The Hidden Queen, page 24
Expect Arick to give in like I always do, but he simply bows. “I have no tales to match the ones you spin, daughter of Gared.”
Selen wrinkles her nose at him. “Ay, maybe we can fix that.” Her eyes flick to me for just an instant when she says it.
Arick takes a step back, but Selen is undeterred, pursuing him until he backs into a wall. “Why so shy? Princes are supposed to be bold.”
Arick raises a hand, creating a barrier between them. “Perhaps some princes, but not me.”
“Why, are you push’ting?” There’s a laugh in her voice when she says it, but then she sees his face. “Oh, night! I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…”
Arick waves it away. “I do not have the luxury to be push’ting, if I am to carry on my father’s name. My stepmother will select a bride for me when I am of age, and I will give her children, if I can.”
Selen smiles again. “Hear it’s an easy recipe. In the meantime, I know a few handsome young men I can introduce you to once we’re back in Hollow.”
She’s trying to be friendly, but Arick smells even more uncomfortable. “I’ve never actually…” He shakes his head. “It doesn’t matter. I am not fit to be with anyone, now.”
Selen reaches out to touch his shoulder, her tone softening further. “None of us had it easy out on the desert, Arick. But that’s all the more reason to keep living.”
“Perhaps,” Arick says. “But not tonight.” He bows again and moves for the stairs.
Selen’s eyes flick back to me, standing frozen at the bar. Her words are too low for anyone else to hear, but she knows I can. “Suppose you already knew he din’t like girls, and let me make a fool of myself anyway.”
She turns for the stairs herself, smelling angry and embarrassed. Know following her’s a mistake, but I do it anyway.
“Go away, Darin,” she growls.
I ignore her. I don’t know what’s happening between us, but I can’t stand it. Got to at least try to make things right.
“Din’t know,” I say. “Ent surprised, but I din’t know. And it ent like I ever ‘let’ you do anything. Only thing Selen Cutter’s ever done is exactly what she wants.”
“Ay, well, see where that’s got me.” Selen puts her hands on her hips. “Go on and have a laugh. Know you think I have it coming.”
The words sting, but they ent fair. “Never laughed at you, Selen Cutter. Not to be mean. Not ever.”
That hits, maybe harder than I wanted it to. I can smell her tears coming as she turns away. “Well ent you just perfect.” She stinks of shame and humiliation and anger.
“Wait.” The word feels like begging and I hate it, but Selen only picks up speed, heading for her room.
“Go away, Darin,” she says again.
I could flit past her before she knows I’ve moved. I could stand in front of her door and demand she talk to me. But I don’t. She slams the door shut behind her and buries her face in her pillow. She refuses to cry, but I can hear her rapid breathing, and the moisture on the cloth.
I head to my room, but not for long. Arick is already practicing his kamanj and says nothing as I open the window and slip out onto the roof.
I spot Briar immediately, wind carrying his hogroot smell from up a tree, too high even for that weed to grow.
“Took you long enough,” he says. “What did they have for dessert?”
“Sugar cake.” I reach into a pocket for the piece I wrapped in a napkin. “Saved you a slice.”
* * *
—
Over the next week I let myself be seen once every day or two—just enough so no one thinks I’ve gone missing, but I was downright social on the road out of the desert by comparison.
One night while we’re passing through the Laktonian wetlands, Briar waves me off the main road, and I follow as he runs at speed through peat bogs full of rotten logs and hidden sinkholes. I can smell corelings out here in the wetlands. Not many—just a handful of bog and swamp demons that were lucky enough to be out of range when my da purged them from the cities. Easy enough to avoid.
Still, I put up the hood of Mam’s Cloak of Unsight. Might be even these stragglers wandering the wetlands report back to Alagai Ka at new moon.
We come upon a small village. Used to think Tibbet’s Brook was small compared to Hollow or Everam’s Bounty, but this place makes the Brook look like one of the Free Cities. Just a little cluster of modest houses, made more from sod and mud than wood and stone.
