Kingdom of Ashes

by Rhiannon Thomas

  “That was not why I ran.”

  Erin nodded. “There were discussions about a marriage alliance between us, you see. I think my mother was more interested in pursuing one farther away, in Palir perhaps . . . but after the tragedy with Princess Isabelle, she may pursue it again. If Finnegan cannot cement the alliance, then it might fall to me. And so I was curious.”

  Aurora looked at the younger princess, the way even the curl of her long red hair was elegant. She was the sort of girl Iris had expected, the sort who could have taken everyone’s adoration and spoken wisely and used it for good. Perhaps Aurora should have been jealous, to hear that Erin might marry Rodric one day. But Rodric deserved happiness, and it would not come with Aurora. She had no claim to him, except as a friend. She didn’t want any claim to him beyond that. “Rodric is wonderful,” she said. “He would make a good husband, I think.”

  “Yet you did not marry him.”

  Aurora opened the book in front of her and began to turn the pages, without really looking at the words. Her hands could not keep still. “I could not stay,” she said. “I could not support John like that . . .”

  “That is the only reason?”

  Aurora looked back up at her. Erin was watching her, lips apart. Intrigued. “It was strange,” Aurora said. “At first, I thought Rodric was rather . . . awkward. That we didn’t fit together. But I don’t think I’ve ever met a kinder person. It was as though . . . he seemed exactly like the sort of person I should love. That I would be a fool not to see the value in him.”

  “You did see the value in him,” Erin said. “From what you’ve said.”

  “But I didn’t feel for him that way,” Aurora said. “I liked him as a friend, and we might have been happy enough together, but—I didn’t feel what I should.”

  “You felt what you felt,” Erin said. “And if you did not love him, and the marriage could only hurt the kingdom, it is better that you ran, don’t you think? A sweet person like that deserves someone who will not resent him.”

  “I don’t resent him.”

  “Then you are a better person than most, if that is true.”

  Aurora turned another page. “And you think you will resent whoever you marry?”

  “No,” Erin said softly. “No, of course not. I think there is a difference between making a diplomatic alliance you’ve expected your whole life, and waking up in a future to find out that your throne is no longer yours and you are expected to marry the new heir. It is a strange sort of coup. If you do not mind my saying so.” She let out a little huff of impatience. “Besides, the sooner I’m marked to be queen of another kingdom, the sooner Finnegan will realize that I do not intend to usurp him.”

  “I do not think he thinks you plan to overthrow him,” Aurora said carefully. “But he thinks people would prefer you as queen.”

  “Finnegan is ridiculous,” Erin said, and for the first time, her voice was harsh. “He is the elder sibling; he is next in line to the throne. That is how it works. Maybe if he allowed people to see his serious side occasionally, he would not worry about this so much.” She stopped and looked at Aurora again. Then she blushed. “I should not have said that,” she said. “It does not matter. He is next in line to the throne. My mother may get irritated with him, but that changes nothing.”

  Erin’s cheeks were still red, the first hint of awkwardness Aurora had ever seen in her. But even her blush looked lovely somehow. She looked like someone who was meant to rule. “Would you want to be queen?”

  “If it was my right,” Erin said. “But if I were queen of Vanhelm, that would mean Finnegan was either dead or disinherited. I would not wish for either. And . . . well. Queenship never seems to end well in the histories, does it?”

  “It seems to work for your mother.”

  “Perhaps,” Erin said. “But I am not like my mother.”

  Aurora could not entirely agree. “Do you think you would make a good queen?”

  Erin raised her chin. “I do.”

  “I do too.”

  “You barely know me,” Erin said. “And surely your loyalties should be with Finnegan. Or do you have other hopes for him?”

  “Other hopes?”

  Erin tilted her head, still watching her. Aurora could see Finnegan in her, in the curve of her lips and the green of her eyes. They were the exact same shade, and shone with the same understanding. Erin’s expression was much softer, though, with some of the steel of her mother. “I’m sorry,” she said. “That was presumptuous of me.” She glanced at the door. “Thank you for letting me intrude. I’ll leave you to your day.”

