The Firethorn Crown

by Lea Doué

  Set in a wall of grey stone, the archway stood three feet above Lily’s head. Rusted hinges hung like broken teeth on each side. The mist didn’t pass its threshold, as if somehow the missing doors kept it at bay.

  “Bay!” Lily said. “Could she have come down here?”

  Hazel allowed a small wrinkle between her brows. “It’s possible.”

  “She could be anywhere,” Coral said.

  Junia cringed. “Don’t yell for her.”

  Coral rolled her eyes.

  “It’s brighter on the other side of the arches,” Lily said. “We’ll look there first.”

  “What’s in there?” Neylan asked.

  “More trees. But I think they’re topiaries.” A whole garden erupted beyond the archway. Whether real or treasure, they would soon see. A smooth path—more of the grey stone—wound through hedges no higher than her shoulder, past flowers and plants in dream-like hues. The topiaries were spaced as in any formal garden, and some of the shadows farther on might be fruit trees.

  She waved the mist from her face and then sucked in a surprised breath.

  “What?” Gwen said.

  She pointed. A golden light shone in the distance, small and warm, cutting through the white miasma in the air.

  Coral looked over their shoulders. “The sun? It’s still daylight!”

  “Let’s go!” Junia spoke in a strained whisper, jostling the nearest girls.

  “Watch the claws, June Bug!” Melantha kept her from creating a stampede.

  With a few nods from the girls, Lily dashed through the archway, as eager as Junia to be out of the maze, both the upper and lower parts of it.

  The girls hissed and gasped quietly behind her. Gwen tore her hand away from Lily’s. Junia shrieked.

  “Oh!” The twins sounded both delighted and startled.

  Lily turned around and then took a step back.

  All the girls now wore ballgowns, except Melantha, who stood frozen on the other side of the archway, her mouth open. Dark, elaborate, breathtaking ballgowns draped each girl, perfectly fitted to her body. Neylan’s had black feathers, but most sparkled with rubies, sapphires, onyx. Ivy sat on her knees, head buried in Mara’s sooty velvet skirts, while Coral and Azure twirled in cobalt silk.

  Lily shook her clammy hands, wiped them on her dress, and then gasped. Burgundy taffeta crumpled beneath her fingers, and a wide, diamond-studded belt separated the bodice from the skirts. Her shoulders were bare, and she wondered why she wasn’t cold. She wiggled her toes, kicking a foot out from under the gown. Matching slippers. How could she explain this? It wasn’t natural. She wasn’t equipped to deal with dresses transforming into ballgowns while traveling through underground gardens studded with jewelled trees, or stone tunnels and mirrors with misty lights, or suitors who—

  “Breathe.” Gwen put an arm around her shoulder.

  Lily did, gulping in great, cold lungfuls, until her heart stopped racing, and her head cleared enough for one word to come to her lips. “Sorcery.”

  Coral and Azure stopped twirling, and twenty-two eyes looked back into hers.

  “The corridor reflected in the mirror wasn’t an optical illusion. It was a real illusion, put there by a sorcerer.”

  As if saying it aloud made it final, the girls began arguing about their options. Lily wanted to join in, to run towards the golden light, or to sit and cry at someone’s feet. Instead, she stayed quiet and still. She’d gotten the girls into this mess, and she had to get them out. If she couldn’t do that, what kind of queen would she be?

  “Enough.” She spoke firmly, not much above her usual volume, and the girls quieted one by one. They hadn’t been arguing as loudly as they did above ground. This cavern made them all nervous.

  “We have to go forward.”

  “No way!” Melantha moved for the first time since their transformation. “Maybe the tunnel is open now.” She sprinted off.

  “Mel, no!” Lily cringed at the shrillness of her own voice.

  Melantha skidded on the path and turned, her hair whipping around her. She had gotten too far. She bounced on her toes, ready to dart off again.

  “We can’t split up.” Lily sounded desperate, but she couldn’t risk losing anyone in that glittering forest.

  “Then come with me.”

  Mara dashed forward to join her, but the instant she reached the archway, she bounced backward and ended up on the ground, with Wren pinned underneath.

