Leaves of Revolution

by Puttroff, Breeana

  She shrugged. “I don’t really know. Just watching.”

  “Watching me make an idiot out of myself?”

  Her eyebrows knitted together. “Don’t do that, Zander – you were just finally getting confident with something. It was … nice to see. Don’t spoil it.”

  He stared at her for several long seconds. “I don’t know how to respond when you say things like that,” he finally said.

  “Join the club,” she said, chuckling. “I hear it’s a large one.”

  Perhaps laughing should have felt wrong right now, but it didn’t. Instead, it was… cathartic. He’d never understood the meaning of that word until now. Once they started, neither of them could stop. He was afraid the noise they were making would disrupt everyone and bring them back into the room, but even though the door was open, nobody came.

  He wasn’t sure when Linnea’s laughter turned to tears; he only knew that when he looked at her and saw the glistening drops running down her cheeks, he wanted to cry, too.

  Maybe he did – he couldn’t really tell, and Linnea never said anything. All he knew was that he pulled her into his arms and held her there for a very long time, until her shoulders finally stopped heaving, and the front of his shirt was soaked.

  “Sorry,” she whispered when she finally pulled away.

  That word broke something so deep inside of him that he couldn’t even get out a response before she turned and exited the room.

  He stood there staring at the door she’d gone through, struggling to remember how to breathe.

  The room was dark except for the flickering light of the dying fire when he finally registered Marcus’ silhouette in the doorway. The way Marcus was looking at him gave him the impression that he’d been standing there for at least a little while.

  “Come on, Zander,” Marcus said quietly. “Dinner is ready.”

  ~ Thirty-Five ~

  Reigning

  FOR THE FIRST TIME since leaving the castle – probably for the first time since her coronation, really – Quinn felt like she actually sort of knew what she was doing.

  Zander’s strategy worked. They started by sending troops to some of the more isolated villages, spreading the news that Quinn was alive and fighting for her kingdom, and offering whatever help they could provide to the people there.

  Not everyone was immediately receptive. In at least one village, Kian reported seeing men leave, headed for the direction of the capital.

  She surprised everyone when she told him to let them go – her fight was with Tolliver, not her people.

  That worked, too. As she slowly gained the trust of the people, the number of her supporters swelled, and even some of her most hostile detractors became at least neutral.

  Her army grew so rapidly it became hard to contain. At this rate, she was going to have to give Tobias an entirely new property after all the damage they’d done to this one, constructing shelters and supply buildings to create a strong base for the army and house guards. Of course, he insisted he didn’t mind, but they did what they could to establish bases in other areas to minimize the impact on one place and to spread out her troops.

  Despite the harsh winter that kept disrupting their movements, often keeping everyone locked inside for days, within less than three moons, Quinn’s troops had the entire region secured. The Friends of Philip was no longer a clandestine resistance, but a powerful force.

  So far, they’d had two run-ins with Tolliver’s army, but her troops had won both battles easily, causing severe damage to the other side while sustaining few casualties themselves.

  Zander, of course, was the one who noted exactly what was keeping Tolliver’s troops mostly at bay – any time he used forces containing Philothean soldiers, many of them would defect to Quinn’s side during a battle.

  Tolliver and the army captains he’d chosen were apparently relying on force and threats – often against wives and children – to draft men into his army.

  In the second battle – a particularly victorious one in the valley between Milldale and Greybell – twenty of Tolliver’s Philothean soldiers turned on their captains during the initial assault, beheading two high-level officers from Dovelnia.

  The initial soldiers who’d banded together and come to find Quinn on their own were mostly young men without wives or children – men who weren’t as easy to threaten, because they had so much less to lose.

  It wasn’t until they dug deeper, and had the chance to talk to some of those who defected during battles – or who were taken prisoner – that they’d discovered the real depths of Dovelnia’s reach.

  She had to admit that Tolliver’s plans had been well-laid and careful, built over a long time. Much of the groundwork had probably been done by Hector, long before he’d even made public his plans to put Tolliver on the throne. Quinn wondered how much of the initial stages had happened even when her father was alive.

  Hector had been nothing if not patient.

  For many cycles, the officers and leaders among the Philothean guards had been carefully chosen – those with strong family ties in important cities and villages.

  Those families had been lavished, with property, food, gifts. They’d spent time in the royal court of Dovelnia. They’d been promised much more. If Tolliver were to become king, they’d have power, too.

  The only mistake Hector had made – and Tolliver had certainly not bothered to correct – was in ignoring those people and places they didn’t feel were helpful to them. They’d concentrated all their efforts on the capital and other stronghold cities in the middle of the kingdom and on the borders, but they’d ignored the smaller ones in rural areas. The entire mountainous western region of Philotheum – where Tobias lived – was open to Quinn.

  Once she understood what had been done to her guards – and what her people so desperately needed – she concentrated her efforts on meeting their needs. Whenever guards defected from Tolliver’s army, she dispatched troops to do whatever they could to get the man’s family to safety.

  In every town they contacted, the first priority was securing the town against invasion, getting food and supplies into protected places, and always leaving enough guards to mount an adequate defense.

