by Jill M Beene
“Because that’s the way it’s done.”
“Why?” she demanded.
He shrugged and a valley of irritation formed between his eyebrows as they drew together. “Because... that’s how it is.”
Samiris laughed, a sound barren of any real humor. Artem tensed, his shoulders squaring off as if he was getting ready to do battle.
“It’s the same thing, over and over and over with you people,” she said. “You don’t have any good reasons for why things are the way that they are.” Samiris gestured toward the castle behind her, her movements jerky with her anger. “You’re all like overdressed sheep, doing things just because you’ve always done them, going through the motions of ridiculous social customs because that’s how things have always been done.”
“I don’t expect that you would understand the reasons behind the traditions we have...”
Samiris cut him off. “You don’t even understand why you do what you do. You people are the only ones with the real power to change things, and you don’t question anything!”
“Stop saying that,” Artem said through gritted teeth.
“What?”
“You people... like you aren’t from the same country, like you aren’t the same as all of us.”
Just then, a cacophony of giggling erupted from an archway behind them. Narcise, Ladonna, and another lady approached from the far wall. The three figures were swathed in wide expanses of pastel tulle and ribbons and capped off in ridiculous little hats, with pointless sheer veils over their faces. If Samiris squinted, they looked like three walking bunches of spun sugar.
“You tell me, Artem,” she said. “Do I look like I’m the same as all of you?”
“No,” he said bluntly. “You don’t. But it doesn’t look like Cyra is having any problem fitting in here, following our stupid rules.”
He turned away from Samiris, and walked toward the group of ladies who were still twittering like birds.
“Hello, ladies!” Artem called out, his voice thick with the charm that he hadn’t bothered to use on Samiris.
Samiris jerked as if someone had socked her in the stomach. The third figure in the group was Cyra. She was dressed in ice blue, to compliment Narcise’s lavender and Ladonna’s rosebud pink. The three ladies were a matching set, as if the same dressmaker had made their outfits. Samiris looked down at her tan dress and frowned.
If there had been any glimmer of hope about Cyra wanting to be her friend, her showing up looking like Narcise and Ladonna’s long lost triplet killed it. As Samiris watched, Narcise looked up and met her eyes. A cold smile gilded Narcise’s lips, and her eyebrow lifted in challenge. Samiris kept her expression blank.
An hour later, Samiris was propped haphazardly on top of a doe-eyed brown mare. The rules of Teymara dictated that ladies ride side-saddle instead of astride. Once again, no one knew why this was, but Samiris doubted her stupid riding dress would let her throw a leg over a horse, anyways.
Who had come up with the idea of a riding dress, anyways? An idiot, that’s who. Probably a male idiot. Or maybe a female idiot who never needed to go anywhere in a hurry. Idiots. Indeed, their procession was a lumbering beast. Any ideas that Samiris had of actually riding were torn to shreds by now.
They rode two abreast. In the front were six armed royal guards. Just behind them were the Crown Prince and Narcise, followed by Ladonna and Cyra, who had not met Samiris’ eye once yet. Samiris was riding in the rear, alone. Behind her was Artem and five more guards.
Samiris told herself that she was fine riding alone, even if it did get tiresome after awhile. They plodded along, taking a side street out of the city walls and winding up into the gently rolling, wooded hills behind the castle. In a clearing at the top of a rise, they paused and gathered in a loose grouping to take in the view of the city below.
Samiris knew that the group as a whole was probably admiring the castle and the city, framed beautifully by the backdrop of the sea. But Samiris’ eyes snagged on movement directly below.
In the river basin beneath them was a ramshackle encampment. Tattered tents fluttered in the breeze like the shredded flags of a defeated army after battle. A winding muck of a path cut the settlement into two crude halves, with a primitive well, really no more than a hole, marking the center. This must be the Sands, the only home refugees from the South could claim.