I like it. Most towns dominate their area, built on high ground on big clearings of land. This place blends into the bogs instead.
“This is Bogton,” Briar says. “I was born here. Come.”
There’s a small Holy House that ent got room for more’n a hundred in the pews, but it’s got good strong wards. Briar climbs up to the bell tower and then slips down inside. He sneaks up to the altar and lifts the silver cover to the offering, a fresh-baked loaf of bread. He takes it, sniggering to himself as he leaves a sprig of hogroot in its place like it’s some secret joke.
“It’s not sugar cake,” he tells me, “but Tender Heath missed his calling as a baker.”
We take the prize out of the town proper, sharing it as we walk a dark and winding path to what smells like the town dump. It’s mostly bigger refuse—folk compost the food waste—but there’s still plenty of stink. Even amid all of it, I can smell something else.
I put a hand on Briar’s arm, pointing up ahead with my chin. “Bog demon.”
Briar nods. “If one gets close to town, the folk come out with bows to drive it away, but no one comes to the dump at night.”
I follow him up a tree and we string our bows, waiting for the demon to step out of cover. When it does, I take aim, but before I can loose, Briar has already put a warded arrow in its chest, dropping it as we watch the ground around it grow wet with ichor, bright with magic.
Briar drops down and moves to retrieve his arrow, laying his warded hand on the coreling as he does. Immediately, the demon’s fading glow is Drawn to Briar’s tattoo, and I see his own aura brighten in response, even as the bog demon’s grows dim.
His eyes glow like a cat’s at night, and I know his other senses have come alive as well. He’s experiencing the world like I do. He stands still, reaching out to see if any other corelings have gotten close.
They haven’t. I flit down to join him as he cleans the ichor from his arrow and puts it back in the quiver.
“Ever get to be too much, all the sights and sounds and smells?” I ask.
Briar looks at me, sympathy in his eyes. “Sometimes. But I’ve learned to filter some of it out. Like skimming my eyes over the page of a book without reading.”
“Never been much good at that,” I admit.
“It’s about finding harmony with the world around you,” Briar says. “Becoming part of the night, instead of passing through it. Making its sounds and smells yours.”
He leads me to a great patch of wild hogroot, growing on a pile of trash near the center of the dump. I follow him right into the weeds, and he rolls a tabletop out of the way, revealing an entrance to a cozy hiding hole inside. It’s tight, but I can sense this is a special place for him, and I don’t complain as we squeeze in.
“I used to stay up all night, in here, listening,” Briar says. “Frightened. Paranoid. Jumping at every sound. But those feelings keep you alive in the naked night. Don’t ever forget that.”
“Why did you stay here, when the dawn came?” I have no right to ask, but I need to know.
Briar’s eyes drop to the floor. “It was my carelessness that caused our wards to fail, and my family paid the price. We were the only mixed-blood family in the village, and I did not think any would take in one mudboy stray. Better I live here, among the trash, than among those who would only remind me of loss.”
Having shown me this place, he seems eager to be gone, crawling out the way we came and standing back up to look at the stars and moon above. “It feels safe to hide, to not get involved in people’s problems. But it’s empty and lonely and will slowly drive you mad. I was adrift until I found people again.”
“Sometimes I feel more adrift around people,” I admit.
Briar nods. “We create patterns for our own sanity, but we don’t need to be slaves to them. Wherever you go, you can make a new pattern.” He waves to the hogroot patch. “I created dozens of briarpatches like this one while I was scouting during the war. Places to retreat, find my center, and emerge strong once more.”
“Ent ever been strong,” I say. “Running away to hide’s the only thing I ever been good at.”
“You and I both know that isn’t true,” Briar says.
Slowly, he reaches for my shoulder. Don’t like being touched, but he’s showin’ trust by giving me time to step back, and so I allow it. His hand comes to rest and squeezes. “It is easy to feel small, Darin am’Bales, when the enemy is vast. But the tiniest point can pierce a bubble, and let its own power destroy it.”
