by Callie Bates
My mother doesn’t join the men, either. “Your father manages to risk his life quite well without my help,” she says when I ask why she stays. Quietly, she adds, “All our lives.”
Instead she talks to me of our past—all the many incidents I’ve forgotten from my childhood, the story of how she and Father met when she came to Laon at the age of twenty-two to perform on the pianoforte before the court. Her compositions were widely acclaimed and—even I have heard this part, albeit through gossip—her beauty and graciousness won her many suitors. My father was among them. Being from Baedon, Mother knew nothing of Caeris or the Ereni conquest or Father’s hope for revolution—at least not at first. “How did you choose him?” I ask, for though she doesn’t boast, it’s clear she had several offers.
Her mouth curves in a secretive smile. “He was the one who seemed to really see me. And he talked to me, not at me. He was interested in everything.”
Is that the way Jahan looks at me? As if he really sees me?
We tour the house and grounds; she plays music for me. Sometimes Sophy joins us, quick to smile at me and laugh at Mother’s stories, and soon I find I’ve forgotten my brief resentment of her.
One day when he’s home, Father presents me with a stack of books on Caerisian history. “Much of the knowledge of the land has been lost, except for the secrets the mountain lords keep. You may be able to glean some understanding of the Caveadear’s power from these, though.”
So, when I’m not with Mother and Sophy, I read. It’s easier to lose myself in the conflicts of history than to decide where my own loyalties lie, though the histories contrast so starkly with what I learned in Laon that I cannot forget the divide. The more I read of Caeris’s tripartite government, the more logical it begins to seem, despite the sneers of my childhood tutors. How else is one to keep a single person from holding too much power? Maybe that is what brought Antoine to lie, to value his personal gains before his people. Maybe being answerable to others would make Loyce a more responsible queen. I don’t know, but I wonder.
I read more about Caeris’s last king, Ossian, and his efforts to wake the land—though, frustratingly, the books tell almost nothing of how he used his magic. Perhaps the writers did not know; my father called the Caveadear’s power a mystery. And I cannot help but feel the history is incomplete, especially the explanation of the blood rituals. Dropping my blood to the stone circles does not seem to wake the land; it wakes the stones—or, in some cases, the ancestors within them. There seems no way for me to access the amount of power Ossian possessed, much less guess what he did.
In an effort to find more information about the magic, I give up on the recent histories and wade into the books written before the Ereni invasion. Few survive. Time—and the successive waves of first Paladisan and then Ereni conquest—has destroyed many volumes and censored others. The volumes that remain confirm that most towns in Eren and Caeris were built around stone monuments, which in turn were believed to have been erected by the gods. It seems the stewards of the land used the circles, but in what way, and to what purpose, remains shrouded in vagary. Maybe the historians didn’t dare put their knowledge to paper.
Hugh comes upon me one afternoon while I’m in a state of deep frustration. “This book,” I exclaim, “has been censored! There are pages missing!”
He takes it from me, shaking his head as he leafs through it. “After the Paladisans conquered us, many libraries were purged. People often censored books themselves, removing the text about magic so the witch hunters couldn’t find it. The only complete library is in Dalriada, in the mountains, where the invading armies did not come.”
“Then I should go to Dalriada,” I say.
Hugh looks at me. “If only it were that easy. I’m afraid you’ll have to wait for an invitation; you’ll never find your way there yourself. Now, if you want more information on the stewards, look in the books of legends and folktales. The old writers often hid true things in supposedly harmless stories.” He winks.
But the legends are obtuse. Several times, I read the story of how Wildegarde wedded the land. The people wanted her to marry, so that by having offspring her blood would continue to bless them forever. But instead she went out on the Day of the Dying Year and laid herself down in the earth, and in the morning she went back to her people and said she had married—not a man, but the land itself. “Now I am within the land always,” she said. “I am always with you. Mo cri, mo tire, mo fiel. This is my heart, my land, my blood.”
