by Kristen Pham
“Everyone was a wreck without you,” he said. “Even me.”
Kanti smiled for the first time since she’d heard what had happened in her absence.
“I’m here now, and we’re going to take back control of this war,” she said.
Kanti and Cyrus stepped inside the carriage, and Cyrus squeezed Valerie’s hand once before taking a seat as far away from her as possible.
“Go!” Kanti shouted, and the horses took off so fast that Valerie nearly had whiplash.
The animals were spelled to travel fast, and the landscape rushed by, making Valerie dizzy.
“So what’s the grand plan, princess?” Cyrus asked, a flicker of his old humor in his eyes.
“Valerie told me that soldiers from Elsinore are fighting for the Fractus. That means that my Aunt Ani must be organizing them, because I don’t think my parents would encourage that, no matter how shallow they may be.”
“Then let’s take her out,” Cyrus said. “She won’t be a match for Valerie.”
“No question, Valerie could have her beaten, bound, and carted away with no trouble,” Kanti said. “But that might not help our cause. My people need their own leader to believe in, and I think it will have to be me.”
Cyrus nodded slowly. “You need to be the one to defeat Ani and rally your people. Then you can publicly announce an alliance with Valerie and the Fist. That’s smart.”
“We need soldiers for the Fist, or at the very least, no additional soldiers for the Fractus,” Kanti said. “I have to challenge Ani to a Test of Power—it’s an old tradition in my country. Ani’s ruling now because the people think she’s the most powerful Conjuror in Elsinore. I have to prove them wrong.”
“I don’t like this plan. Ani nearly took me out once. No offense, Kanti, but she could kill you,” Valerie said.
“That’s the other reason I wanted you here. If things go really south, you can step in,” Kanti allowed. “But how do we get the word out? We need people to witness the Test.”
“Tell all those birds that carry news. They’ll do the work for you,” Cyrus suggested.
“But how will you beat her? This whole plan falls apart if you fail,” Valerie reminded her.
Kanti grinned. “Aside from the training and fighting I’ve been doing for the past few years with you, there is also this.”
The carriage hummed as Kanti concentrated, drawing on her power. A rose grew in Kanti’s palm, first the stem, then the petals, and last, sharp thorns. The rose had the faintest glow, as if something inside was lighting the flower up.
“I’m tougher than you think,” Kanti said. “And being touched by a vivicus has enhanced my power.”
Kanti managed to sneak them all into her ice castle undetected, so Valerie was able to get a night’s sleep before they launched their plan. She awoke to the sound of Kanti and Cyrus deep in conversation.
“You’ve got to provoke Ani to strike first. It will spark everyone’s outrage, seeing their princess attacked,” Cyrus said.
Kanti nodded slowly. “Good. I know my people will want the person with the most magic to win, but it will help my cause after the fight if I also have their hearts.”
“Let’s take some time to practice your skills before we challenge her to this Test thing, okay?” Valerie asked, rubbing her eyes.
Kanti and Cyrus both glanced out the window. Valerie followed their gazes and saw a veritable storm of birds outside the castle gates.
“You’ve already made the challenge? You’re being reckless! We just got you back,” Valerie said.
“They spotted us coming in,” Kanti said. “We’ve got to strike now before Ani figures out another strategy.”
The door opened, and Kanti’s mom floated in on a cloud of perfume.
“Darling, we’re thrilled to see you, but there’s the strangest rumor that you’ve challenged your aunt to a Test of Power, and that you’re turning it into a common street fight,” Pauline said, nodding a greeting to Valerie and Cyrus.
Isabella was cowering behind her mother.
“She’ll kill you,” Isabella said. Kanti’s eldest sister was paler than the last time Valerie had seen her.
“And fighting in the streets? It’s for the power-deprived,” Pauline said with distaste.
Kanti ignored her mother, glaring at Isabella.
“You’re the one who helped fool everyone into thinking I was okay when I was locked up by Reaper. Do you hate me so much that you want me dead?” Kanti asked.
