by Jessica Daw
His hair was blond, like waving wheat in fall sunshine, neither short nor long, falling perfectly over his forehead and ears, just brushing his collar. His face was that of a prince, planes both elegant and strong, as flawless as a carving but more lovely than human hand could recreate. And his sky blue eyes could never be duplicated in stone.
I had not noticed August until he made a disgusted noise. Immediately I was embarrassed. I had stood staring, deaf to any introductions that had been made, exactly like the countrified miss I was.
Even still I could not make my mind function properly as Espen Kjeldsen smiled, walking towards me, holding out a hand for mine. I offered it, social convention saving me where thought and reason failed. He kissed my hand lightly and I thought I would expire on the spot.
“Pleased to meet you,” he said in a low voice, still bending over my hand, looking up at me through thick golden lashes.
I opened my mouth, closed it, and finally succeeded in saying, “Me too. You. I mean. Pleased to meet you. I am pleased.” My face was burning. I had been so upset about having to marry someone I didn’t choose that it hadn’t occurred to me to worry about making a fool of myself in front of the most beautiful man alive. Stupid mistake.
His smile at my stumbling words stopped my heart. It was a smile that saw my soul and approved. August would never speak to me again if I told him that’s how Espen’s smile felt.
I heard, as if from a distance, “Perhaps we’ll leave you two to get acquainted for a moment.” It sounded vaguely like Father’s voice, but I couldn’t be certain. I was lost in sky blue eyes.
“She can get to know him while we’re here,” August grumbled angrily. That I heard a bit more clearly.
“Come along, August,” Father insisted.
As soon as their footsteps faded away, Espen the divine smiled again. “Would you care to sit?”
The haze he cast over me wasn’t thick enough to make me forget I did not like sitting and chatting quietly. “I’d prefer a walk.”
He blinked, and then the smile reappeared. “It is perfect weather for walking.”
We walked. I saw nothing of our surroundings, and could not remember a single word either of us spoke, but somehow I made it back into the estate without breaking my neck or throwing up or doing something equally embarrassing.
Espen bowed and kissed my hand and departed, and then I realized Father had been there, as he disturbed my view of Espen’s retreating back, walking away behind my betrothed.
My betrothed.
I was betrothed to a god.
How my feet carried me to my room was nearly as great a mystery as how they’d carried me on my walk with Espen, but somehow I was there, staring at my door.
Oops. Not a door. That would be August, dark eyebrows pulled tight over his light blue eyes.
“Well?” he said belligerently.
“Well what?” I snapped back.
“I don’t suppose you are pretending to be an idiot to try and scare Espen away, are you?” His arms were folded across his chest, but I could see his fists were clenched.
I folded my arms too. “What does it matter to you?”
His lip curled in preparation to say something scornful, but then he glued his lips shut and glared away.
“You should be happy that he isn’t an ogre or something dreadful.”
“Why would that make me happy?” August grumbled, still looking away.
Throwing my hands up, I said, “I don’t know! Because I’m your friend!”
“People in love don’t have much time for friends. You didn’t even see me as soon as you laid eyes on him and his expensive clothes and fancy wards, like I was invisible, after all the years we’ve spent together. Like I’m nothing to you,” August said, fast and low and furious, and before I could reply, he stormed away.
Chapter Two
Lena
Father was dressed in his warrior’s clothes, leather and metal covered in symbols of protective wards, carved and engraved and embroidered. He’d told me that in times of waiting during the war, he’d sit by the fire or in his tent and improve his wards, replenish their energy, though energy could ill be spared during war.
“Why do you have to go?” I asked, feeling childish but having to ask.
“The queen of Tryllejor was killed in Nyput. We have been allies with Tryllejor for a long time. Our country cannot leave them without assistance.” He spoke gently.
“But you just got back,” I complained. I hated, hated, hated stupid politics. Admittedly I was feeling much better about the betrothal, but this? People died in wars. People who were fathers. People whose daughters hadn’t wanted to say goodbye.
His brows contracted, and he pulled me into a hug. “I’m sorry. I wish I could stay.”
Nothing else would have stopped me from arguing, but that made me cry instead. “And why do Espen and August have to leave too?”
“They don’t leave quite yet,” he said, his voice rumbling in my chest.
“In two days,” I sobbed into his engraved leather.
He sighed. “I know.”
“Why do they have to leave too?” I repeated insistently, knotting my fingers in the silver chain he wore around his neck, buzzing faintly with its gathered energy and prepared spells.
“Nyput has the largest army in all of Luspe, and Sikuvok is a very powerful nation of war mages. If the Sikkens agree to fight with us against Nyput, it could save Tryllejor, and our own Vansland, from destruction and defeat. Espen is a very adroit diplomat, and with your betrothal is now well-connected to both Tryllejor and Vansland. Prince Kristian of Tryllejor has been in Sikuvok but is going to assist his father in fighting, and Espen will be capable of carrying on the work Prince Kristian did.”