  “What was that?” Lily asked, rushing over.

  Mara groaned and helped Wren stand, brushing dirt from their gowns. “I don’t know. Something pushed me back.”

  “Pushed you?” Lily shared a glance with Neylan, and they both approached the archway. They patted the air, expecting to find some sort of invisible barrier, like glass.

  “I don’t feel anything,” Lily said.

  “Push harder.” Neylan leaned at an alarming angle, her arms outstretched against nothing. “Something is pushing back.”

  Lily struck the barrier, palm out, hard and fast, the way Riva had taught them when she’d still been their governess. Her hand rebounded, jarring her shoulder, but she hadn’t felt anything. “It’s like hitting a pillow and having someone push it back at the same time, but I couldn’t feel the pillow.”

  “Didn’t feel like a pillow to me,” Mara mumbled.

  Melantha glanced in the direction of the tunnel. She groaned and marched back to the archway, stopping just on the other side. “What now?” Her eyes crossed as she examined the empty air between the stones.

  “Whoever made this place didn’t intend for us to go backwards. We need to get to that light.” Lily gestured over her shoulder. “It might be a way out.”

  “Or it might not.”

  “There’s always a way out where sorcery is involved.” Neylan spoke as if she knew a thing or two about sorcery, although no books existed, and no practicing sorcerer had set foot in Eltekon since Father was a child.

  In this case, the out-clause was one of the few things that most people knew about sorcery.

  Lily held out her hand. “Come on.”

  Melantha inched her fingers forward and gripped Lily’s tightly. Having seen every one of the other girls transform, she had to know it would be painless, and, yet, she hesitated.

  “I know you don’t like wearing ballgowns, but it’s really not that bad.”

  “Ha-ha.” She took a quick breath. “I look terrible in black.”

  She didn’t, of course. Lily yanked her through the archway and backed up. A quiet hiss and whoosh, followed by a quick flash the color of coal dust, and Melantha’s dress changed into layer upon layer of gauzy skirts, pitch-black and dotted with hundreds of tiny crystals that winked like stars. The unadorned bodice fit like skin. She looked stunning.

  “Great. I look like a burnt cupcake.”

  Azure snorted.

  “Shut up. At least you’re wearing blue.”

  Coral twirled. “What’s the point of the gowns, if there’s no one to see them.”

  “Maybe it was some sort of retreat for the soldier-king and his courtiers,” Lily said.

  “I feel like I’m still wearing my boots.” Melantha examined her foot, covered in a dainty diamond-encrusted slipper, by far the most delicate footwear she’d ever worn. She stomped her feet. “Boots.”

  “Of course you do,” Neylan said. “The gowns are illusions.”

  Ivy whimpered. She looked paler than usual.

  Mara hugged her close. “Any pain?”

  Ivy shook her head.

  The other girls moved a bit, wiggling toes, stretching arms. Lily waved her arms back and forth and then crossed them over her chest. She felt something, almost like the pillow barrier. She ran her hands up and down her arms, but her fingers felt only bare skin. Curious, but she couldn’t dwell on it. She needed to get the girls out.

  She led the way, with Gwen beside her, their hands close, but no longer linked. She avoided looking at the ceiling, her eyes unable
to focus on its inky blackness, and instead studied the uncountable variety of plants in the well-tended garden, only a few of which she recognized. Purple ranunculus with their swirling petals, ashy-black hellebore, and roses of every midnight hue imaginable. A fig tree slumped behind a low bench, its branches weighed down with purple-black fruit. The plants couldn’t be real, growing this far underground. Could they? She pinched a leaf off the low hedge and crushed it between her fingers. It bruised like a real leaf. She sniffed. Smelled like a real leaf, too.

  “Who could the gardener be?” she said.

  “Let’s get out of here, then you can wonder all you like,” Gwen said.

  She needn’t have feared. Lily had no interest in the meandering paths branching off the main one. Her goal was the golden light at the far side of the garden.

  “You may not have to wait for your answer,” Hazel said.

  Lily saw it, too—a man-sized form approaching from straight ahead. She stopped. Had Runson found his way down, after all?