* * *
—
Soon after, we cross the border into Hollow, and the hubbub when we left Krasia is nothing compared to the reception we get once we start passing through the boroughs. Word traveled ahead of us, and it seems like every hamlet’s taken it as an excuse to throw a party.
Even when we’re just passin’ through, Olive and Selen have to get down and shake hands with the grayhairs on every town council, and let every Herb Gatherer ask after their health. There are tears and hugging and praises to the Creator, and I don’t want any part of it.
Arick’s and Rojvah’s names are on everyone’s lips, and talk of their father, Halfgrip, the famed fiddle wizard. They see Arick’s kamanj case on his back and he doesn’t even need to play it before they are falling over themselves in praise.
Rojvah handles it better. Her carriage and regal bearing, not to mention her Sharum guards, keep folk on their best behavior, especially in the hamlets where folk ent used to royals passing through. But she seems energized by the attention, whether she’s waving from her carriage window, bestowing blessings on Town Speakers, or asking a group of wide-eyed children to teach her the local songs and dances.
Even Briar is sucked in. An experienced guide, he has contacts he needs to maintain in most of these towns. But the check-ins are never just a How d’you do. There’s more hugging and kissing and usually a meal with the whole family crowding the table.
I stay away from all of it, hovering just at the range of my senses. I watch our caravan get a little bigger with each town. Local militia volunteer to escort us through their lands, but never seem to turn back at their borders.
It shouldn’t be surprising. Hollow thought Olive and Selen lost, and the duchy with them. Now they are returned, and layer by layer, the Hollowers are creating a protective shell around them.
I get it, but I don’t like it. It’s suffocating, and I wonder what it’s going to mean when we need to sneak off, again. Folk ent gonna like that. But right now, it’s all Creator be praised! and spontaneous cheering.
Ent like they don’t got cause. I just like my celebrations…quieter. I keep my distance until one afternoon, a day out from the capital city of Cutter’s Hollow, when Olive calls me on it.
I’m half a mile from the road, too far to smell, but Olive raises her voice just a bit, and the irritation in her tone hits me like a cat scratch. “Enough sulking, Darin. These people are scared, and grieving, and they need to see you and know that you’re safe.”
None of us are safe. But I blow out a breath, knowing she’s right. I make sure I’m seen as I rejoin the procession.
Dusk Runner perks up the moment he smells me. I make time for him every day, but it’s nothing like it was in the desert, when we were all but inseparable. He’s happy to be unhitched, and I don’t weigh much to the likes of him. I put up the awning on his saddle and take out my pipes, letting everyone know I’m about.
No one wants to interrupt my playing, so they keep their distance out of respect. I get to smile and nod and that’s enough, no need for hugging. All I have to do is play continuously, which is a fair deal, you ask me.
But pipes ent enough in Cutter’s Hollow. People are gathered in the thousands, packing every side street and lining every avenue with barely enough room for us to pass. They are singing, cheering, crying, and sometimes just…shrieking.
Even I can’t hear my pipes, and I’m the one playing them. It’s daytime, so I can’t use the magic coin to amplify my pipes, or turn slippery and flee. I’m stuck, and the noise envelops me, cutting from all sides until it feels like I can’t breathe.
There’s only one place I can go, and it can’t possibly be worse than this.
I slip from Dusk Runner and flee to Rojvah’s carriage.
Know I ought to knock, but it hurts too much. I bounce right up onto the step and open the door, rolling inside and pulling it shut before the guard even fully realizes I am there.
Rojvah is alone by the window, waving to folk, but she doesn’t so much as yelp as I tumble past her and pull down the shade on the opposite side. I curl up in that shaded corner, arms over my ears and eyes. I expect the guard to give a shout, but he doesn’t.
Someone in the crowd does, though. A man bellows my name, and others take up the call.
