by Elise Kova
That can’t have been real. Tell me this is all a nightmare, I want to scream.
But as I straighten, I can’t help but see. The square has become something out of a storybook. Plants and humans pulse with a greenish light. Inanimate objects are gray.
I blink several times, watching the auras fade in and out of my awareness. Everything around me is awash with the same color…except for him.
The king is a pale blue. The aura that surrounds him is unlike the still, orderly magic of life. His magic is writhing, angry, and violent. Much like the scowl on his face. Whatever vision I was granted fades as I continue to gape at him.
He stares down at me, eyes unreadable, brow furrowed.
“What…” I rasp, trying to find my voice. “How?”
He tilts his head to the side. “So you truly did not know.”
“I…” My throat closes and I choke on air.
Know.
Know I am the Human Queen, he means.
“Tell me what’s happening?” I manage, but am ignored.
“So the question becomes, who?” The king turns, sweeping his eyes across the square. The people I once knew, my friends and family, gaze in shock and awe. “Who hid her? Who gave her this?” the king demands, holding up the necklace he tore from my throat.
“That…” The moment I speak, the Elf King’s eyes are back on me, accusatory and oppressive. Even if I had the capacity to lie, I couldn’t. My eyes have already betrayed me as they dart over to my caged childhood friend. “Luke. It was a gift from Luke.”
“How dare you,” Luke seethes at me. His face is ugly, horrible. It is the face of hatred. The eyes I’d dreamed about—eyes that, hours ago, looked at me with admiration as he declared he would marry me—I now can’t recognize. “I loved you, I wanted to protect you and now you’d condemn me?”
“It…it would’ve come out anyway.” I defend my actions by instinct. It only makes him scowl deeper. Can’t he see the best possible way forward is honesty? I’m sure this is all some kind of misunderstanding. It has to be.
“What is the meaning of this?” the Head Keeper demands.
“What did you do?” another one of the Keepers asks.
Luke says nothing. He continues to dig daggers into me with his eyes alone, holding me to the ground as if I am nothing more than dirt to him.
He said he loved me.
The king marches over and the stone prison containing him melts away. He grips Luke’s face so tightly his nails dig into his chin, drawing blood. “Tell them what you did,” the king growls.
“I did nothing,” Luke claims.
The Elf King casts Luke into the center of the square, in a circle created by all those gathered. Luke staggers, spinning, searching for someone to take his side. We can all hear the lie in his voice. His eyes land on me. They beg for something I don’t know if I can give. I might have been able to, once, but not anymore.
“Tell her what you did,” the king commands.
“I tried to take you away,” Luke breathes. I can see his eyes are red, tears welling in them. “Why didn’t you leave with me?”
“How did she get this?” The Elf King shoves the necklace Luke gave me in his face.
“Someone, help me, why won’t anyone help me?” Luke turns, begging the townsfolk.
No one comes forward.
“What happened?” I finally find my voice. Using what remains of my strength, I stand, collecting myself and my satchel from where it fell at my side. “Tell me,” I demand.
He crumples. “I… I never meant for you to get hurt. I never meant for any of this to happen.” I can see the lie in Luke’s shifting eyes as he speaks. Lies, lies, lies. “I thought…I thought we could find another way.”
“What’re you saying?” I whisper. Luke’s eyes come back to me.
“Do you remember the day I went with you and Emma to the forest? When we were twelve? It was the first time she had one of her attacks and you made her a potion.” I do remember, exactly as he says. “I saw it then—how you wielded magic without realizing it. How tiny flowers sprouted in your footprints among the grasses behind you without you ever knowing. How the trees seemed to rustle in greeting as you passed and yet you always thought it was the wind.”
The forest had seemed so alive when I was a child, like it was its own person—a friend, as much as a place. I thought it had just been something that vanished with age and maturity. But now I’m not sure.
“I knew you were the queen,” he admits. The townsfolk gasp.