  When Erin had gone, Aurora turned back to her slightly dented candle. But Erin’s comment lingered. Did she not want him to be king? She wanted Finnegan to be happy, yes; she had assumed that he would be king, but the idea of him not inheriting the throne held an appeal that she had not acknowledged before. She enjoyed flirting with Finnegan the irreverent prince, the one who schemed and dreamed and shoved rules aside, but a king would be very different. So weighed down by responsibility, so concerned with things other than himself. His actions dictated by the diplomatic needs of the kingdom. Prince Finnegan was appealing, but King Finnegan . . .

  It shouldn’t matter what Finnegan’s future held. They had a temporary alliance; that was all. But this thought of a different future unsettled her. There was a part of her, a voice that she fought to ignore, that wanted Finnegan to be hers. That wanted all other responsibilities, all other allegiances, to disappear.

  She wanted Finnegan to be part of her future, not his own. And that thought worried her most of all.

  SEVENTEEN

  “IT MUST BE AMAZING,” FINNEGAN SAID, AS THEY ATE dinner that evening.

  Aurora looked across the table at him. She had been so lost in thought that she barely heard him speak. “What must be amazing?”

  “Whatever you’re thinking of. It’s distracted you for the last half an hour at least.”

  She could not stop thinking of Erin’s words, of this new insight into herself. She wished she could ask Nettle for her thoughts. Nettle would be clear, and she would not judge. She pushed a piece of fish across her plate with her fork. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I guess I miss Nettle. I hope she’s doing all right.”

  “She’ll be fine, Rora. She’s an expert at this stuff.” He laid down his knife. “Now tell me what’s really bothering you. Did Celestine threaten you again?”

  “No,” Aurora said. “Not that.” But she couldn’t tell him the real reason for her distraction, and she wasn’t certain that she should mention Tristan, either. She could not know how he would respond. “Some men cornered me in the city today,” she said instead. “They wanted to capture me, trade me in for King John’s reward. But I’m fine. I just didn’t expect his men to find me so soon.”

  “He sent guards after you?”

  “No,” she said. “I’m sure he needs all his loyal men to protect him, if what I’ve heard about events in Petrichor is true. But plenty of other people seem to be willing to do his dirty work for him.”

  Finnegan frowned, and suddenly he looked much older, much more tired than he had before. “People are getting reckless,” he said, “if they’ll try to capture you on the street in daylight.”

  “A thousand gold coins is a pretty big reward.”

  “I’ll have more soldiers patrol the city and watch the docks.” He looked at her for a long moment, as though considering, and then pushed back his chair. “Let’s go see a play,” he said. “I know of a good one. Lots of drama, epic romance. You’ll love it. There’s no point sitting inside and worrying about this.”

  “It isn’t safe,” she said slowly. “King John’s men—”

  “Nothing is safe,” he said. “And you survived, didn’t you?” He walked around to her side of the table and grabbed her hand, pulling her to her feet. “Come on, Rora,” he said. “What’s the fun without a little risk?”

  The play was everything Finnegan promised: a star
-crossed romance, mistaken identities, the enemy disguised as a friend. The songs stuck in Aurora’s head, the death scene put tears in her eyes, and when the curtain fell, she leapt to her feet to applaud.

  “See?” Finnegan said, as they walked out onto the street. “That wasn’t so terrible, was it?”

  “It was passable,” Aurora teased. “Your tastes are not as bad as I thought.”

  “Such a compliment.” He held out his arm. “Shall we return to the safety of the palace then, my lady?”

  Aurora hesitated. The night was unseasonably warm, and the stars were bright. She felt safer, out in the darkness. She was not ready to return to her worries yet.

  “Maybe we could walk around,” she said. “For a little while.”

  Finnegan smiled. “I know just the place.”

  She rested her hand in the crook of his arm, and they stepped down the street together. Streetlamps sent light flickering across the stone roads, and a tram bell rang in the distance.

