Reign the Earth

by A. C. Gaughen

  “Leave,” I told him, staring at my knees.

  “Shalia,” he said, coming closer.

  “Please,” I said, huddled against the wall, shutting my eyes and wishing it would change what I found when I opened them. “Please leave.”

  I knew he was angry, but I didn’t care. I didn’t look up or move, either, so I suppose that belied my bravery.

  “Go,” Danae said. “You release her brother, and I will take care of her.”

  I jumped when I heard the door shut. I felt her shadow on me and heard her moving nearby, but I didn’t look up until I felt her hand touch my foot.

  She was sitting in front of me on the ground, leaning against the wall in the same way I was, reaching out to me. She sighed when I looked up, then stood, getting one of the damp cloths the ishru had left. She knelt down, touching the cloth to my face, and I winced. It came away bloody, and I stared at it.

  “There’s a cut on your cheek,” she said softly. “And it looks like your mouth was bleeding a little too.”

  She cleaned it, slowly and gently, and I just looked at her, silent.

  “You’re younger than me—did you know that?” she asked. I shook my head a tiny bit. She nodded. “By more than a year. It’s strange. You seem so wise, you know. You’re very self-possessed. Strong. And I thought, when he married you, that the better parts of him would prevail.” She sighed, rocking back.

  “This doesn’t surprise you,” I said.

  “Calix can be very cruel,” she told me, lifting her shoulder and not looking at me. “But he can also be protective, and sweet, and loving, when he’s not so very afraid.”

  My eyes shut as my head throbbed. “Will you really kill Rian?” I asked.

  She put down the cloth, and the pounding pain in my cheek seemed to get worse. “That’s what I do, Shalia. Calix tells me to kill someone, and I do. I don’t stop until they’re dead.”

  Anger made me glare at her. “You have a choice. You don’t have to do what he says. Danae, don’t do what he says,” I told her. “Please.”

  She sighed. “Calix never wanted this for me, you know,” she said. “I just—after my parents died, there were many attempts on us, particularly on me because I was very young and weak then. It got to the point that I was frightened to go places alone. I thought I was being followed. And then someone poisoned us all, and I almost died. I was sent to live in safety, away from court.” She leaned against the wall again, watching me. “And I didn’t want to be helpless. I wanted to be more than a rabbit in a snare.”

  I pressed the cloth to my lip, trying to be calm, trying not to notice the blood building up on the white cloth. “He doesn’t deserve your devotion,” I told her bitterly.

  “He does,” she said. “Maybe he doesn’t deserve yours, but he deserves mine.” She looked away from me. “And I don’t want to know of a day when he doesn’t, because I won’t be welcome here. I won’t be welcome anywhere in the Trifectate,” she told me. “So I have to be useful. But with any luck, Rian’s left the city already.”

  “If Calix accepted you as you are, everyone else would,” I said.

  She gave a dry, sad laugh. “Calix doesn’t mind that I’m a spy, or an assassin, or whatever else I must be to serve the God. But he’ll never forgive finding me kissing another girl when I was thirteen,” she told me, shaking her head. “That’s too much to ask.”

  “He loves you,” I said. “Why would he care who you kiss?”

  Her stare was flat, defiant. “The girl was found below the cliffs the next morning, so I think he cares.” She shrugged, and I could only imagine how painful the memory was for her. “You don’t seem shocked. Is such a thing common in the desert?”

  I pulled the cloth away, dabbing at my cheek again and looking at it. More red, new patterns. “There’s a different ceremony if you choose someone of your own sex. Because you can’t have children of your own, you can choose a clan and travel with them. It’s not common, but it’s not strange.”

  Danae was quiet for many long moments. “In the Trifectate, people like me are meant to be sacrificed to the Three-Faced God. Like the Elementae.”

  I reached forward and took her hand. She squeezed mine tight.

  “Is it throbbing?” she asked, looking at my cheek.

  I nodded. “I can’t stay here, Danae.” Tears pushed up behind my eyes, and the pressure made the pain worse. “I can’t be here.”

  She met my eyes, full of warning. “You can’t leave, Shalia.”