The Sands had been built upon a floodplain, on land that was so unsuitable for living that no one else had claimed it. With every rain, the river rose into the tents, soaking what few belongings the inhabitants had, and sweeping away the ragged edges of the encampment. The camp was settled so precariously close to the river below that it looked as if it would tip over and float away at any moment. Samiris could see the carcasses of several buildings that had been reclaimed by the river, their boards sticking out of the water like the ribs of some dead beast.
These people had fled north when their farmlands in Chaikine had dried up, when the locusts had come pouring out of the cracks in the sun-beaten land. Some of them had come from Cattule, when deep-water fishing became a deadly game of chance. They had heard the stories about how things still grew in Teymara, had clasped onto the whispered rumors of hope as if it were a tangible dragline, and had pulled themselves, hand over bleeding hand, to safety.
Only to land here. The Sands.
Because it was more important for the good citizens of Teymara to not be offended by their brothers’ wanton need than it was for the people of the Sands to thrive. Because Teymarians equated poverty with criminality, and thought that these people would rob them blind if they were given haven within the city. Because diamonds and gold meant more to the citizens of Teymara than the lives of these men, women and children. Samiris gripped her reins at the thought.
She frowned down at her fine leather gloves. Her hands were warm; her feet were dry. And yet, she could feel the water seeping into her boots, could feel the kind of cold that wormed its way under the skin and nested in the bones. Samiris could feel it, because she had lived it. Never the way the people of the Sands had, though. She had always had a warm hearth to nestle beside. Even on those last days of winter, when spring was prying the chill’s grip from the land finger by finger, and there was no food, she and Tamrah could heat herbs in water and pretend it was soup.
But there were no woods for these people to forage. There were only dark alleys and trash cans, and the goodwill of strangers that was all too soon depleted. There was only a Crown Prince with more concern for invented problems than for the very real ones in his backyard. He wasn’t even trying to make these people’s lives easier. All it would take was a small seawall, a berm of soil and stone along the length of the river, and their homes wouldn’t flood. Some gravel along the main road would help, and a stone mason and a carpenter to make a better cover for the well. A few gold hektes would make all the difference in the world.
“Look at that camp below. It’s charming, really,” Narcise cooed, batting her eyelashes up at the Crown Prince.
Samiris’ head whipped up, and she scowled. “Yes, it’s all so quaint, so rustic, so exciting,” Samiris said without thinking, sarcasm twisting the words as they escaped her mouth.
“Well, isn’t it?” The Crown Prince’s eyebrows drew together, his forehead wrinkling.
“I wager they don’t think so,” Samiris said, jerking her head toward the refugees. “The only people who find tent-living ‘charming’ are those who have warm homes to return to whenever they choose.”
Samiris saw the corner of Cyra’s mouth twitch, but she turned her head to smooth her expression while the Crown Prince wrestled with the meaning of what Samiris had said.
“You don’t like tents?” he finally mustered, still searching Samiris’ face for further explanation.
“Of course I like tents,” she said with a withering sigh. “On dry, sunny days, I can imagine there
is nothing better than a fine tent, with a soft rug underfoot, cushions all around, and servants to bring you trays of cold cutlets, bread, and cheese. Provided I don’t have to be the least bit uncomfortable, I enjoy playing at pauper as much as the next noble.”
“Very well, then!” Fitzhumphrey said, his face alight with a chubby grin. “It is a fine, sunny day, just as you like, and I’d wager there’ll be some cuts of cold meat and a nice pâté to slather on our bread once we get where we are going.”
He nudged his horse onward, Lady Narcise at his side. Cyra followed, still trying to cover her smile and mostly succeeding. Ladonna was at Cyra’s side. Samiris held back and shook her head, a noise of derision escaping through her nostrils. She looked up to see Artem blocking her path, anger simmering in his eyes. They were alone.
“You may not want to be here,” he began, the tone of his voice a low, dangerous warning. “But do not be cruel to him. What has happened to his kingdom...that is not of his doing.”
