder and was ten feet above the floor, with solid sides to keep someone from falling out … or anyone below from seeing in.

  “Here, towels, night shirts, and just leave your dirty clothes with mine to get washed.”

  “Won’t anyone ask how you got two extra outfits soaked and dirty over night?” Jes asked.

  Chris shrugged. “Not really. That happens at least once a week.”

  Jes felt like her muscles were turning into jelly. After Chris left to let them change, Amalia stood behind her on the ladder and helped her climb. She was pretty sure she was asleep before she hit the mattress.

  * * *

  Chris brought a picnic basket up into the Crow’s Nest—his name for his top bunk—around noon. Jes moaned and covered her head with the nearest pillow until the scents of the food got through to her. “Do you have cinnamon rolls?”

  “Cinnamon rolls, meat pies, roasted chicken, some vegetables nobody will eat, cheese, and apples.” Chris sounded like someone who had slept a lot longer than either of them had. Jes decided to dive for the basket rather than hit him.

  “We can’t use the tunnels to get to West Waveborn, and Queen Melia is the last person we have to turn to,” Amalia said, grabbing an apple.

  Chris frowned. “But there were nine heroes at the beginning. Who were the other two?”

  Jes and Amalia turned to look at him. “Nine heroes?” Jes asked.

  “That’s what the song said. The night before last, Mom was complaining about everything that the song got wrong. It claimed that she and Queen Melia were sorceresses, and Dad was a wizard, and lots of other stupid stuff.” Chris shrugged. “The musician that sang it hadn’t written it, and I don’t know who did write it. But it said nine heroes, and I only know about our parents and Queen Melia. Donal’s father wasn’t one of them; he and Queen Melia were only married for a couple of months before he decided he wanted to be an explorer more than a prince consort.”

  “Didn’t you ask her or your dad who the other two were?” Amalia demanded.

  Chris shrugged again. “I was going to, but then there were these other things like explosives and battles to ask about, and then yesterday morning they left.”

  Jes brushed her hair back from her face, then stopped. “My earring!”

  Chris looked at her like she was crazy, and Amalia explained.

  “It was from Queen Melia, and it let Jes listen in to the other one back where the conspirators were.”

  Chris frowned. “Even if Queen Melia is gone, like our parents, I bet Donal has some way to get in touch with her. We just need to get to him. There’s the land bridge, but there’s a border crossing partway across.”

  “How many guards?” Amalia asked, fingering the hilt of her sword.

  “Usually two. Mom and Dad would be really mad if we hurt them, though.”

  Jes imagined her two friends fighting fully grown, armed, trained guards. What would I be doing? Throwing rocks? She rubbed her forehead.

  “We could take a rowboat, but that’s really slow, and somebody would probably see us. Maybe we could stow away on a smuggler’s ship.”

  “Do you really think your parents would allow smugglers to land here?” Amalia argued.

  Jes frowned harder, trying to follow some stray thought. Smugglers …

  “Amalia, remember the stories about our great grandfather, Giuseppe?”

  Amalia nodded. “A few of them.”

  Jes turned to Chris. “When he was y
oung, there was a disagreement between his city and the neighboring one, and there were custom stops between them that charged just crazy amounts. Grandfather decided to become a smuggler. Every week he’d go to one custom house with a string of donkeys loaded down with rags and straw. The custom officer would go through everything looking for something of value, but he never found anything, and Grandfather would go home later another way.”

  “So, what was he smuggling?” Chris asked.

  Amalia chuckled. “Donkeys.” She turned back to Jes. “You want us to smuggle donkeys?”

  Jes shook her head. “I want us to smuggle ourselves.”

  They didn’t even have to wash up for the role, just put on dry clothing and pack laundry bags full of rags. Amalia had kept their packs from completely soaking, so they had the clothing, and Jes’s emergency food was still in fair shape.

  Amalia argued a little about leaving behind the caltrops and the flask of oil.

