The Bitter Kingdom

41

“WELCOME, queenling,” Eduardo says, his close-cropped beard twitching with amusement. Or maybe triumph.

I step backward. I must make a run for it. They’ll probably catch me, but I have to try.

My rear collides with a solid wall, and I gasp. Barrier magic.

“Please, come in,” he says, as if inviting me for tea and pastries.

There is nowhere else for me to go. Reluctantly I step forward into the relative brightness of my dead husband’s bedchamber.

Captain Lucio lies collapsed and bleeding out on the floor. Others slump against the wall, their armor smoking, their flesh melted from the animagi’s fire. Still others stand frozen. The standing ones are alive, I note with relief, with eyes wide open, but they are unable to move against the sorcerer’s magic.

I scan the room for Belén, and when I spot him a sob bursts from somewhere deep inside me. He lies on his side, half hidden by the edge of a divan. His eye patch is askew, revealing his ruined socket. Half his hair has been singed away. Blood pools beneath his shoulder.

Oh, Belén.

“Surrender,” Conde Eduardo says. “If you sign and seal a proclamation that cedes the throne of Joya d’Arena to me, I’ll let everyone else go.”

“Why, Eduardo? Why have you done this?” I ask, stalling.

He looks genuinely surprised that I would ask. “Because our nation suffers. After generations of weak rule, we are at the brink of ruin. Now we are ruled by a seventeen-year-old foreigner. I knew the moment Alejandro died that I had to wrest the throne away from you in order to save it.”

“You just admitted treason.”

He shrugs. “I am only treasonous if I fail. But I won’t. History will judge me a brave visionary for having succeeded.” I stare at Belén’s tortured body. Whether traitor or visionary, the desire to kill Eduardo is so powerful I almost choke on it.

“So?” he prods. “Do you surrender?”

Maybe I should. Maybe he’ll imprison me instead of kill me right out. Maybe it would save the other guards, the ones who are merely frozen.

But his eyes glint keenly, wide with passion or mania or insanity. I’ve seen that look before, and I know I can’t trust it. I can’t trust him. If I surrender, we die anyway. “We Joyans are such filthy liars,” I mutter.

“What?”

“I said I can’t surrender. I’ve bargained for peace with Invierne, you see. And for the treaty to proceed, I must sit the throne.”

Eduardo looks at me like I’ve just molted and turned into an iguana. He turns to the animagus on his right. “Is that the most ridiculous thing you’ve ever heard?” To me, he says, “I am the one who has bargained for peace. Several Inviernos are currently in my employ. They agreed to a cessation of hostilities if it meant ridding the world of you.”

What an idiot. “You have no idea, do you? Who did you bargain with? Franco? He’s dead, you know. You were a pawn in their bid to weaken Joya. But I journeyed to Umbra de Deus and spoke with the Deciregi themselves. My agreement is with them.”

“You speak falsehood,” hisses one of the animagi.

“I do not.” I step forward, hands raised to show I mean no harm. “I journeyed—”

My body clenches up, and suddenly I can’t move, can’t even blink. The sorcerer’s barrier tightens around me until it feels as though my ribs will splinter into my gut.

“Kill her,” Eduardo says.

Instinctively, I fling my awareness into the earth, seeking the zafira. But there is nothing.

The other sorcerer swings his amulet toward me, and his Godstone begins to spark blue fire from within its tiny iron cage.

I’m frozen, hands raised, one foot in front of the other. How did Hector struggle through this? I can’t even flex a muscle. I can only watch, horrified, as the animagus’ Godstone grows brighter and brighter.

“Some say you are immune to magic,” says the Invierno. “Let us see, shall we?”

I am not immune, not without the Godstone living inside me. I will burn like everyone else. And I will die young after all, like most of the bearers before me.

Oh, Hector, I hope you live. I hope you flee this place, find someone else to grow happily old with. I hope—

The door to the suite bursts open.

The animagus looses a firebolt.

A warrior’s cry, a blur of gray in front of me, a large body crashing at my feet.

I can’t turn my head to look, to figure out what has happened, but the smell of burned flesh fills my nose, and bile creeps up my throat.

“My sky,” someone whispers from the floor.

My heart caves in on itself, as if the firebolt did hit me. Tears flood my eyes, blind me, for the barrier is so tight against me they’ve nowhere to go.

The animagus who loosed the firebolt swears loudly. He put too much into the blast, thinking it would impact the bearer. Now he must wait to fill up again.

I can’t sense him calling on the zafira. But I recognize his grounded stance. It does not flood his stone with power the way it did before, in spite of the blood everywhere. He needs more time.