The Head Keeper steps forward. “How dare you.” She says what everyone is thinking.
“But I couldn’t give you up. I wouldn’t. I loved you then as I love you now,” Luke continues, speaking only for me. “So I found the necklace in the Keepers’ stores and gave it to you. I thought it would keep you hidden and when we were old enough I would—”
“Take me away,” I finish with a whisper. He swallows thickly and nods.
As if on command, the king throws the necklace he ripped from my throat to the stage. It lands at the feet of the Head Keeper.
“Elvish make, an old style of token. We have not traded goods of this like with Capton in centuries, so I have no doubt it was buried deep. Black obsidian to mute her powers and labradorite to protect her from the Knowing should she encounter any elves who attempted to discover her true name.”
I look to the necklace and then back to Luke. “You said it would protect me.”
“I was trying to spare you,” Luke pleads with a high-pitched, whining voice that I’ve never heard from him before. “I thought I could save you from a terrible future.”
Luke’s actions, my abilities to heal, the fact that I always felt duty bound, it all makes sense now. Terrible, horrible sense.
“Luella.” Luke staggers toward me. “I loved you, even then. I was made for you, and you were made for me.”
A willowy arm blocks Luke’s path, preventing him from drawing any closer to me. I never thought I’d be grateful for the Elf King. But I don’t know what I’d do if Luke dared to touch me right now. It’s hard enough to have him just look at me.
“No,” I breathe to Luke. “You don’t love me, you never did.”
He tries to step around the Elf King. But the king continues to position himself in Luke’s way, grabbing Luke’s wrist.
“You must believe me. All I did was try and save you from this wretched future.”
“You tried to save me at the expense of everyone I loved! You would see them all suffer and die because you wanted to keep me hidden for yourself.”
“Because of love!”
“This isn’t love!” I allow my voice to echo to the mountaintops. The trees shudder at my rage. Their roots quake the foundation of the earth deep below my feet. The wind howls and storms close in on the horizon. “Love is choice,” I continue before he can get another word out. “You—you wanted to own me. You wanted to keep me for yourself regardless of how I may have felt. You never even allowed me to make the decision on my own and now our town, our people, have suffered because of your selfishness. I shudder to think what might have happened to our whole world if you had gotten your way.”
Every funeral we attended of townsfolk, dead before their time from the Weakness, flashes before me. Luke, standing with the other Keepers, mourning for their loss as though he actually cared—as if his actions hadn’t led to their deaths. His tears meant nothing then and his remorse means just as much now.
“Luella—”
“Stop,” I whisper. “Never say my name again.” I barely stop from wishing the earth would open up and swallow him whole. With how I feel right now…it just might heed my command. “Get rid of him. I want him gone,” I ask no one in particular. I don’t care who does the deed.
It’s the Elf King who heeds me. He rips off Luke’s Keeper bracelet without a second of hesitation. His eyes flash a bright blue, he crosses his arms before him, and then slowly pulls them apart—as though he’s stretching t
affy between his hands. Luke goes rigid and he hovers on his toes unnaturally. The king’s fingers tense further, pulling. A pathetic, whining sound escapes Luke as he contorts. Popping fills the air. The townsfolk begin to scream.
“No! Don’t hurt him!” I rush over to the Elf King and grab his arm. He looks at the contact with an air of shock and offense. “I don’t want him dead.” My heart is being torn apart; I can’t bear witnessing Luke being ripped in two. The Elf King tries to shrug me off but I hold fast, digging in my heels. “He must be tried by the Capton Council. He must atone for his crimes as is fair and just.”
The Elf King narrows his eyes at me in a scowl and, for a moment, I think he might ignore me. I don’t release him. What more can he want to take from this town? He already has my life. If I am the Human Queen—and I am, there’s no denying it after that display earlier—he should need nothing more.
“Luke doesn’t matter to you,” I say, my voice thin. “My people will see justice done. You have me, let him go.”