“No, Kanti, I swear,” Isabella almost whispered. “Ani said she’d kill us all. I didn’t understand what she was really like until it was too late.”
“I guess that just makes you a selfish coward, instead of a jealous psycho. Congratulations,” Kanti snapped.
Valerie touched her friend’s arm. “I can see how your sister would be scared of your aunt. War is no time for grudges. You’re both alive, and you’re on the same side now.”
“I’m simply furious with her, Kanti,” Pauline interjected. “But think how it would look if it were discovered that two of Elsinore’s princesses were not on good terms. And you’re all right now, aren’t you, darling?”
“You don’t know at what cost,” Kanti said, and Valerie gripped her friend’s hand and fought tears of her own.
“Kanti is here to do what’s best for your country, and that means removing Ani from power and taking her position as the rightful leader,” Valerie said. “I suggest you both think about how you can support her in doing what’s right for your people. It seems like it’s been a while since you’ve thought about that.”
Pauline’s and Isabella’s mouths hung open a little, as if they were dazed by what they’d heard.
“Thank you for stopping by, but Princess Kanti needs complete peace to prepare for the Test,” Cyrus said, ushering Kanti’s family firmly out the door.
Once they were gone, Valerie turned to her friend. The time for questioning her decision had passed.
“Let’s get you a staff. You’re practicing as much as you can until you fight that hag,” Valerie said, and Kanti grinned, which was what she’d intended.
Chapter 16
By the end of the week, all anyone in Elsinore was talking about was the upcoming Test of Power between Princess Kanti and the Reigning Royal, Ani.
Kanti trained relentlessly with Valerie, and Cyrus put some contingency plans in place to help ensure the outcome they needed.
The morning of the Test, Kanti’s father, George, came into her room. His demeanor, along with the rest of the family’s, was almost deferential now.
“Henry is at the main mirror again, Kanti dear,” he said. “I’ve begun to feel quite sorry for the young man. And your mother says he is quite a powerful Conjuror.”
Kanti rolled her eyes at his comment, but glanced down the hall.
“Say something to him,” Valerie said.
Kanti straightened her back and nodded. Valerie followed her down a long hall to an immense mirror. Henry’s face filled the glass. His hair was disheveled, and there was a wildness in his eyes. When he saw Kanti, he drank in the sight of her, and from across the Globe Valerie felt his relief.
“You’re okay,” he said. “Is it true that you’re challenging Ani to some kind of battle?”
“It’s a Test of Power. Nothing to worry about,” Kanti lied.
Valerie knew otherwise, but Kanti showed no outward sign of the risk she was taking. Standing straight with her head high, Kanti was the embodiment of perfect confidence.
“I won’t ask you not to do it,” Henry said.
“Good, because I wouldn’t change my mind, even for you. I’m doing the right thing,” Kanti said. “You should try it. You’d be amazed how fearless you are when you’ve got right on your side.”
Henry’s eyes were unfocused as he answered, and Valerie’s mind was disconnected from his, which scared her more than his grief and guilt.
“There’s no one who could stop you, I know that. I’m sorry t
hat I let you down. I love you,” he said.
Kanti’s rigid posture relaxed a little.
“Me, too,” she replied, but Henry’s face had already disappeared from the screen.
“After this is over, I’ll find Henry, and we’ll fix what’s broken between us,” Kanti said, her eyes a little desperate as they searched Valerie’s.
“You will. We’re going to make it all right,” Valerie said.
The challenge was scheduled for the end of the day. Kanti, Valerie, and Cyrus rode in an enormous silver ice carriage through the town. People crowded the streets the entire way, waving and cheering. Some held flags stitched with white swans in the air, chanting Kanti’s name. Ani’s Fractus supporters wore black and glared at the carriage.
The horses stopped in a town square that had an elevated platform made of solid ice. Etched into the ice was the image of a crown.
Kanti was quiet now, but her voice didn’t shake when she turned to Cyrus and Valerie.
“Don’t interfere. I know I said Val would be backup if something goes wrong, but it won’t. You’ll come in too soon, and you have to trust me that I can do this,” Kanti said.
