Homecoming

Wizardry was outlawed for good reason. This simple point of law nagged at Bethniel as her foster sister huddled on the opposite bench, knees curled to her forehead. Four months ago, Victoria of Ourtown had drunk the Waters of the Dead and become a wizard. Since then, she had won a decades-long war almost single-handedly, but the Lathan people would brand her an outlaw and banish her for life if they discovered how Vic had crushed their enemies. She had literally crushed them. And burned them to ash. Nose twitching, Bethniel pressed a scented handkerchief to her face, hoping to mask the stink of roasted flesh that festered in her pores. Vic had done many terrible things with her powers in the past four months, but the worst of those horrors, she’d done on Bethniel’s orders.

The carriage jolted out of a rut, and Vic groaned. “I thought sea voyages were bad.”

Bethniel moved across the cab and pillowed her sister’s head on her lap. “Can I do anything for you?”

“Move, so I don’t ruin that dress if I throw up.”

She massaged Vic’s temples. “I have dozens more at home.” Snow-draped branches scrolled between velvet curtains, the scenery like any stretch of road in Kiareinoll Fembrosh, the vast forest that covered most of Latha, but Bethniel recognized the twining limbs. An old geilmor leaned out across the road, its spiraling needles a familiar landmark. “We’re almost to Narath.”

Lips pressed together, Vic cringed into a tighter ball. Wizardry was outlawed not only for what wizards could do with their power, but for what the power did to the wizard. The Waters of the Dead bore that name because most who drank them died. Vic had been lucky; she’d only been sick as a cat since the day she’d choked the Waters down. Sick as a cat, but strong enough to blow apart a city wall and, before that, destroy a mountain.

The carriage stopped. Horses snorted, and Ashel poked his head inside the carriage. “We’re in view of the city. Come look.” Eyes falling on Vic, he sprang through the door and cupped her cheek. “She’s worse?"

“No,” Vic moaned.

“Yes,” Bethniel said. “She’s having a very bad day.”

“Vic,” he said, making that single syllable as rich and complex as the finest Eldanion red wine. He was called the Crystal Voice of Latha, his gifts so great that the son of a king had become a musician rather than a statesman. “There are banners everywhere, all hung in your honor.”

Vic grasped his wrist, and he bent toward her, their gazes locked. Bethniel’s heart skipped, hoping to see five years’ worth of hints and nudges come to fruition.

“All right.” Vic tugged herself up. “Maybe I can plunge this pounding skull into a snowdrift.”

Ashel’s smile melted as she slipped outside. Disappointment a cold knot in her belly, Bethniel squeezed his arm. “Be patient. She blames herself.”

He grimaced at the glove covering his right hand. “She shouldn’t.” Fur-lined leather hid a stump and a lone thumb. Fixing his lips in a cheery mask, he urged her out of the carriage. “Come see, sis.”

Greetings traced their passage through the royal retinue to the top of a rise. At the head of the column, Vic stood alone, feet apart and arms out, as if she fought for balance. Bethniel and Ashel each took an elbow, and their long, steady shadows sandwiched a small trembling one, all three pointing toward Latha’s capital. Banners draped the palisade, bearing the image of a crystal dagger, symbol of Vic the Blade. Pennants stirred, and the sinking sun painted sky and snow a fiery golden red, like the hair breezing round Vic’s face. The crystal atop the Senate building caught the sunset, refracting amber over rooftops. On the city walls, lanterns bloomed like glowbugs.

“It is beautiful.” Vic’s lips curved and froze. Her eyes rolled upward, her arms stiffened and back arched. Gagging escaped clenched jaws. Bethniel shouted for help. Ashel whipped off his cloak and laid Vic atop it. A Healer hurried through the retinue and wedged a knot of cloth between Vic’s teeth until the fit passed and she slumped insensate in Ashel’s arms.

“We must take her to the hospice,” the Healer said.

Cradling Vic, Ashel climbed to his feet. “We’ll take her to the Manor.”

“Your Highness, she should be properly examined—”

“Ashel’s right,” Bethniel said. Fear stuffed her lungs, leaving no room for breath. Wizardry was outlawed. Vic would be exiled if anyone traced this illness to her encounter with the Kragnashians. “The Ruler’s Healer will tend her. Get me a horse.”