The king releases Luke and he crumples to the ground, gasping. Two Keepers step forward and grab him underneath his arms. They begin to drag him away, Luke begging and muttering apologies the entire time.
None of the townsfolk listen. They glare openly at him, their faces cold and closed.
The Elf King turns to me. “Come, Queen, we must depart immediately. You are needed across the Fade,” he says gravely.
I’m numb from the top of my head to my toes. He grabs my arm, summoning me back to reality. I glare up at him. A thousand objections live on my tongue and yet I can’t muster the strength to say any of them.
Since I was a girl, I’ve been taught the fate of the Human Queen. If I tell him of my duties as a healer, my pleas will fall on deaf ears. If I beg him to let me stay a little longer, I know he will refuse because this is the way of things.
If I refuse to go, my world dies.
“There is no time. You and I must be wed.”
Chapter 5
We are to be wed. Me. To the Elf King. I can’t think straight.
“When?” I manage to ask.
“Now. Time is of the essence,” the Head Keeper says.
My attention shifts off the Head Keeper, landing on a man beside her—my father. My ribs collapse on my lungs and I let out a soft gasp of air that chokes into an emotion rawer than tears.
“But—” I start.
“There is no time,” the king says gruffly. “The fact that I was able to come here and use so much wild magic on this plane is proof enough that the Fade is wavering. The lines between our worlds are blurring—which, let me assure you, is something you do not want.”
I seek a flicker of some kindness or resignation in the king’s eyes. But all I see is sheer determination. I wonder if he is enduring this on strength of will alone too. I wonder what he’s hiding underneath his carefully composed surface. Maybe he’s hiding nothing and he is just a man of stone and magic.
“We will do it now,” the Keeper says.
I search in the crowd for my mother, but I can’t find her. Between the brush and the trees, magically created, and the fact that almost all of Capton has assembled, she’s nowhere to be seen. I turn back to my father. His mouth is pressed in a hard line. He says nothing.
He knows this must be done, just as I do. There is no choice.
We march in a large group up to the Temple. I am silent, rigid, walking at the side of the Elf King. I try and keep my head high, but I am tired, so tired. One moment I was in the town square. The next, I’m in the main hall of the temple being anointed with oil, townsfolk surrounding me, the Head Keeper leafing through a giant tome on the altar.
Sunlight streams down through the stained glass behind the Head Keeper. It hits my shoulders, but fails to light up the dark hollow growing inside of me. I’m surrounded—people are packed into the neat rows of redwood pews, carved from the mighty trees surrounding the temple—yet I feel alone. I don’t even have it in me to admire the organic architecture of the temple like I usually would, with all its vaulted ceilings supported by gnarled branches, as if it was grown rather than made in the shade of the great redwood at the heart of the temple.
Deafening silence rings in my ears as I stand opposite the Elf King. I’m about to get married…to the Elf King. That thought nearly makes me throw up.
“Can I have a moment?” I whisper.
“There is no time,” the Head Keeper whispers back, not unkindly.
“For the washroom, please.” I’m going to be sick. Or pass out. Maybe both, one right after the other.
“This will be over soon.” She’s found her page and begins reading from it. “Before the old gods, in the remnants of the keep of the once-kingdom of Alvarayal, in the shadow of the original keystone, we honor the pact made…”
Don’t be sick. Don’t be sick. I no longer hear the Head Keeper. All I hear in my head is that singular phrase repeating over and over.
The Elf King raises his hands. The sensation of his eyes boring into my forehead brings my eyes up to his. I swallow dryly.
“Let their hands first be joined,” the Head Keeper repeats firmly and with some agitation. It must be the second time she’s said it. I barely resist snapping at her that I have no idea what’s going on.
Usually, the Human Queen is identified at sixteen or seventeen. She has a year or three to study in the temple under the Keepers. She is fed food from beyond the Fade, taught the elvish ways, and studies the secret knowledge the Keepers protect.