  Pulling my hand from hers, I shook my head. “Please. I have to. I can’t stay here. Not right now. The tour—why can’t I just go to a city now and wave a bit or whatever it is he wishes me to do?”

  “They’ll see the bruise, Shalia. As bad as things are, they’ll be worse if people know that Calix hit you.”

  A shiver racked my body thinking of Kairos’s words. “Will you find Kairos? I don’t believe Calix that they’ll release him.”

  “Yes. But, Shalia, you can’t—”

  “The rebels,” I told her. “He can use me as part of his ridiculous reasoning to tear his people apart. Tell them I was injured by the rebels. But I will leave in the morning.”

  She stood with a sigh. “Well, he’ll agree to that.”

  “I don’t give a damn if he agrees,” I told her. She extended a hand to help me up, but I shook my head.

  She held out her palm for a moment longer, and let it drop. “I know. But, Shalia, if you leave him, if you go to the desert, ‘cruel’ will not begin to describe the things he will do to your people.”

  I shuddered. “Yes, I know.” She walked to the door, and I watched her. “Danae,” I said, and she stopped. “Thank you. For your help, and your honesty. I appreciate both more than you know.”

  She met my gaze. “I trust you, Shalia. And that’s not a simple thing in this court.”

  She left, and I stayed frozen.

  Binding

  I slept curled against the wall. When I woke to the first blush of dawn, I asked the ishru to pack things for me and opened the door. Zeph, Theron, and Kairos all stood there in the same clothes from the day before, looking haggard and tired.

  “Great Skies,” Kai breathed, touching my chin and turning my face a little. I pushed away from him. I hadn’t looked at it yet—I didn’t want to look at it. Zeph and Theron looked mournful, and Zeph opened his mouth, but I held up a hand.

  “You should have slept,” I told them. “We’re leaving as soon as we can.”

  Zeph straightened. “Where?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. Pick a city that my husband wanted me to tour—it doesn’t matter. As long as it isn’t here.”

  “Your guard—”

  “Take whatever men you need. I’m sure you can figure that out quickly.”

  Zeph nodded, and when he turned, I saw Adria standing there, her face pale. “You’re leaving?” she said, and then a second later her eyes fell on my face. “My queen,” she said, her voice soft and urgent. “I heard—I know you didn’t get that bruise on our way home yesterday.”

  My eyes widened. I hadn’t thought of her—the one person who would notice, and know. “Adria—” I started, but I had no idea what else to say.

  Kairos took a step forward, standing between us, his hand on his scimitar’s hilt.

  “I won’t tell,” she said quickly, looking between us. Her eyes met mine, deep with meaning, and she continued. “If you don’t want me to. It’s the sort of thing my father would be very interested in hearing, because of how it might build sentiment against your husband among the vestai. So I won’t tell—unless you want me to.”

  I shook my head. That didn’t seem like a solution. “I don’t know what I want. But I’d prefer if you didn’t tell. You should go, Adria. I don’t think it would be for the best if Calix saw you now.”

  She drew a deep breath and nodded.

  “Shy,” Kairos said, and I turned to him as she walked away.

  Tears filled my eyes as I looked
him over. “You’re all right?” I asked. “They didn’t hurt you?”

  “Not badly.”

  I covered my mouth.

  “Shy, I’m fine. You’re not,” he said. His voice dropped. “If we’re leaving, we should head north. To the desert.”

  I shook my head. “First we leave. Then we’ll discuss what to do next.”

  His mouth folded down, but he nodded. “Very well.”

  The ishru packed in a flurry while I dressed, and from the small room where my clothes were, I heard voices raised. My heart tightened, and I finished dressing, winding a length of purple fabric around my head to make a hood—for as long as I could, I wanted to hide my face, and hide the marks that my husband had put there.

  I opened the door to find my brother leaning casually in the doorframe, facing out, his arms crossed over his chest, standing between me and the rest of the room.

  “Kai?” I whispered.

  “The queen does not wish to—” Zeph was saying, but Calix tried to push past him and Theron.

  “I will cut off your hands if you keep me from my wife,” Calix snarled.