What on earth made Father think I wanted that kind of explanation? I didn’t care about Nyput or Sikuvok or armies, I cared about being alone, about Father and August and divine Espen leaving me, with no idea when they’d return. Wars were long and I doubted anyone would even tell me if Father or August or Espen died until a year after they were gone.
“Mother will be here in a few days,” Father added, as if that were any consolation.
“Why aren’t you waiting for her? Doesn’t she want to see you off?” I didn’t want to pull away from Father, didn’t want him to see my face, didn’t want to see his face.
Another sigh moved Father’s chest beneath my cheek. “I told her when I was leaving, but she could not . . . afford to leave Edeleste for another three days.”
“And you can’t wait another three days?”
“That is not your business, Lena,” he said firmly, and I sniffled. “I told King Henrik that I would come join him and I must keep my word. Besides which, I do not go alone. The whole Vansen army awaits me to depart.”
“The lords who are sworn to serve you?” I asked, belligerence rising in me.
“Not only nobles fight.”
“Then what is the point of nobles? Aren’t we supposed to protect people with our superior magic education, bought with the time we gain from not growing food and trading?”
“You’re interested in politics now, of all time?” Definitely exasperated by now. I didn’t want him to leave on this note. I didn’t know when I’d see him next. But I was already on this path, and I didn’t know how to go back.
“I’ve always been interested, but the Council has banned me from participating.” At least the latter part was true. It wasn’t so much that I wasn’t interested, but that I hated what politics did to my life. Hated that I wasn’t in control of politics.
“Only until you turn eighteen,” he reminded me.
Finally, I pulled away. My tears had dried enough for that. I folded my arms across my chest. “At which point they will reevaluate their decision to revoke my magic and forbid me from participating in politics.”
“Doubtless you will pass!” He tried to sound emphatic and sure, but I saw through it.
“Doubtless,” I repeated sourly
. “You know the Council despises me.”
“Not all of them.” Again, less than convincing.
“But if you are not here, they will never allow me to be free,” I said, the words coming out more frightened than I’d meant them to.
Father’s warrior face softened in response. “I’ll be home by then.”
“Do you promise?”
He hesitated.
“Do you promise?” I repeated, more fiercely.
“If at all possible, I will be here for your review in front of the Council.”
Tears resurfaced then, at the political wording of his answer and the pain in his eyes and the emptiness of two and a half years before my eighteenth birthday burying my mind. I didn’t want to cry again, didn’t want to remind Father that he had a weak daughter for an heir, didn’t want to prove the Council right when they said I would never be fit to lead Vansland.
Without another word, I turned and ran.
“Lena!” Father called after me, but I couldn’t stop. He didn’t follow me.
My mood improved very little in the two intervening days, before August and Espen departed. August was still busy being angry at me for liking Espen, and Espen was holed up, reading everything he could about Sikuvok, and receiving advice from a visiting Council member (who I avoided like the plague) on how to court Sikuvok’s support for the war against Nyput. August consulted with him too, but he wouldn’t have spent time with me even if he wasn’t busy learning about Sikuvok. If there was one thing August did well, it was stay angry for a good long time.
Why August was mad was beyond me. Espen was charming and delightful and had a thousand interesting stories about people he knew and places he’d been whenever I got to see him. Espen would sit next to me at the dinner table, as engaging as an illusion show. August would sit opposite, glowering. I ignored August.
Then it was time for them to leave. Espen had arrived only a week before. I had spent only one week with my divine betrothed.
And now I was bidding him farewell on the front steps of the estate.
Espen was holding my hands, and I was looking at our interlocked fingers, torn between wanting to impress him with my maturity, wit, and general suitability to be his wife and wanting to cry and beg him to stay and rage at him for leaving after coming only a week earlier. Still, I had learned from Father’s departure that crying did not stop a war, and it would not stop a warrior from doing his duty.
“I hate duty,” I muttered to the ground.
“At moments like this, so do I,” Espen replied in his beautiful low tone that meant he and I were the only people in the world. “I’ll write you, every week.”
“Does Sikuvok even have wood to burn smoke letters with? Will they even allow you to use energy on such frivolities?” I asked, angry despite my best intentions. Father always said that was why he didn’t write, too expensive to build the fires and too costly to use energy to burn the letter and send the fragments through the air to the recipient, where the letter would reassemble itself exactly as it had been before the burning.
Espen freed one of his hands from mine, brushing my hair from my face. “Helena. I will write you. I’ll find a way, I swear it, even if there’s not a tree in all of Sikuvok.”
Why would divine Espen make such a sweet promise like that to me? I had no idea what was the right way to respond to that. “What do you say to your betrothed, when they’re leaving for no one knows how long?” I asked, only meeting his eyes because his hand still rested on my cheek and I couldn’t very well look down.
My question seemed to confuse him momentarily. “Are you in earnest?” His hand fell from my cheek, and I looked down.
“Yes?”
He shook his head, smiling crookedly. “You are not like anyone I’ve ever met.”
“Neither are you. Like anyone I’ve ever met. You’re not like anyone I’ve ever met either.” Stupid me.
