She regarded our little group critically, and a smug smirk played across her lips. “Curlin, darling, you’ve let yourself go,” she scolded. “Come back to the fold. Your punishment will be gentle, I promise. No more than a few years of hard labor before you’re allowed to start working your way back up to your former rank.”
Curlin, remarkably, kept her face impassive.
Aphra cleared her throat. “Listen to me. Hear me. Open your minds to Curlin’s words.”
The Shriven stopped shifting in place and exchanging glances with one another. The weight of their focus landed squarely on Curlin.
“We, the leaders of the fight for reform in the colony of Ilor, come before you to offer you a chance. A choice. A chance that I was given not a few months ago. A choice I resisted.” Curlin paused for a moment, surveyed the group of Shriven. “We will meet you on the battlefield in two days, but you do not have to fight. Until dawn two days from now, we will grant complete amnesty to any of the Shriven who come to our camp and willingly surrender their weapons. You will not be asked to fight against your brothers and sisters. We ask nothing of you, beyond laying down your arms.”
Curlin swallowed, as if fighting back tears. “I was forced to join the Shriven when I was still a child. I had no option, no other choice. I did terrible things that I will regret for the rest of my life while under orders. It wasn’t until my matron left me for dead, and my childhood friend—whom I’d betrayed over and over again—decided to save my life, that I was given another chance. I know that there are those among you who joined willingly, who love what you do, who believe in the original ideals of the order, and I can respect that. But those ideals have been warped and stripped away by the corruption of the Suzerain.” Her gaze went hard. “I know you see it. I did. So I’m here to offer you another way. A way out.”
Aphra smiled at Curlin.
“Hear the truth in her words, and consider it as you resume your daily lives. You have until dawn two days from now.”
Curlin gave the Shriven a four-fingered salute, wheeled her horse around and nudged him to a brisk canter. Quill and Aphra followed suit, but I waited just a moment, looking out into the crowd. Past the paint, the tattoos and the shorn heads, making eye contact with the faces I knew. Making sure they saw me recognize them. Forcing them to see me.
Then I awkwardly turned Beetle’s head and followed the others back into the jungle.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Bo
“I thought I knew what it was to be alone before, but now loneliness surrounds me, envelops me. Even when I am surrounded by dozens of courtiers or hundreds of soldiers, absence follows me like a dark and overwhelming shadow.”
—from Bo to Vi
Noriava’s personal doctor appeared mere minutes after she sent for him. Despite the late hour, the man’s salt-and-pepper hair was perfectly coiffed and his white coat pristine. I watched, fighting back tears, as the doctor slipped a needle into Swinton’s arm. Swinton fought against the restraints for another moment before he went suddenly stiff and slumped in his chair.
“He’ll be out for a few hours. Long enough to get him to the institution in Marvella,” the doctor said, bowing to Noriava. “I’ll have the transport readied.”
I flew off the chair where I’d been perched, watching, and went to stand in front of Swinton. “You’re not taking him anywhere.”
Noriava sighed. “Be reasonable, Bo. We have facilities to treat the diminished. He’ll be well cared for.”
I gritted my teeth. “You think that I would trust you for a single second after what you did tonight? He’s not leaving my sight.”
“Your Highness, there is no way to keep you safe while he’s being treated if he remains here. Please. You must consider your safety and the safety of the palace staff,” the doctor said.
“Your Majesty,” I corrected stiffly. “It’s his safety I’m worried about. There’s a small servant’s room in my suite. It’s windowless, and I’m sure there’s someone in this godsforsaken palace who can find a way to install a lock on the door.”
The doctor looked to Noriava for direction, and she rolled her eyes. “Fine. But the moment he injures someone, he’s off to an institution.”
“But in the meantime, he’ll see a specialist,” I insisted. “Starting tomorrow.”
Noriava nodded and looked at her doctor. “Send someone first thing, and ring for our guests’ butler on your way out. The servant’s room will need to be swept for danger. The guards can take him to the king’s suite.”
“There’s no need for anyone else but a doctor to get involved. We can take care of him,” I snapped. “Pem. Still. I want you to go through that room with a fine-tooth comb. Remove everything he could use to hurt himself or anyone else.”
Pem and Still nodded, their faces grim. “Do you want us to wait for you?” Still asked. “We could help you get Swinton to his room.”
I shook my head. “I’ll be right behind you.”
When the door swung closed behind them, I turned to face Noriava. “I know you think you have all the power in this situation, but I could easily make your life miserable. Don’t try to double-cross me again. There will be consequences if you violate the terms of our agreement in any way.”
With that, I unbuckled Swinton’s restraints, heaved his limp body over my shoulder and carried him out of the room. I had to stop and lean against the smooth stone walls of the palace corridors several times on the way to my suite, but I managed to get Swinton back without dropping him. Pem and Still leaped up when I opened the door, and together, we managed to get Swinton into the narrow bed. I removed his boots, belt and knives, then tucked a down comforter around him.
As I eased the door shut, I saw a pair of thick dead bolts had been hastily installed on the gilded birchwood door. “They didn’t waste any time, did they?” I asked, fighting back tears as I slid the locks into place.