I start, reading it. It’s the phrase the specters spoke on the Hill of the Imperishable. And, in fact, throughout my reading, the words are often echoed in various stories about the Caveadears. It makes me wonder whether the stewards also wedded the land, in some ceremony similar to Wildegarde’s, for I find references to the Caveadears “uniting with the earth.” But as ever, the writers seem to be deliberately obtuse.
And they don’t tell me how Wildegarde did anything; nor are they at all clear on how Caveadears after her performed their magic.
Perhaps it’s because it isn’t possible to wake the land, and wedding her is simply some arcane ritual justified by Wildegarde’s supposed existence. These are legends, after all. Are we expected to believe they tell the literal truth? It can’t be so, and if this is what the Caerisians expect me to do, they’re setting themselves up for disappointment. Oh, I can make a plant grow quickly—but what good does that do to win a war? How can dropping my blood to the stones defeat the Butcher and Loyce’s army?
We need the black ships. We need Paladis’s might, her resources, her manpower—not my unreliable and forbidden skills.
But I have little else to occupy my time, so I revisit the Valtai Stone, and though it roars for me again, I can discern no meaning from it.
I go alone to the Sentry Rock, the stone circle on top of the ridge. This time, I drop my blood onto each of the stones, finishing at the one in the center. By now the weeping and shrieking is almost deafening.
Then my ancestors step from the stones.
They are spectral, as if only half remembered, dressed in garments whose names are long forgotten. The terrible noise comes from them as well as the stones; I cannot fathom how my mother shaped it into true music. As I watch, the dagger in my hand, my ancestors begin to dance. They dance slowly, as if their feet are heavy, as if grief weighs them down. It is not a dance of joy. Every movement of it signifies mourning.
I watch them dance for a long time. They do not seem to see me. Their movement does not tell me what I need to know about my power, or what I should do about the divide between Eren and Caeris. They don’t tell me what truth, if any, exists in the legends, or whether I can hope to use it.
At last I wipe my blood from the stones and go back down to the house.
—
A FEW EVENINGS later, as we gather before supper, my father announces that he and Finn will be gone for several days. I look up. He has not announced his departures before, and certainly not in such ringing tones.
“Hugh will remain here. He knows what to do should we fail to return,” Father says with an easy smile.
“Fail to return?” I say. “Where are you going?”
He leans forward, putting a finger to his lips conspiratorially. “Across the border. To Eren. We must make a meeting with an important man.” His gaze grows thoughtful. “Perhaps, Elanna, if you were willing…”
My mother’s face darkens. “No, Ruadan! It’s bad enough that you’re sending yourself into such danger. You won’t take my daughter with you.” She’s glaring now, and when I draw a breath to speak, she whirls on me. “No arguments.”
I don’t try to argue. She’s been in a black mood for the last week, shut up in her room composing with single-minded ferocity. Now she thrusts a sheaf of paper at Sophy, who looks, blinking, down at a line of scribbled lyrics. Mother marches to the clavichord and, without counting in the beat, launches into the music. Sophy catches up a moment later, faltering on the words.
/> The song tells of two centuries of Caeris’s grief, of a desperate search for a people’s forgotten glory, of odds almost insurmountable. It reminds us of how the Dromahair family died on the steps of Barrody Castle; how the last king, Ossian, died too, and how all of Caeris’s hope died with him. And it tells us that Eren invaded Caeris in revenge for some slight done to an Ereni princess; it reminds us that, before the conquest, the Caerisians tormented Eren with endless cattle raids and squabbles over the border.
Sophy’s voice shakes on the final line: “For though the land cries for liberty, it demands the cost in blood.”
I swallow. This is why I never liked music. It makes me feel too much. I want to sit on the floor and weep.
Finn grimaces at me.
Afterward, Mother comes up to me and strokes an imaginary hair back from my cheek. She leans close and whispers in my ear, “I wish I could spare you this.”
This: the impending war, being the figurehead in a revolution I can’t believe in. The hope in my father’s eyes when he almost asked if I would come with him into Eren.