“Please don’t ask me to watch you die,” Valerie begged.
“I’m not. I’m asking you to watch me win.”
Kanti exited the carriage, and Cyrus and Valerie tried to melt into the crowd around the platform. But they were swarmed by the tiny birds that were buzzing over everyone’s heads.
“What does the princess think her chances are?” one squeaked.
“How is she doing today?” another chirped.
“Is it true that the princess opposes the Fractus?”
After unsuccessfully swatting them away, Valerie saw Cyrus release tiny beams of light into their eyes. The birds were irritated, as much by their lack of response as by the light, but they fluttered a little distance away.
The people of Elsinore gave them a wide berth, which had the advantage of giving Cyrus and Valerie a prime spot by the platform.
Kanti stood in the center. The crowd split apart as Ani approached, a black sword strapped to her side. When she stepped beside Kanti, a hum of magic vibrated from the platform.
“The Test has begun. Now no one can approach until it’s complete,” one of the birds nearby said.
“What does that mean?” Valerie asked. She tried to touch the platform, and it zapped her. “We can’t help her!”
Cyrus cracked his knuckles. “I’ve heard of this ritual before, so I suspected we might not be able to help her. But when she made you promise not to interfere, I was sure. She didn’t want you to stop her.”
“I wouldn’t. It’s her choice,” Valerie said.
“I know,” Cyrus said, and he gripped her hand. Valerie was grateful for the warmth of his touch.
“You’re but a child,” Ani said, loudly enough for everyone to hear. “I release you from this Test now, with a promise that your life will be spared.”
“I reject your offer,” Kanti said.
“Then prove your magic,” Ani said.
Kanti nodded, and from the center of the ice grew a rose. The crowd applauded politely as it grew and grew, finally bursting into a bloom the size of a basketball.
Ani smiled indulgently. “Very pretty.”
Ani threw back her head and released a sound that clawed at Valerie’s mind. She fell to her knees, and in some part of her brain, it registered that everyone in the crowd was on their knees, as well. On stage, Kanti staggered.
Seeing her friend in distress triggered Valerie’s locus, and she pushed Ani’s siren song from her mind. Around her, everyone in the crowd had shut their eyes, in answer to Ani’s magic and in awe of the beauty of her song, so they didn’t see Ani unsheathe her sword to cut Kanti down.
Valerie and Cyrus surged toward the platform, but its magic pushed them backward so hard, they fell flat on their backs.
Kanti dropped to one knee, still gripping her staff, white knuckled. Ani raised her sword, but before it fell, Kanti raised her staff and smashed it into the platform once. From where her blow landed, grooves shot through the ice, etching a complicated pattern into its surface. The sound awoke the crowd from their trance, but everyone was silent as they watched the battle progress.
Ani lunged forward with her ink-dipped weapon. Kanti twisted away, deflecting the killing blow that Ani aimed at her heart, but the blade sliced through Kanti’s side.
“No!” Valerie shouted, and she heard the collective gasp of the people of Elsinore at the sight of their princess being attacked.
It seemed to snap them out of their stupor from Ani’s song.
“It’s against the rules to draw blood!” someone shouted from the crowd.
Kanti’s blood poured down her side onto the platform. It ran into the pattern of grooves that she’d created with her staff, flowing fast and with purpose.
“Letting Ani cut her wasn’t an accident,” Cyrus said, gripping Valerie’s hand even tighter.
The grooves Kanti created with her staff were channeling her blood to the rose at the center of the platform.
Valerie stared in shock as Kanti’s blood reached its destination. The rose pulsed once and then struck out at Ani, twisting its stem around her arm. The thorns pierced her skin. The rose throbbed, as if it were pumping something into Ani through the thorns, and Ani began to glow like she’d been given an injection of light.
The light raced through her body, illuminating her, and shot out of her fingers, turning her black sword to plain metal. Ani dropped it as if it were a snake. She opened her mouth to scream, and more light poured out of her, bathing Kanti in its glow. The wound on Kanti’s side stopped bleeding, and the cut faded to a scar. That’s when Kanti struck Ani in the head with her staff, and Ani fell to the ground, unconscious.