  “Don’t do that,” Kairos murmured, even before I moved around him, fury rising within me.

  “I have had enough of your threats,” I yelled at Calix, standing well behind Zeph and Theron where I could see him without being close to him. Kairos crossed in front of me like a cat, noting the distance, his hands inching near his scimitar. He was wearing the second one now, something desert men usually only did in war. “How dare you fault these men for protecting me when you assaulted me?”

  “Shalia, I need to speak to you without them here,” he told me.

  Shame and anger made my throat thick around my words. “Why?” I asked. “You don’t think they know what you did?”

  “Shalia, you have to see, it’s not my fault. It’s your family, your damn brother, they come between us at every turn!”

  Kairos crossed his arms. “Which brother would that be?” he asked.

  “Both of you,” Calix snarled back at him.

  Kairos smiled. “There are more where we came from, you know. All sorts of brothers getting in your way. Imagine what my littlest sister could do.”

  Calix’s eyes narrowed on him.

  “Is that what you think?” I whispered, trembling. “You believe that my family made you strike me? Made you hate the Elementae, made you gouge the eyes out of that guard, made you—you are cruel, Calix,” I cried. “You’re cruel. My family had nothing to do with that. You would rather demean and maim and … and kill people than truly work for peace.”

  “No?” he asked. “Rian has undermined me at every turn. It was him, you know. Him who stole her from me. He has always sought to steal what’s mine. But you, my wife—I love you despite these things. I love you and our child more than anything, and I was a fool to be blinded by your brother’s treachery. Please don’t go. Please let me make this up to you.”

  I was trembling, but I shook my head.

  “You’re weak, and tired,” he said. “You’re not in any condition to be traveling.”

  “I can’t look at you,” I told him, my voice full of steel and ice. Even the light movement of my cheek burned. “I can’t stay here. I can’t listen to you and these awful things anymore. I can’t keep crying because my face is swollen and sore, and I just want to stop hurting so much, Calix.”

  He didn’t say anything, and I looked to Zeph. “Please,” I said. “We should leave.”

  He nodded once, and he and Theron shifted so Zeph could lead me out and Theron could block Calix.

  “Shalia!” Calix shouted, and I flinched away from him. He looked shocked by this, but Kairos put his arm around me, blocking my view of my husband, and shepherded me out.

  By the time I reached the courtyard, ten guards, my brother, and my belongings were waiting for me. A saddled horse stood, flicking his tail restlessly, and I hesitated as I got close. Usually I didn’t have any problem getting into the saddle, but I felt weak and shaky still; I didn’t think my muscles would hold.

  “Here,” Galen said, appearing from behind me. I jumped, and he glanced at my face and the purple cloth that covered it, but he looked away before he could have truly seen beneath the hood. He knitted his fingers together and held them out.

  My heart beat faster as I watched him, but he didn’t lift his eyes to me, just staring at my foot, which wasn’t moving toward his hand.

  He cleared his throat, and I raised my foot, putting it into his hands.

  I grabbed the saddle and he pushed me up, raising me high and fast so I could mount the horse. “Thank you,” I said, my heart racing.

  He nodded sharply and went toward another horse.

  Kairos saw Calix before I did, and he moved his horse between me and the wide entrance to the castle. Osmost leaped off Kairos’s shoulder to take to the sky, like he was as ready to defend me as my brother was.

  Standing in the archway in his black clothing, Calix looked small and insignificant, like an insect. But I couldn’t help the shiver within me.

  “I will give you two days, wife,” he called. “If you don’t return before that, I will bring you back.”

  “It will take longer,” Galen said, walking toward him, standing at the bottom of the walkway. “We’re going to Trizala.”

  I blinked, looking at him. He was coming with us?

  Calix came slowly down the walkway, and I felt every step closer to me like a growing threat. “Pick another city.”

  “She’ll like Trizala,” Galen said. “We’ll be back in three days at the earliest.”

  Calix glared at his brother. “Fine.”

  “Oh, and, Calix?” Galen said, closing the several feet between them. Calix looked at him, and Galen drew his arm back, launching his fist into his brother’s jaw. Calix stumbled back and Galen turned away, shaking out his fist as he went to his horse and mounted it.