I climb the stairs and let myself into my bedroom. I clamber into the embrace of the window seat. A candle burning behind me casts a suggestion of my face onto the glass, and on the other side of the window, the lawns of Cerid Aven are lost to darkness.
“El.”
It’s soft as a whisper, but still it startles me out of my thoughts. I had given up on hearing from Jahan after those first few days of haunting mirrors and tentatively whispering his name. But now, instead of the shape of my face, I see his in the window glass, well lit and intent.
“When we first met,” he says, “you told me you wanted to go to Ida. Do you still want to?”
“I—Do I—Ida?” I stutter to a stop. Do I want to go to Ida? It’s a solution to my dilemma, a way out of the conflict within myself. In Ida, I would be neither Ereni nor Caerisian; I would just be a foreigner. No one would demand that I do the impossible and wake the earth. No one would accuse me of witchcraft and regicide.
I see again the Ereni soldier in the woods, the stark terror on his face as Alistar pointed the gun at his head. I see my father, standing between me and the Butcher, between me and the gun. I see the shards of glass on the carpet, feel the weight of the pistol against my own head.
Jahan is watching me, his eyes bright. A wave of heat sweeps through me. “Would you go, too?” I ask.
He smiles. “Yes. We would go together. I need to make a case before the emperor—so that he’ll provide us with the black ships, munitions, aid. And what better way than to bring you with me?”
“But…” My father needs me here. And there is the terror of exposing my magic before the imperial court.
Jahan seems to read the concerns from my mind. “We all know we need the emperor’s support to win this rebellion. He’s reluctant because he only has Euan Dromahair to speak in Caeris’s favor, and, between you and me, Euan is about as dashing as a lamppost. But if a charming Caerisian lady came to plead for her people’s freedom? You could stir everyone’s hearts to sympathy for Caeris, not just the emperor’s.” He leans forward with an eager smile. “They would love your accent, and your botanical studies, and your wit, and…well, everything about you.”
Heat floods into my face. Jahan Korakides thinks I could charm the emperor of Paladis?
“Of course you’re worried they’ll discover your secret,” he adds quickly. “But as I know all too well, the best way to hide your gift is in plain sight. And if the court likes you, they won’t believe you capable of such a heinous crime as sorcery. You’ll be the darling of Ida—everyone will want to be your friend.” Somewhat self-consciously, he adds, “How could they not?”
I realize I’m staring at him—at the brightness in his eyes, and the way he ducked his chin a little after he said that.
He glances up and flashes a smile. “And if you’re popular with the court, that only increases our chances of succeeding. We might find funding and supporters beyond the emperor himself.” He’s all business now, but then he adds, softly, as if he’s offering me a secret, “Also, during the great witch hunts, not all works on magic were destroyed. Some still exist, in the university archives in Ida. There are some that pertain to Caeris, and the magic of the Caveadear.”
My heart leaps. Ida—the city I have always wanted to visit, and the answers I seek for these preposterous feats of magic. A vision flashes through my mind of myself on Jahan Korakides’s arm, being presented to the emperor. But I have to be rational; this journey could be very dangerous. What Jahan proposes is a daring scheme—hoodwinking the imperial court. If it worked, though…
“I don’t know,” I say. “I—I’ll have to present the plan to my father.”
Even without asking him, I know he’ll view it as a betrayal. The Caveadear belongs in Caeris, the figurehead of the revolution and our nation. But a figurehead cannot win a war—unless, unimaginably, I managed a magic as great as Wildegarde’s. No, it’s not possible. To win a war, you need manpower and resources we don’t have. And my father has almost as great a daring streak as Jahan. Maybe he’ll like the audacity of the plan.
“Think on it,” Jahan says with a grin. “You’re coming with them tomorrow, yes? I’ll be there, of course, for the negotiations. If you and Ruadan agree on the plan, you can join me. We’ll make straight for the port after we put the terms in writing.”