  “They’ll make the customs people nervous,” Jes pointed out. “Besides, I bet Donal has lots of cool gadgets, and I’m sure he’ll share.”

  “I can see the oil,” Amalia argued, “but my mini caltrops just look like a game of jacks. If Chris has a rubber ball to put in with them, no one will think twice.”

  Chris, it turned out, had dozens of rubber balls of different sizes and colors. They were so busy bouncing for a minute that they almost missed the knock on the door.

  “Up!” Chris stage whispered and walked slowly and loudly to the door as Jes and Amalia climbed back into the top bunk. Jes peered around a toy cannon and through a porthole in time to see him reach the door and open it.

  “Your Highness,” a familiar voice said. Jes felt Amalia stiffen beside her. The woman—Lady Indigo—looked just like the other two, and she was frowning down her nose at Chris.

  “Yes?” Chris asked.

  Lady Indigo bowed. “I just wanted to make sure that you would be present for dinner tonight.”

  Chris tilted his head. “I never miss meals. Unless I’ve already eaten them, but usually I’m hungry enough to eat again.”

  Lady Indigo gave a tiny shrug. “I’ll see you tonight, then.” She stepped back out and closed the door. There was a tiny clicking noise.

  “That’s weird,” Chris muttered. He shrugged and looked up at them. “So, are we ready to go?”

  Amalia stuffed a small red ball into her bag of caltrops. “Mostly. But I think you want to try that door again. I think we’ve been locked in.”

  5

  The door was locked. Amalia tried to pick it, but a bar had been set across the door. They were well and truly stuck.

  They went to the window and looked down. It was fifty feet down to solid footing, and even that was a rocky bluff overlooking the sea. Jes felt queasy and moved back, sitting down on the edge of Chris’s bed.

  “There’s a window just below, only about eight feet down,” Amalia announced cheerfully. “If it’s unlocked, we can go in that way and escape from there.”

  “How are we going to get down?” Chris asked. “We could take the ladder from the bed, but there isn’t any way to attach it.”

  “Sheets and pillow cases,” Amalia announced. “We tie each set of sheets together long-ways—top sheet to bottom sheet—and then we cross the two sets across each other and tie with the pillow cases to make steps. We just attach the whole thing to the bottom of the bed—easy!”

  Jes swallowed. She forced herself to walk over to the window, looked down, and scurried away again. “Amalia … I can’t. I’m sorry.”

  Amalia looked worried for a moment, then smiled. “That’s okay. We won’t be able to bring our packs and swords down that way, so Chris and I will go down, break in, and come back up to let you out and get our stuff. You can double check the packing while we’re gone.”

  Chris opened his mouth, and Amalia elbowed him in the ribs. Hard.

  “Uh, right. Just as easy to have you wait here,” he managed.

  Jes felt tears prick her eyes, but she only nodded. I hate being the weakest one. Slowest runner and the only one afraid of heights. Why would they even want to be friends with me?

  She stayed away from the window as she helped tie off the sheets and double check the connections. In a few minutes, they were ready, and she forced herself back to the window to watch them go.

  Watching Amalia take that first step into open air made Jes want to throw up. There were long seconds until her foot found the first cross-tie, and then Amalia grinned and scampered down like a monkey. Chris only waited for her to swing open the lower window and scramble inside before he started down after her. Jes watched as he climbed into the lower room as well. She knelt in front of the window, still looking down, in case they had to come back this way. And then what will we do?

  A minute passed, and then Chris appeared briefly in the window to give her a thumbs-up. She waved back and then went to the packs, double checking straps and contents. She put on her own to avoid delays and then counted to herself.

  Sometime after seven hundred, Jes heard a noise outside the door. She froze, trying to decide if it was worth it to pick up a sword she didn’t know how to use. The door slid open, and Amalia peered inside. “Got it! Ready to go?”

  The climb had added some extra grime to their hands and faces. Amalia and Chris put on their packs and slid their swords back into the scabbards. With their loads, only someone who knew them would realize they were royalty.