Surrounded by soldiers, they tore across open fields, around the city toward the Manor. Held tight to Ashel’s chest, Vic slumped forward, head lolling with each bump and turn. On Manor Road, dense forest swallowed the last light of the sun. Hindquarters bunched and surged as their mounts rounded switchbacks, and every steaming huff crushed Bethniel’s chest a little more. The Waters of the Dead bore that name for a reason. Her foster sister had survived slavery and war—she could not die now in sight of home!

At the gate, the guards shouted questions as they sped past. Hooves skidded on slick cobbles before the Manor’s entrance, and Ashel leapt down and charged inside with Vic. Shouting orders at servants, Bethniel followed him up three flights and down a gallery to Vic’s room, where they pulled off her shoes and cloak and tucked her into bed. Panting, Bethniel sank onto the mattress.

“What’s wrong with her?”

Princess and prince jumped as if they were children caught at mischief. Queen Elekia of Reinoll Parish—their mother—stood in the doorway.

“She had a seizure,” Bethniel said.

“Just now?”

“Just as we arrived in sight of Narath. We rode here as fast as we could.”

Their mother crossed the threshold, and the door shut behind her, pushed by an invisible hand. “How long since she’s used wizardry?”

“At least six weeks.”

“All the way from Re, then.”

“Since the peace treaty was signed.”

Beaded braids clicked as the queen bent over Vic. Her scowl softened as she smoothed red hair from a pale forehead, but severity returned as she faced her natural-born children. “Did neither of you feel an urge to help her?”

“What kind of question is that?” Ashel snapped.

“The kind that needs to be asked, if your foster sister is having fits in sight of soldiers and courtiers.”

“Of course we helped her,” Bethniel cut in as Ashel’s chest puffed. “But she’s been ill since the Kragnashians made her drink the Waters of the Dead.”

“Which is exactly why I sent you with her.”

Bethniel winced at the sharp rebuke, though she had no idea what failure warranted a scolding. Latha’s Ruler had sent the Heir to be her Emissary. A mission of statecraft—one meant to assure the Senate Bethniel was fit to rule—it had been a triumph. Vic may have defeated their enemies, but Bethniel had secured a peace treaty that would be hailed for generations. Mother’s glower made her feel as if the signed parchment she carried in her satchel was privy paper.

“You had no desire to . . . share anything with her? Either of you?”

“Stop being so bloody cryptic, Mother,” Ashel said.

“Cryptic? Watch and learn.” Unsheathing her pocketknife, Mother sliced her thumb, dribbled blood onto Vic’s lips, and slipped the digit inside her mouth.

Ashel’s eyes snagged Bethniel’s, his twisted lips mirroring her own revulsion as Vic’s throat bobbed, swallowing their mother’s blood.

“That should help her.” Mother withdrew her thumb and graced them with a rare smile. “I am glad—very, very glad—to see you all safe. Welcome home.”

Tenderness from their mother was so rare a treasure that Bethniel’s shock melted and she flew into the queen’s open arms. They held each other, tears wetting collars, a long time.

Fingers combed through Bethniel’s shorn tresses. “You cut your hair?”

“The Kragnashians wanted it for trade. They wanted Vic’s too, but she gave them only a single lock.”

A crease marred their mother’s forehead as she turned to Ashel. “I prayed Elesendar would see you home safe, son.”

Glowering, he pulled off his right glove and showed her the stump. “When he took the first finger, Lornk Korng said, ‘This is a gift for your mother.’”

“I heard you stopped Vic from killing him.” She caressed his cheek.

“I thought you should do your own dirty work.”

Eyebrows flattening, Mother stepped away from him. “Go rest, both of you. Tomorrow you can explain why you sent me the Relmlord alive, when I asked for his corpse.”

“Because Lornk Korng’s crimes were committed against an entire people,” Vic said, elbowing out from under the blankets.

Bethniel bit back a cry of joy—neither Vic nor her mother cared for girlish squealing at any time, much less when it interrupted a discussion of their enemy’s depravities.

“I didn’t kill him,” Vic continued, “because Ashel, with his butchered fingers on the floor, soaked in his own blood, made me see that Lornk didn’t harm just him, or me, or you. Ashel spoke for every Lathan soldier taken in battle and sold into slavery, and for every Lathan farmer whose family was murdered by Relman raiders. He made me see that Lornk deserves to be tried and convicted and to starve and rot under the Shrine at Mirkeldirk. That’s what you do with the worst criminals, isn’t it?”

“It isn’t so simple when the accused was a sovereign of a rival nation. I do not have legal standing to prosecute him.”

