Eliana
“His Excellency Ravikant, Admiral of the Imperial Fleet, Loyal Servant to His Majesty the Emperor of the Undying, invites you to the city of Festival on October 4, to partake in the Jubilee to be held in his honor, to celebrate His Excellency’s naming day, and to commemorate the arrival of imperial forces that did seize this kingdom and began the great work of restoring it to its previous angelic glory. Attendance is not required but is strongly encouraged.”
—Invitation to the Admiral’s Jubilee, sent to all citizens of Festival and surrounding territories September 14, Year 1018 of the Third Age
The day before the Jubilee passed in a blur of nerves and preparation. Red Crown operatives flitted through the mansion like birds, carrying messages and supplies. Dani’s sons clomped upstairs and downstairs, rushing plates of food to everyone working. Rain beat yet again on the windows, which no one was happy about, for mud made everything more easily trackable.
And through all of this, Eliana rested, stewing.
She had been ordered to rest by Simon, and then had scolded him roundly for ordering her to do anything, and then, after he had obeyed her command to leave her alone for a while, she had chastised herself into admitting he was right. She did need to rest. Fighting Rielle had left her considerably drained, as had the trip through time. Her power felt far from her, buried beneath layers of stone. And Simon himself was resting in his own room, which had become a war chamber, everyone hurrying to and from with messages for him, rolled-up maps of the city, weapons to be inspected and approved.
Logically, Eliana knew that the longer each of them rested, the more successful their next attempt to travel back to the Old World would be.
But that didn’t make the agony of sitting idly, waiting for time to creep on, any less agonizing.
In the late afternoon, Dani came to Eliana’s room and found her cross-legged on the floor, cleaning her knives. Remy sat squashed in an armchair near the window, writing out phrases in Old Celdarian for her to study.
Dani leaned against the door frame. “I’m not sure those knives could get any cleaner if you worked on them for another hundred years.”
Eliana had barely glanced up when Dani arrived. It was a strangeness unmatched in her very strange life to adjust to the new reality of the world—Jessamyn gone, Dani’s husband gone, the house changed just enough to leave her feeling unbalanced, and no one but her and Simon noticing the difference. Several times during the last few hours, she had had to bite her tongue to keep from pulling Patrik away from his work to sit him down and tell him everything she knew about Jessamyn, curious if it would trigger some faint, warped memory inside him.
But Simon had cautioned her against doing so. It would only confuse things, he warned. It would only further muddy the waters they had already muddied by traveling to the past.
“Time travel has many repercussions, some of which even I don’t understand,” he had told her, fussing about her room, needlessly straightening furniture and pillows and her strewn-about clothes. “It’s not an act to be taken lightly.”
As if she took anything lightly in this world. As if she had ever been given the chance to.
She had lost hold of her slipping patience and ordered him out of her room. Never mind that she recognized his needless fussing as a manifestation of energy as nervous as her own. Afterward, she’d stormed across the floor in an ugly temper, unsure where to direct her anger and settling at last on everything. Then her mind, apparently eager to hurt itself, had wandered to Harkan, and she’d had to sit on the edge of her bed, very still, breathing slowly, for it felt like any sudden movement would throw her completely into chaos.
She wondered how he was faring, wherever he was stationed in the city—with Zahra, and Viri and Catilla, and all the recruits that had been assigned to them. Or had those disastrous few moments in the past ruined everything for Harkan’s team? Were they at this very moment walking into a trap? Were they already dead?
And now Dani was standing in her door, seemingly determined to strike up a conversation.
“I would really rather be alone right now, Dani,” Eliana said, bearing down hard on Nox’s curved, flat blade.
“Except for me,” Remy added from across the room.
“Except for Remy,” Eliana agreed.
“Well, I’m afraid you’ve got to tolerate me for at least a little while,” said Dani. “I’ve dug up one of my old gowns for you, and it just might fit.”
• • •
Eliana had to admit that it was a splendid gown.
A deep crimson across her neck, shoulders, and arms, fading gradually to pure, glittering onyx at the hem. A high neckline in the front, and long sleeves that clung to her arms as if they had been painted there. In the back, the snug bodice opened wide, a broad V that left most of her back exposed and came to a point at the dip of her hips. The fabric was light enough for her to twist easily, but boasted an array of intricate beadwork that caught the light when she turned. Ester and Patrik had sewn various cleverly concealed pockets into the wide skirts, each pocket narrow but deep, for housing her knives. And the skirts themselves flowed and twirled as she walked and spun, allowing for easy movement. The boots Dani had found for her were a bit dull, but supple and sturdy.
She disapproved of only two design elements: the caps of black feathers on the sleeves, and the fact that the beadwork spanning the gown had been sewn in the shapes of feathers as well.
“Can we at least remove the sleeve feathers?” Eliana said, ruffling them with a frown. “They’re rather angelic.”
“That’s the idea.” Dani bustled about, instructing Ester where to pin and pointing out what needed adjusting. “Everyone at these parties tries to reference angels as many times as possible in their wardrobe. It flatters the angels and demonstrates to them that you buy into the whole thing.”
“The whole thing?” Eliana asked.
“The Empire. Their perpetual, world-spanning rule. You know. The whole thing.”
Ester looked back, mouth full of pins. “Oh, is that what you call it?”
“I could call it other things, but I’m trying to curb my foul language,” Dani said.
“Whatever for?”
“You know, now that I think about it, I can’t remember why I ever decided that. So, fuck it.” Dani put her hands on her hips, inspecting Eliana from hem to hair. “You look beautiful, at least. That’s a joy for my tired eyes. We’ll have to do something with your hair though. You can’t wear that messy braid every day of your life.”
Eliana ran her hands down her front, turning left and right in the mirror. She winced a little as she brushed against the bandage under her bodice.
