Danae found her a few minutes later while she was still contemplating what to make of Constantine, his past, and the history of this world. It seemed even more complicated than the one she had left behind, and she would have thought that impossible only a few days earlier.
“There you are,” Danae said with a smile. “Heard you’re making trouble with the gladiators.”
“It seems the gladiators are just trouble.”
“True enough. That’s why there’s only you and me here. No other women. All the servants are men.”
Kerrigan blinked. “What about your mother?”
Her eyes hit the floor. “My mother is dead.”
“Oh,” Kerrigan whispered. “I’m sorry.”
“It was a long time ago. Come on. Let’s get you cleaned up, and I’ll tell you the story.” Kerrigan followed down a set of stairs. “My father chose this plot of land because of its proximity to the nearby hot springs. He had them back at home, and when he retained his credentials here, he wanted to bring them back. Many of the men use them every evening. They’ll be empty for us now though.”
Kerrigan hurried down the stairs at the prospect of a hot spring. She’d had one on her lands back in Bryonica. In fact, she and Fordham had … consummated their relationship in it. Any hot spring was going to be preferable to the lukewarm baths that Flavia had been forcing her into day and night.
The air thickened with humidity as she took the final step. Steam billowed in the room, and already, she was sticky with condensation. The rectangular pool was massive, taking up the entirety of the bottom floor.
“Wow,” she whispered.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?”
“It is.”
“We disrobe over there.” Danae gestured to an empty rack as she plucked at the garment she wore—a blue dress similar in fashion to what Kerrigan was wearing but draped differently.
Kerrigan stripped off her own white dress, thankful to see it gone, and slung it on a hook. She put her sandals into a small cubby and then followed Danae to the pool. She couldn’t resist a groan as she sank deep into the water. She dunked her head under the water, letting her curls loose to their own machinations. It was bliss.
“I’m not sure how much you know about the Ando-Domaran War,” Danae said, running her fingers through the water.
“Andines lost.”
Danae nodded. “Yes, I suppose that is accurate. Nothing else?”
Kerrigan shook her head.
“Huh. I figured with your appearance, you would have been educated somewhere. Maybe at one of the universities.” Danae shrugged. “Perhaps I shouldn’t judge someone on their appearance if I don’t want them judging me on mine.”
“So far, it seems the only thing my appearance has gotten me is problems.”
Danae frowned. “Yes, I can see that. Well, I’ll start at the beginning then. In Andine, there were many kings. Each one ruled their own land and people as they saw fit. My father was one such king. He was fair and just. There was commerce between Domara and Andine for generations before any conflict erupted. We had our gods and idols. Domara had their gods. Their Doma. I was a child when the war broke out over who were the ‘correct’ gods.”
“Why would they care if you worshipped other gods?”
“Power and resources. The gods were an excuse to plunder our home, steal our women, and claim Andine for their own. We were richer in resources. Our fields grew more food than we could have ever needed.” She looked down at her slowly wrinkling fingers. “People covet what they do not possess.”
“And fear what they don’t understand,” Kerrigan filled in for her.
She had seen that time and time again in her own land. Anything that was deemed different, like a half-Fae with magic, was to be vilified and not revered. The human churches were burned not because the Fae disagreed with their worship, but to prove a point that they were in charge. It was a repeated cycle, and she was sad to see it existed here as well. The need for power was an equalizer across worlds.
“Yes,” Danae said with a sad smile. “Magic was involved, of course. The Doma had power unrivaled by our people. Our magic wasn’t small, but it wasn’t reserved either. The Doma hoard their gifts, handing out magic like prizes and shoring up their bloodlines. Whereas everyone in Andine had a little bit of magic. It was all cherished and coveted for the bounty it gave our world. We couldn’t compete when their gods were set against us. The Doma destroyed … everything.” She choked on the last word. “The lavender fields of my youth. The wheat fields that my mother grew just by looking at them. The castle where I was raised—sundered to its foundation. As much as I love Andine and would do anything to return to it, it is not the place where I was raised any longer.”
“And the Doma killed your mother?” Kerrigan intuited.
Her heart ached for this girl. For all the Andine people. She knew what it was like to be oppressed and abandoned. Danae had lost everything she loved and was still living among the ones who hated her. Kerrigan couldn’t imagine not wanting to tear them down piece by piece until there was nothing left, just for a spark of revenge. Even if revenge couldn’t bring her home or her mother back.
“Yes and no,” Danae said. “My father was on the front lines for much of the war. He brokered a peace treaty to end the suffering of his people, against the wishes of the other kings. They agreed that all the kings would relinquish their titles and relocate to Domara.”
“So they could watch them.”
Danae nodded. “Though I believe they didn’t think that any would do this, and they were right. The other kings banded together to try to kill the Doma, but they were slain, except for my father, who had agreed to the terms.”
“So, why?”
“They believed he was part of it. Or said they did. They demanded my mother in return for his treachery. To prove his loyalty.”
Kerrigan blanched. “Oh gods.”
“He refused, but my mother went in the dead of the night to fulfill the bargain. Lord Divillius was the one to accept her surrender. Tarcus’s father.” Danae ran her hand along the stone, drawing patterns in the condensation. “She was enslaved to his family and eventually took her own life.”