  News of the safe havens spread through the kingdom surprisingly quickly, and soon many of the villages were overwhelmed with refugees – most of them willing to defend and fight, too.

  At the beginning of the war, Tolliver’s troops had controlled the borders successfully. Quinn didn’t dare send her troops anywhere near the major towns there. Now, though, the situation in the border towns was slowly improving – at least along the Eirenthean border.

  It had taken both Quinn and Max arguing with everything they had to keep Stephen from traveling to Philotheum himself after Max’s injury. The letters had flown back and forth between the two kingdoms for days. After the second day, Stephen’s response time had improved so dramatically that Quinn had been terrified – she knew he was traveling, and she also knew that the border was then a place Tolliver was enjoying a much greater advantage.

  After an impassioned – angry – letter from Max, Stephen had finally listened and gone back to his own castle, but after that, he’d dedicated so many troops to the effort at the border they were finally starting to make some headway. Two weeks ago, Stephen’s troops had successfully taken the border crossing at Estora and now occupied the town.

  Quinn had worried about that occupation at first, but Stephen gave the same instructions to his troops that she’d been giving to hers – they housed themselves and provided whatever supplies and help they could to the townspeople. Stephen’s troops had the added advantage of more healers trained in Nathaniel and William’s medical knowledge. Within days, the entire town of Estora was solidly united against Tolliver.

  The castle and capital city, however, were untouchable. They were still unable to even get communication in or out of there. Two of Tobias’ birds never returned after attempts to get messages to a Friends of Phi
lip safe house northeast of the capital.

  All of this was why, on the day that Marcus handed a letter to Quinn and she flipped it over to see the royal seal of Philotheum, her heart nearly stopped.

  She must have made a noise, too, although she didn’t notice, because Linnea pushed herself off the couch and came over to see.

  “What bird brought this?”

  “Larya.”

  She frowned so hard that a sudden pain rushed from the back of her head to her temples. “How is that possible?” Zander’s bird had just carried a message to the military base outside Lincliff this morning.

  As if just the name of his bird summoned him, Zander knocked once and then opened the door and poked his head inside. “Can I come in?”

  “Isn’t it a little late to ask?” Linnea gave him a sideways glance as she stepped back to make room for him.

  Quinn narrowed her eyes at Linnea’s tone – she needed to have a conversation with her sister today, but first she looked at Zander. “Do you know anything about Larya bringing this?”

  He shook his head. “I didn’t even see her. I was helping put a temporary roof on the new barracks. It looks like another bad storm is getting ready to roll in.”

  “Do you want me to open it?” Linnea asked. “If it’s from Tolliver and he’s already taken over the base at Lincliff we might want to know.”

  “I can handle it.” She slipped her finger under the flap and broke the green wax seal. As she read, her mouth fell open, and by the time she finished, she didn’t know whether to cheer or throw the letter across the room. Instead of doing either, she shoved it into Marcus’ hand. “It’s from Jonathan.”

  “From Jonathan?” Zander spluttered. “At this point, he’d better be writing from beyond the grave.”

  “You’d think, but no. It’s intelligence. Apparently several castle guards disappeared two days ago along with a massive stockpile of weapons and food meant for a mission.”

  Zander frowned. “I don’t know if that’s good news for us or bad news.”

  “The way Jonathan writes, it sounds like he thinks it’s good news.”

  “Yeah, well, Jonathan hasn’t bothered to contact us in the entire three and a half moons since we left the castle, so I don’t know how I feel about his opinions.”

  Quinn sighed. “Neither do I.”

  “I don’t suppose he at least knows what happened to Ellen and Charles?”

  “He does. They’re in a town called Wellham.”

  The name was barely out of her mouth before Zander was over at the map on the wall. She knew he’d find it.

  Marcus looked up from the letter, finished reading. “And Tolliver is planning to send troops to attack Wellham and arrest them.”

  “Or he was,” Quinn agreed.

  “Until his weapons disappeared?” Linnea said.

  “That I don’t actually know. It sounds like he may still be planning on it, but now Jonathan doesn’t know how or when.”

  Zander turned around, though he kept his finger on a spot on the map. “But why now? Why wait all this time and then contact you out of the blue to tell you something like this? Let me guess. He heard you have troops and supplies?”

  “Well, that’s my guess, too, but he didn’t say why he’s contacting me now.”

  “He said he would be in touch again soon,” Marcus said, folding the letter and setting it on a table.

  “How did he get in touch this time?” Linnea asked. “How did he get ahold of Zander’s bird? Where is he?”

  Quinn scoffed. “It’s Jonathan. He didn’t disclose any of that – I don’t think I’d put money on ever getting answers to all of those questions.”

  She looked down at the floor, rubbing the back of her neck – until the sound of the windows suddenly rattling distracted her.

  Wind. Again. And already the sky was spitting tiny frozen drops against the windowpanes, crackling like gravel as they hit.

