by Elise Kova
“Let me say goodbye.”
“It is not done.”
“It is now,” I snap at him with a glare.
He takes another step forward, closing the distance once more with his long stride. I’m reminded that I’m dealing with a dangerous creature. He may look like a man, but I know the truth.
He’s nothing more than a tempest of raging magic.
“Very well.” His voice drops so only I can hear. “I will indulge you in this, as my future queen. And, also, because I know you have not had the benefit of being properly educated. You have not been trained to be my bride. But I do hope you are a fast learner because I will not tolerate my queen speaking to me in such a way.”
He wants me to cower. My knees are knocking in response to the silent demand. But I jut out my chin defiantly. I’m too tired to think sensibly—bravery and stupidity are two sides of the same coin. If he thinks he can “train” me I’m going to have to show him he has another thing coming from this queen.
“I will say goodbye.”
The king glowers at me, but stays put as I step away. His eyes dim once more and his magic releases its frigid hold. He knows I’m his, now and forevermore. He can handle not being in control for five more minutes so I can embrace my parents one last time.
I rush into my mother’s waiting arms. She leaps from my father to scoop me up. I hold out an arm and he joins too.
“Luella, Luella,” Mother weeps, as if my name is the only thing she knows how to say. “I’m so sorry.”
“I had no idea,” Father says.
“I know. I didn’t either.” We’re all in this terrible spot together, about to be ripped apart for good, and it’s all Luke’s fault. I might have always been destined to go. But he took a proper goodbye from me. I hope he rots in a cell forever for all he’s done.
“I’m sorry we didn’t ready you for this. Had we known, we would’ve.” Mother squeezes me tighter. If she keeps holding me that firmly, she’ll squeeze out the tears I’m holding back.
“I know,” I repeat and pull away. “Don’t cry, it’s all right,” I try and soothe as my own voice is cracking at the sight of my mother’s tears. “I know you would’ve let me prepare to be the queen. You didn’t know. None of us did. It wasn’t any of our faults.” I swallow hard, trying to drown my emotions. “But now I can go and I can make a difference. The Weakness will come to an end. It’s not as I wanted, but I can still help Capton.”
I squeeze both my parents tightly once more and stop trying to hold back the tears. I draw quivering breaths and weep with my family. It feels like the last thing we’ll ever do together.
“Midsummer,” Mother says.
“I’ll try.” I think of what Mister Abbot says. And about how I never heard of the Human Queen leaving the temple before. Hopefully I will be different.
“Luella.” The Elf King’s unfeeling voice breaks us apart. “We must leave.”
I hastily turn back to my parents. “Both of you, stay safe, all right? I’ll try and send letters. I love you both so very much.”
“Don’t go.” Mother grabs my hand.
“She has to.” Father wraps his arms around his wife, as if holding her back from me.
I take a step away, and then another. My mother’s fingers curl around mine, grasping like the vines that grew in the square. We separate and a chord of emotion snaps in me. It will never resonate with sound again. The sight of my mother’s face, the sound of her sobs, have muted whatever that happy feeling was for good.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper. Sorry for more than I can possibly comprehend in this moment.
Putting my back to them and the world I knew, I slowly trudge up to the man who is king, husband, and stranger to me.
“Thank you for giving me that,” I say begrudgingly.
“Let it be known I am kind,” he says gruffly and reaches out for me. His eyes remain normal—no bright flashes—so I hesitantly take his hand and walk willingly with him deeper into the woods along the path that snakes toward the base of the island’s tallest mountain.
The sound of my mother’s sobs fades. The echo of my father’s outburst of emotion as he broke down with her rings only in my ears. It’s long since stopped bouncing between the trees.
The elf legion follows us into the dark shadows of the deep woods. I move into the great unknown that is the Fade as a stranger queen. The path becomes broken and more overgrown than not. Cobblestones are now stepping stones.
Soon, there’s not a path at all. I have gone farther into the forest than ever before and the darkness of what I assume to be the Fade closes in around me.
The thick, shadowy mist blots out the trees. It curls around us and in the darkness I see the outlines of figures, wandering in the distance. Some look human, and others like beasts. I shudder, not entirely from the chill.
My fingers close a little more tightly around the king’s.
Surely, we must be at the foot of the mountain now? I look behind me and see nothing but elves and darkness. The deep woods thrum with anxious energy. There’s power here, pulled taut all around me, thrumming under the tension.
Then, in the distance, I see a glimmer of light. The inky blackness becomes tunneled. Trees are wedged so closely together that they form an almost perfect wall. Vines and branches arc overhead as the light grows.
Blinking, I emerge onto the other side of the Fade for the first time, and take my first steps into the city of the elves.
Chapter 6
We stand at the top of a long staircase—though not half as long as the steep path that leads up from Capton to the temple grounds. Behind me, a wall is cut into the mountainside. The only opening is the dark blemish in the smooth stone that we just emerged from.
Below us, a gray city sprawls in a valley nestled in a basin formed by mountains. Winter winds howl through the buildings and barren trees, racing to nip at my skin. It looks cold and closed, off-putting, and nothing like the warm cheer that I always imagined hovering over Capton.
