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I OPEN MY EYES AND close them straight away. What am I seeing?
Archer.
I open them again and he’s still there. I reach out a hand and I touch him. He’s real. I can feel his skin with my touch. He’s warm. Alive.
“Archer?” I grab hold of him, drawing him as close as I can, holding him, squeezing him, crying and laughing, confused but uncaring. Archer is alive.
“How?”
His hands are in my hair, his tears mixing with mine.
Was it only three days ago, I watched him die?
The teacher steps forward, Halfreda’s teacher. “Everleigh. I think I can explain this better than Archer.”
I nod my head, and hold on to Archer’s hand, sneaking glances at him, catching him sneaking glances at me.
The teacher paces the cave while he talks and I watch him, trying to concentrate, though the warmth of Archer’s body next to mine is making it almost impossible.
“Before I left, after your father was found dead, I spoke to Archer. I feared for your safety and his. I gave him a gift, something I was given by a man from the North of the Realm. I’ve never seen anything like it; it may be magical, or just clever workmanship, but it’s a body shield to be worn under clothes. Normally armour is worn over clothes, but this is designed to be hidden, deceitful even. It gives a fighter an unfair advantage in a duel or a tourney and so it’s not something I would have asked Archer to wear in either of those situations. But the coronation was neither and I felt the danger.”
I am trying to follow what he’s saying, even though my head is hurting.
“I was selfish in leaving the castle, but I had to. I...” He shakes his head. “Anyway. I left Archer with this gift and I urged him to wear it.”
“And I did,” Archer says.
“I was well away from the castle when I had the strongest need to return. I came back and I arrived at the tail end of the coronation. I saw Millard attack Archer and I watched everybody leave. Sure, he was dead.”
I close my eyes remembering the pain. My brother killing our other brother, Macsen, Wolf attacking me, Halfreda dead, Archer dead. So many bad things it’s hard to say which was worse.
“I waited until the crowd dispersed. It didn’t take long with the spectacle over. I couldn’t feel the beat of life inside him, but I hoped it was because he was wearing the shield. I put your cloak over another body – there were several laying around unfortunately. Violence really does inspire violence.”
“So, you moved him. How?”
I don’t want to be rude or personal, but Archer is pretty tall and the teacher is a dwarf.
“I admit it was difficult. I wrapped my cloak around his feet, tight as I could manage and I dragged him. It took a long time, but luck was on my side. Those who saw me must have found the sight of a dwarf dragging a dead body along strange enough to ignore me. There are rumours about dwarves; that we like to eat our young, and other such nonsense. No one questioned me or tried to stop me. By the time I got Archer to the woods I was almost dead myself.”
Archer, even though he’s the subject of the story and knows some of the details, is as transfixed as me. I cannot believe I am seeing them both. I cannot get my head around Archer being alive, being next to me.
“I stripped off his top and found the shield underneath. Without it I could feel the beat of life within him. Faint, but present. I made a fire, tended to his wounds – the wounds I had caused by dragging him and the wounds your brother inflicted. I searched the woods and found these caves. I made potions with what I could gather, I healed him with my abilities. I administered every cure I could think of, hoping that one or more would work.”
“And they did.” Archer’s voice is like a balm to me. It takes me back to when I first met him, strangers but planning a future together. He knew he would serve a Queen. I knew I would live. I can close my eyes, breathe in the – pretty unpleasant at the moment, actually – smell of him and I am transported. The Realm is a happy place; the people I love are alive and safe.
The teacher continues and I open my eyes, back to the present. “After a few days, the beat in his chest became stronger, the colour came back to him, he opened his eyes. He’s still far from well.”
“I thought he was dead. I’ll take him however he is.”
Both men smile at me, and I smile back. They mean so much to me in different ways.
The teacher represents freedom from my sure death as the Kingmaker. He told Halfreda of the prophecy and she told me. He also told me that it was my choice to live which made me the Kingmaker who would rule and he brought the actual prophecy to me so I could see it with my own eyes.
And Archer. The first boy, man, I have loved. Kissed.
I spent my whole life until I was almost seventeen waiting to die, knowing it was coming and accepting it. I never thought I would find love, or even the chance of it. I don’t know if I’ll be with Archer forever but the fact that I could be, that I have the choice, that we have the choice, that he’s not dead, is filling my head and my heart with the most happiness I have felt since my father was killed.
“And Brett?” He’s not here now but he was. And he saved me.
I don’t understand why and I have to ask. The last time I saw Brett I fired an arrow into his hand while he and his friends were fighting Archer. The time before that he...I cannot stand to think of it, what he would have done, might have done, alone in the forest with me if Archer hadn’t shot his arrow at him.
