by EF Joyce
II
Elixa curled on her sofa by the crackling fire, lulled by its warmth and the sound of the rain beating on the windows, the wind whistling through the cracks in the stone. Since her father's return, everything had been simpler. He'd unlocked her tower, restored her servants and killed Mills before she'd had the chance. The same day he'd taken back the palace, he'd sent heralds running to every province to declare his glorious return to power. The riots and religious uprising had ceased almost immediately, though clusters of people in outlying regions still used the chaos as an excuse to loot and destroy.
Perhaps the world would not be so horrible when Alaric took over. Mind control seemed a terrible price, but peace would come with it. No wars when everyone was told what to think, when all their minds belonged to one man. No murder, no riots, no tragedy. Just life; controlled but safe. Elixa wasn't sure she believed that, but what else could she do? Alaric held all the cards. She could either try to find a place in his new world or she could die in a useless fight. Would he let her keep her thoughts if she went along with him? Did they have a chance if she warned her father of Anaka's betrayal?
Her sitting room door whipped open and her father stomped in, irritable as usual. "I've drawn up a contract with Faifax Hale. I gave him the Duzan Plains and the Yabani Expanse for his people to relocate. He has offered his city to us as a province of Yeraz in return." All the technology left in the world, under their control? Sounded like false promises.
"Seems like we are getting a lot for very little. Do you trust him?" she looked at her father, his black eyes focused on the fire.
"He is desperate. He became a king through murder, rebellion and upheaval. If he cannot keep his promises he won't keep his crown, or his life, for long. I don't know him enough to trust him, but I can trust his motives."
"How long until the weapons can get here?" she pressed.
"Not long. A few days, maybe. A week."
"Alright. Give him whatever he asks for." He nodded.
"The weapons will help, but our men have no training. No expertise. We cannot win with Hale's deal alone. We need your magic, Elixa. We have little time before Eide's armies arrive." The truth would have to come out, sooner rather than later. Her empire would lose this war if her father did not have time to prepare, if he did not know the truth. Every second she delayed, more innocent died.
"His troops are advancing daily, unhindered by the enormous gift of magic I have given you," he added, no longer enraged or cold, but desperate. Pleading. He cared for the empire as much as she did. Her people. Her world. I love you Anaka, but not more than my empire. Not more than the thousands of lives that are taken each day I continue to carry your secret with me. I wish I could tell you how sorry I am, but this was your own doing.
"I'm not refusing to dream of Dalga. Alaric is blocking my magic."
"And I've told you, he cannot block you that thoroughly!" Elixa stared at the floor. The carpet really was beautiful, intricately woven with blue, violet and silver. Soft as sand on a southern beach or the petals of a southern flower. When she'd first moved here as a child queen, she'd lay on this carpet, stretched out in front of the dying embers of night, listening to her papa's stories. The sofa cushions bent in with her father's weight as he sat down. "What aren't you telling me?" he asked, his voice hushed as a secret.
"If I tell you, will you promise me something?" she whispered, tears burning in her eyes. Finding out her closest friend had utterly betrayed her had been heartrending. But Sebastian? He hadn't fallen for anyone in three-thousand-years. Telling him his wife had disclosed a secret just as old to his greatest enemy would shatter him. Elixa loved Anaka, but Sebastian loved her more. The greater the love, the farther the fall.
"Elixa..." His black eyes locked on hers, dark and unreadable.
"Promise me." She said, no room for argument.
"What am I promising?" Exasperated but acquiescent.
"That you will spare my little sister." Her voice shook and hot tears streamed down her pale cheeks. Elixa locked her gaze with his and watched him work it out. Watched him realize who had betrayed him and what she had done. She'd expected fury – overturned furniture and streams of curses. She'd expected tears – the uncontrollable sobbing of a man undone. Instead she got silence and stillness.
"Anaka gave Eide my true name. Which means he has yours now too." He said, as if he were commenting on the rain outside. "How long have you known?"
