God’s Church was a strange marriage of the hierarchy of pre-Crossing Catholicism and the beliefs of a particular sect of Protestantism that emerged in the early aftermath of the Landing. This sect was less concerned with the moral salvation of souls than with the biological salvation of the human race, a salvation viewed as God’s great plan in raising the New World out of the sea.
This strange mixture of disparate elements was both a marriage of necessity and a harbinger of things to come. God’s Church became a realist’s religion, its interpretation of the gospels riddled with pragmatic holes, the influence of the pre-Crossing Bible limited to what would serve. Ecclesiastical discontent was inevitable; many priests, faced with the increasingly brutal political realities of theology in the Tearling, needed only the slightest touch and they were ready to topple.
—Religious Dimensions of the Tearling: An Essay, FATHER ANSELM
When Father Tyler entered the audience chamber, Kelsea’s first impression was that he carried a great burden. The priest she remembered had been timid, not saturnine. He still moved cautiously, but now his shoulders sagged. This weight on him was new.
“Father,” she greeted him. Father Tyler looked up toward the throne, his blue eyes flickering to meet hers and then darting away. Years of Carlin’s tutelage had prepared Kelsea to find all priests either bombasts or zealots, but Father Tyler seemed neither. She wondered about his function in the Church. With such a quiet demeanor, he couldn’t be a ceremonial priest. There were weak priests, certainly; Carlin had covered that territory extensively. But only a fool mistook caution for weakness.
“You’re welcome here, Father. Please.” She indicated the chair on her left.
Father Tyler hesitated, and no wonder; Mace was stationed behind the proffered chair. The priest approached as toward a chopping block, his white robe trailing behind him up the steps to the dais. He sat down without meeting Mace’s eyes, but when he finally turned to Kelsea, his gaze was clear and direct.
More afraid of Mace than of me, Kelsea thought ruefully. Well, he wasn’t the only one.
“Majesty,” the priest opened, in a voice as thin as paper. “The Church, and the Holy Father in particular, send greetings and wishes for Your Majesty’s health.”
Kelsea nodded, keeping her expression pleasant. Mace had informed her that the Holy Father had entertained many Tear nobles in the Arvath over the past week. Mace had great respect for the guile of the Holy Father, and so Kelsea did not underestimate it either; the question was whether that guile extended to this junior priest, who stared at her expectantly.
Everyone is waiting for something from me, Kelsea thought tiredly. Her shoulder, which hadn’t troubled her for at least several days, gave an answering throb. “Daylight runs, Father. What can I do for you?”
“The Church wishes to consult you about the matter of your Keep Priest, Majesty.”
“I understood that a Keep Priest was a discretionary matter.”
“Yes, well . . .” Father Tyler glanced around, as though looking for his next words on the floor. “The Holy Father requests a report on what your discretion has dictated.”
“Which priest would they give me?”
His face twitched, betraying anxiety. “That matter hasn’t been decided yet, Majesty.”
“Of course it has, Father, or you wouldn’t be here.” Kelsea smiled. “You’re no card player.”
Father Tyler gave a surprised huff of laughter. “I’ve never played cards in my life.”
“Are you close to the Holy Father?”
“I’ve met him personally twice, Lady.”
“In the past two weeks, I’ll wager. What are you really doing here, Father?”
“Just what I said, Majesty. I’ve come to consult you about appointment of your Keep Priest.”
“And who would you recommend?”
“Me.” The priest stared at her defiantly, his eyes full of a bitterness that seemed entirely impersonal. “I present myself and my spiritual knowledge for Your Majesty’s service.”
No one would ever know the courage it took Tyler to drag himself to the Keep on his devil’s errand. If he succeeded, he would become a loathsome creature, an agent of duplicity. If he failed, the Holy Father would have his revenge on Tyler's library. For years, the Church had turned a blind eye to the growing collection of secular books in Tyler’s quarters. The senior priests thought his hobby odd but harmless. Ascetics had few enough pleasures, and no one had a burning interest in pre-Crossing history anyway. Upon Tyler’s death, his room would be cleaned out and all of his books would belong to the Church. No harm done.
But if the question were put to him, Tyler would be forced to admit that he wasn’t a true ascetic. His love of the things of this world was as strong as anyone’s. Wine, food, women, Tyler had let them all go easily. But his books . . .
The Holy Father wasn’t a stupid man, and neither was Cardinal Anders. Two days ago, Tyler had awakened from the most vivid yet of his nightmares, in which he failed in his errand and returned to the Arvath to find his room locked from the inside, smoke pouring from beneath the door. Tyler knew it was a dream, for he was wearing robes of grey, and no priest of God’s Church wore grey. But the knowledge that he was dreaming didn’t change the horror. Tyler clawed at the doorknob, then tried to break the door down, until both of his thin shoulders were battered and he was screaming. When he finally gave up, he turned and found Cardinal Anders behind him, holding a copy of the Bible, his red robes aflame. He held the Bible out to Tyler, intoning solemnly, “You are part of God’s great work.”
For the past two days, Tyler had slept for only a few minutes at a time.
He thought that the Queen might burst out laughing when he finally got around to the real subject of his visit, but she didn’t. She stared at him, and Tyler began to glimpse, if only dimly, how this girl could command such a fearsome character as the Mace. One could watch the Queen and almost see her thinking, a series of rapid and complex calculations. It made Tyler think of pre-Crossing computers, machines whose great value had essentially been the ability to do many things at once. He felt that hundreds of small variables went into the Queen’s deliberation, and wondered what sort of variable he was.
“Accepted, with conditions.”
Tyler struggled to hide his surprise. “Yes?”
“The Keep chapel will be converted into a school.”
She watched him narrowly, clearly expecting an outburst, but Tyler said nothing. As far as he was concerned, God had never lived in that chapel. The Holy Father would rant and rave, but Tyler couldn’t worry about that now. He was focused on the exact task he’d been given.
“You are not, at any time, to attempt to proselytize me,” the Queen continued. “I’ll have none of it. I won’t silence you when you speak to others, but I may debate you to the best of my ability. If you can tolerate my arguments, you’re free to minister to or convert any other occupant of this Keep, not excepting the pigs and chickens.”
“You make sport of my religion, Lady,” replied Tyler, but his words were automatic, without rancor. He had long outgrown the period of his life when atheism could rouse his temper.
“I make sport of all things inconsistent, Father.”
Tyler’s attention was drawn to the silver tiara on her head, the tiara that he had held in his hand. Again he was arrested by the revolving nature of history; it repeated itself in such extraordinary and unexpected ways. There had been another monarch, a pre-Crossing monarch, crowned amid bloodshed, never meant to ascend the throne. Where had it been . . . France? England?
The Holy Father won’t care about the pre-Crossing, his mind whispered, and Tyler shook himself from such thoughts. “If there’s no chapel in the Keep, Majesty, and you yourself reject the word of God, what exactly am I to do here?”
“You’re an academic, I’m told, Father. What is your area of expertise?”
“History.”
“Ah, good. That will be your use to me. I’ve read many works of history, but I’ve missed many also.”
Tyler blinked. “What works of history?”
“Works mostly of the pre-Crossing. I flatter myself that I have a good knowledge of pre-Crossing history, but I’m poorly informed about early Tear history, and particularly the Crossing itself.”
Tyler stuck on one piece of information. “What works of the pre-Crossing?”
The Queen smiled, slightly smug, the corners of her mouth tucking downward. “Come with me, Father.”
The Queen’s wound must have been well on the way to healing, for she rose from the throne without assistance. Tyler made no sudden moves as he followed her down the steps, avoiding the guards who shifted themselves expertly to follow her progress and block him off. He could sense the Mace right behind him, and resolved not to turn around.
The Queen walked in a purposeful way that many would describe as mannish. No one had taught her the graceful little steps that Tyler had observed in women born ladies. The Queen moved in great strides, so great that Tyler, whose arthritic hip never really quieted these days, was hard-pressed to keep up. He sensed again that he was in the middle of something extraordinary, and didn’t know whether to thank God or not.
