Elpis gives me a small smile when I meet her back at the door, and we start down the hall to the pavilion. There is little that can be said, since the halls are crowded with people. Still, having her close helps me focus. Elpis is why I’m doing all of this, why I’m playing a game I have a hard time imagining I can win, why I’m carrying a vial of poison in my pocket intended for my closest friend. Elpis, and all the people she represents, all the others who have been enslaved for as long as they can remember. All the others who are chained and beaten and hungry but still have the gall to dream of a better world. I will build it for them, but not with the bones of innocents.
We turn down an empty hallway that leads to the east wing of the palace. Talking is still too much of a risk, but as soon as she’s sure we’re alone, Elpis grabs my hand. Her fingers are all bone and another wave of guilt slams through me. I ate a five-course meal last night, but when was the last time she ate more than a bowl of broth?
She presses something into my palm before dropping her hand. When I look, there is a small, crumpled flower made of scraps of pink silk I recognize from one of Cress’s gowns. Each petal has been painstakingly cut and arranged around a single pearl no bigger than a freckle. The memory is there, but it slips through my fingers like smoke.
“Happy Belsiméra, Your Highness,” she murmurs, her smile rare and wide.
I close my palm over the flower and tuck it into my pocket and out of sight. My mother and I used to make dozens of silk flowers together for Belsiméra for those closest to us, though my tiny fingers were clumsy and most of my flowers turned out shapeless and unusable. She enlisted seamstresses to make hundreds more, enough for all the Guardians and the palace staff.
Belsiméra—the birthday of Belsimia, goddess of love and beauty. In the story my mother used to tell me, the earth goddess, Glaidi, always loathed the fall, when her flowers would die and her trees would grow skeletal. She mourned the loss of color in the world, the loss of beauty.
One year, when the season turned and Glaidi grew melancholy and distant, the water goddess, Suta, cheered her up by crafting a hundred flowers from silk and presenting them to her friend. When Glaidi saw them, she was so moved by the display of love and beauty that she began to weep tears of joy. One of the tears landed on one of the silk flowers, and from that bloom, Belsimia was born.
To celebrate Belsimia and the deep friendship that created her, we used to craft silk flowers and give them to friends and loved ones throughout the day. At night, there was a celebration in the capital, with dancing and sweets and silk flowers everywhere.
I remember making the flowers with my mother and passing them out to everyone who worked and lived in the palace. I remember the festival, when Ampelio scooped me up in his arms and swung me around in a dance until I was delirious with giggles. I remember it was my favorite night of the year, even more so than the ones with gifts.
“Thank you, Elpis,” I say, looking at the younger girl, whose cheeks flush pink. “I’m sorry, I don’t…” I trail off, biting my lip, embarrassed. “I’d forgotten.”
She nods, her eyes solemn. “We celebrate in the slave quarter still, but we have to do it very quietly. If anyone knew…” She shakes her head. “I wanted to give one to you. You’ll keep it hidden, won’t you?”
“Of course,” I say, smiling. “Thank you.”
I turn to start down the hall again, but Elpis touches my arm, stopping me.
“I need to do something,” she whispers.
“Elpis—” I start, but she interrupts.
“Anything, please,” she says. “I can help, if you’ll let me.”
Her dark eyes are so earnest that it’s easy to forget she’s only thirteen. In the old Astrea, she would still be considered a child.
“I need you to stay safe,” I tell her gently.
“But—”
“The time is coming,” I murmur in Astrean, casting a glance down the hall for anyone who might be listening. “I need your patience.”
She bites her lip and releases my arm. “I just want to help,” she says, sounding even younger than she is.
The desperation in her voice clutches at my heart. “You are helping,” I assure her. “You’ve already done so much.”
Her eyes dart up to mine, searching for any sign that I’m patronizing her. Finally she bows her head slightly.
“Thank you, Your Highness,” she says.
She doesn’t say the title the way the others do; there are no strings attached. I hold her full trust in my hands and it is a terribly fragile thing. I will not break it.
COFFEE HAS BEEN SET UP at one of the wrought-iron tables on the public sun pavilion. Striped violet and white silk awnings hang over the large veranda, flapping in the wind, while gold candles lend warmth to each table, aided by the Fire Gems studding the holders. Though winter is fast approaching and the sun is becoming a rarer and rarer sight, the space is still alive with court activity. If anything, the Kaiserin’s death has reanimated the courtiers. They are bursting with fresh gossip now about who the Kaiser will marry next, and each great family has a daughter they are eager to sacrifice for an extra helping of favor.
I count twelve of them now, some younger than me, and each in a dress far too revealing for the weather. Everyone but me, it seems, has already moved on from mourning gray though there are three weeks left of the traditional Kalovaxian mourning period. They all shiver in their silks and sip coffee with shaking hands, surrounded by circles of fussing family members as they wait, just in case the Kaiser decides to make an appearance.
Across from me, Cress studies a book of poems, rarely looking up even though she invited me today. We still haven’t spoken of our conversation in the garden, but I can feel it wedging between us and casting a shadow over every word we speak. I want to bring it up again now, to push her the way I didn’t have the chance to then, but every time I try, the words die in my throat.