"Five days. Since you took back the palace with Arzun weapons. I didn't want you to kill your own daughter with her." The queen wiped her eyes on the backs of her hands, unable to see more than blurry images through the curtain of her tears.
"I won't. I promise." He stood and walked out, closing the door with a muted click behind him.
Chapter 37
I
Anaka woke to the hearth crackling with fire and the smells of eggs and beef biscuit. The rain pattered gently outside as the scents of breakfast wafted in from the sitting room, making her mouth water. Stellan entered as if sensing the moment she woke, carrying a silver tray in his hands neatly arranged with food and gras.
"What's all this for?" she asked as he set it gently on her lap. She hadn't seen him last night after he'd gone to talk to Elixa, but she was used to him disappearing, especially lately with Eide marching ever closer.
"You're to have our baby any day now. You should be resting. The least I could do is fetch you breakfast." He said, but his face was lined and serious, his dark eyes locked on the floor.
"What's wrong?" she asked, taking his ice cold hand. The war of course, Anaka. But perhaps something more?
"Nothing...everything." He rubbed his eyes. "We're going to lose this war."
"Don't say that," she argued. "We'll get the weapons -"
"Just eat your breakfast, Annie. I want you and Calixte to be strong." With her appetite and the delicious smells coming from her plate, she didn't need any further encouragement. She devoured the eggs and biscuit and then drained the cup of gras. "That was amazing. Thank you." Stellan did not reply. He took the tray from her lap and set it on the night table, then sat down on the bed facing her.
His black eyes locked on hers, his beautiful face so focused on her, her love for him unending. She loved him for who he was, no matter what kinds of things he'd done in the past. A tiny smile played at her lips and she leaned forward to kiss him...and couldn't move her legs, or even feel them.
"Stellan..." she said, struggling harder to move. The numbness was spreading, up over her waist and abdomen.
"Yes, that's my name. I hope you got a good price for it." No, no, no. That word over and over was all her mind had room for. "Why did you do it, Annie? Why! Tell me while you can still speak!"
"For our daughter!" she sobbed, the numbness crawling up her hands and arms. "To save her!"
"I know that!" he yelled. "But why did you stay with me? Why did you marry me?" The numbness crept over her shoulders and up her neck.
"Because I made a mistake." Over her chin and her cheeks. "Because I love you." Over her lips and nose and eyelids. Anaka lay in the bed like a stone, glassy eyes staring unblinkingly at the white painted ceiling.
"You made a mistake." His jaw tightened, his black eyes locked on her paralyzed form. "Now that Eide has my name, has Elixa's name, there is nothing and no one capable of stopping him. He will cross the provinces of Yeraz with our own armies. He will raze the capitol and take us all for prisoners and slaves, unable to even form the idea of fighting back. You have destroyed the world, and me with it. I hope you're happy." A slender tear dropped down his angular cheek. She watched it fall from her frozen state, a perfect clear droplet that soaked into her black tunic and faded away. Stellan scooped her up in his arms like a child, her unmoving body limp and heavy in his embrace.
"I promised my daughter I would not harm her sister," he explained, his voice stern but shaky. He carried her gently down the long, chilled corridors decorated with frayed tapestries of th
e queens' grandest dreams and up two flights of steps to the topmost floor. "I have a secure room prepared for you, warded with Elixa's magic. You will not be able to dream your way out. Once Calixte is born, you will die." He said nothing more and Anaka could not reply.
Of course she would die. Every tiny step of betrayal against Stellan was one toward her own end. No one would rescue her, and that was alright. She deserved this. Her daughter would live. Elixa had saved her, somehow. The queen had been a better friend than she'd had a right to. She should have told her the truth when she'd had the chance.
Her death would be long, horrible and agonizing. She would probably be tortured by Stellan himself, to take his own pain out on the one who had caused it. Anaka would face it, probably screaming and crying, but not begging. Anaka Elspeth would never beg for anything again.