And in the slight relief that comes with knowing I have a few moments more, the realization hits: If I can’t sense him, he can’t sense me either. I no longer have my living stone.

I take a shallow breath, for that is all the barrier will allow, and I say, “I am not the queen.”

Conde Eduardo’s head snaps toward me. But the shock leaves his face as soon as it comes. “Of course you are.”

“I’m her decoy. Her Majesty has been using decoys for months.” Like the one Franco killed.

Both animagi are studying me carefully now, and I press my case. “I can prove it. Look at my belly. You’ll find no Godstone there.”

One of the animagi steps close, peers into my face. I try to lurch backward, but the barrier holds me tight. “She speaks truth,” he hisses. “I sense no power in her.”

Eduardo glares at me. “The resemblance is preternatural.”

“The queen is hiding in a secret passage,” I insist. “I can take you to her.” Maybe I can draw them away from this room and save my remaining men.

Breath fills my lungs in a whoosh of air. The tears trapped in my eyes stream down my cheeks. The animagus indicates the doorway. “Show us,” he says.

But Conde Eduardo is out of patience. “Fine. I’ll kill her myself.” He pulls a knife from a sheath at his belt.

I try to dart away, but his arm hooks my neck, and he spins me around so that my back is pressed against him. He’s going to slit my throat, but he doesn’t want to be splashed with my blood.

“Good-bye, queenling,” he says, and raises his knife.

I lift my heel and slam it into his instep. He bellows, and I grab his arm, shove my shoulder into his, and flip him over onto his back. Just like Hector taught me.

The animagi raise their amulets toward me as they draw on the zafira. But they struggle, for both have recently used too much power. Their dependence on magic makes them vulnerable.

I am not dependent on magic.

I draw my own daggers, launch over the conde’s sprawled form and Ximena’s burned body, and plunge the blade into the stomach of one, right where his Godstone used to be. I gut him hard, twisting with my knife until he crumples to the ground, sliding from the blade.

The other looses a firebolt, but it’s weak, and I lift my forearm to block. Pain explodes on my skin and I’m knocked back a few steps. He flings another bolt, but I’m already diving for his knees.

We crash to the ground in a tangle of bodies. His amulet sizzles against my shoulder and I jerk away, rolling off him. I jump to my feet, dropping my right dagger. He crab crawls backward until he collides with the massive bed; then he reaches for his amulet again.

I leap forward, palm flat, and I smash his nose into his brain. He goes limp as a rag doll and puddles onto the ground.

I sense movement behind me and whirl to face Conde Eduardo, who struggles to his feet. But the guards who stood frozen moments ago now ring him with swords.

Relief and sadness and exhaustion all battle so fiercely inside me that I fear I might vomit. Covering my mouth with one hand, I stumble toward the crumpled body of my former nurse and drop to my knees beside her.

“Oh, Ximena.”

Breath still gurgles in her throat. Her eyes flutter open, and she reaches weakly for me with one hand. I grab it before it can drop. It’s ice cold.

“My sky,” she whispers.

“Why? How . . .” I’m not sure what I’m asking. I can hardly force the words from my throat anyway, for it has become so thick and hot that it chokes me.

“Something was wrong,” she says. “Nicandro’s informants said the others were in place, but we heard nothing . . . from the residence . . . so he sent me. . . . Oh, it hurts.”

And I know it must, for never once in my life have I heard her complain of pain.

“You shouldn’t have, Ximena. You should have gone home to Alodia like I asked.” I’m gripping her hand so tight it must surely hurt her as well, but I can’t help myself. I’m afraid of what will happen if I let go.

“No,” she says, and her voice has a smidge of its usual firmness. “I was meant to die for you. I was ordained for it.”

And she does. Just like that. The spark of her life winks out, and she seems to cave in on herself. I release her hand finally, feeling like I’m letting go of a huge chunk of myself. Strange how I can be so angry at someone I loved so much.

“He is alive,” someone says.

My heart latches onto the word “alive,” and I let it pull me to my feet. I cradle my burned forearm and look in the direction of the voice.

A guard bends over Belén’s prostrate form. I can’t see his face, but his leg twitches. I rush forward, elbowing people out of my way.

Belén is helped to a sitting position. His head lolls, and his good eye blinks rapidly.

“He’s lost a lot of blood, Majesty,” my guard says. “Hit his head after the animagus burned him. But I think he’ll live.”

I don’t have time to savor my relief. “Take Eduardo to the prison tower. And you, I need a report on the situation in the courtyard immediately. And you—”

The door bursts open and I whirl, but it’s my own Imperial Guard, Hector leading the way. I launch myself at him. Our arms wrap around each other. “You’re all right,” he murmurs. “I can’t believe it worked.”