“Poor girls,” Cress murmurs, barely looking up from her book of Lyrian poems, quill in hand. “All that work for nothing. My father says the Kaiser already has his bride picked out. He thinks the betrothal will be official by the time my father leaves for Elcourt in four days.”
I freeze, cup to my mouth, dread pooling in the pit of my stomach.
“I don’t suppose you heard who?” I ask casually, setting the coffee cup down on the saucer.
She shakes her head with a huff and scribbles something out. “He wouldn’t tell me, as usual. He seems to think I can’t be trusted with his secrets.”
I force a laugh. “Well, he’s right, isn’t he?” I tease.
I expect her to laugh as well, but when she looks up at me, her eyes are somber. “I can keep secrets, Thora.”
The words are innocuous enough, but they feel heavy. What I said in the garden was treason, and she could have used that to secure herself a crown. But she didn’t and that means something, doesn’t it?
“Of course you can,” I tell her quietly. “You’re my heart’s sister, Cress. I’d trust you with my life.”
The vial of poison is warm against my skin.
She nods once and goes back to her poem. “Ch’bur,” she says, twisting the feather of her quill as she thinks. “Do you suppose that’s related to the Oriamic word chabor? Clawed?”
“I don’t know,” I admit. “Try it out loud.”
She bites her bottom lip for a moment. “In the valley of Gredane—that’s their term for the underworld—my love waits for me, still wrapped in Death’s clawed embrace. No. That can’t be right, can it?”
I try to answer, but all I can see is Cress’s limp, gray body held in a giant bird’s claw.
“Besides, I don’t see what it matters,” she says, dragging me out of my thoughts and scribbling something else in her book. “It isn’t as though the girl—whoever she is—will say no, is it?”
&nb
sp; It takes me a moment to realize she isn’t talking about the poem anymore, or alluding to my treason. We’ve circled back to the Kaiser now, and she seems awfully cavalier about it, considering she’s as eligible for the role as any other girl. But it won’t be her and I suppose she knows it. Her father wouldn’t let that happen. He might be the Kaiser’s attack dog, but even he has a line and that line has always been Cress.
“It isn’t as though she can say no,” I point out, earning me a warning look from Cress.
“Don’t pity her too much, Thora,” she says. “I think I could put up with the Kaiser if the crown came with it.”
Kaiserin Anke might disagree with you, I want to say, but I manage to hold myself back. Cress and I have a silent agreement not to mention what we saw that night, and I’m not about to break it. She knows the Kaiser pushed the Kaiserin out that window as well as I do, but neither of us has the courage to say it out loud, as if not speaking the words is enough to quell the danger of what we saw. After all, if the Kaiser murdered his wife because she was an inconvenience, what’s to stop him from doing the same to us?
Still, I want to confide in someone about the things the Kaiserin said before she died—before she was killed. I want to tell someone about my feelings for Søren and how that complicates the plan I hatched with my Shadows. I want to talk about that plan and how fragile it feels sometimes.
But I can hear her voice whisper through my mind. “That’s treason. Stop it, Thora.” And I can’t even bear to think what her reaction would be if she knew about Søren and me.
But I don’t know if I can even be angry at her for her reaction in the garden. I asked her to choose between me and her country—not to mention her father. I should have known what she would choose. I know what I’m choosing, after all.
The poison weighs heavier than ever in my pocket.
“And,” Cress continues without looking up from her poem, “it’ll be a better match than you could have hoped for otherwise.”
I freeze, my cup halfway to my lips. With shaking hands, I place it back in its saucer.
“What did you say?” I ask.
She lifts one shoulder in a blasé shrug. “No one had to tell me the Kaiser’s plans, Thora. It just makes sense. I heard a few whispers about the riots, how there are still countries who refuse to acknowledge the Kaiser’s claim on Astrea. His marriage to you would solve that problem nicely. Also, he had no use for the Kaiserin anymore—she gave him his heir, served her purpose. And I always wondered, I suppose, why he kept you alive.”
She says it all so calmly, her eyes still fixed on her book. But it’s not because she doesn’t care. I can hear it in her voice. It’s because she’s afraid to look at me.
“So when you saw him push her out that window, it must have confirmed your suspicions,” I reply, matching her easy tone, as if we were talking about dinner plans instead of murder.
She flinches at that, but it’s so slight I nearly miss it. After a breath, she finally looks up at me, placing her quill down on the table.
“It’ll be for the best, Thora,” she says firmly. “You’ll be the Kaiserin. You’ll have power.”
“Like Kaiserin Anke had power?” I ask her. “You say I am your heart’s sister and that’s what you want for me? To end up like her?”
The flinch is more pronounced this time and her gray eyes dart around. She exhales.
“Better that than a traitor on the executioner’s block,” she says, her voice low.
The venom in the words feels like a slap and I struggle not to recoil from her. I swallow. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Cress,” I say, but my voice shakes and I know it doesn’t fool her. No matter how she tries to pretend otherwise, Cress is no fool.