Stellan hauled her into a comfortable suite of rooms much like her old ones, but with boarded windows. A sitting room furnished with fluffy sofas and a warm hearth, a bedroom with a four-poster bed and clean linens, a private bath. He dumped her on the bed, gave her one last, almost longing gaze, then walked out.
II
Three hours later, the poison had worn off. Anaka slipped into a hot bath, deciding to enjoy her last days to best of her ability. Idiot for falling in love with him. Reckless for daring to betray him. Careless for giving out his name without bothering to think of the consequences. She should be in Dalga now, living out a quiet life on a sparsely populated shore with Ronan. Instead she was here, Stellan's prisoner and doomed to die a horrible death. All her own fault.
So many times she'd been given the opportunity to walk away from this. She'd known from the start just what kind of man he was. She couldn't help but remember when Elixa had asked her to spy on him. Anaka had been shocked, intrigued and flattered the great Ilahi would be interested in a Wakati girl like her, if only because she'd been coldhearted enough to slaughter her own village. If she had told Elixa the truth that night, none of this would have happened. Stellan would have never been interested in her. She would have been just another Handmaiden that he'd take to bed once, make a queen and never look back. She should have been.
I would tell you the truth now, Stellan. Your love for me is all based on a lie.
The black waves had lapped the shadowy shore in a rhythmic melody. Anaka had crouched low between the heavy ferns and the sea, the moonlight hidden behind a thick cloud, the stars glittering over her like spying eyes. A guard walked by, his footsteps nearly silent over the fine sand. Ten minutes since he'd last passed. Peering over the leaves, she'd watched him vanish around the corner of the low wooden structure, this island's version of a palace.
A single story building made entirely of wood, the tiled roof ending in pointed corners, a little too large for the structure and held up by intricately painted and carved pillars. All the windows were made of a slightly transparent paper and the doors slid on wooden tracks. The architecture was like nothing she'd ever seen in Yeraz, but she was far from home, on the Wakati Islands, on the very island she'd been born on if her mother was to be believed.
Out of 374 islands, most uninhabited, this one was special, different. They called it Seers' Island, home to a sort of magic that only these people possessed. Anaka had never believed it – neither her nor her mother had had any kind of seeing magic, and because the Wakati were famed for keeping to themselves, their powers were not widely used throughout the rest of the world. Did such magic even exist? So far, that question had yet to be definitively answered.
There had been rumors that other kingdoms had tried to conquer Seers Island before, but they had always seen them coming, predicted their attacks before they happened, and either devastated the enemy armies or fled the island until it became safe to return. Anaka thought it bullshit, even now. Qafali, a kingdom bordering Tibre, Yeraz's main food source, had decided to make war with the young queen. They had evidently hired out the ruler of the island, the master seer, a man who called himself the Oracle. Though no one had much believed the rumors of seers, Qafali had defeated Elixa and her army at every turn, even managing to avoid her magic.
So there she was, seventeen-years-old and newly minted as the Black Hand, here to kill a man who would see her coming years away, if the stories were to be believed. Elixa thought that by using Anaka, another Wakati and native of Seers' Island, the Oracle would be thrown off, unable or unwilling to kill her, maybe unable to see her coming, who knew how it worked? The assassin thought it a doomed mission – if this so called Oracle really could see the future, she would never be able to get at him. If he couldn't, killing him would only determine that Qafali was getting their information elsewhere, perhaps a source within Yeraz itself, and the war would continue.
In the silent darkness, Anaka had slipped through the dense undergrowth, stepping onto the porch just as the moon reemerged from the clouds. She had only killed four men to get here – two at the docks of the island next door, where she had commandeered a boat, and two at these docks when she'd arrived. She'd hidden their bodies in the bushes and no one had been the wiser. Her spine tingled with a creeping suspicion as she slid open an unlocked door and stepped into a dark, empty room. Too easy, all of it.
