The Bitter Kingdom

8

WE find ourselves on the bald face of a giant granite outcropping. The trail disappears, marked only by piles of stone left by previous travelers to guide the way across the bare mountainside. Without the cover of pine forest, the wind is as loud and steady as a rushing river, the sun bright and fierce.

We take a moment to gaze westward toward the desert and see how far we’ve come. Below, the foothills spread wide, forested nearby but becoming sparser and sparser until they disappear into a hazy yellow horizon. Looking down at the vast landscape makes me feel strong, like I’ve accomplished something magnificent.

I imagine the Invierno soldiers who traveled this unforgiving path. There must have been an endless stream over many years to have amassed the enormous army that eventually attacked and nearly destroyed my capital city. I am filled with a sense of grudging admiration for the determination and stubbornness such a venture would take.

We cross the outcropping and drop into a grassy valley. Storm says the first free village is just ahead, past a copse of spruce. Though no one here is likely to recognize us, Belén has warned us to be alert at all times. I clutch my reins so tight they dig into my palms, because at last we’ve come to a place where we can ask openly about travelers who have passed through before us.

I momentarily forget all this when I catch first sight of it. Massive stone walls jut from rolling grass, rising four or five times the height of a man before ending in jagged ruins, as if a giant cleaver has lopped off their tops. Chunks of quarry stone lie scattered throughout the meadow, half buried in sod.

I’ve seen this before—huge granite blocks so tightly fitted that the mortar is either invisible or absent, vegetation scaling the sides, corners rounded and worn smooth from centuries of wind and rain.

It’s just like the hidden valley Storm and I discovered on our way to the zafira—the valley I destroyed. Perhaps the towers in this mountain village were also built by the ancestors of the Inviernos, long before God brought my own people to this world.

The village has grown up around these ruins, incorporating ancient walls and cornerstones into its own odd architecture. We pass a small cottage that uses one of the towers for its rear wall. Its roof is steep and pointed—never have I seen such a steep roof—and smoke curls lazily from a fat chimney. A stout woman dressed in doeskin leans over a porch railing, beating dust from a large pelt with a club. She studies us as we pass, but seems unconcerned.

Farther in, we encounter a large plaza of paver stone. Market stalls ring the area, and merchants cry their wares to everyone passing through. It’s a busier, louder place than the commandeered village where we stole our horses. Looking around, listening to the rhythm of haggling, I could almost forget that a war is coming.

We toss a few coins to a stable boy who promises to feed and rub down our mounts, then Storm leads us toward the inn—a larger building with two gable windows. The setting sun reflects against the panes, and I can’t shake the feeling that they’re fiery eyes, glaring at us.

We’re stepping onto the wood-plank porch when something flashes bright blue in my peripheral vision. I turn, puzzled.

Beside the inn is one of the many merchants’ stalls, and it’s obvious why this one faces west. In the setting sun, its wares are as bright as candle flames, for the stall is filled with glass. Glass of every color, sculpted into goblets and jewelry and candlestick holders, even blown into delicate sculptures of animals and people.

A mobile hangs from the ceiling, dangling squares that dance and sway in the gentle breeze, throwing prismatic shards against the walls of the hut—and against the face of the tall, supremely beautiful Invierno woman inside.

Storm nudges me forward, but I can’t stop staring. She has light-brown eyes shaped like a cat’s, an elegant nose and chin, and shining reddish-brown hair. If her coloring were a little darker, if she were not quite so tall, she would look like a Joyan woman.

She returns my stare without flinching, her expression curious. My Godstone flashes warm, and her eyes widen slightly.

I stumble up the stairs, Storm at my back. “I think she sensed your Godstone just now,” he whispers. “I’ll speak with her later and try to convince her it was mine.”

I nod numbly, allowing myself to be led inside.

The interior is dim and hazy, acrid with smoke from both the enormous hearth and the pipes of several bearded man huddled around a table in the corner. Dry rushes line the edges of the room where the wall meets the stone floor. I watch, aghast, as one of the bearded men stands, turns toward the wall, and urinates into the rushes.