Pen Alcott walked a few feet ahead of Tyler, right on the Queen’s heels, his hand on his sword. Tyler had assumed that the Mace would be her close guard; no doubt the whole kingdom had thought so. But the Mace had other business several days ago, in the south of the kingdom. News of the fire that destroyed the southern Graham stronghold had run like quicksilver through the Arvath. The Grahams were generous donors, and the senior Lord Graham was one of the Holy Father’s old friends. The Holy Father had made it clear that Tyler should call the Mace and his mistress to account.
Later, Tyler thought. For now, the exact task I was given.
The Queen led Tyler down a long corridor behind the throne, a corridor with at least thirty doors. It was a servant’s wing, Tyler realized with astonishment. Could anyone, even a queen, need that many servants?
Only a few of the doors were guarded. When the Queen approached one of them, the guard opened the door and then stood aside. Tyler found himself in a small chamber that was nearly empty, save for a desk and a few armchairs and sofas. It seemed an odd use of space. But then he halted just inside the threshold, dumbfounded.
The far wall was covered with books, beautiful leather-bound volumes in the rich hues that had been used before the Crossing: red, blue, and most astonishing of all, purple. Tyler had never seen purple leather, hadn’t even known it was possible. Whatever the dye was, the formula had been lost.
At a gesture of invitation from the Queen, Tyler ventured closer, assessing the quality of the books with a collector’s eye. His own collection was much smaller; many of his volumes were as ancient as these, but most were bound in cloth or paper, and required great care and constant treatment with fixatives to keep them from falling to pieces. Someone had taken equally conscientious care of these books. Their leather bindings appeared to be intact. There had to be well over a thousand, but Tyler noted—with some satisfaction—that he had many titles that the Queen’s collection was lacking. His fingers itched to touch the books, but he didn’t dare without her permission.
“You may, Father.” When he looked up, he found her watching him with clear amusement, her mouth curled as if at a private joke. “I told you that you were no card player.”
Tyler turned eagerly to the shelf. Several authors’ names immediately leaped out at him. He took down a Tuchman book and opened it gently, grinning with delight. Most of his own books had been treated with an imperfect fixative, leaving their pages wrinkled and discolored. This book’s pages were crisp yet soft, nearly white. There were also several inset pages of photographs, and these he perused closely, almost unaware that he was speaking at the same time. “I have several Tuchman books, but this one I’ve never seen. What’s the subject?”
“Several eras of pre-Crossing history,” the Queen replied, “used to illustrate the fact that folly inherently pervades government.”
Despite his fascination with the book, something in the Queen’s tone made Tyler close the cover. Turning, he found her staring at her books with utter devotion, like a lover. Or a priest.
“The Tearling is in crisis, Father.”
Tyler nodded.
“The Arvath gave its blessing to the lottery.”
Tyler nodded again, his face coloring. The shipment had rolled right past the Arvath for years, and even from his small window, Tyler had always been able to hear the tide of misery below. Father Wyde said that sometimes the families followed the shipment for miles; rumor had it that one family had even walked behind the cages all the way to the foothills of Mount Willingham. As far as Tyler knew, Father Timpany had given the Regent absolution for his sins with the sanction of the Holy Father. It was so much easier for Tyler to ignore these matters in his room, with his mind wrapped in his studies, his bookkeeping. But here, with the Queen staring at him, her expression demanding explanation, the things Tyler knew deep down couldn’t be so easily dismissed.
“So what do you think?” the Queen asked. “Have I pursued folly since taking the throne?”
The question seemed academic, but Tyler understood that it wasn’t. It hit him suddenly that the Queen was only nineteen years old, and that she had cheated death for years. And yet her first act upon arrival had been to poke a stick at a hornets’ nest.
Why, she’s frightened, he realized. He would never have considered the possibility, but of course she would be. He could see that she had already taken responsibility for her actions, that consequences already sat on her shoulders. Tyler wanted to say something reassuring but found that he couldn’t, for he didn’t know her. “I can’t speak to political salvation, Majesty. I’m a spiritual adviser.”
“No one needs spiritual advice right now.”
Tyler spoke more sharply than he intended. “Those who cease to worry about their souls often find them difficult to reclaim later, Majesty. God doesn’t make such distinctions.”
“How do you expect anyone to believe in your God in these times?”
“I believe in my God, Majesty.”
“Then you’re a fool.”
Tyler straightened and spoke coldly. “You’re welcome to believe what you like, and think what you like of my church, but don’t malign my faith. Not in front of me.”
“You don’t give the Queen orders!” the Mace snarled.
Tyler cringed; he had forgotten that the Mace was there. But the Mace fell silent as suddenly as he’d begun, and when Tyler turned back to the Queen, he found her wearing an odd smile, both rueful and satisfied.
“You are genuine,” she murmured. “Forgive me, but I had to know. There must be so few of you living over in that golden nightmare.”
“That’s unfair, Majesty. I know many good and devout men in the Arvath.”
“Was it a good and devout man who sent you to keep an eye on me, Father?”
Tyler couldn’t answer.
“Will you live in here with us?”
Thinking of his books, he shook his head. “I’d prefer to remain in the Arvath.”
“Then I propose an exchange,” the Queen replied briskly. “You take the book in your hand and borrow it for a week. Next Sunday, you’ll return it to me, at which time you may borrow another. But you’ll also bring me one of your own books, one I don’t have.”
“A library system,” Tyler replied with a smile.
“Not exactly, Father. Clerks are already at work copying my own books, several at a time. When you loan me a book, they’ll copy it as well.”
“To what purpose?”
“I’ll hold master copies here in the Keep, but sooner or later, I’ll find someone who can construct a printing press.”
Tyler inhaled sharply. “A press?”
“I see this land flowing with books, Father. Widespread literacy. Books everywhere, as common as they used to be in circulation before the Crossing, affordable even for the poor.”
Tyler stared at her, shocked. The necklace on her chest twinkled; he could have sworn it had winked at him.
“Can’t you see it?”
And after another moment, Tyler could. The idea was staggering. Printing presses meant bookshops and libraries. New stories transcribed. New histories.
Later, Tyler would realize that his decision was made then, that there was never any other path for him. But in the moment, he felt only shock. He stumbled away from the bookshelves and came face-to-face with the Mace, whose face had darkened. Tyler hoped the man’s anger wasn’t directed toward himself, for he found the Mace terrifying. But no, the Mace was looking at the books.
An extraordinary certainty dawned in Tyler’s mind. He tried to dismiss it, but the thought persisted: the Mace could not read. Tyler felt a stab of pity, but turned quickly away before it showed on his face. “Well, it’s quite a dream, Majesty.”
Her face hardened, the corners of her mouth tucking in. The Mace gave a quiet grunt of satisfaction, which only seemed to irritate the Queen further. Her voice, when she spoke, was businesslike, all passion vanished. “Sunday next, I’ll expect you. But you’re welcome in my court anytime, Father.”
Tyler bowed, feeling as though someone had grabbed him and shaken him hard. This is why I never leave my room, he thought. So much safer there.
He turned and trudged back toward the audience chamber, clutching the book in his hand, nearly oblivious to the three guards who followed him. The Holy Father would undoubtedly want an immediate report, but Tyler could sneak into the Arvath through the tradesmen’s entrance. It was Tuesday, and Brother Emory would be on duty; he was young and lazy, and often forgot to report arrivals. Tyler might read well over a hundred pages before the Holy Father knew he’d returned.
“And Father?”
Tyler turned and found the Queen seated on her throne, her chin propped on one hand. The Mace stood beside her, as forbidding as ever, his hand on his sword.
“Majesty?”
She grinned impishly, looking her true age for the first time since Tyler had seen her. “Don’t forget to bring me a book.”
On Monday Kelsea sat on her throne, biting relentlessly at the inside of her cheek. Technically, she was holding audience, but what she was really doing was allowing various interested parties to have a look at her, and looking at them in turn. After the incident with the assassin, she’d thought that Mace might cancel this event, but now he seemed to consider it even more important that Kelsea show her face. Her first audience went ahead on schedule, although the entire Queen’s Guard had been stationed in the audience chamber, even those who usually worked the night and slept during the day.
True to his word, Mace had moved the great silver throne, along with its dais, into the Queen’s Wing. After perhaps an hour perched on the throne, Kelsea discovered that silver was hard, and worse, it was cold. She longed for the comfort of her old, worn armchair. She couldn’t even slouch; there were too many eyes on her. A crowd of nobles thronged the room, many of them the same people who had attended her crowning. She saw the same clothing, the same hairstyles, and the same excess.