It’s quieter, inside. Not quiet, but…quieter. The carriage walls are thick, and lined with stuffing and velvet and layers of paint for just this purpose. The inside is just a wide and thickly carpeted floor, covered in pillows that muffle everything, helping me filter some of the noise from outside.
Rojvah smells amused. “I was wondering when I would see you again, Intended.”
’Course she’s amused. All a joke to her. Some whisper of the ripping dice so she can clip off her mam’s apron strings.
Folk are chanting my name now, and it’s like a drumbeat fixing to split my skull open. I moan and grab a pair of pillows, stuffing them into my face. Rojvah’s got a window cracked, letting in sound and light and smells like a lash. I start digging. Maybe I can bury myself in the pillows.
“Oh, Intended.” The amusement is gone, but now it’s worse. She smells like pity, and it makes me wish I’d never left Tibbet’s Brook.
She closes the window and draws down the shade. Helps a little. But then she pulls a rope and thick velvet blackout curtains drop, bathing the inside of the carriage in complete darkness.
“This is a dama’ting carriage, Intended,” Rojvah whispers, “designed to let my sisters use hora in the day.”
My eyes are shut tight, but I hear as she dials the gem on her choker, changing the alignment of the delicate wards around it. The hora stone within activates, casting a bubble of silence around us.
I take a full breath for the first time in what feels like hours, but I am still shaking and clenched, gritting my teeth not to cry. The sounds are gone but I still hear them, over and over in my head.
I try to pull away when Rojvah reaches for me, but I’m not in control of my body anymore, and can do little more than twitch as she pulls my head into her lap, and begins to sing.
Slowly, at first. A hum that rises into notes that wrap themselves around me like my mam’s arms, pushing out the echoes of the crowd. Then rising in power to make it my whole world.
The smell of her perfume is everywhere. Never much liked perfumes. They tend to give me a headache, just hanging in the room, covering up everything else. But right now, it’s something to focus on other than the competing stinks of the thousands in the crowd, and by itself it smells…nice. Somewhere between a flower and a spice.
Her hand is cool as she strokes my cheek in time with her song, a Krasian lullaby. I crack my eyelids, and the inside of the carriage is so dark my night eyes come to life, seeing in magic’s light. Rojvah is painted in a wash of colors, prettier than a sunset.
I don’t smell pity anymore, and at last, I start to relax.
There’s a bang at the door, and I close my eyes against a flare of light as it’s yanked open. Catch a glimpse of Selen standing on the step of the moving carriage. “You okay, Darin?”
“Nie’s black heart!” Rojvah throws a pillow that I hear thump against Selen’s head. “He was, oaf, before you pulled open the door!”
“Ay, sorry!” I hear Selen say.
“Get out!” Rojvah throws another pillow, but it hits the door as Selen withdraws and shuts it tight, reestablishing the dark and quiet.
She doesn’t start singing again. That spell is broken. But neither does she press, as I crack open my eyes and adjust to the inside of the carriage. She gives me water to drink, and a honey cake to nibble, and after a little while, I feel like myself again.
“Do not be vexed at the daughter of Gared,” Rojvah whispers. “No doubt she believed she was running to save you.”
“Maybe I don’t need savin’,” I say.
“Everyone needs saving sometimes, Intended,” Rojvah says. “We are all of us connected, and there is no shame in it.”
“Well it’s only going to get worse once we get to the keep,” I say. “Everyone’s going to want a piece of us. I’ll try to spare you having to save me twice in one day.”
I start to get up, but Rojvah lays a gentle hand on my chest, and I stay where I am, head still in her lap as she strokes my hair. “There is no counting between intended. I will save you a thousand thousand times, as you have done for me. Do not fear what is to come at court.”
“You’ve never even been to court at Hollow,” I say. “How can you know what there is to fear?”
“Phagh.” Rojvah waves a hand. “The night is your place of power, Intended, but court is mine. Stay close and let me do the talking. You will think you have gone slippery, with the polite ease I slide us past the servants, penitents, and well-wishers, and parry away even the most powerful and banal.”