As soon as he is done, a little girl no more than eight years old darts over with an armful of fresh rushes that she drops right on top of the old ones. One of the men reaches out and pinches her rear, but she ignores him and scurries away.

I’m about to tell Belén that maybe coming here was a mistake, that replenishing our supplies can wait and I’m not that curious about this place after all. But a tall man in a fur cap and a shop apron places himself between us and the doorway, eyeing us hungrily.

“You are Joyans, yes?” he says. “You have come a long way in a perilous time.”

His words are friendly, but cold calculation hardens his roving eyes as he sizes up our bearing, our cloaks, even our desert boots. We outfitted ourselves carefully, choosing nondescript clothing. Perhaps it is not nondescript enough.

Belén’s return grin is equally calculating. “My companions and I hope to do a tidy business where lesser merchants fear to tread,” he says.

“Wise! Very wise indeed. You’ll be taking rooms, then?”

“Yes,” Belén says. “Two, please. And what does your cook have today?”

The man’s gaze fixates on Belén’s eye patch. “Venison stew. The best in the mountains.” He leans forward and says, in a conspiratorial voice, “But for our higher class of customers, those that have the coin for it, we also have a limited amount of lamb shanks braised in garlic sauce, served with fresh flatbread.”

My mouth waters.

Belén turns to me for a decision. Reluctantly I say, “The venison stew sounds delicious.” We’ve drawn enough attention to ourselves with our finely woven shirts and thick cloaks.

I think of Mara’s spice satchel, hidden in her pack. Once we realized we would make the first leg of our journey on foot, we exchanged most of our coin for spices, which are less cumbersome to carry. Mara’s satchel holds marjoram, allspice berries, cardamom, dried ginger, and even some saffron—enough wealth to get us killed if we are foolish.

And Mara isn’t the only one with hidden cargo. Shoved down into the bottom of my own pack is a wooden box containing my crown of shattered Godstones. Storm insisted—and rightly so—that I might need it at some point. It’s worth more than this entire village, and its discovery would identify me with absolute surety.

“Mula!” the man yells, and the tiny girl who carried the rushes dashes to his side and looks up, wide-eyed. Why would someone name a child a word that means “mule”?

“Venison stew for our guests,” the innkeeper bellows. “Four bowls. Quick, or you’ll feel the back of my hand.”

My Godstone eases warmth into my belly as I peer at her departing figure. It’s hard to see in the dim smoke haze, but there’s something unusual about the cast of her nose and chin, about the way she moves.

Belén directs us to a table. It’s rough-hewn, the planks poorly joined. We sit on stumps to await our meal. I hope the little girl serves us. I want a better look at her.

We don’t wait long. She hurries up, balancing four bowls in a miraculous feat, and slides them onto the table. Murky brown stuff slops over the side of one of them. She stares at the slight mess, horrified.

She is so tiny that even though I’m sitting, her head barely reaches my shoulder. Her limbs are scrawny beneath the ragged hem of her shift. Her feet are bare, her toenails crusted with dirt. A large bruise purples her forearm.

She looks up at me with pleading eyes, and I gasp. “Please don’t tell that I spilled the stew,” she whispers.

Her eyes are lightest brown, almost yellow, like a cat’s. And she has the same high cheeks and delicate chin as Storm. But her skin is darker than that of any Invierno I’ve seen, her short, ragged hair a sooty black. My Godstone pulses warmly, as if greeting an old friend.

“Lady?” she says again, and her voice quivers. “You won’t tell, will you?”

“There is nothing to tell,” I say gently. “I see no spill.”

Her grin is as quick and bright as lightning, and she dashes away.

“Why so interested in the girl?” Belén asks around a mouthful of stew.

“I thought she might be an Invierno child,” I say, grabbing my spoon. “But now I’m not so sure.”

“She’s a mule,” Storm says.

I pause, the spoonful of stew halfway to my mouth. “What do you mean?”

He takes a deep breath, as if greatly burdened to instruct me in something so obvious. “She’s a mixed child. Part Invierno, part Joyan.”

I set my spoon back down. “Oh. Are there . . . many . . . mixed people?”

“Oh, no, they are quite rare. A union between our people rarely produces children, and when it does, they grow up to be infertile, unable to bear children of their own.”