  Chapter Five

  Lily pressed a hand to her collarbone as the man approached. His boot heels struck slowly and confidently on the stone path, his posture indicating familiarity with the sombre cavern. He was taller than Runson, and slim, and his high-collared velvet tunic appeared too fine for a gardener. A fringe of dark hair fell over his forehead, framing an unwavering gaze. She couldn’t imagine why he was here, or what he wanted.

  She dropped her hand and held her ground, afraid he wouldn’t stop. When he did, she lifted her chin to avoid staring at his mouth. Crimson lips in a face as pale as snow. Dark eyes raked over her body from head to toe to fingertips, absorbing every detail, and then settled just above her head. Tentatively, he reached out, pulled the twig from her hair, and watched the silky strands cascade down her back. He looked at her as she must have looked at the jewelled trees, in awe.

  Gwen stepped up and brushed shoulders with her. “Excuse me, sir.”

  Lily broke eye contact with the stranger. She blinked and took a step back. Just a small one.

  “Forgive me,” the man said, his voice deep and resonant. He bowed low, a courtly bow.

  “Who are you?” Melantha demanded.

  He extended a gloved hand to Lily. “Please, allow me to introduce myself.”

  She let him wait for a breath or two before placing her fingers gingerly in his.

  The corners of his lips twitched. “I am Prince Tharius, First Son of the Undergarden. Welcome to my—kingdom.” He mocked his domain, sweeping his arm out to indicate everything she had already seen, as well as the golden light shining behind him. He kissed her fingers, the barest touch of his lips against her skin, and released her.

  She shivered. How could Father not know there was a prince living under palace grounds?

  Gwen elbowed her, reminding her of her manners, but Prince Tharius spoke first.

  “And you are Her Royal Highness Princess Lily, First Daughter and Crown Princess of Ituria.”

  Her jaw dropped, all manners forgotten.

  “I’ve been watching you in the maze,” he said, as if it were no big deal.

  “You’re a sorcerer,” Neylan said in an accusing tone. And she had cause. The sorcerer’s tattoo didn’t mar his cheek.

  Lily had only seen the mark on one person, Ivy’s bodyguard. Yarrow had given up sorcery long ago, but the tattoo remained.

  He waved away Neylan’s accusation. “Of course, I’m a sorcerer, but nothing of consequence.”

  Lily frowned. This garden was certainly not made by a sorcerer of no consequence.

  “Sir, I won’t ask how you’ve been watching me.” Unless you were a marked apprentice, it was pointless to ask a sorcerer’s secrets. “But I will ask you how we can get out of this place.”

  He smiled, revealing teeth as pale as his skin. “She speaks to me,” he whispered. He offered her his arm and spoke in a normal tone. “I will tell you what you want to know, but first, a tour of my home.”

  Lily took a step back, and Gwen followed. She had no interest in seeing more of this place, although she had many questions about the prince. “I really must get my sisters back home.”

  He lowered his arm. “I understand.” His smile slipped, and his eyes hardened. “I would escort you myself, if it were possible.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “This garden, and the castle beyond . . . they are my kingdom.” He drew in a deep breath and released it, too slowly to be a sigh. “And they are my prison.”

  A few of the girls gasped, but Prince Tharius watched Lily. This place of beauty and darkness was his prison? How long had he been here? The subtle lines on his brow attested to more years than she had seen, but he couldn’t be as old as Father.

  And, more importantly, what had he done to deserve imprisonment?

  Again, he answered before she could respond. “Have no fear of me. I did nothing to deserve this banishment. A sorcerer far greater than I created this . . . paradise. He cursed my father, trapping my mother and my grandfather with him.” He nodded his head in the direction he’d come from, without looking away from her. “I was born in the castle beyond the garden.”

  Lily peered ahead, but couldn’t see the castle; only golden light flickered and beckoned beyond the garden, suggesting warmth and safety. This man was a sorcerer—could she believe anything he said?

  “Please.” He offered his arm again. “Please walk with me. Talk with me awhile before you leave me.” Pleading eyes and a desperate tone squeezed her heart. “You’re the first to ever come here. Let me be near, if only for a moment, one who has stood in the light.”