Kerrigan said nothing, just stared in revulsion. What horrors Danae’s mother must have endured at the hands of Tarcus’s family to choose death over an enslavement she had willingly entered into.
“I’m sorry,” Kerrigan finally whispered.
“As I said, it was a long time ago. I was very young.”
Her heart went out to Danae. She understood that all too well. “I thought my mother died in childbirth,” Kerrigan said when the silence stretched too thin. “And my father abandoned me when I was old enough to start to reveal that I was not fully Fae.”
Danae tilted her head, her eyes going to Kerrigan’s ears. “Ah, but you are Fae-touched. That is highly prized. Why would he abandon you for that?”
“It’s not prized where I’m from. Only full-Fae with sharply pointed ears are respected. I believed for a long time that my mother was dead and my father didn’t want me. And I suffered greatly for being different. I am sorry to hear that you have endured a similar fate.”
Danae was quiet a moment at Kerrigan’s pronouncement. “You’re not from here, are you?”
Kerrigan bit her lip. “No, I’m not.”
“Well … how did you get here?”
“A portal,” she said, reaching for a truth the way that Danae had given her own truth. She didn’t know what made her want to say it, but something about Danae was so soothing. As if Kerrigan could tell her anything.
Her eyes widened. “A portal from another world. We had tales of that back in Andine, but I believed them to be myth. Why would you come through the portal here?”
“My world is in peril. War broke out, and we lost. As Andine lost to Domara. I was sent to find a way to save my people.”
“But you were caught by Flavia,” Danae said, as if all the pieces fit together.
“Yes, I’ve made costly mistakes because I didn’t understand this world. Like you, I want to get home. I want to save my world.”
An inkling in the back of her brain was starting to pulse at her. She didn’t know what it was, but something was telling her to ignore it. And she wanted to ignore it. Still, it was there. As if drawing her in. She didn’t know how to stop it.
So, she went into herself the way she would have when she had magic. There was nothing there to control it, but that pulse was still active. Kerrigan reached out and touched it. The bubble burst, and suddenly, Kerrigan gasped, coming fully back to herself.
She wrenched away from Danae in the water. “What did you do?”
Danae’s mouth opened in shock. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“What did you do?” she demanded.
“I … I …” Danae opened and closed her mouth. “I’ve never had that happen before. I swear it.”
“Have what happen?”
Her hands covered her face, and she spun away from Kerrigan. “I’m so sorry. I got caught up in the tale. I didn’t mean to spin it on you.”
“Spin what on me?”
Danae swiped at tears and then faced her again. “No one knows. No one. If I tell you, I’ll be breaking every rule.”
“If you don’t tell me what you just did, I will force you to tell me,” Kerrigan snarled.
Danae held her hands up. “I’m a truthteller.”
“A what?”
“I can judge when someone is telling me the truth. Or at least … that is how I’ve always used the magic before.”
“And now?”
“I think … I made you tell me the truth.”
Kerrigan seethed. She never would have confessed information to this total stranger otherwise.
“That is invasive and horrible.” She headed back the way she had come in the pool. She couldn’t be in Danae’s presence any longer. Not if Danae was going to secretly use her magic to get information from her.
“Kerrigan, wait …”
Kerrigan froze at that name. “What did you just call me?”
“The truth,” Danae admitted slowly. “I didn’t know that until I said it. Please, let me explain.”
“And why should I trust you?”
“You shouldn’t. Not after what I did, but I promise you on my mother’s life that I didn’t know I was doing it. My powers have been suppressed. Truthtellers are owned by the Doma. My father and mother kept me hidden from them. That is why there are so few servants and why my father keeps us far away on this compound instead of in the city. It’s too dangerous for me.”
“And you just manifested your powers around me?” she asked skeptically. “Constantine didn’t put you up to this?”
“No, he’d be furious if he found out.” She was trembling in the water, and she looked so young. She wasn’t even as old as Kerrigan, but had dealt with this much hidden power and a life of trauma. “I don’t know what happened. My magic has been hidden so long that it just … uncoiled at my confessions to you.”
Which felt … true. Though how could Kerrigan judge what was and wasn’t truth around a girl who could spin the truth? And yet she knew what it was to be scared of her own abilities. To have her spirit magic consume her to the point where she had nearly died without a teacher. Danae would be the same if she kept it locked away forever.
“You need to learn control, not suppression,” Kerrigan said.
“Who would teach me that? The only other truthtellers are enslaved to the Doma, as I would be if anyone found out.” Danae crossed her arms over her body in fear. “I’m glad you were able to break the spell. I wanted you as a friend. Not … not what happened.”
“A friend. Yet I am enslaved here.”
Danae sighed. “If it makes you feel better, my father has no intention of selling you. He just didn’t want Tarcus to have you.”
“Then, he should let me go.”
“You won’t trust him until he does?”
“Are you using your truth magic on me again?”
“No,” she whispered.
Kerrigan pulled herself out of the welcoming waters. She didn’t know what to make of Danae. She liked the girl. She might have even wanted to trust her before what had happened. The magic wasn’t Danae’s fault. And she seemed genuinely concerned by her own magical outburst. But it was just one too many things all at once.
She was glad that she hadn’t told Danae about her mother here in Domara. Even magic hadn’t been able to pry that from her mouth.
“Kerrigan, I am sorry.”
“I know,” she said and then grabbed her dress and stalked from the room.