by Amber Argyle
His mother clapped a hand on his arm. “This is why you always win the game of fire. This is why you will win the War of the Queens for me.”
“You vastly overestimate my mother’s affection.” Elice scoffed. She wondered if her mother would feel anything at all when she learned of her daughter’s capture.
Nelay crouched beside Elice and studied her face. “You have your father’s curls and the shape of his eyes,” she said finally. “Your mother will come.” Nelay rose and pivoted, gesturing to the fairies. “Take her to Thanjavar.” The queen’s wings of fire unfurled from her back. “Quickly. Her mother’s spies might already know we have her.”
“How many must die before you stop this?” Elice said as she struggled to keep her eyes open.
Nelay looked down at her. “I didn’t start this war. But I will finish it.” Then hundreds of fairies converged on Elice, blocking out everything else.
Long after midnight, the net carried by a thousand fairies settled Adar on top of the observation tower in the palatial compound of Thanjavar. He scrambled to free himself. Ignoring the cramps in his calves, he headed straight to his apartments on the second floor of the palace. He changed into his fighting clothes—loose, dark robes that tied together with a pleated fabric belt. His shoulder ached as he laced his boots and armed himself with his double-cross baldric and a half dozen knives. Feeling more in control than he had in weeks, he stormed from his rooms, glaring at anyone who dared approach him.
He stalked through the darkness, heading straight for his family’s quarters down another corridor. The Summer Queen’s guards wore a special sun emblem, meaning they were under her control and not that of Idara’s queen, Parisa, who lived on the coast in the capitol city of Mubia.
“I need to speak with the goddess,” Adar told his mother’s guards.
They bowed from the shoulders. “She has gone to Commander Jezzel’s quarters, my prince.”
Adar pivoted without another word. He was halfway to Jezzel’s apartments when he saw the faint blue light of one of his mother’s fires. He slowed his steps and peered down the corridor to find his mother and Jezzel, heads bent together in furtive whispers, the blue nimbus above them casting harsh shadows across their faces. Anyone seeing them for the first time would merely see two girls no more than eighteen years old, whispering palace gossip or lamenting an assignment from one of their teachers. No one would ever guess both women were over forty years old. Or that Nelay had eighteen children. Or that the enormously pregnant Jezzel was days away from being a grandmother.
As the Fairy Queen, his mother had granted immortality to Jezzel and to Adar’s father, Rycus. Every year, each received a single petal from an elice blossom. Only one bloomed per year, producing just three petals. The third was saved for emergencies; Adar had received one himself, after his chariot accident. And the time before that, when he’d been shot in the back by a crossbolt. Since then, he’d never had so much as a sniffle, and he healed remarkably fast.
Now he stepped closer to hear the conversation between his mother and Jezzel.
“You will do as I say,” Nelay said, her tone hard. She held out a single elice petal, white with a burgundy center.
Jezzel crossed her arms over her chest. “I have been your commander for twenty years. I’m tired of war and death and blood. Cinab is now twice my age, and my daughter is older than I am. She will give birth any day. Someday that child will be older than me, as well. And sometime after that, they will all be dead. I don’t want to be young anymore, not if it means being left behind by my family.”
“Adar is older than I am,” Nelay admitted. “But you don’t see me giving up.”
Jezzel huffed. “Can you bear to watch him grow old and die while you remain forever young?”
Nelay glanced away. “I don’t have a choice.”
“But I do. And I’ve made my choice. It’s over, Nelay. We made our gambit and we lost. I won’t take my petal. I’m going to have this baby in whatever peace I can find.”
Adar had never seen Jezzel so despondent, or his mother so desperate.
“You would leave me alone?”
“You’ve never been alone, Nelay. You have Rycus, and he will never leave you.”
Nelay stared at her friend, pleading in her gaze. Seeming to soften a bit, Jezzel murmured, “I’ll still be here. I just won’t be commanding the armies anymore.”