So that’s why my father is courting danger by crossing the border into Eren. He needs to meet with the Paladisan ambassador, to negotiate an agreement between himself and the emperor. Between an independent Caeris and the empire. It’s the agreement Finn failed to achieve before coming here, so now my father is forced to do it himself, despite the danger.
They want me to come so that I can add my name to the agreement. And so I can protect them on the way there, with my magic.
And, though earlier I thought Father’s intent to go south was pure madness, now I find I want to say yes so badly. It’s not just because Jahan’s scheme thrills me, or because I want to see Ida and the imperial court. No, I want to look into Jahan’s eyes, in person. I’m struck with a sudden, visceral memory of how he smells: of cloves and cinnamon.
Jahan glances over his shoulder. “I have to go. See you tomorrow.” His eyes meet mine in the glass with a sudden intensity. He presses one hand against the pane, and I raise mine to mirror it. Our fingertips touch—it almost seems I feel the fleeting warmth of his skin against mine, a bright, electrical pulse. I lean forward, unsure what I’m going to say, but sure I need to say something.
Only he’s gone. The silhouette in the glass just shows the outline of my own tangled hair. My shoulders sag. I feel a little foolish; I don’t know what I thought he might say.
Do I want to stay here, or do I want to go? Wield my magic or hide it? Fight openly in Caeris, or through deception in Ida?
The questions jumble against each other, and I have no answer. I don’t know what’s best. I do know that, though the land speaks to me, I can’t bear to see Ereni die. I would give anything to delay this war.
And I don’t have to come back.
The thought strikes me like a physical blow. I could stay in Ida. I could avoid this war; I could avoid choosing between Caeris and Eren.
My father doesn’t need me—he wants a figurehead for his rebellion. And the powers conferred upon Caveadears in myth can’t be achievable, not for a real person; my own power is so much smaller. It’s the emperor’s support that will win this rebellion, not a figure out of legends. It’s Paladis my father needs, not me. So I will give him Paladis’s help.
And once the rebellion is won, I could give myself a life in Ida, studying botany with Markarades. I could live the life I’ve dreamed of, visiting salons and theaters, discussing science and discoveries with the most brilliant minds in the world.
I run my fingers through my hair. Then I walk down the hall to my parents’ chambers and tap on the door. Father answers, raising his brows in surp
rise to see me.
“I want to come tomorrow.” The simple, truthful words feel like a deception, though they shouldn’t. This is for the best; I’m trying to help him. “I’ve just heard from Jahan. He told me his plan. To go to Ida and present our cause before the emperor and the court, in person. He—he’s asked me to come with him.”
Father’s brows rise even higher. “And the advantage of exposing you to the imperial court would be…?”
“It’s not enough for Jahan to make our case alone; the emperor needs to see that Caerisians desire his help, too. Not only Euan Dromahair, but someone from Caeris.”
“And who better than my daughter, young and charming and well spoken?” He gives me a knowing look.
I hope the dim light conceals the blush darkening my ears.
Father is thinking it through, his eyes moving as if reading the book of his ideas. “It’s a bold move, since you stand accused of regicide as well as witchcraft. Jahan—and you—would have to play it just right. But if we sent you with a delegation of Caerisians who made our cause known throughout the court…”
“Jahan will make it popular.”
“Jahan will make you popular,” my father counters. He nods. “I can see the advantages. You would pull their heartstrings; play to sentiment as well as politics. It might indeed be more easily accomplished with your presence. I can’t imagine King Euan stirring many to action.”
“Yes—and we need the empire’s support. I don’t see how we can win without the black ships.”
He folds his arms and looks at me. “I say I see the advantages—and I do. But I also see the danger. You are the steward of the land. If anyone were to discover your power, the witch hunters would seize you. We would lose you, and we’d lose any support we have thus far gained. The emperor will never condone the open use of magic.”
“But I’ve hidden my magic for years in Laon. Jahan says the best way to hide is in the open—and he should know!”