“It’s in the peace treaty,” Bethniel said. “We made sure of it.”

“And how did you get the Relmans to agree to that?”

Cheeks hot, Bethniel exchanged a shamefaced look with Vic. The worst horrors Vic had committed had been done on Bethniel’s orders.

An invisible force yanks the Relman’s arm out straight, and an iron gauntlet flies across the room and snaps round her hand. The metal begins to glow red. As the color brightens, shrieks rend the air. The Councilors’ cries tumble after. The woman’s keens squeeze into ragged breaths, billow again into an ear-shattering howl. Burning flesh jabs Bethniel’s nose. A Councilor bends over, and a vile, stinking mess hits the polished marble floor, splattering boots and slippers and garment hems.

“This will end when one of you signs the treaty,” Bethniel announces. Her voice is as icy as her mother’s glare, but inside she’s gibbering in horror.

“I showed them what their defiance would cost,” Vic said.

“And carried out retribution against Lornk’s chief interrogator,” Ashel added, his eyes as hard as they’d been that day, when Vic had tortured a woman with wizardry and cowed the Relman Council into acceding to all their demands. Kindness had once been the keystone of her brother’s character, but his ordeal had stripped away mercy. That woman deserved none, Bethniel reminded herself, summoning the cold, bitter rage she’d felt upon learning how badly Ashel had suffered while Lornk’s prisoner. In Lordhome’s dungeons, the guards had burned his hands with the same iron gauntlets Vic had used for retribution—and justice—in the Council chamber.

“We needed to secure peace,” Bethniel said, “and the surest, quickest way to do it was a direct and undeniable demonstration of Vic’s power.”

“You used your power openly?” Mother asked.

“I had to,” Vic replied.

“The Council was sworn to secrecy as part of the treaty,” Bethniel said, drawing the document out of her satchel and handing it over.

“An impossible provision to enforce,” Mother grumbled. Her eyes darted over the page. “What is this about a Penance?”

“There was a village—” Vic began.

“There were unavoidable casualties,” Bethniel interjected. “We needed to maintain secrecy.”

“This says three hundred and twelve Lathans shall serve Penance in the Badlands?”

“It was the one concession I gave the Relmans, and it was an easy one to grant. They didn’t insist that anyone actually involved serve this Penance, only that any Lathan found in the Badlands do it until the number of Lathans matched the number of dead. There’s no reason in the world any of our people would ever go into the nomads’ territory, so I saw no harm in agreeing.”

“You battled three hundred nomad warriors?” Mother asked Vic.

“Not just warriors. Elders, nursing mothers, children . . . I killed them.” Vic finished with a whisper, speaking aloud with reverence and regret, in the manner Lathans always spoke of the dead.

“Elesendar,” Mother swore aloud.

“It was necessary,” Bethniel asserted, reverting to mindspeech. Lathans only used their voices for formal occasions or when passions reigned. Everyone needed to remain rational, so she spoke silently as one did about ordinary things. “I take full responsibility for it.” She had steeled herself to accept the nomad massacre as a terrible judgment, but one that was inevitable and unchangeable. Her father had always said a ruler should learn from mistakes, but never be crippled by regrets.

“What else did you do?”

Vic expelled a long breath. “Three hundred and thirty-seven people, most of them civilians, were crushed when I brought down the mountain palace at Olmlablaire. I blew a breach in the walls around the Relman capital, and of the three thousand Relman soldiers dead in that battle, a lot of those were mine. A lot.”

“Just how powerful are you?”

Vic shrugged. “I tore apart a mountain.”

“The official story is, we used sulfa bombs to blow up Olmlablaire and the wall at Re,” Bethniel said in mindspeech, again trying to restore reason before Vic’s regrets and Mother’s fury dominated the conversation. “And the Relmans lost the Battle of Re because their command collapsed without Lornk Korng to lead them. Fortunately, it was raining that day, with a heavy fog and—”

“I thought the rumors were gross exaggerations,” Mother said. “Vic, if your powers are undeniably revealed, I will have to exile you. I’ll have no choice.”

“You sit the throne with the very same power,” Ashel growled aloud. Bethniel’s hands itched to strangle him.

“I use my power only for small acts of convenience, and never in public. Vic has used hers as a weapon, and the Opposition can seize on that to stir up discord and undermine my government.”

“You’re never sick,” Vic said. “I’ve been sick since the day I drank the Waters of the Dead, but you never are. Will I get used to it?”

“I told you when I sent you to save my son, that I was giving you the heaviest burden.”

