by S. M. Boyce
Four lines of Kirelms walked from behind the very stairs where the Hillsidians had disappeared. As they spread out across the floor, Twin bowed to them and left. The singers now had the room’s full attention.
Each Kirelm snapped their wings open in the quiet hall and took off at a different time, heading for the otherwise inaccessible rafters. As they flew, a low hum began. It resonated in the hall’s acoustics, brewing as they flew. The sound blended with the beating of their wings, growing stronger the longer it lasted, until the first landed on a walkway high in the rafters. The humming split apart into lyrics Kara didn’t understand as the Kirelms sang a sweet tune, its somber lines dipping in the perfect blend of the singers’ harmonies.
Kara settled back in her chair, hunger forgotten. Even Flick set his paws on the table to get a better look.
At an unseen cue, the somber melody broke into a racing thrum. The song had no instruments, yet some of the singers managed to create a deep bass rhythm that held the troupe together like a drum line. The song raced away, a vocal epic that kept Kara on the edge of her seat.
The song built, growing in power until Kara leaned forward, waiting for the end but not ever wanting it to finish. Goose bumps raced across her arms. The vocalists held the last note, a cliffhanger, even as the room erupted into applause.
“That was beautiful!” she said to whoever would listen.
“Wait until you see what’s next,” someone said beside her.
She turned to see the Lossian prince sitting in the seat next to her. He had been so quiet throughout the speeches that she hadn’t even looked over to realize he’d been in the seat next to her. Come to think of it, she’d never actually heard him speak before.
“Is Losse performing next, by chance?” she asked with a grin.
He smiled. “Perhaps.”
One of the Kirelm singers flew toward the head table and hovered in the air as he came near.
“Next come the Lossian dancers, who pride themselves on performances that perfectly balance art and war,” the singer said. He bowed to the table and flew off into the now-empty rafters. Kara wondered where the other singers had gone.
A mist rolled out into the crowd from nowhere in particular, weaving through the guests’ feet as it consumed the floor. The fog swirled in the room’s center, growing thicker. A Lossian woman appeared from the mist, even though there was no way for her to have even crawled through the thin fog without being seen.
The Lossian performer stood on one leg and rested the other on her knee. She held a sword just in front of her face, eyes closed, and did not move. The room settled in to watch.
A harp played, though Kara couldn’t see it. Its gentle notes hovered over the mist. In response, the Lossian dancer waved her sword in small arcs, her arm the only part of her body that moved. Wherever her sword pointed, another Lossian appeared, already mimicking her movements as they rose from the mist. In a matter of minutes, perfectly spaced Lossians covered the floor.
“How are they doing that?” Kara asked, leaning toward the Lossian prince.
He grinned. “There are some water techniques we will never share, even with you.”
So it was a water technique—used for war, no doubt. She wondered if the Lossians were maybe moving through the mist somehow, or changing form to remain unseen. She shook her head and turned back to the performance. She would have to figure it out later.
A drum joined the harp’s chorus in a combination Kara would have otherwise thought to be, well, strange. But as the two instruments blended together, the Lossians spun their swords and moved in unison, always with a gentle grace that rivaled even Twin’s dancing. The drum sped up, pulling the dancers along with it until they were jumping and flipping across the dance floor as one.
The drum slowed, its notes fading away until only the harp remained. The dancers, in turn, slowed as well until they stopped altogether. Just as the original dancer had summoned them, she now dismissed them. They sank into the mist one-by-one until she was alone on the dance floor. She paused in the same position she had assumed at the dance’s start and bowed once the harp notes faded away with a mournful twang.
The room applauded yet again.
The dancer bowed once more. “My friends, please welcome Ayavel’s seers for our final performance.”
She dissolved into the fog as it faded away. Two lines of Ayavelians entered, breaking up the mist as they strode through it. They each carried a glass vase with a lid. Inside, a blue orb glowed in its clear prison, its light twisting around with no defined edge.
The Ayavelians bowed to the head table and lifted the lids from their vases. The orbs flew out, each spinning around the others until they became a floating blur that rose into the rafters. The blur of light darkened the higher they went, turning black as they spun faster and faster.
A boom echoed through the hall as the spinning orbs collided near the ceiling. Darkness spread from the ceiling like dripping paint on a globe—it encircled the room until the last light faded.
Kara held onto her armrest. She didn’t like darkness, not complete darkness like this. Gavin’s hand found hers, but she brushed it away. She had Flick. She would be fine.
A brilliant white light erupted in the room’s center, blinding her. It took a few moments to blink away the sudden brilliance, but Kara gasped when she did.
An Ayavelian man held the light in his hands. It gleamed through his fingers, casting shadows across his face and across the audience members nearest to him. He slowly pried apart his hands, letting the light float above his palm, and lifted it for all to see. It hovered and swayed to a silent beat. Its tendrils blew away as it moved, dissolving into the air. The man held a ball of pure energy that pulsated with life—Kara didn’t know what else it could be.
More lights erupted around him, each in the palm of an Ayavelian seer. They raised their hands, offering their lights for the audience to see. At once, they released the balls of light, which continued to hover as their masters faded away into the darkness.