Kelsea had spent long hours preparing for this audience with Mace and Arliss, as well as with Marguerite, who had a surprising amount of information to share about the Regent’s allies in the nobility. The Regent had kept her nearby at all times, even while doing business. This further evidence of her uncle’s poor judgment came as no surprise to Kelsea, but it made her feel despondent all the same.
“Are you happy here?” Kelsea had asked Marguerite, when they finished talking for the night.
“Yes,” replied Marguerite, so quickly that Kelsea didn’t think she understood the question. Marguerite knew a fair amount of Tear, but she’d been delighted to find that Kelsea spoke good Mort, so they spoke in that language. Kelsea tried her question again, making sure she was using the correct words.
“I understand that you were delivered here, against your will, from Mortmesne. Don’t you want to go home?”
“No. I like taking care of the children, and there’s nothing for me in Mortmesne.”
“Why?” Kelsea asked, confused. She found Marguerite to be both educated and intelligent, and when it came to human nature the woman was smart as a whip. Kelsea had been pondering what to do about the rest of the Regent’s women; she had no urge to have them all invade the Queen’s Wing, nor could she offer them any sort of gainful employment. But she thought they deserved something from the Crown, since their lives couldn’t have been easy.
Marguerite had assured Kelsea that the other women would be snapped up quickly as paid companions by nobles, most of whom had cast a jealous eye on the Regent’s women for years. This was useful information, if an extremely unwelcome insight into the male psyche, and Marguerite had been right; when Coryn went to make sure that the Regent had cleared out, the women and their belongings were gone as well.
“Because of this,” Marguerite replied, running an explanatory hand up her body and circling it around her face. “This determines what I am.”
“Being beautiful?”
“Yes.”
Kelsea stared at her, bewildered. She would give anything to look like Marguerite. The Fetch’s voice echoed in her head, always within cutting reach: Far too plain for my taste. She had already noticed how, on those rare occasions when Marguerite emerged from the nursery, the guards’ eyes followed her across the room. There was no overtly boorish behavior, nothing for which Kelsea could take them to task, but sometimes she wanted to reach out and slap them, scream in their faces: Look at me! I’m valuable too! Eyes followed Kelsea across the room as well, but it wasn’t the same at all.
If I looked like Marguerite, the Fetch would worship at my feet.
Some of this must have shown on Kelsea’s face, for Marguerite smiled sadly. “You think of beauty only as a blessing, Majesty, but it brings its own punishments. Believe me.”
Kelsea nodded, trying to look sympathetic, but in truth she was skeptical. Beauty was currency. For every man who valued Marguerite less because of her beauty, there would be a hundred men, and many women as well, who automatically valued her more. But Kelsea liked Marguerite’s grave intelligence, so she tried to curb her resentment, though something inside told her that it would be a constant struggle, to look at this woman every day without jealousy.
“What’s Mortmesne like?”
“Different from the Tearling, Majesty. At first glance, better. Not so many poor and hungry. Order in the streets. But look long enough, and you will notice that all eyes are afraid.”
“Afraid of what?”
“Of her.”
“They’re afraid here, too, but not of me. Of the lottery.”
“Once, perhaps, Majesty.”
The people in the audience chamber certainly weren’t afraid of Kelsea. Some of them looked at her wistfully, some with suspicion. Mace, not liking the pockets of shadow created by the crowd, had ordered the walls hung with extra torches for the audience, and he had also produced a herald from somewhere, a thin, harmless boy-man named Jordan with an extraordinarily deep, clear voice, who announced each personage before the throne. Those who wanted to have private speech with Kelsea came forward only after being searched for weapons and cleared by Mhurn. Some had come simply to swear fealty, perhaps in the hope of gaining access to the treasury or putting Kelsea off her guard. Many of them tried to kiss her hand; one noble, Lord Perkins, even succeeded in planting a moist, sticky patch on her knuckle before Kelsea could yank free. She tucked both hands inside the black folds of her skirt to keep them safe.
Andalie sat on a chair to Kelsea’s right, the seat several inches lower so that she appeared shorter than Kelsea. Kelsea had argued against this arrangement, but Andalie and Mace had overruled her. As Lord Perkins and his retinue left the dais, Andalie offered a cup of water, which Kelsea accepted gratefully. Her wound was healing well, and she could sit up for longer periods now, but she had been exchanging pleasantries more or less nonstop for two hours and her voice was becoming unwieldy.
A noble named Killian came forward with his wife. Kelsea searched through the files in her mind and placed the man: Marguerite had told her that Lord Killian liked to gamble at cards and that he had once knifed another noble over a disputed hand of poker. None of his four children had ever run afoul of the lottery. The Killians looked more like twins than husband and wife; both had round, well-fed faces, and both eyed her with the same expression Kelsea had seen on the faces of many nobles over the course of the day: smiles on top and craft underneath. She exchanged pleasantries with the pair and accepted a beautiful tapestry that the wife assured her had been woven by her own hands. Kelsea very much doubted this; the era in which noblewomen actually had to do their own handwork was long gone, and the tapestry bespoke considerable skill.
When the Killians’ audience was over, Kelsea watched the pair retreat. She hadn’t liked most of the nobles she’d met today. They were dangerously complacent. Even the inadequate old concept of noblesse oblige had fallen by the wayside in this kingdom, and the privileged refused to look beyond their own walls and gardens. It was a problem that had contributed greatly to the Crossing; Kelsea could almost feel Carlin hovering somewhere close by, her face pinched in its old disapproval as she spoke of the ruling classes of times long gone.
Mace was peering toward the end of the hall, and as the Killians disappeared and Kelsea’s guard began to relax, he called a sharp command to remain at attention. A solitary man was trudging toward the throne, his face nearly hidden under a thick black beard. At the edge of Kelsea’s vision, Andalie made an involuntary movement, her hands stiffening.
Kelsea tapped her fingers on the silver arm of her throne, debating, while the man was searched. She looked to Andalie, who was staring at her husband with deep, dark eyes, her hands clenched tightly in her lap.
Mace had descended to the foot of the dais and taken up what Kelsea thought of as his ready pose, a stance so casual that one who didn’t know Mace might think him lounging. But if Andalie’s husband should move a muscle in the wrong direction, Mace would have him down. The husband seemed to know as well; his eyes twitched toward Mace and he halted of his own volition, announcing, “I am Borwen! I come to demand the return of my wife and children!”
“You demand nothing here,” Kelsea replied.
He glowered at her for a moment. “Ask, then.”
“You’ll address the Queen properly,” Mace growled, “or you’ll be removed from this hall.”
Borwen took several deep breaths, his right hand creeping to his left bicep and feeling it gently, as though for comfort. “I ask Your Majesty for the return of my wife and children.”
“Your wife is free to leave, of her own volition, at any time,” Kelsea replied. “But if you wish to ask her anything here, you’ll first account for the marks on her skin.”
Borwen hesitated, and Kelsea could see countless excuses tumbling through his head. He mumbled a reply.
“Repeat!”
“Majesty, she wasn’t an obedient wife.”
Andalie snickered softly. Kelsea shrank from the sound, which held murder. “Borwen, are you a believer in God’s Church?”
“I go every Sunday, Majesty.”
“A wife is to be obedient to the husband, yes?”
“Such is the word of God.”
“I see.” Kelsea leaned back, studying him. How on earth had Andalie ended up wed to this creature? It would have taken a braver woman than Kelsea to ask her. “And did your manner of correction make her obedient?”
“I was within my rights.”
Kelsea opened her mouth, not knowing what would come out, but fortunately she was stalled by Andalie, who stood to her full height and said, “Majesty, I pray you, do not place myself or any of my children under this man’s dominion.”
Kelsea reached out and clasped her wrist. “You know I wouldn’t.”
Andalie looked down, and Kelsea thought she saw a flash of warmth in those grey eyes. Then she was simply Andalie again, her face blank and cold. “I know it.”
“What would you have me do here?” Kelsea asked.
“I care little, so long as he never comes near my children again.”