“We have to go.” August’s voice was like a splash of cold water, ruining my golden scene with my golden Espen. My eyes flew to his face. He was clearly avoiding looking at me, eyes trained on Espen, angry. Angry was his habitual look since news of Espen’s arrival and my betrothal. Where Espen looked elegant and graceful, dressed in red embroidered with golden wards, August looked uncouth and countrified, his clothes black and gray, protective symbols entirely practical and without artistry.
If Espen weren’t there, I would’ve talked with August and tried to make him understand, tried to make peace with him. He was the closest thing I had to a brother, and my best friend. My only friend, if one didn’t count Father or my maid Dagmar. I hated letting him leave, indefinitely, so angry. But what could I do? Espen was there.
“He’s right,” Espen said with regret that would have made a stone heart weep. Tears started at the corners of my eyes. My beautiful, divine, golden Espen was leaving. I had finally been given someone . . . I almost dared think I could love him . . . I did love him . . . and he was leaving.
Impulsively, tears spilling free, I threw my arms around Espen and whispered, feeling braver than ever, “I love you,” in his ear.
After a beat, he hugged me back and I was wrapped in heaven.
I heard a grunt, and instinctively looked up to see August, and something had broken the anger on his face. It looked like he’d been hit with a projectile stone, right in the middle of his chest.
Before I could think beyond my surprise, Espen replaced it with a different surprise by placing a soft kiss on my cheek. It felt like my face would fall off. I probably resembled August.
“Farewell, Princess Helena,” Espen whispered, and then I was alone, watching my sun disappearing, climbing onto his horse, riding off to the harbors of Edeleste, to the ship that would carry him the vast distance between Vansland and Sikuvok.
Too late, I realized I hadn’t said a single parting word to August. My cousin, my best friend. Angry or not, I felt miserable. I began running, wanting to say one last word, but I was too slow and their horses too fast.
Chapter Three
Lena
Dear Espen
Beloved Espen
Perfect Espen
Divinest, beloved, perfect, dear Espen
Espen
I miss you. I think of nothing but you. If I weren’t confined to this stupid estate, I would have ridden after you to Sikuvok and made you love me
I miss you. I hope you’re safe. I know you don’t have time to write to your stupid betrothed to someone who can’t even use magic to the girl you maybe never wanted to marry anyway to me.
Things are nice here. I’m all alone. I hoped you would take me away and that I’d never be left here alone again. I have Dagmar, my maid. She thinks you’re a good match for me, because she hopes you won’t just let me do whatever I want because you’re very handsome because you are a gentleman. She is teaching me to be a lady, so when you come back you will find me very genteel and well-behaved. I wish with my whole heart that you’d write me back.
How many years can a war last? Maybe you should just stop fighting in the war and come back. I hope the war is going well like you want nicely fast. What could the Sikkens possibly be waiting for before joining the war? How can you not be done?
This letter was supposed to impress you. I have thrown three pens into the fireplace, my fingers are covered in ink, and this is the fifth time I’ve tried to write this letter. My handwriting is stupid no matter how hard I try to write well and you’ll never love me at this rate and I will be miserable forever because I’ll die before I stop loving you.
I love you.
Forever yours
Yours, Lena
Helena
Chapter Four
Lena
Two years, four months, and four days later
“Your mother wishes to see you,” Dagmar said, returning from the entry to my suite, where a servant had waylaid her. Mother had been residing at the estate since the death of King Henrik had become public knowledge a year earlier and terror o
f the war spreading to Tryllejor and then to Vansland had driven any remaining noblemen into hiding. It made sense, though I was annoyed at my fellow noblemen’s cowardice—most of those who remained were those who could not fight, for one reason or another. Such as Mother.
I groaned, slumping in my chair, then groaned again when my armor prevented me from slumping as much as I wanted to. Mother insisted I wear the stupid iron stuff. It was of the best design, she’d say, fitted precisely to me, engraved with every protective rune known to man, and no one could tell I wore it, as it fit under my clothes. Unfortunately, Dagmar agreed, meaning there was no escaping, no matter how vehemently I protested.
“Young lady, it is not becoming for a woman of seventeen to behave in such a way.” Despite Dagmar’s toothlessness, she managed to sound severe.
I slumped further, my ribs protesting as the iron dug into them. As if I wasn’t stuck with enough iron without the armor, eleven months left before the Council would consider letting me remove my energy-draining iron bands. “I don’t wish to see Mother.”
“Your mother is the queen of Vansland. You are her loyal subject. You must obey her summons, whether you like it or not.”
Scowling, I folded my arms. “But Dagmar,” I whined.
She folded her arms too, making her compact bulk even more impressive. “Helena Nordskov. You will go speak with your mother.”
“But–”
“Now. I’ll not tolerate any more backtalk. Go.”
Now scowling as hard as I could, I dragged my armor-clad body out of my chair, leaving behind the books I’d occupied myself with, and started stomping towards Mother’s room.
“If you make that face too long, it’ll stick,” Dagmar warned as I walked away.