The lights pulsated, each burning brighter the longer Kara stared. They swayed in unison. A humming erupted from them, harmonized into different notes that made Kara’s hair stand on end. The sound was at once chaotic and beautiful.
Red light splintered away from some of the wisps, followed closely by blue and yellow. Green light pulled away from others—and purple, and pink, and orange, until ribbons of colored light littered the room. The trails of color spun and wove around the audience as gasps and laughter rippled through the assembled yakona.
A purple trail of light made its way to Kara and slipped through her fingers. It wrapped around her hand, making her skin prickle and tingle. It settled against her palm and hummed, the sound vibrating in her chest. Warmth spread through her—peace. Tension faded from her neck, and her spine straightened on its own, stretching taller than she had ever thought it could.
The light healed her, even when she thought herself to be perfectly healthy.
A smile spread across her face, and she looked down the table. All the Bloods and their families smiled, each marveling at the lights coiled around their hands or arms. Even Braeden looked down at his—a wisp of pure white.
Flick chirped. The light slid off of Kara’s arm and wrapped around his paw. He giggled, and Kara scratched his head.
Her purple light began to fade. She looked around—everyone’s lights were fading. The balls of white light dimmed in the room’s center until they, too, faded. The humming continued even as the darkness around them pulled away, the room’s natural candlelight returning. The humming didn’t stop until the room returned completely.
Applause rippled through the crowd, but the Ayavelians smiled and offered only one modest bow before they left one-by-one in a slow procession. Kara blinked herself awake, lulled as she was into the happy peace the wisp had given her.
Gavin stood beside her and addressed the still-applauding diners. “Eat, my friends and allies! Enjoy yourselves tonight,
for it is the first night of a new era!”
The hall erupted into even louder applause at the thought of food. Waiters from every kingdom brought out plates full of meats, breads, cheeses, fruit—the menu seemed endless. Roasts followed plates of vegetables, and servers set out more types of bread than Kara had ever seen in her life.
Flick peeked over the edge of the table as a waiter put an array of cheeses on Kara’s plate. The little creature nabbed a slice and dragged it into her lap, where he remained while she slid him bits of bread and sliced apples.
She glanced around the table at the Bloods as they ate. The boxes in front of each setting went largely unnoticed. She wondered if there would be another large announcement when they started to open their gifts. She hoped not. It would be like a televised Christmas, where each person opened all of their gifts at once and everyone else had to wait patiently before they could get to theirs.
Kara caught sight of Braeden again as Gavin leaned back to speak with an attendant. The Stelian stared at her little box at his place setting, eating slowly and without much interest in the food. She rolled a piece of her bread into a small ball and threw it at him. In reflex, he caught it before it hit him.
She rolled her eyes. Of course he caught it. He looked at her, confused. She grinned.
“Open it,” she mouthed, pointing to his gift.
He smiled and pulled the box toward him. He opened the lid and raised his eyebrows at what was inside, but beamed when he pulled out the wrist guards Kara had found for him in the Vagabond’s vault. He rubbed his thumb over the silver clover symbol embossed in the center of one of them.
“Thank you,” he mouthed back.
She nodded. Even if she couldn’t turn him, she wanted him to know he was still a vagabond to her.
Gavin returned to block the space between them and turned toward Braeden. “You’ve started opening presents already? Well, I don’t want to fall behind. Bloods, let’s ignore tradition in the light of the festivities and open our gifts as well!”
Oops. So she had broken a tradition after all.
A few boxes crowded the space in front of Kara, and she moved aside her plate to bring each forward. One box was a shell fastened shut and attached with a hinge in the back, and she could only assume it came from Losse. She opened it with that in mind.
A large, opalescent pearl sat on a blue pillow nestled within the shell. Unable to quell the rising memory of her near escape, she cocked her head to the left. The prince glanced over and smirked as he raised his glass to her, but she couldn’t see his parents from this angle. She forced a smile and squirmed.
The prince leaned in. “There’s a note under the pillow.”
Kara resisted the impulse to sigh and peeked beneath the pearl. Sure enough, a folded piece of parchment separated the pillow from the polished shell case. Kara pulled it gently from beneath the pearl and read it.
We acted while thinking of your safety. We did not mean to offend, as we obviously have, and hope you find it in your heart to forgive us. We do not want you as an enemy.
“Thanks,” she said, feigning a smile to the Lossian prince.
“You are welcome,” he said.
When he turned back to his dinner and ignored his own presents, Kara reached for the solid silver box she guessed contained Kirelm’s gift. Black silk lined the box’s interior, and a note covered the gift inside.
May this remind you, Vagabond, that your way is not the only path, nor is it the only option for those around you unless they decide such for themselves.
Kara peered past the note to see a silver pendant lying on the black satin pillow. The necklace twisted and arched in an abstract interpretation of what she assumed was a sun. She turned to Aurora, who wore the same necklace around her own neck. The Heir smiled and bowed in her seat. Kara nodded back, but snapped the box quickly closed.
She reached for an elegant box with four silver feet that, she assumed, had come from Aislynn. Inside was a single brown seed about the size of an acorn. Kara frowned as she tried to figure it out.
