The Exalted

by Kaitlyn Sage Patterson

  Curlin’s hand tightened on her staff as she surged forward, but I put a hand out to stop her.

  “There’s an Alskad ship in the harbor flying the king’s colors,” I said. “Tell me again how he’s not here.”

  The woman raised her hand, and a line of slatted openings slid open above the portcullis. A moment later, the barrels of a dozen rifles were trained on the four of us.

  “Get gone, scum, or get dead. And if I or any of my soldiers see you in the city again, it’ll be your gods’ judgment you face at the bottom of the harbor.”

  Jihye laid her hand on my shoulder in warning, but I was already backing out of the square, hands up. Fury seethed like a boiling cauldron inside me as various plots and plans twisted themselves together like coils of rope in my head.

  I wouldn’t let some self-righteous twig of an untested soldier keep me from my brother. Not in this life or the next.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Bo

  “Sometimes the monarchy feels like a gift. Other times, like a punishment. But it is always there, like a weight around my neck or an unruly beast tethered to my waist. I’m never without it.”

  —from Bo to Vi

  Noriava’s words hung like a chain around my neck. I didn’t know if I could take her approach to the monarchy, much less want to. It seemed to me that she’d given up everything, even her own sense of self, to become her idea of the best monarch. Looking back on our conversations, I had to admit that she was exceptionally dedicated to her people. But with all of her sacrifices, she’d put aside something else that should have truly mattered: herself.

  She wasn’t really Noriava anymore. She was the living manifestation of Denor. Since our argument, I’d spent innumerable hours contemplating that sacrifice. Was it really the best thing for a country if its monarch lost herself so completely, even if it was for the good of the realm? Was I right to admire her dedication to her crown? Should I do the same?

  I wondered what Runa would do—what she had done.

  I wanted to talk to Vi, as my intention all along was to share the power of the monarchy with her. And to Swinton as well, because articulating the issue to him would crystallize the clarity of my thoughts and ideas. But as things stood now, I had only myself and the unfocused attention of my increasingly absent little sisters to rely on.

  Late one afternoon, as I was mentally preparing myself for the rigors of supper with Noriava and her court, Still burst through the doors of the sitting room, a wide smile on her face and a scrap of paper in her hand.

  “You’ll never guess who I found skulking around the gates of the castle,” she crowed with a laugh.

  “If I’ll never guess, why don’t you go ahead and tell me,” I replied tiredly. “I’m supposed to be downstairs for supper in just a few minutes.”

  Still snapped, “We’d never’ve agreed to come if we’d known all you were going to do was yell at us all the damned time.”

  “I’m sorry, Still,” I said with a sigh. “I don’t mean to be so irritable. I’ve got a lot on my mind. Who did you find outside the castle? Just so that you’re warned, though, if you tell me you’ve spent more money on useless trinkets for our siblings back home, I’ll be forced to wring your neck.”

  Still looked guiltily at her boots and bit her lip. “That’s not what I’ve come to tell you,” she said, then, regaining her arrogant swagger, continued, “but if you’re going to be a snot about it, I’ll just go on about my business and leave you right here in the dark with your head up your ass.”

  I cringed at the image and stuck my tongue out at her by way of apology. “Well, who was it?”

  Still shoved the paper into my hand with a grin. Unfolding it, I at once recognized the familiar hand.

  Bo,

  I’ve been in Salemouth for three days but can’t get the guards to let me into the palace to see you. Still says that you’ve gone and gotten yourself engaged to the queen. Which is bloody stupid, by the way, but we can discuss your horrible decision-making later. Look, I’ve got a ship full of the Shriven—long story—ready to fight for you in Alskad, but the captain won’t wait forever. Either get your ass to the harbor or find a place to house them, and fast. No one here in the city will do business with any of us, and we’re running out of stores on board to feed ourselves.

  —Vi

  PS: Of all of our siblings, you chose to bring these two thieving weasels with you? I wonder how you’ll manage the folks at court if you let Pem and Still have their way with you, and them only children.

  PPS: On second thought, it might be good practice.