Andalie’s tone was as flat as her expression. Kelsea stared at her for a moment, a terrible picture forming in her mind, but before it could take shape, she whipped back to Borwen. “Denied. On the day your wife wishes, she can return to you with my blessing. But I won’t compel it.”
Borwen’s black eyes blazed, and a strange, feral sound emerged from his beard. “Is Your Majesty ignorant of the word of God?”
Kelsea frowned. The crowd, which had seemed sleepy, was fully awake now, looking between her and Borwen as though the conversation were a tennis volley. Any reply she made would get back to the Church, and she couldn’t lie; there were too many people in this hall. She arranged her words carefully before speaking. “History is full of failed kingdoms that purported to be ruled solely by the word of God. The Tearling is not a theocracy, and I must look to more sources than the Bible.” She felt her voice sharpening, but couldn’t stop it. “The word of God aside, Borwen, it seems to me that if you truly deserved the sort of obedience you crave, you would be able to compel it with some lever besides your fists.”
Color rose in Borwen’s face, and his eyes squinted down to black slits. Dyer, at the foot of the dais, advanced a few steps to stand in his path, one hand on his sword.
“Is there a recorder here?” Kelsea asked Mace.
“Somewhere. I sent him into the crowd, but he should be listening.”
Kelsea raised her voice and spoke over the hall. “My throne won’t tolerate abuse, no matter what God says about it. Husband, wife, child, it makes no matter; the one who lays violent hands on the other will account for it.”
She focused on Borwen again. “You, Borwen, as the first offender before me, won’t be punished. You provide the example around which I structure my law. But if you ever come before me again, or before any member of my judiciary, on a similar charge, the law will deal heavily with you.”
“I’ve been charged with nothing!” Borwen shouted, his heavy face crimson with rage. “I come to reclaim my stolen wife and children, and find myself put upon! It’s no justice!”
“Have you ever heard of the equitable doctrine of clean hands, Borwen?”
“No, and I care not!” he snarled. “I’m a man robbed, and I’ll say so before all the Tearling, if I must, to gain justice!”
Mace moved forward, but Kelsea snapped her fingers. “No.”
“But Lady—”
“I don’t know what’s gone on here in the past, Lazarus, but we don’t punish people for words. We’ll ask him to leave, and if he doesn’t, you can remove him as you like.”
Borwen was breathing hard now, great hoarse gasps; the sound reminded Kelsea of a slumbering brown bear that she and Barty had once come upon in the woods. Barty had given Kelsea a signal, and they had quietly reversed their steps. But the man in front of Kelsea was something entirely different, and she thought suddenly that she would enjoy fighting him, even with her bare hands, even if she took a beating for it.
I have too much anger in me, Kelsea realized. But the thought was a proud one: whatever her other failings, she knew that the anger would always be there, a deep and tappable well of force. Carlin would be disappointed, but Kelsea was the Queen now, not a frightened child, and she had learned much since leaving the cottage. She would be able to stand before Carlin and account for herself . . . not without fear, perhaps, but at least without the debilitating certainty that Carlin always knew best. Carlin had been right about many things, but even she had limitations; Kelsea saw them clearly now, outlined in bright colors. Carlin was without passion, without imagination, and Kelsea had plenty of both. Looking at the man below her, she saw an easy way out.
“Borwen, you’ve taken too much of my time with this nonsense, and you’ll leave my hall now. You’re free to charge my throne with any sort of injustice, but know that I will match it with your wife’s account of you. The choice is yours.”
Borwen’s mouth worked, but words had deserted him. His black eyes rolled like those of a cornered animal, and he slammed one large fist into his other hand, glaring up at Andalie. “Still haughty as ever, aren’t we? Does she know where you were raised? Does she know you have Mort blood?”
“Enough!” Kelsea pushed herself up from the throne, ignoring the protest from her shoulder. Her sapphire had come roaring to life; she felt it, a small, violent animal beneath her dress. “You’ve reached the end of my patience. You’ll leave this hall immediately, or I’ll allow Lazarus to remove you by any means he likes.”
Borwen backed away, smiling triumphantly. “Mort she is! Infected!”
“Lazarus, go.”
Mace leaped toward Borwen, who turned tail and sprinted toward the doors. Appreciative laughter rippled from the crowd as he fled up the aisle. Andalie reseated herself beside Kelsea, her face as blank as ever. Once Borwen disappeared, Mace stopped his halfhearted pursuit and returned, his eyes sparkling with mirth. But Kelsea rubbed her own eyes wearily. What next?
“Lady Andrews, Majesty!” the herald cried.
A woman stormed toward the throne. Today her hair was covered by an elaborate hat, bright purple velvet decorated with purple silk ribbons and peacock feathers. But Kelsea recognized that pinched, displeased mouth with no difficulty at all.
“Oh, for God’s sake,” she muttered to Mace. “Didn’t we pay her for the damned tiara?”
“We did, Lady. Overpaid, actually. The Andrews are a house of chiselers, and Arliss didn’t want them to have any cause for complaint.”
Lady Andrews halted at the foot of the steps. She was much older than she’d seemed in the dim light of the throne room, perhaps as old as forty, and her face appeared to have been pulled unnaturally taut. Cosmetic surgery? There were no plastic surgeons in the Tearling, but it was rumored that Mortmesne had revived the practice. Tear nobles might dare the journey, particularly nobles like this one. Lady Andrews wore a saccharine smile, but her eyes said it all.
She hates me, Kelsea realized with some bemusement. Didn’t the woman have anything to worry about besides her hair?
“I’ve come to swear fealty before Your Majesty,” Lady Andrews announced. She had a distinctive voice, so raspy and hoarse that Kelsea wondered if she was a smoker, like Arliss. Or perhaps it was merely excessive drink.
“I’m honored.”
“I bring Your Majesty a gift, a gown of Callaen silk.”
The gown was beautiful, made of a bright royal blue silk that gleamed in the torchlight. But when Lady Andrews held it up, Kelsea saw that it was perhaps three sizes too small, tailored for a tall, slender woman like Lady Andrews herself. After considering it for a moment, Kelsea decided that the woman had sized the gown deliberately out of spite, just for the joy of having it be too small when Kelsea tried it on.
“Thank you,” Kelsea replied, feeling a small smile play on her lips. “How kind.”
Arliss took the dress and placed it among the steadily growing stack of gifts. Some of them were truly dreadful, given by people who apparently had the same taste in art as the Regent. But all of the gifts were at least valuable in materials; no one was quite brave enough to give Kelsea something that was junk. She had already decided to sell most of them, but Arliss was well ahead of her. He eyed the blue gown with a calculating gaze for a moment before making a note in his little book.
“I’ve also come to ask what Your Majesty means to do about Mortmesne.”
“I beg your pardon?”
Lady Andrews smiled, that deceptively sweet smile that seemed built to hide gnashing teeth. “You’ve violated the Mort Treaty, Majesty. I own lands toward the end of the Crithe, in the eastern Almont. I have much to lose.”
Kelsea snuck a glance at Mace and found him staring out across the crowd. “I have more to lose than you, Lady Andrews. More land, and my life as well. So why don’t you let me worry about it?”
“My tenants are alarmed, Majesty. I can’t say I blame them. They stand right in the path to New London, and they suffered cruelly in the last invasion.”
“I’m sure you cared deeply then as well,” Kelsea murmured. Her sapphire gave a sharp burn against her chest, and she suddenly saw a picture in her mind: a tall tower, its doors closed, its gates barricaded. “Did you and your guard go out to defend them?”
Lady Andrews opened her mouth, then paused.
“You didn’t, did you? You remained in your tower and left them to their own devices.”
The older woman’s face stiffened. “I saw no point in dying with them.”
“I’m sure you didn’t.”
“What is your grievance with the shipment, Majesty?”
“My grievance?”
“It’s a fair system. We owe Mortmesne.”
Kelsea leaned forward. “Do you have children, Lady Andrews?”
“No, Majesty.”
Of course not, Kelsea thought. Children conceived by this woman would only be cannibalized by her womb. She raised her voice. “Then you don’t risk much in the lottery, do you? You have no children, you don’t look strong enough for labor, and you’re really too old to appeal to anyone for sex.”
Lady Andrews’s eyes widened in fury. Several feminine giggles echoed across the hall behind her.