“Don’t insult me,” she says, leaning back in her chair. She reaches into her pocket and withdraws a folded piece of paper. The seal has been broken, but it once was a drakkon breathing fire. Søren’s sigil. The sight of it hollows my stomach, and a thousand excuses rise to my lips, but I already know there is no excuse for what is in that letter.
“Where did you get that?” I ask instead, as if I can somehow turn this on her, make her the one who betrayed me.
She ignores me, opening the letter slowly. Hurt flickers across her expression as she begins to read.
“ ‘Dear Thora.’ ” Her voice remains flat and emotionless. “ ‘I can’t find the words to express how happy your letter made me. I know that I didn’t say it so plainly in my last letter, though I’m sure you could have surmised as much, but my heart is yours as well.
“ ‘In your letter, you said that you wanted a way for us to be together without having to hide it. I want the same. I want to tell everyone; I want to brag about your letters the way my men brag about the letters their sweethearts send them; I want a world where there is a future for us that is not sneaking through dark tunnels (as enjoyable as that sneaking might be). But I think, more than anything else, I want to live in a better world than the one my father has created. I have hope that one day, when I am kaiser, I can create that world. And now I have hope that when I do, you’ll be at my side.’ ”
She looks back at me as she folds the letter again. “There’s more, of course. Bits about his ship’s activities, how the battle is going—painfully boring, really, though I’d imagine that’s the part you’re interested in.”
I can’t say anything, only watch as she tucks the letter away. It must have come recently. I’d assumed he’d been too busy in battle to write me back, but Cress must have found it under my doormat.
“It isn’t what you think,” I manage finally, though it’s ridiculous how untrue that is.
“I think you lied to me, Thora,” she says softly, but all traces of softness are gone from her expression. She is all hard angles and furious eyes. She looks, for the first time, like her father. “I think you stole my Spiritgems, which means you’re working with others. You wouldn’t have grown this rebellious on your own. Three, I would imagine, given how many of my pieces you took?”
Ice trickles down my spine and my heart thunders. She can’t know about my Shadows, not like this. I cast my eyes around and spot them off to the side of the sun pavilion, watching but too far away to hear anything. They’re still there, which means she hasn’t told anyone about her suspicions yet. I can’t let her.
“I’m sorry,” I tell her, leaning forward. “I’m so sorry, Cress, but it isn’t what you think.”
“What I think is that it’s too convenient,” she says, pursing her lips. There’s a dangerous glint in her eyes that reminds me of her father. “These others that you’re working with show up and you get them Spiritgems and at the same time you decide to start romancing the Prinz. You have to know that a match between him and you would never be allowed, and you’re too smart to pretend otherwise. Which means you were aiming for something else.”
She glances back down at the letter in her hands.
“ ‘I misled you before, when I said we were leaving to solve some issues with Dragonsbane in the trade route, but if you’re truly so bored that you want to know what’s happening here, I’ll tell you.’ ”
She breaks off again and looks back up at me. There is no emotion in her eyes, which is just as well. My whole body is numb.
“You don’t care about whatever mission the Kaiser sent him on. I have a hard time believing you wanted to hear about it, but I suppose these people—whoever you’re working with—did, though, and they told you to seduce the Prinz to get as much information as you could for them. Am I wrong?” she asks, tilting her head to one side as she watches me.
Yes, I want to say. But not about what really matters.
She must take my silence for a no because she continues. “I understand it, Thora,” she says, her voice shifting to what I’m used to from her, gentle and kind. It reminds me of the way the Th
eyn spoke to me after he killed my mother, asking if I was hungry or thirsty while her blood was still wet on his hands. “I meant it when I said that your life is unfair. The way he treats you is unfair. But this isn’t the way to fix it.”
I want to scream that it isn’t about me at all, that the unfairness of my life is nothing compared to the miseries endured by the other Astreans in the city, the other Astreans in the mines, the other Astreans who fled to become third-class citizens in other countries.
I take a breath, force myself to hold her gaze instead of screaming the way I so badly want to. Because I am not her friend and I never have been. I am her pet and she loves me like I’m something less than her, and the realization of that feels like I drank the vial of Encatrio myself. Like I’m turning to ash from the inside out.
When I speak, my voice is soft and level. It is remorseful, despite the resentment coursing through me. “How do I fix it, then?” I ask her.
It’s exactly what she wants to hear. Her smile is genuine, relieved. She reaches across the table to take my hands in hers.
“You do what’s expected of you,” she says, as if it’s simple. To Cress, it is. She’s always done what is expected of her and she’s going to get a crown because of it. But we are not the same. We live in two different worlds, and different things are expected of us. “You give the Kaiser what he wants. You stay alive until I can save you.”
I swallow down the bile rising in my throat. She means well, which makes it so much worse.
“Will you tell the Kaiser?” I ask.
She draws her hands back and clears her throat. “I don’t see why he needs to know. You faltered, it’s to be expected. But no real harm has been done, has it?” she says, as if I broke a piece of china instead of plotted treason.
“No,” I say.
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