Did Aislynn give me a cherry pit or something?
“Do you know what that is?” someone asked.
Kara turned around to see Aislynn standing behind her with a warm smile on her face.
“I’m afraid I don’t,” Kara answered with a laugh.
“That is a seed for a sanguini tree. When planted with a drop of your blood, a sanguini seed will grow as your family grows. As members are added, a bloom will appear on the tree. As they die, it will wilt and fall off. The tree will only die when your entire lineage also perishes.
“This is the only seed I have ever seen, and I wanted you to have it. I honestly don’t know if it will work for you, considering that you have no blood loyalty, but I hope you take it as a token of my appreciation for all you have done.”
“Aislynn, I couldn’t…” Kara trailed off, her voice faltering at the thought of even holding something so rare, much less owning it.
“You may not refuse a gift from a Blood in a formal setting such as this,” Aislynn said with a wink.
The queen walked back to her seat and sat beside Evelyn, who glared into the box Kara had left for the princess. Kara couldn’t imagine what the girl found insulting about the simple silver drop pendant inside.
Kara turned back to her pile of presents. A large, familiar black box that could only be from Gavin hid behind the rest. She didn’t bother opening it because she already knew what was inside.
She leaned over and caught Gavin’s eye. He smiled, but all Kara wanted to do was smack him.
“Are you trying to insult me?” she asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Take this tiara away. I already told you the only thing you can give me. How did you even get it? I buried it at the bottom of my dresser.”
Gavin sighed. “I know. I had a servant find it and bring it back to me. As Aislynn said, you cannot refuse a present formally given to you by a Blood tonight. However, you don’t have to wear it. I would never insult you, Vagabond.”
The king bowed his head low, his voice tense and quiet. They avoided eye contact for the remainder of dinner.
The chatter grew louder as everyone finished their meals. Servants asked some of the yakona in the audience to stand. As they did, the waiters set their hands on the tables in unison. At their touch, the tables, linens, and dirty dishes dissolved into thin air.
Instead of a blank dance floor like Kara expected, someone had painted the Grimoire symbol onto the stone tiles. In each of the four circles of the symbol’s clover, the artist had drawn a familiar castle. In the top right crest, Kara noticed a floating city of spires between spaces in perfectly shaded clouds. At the top left, bridges connected five trees painted in rich browns and greens. On the bottom left, a golden dome encircled a towering castle carved from coral and shells. And in the bottom right, a white castle with golden windows filled every inch of available space in the mural.
The musicians returned to their platform and began strumming a chord before they dove into a smooth waltz. Even as the music swelled, though, the floor remained clear of dancers. Kara fidgeted in her seat, ready to stand and get the dancing over with. Flick climbed up onto her shoulder.
“May I have the honor of the first dance?” a voice asked from behind her.
She turned to see Braeden standing behind Gavin, his boot against the chair’s foot as if to keep the king from scooting back. Braeden smirked and offered her his hand without looking at the king—something Kara avoided as well.
She grinned and stood. “I’d be delighted.”
She walked around the table with Braeden, biting the inside of her cheek to keep herself from laughing as Gavin mumbled muffled curses. She turned in time to see him stand and bow to Evelyn.
Braeden spun Kara and pulled her in close, leaving her with no choice but to look up at him. He smiled and set his hand on her waist. Kara focused on her breathing instead of the fact that her skin tingled at h
is touch even from under her dress.
“We’ll make it up together, right?” she asked him in a whisper.
“Right.”
He pushed against her waist, leading her in a circle, and twirled her around the floor. It took all of two minutes for her to realize Braeden had lied. From the way he led her movement, he knew full well how to dance.
Kara cleared her mind, trying not to question the subtle pull on her waist as he directed her in their next swirl or dip. Even when she pulled in reflex against him, tripping on her own feet, he somehow pulled just hard enough to keep her from falling. His grip held her, always certain of the next step, and it wasn’t long before she smiled like an idiot in front of hundreds of yakona.
On her shoulder, Flick swayed to the music and twitched his tail to match Braeden’s motion. The little creature grinned and chirped, his stomach no doubt full and the rest of him therefore also happy. Judging by Flick’s movement, Kara was pretty sure her pet had more rhythm than she did.
The song ended and a faster one began. Dozens of yakona in the crowd now grabbed their friends and lovers and took over the gaps in the floor, having respectfully watched their Bloods dance the first song. This new song had a faster tempo, and now Braeden led her in smaller circles at a quicker pace. Despite herself, she laughed as they spun. Flick’s tiny claws dug into her shoulder as he held on, giggling harder than ever.
The party guests spun around the dance floor, all laughing and joking. Though all couples she came across were of the same race, at least they were near each other. It was a start.
“I’m impressed, Braeden. Look at everyone! No one’s trying to kill each other,” she said with a laugh.
She glanced to Braeden’s face, only to realize he’d already been watching her. He smiled, carefree, and leaned in to whisper. The music hid his words from prying ears.
“I hear there’s a garden hidden on an enclave farther up the mountain,” he said.
She shook her head and laughed. “I heard about it, too.”