“I’ll listen to complaints about Mortmesne and the lottery from people who actually have something to lose,” Kelsea announced to the hall. “People with a stake in the shipment can come and raise this issue with me any time I hold audience.”
She turned back to Lady Andrews. “But not you.”
Lady Andrews’s hands had clutched into claws. The nails were long hooks, manicured a bright purple. Deep pockets of red had emerged in the fleshless crescents beneath her eyes. Kelsea wondered if the woman would actually try to strike with her bare hands; it seemed unlikely, but Kelsea wasn’t sure. Neither was Mace; he’d moved a few inches closer, and now he stared at Lady Andrews with his most forbidding expression.
What does she see when she looks in the mirror? Kelsea wondered. How could a woman who looked so old still place so much importance on being attractive? She had read about this particular delusion in books many times, but it was different to see it in practice. And for all the anguish that Kelsea’s own reflection had caused her lately, she saw now that there was something far worse than being ugly: being ugly and thinking you were beautiful.
Lady Andrews recovered quickly, though her low voice still shook with anger. “And what have you to lose, Majesty? You spent your childhood in hiding. Has your name ever gone into the lot?”
Kelsea flushed, surprised into silence; this was something she’d never even considered. Of course her Glynn name had never been in the lottery, since no one knew that Kelsea Glynn existed. But was there even a lottery marker for Kelsea Raleigh? Of course not, no more than there had been a marker for Elyssa Raleigh or Thomas Raleigh or any of the countless parade of nobles who could afford to buy their way free of the lot.
Lady Andrews took another step forward now, undaunted by the proximity of Mace, her smile pure spite. “In fact, Majesty, you risk less than any of us, don’t you? If she invades again, you merely barricade yourself in your own tower, just as I did. Only your tower is even taller.”
Kelsea colored, thinking of the several rooms down the hallway filled with siege supplies: provisions and weapons, torches and barrels of oil. What could she do, promise to fight alongside the populace of New London? Seconds passed, and the people in the hall began to whisper. She looked to Mace and Pen, but found them stumped as well. Lady Andrews was grinning, the grin of a hunter with cornered prey, all perfectly shaped fangs. The thought of being cornered by this woman made Kelsea die inside, in some deep, dark place where none of Carlin’s lessons had penetrated.
In desperation, Kelsea grabbed her necklace and drew the sapphire out, clutching it tightly in one hand. She would take any answer it had, but the jewel gave her nothing, not even a hint of heat. The murmuring grew louder, echoing off the walls. Any moment now, someone would begin to laugh, and this creature would win.
“I was one of your villagers, Lady.”
Kelsea looked past Lady Andrews and saw that Mhurn had stepped forward. His face was white as ever, his bloodshot eyes pinned on Lady Andrews, but for once, his pallor was not from sleeplessness. It was from fury.
“Who the fuck are you?” Lady Andrews snarled at him. “A guard who dares to address a noble direct? You’d be whipped for that in my audience chamber.”
Mhurn ignored her. “We tried, you know. My wife had never learned to ride, and my daughter was ill. We had no chance to outrun the Mort on the horizon. We went to the gate of the castle and begged for shelter, and I saw you up at the window, staring down at us. You had all those rooms, yet you refused to give us even a single one.”
Kelsea was suddenly overcome with memory: the day in the Almont, the farmers working in the fields and the tall tower of brick. Lady Andrews had begun to back away, but Mhurn advanced, and Kelsea saw the glint of tears in his eyes. “I’ve known the Queen barely a month, but I promise you, when the Mort come, she will try to cram the entire Tearling into this Keep, and she won’t care how recently they’ve bathed or how poor they are. She’ll make room for all.”
Lady Andrews stared at him, her mouth open wide, utterly speechless. Mace went to Mhurn and spoke to him in a low voice. Mhurn nodded and walked quickly behind the throne toward the guard quarters. Kelsea remembered the day, earlier this week, when she had passed Mhurn to go out on the balcony and been overwhelmed by suspicion. She looked around at the other guards stationed on the chamber, nineteen of them now, their faces hard. Did they all have similar stories? She felt suddenly wretched. Even if one of them was guilty, how could she suspect any of them?
“I demand punishment, Majesty!” Lady Andrews had recovered her voice. “Give me that guard!”
Kelsea burst out laughing, true laughter that rang across the audience chamber. It felt wonderful, more so as Lady Andrews’s face turned a bright, choleric purple.
“I’ll tell you what you do, Lady Andrews. You take your dress and get the hell out of my Keep.”
Lady Andrews opened her mouth, but for a moment nothing came out. In the space of seconds, a thousand tiny lines seemed to have sprung up in the taut skin of her face. Arliss had produced the dress and now offered it to Lady Andrews, though his lowered brows told Kelsea that they’d be discussing it later.
Lady Andrews snatched the dress back and stomped away with her neck hunched into her shoulders, her gait showing her age. As she went up the aisle, many in the crowd gave her disgusted glances, but Kelsea was unimpressed; they’d likely behaved no better during the last invasion. As on the day of her crowning, there were no poor here. She would have to change that. Next week when she held audience, she would tell Mace to throw the doors open to the first few hundred who came.
“Are there any more?” she asked Mace.
“Don’t think so, Lady.” Mace raised his eyebrows toward the herald, who shook his head. Mace made a cutting motion, and the herald announced, “This audience is concluded! Please proceed in an orderly fashion through the doors!”
“He’s good, that herald,” Kelsea remarked. “Hard to believe that much sound could come from such a slight boy.”
“Thin men always make the best heralds, Lady, don’t ask me why. I’ll let him know you were pleased.”
Kelsea sank back against the throne, wishing again that it were her armchair. Leaning back in this thing was like reclining against a rock. She decided to pile it with cushions when there was no one around.
Orderly fashion was a bit much to hope for; the crowd had bottlenecked at the door, each of them apparently feeling that he deserved to go through first.
“God, what a scrum,” Pen remarked, chuckling. Kelsea took the opportunity to scratch her nose, which had been itching madly for some time, then beckoned Andalie. “I’m fine for the night, Andalie. You’re off duty.”
“Thank you, Lady,” Andalie replied, and left the dais.
When the crowd had finally disappeared and her guard had begun to bolt the doors, Kelsea asked, “So what do you think Lady Andrews was trying to do?”
“Ah, she was set up to it,” Mace replied. “Just making trouble.”
Arliss, who’d been listening from his place at the foot of the dais, nodded. “Scene had Thorne all over it, but he wasn’t stupid enough to show up today.”
Kelsea frowned. Thanks to Mace and Arliss, she now understood much more about Thorne’s Census Bureau. Although it had originally been created as a tool of the Crown, it had taken on a terrible life of its own, becoming such a power in the Tearling that it rivaled God’s Church. The Census was too big to be shut down wholesale; it would need to be dismantled piece by piece, and the biggest piece was Thorne himself. “I won’t have Thorne sabotage what we build. He needs to go, with a decent pension.”
“The Census Bureau has most of the educated men in the kingdom, Lady,” Mace cautioned. “If you try to break it up, you’ll have to find them all gainful employment.”
“Perhaps they could become teachers. Or tax collectors, I don’t know.”
She would have to wait to see what they thought of this idea, for Wellmer’s stomach suddenly gurgled quite loudly in the silence, prompting muted laughter from the group of guards. Milla was cooking dinner now, and the scent of garlic permeated the hall. Wellmer turned tomato-red, but Kelsea smiled and said, “We’re done. I’ll eat in my chamber tonight; you’re welcome to the table. Someone bring Mhurn some food and force him to eat.”
They bowed in unison, and several guards headed off to the kitchen while the rest disappeared down the corridor to their families and the guard quarters. Milla had put her foot down and declared that she wouldn’t have twenty guards invade her kitchen every mealtime, so now several of the guards worked as servers for the rest of the families at each meal. They’d created some sort of system very diplomatically among themselves, and Mace hadn’t needed to intervene. A minor detail, but Kelsea felt that it was a positive note, a sign of community.
“Lazarus, wait a moment.”
Mace leaned down to her. “Lady?”
“Any progress on locating Barty and Carlin?”
Mace straightened. “Not yet, Lady.”