The magic humming from the platform abruptly stopped, and the crowd burst into cheers so loud that Valerie’s eardrums hurt. The commotion was intense as people began to rush the platform. No one noticed the way the atmosphere darkened.
“The Fractus are here,” Valerie said, drawing Pathos.
Around the edges of the courtyard, creeping out of doorways and alleys were easily thirty Fractus.
“We knew this might happen,” Cyrus said.
He made eye contact with Kanti’s sister Peach, where she stood with her family on a nearby balcony. Peach nodded and then burst into song.
Like her aunt, Peach was a siren. Valerie, Cyrus, and Kanti stuffed their fingers in their ears so her spell wouldn’t distract them, but the rest of the crowd was hypnotized. She wove in a message to leave the square as quickly as they could.
The Fractus were swarmed as the mob hurried to obey the siren song. Whatever they’d been expecting, this wasn’t it. They couldn’t fight the sheer number of bodies pressing them back, away from the platform.
Kanti ran to the carriage, and Cyrus and Valerie leaped in after her. They raced away from the scene.
Kanti was glowing, high from her success, as Cyrus pumped light into her to drive out any residual magic from Ani’s dark weapon.
“I did it. I know there are Fractus among my people I’ll have to root out, but now I have a chance. We have a chance,” Kanti said.
Cyrus leaned back, grinning even though his glow had diminished from helping Kanti. “I think it’s safe to say the ruling princess of Elsinore will live. Make sure the people know who the real hero was today.”
“This war had its first real victory in a long time today,” Valerie said.
When the chaos died down, the square was filled with debris, but no one had been hurt. The only loss was that Ani had escaped.
Valerie and Cyrus couldn’t remain in Elsinore any longer, and they all cried a little when Kanti sent them back in one of her carriages.
“It’s only been four years since you first came to the Globe, Val, but we’ve all changed so much,” Cyrus mused as they raced back to Arden. “You, most of all.”
“I’m sorry I hurt
you,” Valerie said, reaching for his hand. “Can we find our way back to being best friends again?”
But unlike when they’d watched Kanti fight Ani, Cyrus pulled away.
“I know we’re in the middle of a war, and that makes everything else seem petty,” Cyrus said. “But I can’t help that I’m still in love with you. I was, even before the first time you were with Thai, but back then, I didn’t know what it was like to have you love me back. Now I do, and watching you together, knowing what I’ve lost… It could wreck me if I let it.”
Valerie didn’t let herself release the little sob in her chest at his words.
“I’m not with Thai,” she said.
What she didn’t say was that she’d decided that she couldn’t be with anyone. With her mind falling apart, there’d be nothing left for anyone by the time the war was over. Maybe it was better that Cyrus blamed Thai. Whatever helped him get distance from her.
“But you will be!” Cyrus said. “I need you to stay away from me. I can’t be your best friend right now. Let me go, and promise me you’ll be okay if I’m not here for you right now.”
“I promise,” Valerie said, making her voice strong.
Thankfully, the carriage reached Cyrus’s dorm, and he left. Only after she was sure that he couldn’t hear her did she let out a sound of pain. Cyrus was gone.
Chapter 17
It was good to be in her own home again, even if it was an empty one. Without Dulcea stopping by to deliver treats and general cheer, Cyrus to break the tension with his humor, Gideon to keep her centered, or Kanti’s practical support, the atmosphere was relentlessly grim.
Henry stayed in his room, and from the occasional glimpses into his mind, Valerie knew that he was battling his own demons. Thai spent long hours at the Healers’ Guild, as wounded soldiers of the Fist poured in, starting with injured Grand Masters who’d escaped Reaper’s attack at the Capitol.
Valerie split her attention between organizing the forces on the Globe with Skye and battling the Fractus on Earth.
After a long, fruitless day chasing down clues about the charm binding magic on Earth, Valerie stopped in Egypt to talk to Chisisi for her daily update.