  Chris knew the servants’ stairs as well as Amalia did in her own home, and they only had to pause twice on their descent to the kitchen level. From there, they took a worn door to the kitchen garden and then out to a dirt trail that led from that servants’ entrance into the seaport.

  South Waveborn had more trees than Jes was used to, mostly bending trunks with large, broad leaves springing from the tops. Although she knew none of the trees could be much older than she was, they towered above her. You’d never know that this island was underwater for centuries.

  The harbor was small and sheltered, but they bypassed it altogether, so they only saw the tops of the taller ships. An orange tree, complete with ripe fruit, marked the path to the land bridge.

  The land bridge between South Waveborn and West Waveborn was dotted with board and rope bridges over open stretches of water. The bridges swung as the three crossed over, and Jes gripped the sides tightly every time. It wasn’t a long way to fall, and she could swim, but the shifting surface was unpleasant. Chris and Amalia appeared to disagree, as they raced each other over every bridge they came to. Jes couldn’t bring herself to complain after she’d refused the sheet ladder, so she clung on grimly and kept going.

  The actual land parts were boring, barren rocks with some sparse salt grasses and sea birds’ nests. The central spire island was like this, just a place for pirates to land. These areas were too small even for that.

  “I bet they know we’re gone now,” Jes said to Amalia. “You and I, that is, since Lady Indigo just saw Chris, but I bet someone realized that at least one of us was long gone. Otherwise, why would they have locked Chris in?”

  Amalia frowned. “Maybe. I do take off a lot, but I’m usually there for meals, and this is two I’ve missed now.”

  “No one will be looking for the three of us together,” Chris said, walking backwards to face them. “The louder we are, the less likely they’ll think we have anything to hide.”

  “Tree, Chris,” Jes pointed out. He kept walking backwards, gesturing now with one hand.

  “If you want to hide, be conspicuous! That’s what Dad says.”

  “Tree!” Amalia yelled.

  “Yeah, like that!” Chris took another step back, slamming into the tree trunk. “Okay, maybe not quite like that.”

  Jes tried not to laugh, but Amalia and Chris laughed until she had to join in.

  “Is that the border stop?” she asked, pointing, when she could talk again.

  “Yeah, you can’t really call it a house, can you?” There wa
s a single gate across a narrow bit of land, and two bored guards standing on either side of it. The woman who was nearer to them wore a blue uniform, while the man on the other side wore red. They were chatting with each other but stopped as the three of them approached.

  “Aren’t you supposed to be in school?” the woman asked.

  “School break,” Jes said brightly. “Mom wanted us out of the house for a bit and sent us to visit Grandma.”

  “And we didn’t do anything!” Amalia chimed in.

  “Much,” Chris muttered.

  The woman quirked a small smile. “Don’t leave it too late if you’re coming home tonight. No passing after dark.”

  She stood back, and they walked up to the gate, where the guard in red seemed less happy to see them.

  “Anything to declare?” he asked.

  They looked at each other and shrugged. “Is it nouns that are declarative or verbs?” Amalia asked. “I get that mixed up.”

  The man sighed. “Are you bringing anything valuable with you?”

  They obediently took off their bags. “This piece of purple might make a doll’s dress,” Jes pointed out. “It’s kind of small, but it’s pretty.”

  “This green is nicer, but I’m too old for dolls,” Amalia informed him.

  “I never liked dolls much, but I bet you could make a cool flag out of all the pieces,” Chris offered.

  The man sighed, the woman hid a smile, and the three of them held out their bags expectantly. The man peered and shuffled through each one as though afraid to hurt their feelings by not searching them, then let them on through.

  “Go straight to your grandmother’s!” he advised.

  “We will,” Jes lied.

  “Ee-yaw,” brayed Chris, and Amalia hit him as they walked on, leaving the checkpoint behind.

  “Why did you do that?” she hissed.

  “Because we’re donkeys, and it worked,” Chris said, still smiling. “A doll’s dress. Really?”