“Welcome to your new home,” the king says, sounding anything but welcoming.
“It’s not what I would’ve expected.” My voice is cracking and tired from the rolling waves of emotion I’ve been sailing on.
“What would you have expected?”
“Something more…lavish.” The houses are simple, no nicer than what we have at Capton, albeit a different style of construction. Our homes are more pragmatic and boxy. These buildings have thatched roofs and offset second and third stories that make them look like teetering houses of cards.
Even though it is different, it is…dull. I had hoped for a world teeming with life and magic. But what I’m greeted with looks like a dreary painting where the artist forgot they had more colors than just blue and gray.
“Why would you think that?”
“Elves seem fancy enough. Based on the goods the Keepers always kept under lock.” I shrug. The sentiment reminds me of my few meager possessions in my attic bedroom—of the elvish teapot still in my shop. I clutch the satchel I took with me to the town hall this morning. At least I have something of home. Thank goodness I never leave without my journal and essentials.
He snorts and says nothing further on the matter, settling for a simple, “Come.”
I follow him down the steps with chattering teeth. The legion marches behind us. Even though it was a balmy dusk in Capton, it is a brisk winter’s dawn here. The city is waking up. The streets are still mostly empty. Everything is unnaturally quiet and covered with a frost to match the gray sky.
At the center of the city is a large lake. A river runs out from it to the mountain behind us, presumably into Capton. In the center of this lake is a sculpture of an elf man and human woman.
I pause. The king stops as well, as does the legion, several paces behind. “Is that the first Human Queen?”
He hesitates a moment, as if debating if he should answer. “It is. And one of my long ago predecessors.”
“Predecesso
rs?” I look to him. “You’re not the Elf King?”
“What a strange question.” He narrows his eyes at me. “How could you doubt after all that has transpired?”
“No, I…” I pinch the bridge of my nose and sigh. It has been a very long day. “I thought all the Human Queens were married to the same Elf King.”
He tilts his head back and laughs. It would be a lovely sound if not for being at my expense. “You think one man has been alive for three thousand years?”
“Well…”
“The rumors of elves’ life spans are greatly exaggerated in your human stories. We elves live about as long as the humans of Capton do.” The king stares down at me. “Our lives became tied to each other from the moment we were wed. When you die, I will be marked for death not long after.”
“Then, your father was the king married to Alice?”
He goes rigid, tense. The muscles in his jaw bulge as he fights back whatever his first instinct told him to say. “He was.”
Without another word on the matter, we continue forward. Though I would’ve given anything to stop and probe the depths of the emotions he was trying to hide. What was Alice to him? And what was her place in this world really like?
I look back to the statue of the first Elf King and Human Queen. The king holds a large tablet in his hands, hoisting it upward. The queen is on her knees before him. Hands pressed into the ground at his feet, as if in servitude.
I study the timeworn details of the sculpture, trying to glean what information I can from it. But the appearances of the king and queen have faded and are covered in frost and snow. Still, I want to find something to feel toward her—the first woman to willingly put herself in my position for the sake of peace between humans and the creatures of magic beyond the Fade.
Her magic is in me now, if the stories are true about the magic being passed down from queen to queen.
“How could you tell I was the queen?” I ask as we approach a castle in the distance. It’s wedged between two mountains, the castle spanning the entire width of the opening that connects this valley to whatever world is beyond. The king glances at me and I can’t tell if he’s annoyed I broke the silence yet again or not. I continue anyway, “I understand that the necklace was trying to conceal me—my magic—but how did you know before you took it off?”
“I saw you performing magic.”
“But didn’t the black obsidian hide my magic?”
“Some people can never be hidden; they are meant to be seen.”
“You were certain,” I persist, not taking his vague, poetic answer.
“I touched you,” he says simply.
“You knew from a touch?”
“You heard earlier, the necklace was labradorite and black obsidian. The black obsidian was to conceal your power. Labradorite is a rare stone mined here in Midscape that can prevent me, or any other elf, from performing the Knowing. Usually, labradorite blocks both the Knowing from sight and by touch. However—”
“Wait, what is the Knowing?”
He sighs, as if the conversation is quickly becoming tedious. Too bad for him I don’t care about being a pain. I care about answers.
“The Knowing is when an elf identifies the true name of an object, creature, or person. A true name is sound given to the raw essence of what something is—something unique to every creature and thing. Elves perform the Knowing by sight, or touch, and our innate magic,” he says. “Once a true name is known, the elf can manipulate the creature or thing at will.”
“An elf can do anything to something or someone they have a true name of?” I think of Luke, contorting painfully.
“As long as an elf has a true name, they are limited only by their own powers and imagination.”
I try to suppress a shudder and fail. “And you know my true name now?”
“Yes. I could sense your true name despite the labradorite when we touched—something I shouldn’t have been able to do. The labradorite should have protected you. But I could sense your true name because you are the Human Queen and were destined for me since birth. And as I’ve said, even if I hadn’t touched you, I saw you perform rudimentary magic without realizing it.” His feet slow to a stop as we near a square before a giant portcullis. “Speaking of labradorite, you will need this for your time here. Your hand, please.”