  They walked in silence. Aurora could hear the distant hum of conversation behind some of the doors, but they saw very few people once they left the theater behind. It was so different from Petrichor, with its night festivals and crowded inns.

  Ahead of them, the press of buildings fell away, leaving an expanse of grass and trees. After the crush of the city, it felt as wide and peaceful as a forest. A low metal fence ran around the edge.

  “It’s . . . a garden?” she said.

  “A park. The park. We need a little green amid all the steel and smoke.”

  A sign hung over the fence. Coppergate Park. Closed from sunset to sunrise. A padlock held the gate in place.

  “It’s closed, Finnegan,” she said. “We can’t go in.”

  “I’m the prince,” he said. “And you’re a princess. I think they’ll waive the rules.”

  “It seems rude.”

  “No one will know. No one will care.” They reached the gate. Finnegan stepped over it with ease. He held out his hand. “Or are you afraid?”

  She ignored his hand and placed her left foot on the bottom rung of the fence. Her legs were barely long enough to reach over the bars. She stretched on tiptoe, her skirts tangling on the spikes, and stumbled as she dragged her other leg over. Finnegan caught her, laughing.

  He tugged her deeper into the park. A couple of trees rustled in the breeze above them.

  It was so peaceful, so freeing. She stepped away from Finnegan and cupped her hands in front of her. For a moment, she let her thoughts turn to fire. Her anger that those men had tried to kidnap her, her fear for Tristan and Rodric. But no. She did not want to think of those things now. Instead, she closed her eyes and tried to pull out other feelings. The indignation that raced through her when Finnegan grinned and told her that he was waiting for her to kiss him, and then the curiosity, the sensation that tugged at her stomach and made her regret walking away.

  There. She snatched the spark inside her, the little tendril of magic she had discovered before, and tried to tease it out. To coax it into her cupped hands. To let it burn.

  Warmth licked her palms, and light burst before her eyelids. She opened her eyes. A small ball of flames floated above her hands.

  “Impressive,” Finnegan said.

  The light flickered, then grew stronger. She held it out to Finnegan. “Here,” she said. “Take it.”

  “If you want to set me on fire, you’ll have to be more subtle than that.”

  “Take it,” she said again. She tilted her hands, and the fire slid out of them, floating a few inches away from Finnegan’s chest. It cast light and shade across his face. His eyes glinted.

  “Thank you.”

  She sank into a mock curtsy, and he laughed.

  “Can you create more?”

  She could. Her chest swelled with something beyond anger and fear, an excitement that could not be touched by the world outside the park. She tugged another tendril loose, letting a second ball of flame form over her fingertips. She slid that one free as well, then another, and another, until the air glimmered with light, like she had summoned a hundred fairies to dance around them.

  One spun past Finnegan’s head, and he ducked, laughing. “Careful,” he said. “I really don’t want to be set on fire, if you can avoid it.”

  She laughed too. Another light slid from her fingers, green this time, like the light that Celestine had used to enchant her, all those years ago. It floated through the air, dancing around Finnegan’s hair.

  “Stop, stop, stop,” Finnegan said, running forward to grab her hands, but he was laughing as he spoke. “It’s still fire, Rora.”

  “You don’t trust me?”

  “Oh, about as much as you trust me.” He tugged her toward him. “How about some fireworks?” he said. “Up in the sky.”

  Fireworks. The explosion on the castle steps, the screams of the crowd as they tried to escape, the blood that stained her fingers as she shoved Rodric away. So much pain, even then. She pulled her hands free of Finnegan and threw her head back. Then she tossed the memories into the air, a golden, swirling ball of flame. It rushed up and up, past the trees, over the rooftops, up to the stars. Then she gave it one final push, and it exploded. Tiny streaks of flame rained down.

  “If anyone sees this, they’ll think it’s proof the end is coming,” Aurora said.

  “Let them,” Finnegan said. “What do they know?”