There should have been more guards, more alarms, something. It was as if he'd wanted her to come here. But of course, if the Oracle was truly some master seer, he'd already know, he'd be ready. She had come to her death, but she would face it – for Elixa, for Yeraz, killing him in the process. The young assassin refused to believe she would die a meaningless death, that she would fail in her first solo mission for the empire. Anaka crept down the hallway and eased open the carved door at the end, the only one with a thin line of light at the bottom.
A man was inside, waiting for her. Seated on a mat in the center of the room, he looked up as she entered. Maybe forty, his tan skin smooth and free of wrinkles, he was much younger than she'd expected. For some reason, she'd been imagining a wizened old man with a white beard. The assassin stiffened as he scrutinized her, knowing that whatever happened next would be only what he allowed to happen. She could sense the power in him, somehow, even though she had none of her own, and felt rooted to the floor.
"Do you know why your mother hates you, Anaka?" was the first thing he said. She glared at him, only her slanted eyes visible between her black hood and mask, caught off guard by the unexpected turn. "No arguments? No claims that I'm wrong, that your mother really did love you?" Anaka pulled down her face mask and answered him.
"Wakati law forbids pregnancy outside of marriage. She was exiled because of me." The man chuckled at her, as if she were a simple child. Anaka glared again. Why waste her breath amusing this seer? She would be dead in minutes, but not without a fight. Let them both die this night.
"Is that what she told you? Oh no, we are not nearly so strict here. Your mother's heritage is here, on this island. Her family is a long line of seers dating back through time immemorial – her extended family, siblings, friends, parents, all of them lived here. I've seen your life, Anaka. Azan turned into a bitter woman, blackened by hatred. That's my fault. You see, I'm your father."
"Lies," she spat at him, though the second he said it, she saw the similarities between them; the same flat nose, same fine jaw, same full lips. The truth. She'd never looked like her mother. Why tell her this now? Did he wait until this moment to reveal the truth, knowing years in advance that she would come to kill him, hoping a family tie would save his life? If so, he didn't know her.
"Your mother was deeply in love with another man," he continued, as if she hadn't said anything. "But all seers serve the greater good through the Oracle. I've seen the future, Anaka, farther than any seer before has seen. I've watched the world end, a hundred-thousand different ways. There is but one chance to save it, one slim, shadow of a hope. It's a long and convoluted path, and many things will likely go wrong, but I have to try.
"Your mother had to give up her life here, to have my child, you, and bring you
out into the world. This is the only way. Your mother was a seer, even if you never saw her power. She had to end her life, give up her love and her family and go out into the unknown, foreign world, because I told her so, and because she knew that I was right. She too saw the end."
"Saving the world? Stop playing with me. You're working for Qafali against Yeraz. I came to end your life at my queen's orders. You will use your powers to anticipate my moves and kill me, but I will take you with me. That's all there is," she said, daring him to prove her wrong. What could he possibly say to convince her? Would anything? She'd always had support on her other missions, soldiers standing by to help her in a pinch. Now she found herself more than a thousand miles from home with no one to rely on. She could not fail.
"No, not nearly all there is. The future is uncertain, and can be changed at any second by a single choice. I have done the best I can to direct the flow of events, but even this is far beyond me. Unless everything goes exactly right, the world will end, in fire and ash and death. There is only one chance to save it, and only one person who can."
Anaka stared at him, unmoved. This man was insane. But then how had he known about her mother? Well, he'd grown up with her, but there was no proof what he said was true. He looked like her, sure enough, but did that really confirm his paternity? Why try to dissect his words? She needed to find a way to end his life, now.
"You speak of the world ending, of heroes and prophecies like a children's tale. I am here to kill you, not listen to your nonsense. Am I really to believe that I'm some hero, destined to save the world? I'm an assassin."
"I think you're already aware that you're no hero. I will not try to convince you otherwise. You are not the one I speak of, but your choices are important. They will influence the world, the choices of others. Your decisions could bring about the end, or stop it. And there are no such things as prophecies, only actions and consequences. As a seer I can watch the future, the choices people make and the result of them. But I cannot force someone to make one decision over another and I cannot see which future is the one that will occur. I see only possibilities."