Archer saved me and I saved him. We have a bond. He believed I could rule. But Brett? He wished nothing but ill for me.
“That’s a funny story.” The teacher’s voice is deep and soft and I could listen to him all day.
“Funny how?”
“Well apparently, after he got hit the second time, his mother and three sisters sat him down and interrogated him until he told them the truth of his actions and the decisions that led to his injuries. According to him, they were furious, they made him feel terrible. They told him what it is to be a woman in the Realm, to feel the injustice of men having their way all the time, about having no choice. The fear they feel walking alone at night, being judged for their clothes or their actions and they made him feel just awful. They asked him to imagine how he would feel if someone had done that to them, to any of his female relatives. He felt chastened and sorry more than he would have imagined. Ever since he’d been trying to find a way to make amends. He’s the one who knocked Archer out during Millard’s coronation. He overheard Ginata tell him of her vision, when she saw Archer die, and Brett tried to put him out of harm’s way.”
“And we never knew.”
“No. He came across us by accident.” Archer’s voice is deep with regret. “I wish I could have protected you, instead of him.”
I shush him and hold his hand tighter. I won’t have him feeling guilty for almost being killed.
“Archer tried to jump up when Brett came in here, as if he could have fought him in his condition, but straight away Brett had his hands up, placatory. He told us what I just told you and what your brother has been up to and we came up with a plan. If and when he could see a way to step in and rescue you, he would. And he’d bring you here.”
I can understand that people change. I can believe it. I would never have thought I’d want to kill my brother. Never in a million years. But if I could get my hands on him now, with Addyson safe and Lanorie dead, I’d murder him easily.
“So where is he now? He can’t go back without me if my brother thinks he has me. He’ll kill him.”
“Well, we thought he would be better placed in your brother’s company.”
“But he’ll kill him. He killed Lanorie.”
“No!”
Both men look upset and I nod. “He’d kill me if he got hold of me.”
“He won’t know Brett helped you. I punched him, gave him a black eye, a bloody nose and a fat lip.”
“Did you really?”
Archer nods, looking embarrassed. “I had to, we needed Millard to believe he hadn’t helped you in any way.”
“Good idea. It might work...” I go quiet, thinking of the change that’s come over my brother. The change that came over both of them.
All my life my brothers have been by my side, or me by theirs, more like it. I was their annoying little shadow, insisting I was allowed to ride and hunt and learn to fire an arrow. If I was as muddy as they were, as smelly as they were, if I cursed while kicking my foot into dog mess, then I’d had a good day.
How could Macsen have killed our father? What went through his mind when he gave him the death draught? I cannot even imagine. I cannot understand wanting to hurt him. I’d been cross with my father many times. I idolised him growing up; he was the King of the Realm and I was his favourite. His daughter. But after Addyson was born, I couldn’t understand the way he treated her, the way he shunned her. I spent more time by her side then than my brother’s. I had to look after her, love her, stick up for her and shelter her from my father’s anger, his disgust. What that’s done to her, I’ll never know.
Poor Addyson.
As though he’s heard my thoughts the teacher asks after her. “How’s Addyson? Brett seemed to think she’d been rescued. By you?”
“Yes. Well, no, not quite. It’s a long story. Lanorie took Addyson’s place in the tower and then I tried to kill my brother, but he told me if he was found dead the guards would kill Addyson. Of course, I knew it wasn’t Addyson locked up but Lanorie. I couldn’t let him kill her either. I left him alive and we tried to get her out but failed.”
“That was dangerous, Everleigh, trying to kill your brother.” The teacher’s voice is stern and makes me feel bad. “I had to try.” I attempt to sound strong willed but sound a bit petulant I know.
“Anyway, we had some help then, to get Lanorie out. But then she was caught again.”
“Who helped you?”
I look at Archer. He’ll be upset to think his friends thought he was dead but pleased to know they helped us. I think. I do not know him as well as I would like to. Not yet.
“We had two very capable helpers.”
“That’s good. We’ve been so worried about you.”
“It was your friends, Archer, they came looking for you when you didn’t go home. Weaver and Ceryn.”
“Weaver and Ceryn? Really? Are they alright? Do they think I’m...”
He trails off as tears fill his eyes. I wipe them away with my fingers. “They’ll be so happy you’re alive.” Especially Ceryn, I can’t help but think. Ceryn has told me she is in love with Archer. Will this still stand? Probably more so now he’s back from the dead. I know that’s how I’m feeling.
Like I won’t ever let him out of my sight in case I lose him again.