  Aurora tilted her head farther back, taking in the stars. It was a dark night, the moon almost covered, but the stars still glowed.

  She tumbled back onto the grass. Lights floated around her, bobbing as though uncertain where to turn. She grabbed Finnegan’s arm and tugged him down beside her. He landed with a thump, and she giggled.

  “You’re drunk, Rora.”

  “How can I be drunk?” She wriggled in the grass, letting it prickle her back. “I haven’t had anything to drink.”

  “Drunk on magic,” he said. “Drunk on yourself.”

  She turned her head to look at him. Her hair fell over her cheek.

  “Do you really think I can do this? Control the dragons, stop King John?”

  “I think you could do anything. Anything at all.”

  “That isn’t true,” she said. “There are many things I can’t do.”

  “Name one.”

  “I couldn’t marry Rodric,” she whispered. “I couldn’t help Alyssinia when I was there. I couldn’t stop the king from doing all the things he did.”

  “Those things don’t matter.”

  “Of course they matter.”

  “Why do they have to be your responsibility? Why can’t you do what you want to do?”

  “Because,” she said. She closed her eyes, feeling the grass against her cheek. “I can’t.”

  “You can do anything that you want to, Aurora,” he said. “Anything that you want to.”

  “And if I don’t know what that is?”

  “Then you’d better try everything at least once,” he said. “Just to be sure.” She could hear the smirk in his voice, and she laughed. It was good to laugh. To be here.

  “You wanted to know my secret?” she whispered. When she opened her eyes, she could see his, inches from hers, the green sharp in the dark. “Sometimes I’m glad that King John turned out to be so awful. Because it gave me an excuse to leave. Otherwise, I would have married Rodric, and then . . .”

  “Then you’d never have been able to be here with me?”

  “Yes,” she said. “My life would have been theirs forever. I needed a good reason to leave. To figure out my magic. My wanting to wasn’t reason enough.”

  “And what do you think now?” he said, his voice low. “Do you think wanting something is reason enough?”

  “I don’t know.” The words were barely audible above the breeze. Every hair on her arm prickled.

  He won’t kiss me, she thought. I have to be the one to kiss him.

  The tension was too much. She turned her head away, looking at the stars a
gain. “Why do you think the dragons disappeared?”

  “Because the world couldn’t keep them,” Finnegan said. “Dragons are magic, aren’t they? So when the magic faded here, they faded too. Or, at least, they went to sleep, until their time came again. And that just happened to be thousands of years later, when we had forgotten all about them.”

  “So you don’t think a courageous slayer saved the day?”

  “What’s one hero against a dragon? Trust me, Rora. It was the world that got rid of them.”

  “But you think I can make them sleep again?”

  “I think your magic can. Don’t you?”

  Aurora rubbed the edges of her pendant, letting the roughness of the wings scrape against her thumb.

  “And what about Celestine?” she said. “She’s the one who made me sleep. She’s planned all of this. Is she part of the world’s work too?”

  “Perhaps,” Finnegan said. “She had to become the way she is for a reason, don’t you think?”

  She felt the sudden urge to tell him the truth. She had carried Celestine’s secrets alone for too long, letting them worm their way inside her and unsettle her thoughts. She wanted Finnegan to know too. “She said that my mother made a bargain with her,” she said. “And when my mother failed to keep it, she cursed me.”

  She refused to turn and look at Finnegan, but she could feel him watching her. “What was the bargain?” he said.

  Now she let her head tilt to the side. He was close, his expression curious, undemanding. “Me,” she said. “She wanted me.”

  “Celestine? Or your mother?”

  “My mother. I don’t know what Celestine wanted in return.”

  She almost expected Finnegan to leap in with a theory, to pull the conversation into schemes and insights once more. But he continued to watch her, almost gentle. “So that’s why you have this magic,” he said. “That’s why you think Celestine wanted to use you to control the dragons.”

  “Yes,” Aurora said. She closed her eyes. “Perhaps. But then what could my mother have offered?” she murmured. “How did she think she could outsmart Celestine?”