“Ah,” I say, though my heart is racing. “Mules.” This is what Master Geraldo didn’t want me to know. But why?

“Just so. This stew is terrible.”

“They’ve watered it down,” Mara says, her nose wrinkling. “And the turnips are old. Maybe moldy.”

It’s obviously no great revelation to my companions, but my mind whirls with ramifications. Mixed people. Why had this possibility never occurred to me before? “Do our people intermarry, then?” I ask.

“Sometimes,” Storm says. “In the free villages. Such a marriage would never be sanctioned in Invierne, though.”

“In the village we come from,” Mara says, with a chin lift indicating Belén, “there was talk of a marriage to an Invierno trader, generations ago, before the border skirmishes got ugly. But I never thought it was true.”

“Interesting.” I finally take a bite of my stew, and Mara is correct—they’ve watered it down so much it might as well be soup.

“What are you thinking, Elisa?” Belén asks with a narrowed eye.

“Don’t you think it’s odd that, in spite of my royal education, no one ever told me about mules?”

He shrugs. “Maybe they didn’t want you to know how similar Inviernos actually are to us. Painting the enemy as being as inhuman as possible is a great way to win a war.”

I choke down a chunk of potato, hardly tasting it. “Maybe,” I say. “But I want to talk to that girl again.”

The bearded men at the table across from us eye us warily as we’re scraping the last of our stew from our bowls. I’m relieved when Mula returns. “Your rooms are ready,” she says. “I will show you.”

We follow her through the common room to the back stairs. As she steps up, the bottoms of her bare feet flash bright blue, and I’m so startled I almost stumble.

“Slave mark,” Mara whispers.

I frown. Joya d’Arena has not allowed slavery for centuries. My home country of Orovalle never allowed it.

“Here,” says the girl. She opens a door to reveal a small room with two cots. A table rests against the wall between them. On it are a clay pitcher and a half-melted candle, lit from above by a single window too high to look out of. “Your other room is across the hall,” she adds.

“Thank you,” I say, and I hand her a copper coin, which she shoves into her mouth.

I want to ask her some questions, but I’m not sure where to start or what to say, so I’m glad when she lingers, her eyes roving over our packs. “What’s in there?” she says around her mouthful of coin.

“Just supplies,” I say.

“Orlín says you’re traders.”

“Orlín?”

“So what are you trading?”

Mara steps forward, eyes narrowed. “Did Orlín put you up to asking?”

The girl’s golden eyes shift left, but she nods once, sharply.

My disarming smile is wasted on her, since she will not meet anyone’s gaze. “You may tell Orlín that we have some spices,” I say. “Just marjoram and sage. But if it trades well, we’ll come back with more.” The lie sits easy in my mouth. When did I become so comfortable with deception?

She nods and turns to slip out the door, but she pauses, her tiny hand on the frame. “He says you’re fine lords and ladies,” she says over her shoulder. “He has a very bad want for seeing inside those packs. But don’t say I told.” And she scurries away in a flash of bright blue.

I sigh after her. “I guess we should all stay in the same room tonight. And rotate watches.”

“Our packs should be guarded at all times,” Mara adds.

“By your leave,” Storm says, “I’d like to find a barber to trim this loathsome black from my hair.”

I grin, but my amusement is fleeting. “Will you make some inquiries, too? Find out if—when—Franco’s party passed through? And I’d love to know if anyone remembers a prisoner, and . . . and what state he was in.”

“Of course, Majesty.”

“I’m going to see if I can trade for some tack,” Belén says. “Our horses do well enough bareback, but past the timberline, our path is going to be very steep and I’d rather have saddles.”

“Thank you, Belén.”

“Will you and Mara be all right by yourselves?”

Mara and I exchange a look of mutual longing. “Oh, yes,” I say firmly. “Mara and I are going to order baths.”

Mara and I sit on the cot, clad only in our spare blouses while our regular clothes are with a laundress. She combs my damp hair, and the slight tug on my scalp is so familiar, so comforting. With my eyes closed, I can almost imagine that Ximena is the one working through my hair, that I didn’t have to send her away after all.