Nelay leaned forward to rest one of her hands over her friend’s. “Just trust me once more. After this it will be over, I promise.”
Jezzel eyed her. “You have another plan, don’t you?”
“I always do. Come with me.”
They turned up the corridor, heading straight for Adar. Before he could duck back out of sight, his mother spotted him and threw a nimbus of light in his direction. He shielded himself from the brightness.
“Adar?” The ball traveled back up the ceiling. Nelay relaxed her grip on her sword and tucked the petal back into her robes.
He squared his shoulders, then stepped into the light and gave his mother a small bow. “I’ve just arrived. Where is Elice being kept?”
“Somewhere safe.” His mother’s eyes narrowed as she studied him.
“I hear you actually went to the Winter Palace,” Jezzel said with a hint of amusement. “What was it like?”
“Cold,” Adar replied.
Jezzel rolled her eyes. “You know what I meant.”
“There isn’t much evidence of the Sundering in the queendom. Not so for Svass. Many people have died.” There. He’d delivered his report. Now on to what he really wanted to know. “Where is Elice?”
“Safe and well cared for. Go get some rest. We plan to meet with the girl tomorrow after the midday meal. You’ll see her then.” Nelay’s gaze locked on Adar’s bare arm and pulled it into the light. She clucked over the new, rough scar from the seal bite.
He tried to quash the flutter of red fire that flared along his arm, but not before it had singed off the hair that had grown in over the last few months. His mother raised a single eyebrow as he pulled his arm back. Adar scowled in frustration. It had been years since he’d lost control like that. “I’d like to see her now,” he said.
His mother shared a questioning look with Jezzel, then asked, “Why?”
Adar floundered for some explanation, some reason that didn’t betray his feelings. But he couldn’t find the words.
“Need I remind you what’s at stake?” Nelay asked. She didn’t need to, but that didn’t stop her. “The Sundering is upon us. The destruction spreads by the day. You have brought me the tool I needed to end the destruction, but that’s all Elice is—a tool.”
“Ilyenna will have to agree to peace now.” It was the reason Adar had gone to the queendom to fetch the Winter Queen’s daughter.
“We’ve already treatied with her, Son. She’s banished Elice. Said we could keep her.”
My fault, Adar thought bitterly. For a moment, all he could do was breathe. So that’s what they were talking about before. Why Jezzel was ready to give up. “We’ll find another way.”
His mother folded her arms in front of her. “The players may be reset, but the game continues.”
Adar clenched his fists behind his back so his mother and Jezzel wouldn’t see. “How do you plan to use Elice now?”
Nelay made a sound low in her throat. “She’s still our most powerful weapon. We just have to find another way to wield her.”
Adar felt his fingernails cutting into his palms. “She’s not a weapon—she’s a woman. There has to be something we could give the Winter Queen to persuade her to make peace.”
Nelay’s head came up. “Do you think I will surrender? Abandon my realm to Ilyenna’s fury as Leto did?” She moved closer, her words hot against Adar’s face. “I will use Elice as I see fit.”
His mother stepped past him without a backward glance. She and Jezzel headed down the corridor and turned toward the curving stairs, the guards following at a respectful dista
nce.
Adar watched them go, his mind spinning with moves and countermoves. He had to know if Elice was safe—he was sick with worry over her. The only other way to do that would be to follow them. But he must be very careful. His mother always had spies, and if they suspected him, she’d know immediately.
To allay that suspicion, Adar created his own blue nimbus of light and held it out to illuminate the way as he trotted past his mother and Jezzel. He headed straight for the kitchens. Eating always threw fairies off, probably because the consumption of food was foreign to them. He grabbed the first edible thing he could find, a handful of figs, and popped them into his mouth one at a time. Then he grabbed a plate and filled it with some of the fruit, cheese, and bread left out by the cooks.
By the time Adar reached the main throne room, his mother and Jezzel were just heading out. He banished his nimbus and trailed behind them. Though he knew his mother’s fairies watched him, he hoped they wouldn’t find his behavior unusual enough to alert their queen to his presence.