“You could cut it,” she mused. “I’m tired of managing it. The moment I take out my braid, it breeds a hundred new tangles. And cutting it might help disguise me a little.”
Dani made a thoughtful noise. “Now there’s an idea.”
“Remember how my hair used to look, back when I wore it short?” Ester pushed herself upright with a little breathless oof, then dropped a kiss on Dani’s head. “We could try something like that.”
“Yes, I do remember, and stop bending over, you beautiful pregnant fool.” Dani waved her hands at Ester. “Go sit down, put your feet up.”
Simon entered the room, his eyes locking with Eliana’s in the mirror. She resisted the urge to gape at him. He wore a long, black coat that buttoned at the waist over a vest of black brocade, with coattails that fell to his knees. A high collar, a gray cravat. Black gloves; silver cuff links gleaming at his sleeves. High, square shoulders, the architecture of which resembled wings in flight. He had shaven at last, though his hair was still a tousled mess.
When he moved past Eliana, the blazing nearness of his body tugged at her as surely as if he had touched her and pulled her along after him.
“Actually,” he said, addressing the others, “I wonder if I might speak to Eliana alone for a moment.”
Dani and Ester exchanged glances.
“For a moment?” Dani said, straight-faced. “Or perhaps for an hour or two?”
Ester elbowed her in the ribs and grabbed her arm. At the door, Dani turned once more.
“Just please don’t rip the dress,” she said. “If you do, I refuse to mend it.”
Ester pulled her into the hallway with a choked laugh and closed the door behind them.
In their absence, Eliana could only bear the thick silence for the space of a heartbeat.
“I’ve never seen you like this,” she said. “So clean and fine. I hardly know what to think of it.”
Simon smiled a little, then moved toward her and helped her down from the low, flat stool on which she stood. “And then there’s you,” he said softly, his blue eyes glittering as they moved over her body. He let out a long, slow breath, and for a moment she thought he would say something about her appearance. But then a shadow fell over his face, a darkness unlike any she had seen him wear before, flittering and strange, and he turned away from her. He went to the window and stood rigid before it, looking out over the wet, gray world.
“Patrik was fitting me for my Jubilee clothes just now,” he said.
Eliana raised an eyebrow. “Really? I would never have guessed. Isn’t this what you always wear?”
“I was standing there, listening to him prattle endlessly on, and suddenly I couldn’t be there anymore. I couldn’t spend one more moment in that room.” His fists opened and closed at his sides. “I had to see you.”
“Well, here I am.” The longer he stood there, brooding at the window, the greater her uneasiness became. The expression on his face, faintly reflected in the window, was a terrible one.
“Yes, and I can’t even look at you,” he said. “When I do, I want to abandon all of this. I want to forget my training and my mission, defy the Prophet, run away with you like a lovesick boy.”
She moved toward him, her heart skipping against her ribs. She knew she shouldn’t delight in his distress, and yet she did, because it mirrored her own—and because he was a man invincible against most things. But not this. Not her.
“Simon,” she said, reaching for him. Then she hesitated, lowering her arm. “Do you want me to leave?”
“I should stay away from you,” he muttered as if to himself. “Until we leave for the Jubilee, I should want you nowhere near me. And yet, here I am.”
She gently touched his arm and turned him to face her.
“I don’t want you to stay away from me,” she said. “How much time do we have left? Less than a day.”
“Eighteen hours,” he said shortly, “before we leave for Festival.”
She had known that number, had been silently counting down with the passage of every hour. But hearing him say it brought tears to her eyes, and the ache in her chest grew, relentless, until it overcame the rest of her body.
He saw her tears and swore passionately, his face twisting into something almost furious, and reached for her. She met him halfway, their kiss hard and clumsy. His gloved hands slid into her braid, his fingers catching on the tangles, and she welcomed each sting of her scalp, because the small, sharp pain reminded her that she was alive, and so was he—at least for this desperate hour, at least for another seventeen after that.
He kissed her there against the wall, beside the window, his hands in her hair, and she pulled hard on his coat, tugging him as close to her body as she could. But it wasn’t enough. He was too far from her, and she broke away from him with a frustrated sob. A stupid, frantic voice inside her screamed that if she didn’t touch him, right then, that instant, he would disappear from her arms, never to be found again. She fumbled at his clothes, wild for the familiar, rough expanse of his skin. She reached beneath his coat, found his tunic, tugged it loose from his trousers, and when her palms met the warmth of his bare back, she pressed a kiss to his neck and sighed his name.
And then he was tugging up her skirts, lifting her against his hips, and when he entered her, it was swift and hard and everything she craved. She wrapped herself around him and held on, dizzy with him, utterly enveloped in him. His cheek scraped against hers; he whispered her name.
After, as they clung to each other, she pressed her forehead to his, breathing hard, and smiled a little. She touched his damp hair. “I still don’t love you,” she murmured, hoping it would make him smile, hoping it would soften her own grief.
But the expression on his face was utterly bleak, sharp and empty in a way that frightened her, and she knew it had been the wrong thing to say.
“Simon,” she whispered, but before she could apologize, he had taken her face in his hands.
“I need more of you,” he said, his voice low and hungry, his gaze roving restlessly across her face. His hands slipped down her body, tugging at her sleeves, her bodice. He buried his face in the bend of her neck, his teeth scraping against her skin. “Eliana, God help me, if I don’t have you again, I’ll lose what’s left of my mind.”
And there it was again—that strange, skittering darkness in his voice. An agitation in his movements, a slight manic curl in the laugh he breathed against her cheek.
She thought she understood. Time was hurtling them forward, and neither of them could do anything to stop it.
She kissed him, slow and warm, until he calmed, until her own unease had diminished, and then quietly led him upstairs to their room, where she helped him undress and said with her touch what her words could not.