“They were in and out before you got here. Guess Noriava ain’t real good at listening. We figured we’d take shifts watching him,” Pem said.
“I’m going first,” Still added. “So that you can get some sleep.”
“No. I’ll just make a pallet on the floor so that I can be here if he needs anything,” I said, a sob cracking my voice. “I don’t want him to feel alone.”
Pem and Still came and wrapped their arms around me, hugging me between them as I cried. I swallowed hard, wiped away the tears streaming down my cheeks and squeezed my sisters. They helped me drag a pile of pillows and furs and blankets off my bed. We built a nest on the floor outside Swinton’s room, and as the first gray light of dawn patterned the carpet by the windows, the girls went to bed, and I settled myself on the floor.
Gentle hands shook me awake sometime later, and though the light filtering in through the windows said I’d been asleep for hours, it felt like seconds. I dragged myself up to a sitting position against the doorframe and rubbed my eyes. The night before came flooding back to me, and through the door, I heard the sounds of muffled sobs. I started to get up, to reach for the door, but a hand reached out and stopped me.
“Before you open the door, may I ask you a few questions, Your Majesty?”
The woman’s voice was low and lilting and achingly calm. She crouched on the floor beside my pallet, her smooth brown cheeks flushed, her eyes bright and inquisitive. She wore a long, cream-colored jacket over loose black trousers and a faded blue sweater, and her hair was arranged in long twists that she’d tied back with a cord. Her jacket was fitted with a number of pockets, all bristling with bottles, pens, small pads of paper and medical instruments I couldn’t identify.
She smiled at me, and something in her manner put me immediately at ease. “Your Majesty, I’m Doctor Tresley Rutin,” she said. “Doctor Loviar said that your friend was in need of assistance.”
She offered me her hand, and I shook it. Her long
, elegant fingers were cool, but strong. “He’s been poisoned,” I explained. “From what I understand, the drug mimics the violence of the diminished. I don’t know how much help you can give him. Noriava said that the Denorian scientists could make an antidote, but until then...”
Doctor Rutin smiled gently. “My colleagues in the Institute are already hard at work trying to understand the sample you gave the queen. If anyone can find a way to reverse the effects of such a dangerous, potent drug, it’s them. Doctor Loviar sent me to you, though, because my life’s work has been in the treatment and care for the diminished who become drægoners. I’ve had a great deal of success in helping them learn to control their impulses through a combination of talk therapy and, for some, medication. I’d like to see if I can help your friend.”
“Honestly, Doctor—and I do hate to offend—but how can I possibly trust the care of the man I love with someone in the employ of Queen Noriava, when she’s the person who did this to him?”
Pem and Still appeared in the doorway, short knives sparking in each of their hands, ready to pounce should I give them so much as a nod.
Doctor Rutin’s mouth compressed into a thin line. “Queen Noriava did not send me here. Gracious though she is, she has a country to run and no time to track the whereabouts of a humble doctor. As I said, Doctor Loviar thought I might be able to assist.”
“You swear Noriava hasn’t ordered you to make him worse?”
“Do you know the Denorian motto, by chance?”
I racked my brain, trying to remember. Our tutors had forced Claes and me to learn all of them in our lessons years ago. They were all in long-forgotten languages that had been dead even before the cataclysm. The motto of Alskad, In septentrione futura via est, was supposed to be something about the future being in the North, which just seemed like a way to make the early settlers feel better about having chosen such a cold, dark place to make their home. The Denorian motto had been taken from another dead language and, if our tutors were to be believed, was actually a phrase misremembered from the oath doctors had taken before the cataclysm.
It came to me in a flash, triggered by my negotiation with Noriava the night before. “Ikke skade når du kan helbrede,” I said, stumbling over the unfamiliar pronunciation. “Harm not, when you might heal.”
I wondered if Noriava had ever learned the phrase.
Doctor Rutin nodded. “I, like my colleagues and many of my fellow citizens, take that very seriously. I am first a healer, second a Denorian and third employed by the queen of Denor. Please let me help your friend.”
I swallowed, the sour taste of sleep still thick in my mouth. “Thank you. I care about him a great deal. I will be greatly in your debt if you can alleviate his suffering, even a little.”
“Bo.” Still crossed the room, thumbing one of her blades in a way that was meant to look menacing, but really just made me cringe. “The queen’s sent someone to bring you to see the troops. We can stay and make sure she don’t do anything untoward to Swinton.”
Doctor Rutin managed to keep a smile off her lips, but she couldn’t control the twinkle in her eyes. “I’ll certainly keep myself under control with two such ferocious guards watching over me. You go and see to the troops, Your Majesty. I’ll be here when you return.”
Grateful to have found an ally, I stood and retreated to my room to find something to wear that might impress the troops—or, at the very least, hide the circles under my eyes.
* * *
I met Noriava in a wide hall lined with weapons and armor in a mind-boggling variety of styles. There were entire suits made of metal, some polished and shining, some pitted with rust. Mannequins wore black vests thick with layers of metal and padding meant to protect the wearer from weapons long forgotten. Plates of hardened leather adorned others of the faceless horde. It was as though she’d unearthed a collection, a museum that had somehow avoided destruction in the cataclysm.