Nelay and Jezzel moved into the courtyard. Adar tucked behind a phoenix statue and settled on the palace steps with his plate on his lap, pretending to look over the shadows of the city with its onion domes and empty markets. He ate his figs, a tasteless paste in his mouth, while watching his mother and Jezzel. They slipped into the library tower and disappeared from sight. Adar looked up at the five stories of smooth marble gleaming in the moonlight. There was no possibility of scaling the exterior, and no other path up besides the stairs.
Is Elice in the tower? Calculating the risks and rewards, he considered his options. He hadn’t seen Elice since the night his mother had taken her. He’d spent three days in a net carried by fairies, trying to keep his fire from burning them all to cinders. He had to know Elice was well.
Plate still in hand, Adar crossed the courtyard and stepped past the doors to a round room lit with lamps and filled to the brim with books and tables for the historians. He and his father loved this tower. To Adar’s left, two guards stood beside the stairs, wearing his mother’s blasted sun emblem. He strode toward the stairs without hesitation.
The guards exchanged glances. As they stepped to block him, one of the men said, “Prince Adar, your mother has expressly forbidden your entrance.”
Fire and burning! Adar let the fire lick up first one arm and then another. “To be clear, neither of you can stop me.”
The man on the right, the one who had spoken, opened and closed his hands around his spear. “My prince, please, we—”
“I’m not in a mood to negotiate.” The fire started at the nape of Adar’s neck and flared up his head, but it did not burn his hair or his skin. The flames never burned anything unless he wanted them to.
Again the guards glanced anxiously at each other. “You know we have to tell her,” said the one on the left.
They always did. He pushed the plate of leftovers into one guard’s hands. “Enjoy.”
He pushed past them. At a dozen steps up, he laid down a blanket of fire so the guards couldn’t follow. He tied the connection to summer, ensuring the flames wouldn’t dissipate. Then he jogged up the stairs. He was no longer used to the oppressive heat. The air felt hot and heavy in his lungs, and his robes were soaked with sweat by the time he reached the top of the tower.
Beyond an ornate door was the head historian’s quarters. Adar had been here many times with his father. The old historian, Baleesh, must have been moved to other rooms in the palace. Adar pushed on the door, which swung soundlessly open. Inside was another circular room lined with books. Chairs of dark wood surrounded a large table. The room was divided in half by a bookcase with another door in the center.
Adar strode to the door and push it open slightly. He could just make out Elice lying on her back on a wide bed. She had dark circles under her eyes, and her face seemed unnaturally pale in the candlelight. Beside the bed stood Adar’s mother and Jezzel, their backs to him.
“Yes,” Nelay said in a hushed tone. “I’ll admit she was not what I expected.”
Jezzel chuckled. “You mean because she was supposed to be forty years old, and instead she’s young and beautiful?”
Nelay huffed and sat in a chair beside the bed. Her position gave Adar a clear shot of her face. “Leto must have given the elice blossom to Ilyenna, who in turn gave it to her husband and daughter. It’s why she hasn’t aged.” Obviously tired, Nelay rubbed her face. “The look on Adar’s face when he spoke of this girl . . . he’s grown attached to her.”
Jezzel gave a sharp intake of breath. “You don’t think he has feelings for her?”
Adar cursed himself. That flare of fire on his arm must have given him away.
“He has an unfortunate propensity to”—his mother paused as if searching for the right word—“champion those far beneath himself, so I’m not sure how deep his feelings run. But it won’t be long before we find out.”
His mother had always seen his compassion as a weakness, while Adar considered it a strength.
Frowning, Jezzel dragged a chair close to Nelay’s. “So what’s your plan now?”
Nelay stared at Elice, whose face was serene and beautiful. She looked innocent and fresh as new-fallen snow. “I know Ilyenna too well,” Nelay went on. “If she believes we mean the girl harm, she will come.”