Kelsea gritted her teeth. She didn’t want to hassle him, but she wanted Barty, wanted to see his crinkle-eyed smile more than ever. The urge to see Carlin was even more urgent somehow. “Did you search the village?”
“There has been a lot to do, Majesty. I will move on it shortly.”
Kelsea narrowed her eyes. “Lazarus, you’re lying to me.”
Mace stared at her without expression.
“Why are you lying?”
“Lady!” Venner called to her from the hallway. “Your armor is ready!”
Kelsea turned, irritated. “Why are you telling me this, Venner?”
“Fell’s been down sick.”
Another lie. She imagined that Venner had finally been forced to procure the armor himself. But her appetite for conflict was dwindling apace with her growing desire for whatever Milla was preparing in the kitchen. “We’ll take a look at it during tomorrow’s shaming exercise.”
Venner’s mouth twitched, and he went on to the kitchen. Kelsea turned back to continue with Mace and found him gone, vanished from the audience chamber like smoke.
“Sneaky bastard,” she muttered. What had happened to Barty and Carlin? Had they fallen ill? It was a long journey south for two old people during the winter. Had the Caden found them? No, Barty knew how to cover his tracks. But something was wrong. She could see it on Mace’s face.
She descended the dais, Pen in tow. The smell of garlic made her stomach rumble, and Kelsea fought back a giggle of bitter amusement; even anxiety couldn’t dull her appetite. She looked for Mace in the hallway, but he’d hidden himself somewhere. Kelsea thought about demanding his whereabouts from Coryn, who was on duty at the balcony room, but that seemed childish, so she went on down the hallway with a heavy tread.
At the door of her chamber, Kelsea heard Andalie speak her name in the next room over and halted automatically, Pen following suit behind.
“I assure you, the Queen is afraid.”
“She doesn’t look afraid.” That was Andalie’s oldest girl, Aisa, her voice easily recognizable, right on the cusp of deepening and full of discontent.
“But she is, love,” Andalie replied. “She hides her fear in order to lessen ours.”
Kelsea leaned against the wall, knowing that eavesdropping was rude but unable to walk away. Andalie remained a mystery. Even Mace could find nothing of her ancestry or history beyond the fact that she was half Mort, and Andalie had disclosed that fact herself. It was as if she’d dropped from the sky at the age of fifteen and married her worthless husband; all before that was dark.
“This kingdom hasn’t seen anything extraordinary, or even particularly good, in a long time,” Andalie continued. “The Tearling needs a queen. A True Queen. And if she lives, Queen Kelsea will be exactly that. Maybe even a queen of legend.”
Kelsea’s eyes widened and she turned to Pen, who placed a finger to his lips.
“I’d like to be part of a legend, Maman.”
“That’s why we stay.” Andalie’s voice shifted, moving closer now. Kelsea crooked a finger at Pen and they slipped into Kelsea’s chamber. Pen closed the door behind them, muttering, “I told you she had the sight.”
“And I agreed with you. Still, it’s a mistake to put too much stock in visions.”
Here in the antechamber, Pen had set up his own bed, a messy affair of thrown-together sheets and blankets that didn’t match. Dirty clothes were strewn across the floor, and Pen did his best to kick them under the bed. A knock came at the door, and he opened it to admit Milla, carrying two trays of what looked like beef stew. Milla had already staked out her right to bring Kelsea’s food personally; according to Mace, she also tasted every dish of Kelsea’s food before it left the kitchen. This was something of an empty gesture, since so many poisons came with a time delay, but Kelsea had been moved nonetheless.
“Want to eat with me?” she asked Pen.
“All right.” He followed her through the archway into her chamber, where Mace had set up a small table for the nights when Kelsea wanted to eat alone. Milla set the two trays on the table, bowed to Kelsea, and vanished.
Kelsea dug into the stew. It was as good as everything Milla cooked, but tonight Kelsea ate automatically, her mind on Andalie’s oldest girl. If she understood right, some or all of Andalie’s children had been subjected to abuse, and such treatment always left scars. The girl was also entering adolescence, and Kelsea remembered that transition well enough: the feeling of helplessness, and most of all the quick anger at adults’ failure to understand what was important. One day, when Kelsea was perhaps twelve or thirteen, she had found herself screaming at Barty for moving something on her desk.
She looked up and found Pen watching her, his gaze speculative. “What?”
“I enjoy watching you think. It’s like watching two dogs fight in a pen.”
“You watch dogfighting?”
“Not by choice. It’s a vile sport. But my father ran dogpen fights when I was growing up. That’s how I got my name.”
“Where was this?”
Pen shook his head. “When we join the Queen’s Guard, we earn the right to leave our past behind. Besides, you’re just crusader enough to imprison my father.”
“Maybe I should. He sounds like a butcher.”
Kelsea regretted the statement as soon as it came out of her mouth. But Pen only considered her words for a moment before replying mildly, “Perhaps he was once. But now he’s only a blind old man, unable to harm anyone. There’s danger in a system of justice that makes no allowance for circumstance.”
“I agree.”
Pen went back to his stew, and Kelsea to hers. But after another moment, she put down her spoon. “I’m worried about that girl.”
“Andalie’s oldest?”
“Yes.”
“She’s troubled, Lady. We found no information on Andalie before her marriage, and believe me, Mace and I looked hard. But their family life was a different matter.”
“Different how?”
Pen paused for a moment, and Kelsea could see him framing his answer. “Lady, it was common knowledge in their neighborhood that Andalie’s husband had a taste for young girls. His daughters were the worst case, but not the only ones.”
Kelsea swallowed her revulsion, striving for a businesslike tone. “Carlin told me that with no real courts, communities typically take care of these problems themselves. Why didn’t they deal with him?”
“Because Andalie forbade it.”
“That makes no sense. I would expect Andalie to kill her husband herself, before anyone else had a chance.”
“Me as well, Lady, but for that riddle I could find no answer. The neighbors were happy enough to talk about Borwen, but not about Andalie. They thought her a witch.”
“Why?”
“No one would say. Perhaps it’s just her way of looking through you. I fear Andalie, Lady, for all that I fear no man with a sword.”
“I do too.”
Pen took another spoonful of his stew, and his lack of curiosity allowed Kelsea to bring out the heart of her fear. “Andalie should have been the Queen, Pen. Not me. She looks like a queen and talks like a queen, and she inspires dread.”
Pen thought for a minute before answering. This quality of pensiveness was something Kelsea liked about him, that he didn’t seek to fill empty silence with meaningless words. He swallowed two more mouthfuls of stew before replying. “What you’ve just given, Lady, is a perfect description of the Queen of Mortmesne. Andalie may be part Tear, but the essential core of her is Mort. She’d make an ideal queen in that kingdom. But you seek to create another type of queenship entirely, one not built on fear.”
“What’s mine built on?”
“Justice, Lady. Listening. Whether it’ll succeed, none of us know; it’s certainly easier to hold power through fear. But there’s something hard in Andalie, something without mercy, and while it might create a certain advantage, I don’t know that I’d call it strength.”
Kelsea smiled as she turned back to her stew. Justice and listening. Even Carlin would have to be pleased with that.
Kelsea sat up in the dark. She’d heard a child scream in pain, somewhere beyond her own walls. She looked automatically to the left, searching for her fire, but there was nothing, not even the glowing hint of ashes. It must be almost dawn.
She reached to her bedside table for the candle that always stood there, but her fingers closed on nothing. Fear broke over her in a wave, sharp fear with no clear source. She groped, frantically now, and found that even the bedside table was gone.
A woman shrieked outside, her voice escalating until it cut off in a short, choked grunt.
Kelsea threw off her covers and jumped to the ground. Her feet landed not on the cold stone floor of her room but on what felt like hard-packed dirt. She rushed toward the door, not left across her own chamber, but ten feet to the right, through the kitchen area, steps she knew as well as her own name.
Throwing open the door, she cringed at the bitter cold of the night air. The village was still bathed in darkness, only a trace of dawn visible on the horizon. But she could hear pounding feet, the sound of many people running.
“Raiders! Raiders!” a woman shouted from one of the houses behind her. “They’re—”
Her voice cut off without a trace.