  PPPS: I cannot believe I’ve been in this city for three days and you’ve not come to find me yet. Obviously, you have a lot on your mind, but to not notice me at all?

  I ran a hand through my hair, relief and terror flooding my veins in equal measure. Vi was here, and now that I thought of it, I didn’t know how I could’ve managed to ignore the thrum of our connection these last few days. Hers was a vibrant shifting river of feeling that tugged at me. The more I thought of it, the more it edged uncomfortably close to fury, and I pulled back from the connection, dazed by the intensity I felt in her.

  “Where is she?” I asked Still. “How does she look?”

  “I told her to go to a place me’n Pem found by the harbor and gave her enough coin to bribe the barkeep to serve her a drink or two whilst she waits.” Still made a face.

  “What is it?”

  “She’s with two of them Shriven. Nasty-lookin’ pieces, too.” Still pressed her lips together and stuck her hands deep in the pockets of her coat.

  “What aren’t you saying?”

  Still glanced at the door, where Pem stood, staring at her sister. “You go on with Bo and make sure no one sticks him with a knife or nothing. I’ll stay here with Swinton.”

  Pem nodded and ran into my bedroom, returning just moments later with my old, dull traveling clothes and a pair of scuffed boots.

  “There hasn’t been a stabbing in Denor in almost a hundred years,” I said, but my words fell on deaf ears.

  “Don’t want to go looking like a fancy nobleman, anyway,” Pem said. “Still will make your excuses to the queen.”

  Still grinned. “I’ll tell her you got the shits.”

  I groaned internally, but recognizing that Still would come up with something even more vile if I admonished her, I shrugged out of my silk jacket and into the sturdy—if a little musty—wool Pem held for me.

  Pem studied me a moment, then nodded her approval and said, “There’s a hat in the pocket. Put that on. Don’t think you’ll be recognized, but better safe than sorry, yeah?”

  “Lead the way,” I said, sliding the deep hood over my curls and pulling it forward to cast my face in shadows.

  We snuck through the back passages of the palace and out through a hallway stinking of rotting fruit and refuse. The day was cool, and the sun cast the streaks of clouds in shades of blood and fire as it sank below the horizon. I pulled my coat tight around me, thankful for the thick wool as the cold wind coming off the sea whistled through the back alleys and winding closes that Pem led me down. My stomach roiled with a queasy mix of excitement, anxiety and hunger.

  The tavern was built on stilts over the water, more an extension of the docks than a part of the city itself. Men and women of questionable repute, their cheeks bright with cold and drink, lounged against the posts and on the benches, calling out to potential customers as sailors and fishermen walked by. I looked quickly away, hoping Pem hadn’t noticed them, or if she had, that she hadn’t put two and two together.

  “Seems strange that folk’d turn to whoring, what with the queen’s big talk about the crown making sure each citizen has a warm bed to sleep in and a roof over their heads,” Pem commented.

  I grimaced.

  She yanked on the narrow door, swollen with
the damp sea air, and held it open for me. “After you.”

  As my eyes adjusted to the dimness inside the tavern, it took every ounce of my will not to recoil from the stench. The miasma of unwashed bodies, fatty stewed meat and sour ale permeated the room. A haze of smoke hung low over the greasy heads of the tavern’s patrons, bent over their drinks or their hands of cards, oblivious to everything but what lay directly in their path. A woman stumbled past me, hand clapped over her mouth, and Pem leaped back and out of the way only moments before the contents of the woman’s stomach spilled out the open door and onto the wide slats of the dock.

  “Vi should be in the back,” Pem said with a grimace. “I’ll catch up in a moment.”

  “You absolutely will not leave my side,” I hissed. “Not in a place like this.”

  Pem rolled her eyes at me. “This place is safer than the house I grew up in, brother mine.”