Jezzel gasped. “You mean to torture her?”
Adar clenched his jaw to keep silent. His mother had sworn to him that she would not harm Elice.
“I mean to execute her in three days unless Ilyenna agrees to my terms.”
Adar’s hands itched for his swords, and he nearly bolted into the room. He would not allow this. He would die before he allowed this.
“But that is murder,” Jezzel said in shock.
Nelay went to Elice’s side and brushed the back of her fingers across the princess’s soft cheek. “One small evil done to stop a larger one. The life of this one girl could stop this war, Jezzel.”
“Kill her and you lose any leverage you might have had with her mother,” Jezzel pointed out.
“If Ilyenna won’t agree to peace to save her daughter’s life, Elice is of no value to us.”
Jezzel placed her hands protectively around her belly. “You promised Adar you wouldn’t hurt her. It’s the only reason he agreed to help you in the first place.”
“I don’t have a choice.”
“You always have a choice.” When Nelay didn’t respond, Jezzel pushed herself to her feet. “I won’t be a part of this. And neither can you, Nelay. It will leave a stain on your soul you will never be free of.”
His mother lifted a strand of Elice’s thick black hair and rolled it between her fingers. “You’re assuming I have a soul—that it was not burned away the day the fairies took me.”
There was another long silence before Jezzel spoke. “I won’t stand by and watch you do this.”
“Are you threatening me?” Nelay asked softly.
Jezzel chuckled bitterly. “No, but I will take my family and go.”
Nelay dropped Elice’s hair and turned to her friend. “After all we have faced together, you would leave me over this girl?” The two traded glares. “Go back to your rooms, Jez. We’ll talk about this again tomorrow.”
Adar backed away from the door and silently lifted a chair away from the table. He grabbed an open book, propped his feet up, and, after making sure the book wasn’t upside down, pretended to be reading. His mother and Jezzel came out a moment later. He didn’t acknowledge them, simply kept reading without actually understanding any of the words.
“Adar?” His mother’s voice was low and full of warning.
He held up a finger, as if he couldn’t be bothered to stop reading.
“My guards?” his mother said darkly.
Knowing much depended on his performance, Adar shrugged. “I told them they could stand down or die. They decided to depend on your mercy.”
“So much determination,” Nelay mocked.
He set th
e book down carefully, feigning concern about losing his place, then folded his hands across his middle. “So this is where you’re keeping her. What did you do with Master Baleesh?”
His mother glanced behind Jezzel, into the room where Elice was being held. “I bribed him with books from your father’s personal collection.”
That would do it. The love of Baleesh’s life was books, his children their stories.
Jezzel crossed the room and pulled out a chair, then straddled it to face Adar with her arms crossed over the back of it. “How much did you hear?”
He ignored the question. “Elice is my prisoner, Mother. I have a right to know where she’s being kept.”
Nelay’s gaze hardened. “If you can’t live with this, I’ll take Elice elsewhere. It’s not like you can stop me.”
The same threat Adar had leveled at the guards—and equally as true. A shot of fear pierced him to the core, and he struggled to keep his expression blank. Scrambling for a way to keep Elice safe, he realized he would have to reveal some of his secrets. But his plan might backfire.
Adar pushed from his chair and strode toward the room where Elice lay, his eyes daring his mother to try to stop him. To his relief, she stepped aside. He stopped next to the bed. Elice’s beauty made his breath catch in his throat. She had been bathed and then dressed in a simple, long cotton nightgown. Her curly hair flared on the pillow behind her head. Her breaths sounded deep and even, as if she were merely sleeping.
“When will Tix’s venom wear off?” Adar asked.
“Sometime tomorrow,” his mother said.
He sank to his knees next to Elice and took her hand in both of his. With his thumbs, he traced the veins on the back of her hand. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “If I could drown myself in those dark waters before you ever saw me, I would do it.” But the words were too little and too late. And now he was going to have to keep her safe as she’d kept him safe.