After a moment, Gaela swept her stare to encompass the entire company assembled in the holy grove. Regan, still against Ban the Fox, followed her sister’s gaze.
Many nodded immediately: Osli and three other retainers, whose faces were firm and already lit in awe, knelt. Some thought hard, then glanced at one another, and back at her again, before going down on their knees, too. The shaking priests were cowed by the display, and followed the others’ example. Except for one.
The old priest was stone, in body and in regard.
Gaela said, “I will cut you down if you prefer.”
“This is not the way, Your Highness,” he said. “You are right about everything in your history, and what you have earned, but still the island must know you, before giving its people and roots and breath over to your care. You must give it your blood; you must drink from its roots. You must face the stars above. It is not that you are less if you don’t, but that the wind, the water, the island will not—”
“Choose, priest,” Gaela said. “The island might wait, but I won’t.”
He slowly, painfully dropped to his knees. Frustration made his jaw hard and his wrinkled lips thin as he placed the bowl of oil and fire at her feet. “My queen.”
Because she wanted to, she kicked out, catching the discarded sacred bowl with her boot. The oil splattered, and fire destroyed the rest of the hemlock.
“Queen is my sister’s calling. Now, I am king.”
* * *
AS THE SUN rose, Gaela sat in the throne of Innis Lear, there in the great hall of Dondubhan. Regan held herself carefully beside the throne, resting in a narrow, tall-backed chair nearly as regal. Both women were dressed and decorated voluptuously, in the midnight blue of the line of Lear. White clay dotted their brows and red plumped their lips. Star tabards fell across both laps. Gaela wore a heavy silver coronet and held a sword across her thighs. Regan cupped a silver bowl of water from the Tarinnish, a thin diadem of intricate leaves upon her brow.
Dawn slid gray-pink light through tall windows as men and women of Dondubhan and Astore offered vows and gifts to the new monarchs. Unease and hope mingled in a tense, airy soup, for most in the hall did not approve of the timing, yet they wanted nothing so much as for Innis Lear to prosper once again. And here, now, arrived a chance for restoration under their new queens.
Ban the Fox had knelt first, in the winter blue of the Errigal earls, and sworn his loyalty to Gaela, then Regan. They had named him before everyone, not only as earl but as the first root wizard of Innis Lear’s new age.
That had further spread out gossip and hope, like threads of lightning.
Retainers and messengers were sent to the corners of the island, beckoning for the lords to come to their queens on the Longest Night, for the heads of towns and castle stewards to come. There to witness all three daughters of Innis Lear together: the rulers crowned and their priestly sister set to her place in the star towers.
Gaela studied the face of every man, woman, and child who knelt before them, composing to herself the letter she would write to Elia. The defenses she would mount against Aremoria immediately, the summons and plans for sea vessels, the enlisting of unlanded men and women, and the tithing of the landed. The urgent business of the western coastal road, adjustments for depleted grain to the south. Her father’s body would need to be brought to the Star Field. The star towers would be shuttered if they did not make prophecies to suit her needs, despite whatever choice Elia would come to make about her own future. All the wells might be opened if local folk so desired, but Gaela would first send a mission into the heart of the White Forest, perhaps led by the Fox himself. They would need to find the ruins of the ancient star cathedral where the navel of the island drove deepest, that inspiration of the old faith and the way of kings long dead. And that—that well Gaela would fill to the brim with sand and salt.
The only power on Innis Lear would be her own.
Hours ago, in the darkest moment of the night, just before they left that poisoned grove, Ban had spoken, holding Gaela’s sister carefully. His words were a warning, and a challenge:
“Elia would swallow the hemlock, and the rootwaters would save her.”
Regan had closed her eyes, lost to her selfish pain, but Gaela had smiled. “She will not, and they cannot. For I will stop her first.”
To Elia of Lear, and any who would be her allies:
We crown ourselves here at Dondubhan, where the kings of Lear have been crowned for seven generations. The island is ours: I who am Gaela King, and I who am Regan Queen, for the king who was our father named us his true heirs, and as we have made the necessary rituals of our people, so shall we rule.
If you would meet us on this island, be it as subject to her king. We shall appear on the plains of Errigal on the Fourday of this month’s dark week. There you shall submit to our rule. If you choose otherwise, death or exile will be the only way forward. Copies of this letter fly to every corner of Innis Lear, so that all understand our first decree, even so that the very wind and roots understand.
Your sisters and rulers,
Gaela King of Lear
Regan Connley of Lear