“How can you say that?” Samiris snapped. “He is the Crown Prince, and will be Emperor someday. Don’t you think that he should figure out a way to help his starving people?”
“And how would he do that?” Artem bit out.
“He could have started by taking the fae princess into his bed,” Samiris said.
“A fairy’s power over a human is limitless once she beds them,” he said. “But surely you knew that already. Would you have us under this curse for eternity? At least the way he did it, we have a chance.”
“If he had been smarter, if he had been cleverer...”
Artem cut her off, fairly growling. “No one is smarter than a fae princess. You cannot defeat a royal fairy by out-thinking them. No, this curse will be broken by a heart, and there is no one with a better heart than his.”
Samiris was silent, choosing instead to gaze out over the coarse encampment in the valley below.
“And if you are mean to him... if you try and snuff some of his light out, as some sort of twisted payment for whatever has happened to make you so angry, it will not go well for you. I’d sooner see you hanging from a gallows in the courtyard than to see you steal away his hope.”
Samiris clenched her jaw, but did not answer, did not meet his eyes with hers, which were suddenly a bit watery. Instead, she tracked the movements of a woman, bent at the waist over a loosely-woven basket, slogging slowly through the mud in the tent village below. Artem stepped his horse closer to her, until his thigh almost brushed her own.
His voice was gentler when he spoke again. “Don’t you think it hurts him, to see what his land has fallen to? You don’t know how his heart is affected, as he does not age, but watches his people wither and blow away like chaff before him.”
“Ah, feelings,” Samiris snorted, trying to regain her composure. “What good are feelings, when actions are the things that matter? Who cares how he feels, when he sleeps well every night with a full belly?”
“And what more would you have him do?” Artem asked, his voice rigid once more. “Speed up the process? Do two courting sessions per year? Watch the skin of two women blister and peel off as they die screaming in his throne room, instead of just one? Or perhaps you would have him do three?”
Samiris blinked rapidly at the thought.
“Maybe you would like to choose them, the girls who are rounded up like cows and pranced before him like some sort of cattle auction?”
“No,” she finally murmured, when she realized he was waiting for an answer.
“Did you ever hear of the time that he refused to send out invitations?” Artem asked, leaning toward her with a dark smile. “It’s a funny tale, with a very happy ending.”
Samiris shook her head.
“It was the fourth year, and Fitz couldn’t stand the thought of watching another woman burn. Because that is part of the curse, you know... that we cannot look away. The entire court has to watch closely. And the smell. It stays in your nostrils for days... but that isn’t the point. Fitz couldn’t stomach the thought of another innocent woman leaving a scorch mark on his marble floor.” Artem smiled at her, but his eyes were dark. “Haven’t you ever wondered about the strategic placement of all those potted plants?”
Samiris hoped he did not hear her involuntary intake of breath.
“So he decided to not invite anyone. It caused him a terrible headache... bloody nose, vomiting. He even tore out some of his hair in agony. Of course it grew right back. But it would all be worth it, he thought, if only the women were spared.”
“It didn’t work,” Samiris’ voice was a bleak contrast to Artem’s morbidly merry one.
“He thought it did at first,” Artem said. “But the morning that the women were supposed to arrive, twelve large trunks appeared on the castle steps, in a row, neat as you please. No one knew how they got there. The guards said that one instant the steps were clear, the next one, there they were. Each trunk contained the butchered, tortured body of the women that the Crown Prince had failed to invite.”
Samiris swallowed deeply, and did not bother to hide the tears that had spilled from her eyes.
“Want to know the best part?” Artem said with another smile that didn’t meet his eyes.
“No,” Samiris whispered. A plea.
Artem ignored her. “They were still screaming. Their bodies were in pieces, their eyes plucked from their skulls, and still they screamed. Until the Crown Prince himself put a sword through their temple. It wouldn’t end for the guards, or for me. I swear I tried to stop it, tried to save him from it. They were presents, you see, just for him.”