Terrified, Kelsea shut the door and threw the bolt down. She groped on the kitchen table until she found a candle and matches, then lit a single weak flame, cupping it with her fingers to hide the light. Jonarl had made their house well, out of hard-baked mud leavened with small stones. He’d even given her a couple of windows, made of broken glass that he’d salvaged on several trips into the city. The house had been a lovely wedding present, but the windows made it difficult to shield light from the outside.
When she went back into the bedroom, she found William sitting up in bed, blinking sleepily, looking so much like Jonarl that her heart nearly broke at the sight. Jeffrey was still mercifully asleep in his crib, and she scooped him into her arms, keeping him wrapped in his blanket, and held out a hand to William. “It’s all right, love. Up now; I need you to walk. Can you walk for Mummy?”
William climbed out of bed, his toddler’s legs dangling for a moment before he dropped to the ground. He reached up and took her hand.
Booted feet pounded through the street outside. Male feet, she thought automatically. But all of the men were off in the city, trading wheat. Panic was trying to dig into her mind like a fever; where could they go? The house didn’t even have a basement to hide in. She shifted Jeffrey to her other arm and dug in the corner for her cloak and shoes.
“Can you find your jacket and shoes, William? Let’s see who can find their jacket first.”
William stared up at her, bewildered. After a moment he began digging through the pile of outer clothes and blankets. Kelsea moved a stack of quilts and found Jonarl’s winter cloak, still sitting there neatly folded. That was the closest she came to crying, right then, with her dead husband’s cloak staring up at her from the ground. Nausea rose in her throat, good old morning sickness, which always picked the worst possible time to show up.
The front door burst open, the flimsy wood bar shattering into two pieces, which landed on either side of the kitchen. Kelsea cupped one protective hand around Jeffrey’s downy head, then grabbed William and shoved him behind her with the other.
Standing in the doorway were two men, their faces blackened with soot. One of them had a bright red cloak, and even Kelsea knew what that meant. Caden? Here? she thought wildly, before he moved forward and laid hold of Jeffrey where he slept in her arms. The baby woke up and immediately began to scream.
“No!” she cried. He shoved her backward and tore Jeffrey free. Kelsea collapsed into the corner, grabbing the table leg to keep from falling directly on William. Her hip hit the wall with bruising force, and she groaned.
“Get the boy,” the Caden told the other man, then disappeared out the door with Jeffrey. Kelsea shrieked, feeling something pull loose inside her. This was a nightmare, it had to be, but when she looked down she saw that her left foot had landed in her own right shoe as she fell, and now the shoe stuck up at a crazy angle. This detail alone precluded the comfort of nightmare. She grabbed William and shoved him behind her again, holding up her hands to ward off the man standing over her.
“Please,” he said, leaning down to extend a hand. “Please come with me. I don’t want to hurt you or the boy.”
Even beneath the soot, Kelsea could see that his face was pale and drawn. He looked about Jonarl’s age, maybe a bit older . . . the greying hair made it difficult to tell. He had a knife in the hand at his side, but she didn’t think he meant to use it; he looked as though he’d forgotten about it himself.
“Where is he taking my son?”
“Please,” he repeated. “Come quietly.”
“What the fuck is taking so long, Gate Guard?” a hoarse voice barked outside.
“I’m coming!”
He turned back to Kelsea, his face twisting. “Please, for the last time. There’s no other option.”
“William needs his cloak.”
“Quickly, then.”
She looked down at William and saw that he had slipped on his own shoes, and held his cloak in one hand. She knelt in front of him and helped him put it on, doing the buttons with shaking fingers. “Weren’t you smart, William? You beat Mummy.”
But William was staring up at the man with the knife.
“Come now, please.”
She took William’s hand and followed the man out the front door. Briefly she cursed Jonarl for dying, for leaving them alone this way. But of course, it wouldn’t have made any difference. It was the middle of March, and all of the men in Haven had gone to trade wheat in New London, as they did every year at this time, leaving the village defenseless. Kelsea had never thought about it before. The village had never faced this sort of trouble, not since the invasion; they were too far from the Mort border to worry about raiders.
Outside, she was relieved to see the big Caden with Jeffrey carefully balanced on one hip. Jeffrey had quieted a bit, but that wouldn’t last long; he was emitting little snuffles, rooting around on the front of the man’s cloak for a breast. When he didn’t find it, the screaming would begin.
“Come along,” the Caden told her.
“Let me carry my son.”
“No.”
She opened her mouth to protest, but the other man, the shorter one, grabbed her arm and squeezed it gently, warning. She took William’s small hand and followed the Caden down the street toward the outskirts of the village. The horizon was lightening now, and she could see the vague outlines of houses and stables around her. Other groups joined them as they went, more women and children. Allison and her daughters emerged from their house, and Kelsea saw that Allison had a red slash down her arm, that her hands were bound.
She was braver than I was, Kelsea thought unhappily. But most of the women looked like Kelsea herself, dazed, their faces as bewildered as though they’d just awakened from a dream. She stumbled along, dragging William beside her, not understanding where they were going, only knowing that something terrible was happening. Her chest burned, but when she looked down, there was nothing there.
It was only when she rounded the corner of John Taylor’s house, now empty and darkened, that she understood everything, the meaning of all these men, the women and children dragged from their homes. The cage stood high and stark against the lightening horizon, a symmetrical black silhouette with several human shapes moving inside. Another empty cage stood beside it, surrounded by mules. Looking away from the village, Kelsea saw several more of them, lined up perhaps several miles distant, in the direction of the Mort Road.
This is the punishment, Kelsea realized. She could recall two occasions when one of Haven’s villagers had been pulled from the lot. The village treated the allotted as dead, holding a wake and speaking of them in doleful tones of grief. They’d all watched the shipment go by on the Mort Road many times, and each time Kelsea had been secretly thankful in her heart that it wasn’t her, wasn’t her husband or children.
This is the punishment for my relief.
The grey-haired man turned to her. “I must have your son now.”
“No.”
“Please don’t make this difficult. I don’t want them to think you a troublemaker.”
“What will you do with him?”
He pointed to the second cage. “He’ll go in there, with the other children.”
“Can’t I keep him with me?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“That’s enough,” a new voice rasped. Out of the darkness came a tall, skeletal man in a blue cloak, his gaunt face pitiless in the grey dawn light. Kelsea knew him, but did not know him, and she recoiled instinctively, trying to shield her son as he approached. “We’re not here to debate with these people, Gate Guard. Time is of the essence. Split them up and put them in.”
The Gate Guard reached out and grasped William’s wrist, and William yelled indignantly. Hearing his brother’s shouts, Jeffrey began to scream as well, beating tiny, angry fists against the Caden’s cloak. Kelsea grabbed William’s arm, trying to keep him close, but the man was too strong for her, and William was screaming in pain; if she didn’t let him go, he would be pulled apart. She forced herself to release his wrist, and now she was screaming herself.
“Lady! Lady, wake up!”
Someone grabbed her shoulders and shook her, but she strained toward William, who was being hustled away toward the cage. It was a cage built for children, she saw now, filled with small, crying forms. The big Caden turned and strode off in that direction as well, taking Jeffrey, and Kelsea screamed without words, helpless to stop. She had a strong, clear voice, often chosen to sing solos at church, and now scream after scream pealed forth, terrible screams that echoed across the Almont Plain.
“Kelsea!”
A slap cracked across her face, and Kelsea blinked, her screams cutting off as sharply as they’d begun. When she looked up, Pen was there, perched on the bed, his hands resting on either side of her, surrounded by the familiar comfort and firelight of her chamber. Pen’s dark hair was rumpled from sleep, and he wasn’t wearing a shirt. Seeing his chest, muscular and well proportioned, with only the lightest dusting of hair, Kelsea felt a sudden, unaccountable urge to run her fingers across it. Something was burning her.
The cages!
Her eyes widened, and she sat up quickly. “Oh, God.”
Mace bolted into the chamber, his sword in one hand. “What the hell?”
“It’s nothing, sir. She had a nightmare.”
But Kelsea was already shaking her head as he spoke. “Lazarus. Wake everyone up.”
“Why?”
Kelsea shoved Pen to one side, threw off the covers, and hopped out of bed. Her sapphire popped loose from her nightgown, blazing blue light across the room. “Wake them up now. We have to leave within the hour.”