The Elf King holds out his hands expectantly. I lift my trembling fingers and place them in his. His cool grip closes around mine. His eyes flash a bright blue just like they did before he made a prison for Luke.
I suppose I am headed to a different type of prison.
A chill breeze sweeps through me. It’s brisk, bracing, but I’m not left shivering. I stand taller. The ice condenses in the back of my head, radiating cool composure down my spine and into my limbs. My eyes are locked on his as my mouth moves.
“I will honor the pact,” I say. I think I’m repeating the Head Keeper, but I can’t be sure. I can’t be sure of anything beyond the Elf King. Have I ever laid eyes on someone—on anything—more perfect before? How could I have been afraid of this?
This is right. This is how the world should have been all along. A deep sense of unnatural calm fills me.
“I will honor the pact,” he repeats.
“I will fulfill my obligation to this world and those on the other side of the Fade.” We begin to repeat back and forth. “I will uphold the keystones. I will use the powers passed down through my blood by destiny for the betterment of us all—for peace. I will uphold the order that is both natural and crafted.
“I will honor my husband.”
“I will honor my wife.”
Yeah, right, my mind blurts treacherously. But the thought is frosted over by my resolve. I am marrying a king of ice. I will have to be a frigid queen to match.
The Head Elder says a few more words, and the deed is done.
We unclasp our hands and for the second time in one day I stare at mine. What magic was wrought here? What have I done?
I’m married, that’s what I’ve done. Whenever I imagined myself as married—if I imagined myself as married—Luke was standing across from me. I return my gaze to the Elf King’s, seeing his shining blue eyes still on me.
“We should make for the Fade,” he says.
I nod.
The king holds out his hand for me and I take it. His skin is smooth, and cool to the touch, his grip unexpectedly gentle. He leads me by our joined palms in an awkward, rigid way. We walk out of the sanctum, around its side, and start down a side path. I know without needing to be told that this will take us toward the Fade.
The townsfolk collect behind us, moving silently to hover at the foot of the path. The forest is damp; the trees tangle their boughs in the fog like fingers in the hair of a lover. I see flowers bud up, blooming alongside me as
I walk. They open to face me, as if bidding me farewell from this world.
Farewell… I shiver but the thought sticks to my mind. Farewell, I’m leaving. I shiver again, more violently this time, and can almost imagine invisible ice shaking from my shoulders. That cold core in the back of my mind fractures.
“Luella!” I hear my mother’s voice, breaking the silence and decorum.
My fragile composure shatters.
I look over my shoulder. We’ve gone farther than I thought. My mother and father stand at the entrance to the path, down by the sanctum. My father holds tightly onto her, smoothing her ruby hair from her tear-streaked cheeks. He murmurs something I cannot hear. But I can see the words are physically painful for him to say.
“Luella!” she shrieks again.
“Mother!” My heart is racing once more. Heat floods my body and my cheeks. I drop my hand from the king’s and begin to run.
He grabs my elbow. I spin in place. “We must go beyond the Fade. There is precious little time.”
The Elf King’s eyes are back to their normal color. The bright magic that shimmered in them is gone. It’s then I realize what he did.
“You used magic on me,” I whisper in realization. That frosty chill, his glowing eyes, both traits I’m beginning to associate with elf magic. Hatred mixes with horror in my gut and twists my face. “The ceremony—”
“You needed to comply.”
“You bastard.” I rip myself from his person once more. Damn his Fade. Damn the wedding. Damn men who think they can manipulate me down an aisle.
An oath taken under magic influence shouldn’t be upheld. But I know no one will take my side.
I am the Human Queen. Even if I wasn’t trained for my role, I know enough from the stories that are rooted deeper in the social fabric of Capton than the trees around me that the Human Queen has no choice. By magic or circumstance…the oath I took was forced.
“How dare you,” he seethes at my language.