  “Apparently we won’t get any more answers at all today. Can you two go and make sure everything is closed down for the storm? In a little while we’ll get Max, Nathaniel, and Tobias all in here and we can discuss this news.”

  Linnea started to follow Nathaniel and Zander out of the room, but Quinn dashed in front of her and closed the door.

  “Is everything okay?” Linnea asked, frowning.

  “It is with me.” She didn’t add the obligatory, “except for what we just found out about the war,” statement – after this long, they were all too used to that to bother complaining.

  The expression on Linnea’s face changed from concern to suspicion. “And what do you think is wrong with me?”

  “I don’t have any idea. That’s why I’m asking.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Really? Then what was that with the being rude to Zander back there?”

  “He was rude just sticking his head in!”

  “As he’s been doing when he knows I’m discussing something with Marcus every day for moons now, Nay. I don’t have a secretary, and Zander outranks any guards who might be out there. He’s not the problem. Or, at least, his part of this problem is not the one I’m discussing right now.”

  Linnea’s cheeks went through three colors as she collapsed sideways onto a loveseat.

  Quinn closed her eyes and took a deep breath, consciously checking herself to make sure she wasn’t talking like a queen. She took off her shoes and climbed up on the arm of the loveseat, tucking her feet under a cushion near Linnea’s legs.

  “You know, back when we first got here, I thought you and Zander were getting along pretty well – it seemed like the two of you were talking a lot and… I don’t know. It was nice. But ever since James died… it’s been different. You’re snappy and edgy with him all the time.”

  “I’m almost eight moons pregnant, Quinn, and we’re in the middle of a war. My stomach is so huge I’m surprised I fit through doorways. I’m snappy and edgy at spoons.”

  Quinn set her elbows on her knees and her chin on her hands and stared, waiting.

  “What?”

  “Linnea, I’ve been your sister for entirely too long now to fall for that kind of nonsense.”

  Linnea huffed. “I liked you better when you were all shy and nervous and new.”

  “Yeah, well, I liked you better when… Okay, never, actually. I thought you were pretty awesome the first time I met you, and now that you’re my sister I think I must be the luckiest person in the world and I love you to pieces. So I’m not going to leave you alone until you tell me what’s going on.”

  “You’re insufferable.”

  “I learned from the best.”

  Linnea sighed, picking at a loose piece of cream-colored yarn on the blanket that hung over the back of the seat. “I don’t know. Everything you just said is true. I know I’ve been horrible the whole last couple of moons, but I don’t know why.”

  “You haven’t been horrible to everyone, Nay. Just to Zander.”

  Linnea’s eyes widened. “Did he say something?”

  “No. Honestly, I think he either doesn’t notice that you’re only doing it to him, or else… I don’t know. It’s kind of like he thinks he deserves it or something. He’s been different around you, too.”

  “Did you jump down his throat about it, too?”

  “Never mind. You are cranky to everyone.”

  “See?” Linnea kicked playfully at Quinn’s foot.

  Quinn rolled her eyes. “But no, I didn’t talk to him because he hasn’t been mean to you, just more distant than he was. And besides, while Zander and I can talk about a lot of things together now, I have a feeling this topic might never be an appropriate one for him and me.”

  Linnea was giving her a death glare now, but Quinn decided she didn’t care. Whatever was going on was making Linnea more miserable than she needed to be already.

  “Did you two kiss or something, Nay?”

  “No!” Linnea’s response was so emphatic and immediate that Quinn knew she wasn�
�t lying, but the brilliant magenta that lit up her cheeks and forehead gave away the rest of the story.

  “Oh, Nay.” She slid down onto the cushion beside Linnea, scooting as close to her as she could get. “You like him.”

  “No I don’t.”

  She raised an eyebrow.

  “I have a dead husband and I’m about to have a baby. We’re in the middle of a war. I can’t go liking a man from another world that my sister used to court. So no, I don’t.”

  Quinn reached for Linnea’s hand and squeezed it. “I don’t think it works that way. All of those things might be true, but none of them have anything to do with how you feel.”

  Linnea made a noise in the back of her throat. “I don’t know how I feel.”

  “That’s probably because you’ve loaded it all up with all of this other stuff about what you should and shouldn’t be allowed to feel. I’m not going to tell you what I think you should do, because I know I can’t anyway.”

  “There’s nothing for me to do, Quinn. It’s just how things are.”

  “No. You still have choices. For starters, it doesn’t matter even a little bit that Zander and I once dated. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m married now, and he doesn’t have feelings for me anymore. So as far as this little list you’re keeping in your head of why it’s impossible – you can cross that one off. You’ve got enough real issues without inventing ridiculous ones.”

  She chuckled, which made Quinn smile – and her heart ache. None of these things felt like excuses to Linnea. Everything just hurt.

  “Nay…” Her voice was nearly a whisper. “The last thing Ben would ever have wanted is for you to hold yourself back from something good for his sake.”

  The entire piece of yarn was going to come loose from that blanket – Linnea already had it halfway unraveled. “I know that. He was a guard – we had that conversation before he ever proposed. I think he’d come back and yell at me if he found out I wasn’t happy.”