  And with that, she slipped away. Tense, I made my way through the crowded room, scanning for Vi’s familiar face, so much like my own. There were people with skin and hair in all variety of color and cuts; people with scarred and painted faces; people wearing Denorian, Alskader, Samirian and Ilorian clothing in jarring and decidedly strange combinations. But nowhere in the crowd did I see my sister’s freckled face and black curls. I approached the bar, thinking the barkeep might’ve seen her, when a hand reached out of nowhere and pulled me into a dark corner booth I’d not even seen during my inspection of the tavern.

  “Took you long enough,” Vi snapped.

  We were sitting on opposite sides of the booth, but I flung my arms around Vi anyway and pulled her half over the table into a tight, awkward embrace. She held herself stiff and rigid in my arms for a moment. Then, with a deep breath, she relaxed and held me tight in return.

  “I missed you, you great oaf,” she whispered.

  “Missed you, too, stubborn wretch. Kept you waiting, did I?”

  When we finally let go, I glanced around the table. Curlin scowled beside me and an unfamiliar woman sat next to Vi. Her head was covered with a scant inch of spiky black hair and a new, pink scar marked her upper lip. A patient smile twinkled in her dark eyes as she met my gaze. Her tattoos and shaved head marked her as a Shriven, which only brought a slew of new questions to mind.

  I put my hands across the table, palms up, and when Vi laid hers in mine, I gasped.

  “You’re...”

  “Yes, tattooed. I know. Curlin did them.”

  “Did you...?”

  “Join the Shriven?” Vi raised her half-empty glass to Curlin. “You owe me a drink.”

  “You fed him the line. It doesn’t count if he didn’t say it himself.”

  I smiled and poured myself a glass of the thick brown ale from the pitcher in the center of the table. “To be fair, it is what I was going to say.”

  “You’re her twin. Of course you’d take her side,” Curlin grumbled.

  Vi snorted. “To answer your question, no, I didn’t join the Shriven. Curlin’s been telling me about the meaning behind her tattoos, and I wanted a way to commemorate everything I’ve been through. Do you like them?”

  I looked at the patterns crawling over Vi’s hands and arm. The swirls and symbols and geometric designs were so deeply reminiscent of the Shriven’s tattoos that they made my stomach turn circles at a glance, but as I studied them, they began to take on a kind of fascinating beauty. There, on her tattooed wrist, was a golden cuff almost the mirror of mine. When she saw me looking at it, Vi tried to cover it, looking a bit embarrassed, but I brushed her hand away and fingered the filigreed gold.

  “It suits you,” I said, smiling at her.

  Vi raised an eyebrow, but a moment later, her smile met mine. “I’ve missed you, brother.”

  “I’ve been rude,” I said, and offered the woman next to Vi my hand. “I’m Bo. Vi’s twin brother.”

  She took my hand with a warm smile and a raised eyebrow. “I’ve heard there are some other titles that go along with that. I’m Jihye Elias. The Shriven in Ilor who defected to Vi’s cause follow my leadership. Apologies, of course, for the impact on your imperial concerns there.”

  “Um?” I looked to Vi for answers.

  She grinned. “We may or may not’ve liberated Ilor from Alskad’s control just a bit. We can talk on it later.”

  Snorting at the absurdity of the situation, I took a sip of the ale. It was bitter and smooth and went down a bit too easily. “I appreciate that someone so thoroughly trained by the temple might come over to our side,” I told Jihye. “It gives me hope. As for Ilor, the people will always come first. We can discuss next steps when all is said and done. I hold no grudges on that account at all.”

  “So what’s this about you marrying the queen of Denor?” Curlin interjected. “And where’s Swinton?”

  I shifted uncomfortably. “The two are rather intrinsically entwined.”

  Just then, Pem and Still appeared at the end of the table, their faces matching pictures of concealed mischief.

  “If the two of you are here, who’s with Swinton?” I asked, panic rising in my throat.

  “Snuck one of Vi’s folks into your suite and hid her in the drapes,” Pem said. “Bribed a kitchen boy to wear my clothes and lie on the pallet and scream like hell if one of Noriava’s people came close. We’ve got a thing to do.”

  “What thing?” Vi asked, her voice brimming with suspicion.

  “Don’t you go worrying your pretty head about it, sister,” Still said.