Samiris pressed a hand to her roiling stomach. She thought she might vomit.
“The next day, Fitz tried to kill himself.”
“What? How?”
Artem kept his voice deceptively light. “Oh, he was quite inventive, toward the end. Threw himself from a balcony, poisoned himself, took a sword through the heart. Then he ordered me to behead him.”
Samiris was stunned.
“I love my friend dearly, so I tried,” he said, his mouth grim. “He experiences the pain, but he can’t be killed. He cannot escape that way, or save his people from their fates. All we can do is hope that there is a woman out there sweet enough to earn his love and genuinely love him back. The man, not the crown.”
“That woman isn’t Narcise,” Samiris said, her eyes cutting to the trail ahead of them.
“It isn’t you, either,” Artem said, wheeling his horse around and leaving her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Samiris spent the rest of the day in a haze. During the picnic, she perched on a thick cushion in the corner of the billowing white tent and didn’t say a word to anyone. She felt light-headed, and her skin was clammy. Artem’s words rolled round in round in her head until she thought she would be sick with them. He had reminded her how high the stakes were in this game, and she was nothing but a pawn, a placeholder.
She stared at the toes of her new leather riding boots as the three other ladies in the tent pulled the Crown Prince’ time and attention back and forth like three kittens fighting over a ball of string. Samiris was aware of Artem looking over at her several times, his brow furrowed. But like the light, stupid conversation taking place across the tent, he was in the background to her thoughts.
Samiris had known that the Crown Prince and his court did not age at a normal rate, but she had not known that he couldn’t be killed. The fact that he tried to give his own life in order to stop the curse tempered her dislike of him. It shifted her belief that he was nothing more than an idiot who didn’t care for his people.
And more things clicked into place...the traditions that held no place or purpose... perhaps Artem and the Crown Prince clung to those because they were an illusion of order, a way to pretend to make sense of things. If they pretended that everything was the same... well, maybe that made
things more bearable for them, even if it wasn’t true.
Perhaps they were clinging so desperately to the way things were because... well, how did you move forward if you never aged? How did you rule a country if you had no real control? How did you let go of the past, of the only things you’ve known, when the world around you had changed so dramatically? Like a small child clinging to his blanket because the darkness at night terrified him, like a drowning man clinging to a piece of the shipwreck....maybe this was how they coped.
That didn’t excuse their inaction. Samiris shook her head slightly at the thought, earning another concerned glance from Artem. Still, maybe it explained their inaction. And if she could understand the inaction, maybe she could change it. Marla had thrown a spark into Samiris’ mind when she said that Samiris could accomplish something while she was in Teymara.
Maybe she could show the Crown Prince and Artem that although they couldn’t break the curse, they could still change things, make things better. That even if the war was lost, the battles were still worth fighting. And even if she couldn’t convince them, maybe there was a way that she could still make a difference, without their help. But she would have to be careful. She would have to be smart. Teymara was so deeply entrenched in the way things were that any change would be frowned upon. The court was the same as a baby who wailed when its diaper was changed... they might be sitting in filth, but it was all they knew and they were quite comfortable in it.
Samiris endured the long ride back to the castle in silence. As they departed, she didn’t try and crowd her horse closer to the Crown Prince as the other ladies did. Cyra was chosen to ride next to him on the journey back, and Narcise cast a serpentine smile over her shoulder at Samiris, as if she had won something. Samiris met her gaze blandly, and Narcise narrowed her eyes, pursed her lips, and turned back around.
Artem rode Behemoth’s massive form just back and to the side of Samiris’ mare. She could see him from the corner of her eye. His head was angled in her direction, and she could have turned her head to speak with him, but she didn’t. She wanted some more time to think about things. If she were being honest, the story he had told her was too present in her mind, the horrors too fresh, the realization of her misjudgment too new and uncomfortable to admit to someone else.