  How could she refuse? Gwen nodded, and several of the girls muttered that surely it wouldn’t hurt to look around a bit; the exit must be in that direction, anyway, so they might as well follow him.

  Only Ivy whispered, as soft as a sigh, “I don’t trust him.”

  Lily took Prince Tharius’s arm, and he led her off the main path. The amber light grew smaller. A silver glow bathed the flowers, and Lily’s brow furrowed to think that sorcery had created such twisted beauty.

  They passed topiaries with leaves of moldy jade trimmed into mangled geometric shapes, feathery tulips of coal-edged plum, and roses of blackberry, indigo, and grizzled sage, the colors somehow vibrant and dark at the same time. Pale baby’s breath and moonflowers offered contrast to the deep hues. Near the edge of the pathway huddled clusters of pitch-black mushrooms with cracks that oozed an orange glow, like the lava fields described by Travelers from the north. Many of these plants shouldn’t be blooming at the same time, and some of them were poisonous.

  The girls’ whispers blended with the fall of slippers on the smooth stones.

  “I’ve never seen anything like this.” She shook her head. “Did you plant these?”

  “Mmm?” His gaze shifted from her to the garden, as if just noticing their surroundings. “No. I had nothing to do with this . . .” He frowned.

  She waited. When he didn’t continue, she took a guess. “It was created by the sorcerer who imprisoned your parents.”

  “And my grandfather. Yes.” He plucked an orange. “The flowers, the trees . . . they take their own forms.” He handed her the fruit. “They follow the rules set up the sorcerer.” He said the word with distaste.

  “Are we truly the only people to come here?” She studied the orange and the delicate dewdrops glistening on its surface. It looked harmless, but she would never risk eating it. She passed it to Hazel for the girls to see.

  Prince Tharius turned down another path, taking them farther from the golden light. The starless expanse overhead bled into a horizon defined only by the dull stones confining the garden. He took his time answering. She flinched when a drop of water fell onto her shoulder from an unseen source, the icy bead trailing down her back. No birds twittered, no dragons flapped, no bees buzzed. Not even a breeze stirred the leaves.

  Finally, he placed his hand over hers, where it rested on his arm. “My parents gave in
to this place while I was young, leaving Grandfather to teach me what he knew. He tried, we both did when I was strong enough, to break out of this tomb.” He squeezed her fingers gently. “I have only recently succeeded in weakening the barrier enough to allow entry from above. And you came.”

  “It couldn’t have been easy, being alone all these years.”

  They turned a corner, and the golden glow appeared ahead, closer and brighter. Down a short path, past silver-green grasses, the source of the light appeared. Hundreds of candles, each encircled within spindly iron bands, like a spider embracing a flame, hung suspended in enormous oaks arranged around a circular clearing twice the size of the palace ballroom. The treetops disappeared into the sky, forming a dense roof over the dirt floor, which shone like polished wood, reflecting the candles. Not one drop of wax marred the surface.

  She stopped, and the girls rustled and sighed as they took in the sight. When she saw what moved in the shadows of the oaks, her hand dropped from Prince Tharius’s arm.

  He grinned, amused. “Oh, I’m not alone.”

  Dozens of young men and women, wearing garments as dark and rich as those of the princesses, glittered under the trees in silent clusters, their ivory features eerily similar. A few groups of older men with hair as pale as the faces of the young dancers milled about. The gentlemen noticed the newcomers first, an intense curiosity in their eyes and an eagerness in their stances.

  Lily clenched her fists at her sides and then dried her hands in the folds of her gown.

  “My court.” Prince Tharius indicated the men.

  “Your court,” she echoed. They had been here as long as he had. “And the others?” The pale dancers had not acknowledged their presence.

  “Grandfather called them the shadow-people.”

  “I’m not sure I understand.”

  “They are creations of the sorcerer, put here to care for the place and amuse its inhabitants.”

  “So, they’re . . . illusions?”

  “Precisely.”

  “Like the fountains,” Neylan said. They had passed a few on their tour. “I can’t hear them, and I can’t smell some of the flowers.”

  He studied the flowers and leaves Neylan had tucked into her braids, even a black feather from her dress.