“And go where, pray tell?”
“To the Almont Plain. A village called Haven. Maybe all the way to the Mort border, I don’t know. But there’s no time to lose.”
“What the hell are you talking about? It’s four in the morning.”
“Thorne. He’s made a deal behind my back, and he’s on the way to Mortmesne with a shipment of Tear.”
“How do you know?”
One of the switches on Kelsea’s temper went, just like that. It didn’t feel as though there were many more to flip. “Dammit, Lazarus, I know!”
“Lady, you had a nightmare,” Pen insisted. “Maybe you should get back into bed and—”
Kelsea took off her nightgown, and had the small, spiteful satisfaction of seeing Pen’s cheeks redden before he whirled around to face the wall. She turned to her chest of drawers and found Andalie already standing there, holding out a pair of black trousers.
“Lady,” Mace said, in the slow, logical voice one would use with a child, “it’s the middle of the night. You can’t go anywhere now.”
Another switch flipped. “Don’t even think about trying to stop me, Lazarus.”
“It was a dream.”
Andalie spoke up in a quiet, firm tone. “The Queen has to go.”
“Have you both gone mad? What the fuck are you talking about?”
“She has to go. I see it. There’s no other way.”
Kelsea finished dressing herself and found that her sapphire had already sprung free again, its light glaring across the room. Mace and Pen hissed and raised hands to shield their eyes, but Kelsea didn’t even need to blink. Holding the sapphire up, she realized suddenly that she could see a face within its depths: a beautiful woman with dark hair and sharp, cold eyes. Her cheekbones were high and curving, the angles of her face cruel. She smiled at Kelsea and then vanished, leaving the jewel a bright, blank gleam of aquamarine in the torchlight.
For a moment, Kelsea wondered if she really was mad. But that seemed too easy a solution; if she’d gone mad, the real world wouldn’t seem nearly so important. That day in front of the Keep had been her entire foothold, and if a shipment managed to make it to Mortmesne in spite of her decree, she was finished. She would be a paper ruler, and anything else that she tried to accomplish would be doomed to fail.
“Andalie’s right, Lazarus. I have to go.”
Mace swung back to Andalie, his tone disgusted. “Well done.”
“You’re welcome.” Kelsea was surprised to hear the faint trace of a Mort accent, something she’d never heard before in Andalie’s voice. “You make no allowance for gifts beyond your own.”
“Your sort of gift has never been consistent. Not even the Red Queen’s seer could foretell everything.”
“Foretell this, Captain.”
“Shut up!” Kelsea shouted. “We’re all going to go. Pick a couple of guards to stay here with the women and children.”
“No one’s going anywhere,” Mace growled. He took her arm, roughly. “You had a bad dream, Majesty.”
“He’s right, Lady,” Pen told her. “Why don’t you just go back to sleep? By morning you’ll have forgotten all about it.”
Mace was nodding agreement, his face arranged in a solicitous expression that made Kelsea want to smack him. She bared her teeth. “Lazarus, this is a direct order from your Queen. We’re leaving.”
She went for the door again, and this time they both grabbed her, Mace by the arm and Pen around her waist. Kelsea’s temper gave, pulling wide open, a seamless implosion inside her head, and she shoved out at both of them with her anger, feeling it depart her body like a current. Both men flew backward, Pen landing in a huddle at the foot of the bed and Mace bouncing off the far wall to crash on the floor. She hadn’t shoved them very hard, and they recovered easily, each sitting up to stare at her, their faces bathed in blue light. Andalie had backed up to press against the vanity table.
“No one has to come with me,” Kelsea told them, relieved to find that her voice was steady. “But don’t try to stop me. I don’t want to hurt either of you, but I will.”
Mace and Pen looked at each other for a moment, their faces blank. What would they have done if she hadn’t had her sapphire? Locked her in her chamber, she supposed, and allowed her to cry herself out, just as Carlin had always done when Kelsea was a child. She searched for that reserve of anger inside herself and found it, banked but still full. Had she ever been ashamed of her anger? Now it was a gift, somehow reflected through the jewel. It had the potential to be dangerous, certainly . . . if she’d been even a little angrier, Pen and Mace could have been seriously hurt.
Pen recovered first. “If you mean to do it, Lady, we shouldn’t go as the Queen’s Guard. We should dress as army. You’ll want the outfit of a low-ranking officer.”
Mace nodded slowly. “You’ll also have to cut your hair, Majesty. All of it, right down to the nape.”
Kelsea breathed a hidden sigh of relief; she needed Mace’s support, at least. She didn’t even know where her horse was kept, where to find supplies. Andalie crossed the room and went out the door.
“Without your hair,” Mace continued, his tone tinged with malice, “you should have no trouble passing as a man.”
“Of course,” Kelsea replied. A test, she remembered, with a touch of nostalgia. It’s all a test. “Anything else?”
“No, Lady.” He left the room, closing the door behind him, and began firing orders left and right. Kelsea could hear his deep, angry voice even through the thick walls of the chamber.
Pen settled himself in the corner, ignoring her glare. She could see their perspective, and yet . . . they didn’t trust her to know the difference between a nightmare and what she had seen, which had been a vision far more real than any dream. She’d even felt the prickle of goose bumps on her arms in the morning air. Was it a real woman, out there on the Almont Plain? A real bird flying over the Mort army? Kelsea had no proof, but she trusted the visions implicitly; she felt as though she had no choice. She supposed she could see Pen’s side, but she didn’t want to.
You should have believed me, she thought, staring at him from beneath lowered brows. My word should have been enough for you.
Andalie returned with a small towel and a pair of sewing shears. Kelsea reached for the tiara on the vanity table, then drew her hand back. Fake crown or not, she felt real attachment to the thing. But she would have to leave it here.
“Sit, Lady.”
Kelsea sat, and Andalie began shearing the top of Kelsea’s head in great chunks. “I’ve been cutting my children’s hair for years. We couldn’t afford a dresser.”
“Why’d you marry him, Andalie?”
“We don’t always make these choices ourselves.”
“Did someone force you?”
Andalie shook her head, chuckling mirthlessly, then leaned down and murmured in Kelsea’s ear. “Who’s the man, Majesty? I’ve seen his face in your mind many times. The dark-haired man with the snake-charmer’s smile.”
Kelsea blushed. “No one.”
“Not no one.” Andalie grabbed a hank of hair over Kelsea’s left ear and sheared straight through it. “He means very much to you, this man, and I see shame covering all of those feelings.”
“So?”
“Did you choose to feel this way for this man?”
“No,” Kelsea admitted.
“One of the worst choices you could have made, no?”
Kelsea nodded, defeated.
“We don’t always choose, Majesty. We simply make the best choices we can once the deed is done.”
Rather than being comforting, this statement made Kelsea feel utterly hopeless. She sat in silence while Andalie finished, staring bleakly at the growing pile of dark hair on the floor. She meant nothing to the Fetch, she knew, but remote possibility had kept her going. The act of cutting her hair seemed to cross a final bridge into a land where there was no possibility at all.
A guard knocked at the door and, at Pen’s summons, brought in a black Tearling army uniform, dumping it on the bed. His eyes widened at the sight of Kelsea, but when she glared back, he ducked out, closing the door behind him. Pen returned to his armchair, apparently determined not to meet Kelsea’s eye. Andalie finished and motioned for Kelsea to lean over, then quickly combed out the last of her long hair and cut. Levering Kelsea back upright, Andalie surveyed her work. “It’ll do, Lady. A professional dresser can clean it up later.”
Kelsea’s head felt light, almost buoyant. Gathering her courage, she looked in the mirror. Andalie had given her a good haircut, almost the duplicate of Coryn’s, a tight cap of hair around her head. Another woman, one with a perfect elfin face, might even have looked good with such hair, but Kelsea felt like crying. A boy stared back at her from the mirror, a boy with full lips and fine green eyes, but a boy all the same.
“Shit,” she muttered. She’d heard the word from her guard many times, but only now did she understand the real use of profanity. That one word said exactly what she was feeling, said it better than a hundred other words could have done.
“Come, Lady. Clothes next.” Andalie’s blank gaze held a trace of pity.
“Will we succeed, Andalie?”
“I can’t know, Lady. But you have to go, all the same.”