Noriava herself was decked out in utterly impractical gold armor over a frothy white gown. A thin, delicate sword that even I knew was meant for unarmored shows of fencing skill, not actual combat, was strapped to her side with a gilded belt. Her long red hair was knotted into an elaborate updo and topped with not one, but two golden crowns. One looked like a replica of the simple jeweled circlet I wore, the emblem of Alskad, while the other was a heavily embellished spiked tiara with a massively luminous circle of opal in the center.
She looked ridiculous.
“Are you ready to go and meet your troops, my darling?”
Noriava’s tone was treacle-sweet and dripping with condescension. The nearby guards shifted and exchanged subtle glances, but I ignored her and stalked up to the double doors at the end of the hall. I shook the golden cuff out of my sleeve and clasped my hands behind my back, fighting the urge to adjust the crown atop my head or check the collar of my charcoal wool jacket. As I approached, Noriava laced her arm through mine, and at her signal, the doors swung open.
Unlike every other day I’d spent in Denor, the sun was bright and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. The Denorian troops stood in neat rows, their pristine white dress uniforms stark against the black stone of the courtyard. The men and women of the Denorian army wore both pistols and swords at their waists and held quarterstaves in the crooks of their arms. A company of crossbow specialists stood with their legs wide, weapons angled at the ground and thick bolts in quivers strapped to their thighs. A line of commanders paced before the troops, stopping to correct even the tiniest mistakes in dress or stance.
The moment we stepped onto the small platform in the far corner of the courtyard, the troops snapped simultaneously into a sharp, four-fingered salute. Before Noriava had the chance to greet them, I moved forward to speak.
I’d been rehearsing what I would say to the troops, trying to remember the right Denorian words for the sentiment I wanted to convey. I knew I would stumble, but the least I could do was try. I cleared my throat. “Someone recently reminded me of the Denorian motto. Though it is, perhaps, a bit ironic to ask a group of soldiers to repeat a pacifist’s motto, would you indulge me?”
I raised my hand, and on my count, the voices of the entire Denorian army blended with mine as we called out this idea in a language no one actually spoke anymore.
“Ikke skade når du kan helbrede.”
The words echoed off the walls, and I let the waves of sound linger for a moment before I began to speak again. “Out of harm’s way. Denor has been lucky. Since the cataclysm—even during the cataclysm—your people were protected. You’ve remained out of harm’s way.” I shifted and looked out across the silent crowd of soldiers, searching for faces with whom I could connect. “I stand before you today, not as a foreign king deposed, not as the betrothed of your queen, but as a man who has seen great harm done to his people, and who is asking for your support.
“The leaders of the temple in Alskad and Ilor are murdering my people. They have ripped stability and peace from my lands. They’ve created a poison that makes people unstoppably violent and cruel. The temple has put in place a regent who’s called for all of the Alskader diminished to be rounded up and brought to the temple, where gods only know what horrors are being enacted upon them. I cannot stand by and watch this happen. So I’ve come to ask for your help—to ask you to stand beside me, to keep the temple and its corrupt anchorites and the Suzerain from doing more harm.”
I lifted my chin and raised my voice for emphasis. “The Suzerain and their backers won’t stop with my land. No place in the habitable world will be safe if they get their way. So I stand before you not to ask you to go to war for me, but to fight with me, to help the people of Alskad find their way back to peace. To safety. Will you help me save my people from harm?”
A roar erupted from the crowd, and as the army pounded their staffs on the black stone floor, a chant rose from the crowd.
“Harm not,” they cried,
“when you might heal!”
Over and over their voices rose, until birds darted out from under the eaves, fleeing the cacophony. But I remained, staring up at the sky, letting the sound wash over me. It should have sounded like relief, like hope. But instead it sounded like chains winding round my body. Like the locking of a prison door.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Vi
“I seem to have lost myself somewhere in the fields of Ilor. The things I once used to identify myself are all gone, replaced with memories of things that keep me up at night and cloud my vision during the day. I keep searching, but I don’t know how I’ll manage to find my way back to myself.”
—from Vi to Bo
Mist crept over the philomenas as we walked between the rows, pouring cans of lamp oil onto the piles of kindling we’d laid between the bushes. The distant beat of the Shriven’s war drums grew closer as the first rays of sunlight pierced the horizon. Enormous bonfires were being tended on the edges of the field, and a swarm of activity surrounded a long table by the servants’ quarters, where Aphra stirred an enormous trough full of dark mud.
“Quickly, quickly!” Quill called. “There’s not much time.”
I poured the rest of my can between two bushes, chucked it into the row we’d just finished and jogged back toward the others. Myrna was on the roof of the servants’ quarters, peering through a set of binoculars. I glanced up at the person perched atop the windmill. Even knowing that the lookouts would call out the moment they saw movement in the jungle, I still ached to know what they were seeing. I stuck a hand deep into the pocket of my trousers and rubbed the single pearl I’d kept from all my diving back in Alskad—a token of good luck.
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