“You knew what the Kragnashians would do to me?”

Mother’s lips curled into a sad smile. “You have the misfortune to be the second woman of renown to bear the name Victoria of Ourtown. The Kragnashians revere that name, and yes, I believed if they met you, they would give you the Waters of the Dead in remembrance of the One who killed Meylnara the Oppressor.” She pressed her lips to Vic’s forehead. “How do you feel? Any sickness or headache?”

Vic’s fingers grazed a temple. “Better than I’ve felt in months.”

“The Waters contain a parasite called the Woern, which kills most who consume it. Most of those who survive become wizards, like you and me.”

“But you’re not sick.”

“No. My mother traces her family line back to Saelbeneth, leader of the very Council for whom your namesake fought in the war against Meylnara. Saelbeneth was said to be immune to the ill effects of the power. So am I, and I gave you some of my healthy Woern.” She showed Vic the bandaged thumb. “Saelbeneth would do the same to heal her allies of Woernsickness. The Woern can be passed from one wizard to another through sweat, blood, tears, saliva—any fluid of the body. They are also passed from mother to infant in the womb. That was why I sent Bethniel with you—to help you survive.”

“I’m not a wizard!” Bethniel cried.

“Your Woern remained dormant,” Mother replied, “which has been a blessing.”

Bethniel stumbled to the window seat, her skin oozing sweat and pebbled with cold. Outside, stars winked in a deep purple sky. A servant moved along the lane, igniting gas lamps, and snow drifts glittered in pools of yellow light. Vic or Mother could light those lamps with a thought. Bethniel could not fathom doing so. In Kragnash, she had offered to drink the Waters of the Dead in Vic’s stead, but the Center, the leader of all Kragnashians, had refused and told her if she took the Waters, she would die. What could that mean, if she carried these . . . worms . . . already? “Why didn’t you tell me about this before we left? How was I supposed to know I could help Vic if she got sick?”

“She didn’t want you to know she’d sold you to the Kragnashians,” Ashel spat.

“Ashel, you were in my womb when I drank the Waters of the Dead, and since semen is, according to legend, a particularly effective means of transmission, you can pass your Woern to Vic rather easier than your sister or I.”

Ashel’s glare shredded into a flush while Vic looked at the floor, her cheeks almost as red as her hair.

Mother sighed at the blazing faces. “According to legend, only a very, very few wizards are compatible hosts for the Woern, in which case the relationship is symbiotic rather than parasitic. In every other case, Woern and wizard grow increasingly ill together. The only thing that can save either is an infusion of healthy Woern. Also according to legend, the Woern drive their host to seek out such reservoirs. Vic, I believed if you became a wizard, and then became ill, instinct would guide you to obtain what you needed from my children—especially Ashel. Glad as I am to have my foster-daughter home, I had hoped to welcome a marriage-daughter today. Sadly, I was wrong, or you wouldn’t have had a fit within sight of Narath and dozens of witnesses.”

“What’s one more disappointment on your list?” Ashel asked.

“You’re too old for petulance,” Mother snapped. “Vic, when the Healer arrives, you should mention that incident of catatonia from last year, after your accidental encounter with the Relmlord. It will distract him from other possible causes of the seizure. And all of you should rest. We have a full day of victory celebrations tomorrow.”

She left, and silence pressed like stone. Ashel rocked from foot to foot, his single fist clenched, while Vic hid behind a fall of hair. Bethniel climbed out of her own paralyzing consternation, took their hands, and pressed them together. “You two belong together. Mother’s revelation doesn’t change that; it makes it all the more true.”

Their fingers slipped apart, and Bethniel couldn’t tell which drew away first. Ashel’s eyes lingered on Vic for a moment, then he mumbled a good night and left.

Vic rested a tear-stained chin on her knees. “The Center said you’d die if you drank the Waters.”

“I know.” Bethniel sat, trembling. It didn’t feel like fear—she’d become all too familiar with that sensation over the last half-year. Now she felt something more akin to anticipation, like a cat quivering before it pounced. “When it said I’d die, I thought it meant I’d be like most of the people who drink the Waters, where it kills them.”

“But you already have these . . . Woern. So what did the Center mean?”

Drawing a deep breath, she pushed the past into a box and closed the lid. As her father said, don’t be paralyzed by regrets. “We’ll never know. Let’s just be glad it’s over.”

Her sister squeezed her hand. “I am. And it’s good to be home.”