I open my eyes. It was an inevitable decision, and it won’t do me any good to wallow in regret.

“How is your head?” I ask Mara. The bruise above her brow is no longer swollen, but the color has turned the sickly yellow of urine. I’m hoping it’s a good sign.

“Better,” she says. “I don’t get dizzy anymore.”

“Belén was very concerned for you. He didn’t leave your side once while you were drifting in and out of consciousness.”

She freezes, and I wince as the teeth of the comb dig into my scalp with the weight of her hand. After too long a pause, she says, “Oh?”

I hide a smile. “Yes. The way he looked at you . . . you are dear to him, Mara.”

She resumes combing, but her strokes are rhythmic and thoughtless. She combs the same section of hair over and over again. “Maybe . . .” she says. “Maybe I’m dear to him like a sister. We’ve become friends again.”

It’s hard not to laugh. “You know how you always tell me I’m pathetically ignorant in matters of love?”

She pulls my hair back and begins to separate it for braiding. “Well, it’s true. You were the last person to realize Hector was in love with you.”

“Yes, well, everyone is ignorant when it comes to their own life and love.”

“You think so?”

“I think . . .” I struggle to find the exact words. “I think sometimes when we find love we pretend it away, or ignore it, or tell ourselves we’re imagining it. Because it’s the most painful kind of hope there is. It can be ripped away so easily. By indifference. By death. By . . . the need for a political marriage. Or maybe that last one is just me.”

Her fingers move from habit, and I wish we were back in my suite, sitting in front of the vanity mirror so I could see her face. “You think I’m pretending away my hope?” she says in a small voice. “Because it might hurt too much?”

“I don’t know. But that’s what I did with Hector. Even though part of me knew I loved him.”

She plunks down beside me on the cot and lets her face fall into her hands. “I’m afraid,” she whispers into her palms.

“Belén adores you. I’m sure of it.”

“Not of that.” She raises her face, and I have to remind myself that the rippled scar pushing one eyelid down—a gift from her abusive father—always makes her appear sadder than she is. “I could not bear it, to fall in love again, only to have him die.”

“You’re thinking of Julio.” The boy she was secretly betrothed to, before she fled to the rebel village and met me. She doesn’t speak of him often, but over time I’ve eked bits of the story out of her.

“Don’t you ever think of Humberto?” she counters. “Surely losing him so suddenly makes you . . . wary.”

“I think of him often,” I say softly. “Though less than I used to.”

“You loved him.” Her voice is almost accusing.

“I did. It was different, though. I loved Alejandro too, in a small way. I seem to have great capacity for it. Alejandro was the most beautiful man I’d ever seen. But Humberto was the kindest, a different kind of beautiful.”

“And Hector?”

I take a deep breath, for talking about him is both wondrous and painful. “Hector is my friend. I trust him in everything, always. But when I’m with him, it’s like my blood is on fire. And now that I understand you can love someone in different ways at once, I’ll never want less.”

She sighs. “Julio was my friend. And Belén was my fire. But now . . .”

“Now Belén is becoming a friend too.” I shake my head in mock despair. “A deadly combination.”

A little grin sneaks onto her face. “We are doomed, Elisa.”

“Indeed, I think we are.”

She starts to giggle, and then she’s laughing so hard that tears leak from her eyes.

“What, by God’s righteous right hand, is so funny?”

“You!” She gasps between breaths. “Giving me advice on love!”

And it hardly makes sense, but laughter pours out of me like a stream too long dammed, and then we’re hugging on the cot, both of us breathless, until she suddenly sobers and says, “You’re the best friend I’ve ever had, Elisa.” But the moment it leaves her mouth, she stiffens and pulls her arms away. “I’m sorry. That’s not appropriate. I would never presume—”

“And you’re mine,” I say truthfully. There’s a hole inside me that she fills, something I wouldn’t get from being queen or winning a war or even being with Hector.

“You’re the sister I never had,” she adds.

“And you’re the sister I always wish I had.”

She barks a laugh. “Someday you’ll have to tell me all about Princess Alodia and why things are so difficult between you.”

I nod, my thoughts suddenly far away. “When I figure it out,” I murmur, “you’ll be the first to know.”