  Calix straightened and watched me as he wiped blood from his mouth. “I love you, wife. Don’t forget that.”

  I turned away.

  Galen called for the gates to be opened, and he led us out, guards ahead of me and behind, and Zeph and Theron both exhausted on either side of me.

  We rode through the city, Galen keeping a slow pace as we passed a few people, who all shied away from the sight of so many men. It wasn’t long before the cluster of the city faded into farmland, and the road was wider, and we still rode slowly.

  “Is there a reason we’re going so slow?” I asked Zeph. Osmost was making lazy circles in the sky, searching for prey, lacking a challenge.

  Zeph’s jaw rolled a bit. “I believe out of concern for your health, my queen.”

  I pushed my shoulders back. “Then if it’s out of concern for me, we can go much, much faster,” I told him.

  “My queen—” he started, but I wheeled my horse to the side of the column and spurred the stallion onward.

  Every jarring hammer of the horse’s hooves felt like power, like strength, like something solid and whole. My heart beat stronger with the effort, and I craved it just to remember what it felt like to have my heart race with something other than fear.

  My horse thundered past Galen at the start of the column, and I didn’t look at him as I went charging onward. My horse seemed desperate to run, as desperate to stretch his legs as I was to feel that freedom, and he kept on, strong and powerful.

  I heard another horse, and I turned to see Galen riding hard to catch me, a stormy look on his face. I turned forward, urging my horse on faster, delaying his angry lecture as long as I could.

  Galen’s horse was bigger, and faster, and he caught up to me. I expected him to take the reins from me, to yell at me to stop—something. It never came, and he rode beside me, galloping along the country road until I was heaving for breath, my chest burning for air, my muscles bright and sore, like I was finally alive. Finally awake.

  I kept on, even as it hurt and burned, even as I felt every harsh breath like it was fan
ning the pain in my cheek, my blood rushing doubly hard there.

  I only slowed when Galen fell behind. I drew the reins of my horse gently, and he eased out of his gallop. Galen caught up, coming astride me as my horse began to walk. “Three hells,” he said, smiling at me as he panted hard.

  Emotions flooded in with that one rare smile. My heart was still pounding; it rushed with something hot and dizzying. But like a physical reminder of the things that kept us apart, when I tried to smile back, the pain forced the look from my face.

  My hood had blown back, and he saw how I couldn’t smile, and his eyes rested on my cheek. I broke his gaze, looking behind us to where Zeph and Theron were ahead of the others, but still struggling to catch up. I tugged the hood back up, making sure it covered my face.

  “I didn’t know you could ride like that,” Galen said, facing forward.

  “I’m not terribly good at it,” I told him.

  Another smile came to his face, and I wanted to pluck this off, treasure it, collect his smiles from him. “I’ve never met a woman who wanted to ride so damn fast,” he said with a laugh.

  “I can’t stand sitting about,” I told him.

  “Which must be why you walk,” he said, nodding.

  “I walk for an hour each day. Maybe even less,” I told him. “In the desert, we’d walk for whole days in the hot sun. To go somewhere. For food, water, shelter. For a purpose. There’s no purpose here.”

  He was watching me. I could feel it, but I didn’t turn to him. “It’s half the reason I like fighting,” he said. “The practice. Hours a day, moving, hitting, running. Sweating until your heart is pounding,” he said, placing his hand on his chest. I couldn’t help it—I looked at the hand, his broad chest rising under it.

  I nodded.

  “Court is a little useless,” he admitted.

  “I thought I would have a purpose,” I confessed. “I wanted being queen to be about something more than just being his wife. And I understood, when I arrived, that perhaps I could have that, but only if I fought for it. I’m not afraid of that.”

  He glanced at me. “You’ve done tremendous things, Shalia.”

  I shook my head. “That is not the word for them. I’ve done things—things I am proud of—but I don’t know that they’ve made any difference. I keep waiting for the sands to shift, and I thought that this child would be the change we needed. And then he lied to me, and killed yet more people, and did this.”