  “We’re spies now,” Pem said. “Won’t Ma be proud?”

  Vi scowled at them. “Doubt it.”

  “We’ll see,” Pem chirped. “Anyway, that’s not to do with anything. Maybe—”

  Still elbowed her. “Sorry about treating you like a dimmy for so long, Vi. Glad you’re okay.”

  Pem punched her twin’s arm and gave us a pained look. “We’ll see you in a bit.”

  With that, they were gone nearly as quickly as they’d appeared.

  “I cannot believe that you brought those two along to spy for you,” Vi said. “More than that, I can’t believe Brenna let you.”

  “It wasn’t as though they gave her much of a chance to argue.”

  Vi laughed and nodded. “Fair enough there. Care to tell us how much trouble you’ve managed to get yourself into since you left Ilor?”

  As I recounted the details of the last few months, I watched Vi’s face grow more and more still, as though she was putting on a mask, inch by careful inch. By the time I got to the part about my command of the Denorian army, Vi’s mouth was a thin line and her eyes were all steel and reserve. Jihye’s eyebrows had climbed so high on her forehead it looked as though they were trying to escape, and when I finally ran out of things to say, Curlin snorted.

  “I think you’ve mayhap made your situation even worse than it was before you left Alskad.” Curlin swirled the ale in her cup. “I’m beginning to think that perhaps it’s not such a good idea to have the both of you in the same place at the same time. Seems dangerous.”

  “‘They two are chaos, and they will pull great evil from the land.’” Jihye stared down at the battered, scarred wood of the table as she spoke. Her voice was velvet smooth, with the careful accent of a Penby merchant. “‘When finally the dust settles, and everything is still, they two shall build this earth anew.’”

  Curlin gave Jihye a thoughtful, assessing look. “Hamil. The Book of Songs. That’s an obscure one, even for me.”

  Jihye gave her a wry grin. “The Shriven’s training isn’t all tactics and combat. We are devotees, after all.”

  “Are you diminished?” I asked.

  Jihye nodded. “I’ve spent my whole life waiting for the grief to overtake me. I thought being one of the Shriven might save me somehow. When I learned about the poison, everything changed. I just didn’t see a way out unt
il Vi came riding up on her stout little pony, waving a white flag.”

  “I wish I’d been there to see that,” I said with a smile. “Well, I appreciate the sacrifice you and yours have made in joining the cause. And I promise to do everything in my power to see you protected.”

  “So all we have to do now is figure out how to get you and the Denorian army onto a boat without marrying you off to a woman who is both power hungry and seemingly lacking even the barest hint of a conscience,” Curlin quipped, then shrugged. “Can’t be any more difficult than anything else we’ve tackled recently.”

  “You forgot Swinton,” I reminded her, my mood darkening. “We have to find a way to cure Swinton, too.”

  Vi smiled grimly, raised her hand to call over the barkeep and ordered another pitcher of ale.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Vi

  “It’s time.”

  —from Vi to Bo

  I paced the length of the ship as the sun came up. My nose was tingling with cold, and my fingertips were numb as they ran along the wooden rail for the umpteenth time that day. I had to find a way to get Bo out of the castle. Some distraction. A trick. Something.

  Quill emerged from one of the doors at the other end of the ship and waved to me. I quickly looked down, pretending I hadn’t seen him. I knew I needed to talk to him, to tell him why things between us had shifted, soured. I needed him to know that it wasn’t his fault. I needed him to see that the poison I’d inhaled was spiking me through with barbs of fury. I needed him to know that I didn’t want to push him away. But how could I possibly tell him how broken I really was? How could I make him see how much I’d changed, when every time I spoke to him, I was lit aflame with anger for the girl I’d lost?

  I wasn’t the same reckless girl who’d thrust her heart into his hands and run away to fight a war. These last few weeks, the battles with the Shriven—they’d changed me. And not for the better.

  Quill deserved someone undamaged. Not someone as raw and frightened and broken as me.

  “Vi,” Quill called. “Stop running away from me. At the very least, you owe me a conversation.”