I oblige. He pulls out a ring made of the same rainbow stone—what I now know as labradorite—and slips it on my left ring finger. I fight the urge to rip it off. All I see is another token of that terrible stone which a man has put on me, trying to claim me. All I can think of is Luke.
“Must I?” I whisper.
“Yes,” he says firmly. Though the Elf King hesitates just before letting my hand go. “If you wish to change the finger it’s on, then you may do so. I hardly care if you wear it as a symbol of our marriage. It is merely to protect you from other elves performing the Knowing on you. Should someone else learn your true name, it could be dangerous.”
“Would someone hurt me?”
“No queen or king is without enemies,” he answers gravely, nodding back toward the legion behind us.
“Who—” Before I can get the question out I’m silenced by what looks to be a general approaching.
Her skin is a rich brown and her long tresses are black, streaked with bright blue. Her eyes are the color of churned-up sea. A sword is attached to her hip and her movements are clipped and rigid. Three cords are attached to embellished pauldrons on her shoulders. Decorative buttons are pinned over her breast.
The buttons remind me painfully of the ornate pin my father was given when he first became a council member. I take a deep breath, trying to choke down a sudden wave of emotion. I’m struggling to find my footing in a new world. I can’t have some buttons be the thing that has me a weeping mess in front of the Elf King and his soldiers.
“Your Majesty.” She bows her head.
“Take the queen to her apartments and see her dressed as is fitting of her station. We can’t wait a moment longer. It grows colder by the hour.” The king’s words condense into white puffs as if for emphasis.
“Yes, my liege.”
The Elf King wastes no time leaving me in his dust with this woman.
“Wait!” I call after him. He pauses, glancing over his shoulder. One dark eyebrow arches. “What’s your name?”
The thin line of his mouth splits into a smirk, as if he also can’t believe he married someone who didn’t know his name. “You may call me your king, or your majesty, or your liege.”
I’m not taking that answer. No. Not for a moment.
“What would I call you if I was your friend?” My question gives him pause; his face relaxes into something I’d almost say is vulnerable.
“I don’t have friends,” he says faintly. Others may interpret the tone as cool indifference. But I hear a hurt I don’t yet understand drifting through his words.
“Your subjects then?”
He grimaces at that, but finally relents. “King Eldas. I will see you in an hour. We will begin then.”
Chapter 7
“Begin what?” I ask. I know his tall ears can hear me. But he doesn’t stop again. He turns a corner in the dark tunnel ahead of me and is gone.
I am now alone with an unfamiliar elf, who leads a legion of more unfamiliar elves, in an unfamiliar land of wild magic. The Human Queen merely exists. It seemed so unfair. But now that the butt that’s in that throne is mine, I’d be happy to just sit and catch my breath.
It’s been a long, long day.
However, if I’m only meant to sit…what “work” is there to do?
“Come along, Your Majesty.” The way the elf general has to force the formality through gritted teeth tells me that, even if she knew the Human Queen would arrive, she’s not exactly pleased to be answering to a human now. “I’ll show you to your royal apartments.”
As she goes to leave I notice a gash, gnarly and scabbed over, on the hand she rests on the pommel of her
sword. Infection reddens its edges. “I can look at that,” I say, without thinking.
The general stops, blinking several times at me. She finally asks, “Look at what?”
“Your hand.” I’m already rummaging through my satchel. I used up some supplies with Emma, but I should still have—
“It’s merely a training accident,” she says dismissively.
“Well, it’s getting infected and it won’t be any trouble for me.” I find the jar of salve I was looking for. It’s good for minor injuries.
“We have a castle healer for such things,” the general says before I can even get the jar from my satchel.
“Yes, but I have—”
“You are a queen,” she interrupts me in a low and intense tone. Her eyes dart back to the knights still several paces behind. “Healing someone like me is beneath you.”
Beneath me? Healing and helping is…beneath me now? The words grate against everything I’ve ever known.
Suddenly, the grays of this place are darker, more shadowed. Everything takes on a dingier and duller edge, if that were possible. I’ve been taken from my home, my people, my family, and now they’re going to take me from the one thing I’m good at? The one thing I’ve worked toward?
I try and work up my courage, opening my mouth. But I don’t get a word in.
“Now come this way, please.” She has to grit out the word “please,” as if my offer was that shocking, or troublesome to her.
Only a sigh escapes my lips. I can’t fight any of this. Focusing too much on that will overwhelm me with everything that’s been taken from me. The best thing I can do, for now, is try and survive.
I can’t pass judgment on this life until I try and live it. Hopefully it will surprise me. And, if it doesn’t…I just have to remember that my presence here has put an end to the Weakness in Capton and has ensured another one hundred years of peace.
The castle is more of a fortress that’s been built directly out of the mountainside, and I wonder what it’s meant to keep out. Cut through the fortress’s center is a single pathway of stone, two portcullises on either end. The cobblestone road has been smoothed with time; deep ruts from carts span the length of the path.